www.insightssuccess.com May 2018
THE
30 MOST VALUABLE TECH
TITANS 2018
Editor’s Pick Fog Computing On a Surge
Editor’s Choice The Universality of IoT Technology
Sri Manchala
CEO & President
TRIANZ
Creating Unique and Powerful Statements of Value
Editor’s Note
Redefining the Future of Technology Distribution
T
he traditional technology-driven organizations appear to tread on one path whereas the new participants take their shot and make their way into the market by using novel ideas, technologies and approaches. These participants maintain rapid growth by competing with the existing players using their innovative business models. Eventually, the winner becomes the leader of a corresponding industry and is proclaimed as a Tech Titan. In the early 2018, the technology stocks continued to outpace the broader equity markets. According to the independent researchers, currently the combined global tech titans like Apple, Amazon, Alphabet, Facebook and Microsoft have a market capitalization value of around $3.7 trillion and a net cash balance of just over $368bn. Nowadays, these Tech Titans are leading their industries and embracing the emerging technologies and helping to redefine the future of technology distribution. They are bringing the best-of-class global brand names to suit the changing market trends. In order to achieve their business success, they are focusing on providing endpoint security and managed security solutions to fulfill the needs of corporate, enterprise and home users. Additionally, these Titans are creating next generation firewall, advanced threat protection solutions (APT) and data management through cloud, analytics and with transformative digital technology. Some of these titans essentially possess the kill switches over vast parts of the computing landscape.
Since technology is ceaselessly taking share in our daily lives, these tech titans are aggressively competing against one another in the race of building infrastructures to become the best players in the contemporary digital era. To elucidate some of these Tech Titans who are the best players in their own sectors, Insights Success has curated a list of “The 30 Most Valuable Tech Titans 2018”, who are witnessing a growing momentum by providing advanced technology solutions, R&D, consulting and advisory services for clients spanning from small business, enterprises and government globally. Featuring as our Cover Story is, Trianz which is simply composed at the heart of innovation. The company chooses to merge its strategic business consulting model with transformative digital technology. It also helps clients to stay both relevant and competitive, in the global marketplace. Through its exponential growth, Trianz continues to maintain a one-firm culture, adhering to a common set of professional principles, client service standards, and global values. Trianz will also continue to drive enterprises into the digital transformation. Additionally, the company deliberates the decision to position itself as both a business and digital technology execution partner. Under the leadership of Sri Manchala, the President and CEO of Trianz, the company continues to be ahead of its time as one of Silicon Valley’s foremost proponents of digital transformation services. Trianz is also aimed at fomenting leadership and developing forwardlooking perspective, vision and result-oriented strategies. Asserting upon the company’s core business consulting practice, used to achieve success and leading the company to greater heights, Manchala breaks it down saying, “Our Motto statement reflects our commitment to helping businesses and technology leaders drive transformations through simple, yet effective techniques.” Also, make sure to flip through the pages of the articles written by our in-house editorial team and CXO standpoints from some of the leading industry experts to have a brief knowledge of the sector. Let’s start reading!
Bhavithiran Murugan
Contents
Cover Story
10
Trianz:
Creating Unique and Powerful Statements of Value
Interview with Insights Success
Cloudticity: Making Earth a Healthier Place to Live in
22
Tech Talk: Are we at the end of our ‘Search and Find’ Habit?
24
Leader’s Desk: 52
Being Confident about your Future when your Organization is Designed for Control
Insider’s Insight: Using Big Data and AI to Communicate When Seconds Count
74
Expert’s Viewpoint: 86
Entrepreneurs, Brace yourselves for the Future!
Articles 32
44
60
Editor’s Choice
Editor’s Pick
Industry Concern
The Universality of IoT Technology
Fog Computing On a Surge
IoT Technologies Contributing to the Renewable Energy
Blue Eagle Consulting:
FACTON:
Bringing Consultants and Businesses Together
Efficiency and Profit through Groundbreaking Cost Management Software
30
38
28
36
Approyo:
Click Prompt:
Customer-Centric SAP Cloud Solutions
Providing Actionable Information in Real-Time
Liqid Inc.:
Patriot Software:
Breaking the MotherboardChassis Paradigm
Helping Small Business Owners in a Simple and Affordable Manner
48
56
42
50
Kanteron Systems:
Möbius Partners:
Transforming Patient Care for the Better
Empowering IT Solutions
Secured2 Corporation:
REGO Techno Solutions:
Fortifying Global Organizational Data
Leveraging Technology to Deliver Excellence
64
70
58
66
Prisma Labs:
Seceon:
Images Meet Cutting-Edge Deep Learning Technology
A Strong Open Threat Management Platform for Cyber Security
Systweak Software:
UVision:
An Iconic Utility and Gaming App Developer
DeďŹ ning Next Generation Technology
78
84
72
80
SynGlyphXÂŽ
TheMarketsTrust:
Transforming Data to Knowledge, Faster
Building Trust through Next-generation Products, Expert Consulting, and Solutions Integration
Editor-in-Chief Managing Editor Executive Editor Assistant Editors Contributing Editors Visualiser Art & Design Director Associate Designer Co-designer
Pooja M. Bansal Anish Miller Bhavithiran Murugan Jenny Fernandes Kaustav Roy Bhushan Kadam Abhishaj Sajeev David King Amol Kamble Nagesh Tembhekar Rahul Kavanekar
Art & Picture Editors Paul Belin Jayant Khanna Senior Sales Manager Passi D. Business Development Manager Peter Collins Marketing Manager John Matthew Business Development Executives Steve, Joe, Alan, Nilesh Sales Executives David, Kevin, Mark, Prasad Technical Head Jacob Smile Technical Specialists Amar, Pratiksha Digital Marketing Manager Marry D’Souza Online Marketing Strategists Alina Sege, Shubham, Vaibhav K SME-SMO Executives Prashant Chevale, Uma Dhenge, Gemson, Irfan Research Analyst Chidiebere Moses Circulation Managers Robert, Tanaji Database Management Stella Andrew Technology Consultant David Stokes sales@insightssuccess.com
May, 2018 Corporate Ofces: Insights Success Media Tech LLC 555 Metro Place North, Suite 100, Dublin, OH 43017, United States Phone - (614)-602-1754 Email: info@insightssuccess.com For Subscription: www.insightssuccess.com
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Sri Manchala
CEO & President
Cover Story THE
30
MOST VALUABLE
TECH TITANS 2018
TRIANZ Creating Unique and
Powerful Statements of Value
We uncover the business value of data with integrated analytics.
T
By centering its core business consulting practice to leverage advancements in data science, analytics, and cloud technology, Trianz’s portfolio today focuses on achieving business goals through Cloud, Analytics, Digitalization, Infrastructure, and Security. The company continues to be ahead of its time as one of Silicon Valley’s foremost proponents of digital transformation services aimed at fomenting leadership and developing forward-looking perspective, vision and result-oriented strategies. An Astute Leader Leading the company to ever greater heights of success is Trianz’s Founder and President/CEO, Sri Manchala, who embodies the motto of the company: Digital Evolution Simplified. Manchala breaks it down saying, “That statement reflects our commitment to helping businesses and technology leaders drive transformations through simple, yet effective techniques.” Manchala started Trianz in a small office, and now oversees a global, 1,500-person team of professionals. The company already boasts a track record of over 2,500 successful client partnerships and engagements. Through this exponential growth, Trianz continues to maintain a one-firm culture, adhering to a common set of professional principles, client service standards, and global values.
“
Our business theme, 'Digital Evolution Simplied’, reects our commitment to helping businesses and technology leaders drive transformations through simple, yet effective techniques.
“
rianz was established in the heart of innovation, Silicon Valley, in 2001. Its leaders demonstrated impressive forethought when they chose to merge their strategic business consulting model with transformative digital technology, thereby helping clients stay both relevant and competitive in the global marketplace.
Strategic Approaches that Echo Success Enabling clients to coordinate evolutionary strategies for rapid transformation is a two-sided coin, specifically when developing an effective strategy and achieving excellence in execution. Manchala credits this company-wide strategy and execution paradigm in part to his service in the elite National Defense Academy (NDA) of India and his role as an officer in the Indian Army. Assimilating this philosophy into an effective approach for client engagement, Trianz first works with client leaders to understand what they are trying to achieve from a business perspective before delving into the specific technologies to help their business accomplish its goals. Trianz’s “business-first” strategy serves to disrupt the status quo and ensure commitments from the client's leadership teams and partners who understand the objectives that are at stake. This strategy keeps the focus of enterprise evolution on business priorities. These include smarter decision making support with insights in real time, better alignment of financial goals with strategic decisions, more seamless customer experiences, customer tracking and digital ad targeting, more successful product launches, and amplified digital presence. Delivering Superior Value It’s often the rule rather than the exception when an enterprise’s technology infrastructure is simply not equipped to manage these new business demands. Flipping the coin from strategy to the execution of digital transformation, Trianz provides game-changing expertise in following through on its
Cover Story ‘Digital Evolution Simplified’ promise. This allows it to assess, recommend, and execute the technology solutions that offer the most direct and most profitable line to success. Trianz’s goal is to deliver the most optimized configuration considering costs and business size, with customized solutions that both fit specific, current needs and are a function of continued evolution. The firm serves market leaders and emerging clients across the technology, finance, insurance, media, manufacturing, retail, healthcare, life science, logistics and public sector industries. Within these domains, Trianz brings a holistic understanding of issues and opportunities, employing highly-proficient teams that are powered by innovative, futuristic methodologies. Its engagements are delivered in a seamless model combining business expectations and technology experience for superior value. For example, the fundamental Sales unit is often the source of the most frustration for enterprises while also offering the highest potential for rapid business growth through digital transformation. The sales landscape has never been so complex, particularly within today’s e-commerce-driven marketplace. While consumers are no longer bound to traditional linear sales cycle, it is still crucial to maintain consistency of message, branding, and customer service in all sales and marketing channels to grow and retain customers. Instant access to information, guidance from online communities and more options than ever before mean that buyers are more likely to try new products, test options for agile upstarts, and change direction during the sales journey.
For sales executives trying to make sense of these complex, multi-faceted, and multi-channel cycles, advanced digital systems and coordinated support staff are key. Trianz helps sales and marketing leaders define sales enablement, productivity strategies, and organizational structures to better monitor sales cycles, performance, forecasts, and adjustments. These focus areas advance new client perspectives and objectives while providing automated processes and technology integration roadmaps that drive control and visibility in sales operations. Leveraging Digital Evolution The significant impact that the digital evolution has already had on business processes cannot be overstated. Trianz anticipates that disruptions and increased competition will continue to be pressing concerns and drive enterprises to transform their thinking. Arguably, no factor has been more disruptive than the advent of e-commerce, which is almost entirely data-driven and where human interaction is minimal, if it occurs at all.
Trianz’s deliberate decision to position itself as both a business and digital technology execution partner has guided Fortune 1000 clients and other enterprises heavily dependent on ecommerce to better understand their customers; personalize customer experiences; launch new products or services; and facilitate a modern workplace that fosters an innovative culture. Trianz’s leadership believes in the value of partnerships. This extends to staff associates, clients, and numerous leading tech innovators.
Top-tier partnerships with industryleading technology providers like IBM, Amazon and Microsoft continue to play an important role in Trianz’s success. These collaborations have helped it gain in-depth knowledge and expertise in partner solutions. In combination with Trianz’s core competencies, they have enabled the firm to provide integrated turnkey solutions to clients around the globe.
“
Trianz helps actualize your digital transformation through a wide spectrum of services.
Trianz has recently augmented its analytics capabilities by engaging over 40 professionals comprising data analysts, data scientists, and several project executives to lead its in-house data analytics practice. Satisfying Customers and Planning the Future Like its clients, Trianz recognizes the importance of client satisfaction. Therefore, Trianz engages an independent research firm to conduct an annual client survey to gain an accurate picture of its own performance. Trianz’s client satisfaction scores in 2017 were: Ÿ
Business impact: Over 70% of clients rated its focus and business impact delivery as being superior to other firms with which they engage.
Ÿ
Predictability of execution: Over 78% of clients rated Trianz their #1 partner for predictability of execution as measured by timely delivery and minimal surprises.
Ÿ
Commitment to client success: 89% of clients said Trianz brings a level
of commitment to their success, openness and transparency that is superior to other firms. Ÿ
Relationship experience: Over 90% of clients engaged Trianz for repeat business, and over 80% of them referred Trianz to other clients.
This is high praise indeed. Trianz appreciates the regard and trust clients continue to place in the firm. In addition to building its in-house data analytics enterprise, Trianz’s future plans include strategically expanding its global presence to serve clients in emerging markets. The company currently has offices in Silicon Valley, Chicago, Boston, Washington DC Metro, Jersey City, Raleigh, Seattle, Austin, Denver, Dubai, Bangalore, Hyderabad and Chennai.
“
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CORPORATE OFFICE Insights Success Media Tech LLC 555 Metro Place North, Suite 100, Dublin, OH 43017, United States Phone - (614)-602-1754,(302)-319-9947 Email: info@insightssuccess.com For Subscription : www.insightssuccess.com
Company Name
Management
Brief
Adaptive adaptive.com
Jeff Goins CEO
Adaptive is a global company and a market leader with a long history of helping complex organizations adapt to and support the rapidly changing business and IT environments.
Approyo approyo.com
Christopher Carter CEO
Approyo provides full SAP service technology with extensive capabilities in consulting, solutions architecture, hosting and managed services.
Appvance appvance.com
Kevin Surace CEO
Appvance.ai is the leader in AI-driven test generation, which is revolutionizing how software testing is performed.
Blue Eagle Consulting blueeagle-consulting.com
Mark Griffin Founder & President
Blue Eagle Consulting (BEC) excels - in building bridges between organizations and knowledge experts in delivering success to Healthcare Clients on a variety of IT projects; providing seniorlevel consulting professionals with heavy operational and software expertise.
Chromaway chromaway.com
Henrik Hjelte CEO & Co-founder
ChromaWay is a blockchain technology company which is developing and refining their industry-defining blockchain technology platform.
Click Prompt clickprompt.com
Junior Belardo Founder
Click Prompt is an active behavioral solution provider with real-time customer insights that enables a business to better respond to business.
Cloudticity cloudticity.com
Gerry Miller Founder
A next-gen managed services provider for the healthcare industry, Cloudticity helps design, build, migrate, and manage HIPAAcompliant cloud solutions.
Cloudwords cloudwords.com
Michael Meinhardt Founder & CEO
Cloudwords speeds time to market for campaigns and content on a global scale.
CoreDial coredial.com
Alan Rihm CEO
CoreDial cloud software and services enable companies to quickly and cost effectively sell, deliver, manage, and invoice for high quality, private labeled cloud communication products and services including hosted PBX, VoIP and SIP trunking services.
Danlaw danlawinc.com
Raju Dandu CEO
Danlaw is a global leader in connected car and automotive electronics.
Company Name
Management
Brief
Databricks databricks.com
Ali Ghodsi CEO & Co-founder
Databricks provides a Unified Analytics Platform powered by Apache Spark for data science teams to collaborate with data engineering and lines of business to build data products.
Extreme Networks extremenetworks.com
Ed Meyercord Chairman,President & CEO
Extreme Networks, Inc. (EXTR) delivers software-driven networking solutions that help IT departments everywhere to deliver the ultimate business outcome.
FACTON facton.com
Alexander M. Swoboda CEO & Co-owner
FACTON provides advanced costing solutions that give maximum product cost transparency throughout every phase of the product lifecycle for greater efficiency, productivity and profitability.
HID Global Corporation hidglobal.com
Stefan Widing Executive Vice President & Head
HID powers the trusted identities of the world’s people, places and things. They make it possible for people to transact safely, work productively, learn confidently and travel freely.
iDreamsky Technology idreamsky.com
Jeff Lyndon President & Co-founder
iDreamSky (Nasdaq: DSKY) is the largest independent mobile game publishing platform in China.
Kanteron Systems kanteron.com
Jorge Cortell Founder & CEO
Kanteron Systems is a privately held Healthcare IT – Biomedical Informatics Company that transforms patient care through the combination of imaging and genomics.
Liqid liqid.com
Sumit Puri CEO & Co-founder
Liqid Composable interconnects disaggregated resource pools of GPU, CPU, storage and networking to a PCI-Express fabric device to build bare metal servers on demand and right-sized for high-value, data-intensive workloads.
Möbius Partners mobiuspartners.com
Jay Uribe President & Co-founder Junab Ali President & Co-founder
Möbius offers strategic services, technical expertise and sales support to enable organizations to maximize the value of their data center investment.
NETSHIELD netshieldcorp.com
Ed Wall President & CEO
NETSHIELD’s portfolio of highly scalable & affordable breach prevention solutions
Patriot Software patriotsoftware.com
Mike Kappel CEO & Founder
Patriot Software provides fast, simple, and affordable accounting and payroll software.
Company Name
Management
Brief
Prisma Labs prisma-ai.com
Artem Semyanov CEO
Prisma Labs is a mobile technology company specializing in deep learning-related products.
REGO Techno Solutions regotechnosoltions.com
Sagar V. Pawashe Director & CTO
Rego Techno Solutions provides a wide range of creative and technical web solutions, including web design, web development, website hosting, digital marketing, and SEO services.
Seceon seceon.com
Chandra Pandey Founder & CEO
Seceon is focused on empowering organizations of any size to visualize, proactively detect known and unknown threats and provide compliance through continuous monitoring, assessment, policy enforcement and reporting.
Secured² Corporation secured2.com
Daren Klum CEO & Co-founder
Secured² Corporation is a global leader in beyond encryption and quantum resilient security married with cloud applications.
SynGlyphX synglyphx.com
Mark E. Sloan Co-founder, President & CEO
SynGlyphX® software transforms data into a visual, 3D, immersive and interactive environment that simplifies and expedites analysis of vast amounts of data, in context, so that people can discover insights to change their world.
Systweak Software systweak.com
Shrishail Rana Founder
Systweak Software is a leading exporter of IT products and services. Its utility apps for Android have a wise user-base across the globe.
TheMarketsTrust themarketstrust.com
Evangelos Papadopoulos CEO
TheMarketsTrust is an innovative integrated solutions company, providing next-generation products for the financial industry together with expert consulting and solutions integration.
Trianz trianz.com
Sri Manchala President, CEO & Founder
Trianz is a leader in cloud analytics services, data analytics consulting, digital transformation strategies, and IT security consulting.
UVision uvision.co
Omar Uddin Founder & CEO
UVision is a technology innovation company that delivers smart, scalable and secure solutions, managed services & consulting driving results for businesses building custom data, web, mobile, cloud technology.
Verizon verizonwireless.com
Lowell C. McAdam CEO
Verizon is one of the largest communication technology companies in the world.
®
Omnichannel Agent and Customer Engagement Solutions Simplify and personalize the customer experience, empower agents and achieve business success with one workspace for all channel interactions, application integrations, and CX reporting.
Cloudticity:
Gerry Miller Founder
Making Earth a Healthier Place to Live in
W
ith a vision of helping healthcare organizations design, build, migrate, manage, and optimize HIPAA-compliant solutions on Amazon Web Services (AWS), Cloudticity came into existence back in 2011. In an Interview with Insights Success, the Founder of Cloudticity, Gerry Miller shares the journey of the company and its strategies and approaches that make it stand out from the crowd of competitors. What are the products/services/solutions offered by Cloudticity? Gerry: Cloudticity offers Professional Services and Managed Services to the healthcare industry. Professional Services are focused primarily on migrations to AWS, application optimization to better leverage native AWS services, and DevOps automation. On the other hand, our Managed Services practice is delivered through the ground-breakingly automated Cloudticity Oxygen™ platform, which has three primary pillars:
Ÿ
Traditional managed services delivered mostly through automation, including a 24x7 helpdesk, incident management and escalation, monitoring of everything from operating system telemetry to AWS
22
May 2018
metrics, and automated daily tasks such as patching and backups. Ÿ
Continuous compliance, including thousands of checks running at all times, with each control mapped back to HIPAA CFRs as well as common regulatory frameworks such as HITRUST CSF. Most compliance problems found are auto-remediated by Cloudticity Oxygen.
Ÿ
World-class managed security services via deep integration with the Armor Anywhere Security-as-aService solution.
How has the technological advancements influenced the business world? And what role does your company play in that? Gerry: The key technology differentiator that Cloudticity leverages is Amazon Web Services. The public cloud’s nearly limited storage and processing power, coupled with its predictable and manageable OpEx pricing model, enables an unprecedented ability to tackle world-changing challenges in ways that only a few years ago were out of reach for all but the largest multinational corporations and governments. We have driven the healthcare industry to adopt public cloud as
Interview with Insights Success Ÿ
AWS Authorized Commercial and GovCloud Partner
Ÿ
AWS Service Catalog Service Delivery Partner
Ÿ
AWS EC2 Systems Manager Service Delivery Partner
About the Leader Cloudticity’s Founder, Gerry Miller, is a serial entrepreneur and healthcare fanatic who lives, breathes, and dreams technology. Since launching Cloudticity in 2011, Gerry has led 8 consecutive years of growth, customer success, and profitability towards the company. Gerry’s technology career spans over 30 years, and includes both start-ups as well as nearly a decade at Microsoft serving as the US Central Region’s Chief Technology Officer.
the most secure place to manage HIPAA-regulated electronic protected health information. Furthermore, because AWS is fully automatable, Cloudticity has reimagined data centers as completely software defined, driving a new level of agility that allows the company’s clients to innovate at an unprecedented rate. What makes Cloudticity different from its competitors? Gerry: In many ways, Cloudticity has invented automated managed services for healthcare. We are the first to focus exclusively on this mission in the public cloud. Some things that make Cloudticity unique amongst its competitors include: Born in the cloud: Unlike our competitors, Cloudticity has no legacy baggage, no outdated data centers to manage, and no old-school processes that inhibit agility. Total focus on healthcare: Cloudticity speaks healthcare, period. That means a passionate focus on security, compliance, availability,
performance, and agility – all in a fully cost-optimized environment. Our HITRUST certification backs this up. Automation: Our singular focus on delivering service through automation has allowed the company to grow almost 70X since its inception, while delivering consistently, securely, and reliably to its clients. Relationship with AWS: Cloudticity also brings-in world-class technical expertise, with a host of AWS credentials including: Ÿ
AWS Advanced Partner
Ÿ
AWS Audited Managed Services Provider – there are only 104 of these in the world, and we are the only to ever pass the audit with 100% - twice!
Ÿ
AWS Healthcare Competency
Ÿ
AWS DevOps Competency
Ÿ
AWS Public Sector Partner
Kindly explain how Cloudticity tackled initial struggles? Gerry: During Cloudticity’s inception, general industry perception was that public cloud was insecure – a great place for development and testing, but certainly not for production workloads. Imagine how the healthcare industry felt! Initial struggles, therefore, centered around convincing compliance and legal departments that protected health information was not only safe – but actually safer – on the public cloud. To accomplish this, we designed AWS-based systems that leveraged ground-breaking encryption, key management, and compliancemonitoring solutions. To this day, these forms the heart of the company’s Cloudticity Oxygen managed services platform. What can be expected from Cloudticity in the upcoming years? Gerry: Cloudticity will continue to lead the industry in the automated delivery of managed services, compliance, and security. Expect more DevOps-oriented solutions, more self-service capabilities, more innovation around Big Data, Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, and IoT. We are also planning to invest in healthcare systems outside the United States, so expect global expansion as well.
May 2018
23
Ritesh Srivastava Founder & CEO Epictenet
Ritesh Srivastava founder & CEO
About the Author
24
May 2018
Tech Talk
Are we at the end of our ‘Search & Find Habit? ‘
H
ello Joey, can you turn on the lights please!
Many things we got to see only in Hollywood movies are now becoming reality in our day to day life like talking to a machine and getting things done, who thought we’d be doing what voice-based AI assistants like Amazon Alexa, Google Home and Apple’s Siri allow us to these days! Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Big Data, Cloud technologies with great Computing Power are all helping humanize machines.
for everyone to have access to information at their fingertips at any time. Of course, search engines would not have been possible if we did not have the invention of the internet, the computer and so on. This phenomenon (search engines) has impacted and made life easier for people across all industries and professions by presenting information, all accessible in one place. Subsequently, this led to the rise in importance of page rankings and organizations spend a lot of time and money in SEO(Optimization) and SEM(Marketing) and it’s a very big part of the revenue stream for search engine and social media platform providers.
In the past two decades, search engines like Google have played a very important part in our lives and made it easier
Over time, as more and more organizations brought their presence online, the search started becoming more crowded
Ritesh Srivastava is an Innovator and Industry Strategist, always looking to challenge what many consider is the norm. He has a knack of foreseeing tech trends with a passion for driving change. He is also the Founder and CEO of Epictenet, an Australian Fintech, and the driving force behind Joey – their Chatbot offering, spearheading change in the Industry.
May 2018
25
and saturated in a way affecting our ability to find the right information quickly because let’s face it – there are only so many results the first page of a search engine can fit! Combine that with the ever-reducing attention span of people these days (especially the younger generation) and we have a concoction that combines to limit the effectiveness on the industry changing ‘search and find’ way of sourcing information. Technology is also being used to understand consumer behaviour and predict their needs to present more optimised, personalised search results, advertisement and options pro-actively. These trends raise questions about how private our online activities are but let’s face it, is anything on the internet private these days? Privacy is soon becoming a myth in this world with a ferocious appetite for information on behaviour which makes me wonder – is there a better way to go about this? Is our compromise for privacy and overcrowding of search engines pointing us in the direction of something that is more efficient? Are we at the end of our ‘Search and Find’ habit? For a majority of the population, mobile phones (smartphones) are an all-pervasive, must-have that have transcended traditional hurdles to technology like age, cost, relevance to name a few. The past two decades have seen a mobility tech revolution of sorts, where we have been successful in harnessing the power of the personal computer and packaging it in devices that would offer a lot more convenience than a laptop would. The mobile phone device has evolved from a humble calling and texting device to essentially being a computer and camera in your pocket and they keep getting smarter every year. Other devices like laptops, tablets and wearables have also matured over that period but the crucial advantage smartphones have is of them being small to carry but still are extremely potent when it comes to presenting power, usefulness and mobility, the perfect package, Yet. Our world is now centred around smartphones to the point that most of us feel incomplete without having them around. Smartphones have reached the technological maturity and IoT (Internet of things) have become a reality - these have led to an era where most of our interactions and transactions start (and in many cases they get completed) over the mobile phone. They are everywhere, and they are here to stay.
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May 2018
As Google also ranks higher the webpages optimized for mobile and Customer experience over mobile devices is key to the success of any product and services offered and hence we see organizations revamping their websites and digital platforms making it mobile friendly, spending millions of dollars on UI(Design) and UX(Experience). But despite making the web pages responsive and providing a better experience, smartphones have issues of having a small real estate (screen size) and low attention span of the user as most of the time usage on the mobile is on the go. Flicking from one webpage to another and you have already lost the customer. To overcome some of these challenges on smartphones, we got Siri on iPhones and subsequently Google Assistant. Although still in an infancy stage virtual assistants/chatbots are gradually becoming part of our life as more and more use cases are being created across different industries. The advancement in Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning technologies are making it possible to provide more personalized services to customers and it is playing a significant role in the adoption of these technologies by organizations as well as customers. The whole idea of having one channel for all information and interactions opens a whole new world of possibilities with implications to every sphere of customer and user engagement. Virtual assistants are fast becoming a ‘gateway to all digital interactions’ and they are not only going to change the existing digital channels and platforms but also physical devices like remote controls and other physical buttons on various appliances, instruments, devices and vehicles. The Virtual assistants are going to change our ‘Search and Find’ habit to ‘Ask and Select’ and will truly provide personalized services while getting better with every interaction. We will see more and more services getting converged in the virtual assistants and in some way they may be our answer to privacy protections. Disclaimer: Any names of organisations and products mentioned in the article are for reference purposes only. No ill repute intended in any way.
Approyo: Customer-Centric SAP Cloud Solutions
A
“
We want to be the first to offer the latest SAP solution hosted in the cloud to our customers — Christopher Carter CEO
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May 2018
s technology advances, the SAP ecosystem is rapidly following suit. The industry is witnessing a growing momentum towards cloud adoption, the consumerization of IT, an ever-increasing demand for agility, and the mobile revolution. The convergence of these crucial factors on a pivotal crossroad has led to the emergence of efficient, smart, and cost-effective SAP cloud solutions. Solutions providers customize SAP solutions to each business, making sure that the system reacts according to the constraints of the requested use case. They are focused on adopting next-gen intelligent ERP and inmemory data platforms like SAP HANA and S/4HANA. The next major leap is SAP Leonardo, which is the industry’s digital innovation system solution. One company with years of experience in providing the right SAP solutions to a diverse field of customers is Approyo. Approyo is helping small-scale as well as large-scale companies implement innovative SAP solutions. This allows the emerging enterprises with benefits right away in their initial developing phase associated with the SAP hosted solutions.
The company extends its SAP service capabilities with consulting, solutions architecture, hosting, and managed services to develop the right solutions for its customers. Growing Leadership Christopher Carter is the CEO at Approyo and has more than two decades of experience in the big data and SAP industry. He works with businesses around the globe and strives hard to assist them in their journey to adopt big data through Hadoop (Cloudera and Hortonworks) and SAP HANA. Under his leadership, the Approyo team monitors and supports ober 300 SAP landscapes. Christopher has been recognized by the American SAP Users Group, SAP, Hadoop World, Cloud Expo, and other prominent industry leaders for his contributions to the arena. From Inspiration to Foundation The inception of SAP HANA sparked within Christopher the idea of establishing Approyo. HANA—a big data platform inspired the company to manipulate and design available data specific to their business needs and help them gain better insights into their company’s functioning. The company developed custommade solutions, with Ignite being one of its flagship products. This product captures SAP HANA’s various components in one neat and easy package, giving freedom to every
client to use it according to their specific purposes. This helped Approyo to form a network of easy, flexible, and costeffective on-boarding SAP solutions for new and existing customers. Real-time SAP Services Approyo works with a vision to create innovative SAP solutions which are the first of their kind in the cloud. It focuses on providing realtime SAP solutions, regardless of industry or location. These services are based on SAP Sandbox, SAP HANA, SAP S/4HANA, SAP Leonardo, SAP Hybris, SAP Consultation and others. As it oversees over 300 SAP cloud environments around the globe, the company’s ideology is to support each business from production landscapes to live SAP environments. Christopher states, “Our mission is to enable customers and partners to unlock the full potential of SAP cloud technologies to achieve their business goals”. Distinguishing Itself
SAP partners that can migrate companies to the cloud, support those close infrastructures and provide ongoing managed services for the cloud. Approyo believes that clear, uninterrupted communication with its clients, supplemented by strong support, are the keys to its success. A Bright Future Approyo is paving the most creative way possible to fuel its growth and stay in-front of changing technology by providing the most effective SAP technology solutions. It is planning to quench every single customer need by offering solutions in the quickest and most effective way. Recently, the company launched an SAP S/4HANA sandbox, a platform that helps organizations maximize the benefits of the. This is revolutionizing the SAP world because it offers a production-grade sandbox with a secured network at a cost lower than any other competitor - only US$3,000 per month. This will be a game changer for SAP customers and will encourage them to try SAP S/4HANA 1709 and test for migration to S/4HANA.
Approyo is proving itself a formidable competitor by demonstrating how it has helped clients grow through its SAP cloud solutions. The company is widely regarded as the most customer-centric SAP HANA provider in the marketplace. It is known for being one of the only
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Blue Eagle Consulting: Bringing Consultants and Businesses Together
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t is said that no man is an island, and that philosophy holds just as true for organizations, regardless of size. A company may be very accomplished and capable at what it does, but the need for external expertise is bound to arise somewhere along its journey. It is here that Blue Eagle Consulting (BEC) excels - in building bridges between organizations and knowledge experts. Currently focused exclusively on the healthcare sector, BEC is the trusted link between large service providers who invest in multimillion dollar software and individuals who help them realize the full potential of those investments. A Commitment to Consistency The consultation service that Blue Eagle Consulting provides is based on mutual respect between itself, its clients, and its consultants. The company’s management takes great care to emphasize how committed they are to providing the right solution to every client, irrespective of how tight a deadline they may be given. “Our clients need really skilled people. That’s what they’re looking
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for and that’s what they expect,” says Mark Griffin, Founder and President of Blue Eagle Consulting, Proven Multidimensional Leadership Mark exemplifies that unwavering commitment to service excellence. Over a career spanning almost 25 years working for vendors selling solutions to hospitals and large physician groups, he built a solid reputation for being the go-to executive when a job had to be done right. His business acumen, trained expertise, and penchant for recognizing opportunities and market trends saw him rise quickly to the echelon of CEO. He says that it is ironic, then, that the same stellar success that earned him plaudits in his career stifled the budding entrepreneur inside. “I always wanted to run my own company but that success in the corporate world is your biggest deterrent to doing something on your own. You are reluctant to walk away from that success and perceived safety net when you work for someone,” he explains.
Having worked on the other side of the business for 25 years, Mark understands all of the equation equally. He laughs when he recalls the disdain with which he regarded consultants in his years as an executive, “I just didn’t want to get into all the stuff that they were doing!” An Unexpected Start, and Unforeseen Success Blue Eagle Consulting is perhaps the first company whose founder downplays its teething struggles to the extent that Mark does. When we asked him to elaborate on the struggles that he faced in gaining traction in the field, he told us that he did not really recall any! “My first client was a health plan
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Our biggest win is creating an ideal pairing between a consultant’s skill set and a client’s business need. – Mark Griffin Founder & President
provider I knew from the hospital world which had just bought and created a health plan in 2004. They needed an expert to help implement a piece of software they had recently acquired,” he says, “About two weeks later, I not only had a project lead but four additional resources lined up for the account and we implemented that software for them. I found myself in business for myself.” Proven Value Mark understands the value that his clients expect when they come to him. Some clients spend as much as a hundred million dollars on a piece of software. Ensuring that it performs as expected and delivers as promised is crucial not only for the company and its investors, but also to the individual executives who have to answer if such a large investment
fails. “It’s gratifying that BEC is now well known by Health Plans and Providers as the people to call when you absolutely have to have top tier contract resources in a JIT model. Clients know we will deliver BEC’s commitment to only working with the best consultants and presenting them only to Clients with budget and appropriate need for their skills is why the leading software experts who are otherwise not available for standalone projects prefer to work through Blue Eagle. They know that the company is vested as staunchly in them as it is in its own reputation.”
success that Blue Eagle enjoys is a direct result of the quality of the consultants that they engage.
Realizing Dreams Despite the company’s unprecedented track record of a 97% success rate, Mark is not one to rest on his laurels. He knows that the
Considering the spectacular success that he has led it to already, that goal seems to be within grasp in the nottoo-distant future.
Mark is the epitome of the business leader who has largely achieved the first stage of the goals he had envisioned when setting up his company. When asked about his future plans for Blue Eagle Consulting, he says that he would like for it to continue to grow, while never losing its focus and obsession with being at the ‘top of the pyramid, continuing to specialize in providing the most experienced and skilled consultants in the country’.
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The Universality of IoT Technology T
he gratifying tool for companies to lead ahead IoT Technology. The Internet of things (IoT) is a revolutionary change for many sectors like manufacturing, agriculture, retail, electronic, energy and healthcare which are progressing towards the IoT phenomenon to connect digitally. It has placed an opportunity to build unusual results which increases a company’s compatibility. Enterprises seeking development are focusing on the use of real-time data management and IoT analysis. Many of the companies are adopting this technology to heighten their power of consumption. Companies are mainly concentrating on IoT application from “sensing” instead of “doing” to grow its competitive advantages. This element empowers organizations by allowing them to take the IoT advantage and adopt a more ‘innovative connected approach’. Infrastructure Management – Optimization of Technology New applications are now enhancing their level of consumption. Likewise, manufacturing sector is also
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Editor’s Choice getting engrossed and achieving excellence through IoT Techniques. Applications are liable for monitoring and controlling operations for urban and rural manufactures like bridges, farms, and railway tracks. It is the key features of the applications were IoT infrastructure is also used for monitoring the construction safety and risk management system and operations. This major feature represents the mechanism of IoT application which works under infrastructure management. Benefits of IoT Technology are cost reducing, time reducing, better in quality, and increase productivity. It helps to make fast decisions and save money with real-time analysis. IoT devices help to give prominent results by monitoring and controlling operations used in all infrastructure related area. Manufacturing Techniques are Growing with IoT Technology In the manufacturing sector, networking and controlling have been used with IoT devices. It provides information about data and operation stability. Network status and the information is collected in the system by tracking IoT device. Manufacturing control process deliver information about industry application and smart manufacturing details receiving form IoT device. IoT intelligent system enables sharing information about product demands, service management, supply chain networks, sensors and control systems together. Small industries can also be integrated with IoT technology that enables real-time optimization, measurements, production compatibility and safety management. However, intelligent systems are determined as the significant technique that implies user experience and system security which ultimately saves costs.
which land is fertile or which one is dry and predict future fields. IoT Technology Helps to Optimize Energy Consumption Integrated Sensing and Control system helps to optimize energy consumption. IoT devices are integrated with energy consumption systems in order to maintain balance between power generation and energy usage. IoT devices offer the opportunity to remotely gather information. It enables advance functions like remote controlling and changing light conditions. IoT Technology work for home-based energy system which provide power related information, energy consumption and energy usage at homes. IoT devices set goals to improve efficiency, reliability and sustainability of the energy system. Monitoring Environment through IoT Technology Environment monitoring application has been involved with sensors to assist information about environment changes by identifying water quantity, atmosphere, air pressure etc. It also has focus on monitoring movements of wildlife and their habitats. Devices connected to the internet also provide statistics about earthquake or tsunami - early warning systems, and also used as an emergency system. IoT device application is used to collect geographic information and majorly instructive information. This device also uses standardized approach to bring wireless sensing technique and gather finest information. IoT Technology Helps to Sustain Building and Home Automation
IoT Technology brings Innovative Farming Methods The Agriculture sector is one of the industry to implement IoT technology for stability and better performance. IoT technology has become a significant method of farming. It also offers durability and functionality to the whole process. The combination of wireless sensors with agricultural apps and cloud platforms benefits in gathering definite information relating to environmental conditions like, rainfall, temperature, humidity, wind speed etc. Farmers are getting competent results out of it, and are able to find real-time information easily. Linked with farmland, it improves and automates farming techniques like weather information, taking decision on quality and quantity, and minimizes risk and waste. With IoT Tech farmers can find out detailed information of farm and similarly know
With certainty, IoT devices are used to monitor and control the mechanical, electrical and electronic systems. IoT devices are used in various types of home automation and building automation systems. Control and sensory applications offer unified information. The integration of the internet with building creates an energy management system which will allow prominent energy efficiency. There have been many ways for IoT technology to expand compatibility in the digital world, and it will be implemented in each sector to work as an important tool, to enhance its affinity. After all, the IoT network makes technology more unified and satisfying, with its tools and applications and IoT will be a step ahead towards numerous opportunities.
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Click Prompt: T
he customer is king is one of the most commonly heard phrases in marketing, and one with which few smart businesses will disagree. It is also acknowledged that the level of success enjoyed by any organization depends largely on the customer experience it creates for its clientele. Global businesses today are more concerned than ever about the quality of service they provide. Society has largely accepted that there is nothing that cannot be done with the help of technology. In turn, marketers have to constantly adapt to stay connected with customers while social media has opened up an entirely new dimension for them to reach their audience. Click Prompt Technology is not your regular technology company - it is the marketing revolution that every company needs. Click Prompt’s strength is its ability to collate and present information from customers, products and campaigns in real-time. Taking the Market by Storm Click Prompt leverages technology to come up with
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We are an opera onal behavior solu on provider with real- me customer insights agents.
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Providing Ac onable Informa on in Real-Time
Junior Belardo Founder innovative ideas that can transform the market for any type of business. Its team of technicians has developed a platform that allows them to understand customer behavior in real-time. It then uses that data to translate customer patterns into actionable insight so its clients can maximize their business potential. Specifically, Click Prompt uses QR Codes to study customer concerns and behavior patterns, and translates the data using predictive analytics and real-time responses to issues.
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Click Prompt focuses primarily on eliminating issues that influence ‘Repeat Business’ with which it succeeds in maintaining a customer base and improving ‘Referral Business’. It also helps clients understand the impact of negative reviews of their business and provides solutions to counter any adverse repercussions that they cause. Click Prompt entered the niche after recognizing how widespread poor customer service was across various industries, and realizing that there was a desire in both business and customers for change. The company was started by Junior Belardo, Founder of Click Prompt. Belardo is a tech enthusiast who sees himself first as a customer who appreciates quality service. He noticed that big data was a crucial element in the development of bigger corporations for its ability to identify hidden or unaddressed shortcomings. He took the initiative to combine big data with real-time analytics to help companies shape their own paths to success. Market Omnipresence The company’s prime product is QR Codes, which can be employed in various forms for numerous purposes. The significance of Click Prompt is that it is giving its whole attention to the ‘Service Industry’. Amazon is one prime example, which stepped-up and transformed the market ownership through its services; Click Prompt too has targeted itself to improve customer satisfaction. Belardo says, “I think
Click Prompt follows the same category because we have a product that can partner with these organizations to better help customer satisfaction and help an organization understand how to dynamically adjust to the competing retail demand.” Click Prompt also believes that the service sector needs to be reformed because ineffectual customer support, reduced customer satisfaction and unmet client needs are causing organizations to lose business. Belardo explains, “This is where Click Prompt steps in. The sole aim of Click Prompt is to improve the customer experience its clients offer.”
Another feature of Click Prompt which sets it apart is its in-depth knowledge of the market. Despite having a tool that assesses the customer base and their concerns, the implementations of this contrivance is easily adaptable. Belardo says, “We strongly believe that apart from owning a product that is well-equipped to meet the demands of modern businesses, this product is developed in such a manner that it can be easily implemented.” Future Forecasts Click Prompt proposes to expand its range of services to include consultation based on the data and analytics received from QR Codes. It also has plans to deliver end-to-end implementation services with the help of APIs (Application Programming Interfaces).
Click Prompt has seen that there has been a shift within the service industry as customer services move towards self-service rather than personalized service. This change has Belardo adds, “As we continue to led to reduced face-to-face expand our reach, we want to interaction between retailers and establish partnerships with different their customers. ventures and investors to help Click Prompt’s versatility and power develop a solid ‘go to market’ strategy.” as a marketing platform are on full display in situations where it acts as a real-time tool to filter information and empower its customers to address the concerns of their own clientele. As a self-service platform, QR Codes allows users to determine what alerts they receive, and which individuals within their companies receive that and other data. The platform is updated regularly and the data which is generated is displayed on a modern dashboard. Alerts can even be sent via email.
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FACTON: Efficiency and Profit through Groundbreaking Cost Management Software
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roduct costing is a vital facet of any business. It lets manufacturers calculate product cost needed to produce and buy inventory so the manufacturer remains profitable over the lifecycle of the product. Effective product costing solutions empower companies to make better decisions, track projects efficiently, and manage dynamic project cost development. FACTON is gaining prominence across the globe for its cutting-edge product costing solutions. Established in 1998, it aims to revolutionize the world through adept product costing solutions. The company has experienced impressive growth and has a global presence with office locations in Potsdam, Dresden and Stuttgart, Germany and Detroit, Michigan USA. FACTON’s Enterprise Product Costing (EPC) software is its leading product. It standardizes costing across the enterprise and delivers maximum product cost transparency at every phase of the product lifecycle. Its ability to accelerate costing, achieve pinpoint accuracy, and increase profit has made it very popular among manufacturers. Fascinating Capabilities Do you need to send a transparent business proposal, evaluate product cost in the early stage of project development or know how to cost-optimize purchased modules and components? Every manufacturing firm needs the answers to these vital questions. FACTON’s EPC software suite assists manufacturers in addressing them quickly, securely, and at
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the lowest cost. It provides specific solutions that offer robust answers to satisfy the requirements of executive management and individual departments within an enterprise. FACTON EPC Cost Management helps manufacturing companies of all sizes perform consistent and reliable costing. The software employs standardized methods that enable enterprises to perform all of their basic costing tasks quickly and securely using one central costing tool. Companies that develop products via complex processes and which require both technical and financial finesse benefit most from this comprehensive EPC solution. Proactive product costing with full transparency over the cost structure of complex products assists manufacturers in making better business decisions. This is the unique selling proposition of the FACTON EPC Software suite which makes it popular, not only in the automotive, aerospace and mechanical engineering sectors but also in the consumer goods, high-tech, and electronics industries. Total Client Satisfaction FACTON has built a robust relationship with clients based on its superior and effective products. The organization’s focal point has always been to provide a leading-edge costing solution for global enterprises. FACTON works in tandem with its clients to integrate solutions with the costing community by hosting user group conferences led by the company’s user advisory board.
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Calculate your product costs with FACTON EPC to enhance your
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profitability, flexibility, and competitiveness.
FACTON’s active participation in the global costing market in the role of board members of industry and trade associations makes it an indispensable force in the industry. The company always strives for client satisfaction. Even in its early years, FACTON did not compromise on quality despite the pressure of increased operating costs. Now, with decades of experience, FACTON has perfected its delivery model and developed a standard approach to project delivery based on industry best practices. “Industrial enterprises need FACTON EPC to make the right decisions in global competition,” says Dr. Bernd Gottschalk, CEO, AutoValue GmbH, Former President of the German Automotive Association and Daimler Board Member. Ford Motor Company, Henniges Automotive, DURA Automotive Systems, Airbus, Mahle Behr, MANN+HUMMEL, Porsche and more are just a few of the eminent clients which have shown their tremendous faith in FACTON’s services and are happy to continue their collaboration with the company. The Trailblazer A graduate from Vienna University in Business and Economics, Alexander M. Swoboda, is the CEO and Coowner of FACTON. Having worked with many international conglomerates, he has gained over 15 years of invaluable corporate experience in the financial and energy
Alexander M. Swoboda CEO and Co-owner sectors. Among his prominent previous employers are Siemens AG and McKinsey & Company. Alexander is known in the industry for his expertise in finance, venture capital, private equity, and product costing. Alexander joined FACTON in October 2009 as CFO, later took over the role of COO and, in 2015, was appointed its Chief Executive Officer. FACTON has gained immensely from his expertise and management skills. He is the key player in the development of its Enterprise Product Costing pyramid, which now allows FACTON to provide specific solutions covering the needs of different users with different use cases in design costing, should costing, and quoting. Future Endeavors FACTON aspires to make its Enterprise Product Costing solution a global gold standard in cost management on par with PLM and ERP. In the near future, the company wants to build a global costing community to facilitate the exchange of best practices and develop standards which allow collaboration between humans and machines for the betterment of the business community.
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Kanteron Systems: Transforming Patient Care for the Better
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fficient communication strategies and strategic development planning can create a thriving culture of positivity and innovation, all of which contribute to higher company profits. Healthcare IT firm Kanteron Systems is a testament to this philosophy. Much of the credit goes to its CEO and Founder, Jorge Cortell. Jorge has overcome challenges through sheer determination, the courage to take strategic risks, and a fantastic team behind him. Kanteron has quickly become a large company with two offices in Spain as well as subsidiaries in the UK, and USA. Inspiration to Innovate Tech Jorge Cortell risked his company, one which was his livelihood, to save the love of his life from breast cancer. Because of his efforts, people can now be treated faster and more effectively, potentially saving the British National Health Service (NHS) millions of pounds a year.
Jorge Cortell CEO & Founder
Cortell used his computer to tackle cancer. He created programs and used the cloud, like Google Cloud Platform, Microsoft Azure and Amazon’s AWS to allow doctors to easily share images of tumors, check patients’ medical history and ascertain which medications worked best, all with just a few clicks of a mouse. This approach solved a major problem endemic in the often cash-strapped medical world – computer systems
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which handle scans such as X-rays and MRIs are used alongside ones handling genomic data, but none of them work with each other.
American College of Radiology in the USA, the NHS in the UK, Seguridad Social in Spain, ISSSTE in Mexico, and EsSalud in Peru.
Kanteron focuses on three main areas, namely medical imaging, digital pathology, and genomics. Cortell realized that there were many inefficiencies - data wasn’t connected, while crucial steps and procedures were overlooked. He wanted to put together the ‘missing pieces’ to solve the puzzle to help his special someone, and millions of other patients like her.
Services Offered by Kanteron Systems Kanteron Systems provides a single platform composed of several modules to process, manage, store, visualize, integrate, analyze and share data that may be in the form of medical imaging, digital pathology, clinical genomics, pharmacogenomics and biosensors.
Firstly, he set out to standardize digital pathology slides so pathologists could view them, no matter what system they used. Next, he turned to genomics. Most medications are prescribed on a trial and error basis – a patient is given a drug; if it doesn’t work, they go back to the doctor and the process is repeated. Kanteron provides a unified genomic profile database that allows doctors to easily and efficiently tailor medications to patients based on their genes. Lastly, Cortell created a program that allows medical professionals to access all of a patient’s medical images, pathology slides, and genomic tests, on one screen. Experts in Healthcare IT Headquartered in Spain, Kanteron Systems is a privately-held healthcare IT – Biomedical Informatics company founded in 2005. It helps healthcare providers manage imaging and genomic data effectively to deliver precision medicine at the point of care. Kanteron Systems’ solution has already been deployed over 500 times in 12 countries, at some of the world’s largest healthcare institutions like the
Consisting of a very robust PACSVNA, work list server, DICOMIZER, visualizer, and RIS, it is the perfect workflow and image management and storage solution for large institutions and healthcare networks. Kanteron’s platform was developed using feedback from customers as well as the guidelines and requirements of experts. It streamlines the collection, inter-correlation, and
We organize clinical imaging and information, and make it accessible and useful to clinicians at the point of care so they can deliver on the promise of Precision Medicine.
consolidation of information from individual databases (in standard languages). All this is done through a homogeneous interface and intuitive workflow which simplifies the learning process. Making a Global Mark Technological advances have transformed almost every aspect of the business world, in almost every corner of the Earth. However, there is not a single comprehensive precision medicine platform like Kanteron Systems’ in the world. Additionally, their solution is open source, which is very important to guarantee interoperability, a key issue in healthcare. Laser focus and unwavering determination, cliché as it sounds, have been a constant in their journey from start-up to scale-up to an international company. Competing in an ultra-conservative, slow-moving industry dominated by large multinational oligopolies presents frequent challenges, from regulatory to brand recognition. Kanteron’s ace is its excellent and, literally, peerless product. It allows the company to addresses big challenges in a very scalable and agile way. Dreaming Big to Achieve Bigger Exciting changes are coming. Kanteron Systems is finalizing several large distribution agreements, and also working very closely with Google Cloud towards a very interesting technology offering. Along with partners like Google Cloud, the company is playing a significant role in the Healthcare Technology space by placing emphasis on interoperability, standards and, most importantly, a pragmatic and integrated solution to precision medicine, which will accelerate its adoption worldwide.
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orld is growing at a fast pace and so is data. Agility and flexibility of big data applications are gradually taking the form of the Internet of Things (IoT). Internet of Things brings more than an explosive escalation of endpoints. It is unconventional in several ways. The surge and escalation of IoT gave rise to a colossal increase in the volume of digitally generated data. The limitations of current cloud computing is a subject of broader discussion. To the answer to these emerging challenges new computing technologies have arrived. Introduction to Fog Computing A simple definition of fog is ‘cloud closer to the ground,’ which gives us an idea of functioning of fog computing. Fog computing is now positioned as a layer to reduce the latency in hybrid cloud scenarios. The terminology refers to a new breed of applications and services, particularly when it comes to data management and analytics. It is a layer in
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the middle of cloud and the hardware. In cloud computing data needs to be accessed to the central mainframe. Fog Computing offers local and faster accessibility to edge devices. There are two planes in a fog computing network. The ‘Data Plane,’ also referred as forwarding plane, and the ‘Control Plane.’ If anything happens to the data packets, it is determined by the data plane. The computing resources can be placed anywhere in the network with the help of data plane. The distribution can be done on the edge of the network. A critique of the network is provided by the control plane, functioning with the routing protocols which run in the architectural control element. IoT data can be undertaken in a data hub or smart device which are closer to the sensor with the help of fog computing.
Editor’s Pick
Fog Computing On a Surge
The data in fog computing can be accessed in between devices locally without any help of the cloud repository. This will help to boost accessibility, and collaboration among devices and data centers. Fog Computing Under IoT Fog computing is an archetype that extends cloud computing and services to the edge of the network. The distinguishing fog characteristics are its proximity to the end users. Fog infrastructure redistributes the data and compute, so that much of the action takes place on the edge devices right on your ďŹ nger tips. The application services are hosted on the network edges. The data from the things where sensors are attached on the object of interest is transported to the services to the edge of network (a fog network). From the fog network the data is transported to the remote services hosted on the internet to store, manage and process data (cloud network). The goal of fog computing is to improve the eďŹƒciency and reduce the amount of data that needs to be transported to the cloud for analysis or processing or storage.
Emergence of Fog Computing The world is marking a colossal rise in terms of digitally generated data from IoT and connected devices. The growth of smartphones and applications is enabling more users to access data, computation power as well as control and manage their end devices in real-time. A littlest data is required by conventional cloud architectures to send to the central cloud through edge fork devices for computation and analysis, which eventually adds latency. Fog computing allows the edge node devices to carry out some local data processing, cache data management, local resource pooling, local device management, dense geographical distribution, load balancing, latency reduction for better quality of service and edge node analytics. It results in enhancing overall user experiences. Functioning of Fog Computing The cloud is becoming congested due to more and more devices connecting to the internet. In fog computing, most of the processing takes place in data hub or on the edge of the network. The implementation of fog computing separates the data obtained from the closest IoT devices on the most biting aspect which is time.
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Fog-empowered edge node devices locally analyzes the most time-critical data. It results in the lowest latency and prevention of major damage before it may even occur. Time-critical data can consist of alarm status, device status, fault warnings and much more. For a persistent or periodically storage less time-critical data is sent to the central mainframe. It can be retrieved as and when required. Less time-critical data includes files, device logs, reports for analysis and much more. How it is Beneficial for Business The bottom-line impact adds instant value to business. Fog computing makes the production of revenue-generating products and services more efficient and therefore is more cost-effective. It helps in acceleration of rollout cycles, reducing costs and broadens revenue bases. The new revenue streams creates value for IoT. The streams will come from both IoT and Embedded AI and 5G. It will foster the development of long-awaited revenue-generating applications and services. With the help of shred-and-spread nature of the fog architecture, the business will run more efficiently and costeffectively. Fog provides highly functioning internal business services. It also provides a common framework for collaboration and communication. It helps IT and OT business teams to enable work together and bring in cloud capabilities closer. Advantages of Fog Computing Fog computing have several advantages over its ancestor, cloud computing. Basic cloud computing technology is utilized by fog computing at its core. It helps to boost usability and accessibility in different computing environments. The advantages that fog computing offers are as follows: • • • • • • • • • • • •
Globally distributed network helps minimal downtime Place data close to the end-user Load balancing Create dense geographical distribution Maximize network bandwidth utilization Adopt numerous verticals Optimal operational expense Business Agility Support mobility and IoT Better Interconnectivity Enhanced Quality of Service (QoS) Latency Reduction
Cloud computing is going out-of-date and is relevant when it comes to Internet of Things. In the near future, fog computing will take over and cloud will be pushed to the side lines. Fog computing will be handling all critical work. The way the IoT is growing, it needs a special infrastructure base that can handle all its requirements. At present, fog computing is on a surge and it seems to be the most feasible option available.
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Liqid Inc. Breaking the Motherboard-Chassis Paradigm
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he cloud era has brought significant advances to data center architecture but it remains shackled by the motherboard-chassis paradigm which locks resource allocation to the point of purchase. It is here that Liqid Inc. is making its mark, interconnecting disaggregated resource pools to a fabric, and freeing users from the restrictions of the motherboard-chassis configuration that remains one of the final physical limitations of the digital world. Through innovations in low-latency fabrics and intelligent software, Liqid’s Composable platform addresses the painful and costly limitations associated with static architectures. It achieves this by interconnecting compute, network, data storage, and graphics processing devices with a PCI-Express (PCIe) fabric to deliver transformative results. An Industry Veteran Sumit Puri is the CEO and one of Liqid’s Co-founders. He is a storage industry veteran with more than 20 years of experience. Sumit has helped define technology roadmaps for key industry leaders, including SandForce, LSI and Toshiba. He has a long history of bringing successful products to market for large organizations. Before Liqid, Sumit served as Senior Engineer at JTS and at Iomega, as Director of Advanced Development at Fujitsu, and was an Engineering Fellow at Toshiba. He has also served as the Senior Director, Strategic Marketing at SandForce. Liqid was founded by Sumit and others to solve problems associated with high-value industries like AI, IoT, and edge computing that were still nascent at the time. The company took a creative approach, marked by its appreciation for past innovations while understanding that they were not sacrosanct. This sensibility is built into the company’s ethos and drives how the entire Liqid team addresses and overcomes every challenge faced by the company.
Sumit Puri CEO & Co-founder
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Unique Products Liqid Composable is available directly from Liqid, or through resellers and OEM partners like Inspur Systems and One Stop Systems. Liqid has partnered with both these firms to offer rack-level, GPU accelerator appliances.
Liqid offers: Ÿ Liqid Grid with Liqid Command Center Full Stack: Delivers complete and dynamic control of system resources, enabling true hardware disaggregation and bare-metal server orchestration. It comes bundled with a full, industry-standard stack, including GPU, CPU, NVMe SSD, and networking resources for the complete integration of composability into a client’s infrastructure. Ÿ
Developer’s Kit: For customers looking to experience Composable infrastructure solutions from Liqid to immediately improve datacenter resource utilization with a turn-key solution. A complete developer’s kit is also available with compute, network, storage and graphics processing devices included with which users are able to develop applications using Liqid Grid and Command Center within a fully integrated, rackmountable enclosure.
Entering the Vertical Around four years ago, Liqid’s cofounders realized the industry was moving from a cloud-based model for addressing rapidly increasing data demand to one driven by artificial intelligence across traditional on-premises data center environments, the cloud, and the edge, incorporating previously unimagined amounts of Intenet of Things (IoT) sensor data from internet-connected devices . The team recognized that a new approach to data center infrastructure was required to meet the demands of these highly data-intensive applications. This would allow IT users to scale and automate to meet the demands of advanced solutions such as hyperconverged systems. Liqid was created to address these problems with infrastructure solutions, and Composable has become the industry’s most complete end-to-end adaptive solution to address them. When the Tough Get Going According to Liqid, even today’s most advanced hyperconverged infrastructure solutions remain static, locked behind traditional motherboard architectures. They are unable to fully deliver resource flexibility because of this final physical restraint on the digital data pipeline. Without the ability to effectively scale powerful hardware resources such as the GPU to meet the real time performance demands of next-gen applications, overprovisioned resources remain fixed at the point of interface, silo-ed and underutilized. As a result, trillions of dollars in data center resources sit idle, consuming massive amounts of energy. Meanwhile the
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We are delivering adaptive computing with bare-metal composable infrastructure.
data center footprint expands as legacy vendors force 20th century infrastructure strategies to address the demands of the artificial intelligence (AI)-driven 21st century digital economy. Liqid Composable breaks with final physical constraints associated with the motherboard paradigm, evolving past hyperconverged systems to deliver unprecedented adaptive, bare-metal resource orchestration for the Age of AI. Future Roadmap Gartner predicts that 90 percent of all electronic products will contain IoT sensors for a total of 8.4 billion connected things by 2020, creating far more data than the internet of people ever could. DevOps teams will increasingly use machine learning algorithms to automate data management and interpretation in edge computing facilities. Edge computing will become the new norm, morphing with cloud and on-prem environments to create an increasingly seamless, constant data flow that will radically transform how the material world is interpreted and engaged. From these raw materials of the 21st Century economy, the world will transform and advance at an unprecedented pace and in unimagined directions. Liqid’s advancements in Composable infrastructure eliminate the final physical constraints in our digital world, supercharging technological advancements already underway. With Liqid Composable products and solutions now generally available to the IT community, and several key industry partnerships, the company is just getting started. It plans to drive further innovation, automation, and disruption in data center architecture, while laying the groundwork for discoveries yet to be imagined.
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MÖBIUS PARTNERS: Empowering IT Solutions Möbius Partners recognizes that every journey Jay Uribe President & Co-founder toward digital transformation is different. As a Junab Ali leading IT President & Co-founder solutions provider that serves corporate and public echnology is a disruptive sector customers throughout Texas force. Information and the central US, the company’s Technology (IT) is so success is closely tied to their dynamic and transformative that customers’ success. Möbius Partners ignoring technology trends can be is based in San Antonio, TX with detrimental to an enterprise. offices in Dallas and Houston. With a Successful companies are those that highly skilled team of certified implement the right technology to engineers and service delivery align with and propel their business. managers, they make it a priority to In the current market, many stay ahead of technical trends companies are chasing and investing through continuous learning, in digital transformation. The key to certifications, and training. The a growth-generating outcome is a company has a unique ‘work sound and strategic approach to hard/play hard’ culture and believes digital transformation. In order to in working together with their clients accelerate business processes and in order to get the job done right. competencies, companies need a partner that has a pulse on the latest Like their customers, Möbius technology and uses their expertise to Partners is driven by business develop a transformation strategy. outcomes. They invest in long-term relationships with their customers in
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order to maximize the impact of their technology expertise. The team’s sole commitment is to provide constant, responsive, transformational support. Partners In Excellence Junab Ali and Jay Uribe cofounded Möbius Partners in 2000. These two high school friends recognized that their unique strengths and backgrounds were complimentary and that they could leverage their expertise to help enterprise businesses implement the right technology. Nearly 18 years after starting Möbius Partners, Jay and Junab stay true to the tenets on which they established the company. Jay and Junab believe if they get it right with their employees, the employees will get it right with their customers. With a strong belief in a shared vision, the Möbius Partners team is known for finding that hardto-find groove of expertise, innovation and collaboration. That unique ability is the origin of their nickname: Groovers.
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We provide our clients with the most advanced and strategic technologies available to help them innovate,
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transform, and deliver positive business outcomes.
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Best Places to Work in Texas: 2009, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 Best Places to Work in San Antonio: 2007, 2008, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 CRN Magazine’s Tech Elite 250: 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 CRN Magazine’s Solution Provider 500 (Sp500): 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 Top 10 Data Center Networking Solution Providers by Enterprise Networking Magazine: 2016, 2017
Digital Transformation is Key Strategic Technology Solutions
Partnering for Success
Möbius Partners provides the most advanced and strategic technology solutions to deliver positive and growth-generating outcomes. Costeffective solutions are structured around a variety of technology services focusing on Cloud Adoption, IT Task Automation, Monitoring, IT Service Management, Data Center Optimization, Application Delivery, DevOps, Security Compliance, Analytics, and more.
Möbius Partners collaborates with the world’s leading enterprise technology companies to stay ahead of digital transformation trends. Some of our top partners include Aruba, Cisco, CloudPhysics, Cohesity, Dell EMC, Docker, F5, Fortinet, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Micro Focus, New Relic, Red Hat, Splunk, Turbonomic, VMware.
Möbius Partners offers a dedicated support management team to help maximize performance, minimize risk and identify cost-saving opportunities across customer environments. MP SupportLink is a multi-vendor Support Contract Management solution, that provides the much-needed visibility to proactively, effectively, and efficiently manage all service and support contracts.
These partnerships and certifications make Möbius Partners a trusted advisor within their customer base. The Möbius Partners team is often considered an extension of their customer’s workforce because of their strong relationships and commitment to the success of their customers businesses.
Many companies are investing in digital transformation. The key to future success, however, is a sound and strategic approach to digital transformation. In order to accelerate business processes and competencies, companies need a partner to provide comprehensive IT solutions. Möbius Partners has a pulse on the latest technology and uses its expertise to develop a transformation strategy. Looking ahead, the company will continue to grow the services they provide to customers and deliver new managed services to accelerate business and support digital transformation.
Awards and Achievements Möbius Partners has been recognized many times over as a top solutions provider.
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Being confident about your future when your organization is designed for control
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ue to several incidents within the financial sector related to their integrity, people and society in general have lost their trust in banks and insurance firms. Most of the banks and insurance firms know this better than anybody else. Regulators and supervisors are almost furiously trying to restore this trust by imposing strict rules upon them that focus on preventing the previous incidents from happening again. Even though this might win them some battles, I will definitely not win them the war, as the issues they are struggling with are far more complex: Ÿ
Trying to manage their data: Volume, privacy, complexity, security, availability etc. Especially in a context of finance and risk, additional requirements apply to the confidentiality, origination and audit trail of data;
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Reducing their IT expenses: keeping old aged systems up-and-running is difficult and expensive, resources understanding these systems are growing scarce, and such a situation is definitely stalling IT innovations, where they seem to be required to adopt new technology;
Responding to findings from regulators and supervisors, which need to be resolved imminently at the risk of large fines, negative career implications or even license consequences; Ÿ Replacing current solutions being ‘end-of-life cycle’ for which safeguarding the history as built up in their current system may be a specific issue, in addition to a potential operational risk when solutions cease to function. Ÿ
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Processing too many operational risk issues, imposing a reputational risk for both the bank and its leaders, is troubled by a large number of false positive
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alerts, taking up valuable time and resources. These is only an example of reasons for a growing back log. BusinessForensics also aims for banks and insurance companies to rebuild trust. Yet we realize that to win the war, it takes a different approach. We believe that banks and insurance companies need to reorganize themselves in order to improve their operating models and to safeguard the integrity of their employees and clients. Yes, this involves new rules & regulations. But that is not enough. Sustainability requires banks and insurances firms to embrace their future with confidence. This also involves new technologies and new data, which in turn will bring them new risks. It even involves new competition. We believe that truly good-natured banks and insurance firms can be compliant with new rules and regulations. Embrace new technologies and new data. Timely identify new risks. Face their new competition with confidence. To create an organization that is in control. By design. Only then will they be able to avoid crime, coincidence and prejudice. And that is where BusinessForensics comes in. We achieve that level of control for our customers by continuously monitoring their compliance- and integrity risks, from multiple angles. The result: a transparent and truthful view on ‘what is happening, here and now’ in their organization. Our focus on risk allows them to respond effectively to emerging challenges, in order to keep the bad guys out (in terms of clients and employees). By learning from our customer’s experience, our system continuously improves their responsiveness and resilience. Improves their level of control. Control brings confidence, and only with confidence can you build a bright future. BusinessForensics aims to be the trusted partner of choice for banks and insurance companies aiming to rebuild trust. To us, partnership means cooperating to reduce all relevant compliance- and integrity risks to levels that are acceptable
Leader's Desk
Tames Rietdijk
COO Business Forensics
About the Author Tames Rietdijk (1966) started his career in 1987 at KPMG as accountant (division financial institutions) and has been working mostly for software companies since 1994 in different positions from Product Manager to CTO. Since 2005 Tames has been certified as Anti Money Laundering Specialist by the Association of Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialists (ACAMS) and he is a tutor at the Radboud Management Academy. Tames is Chief Operations Officer at BusinessForensics and for the clients in the financial industry (banks and insurance companies) he is a trusted advisor for CFO's, CRO's and Fraud Departments because of his Risk management background combined with a thorough knowledge of software and technology. In his vision on Risk management Tames calls for Risk based supervision instead of traditional Rule based supervision. Risk based supervision requires trend analyses with a total view instead of a snapshot of a specific event. For Risk management to be effective, more is needed than just detection of risks and that is the reason why the BusinessForensics platform offers a total solution in data mining, big data processing up until case management and sanctioning.
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About the Company The team at BusinessForensics consists of consultants, architects and developers with offices in The Hague and Singapore, and has been offering software and know-how for monitoring and managing compliance and integrity risks since 1998, amongst which are financial and economic crime risks. Preferred customers are those banks and insurcance firms that take pride in maintaining or (when necessary) rebuilding the trust of their clients, who do not view compliance as a burden but feel the inherent need to 'do the right thing'. So as partners, we can keep crime, abuse and coincidence away from their clients. The forensic platform (the HQ products) provides real-time (big) data analysis of network, transactions and signal of evolving risks and threat. These are presented users in an accessible and understandable way, providing context and situational awareness. As a result, companies and institutions can discover these risks early and immediately take measures aimed at limiting possible damage as much as possible and optimizing chances for recovery. Compliance is also demonstrated by measuring good behavior Confidence in our system increases by minimizing the number of false positive alerts. In addition, unnecessary (reputational) damage is reduced and corporate agility is greatly improved. Trust improves performance; between man and machine, young and old, customer and supplier.
for banks and insurance firms, for their clients and for society as a whole. Our approach follows 7 standard steps: Ÿ
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An experienced team that understands and is passionate about (big) data analysis, machine learning and (cyber) security, bringing sustainable fintech innovation to your company. We structure your data in such a way that you are prepared for every possible outcome, as it is impossible to predict what you will come across during your analyses. We deliver a fine grained, adaptable configuration because every organization is unique and the system must resemble your specific situation as much as possible. The results or our joint analysis must result in an increased awareness and understanding of what is happening here and now within your organization, with a focus on (integrity) risk. This improved insight in the identified risks will allow you to decide how to best respond to them, in order to reduce potential damages as much and as soon as possible. Our collaborative learning approach allows your organization to continuously improve its resilience and pro-actively reduce its risk profile through automated feedback loops.
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As a result, your organization feels as if it is ‘Designed for Control’, having protected both the privacy of individuals and value of your assets.
In this complex financial world, BusinessForensics provides a coherent package of future-proof solutions to the major challenges facing all financial institutions in the coming decades: Ÿ Implementing new laws and regulations, Ÿ Becoming more responsive to new emerging risks, Ÿ The increasing volume, complexity and velocity of (new) data, Ÿ Embracing new technologies, being able to drive business innovation, Ÿ Preparing for the new competition: technology platforms, crypto currencies, fintech etc. BusinessForensics provides a structured approach to reducing a bank or insurer’s risk profiles while reducing their cost of compliance, and at the same time improving their damage recovery rates. Trust accelerates performance. Between banks and their clients, man and machine, old and young.
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Patriot Software: Helping Small Business Owners in a Simple and Affordable Manner
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ith a mission to make accounting and payroll fast, simple, and affordable for American Small Businesses, Patriot Software Company began in the sometimesheated basement of a factory in Canton, Ohio in 1986. Back then, the company had an unusual list of visitors in its office premise, including rats, birds, flies, and snakes! Office walls were complemented by worn out blankets and maxed out credit cards left the company in a state of financial crisis. “The early years in that basement were very rough, giving me a deep respect for small business owners. I learned first-hand how incredibly difficult it is to start a business from scratch and keep the business running,” recalls Mike Kappel, CEO, and Founder of Patriot Software. After barely surviving past those days filled with bitter experiences, Mike realized his new-found passion to help small business owners.
Mike Kappel CEO & Founder
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Delivering Solutions that make the Company Stand Out Patriot Software offers Accounting and Payroll software that is both simple and affordable. It also provides Time & Attendance and HR software that customers can turn on if desired. “All of our products are fully integrated together and accessible with just one login” mentions Mike.
Patriot consistently receives ratings of high standards, owing to various factors. Contrary to its competitors, Patriots price range is much less and the company proudly displays the fees on its website. Add to that, its free of charge US-based customer support coupled with the simplicity of its software further pushes Patriot ahead of the rising competition. Also, unlike other companies, Patriot does not ask its customers to sign long-term contracts. Stirring the Secret Sauce for Success Back in 1986, when computers were comparatively new and programming techniques were rudimentary, Mike searched for a national niche market to address after going through a handful of custom programming assignments. Subsequently, Mike’s research led him into the recruiting industry, which at that time was a very narrow vertical niche industry. For the next fifteen years, Mike and his team of professionals at Patriot Software learned “the secret sauce” for providing software and services to thousands of these small business executive recruiting firms. “The knowledge gained during this time prepared us to move beyond the vertical niche of recruiting to create accounting and payroll software for small business owners horizontally across many industries nationwide” Mike mentions. Making a mark in the Industry 1987 saw Mike and his team earn their first dollar in the market ($235) for creating a piece of desktop software to mass print 1099. Mike’s office wall still occupies a framed copy of the first dollar bill they received. But much like most entrepreneurs, Mike couldn’t see the forest through the trees and did not pursue the payroll industry any further from that point. Instead, he and his team shifted its focus to the recruiting industry in 1988 and created Top
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When you buy quality, you only cry once. At Patriot, we deliver just that. Echelon, which today holds the distinction of being the largest SaaS network of Executive Recruiters in the USA. “That’s where we learned how to write cloud-based software and properly service small business owners who demand excellence.” In 2002, Mike decided to diversify beyond the recruiting industry and created Patriot Software to provide an Accounting and Payroll Software-as-aService, which would benefit Small Business owners. Sacrificing Quantity for Quality Mike’s 30+ years of experience in business has taught him the importance of not taking shortcuts. He firmly believes in the expression, “When you buy quality, you only cry once” and aims to stay true to the same. Mike breaks it down by saying, “Building something of high quality is always costly. But, if you can maintain high quality, you will never be sorry.” Knowing that writing a payroll engine would be a terribly complicated endeavor, Mike was willing to sacrifice short-term customer growth by allowing his Software Engineers to spend as much time as necessary to build their payroll engine with extreme quality.
companies and their investors, who are on a constant lookout for quick profits. “But, Patriot Software is not your typical SaaS company.” The company understands that precision in quality is required to deal with hundreds-ofmillions of dollars in payroll and accounting, which prompted Patriot to deliberately sacrifice “quantity” for “quality.” “We self-funded tens-of-millions of dollars to build our award-winning payroll engine, which went live in all 50 states in 2015. People thought we were crazy to spend our own money building our cutting-edge software company in Ohio. But our gamble is paying off because Patriot Software’s 2-year compound annual growth rate (CAGR) is 199%... which essentially means that we’re tripling year over year. And our entire operation is poised to scale,” asserts Mike. Disrupting the Status Quo in the Future “I very much respect our competitors, but I don’t envy the challenge that’s before them. I would not want to compete with a company like Patriot Software who’s efficiencies are extremely high and costs are very low.” Small Business owners are savvy enough to know the real value of cloud-based software upon using it, which is why buyers rate Patriot’s Payroll with the Best ROI amongst all its competitors. Patriot Software is quite similar to a well-trained athlete, whom you’ve never seen or heard of before. “An athlete that has been quietly building his strength behind the scenes, very lean and very strong who comes on to the scene and goes off winning.” To summarize, Patriot’s future lies in disrupting the status quo.
Sacrificing short-term growth is not a concept embraced by today’s SaaS
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Prisma Labs:
Images Meet Cutting-Edge Deep Learning Technology
Prisma Labs aims to bring an absolutely new and unique way for people to express their emotions and transfer them into digital creations. The team is working on photo and video style transfer as well as object detection and segmentation on devices. Their goal is to place the most advanced technology in the hands of users worldwide. Prisma Labs works extensively with companies that produce mobile devices, cameras as well as processors to make its technology faster while consuming less power. Holding the Reins Artem Semyanov, CEO of Prisma Labs, is its former COO and Director of R&D. Tom joined the Prisma team at the beginning of 2017. He began building the R&D team and infrastructure to lay the groundwork for new technologies and features. Last year, the R&D team grew to 35 engineers and researchers. Alexey Moiseenkov, Founder and the former CEO of Prisma transferred control of the company to Tom after Prisma switched to a B2B strategy. The Prisma app was developed by Alexey Moiseenkov, Ilya Frolov, Oleg Poyaganov, and Andrey Usoltsev. It was launched in June 2016 as a free mobile app. Exclusive Services Prisma Labs develops a wide range of technologies based on AI and Computer Vision. Its image effects allow companies to add value to their cameras while contributing to an improved user experience. The team also does a lot of research into AR (augmented reality) technology. “We create new technology based on
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We have always been passionately committed to everything connected with AI and neural networks.
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risma Labs is a mobile technology company that specializes in deep learning and related products. Its Prisma Inference Engine allows convolutional neural networks to run on smartphones, fully utilizing the available GPU power and performing much faster than TensorFlow or Caffe. Prisma is a popular photo editing application from Prisma Labs that makes use of neural networks and artificial intelligence to enhance and beautify images.
AR because we believe that it can transform the user experience in a way that no other solutions can,” says Tom. The company’s own flagship technology, Style Transfer is used in the Prisma application. Tom explains, “We have our own Style Transfer architecture that gives us an opportunity to make it faster and even perform in real-time. We already offer more than 100 different exciting styles.” Portrait segmentation is another cutting-edge technology that the company utilizes. The Prisma Labs team has developed a neural network that can separate a person from the picture background. Portrait segmentation can be utilized in Bokeh mode as well. The effect uses portrait segmentation technology for accuracy, and then blurs the background to make the picture more effective. In new premium devices such as the iPhone X and Pixel 2, Portrait mode is very popular among users; it blurs the background and creates a professional camera effect with low aperture settings. With Portrait Segmentation, users can recreate the same effect on any device and in real-time. Earlier this year, Prisma Labs released revolutionary new technology that is essential for the AR experience. Their AR Synchronization System allows multiplayer in AR. Users can play multiplayer AR games (shoot a fireball at a friend!), create collaborative AR art such as 3D digital drawings in a shared environment, create custom markers in the environment and share them with other users (for
example, digital pop-up instructions to show hotel guests how to use a safe or shower), and locate city sights using additional GPS synchronization, among other amazing abilities. Create the Best Prisma Labs creates the best technologies every day that perform with high accuracy, high processing speed, and low power consumption. Prisma Labs has a very skilled and motivated team spread across three international offices in Moscow, Shanghai, and Sunnyvale. Prisma is the first company that switched from cloud-based solutions to on-device computing for neural networks. “We continue to create new optimizations for our algorithms and work closely with processor producers to provide the most efficient solutions,” asserts Tom. Prisma is among the first companies that started to use GPU acceleration device to process images. In fact, it started the trend of on-device AI processing. Super-fast Growth Prisma Labs always knew that they had a quality product but were still surprised at how well it was received. Initially, the team had focused on creating a fast algorithm when creating the app. They then put the app on the App Store to run some tests but it suddenly went viral. People started telling each other about an amazing new app which could turn any dull picture into a work of art within seconds. Prisma became the most downloaded app in 10 countries within nine days. The processing at first was done on servers. “We were not ready for such rapid instant growth; we had to double the server capacity daily but even that was not enough. People were waiting 10-20 times longer than we had planned to get a picture processed. Having enough capacity was not cheap either, and that’s why we decided to do our what was best for our users and make Prisma offline,” reveals the team. Tom adds, “And we have lots of exciting features coming! Stay tuned!”
Artem Semyanov CEO
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IoT Technologies
Contributing to the
Renewable Energy T
he Internet of Things (IoT) represents a modern reality. IoT has been encircled by the services that are associated with the things like hardware, embedded software, and communication services. IoT solution is integrated with one-to-one services or with multiple products.
wide range of vertical markets like industrial control and energy where devices functions in domains. Especially for energy companies, this can be the great flexible move to accommodate new energy source, better management of assets and operations, greater reliability, enhanced security, better customer satisfaction and innovations of new business models and services.
How Internet Of Thing Functions on Energy? Internet Of Thing tenaciously insights to pursue from new Internet-connected devices which can be used to develop new services, enhance productivity and efficiency and develop to prove real-time decision making and decode the critical problems. In today’s technical world, as we all are adjoined by the devices, energy companies have escalated interoperability and security challenges. It also delivers an amalgamation of scalable hardware and software solutions specifically to meet the market needs. The real end-to-end security that IoT necessarily requires has been integrated by the expertise.
Since the tool enabled the smooth combination of two-way power flows from fragmented distributed resources like wind or solar, IoT technologies are relevantly contributing to the renewable energy. Behind-the-meter processes such as on-site energy storage or electric vehicle charging. IoT technologies have been successfully established as a fundamental platform that justifies an ensuing Energy Cloud, which leads to the more distributed, and increasing intelligent grid. Internet of Thing is integrated with these energy themes : • Performance Optimization
Since decades, when innovation and control expertise were drawing intersections between information technology and devices, the companies jointly supervised to deliver interoperable end-to-end solutions. The energy companies are also evolving pretested and per-validated IoT products and solutions such as a gateway, to provide building blocks. With an extreme temperature and safety requirements, these solutions will incorporate the capabilities that support a
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• Storage & Analytics • Renewable Energy • Remote Monitoring & Reliability • Energy Optimization • Safety and Security • Decrease Downtime • Predictive Maintenance
Industry Concern
Empowering Innovations Smartphones and apps are becoming main user interface on IoT. The IoT addresses the consumer electronic market as well as the B2B industry. Depending on analysts, the value of IoT is essential to be from $300 B to close $2000 B in 2020 depending upon on what is accounted in IoT market. Connected LED lamps are expected to be the largest by far in IoT energy services. The incremental cost of hardware and embedded software is relatively small, whereas the service and analytics opportunity is much larger. To build awareness of their products, almost all companies tried different approaches and feature sets. So primarily, many of the suppliers focused on the IoT market on the goods of hardware and software. According to the business models, however, the market will increasingly be driven by the services. There will be service opportunities, that are associated with coordinating and managing the multiple things that typical consumers will interact on an average day. The value chain for IoT for devices and services will come up with a multilayered, understanding the brief measure of analytics software which is designed to pull out the usage trends for further product and service marketing initiatives. IoT generates a heavy data that address the analytics to transform huge volumes of data into a small quantity of operational information. Comfort Benefit The flair benefits of IoT in the energy efficiency market sector is huge for end-users and integrators. IoT will permit end users to measure, check as well as adapt the installation according to the requirement of the market within no time. For energy efficiency system integrators, IoT will exceptionally improvise their capability to distinguish the customer requirements for integration and commission. By utilizing remote diagnostic, the integrator will make a correction to the maintainability their systems and also fix the capability of signified products. However, this market is dominated by large players who have historically protected the highly beneficial market by maintaining an extremely high level of required investment to develop complex solutions while implementing specific standardization at the same time.
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The IoT promises to break the two entry barriers by offering low-cost flexible new communication solutions coming from the internet world. As a consequence, new players are being attracted to this market. SME’s and startups may offer low-cost solutions, at least for a full set of niche applications, while large players from the Internet world may also enter as enter as direct competitors of the traditional large players. The opportunity provided by a large, new potential market is counterbalanced by the risk of these new players entering their traditional market. However, this risk may be balanced by the opportunity to partner with these new players, creating a completely new open ecosystem. Future Directions through IoT on Energy The future of the energy industry will be distorted with the Internet of Things. As energy management experiences other connected devices being developed, it will then gain a greater control, data and energy savings. It’s an exhilarating and challenging time for energy management, and time to harness the opportunities opened by the IoT. Iot-based technology solutions across the globe, associated services foresee to bring tremendous value to the energy sector in future. Hereafter, it will aid the companies to be more flexible in adopting IoT solutions to predict asset performance and swiftly integrate all sections of energy in the system. Conclusion No matter we are at home or at the workplace, IoT will redeem the complexity of managing energy consumption from different places and provide an all-in-one stop. Devices like smartphones, laptops, and tablets can have access to other smart devices like air conditioner, or washing machine for enhanced usability. IoT will now extend to more convenience of lower bills from the devices like remote-controlled households, and home security. IoT-based technology and solutions are expected to raise the immense value to the energy sector. In the coming days, IoT is expected to climb the market hills to grow the energy market from $7.59 billion in 2015 to $22.34 billion by 2020.
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MOST VALUABLE
TECH TITANS 2018
REGO Techno Solutions: Leveraging Technology to Deliver Excellence
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stablished in 2016, Rego Techno Solutions is a specialist at end-to-end technological solutions. The company is committed to helping young entrepreneurs and business personnel from a business consultancy background make their online presence count. Within a year of its inception, Rego has been able to build two domestic offices and an international one. Rego’s vision is to be a frontrunner in digital and related technologies and to deliver peerless technology-driven integrated solutions and services. The aim is to help customers leverage these resources to reshape their business models to lead an ecosystem.
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True flexibility, integrity, and excellence in execution - even in tough times - are the reasons for Rego’s high customer retention rate. “As a services company, we know we have to earn our clients’ business every day,” the team says. Rego’s unprecedented success within a short span of time is founded in the team’s strong commitment to achieve more together each day. From just five clients in 2016, the company has grown by leaps and bounds to now cater to over 30 clients from across the globe.
Scalability is our Identity.
With a firm belief in the value of prototyping, the company works alongside its clients to ideate and build next-generation solutions, each of which is designed with a particular technology stack in mind. Rego integrates those solutions within its
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The Rego family, meanwhile, has also grown from a team of just five to over 50 members making up its innovation and research teams. The Story of the Trailblazers Mr. Sagar V. Pawashe, CTO and Director of Rego Techno Solutions has
been in the industry for over eight years and leads the operations and development team. His innovative ideas and execution techniques have always helped him scale new professional heights. Sagar started his career as a developer with a startup firm. His aptitude for client relations and deep market knowledge motivated him to start a venture of his own, which evolved into Rego. Sagar is a master of interaction, and personally takes care of every project and of the company’s training of new IT professionals. Mr. Shashank Tripathi is the Head of the Sales & Planning team. He is a young entrepreneur with a Master’s degree in Marketing who handles Rego’s business development arm using his knack for understanding and recognizing new markets and opportunities. Shashank focuses on new projects that have the potential to help India grow technically. Exclusive Services Rego’s unique approach to problemsolving makes it a popular choice for business process consulting, website development, mobile application development, CRM software development, and digital marketing & branding. Under its business process outsourcing wing, the company offers an impressive array of services that have the potential to drastically improve a client’s process performance. The company’s website development team works to enhance marketing and designing layouts. Its group of talented young developers works together with customers’ prerequisites as their priority. Mobile application development is a burgeoning sector because apps have become a critical element in the success stories of most modern
companies. The Rego team possesses hands-on expertise in Android, Windows, and iOS application development. Corporate digital presence is equally important. Rego has dedicated teams for Search Engine Marketing and Social Media Marketing who help clients reach their intended audience. The Tech Industry is the Place to be The technology industry is one of the most challenging, inspiring, and rewarding industries in which to be involved today. It is popular with both recent graduates and experienced professionals, and has been growing and evolving at a rapid pace in recent years. Ÿ
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Rego believes there are five reasons that the technology industry is the place to be, especially for students and recent graduates looking to launch their careers and make their mark on the world: A center of research, development, and innovation Meaningful work opportunities Stimulating challenges Variety High demand and high pay
Strongest Team Ever Speaking of Rego’s foundation, Sagar reveals, “It took months to plan our business idea. We were ready for the struggle but all we needed was a project on which to work and build our portfolio.”
Reach Every Corner of the World Eminent leadership, service, innovation & learning, and results & accountability are Rego’s strengths. The company looks forward to being a global leader in several innovation and technology domains.
It took Rego three months and over 50 meetings to get that first project, and the company is extremely grateful to its first client for trusting them and providing a space in which to collaborate.
Rego’s plans for the future has no geographical limitations; it aims to provide technological solutions and help startups reach the global market through digital platform, wherever they might be located.
The company had faced problems in initial recruitment, too, and the founding team of five employees had to work 18 hours a day to deliver the project on time. “The team worked hard and helped us grow. It was the trust of initial clients and employees who joined us in the early phase which has helped us to reach the place where we are now”, Sagar states.
Rego’s Stand on Business Technology According to Rego, business technology can help small enterprises enhance their communication processes. Emails, text messages, websites, and apps can aid communication with consumers, and using several methods simultaneously allows companies to saturate their target demographics with their message. Companies may also receive more consumer feedback through these electronic communication methods. This allows them to reach out to consumers through mobile devices in real-time.
Mr. Sagar V Pawashe CTO & Director
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Seceon: A Strong Open reat Management Platform for Cyber Security
Chandra Pandey Founder & CEO
n an age of digital disruption, businesses are finding it more and more difficult to protect themselves against cybersecurity threats. Old methods simply aren’t sufficient in the modern era. One company that makes this much easier for businesses to accomplish is Seceon.
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solutions. With his team of experts in cybersecurity, machine learning, artificial intelligence (AI), fast/big data streaming and dynamic threat modeling, he has spearheaded development of Seceon’s award-winning, comprehensive cybersecurity platform for the digital era.
Seceon uniquely solves modern day cybersecurity challenges by providing complete visibility of all assets and its interactions in the organization, and rapid detection and elimination of threats, while minimizing costs, staff bandwidth constraints and performance impact.
As Seceon’s CEO, he works closely with customers to define and address the problems, implications, and solutions of defending corporate assets in today’s highly-connected enterprise. Chandra holds multiple patents in application virtualization, highly scalable data center architecture, scalable multicast distribution and power optimization for high performance computers.
Seceon’s platform uses patent-pending predictive analytics, machine learning, and dynamic threat models with behavioral analytics to automatically generate prioritized threat alerts in real-time, providing IT teams with both the ability to detect and respond to the threats before critical data is exfiltrated. The company’s solutions are targeted at enterprises and Managed Security Service Providers (MSSPs), the latter of which use Seceon to deliver affordable, integrated security services to small-to-medium businesses (SMBs) and enterprises. An Inspirational Leader Chandra Pandey, the Founder and CEO of Seceon, is renowned for developing innovative cybersecurity
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Before Seceon, Chandra was General Manager and Vice President of Platform Solutions at BTI Systems (now Juniper Networks). He led a global team through the creation, development and launch of the Intelligent Secure Cloud Connect platform to more than 20 Web 2.0-focused customer deployments in less than 18 months. Chandra has also held senior leadership roles at Juniper Networks, Internet Photonics (Ciena), Lucent and 3Com (HP). The Open Threat Management Platform The OTM Platform is the industry’s first and only fully automated, real-time threat detection and remediation software platform empowering enterprises to respond to security threats in real-time and eliminate them in minutes.
It provides the zero-trust security businesses require in today’s digital era. The platform uses elastic compute power to develop behavioral analytics, advanced machine learning, AI with proprietary feature engineering and anomaly detection algorithms, without a need to establish rules. Seceon OTM has been designed to work independently as well as a complementary to other security solutions, such as, nextgeneration firewalls, endpoint solutions, IPS, and so on. It is an integrated solution that covers a broad threat spectrum of use-cases, such as insider threats, ransomware/malware/spyware, denial of service, data/IP exfiltration, APTs, vulnerability exploits, web exploits, IDS, and more.
Seceon aiMSSP™ provides MSSPs the ability to offer outsourced security services, which includes 24x7 security monitoring, threat intelligence, detection and remediation in real-time, at nominal and predictable linear costs. It encompasses aiSIEMTM, aiSOCTM (security operations center) services and aiMDRTM for threat detection and response in a single solution. The aiMSSP’s SOC-in-a-Box capabilities allow MSSPs to expand the service offerings while bringing advanced threat detection and mitigation capabilities to small-to-medium businesses. Additionally, its state-of-the- art distributed architecture runs at scale while automatic threat remediation and containment brings greater level of operational efficiency to the MSSP SOC team.
Seceon offers two solutions based on the OTM Platform:
Initial Strategy
Seceon aiSIEM™ goes beyond using log data, simple analysis for correlation of events, and applying rules to enhance an organization’s security posture. It ingests raw streaming data from a variety of sources to provide comprehensive visibility into an organization’s security posture at any time. Machine learning handles large data volumes in conjunction with contemporary big data frameworks efficiently and is able to adapt to any environment dynamically upon deployment for deep data analysis.
As a 100% channel-driven company, Seceon faced challenges stemming from partners’ processes and approvals requiring longer cycles to reach customer engagement. Over time, they learned how to identify better partners that are equally vested in accomplishing Seceon’s goals. Working closely with these partners has enabled Seceon to improve their processes, sharpen their communications, and simplify onboarding.
An AI algorithm helps to bolster cybersecurity by generating meaningful alerts with improved accuracy from scores of threat indicators analyzed by the security professionals and producing actionable intelligence for threat containment and elimination in real-time.
Secondly, as a self-funded startup outside of the Silicon Valley and VC universe, it faced challenges generating visibility and credibility for their unique approach. However, because the company’s solution is fast and easy to deploy and incredibly effective at accurately detecting and stopping threats, customers’ responses are always overwhelming positive once they have an opportunity to access the product. Today enterprises of all sizes use Seceon to defeat known and new cyberattacks. Future Roadmap
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Seceon’s best-in-class security solutions leverage historical context to easily detect and eliminate threats in real-time.
Through customer research, Seceon has identified an enormous unmet need to protect small-to-medium-sized businesses of limited resources, who tend to be highly vulnerable to even the least sophisticated of attacks. Often, these smaller enterprises turn to MSSPs for expertise and protection. In the coming years, Seceon will remain focused on providing the ability for organizations of any size or technical talent to protect critical data from loss or damage.
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2
Secured Corporation: Fortifying Global Organizational Data
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very organization with an online presence has an obligation to protect vital records and personal information from potential hackers and malware. Data Encryption techniques have been available since the dawn of the internet age but the need for effective protection is more dire today than ever before. This necessity is being avidly and intelligibly tailored by Secured2 Corporation, a data security and document management company headquartered in Minneapolis, MN. The organization has come up with a revolutionary new way to protect data beyond encryption and from emerging threats like Quantum Computing. It is the first company to offer a cyberwarranty that provides up to $5M in indemnification against a data breach.
Daren Klum Co-founder & CEO
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Secured is the global leader in beyond encryption and quantum resilient security that can be married with the cloud applications you know and love.
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The organization’s technology is rigorously tested, vetted, and thirdparty validated by FBI-trained teams. Their patented ‘Shrink >Shred >Secure’ security process defeats hackers and shrinks data by 80%. Secured2 avails processed data to multiple locations. The organization’s data security technology is completely storage-agnostic. An All-encompassing Leader Daren Klum is the Co-founder and CEO of Secured2 Corporation. He is a visionary in the software and hardware industry with a long list of industry accomplishments. From developing the world’s fastest computer to now solving the fundamental problems found in the present-day encryption systems, he possesses indisputable expertise in the tech industry.
Daren’s numerous contributions to the cyber security arena have conceived some of the most important technologies developed to date. He is an established and widely-acclaimed cyber security innovator, inventor, builder and leader of successful businesses. He boasts a corporate experience with Gartner, Sprint, Digital River, TW Telecom, and Thompson Reuters, and has founded coupled technology start-ups such as LiquidCool Solutions. Apart from an accomplished technologist and business leader with a strong ability to solve big problems, Daren is known for his skill in nurturing talent and executing outstanding customer service. Redefining Innovation “Secured 2 is the game changer in data security and data storage. We are the modern day paper shredder for digital information. We shrink the size of your data using proprietary compression, we shred your data into small pieces and we secure your data using proprietary methods,” asserts Daren while describing the company’s functions, products and services. Secured2 is the first company that allows users to aggregate the storage from public, private and hybrid cloud environments. The company’s solutions offer: Ÿ
S2 Email Security for Office365:
Secure2 Email Security for Office365 is a data protection security solution to secure email in Outlook Desktop, Outlook.com and Office 365. This application takes the user’s messages and secures them beyond encryption, ensuring the communication can’t be hacked or accessed even by the cloud vendors. Ÿ
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S Email Security for Exchange:
Many of today’s enterprises have not taken the leap to the cloud. Secured2
Email Security for Exchange provides beyond-encryption security even for older versions of Exchange. Ÿ
S2 Email Security for Outlook:
The Secured2 Email Security for Outlook feature secures email on desktops from hackers, intruders and other unauthorized parties. Additionally, one can get the same ‘beyond encryption’ protection that eliminates unauthorized access to critical emails and attachments. Ÿ
S2 DepositBox:
Secured² DepositBox is a document storage container that users can host on their website within minutes. One can safely share or collaborate on any kind of sensitive information such as documents, images, video, claims or patient records. The data that goes into DepositBox is shredded into millions of fragments, is randomized and dispersed into multiple locations so that the data is never whole at any single cloud location. Ÿ
S2 Collaborate:
Secured² Collaborate is used to securely share data and facilitate collaboration between multiple people or large user groups. This application was designed specifically to be the hub of any business and provide true document collaboration across the enterprise with employees and outside the enterprise with customers or partners. Ÿ
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S Universal API:
Secured2 Universal API secures all of the user’s application data Beyond Encryption using the company’s proprietary shrink, shred, secure and restore technology. The Secured2 Email Security for Outlook Mobile is a new product that allows users to unlock and read emails securely.
Secured2 Business Process Management is an upcoming product which automates business processes by eliminating human intervention in document workflows, for instance, automating the approval process for a loan application. This business process capability will be built into DepositBox & Collaborate. Voyaging towards Victory Secured2 holds an approach to cloud engineering that works efficiently for its team and ensures that each problem the company decides to tackle, has an ultimate solution. Daren, while describing the company’s journey, states, “We were able to tackle the initial struggles by working backwards. You always start at the problem and then work your way back, solving all the little problems until the bigger problem is solved.” Most security solutions available today don’t provide proof that they are secure. Emphasizing on this issue, Daren asserts, “We knew technology could solve the hacking epidemic and our solution is the first in the market that provides a way to secure data and also the ability to prove that it is secure.” “What makes our solutions different is our patented and proprietary security and cyber warranty that indemnifies you against a data breach,” he explains. Secured2 aims at continuing driving innovation and building leading-edge products conceived from its core of data security. “We see incredible opportunities in the field for securing and protecting Artificial Intelligence, IoT and Blockchain,” Daren reveals while discussing the organization’s future plans.
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SynGlyphX
Transforming Data to Knowledge, Faster
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here is more data available today than ever before. The promise behind all this data is the ability to make better, more informed decisions, more rapidly and with better results. Yet, too often, data goes underutilized or is missed altogether. ®
SynGlyphX software allows users to see more of their data at one time so patterns, trends, and anomalies can be easily seen and recognized. In this way, SynGlyphX® helps users see and know more, faster. The company’s products represent a revolution in data visualization. William Playfair invented the bar chart in 1783, over 230 years ago. All the innovation that has gone into bar charts since then has been an evolution, not of the visualization itself, but of getting data from the ether into the bar chart for analysis. SynGlyphX® presents data in a visual, 3D, immersive and interactive environment that simplifies and expedites analysis of vast amounts of data contextually. It works on commercially available hardware used within the majority of corporate and academic organizations worldwide. A Very Experienced Leader As the Co-founder of SynGlyphX®, Mark E. Sloan brings more than two decades of experience in the technology industry to the company. He is a results-driven technology general manager experienced with new
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ventures as well as with turning around existing businesses.
enable comprehensive interactive data visualization and insight discovery.
He is also the CEO and President of the organization and brings a unique focus to business development and to the marketing of SynGlyphX®’s products. Mark has established a strong operational foundation for the company’s ability to scale in the future.
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GlyphViewerTM provides flexibility and glyph authorship for technical users who want to design and build their own data visualizations.
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GlyphIT TM is designed for managers, researchers, and teams. It provides a series of standard or custom-built glyphs that provide all of the visual power of glyph-based data analysis. Unlike GlyphViewerTM, GlyphITTM glyphs are built by the SynGlyphX® team to the specifications of data owners, simplifying data aggregation, and cleansing processes while enabling rich insight via customer-defined, standardized, views.
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GlyphSATM is designed specifically to help teams accelerate situational awareness. Similar to GlyphITTM, GlyphSATM uses a series of prebuilt or custom glyphs that allow users to visualize the threat surface for an entire network or any element of the network teams. Prebuilt glyphs are designed to provide comprehensive insight into networks and can be modified to meet customer requirements.
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GlyphEd TM is used by schools across the United States such as Notre Dame, John Carroll University, Kent State University, and Gannon University. It enables school administrators to manage student success from application
His interest in the success of people and teams, and desire to help them make breakthroughs, are the biggest drivers of his leadership at SynGlyphX® and in the industry. “We want to help people discover insights that change their world,” says Sloan, “SynGlyphX ® provides a unique opportunity, not just in the software industry, but for everyone.” He started his career at Accenture. Before founding SynGlyphX®, Mark co-founded RTM Consulting, a global consulting firm focused on the technology services industry. He also served as Vice President and General Manager of Convergys’s Consulting and Professional Services Group, a business valued at $375M. Mark holds an M.B.A degree from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and a B.S. in Civil Engineering from the University of Notre Dame. Groundbreaking Solutions SynGlyphX® provides 4 data visualization modules, all designed to
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We provide software and services that help users discover insight and take action on complex data.
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Mark E. Sloan Co-founder, President, & CEO
through to graduation. A series of standardized glyphs enables teams to determine the best candidates for acceptance into a cohort and identify at-risk students through comprehensive analysis of financial aid, engagement, and academic data. Entering the Vertical SynGlyphX® visualization tools improve the speed and quality of data analysis. Organizations have access to more data than ever before and want to take advantage of it to achieve new operational efficiencies, reduce costs, and discover insights that have significant impact on all aspects of life. The likelihood for breakthrough thinking and creative productivity rises when people at all levels of an organization can grasp and share data quickly and easily. As teams grow and morph, it becomes increasingly imperative that every member can grasp the meaning of data and take appropriate action. Common data analysis tools require users to adapt to an antiquated methodology of data analysis. SynGlyphX® was founded to give teams and individuals a more comprehensive and easily understandable view of their data so that they can find the insights to change their world.
A Smooth Sea Never Made a Skilled Sailor There is a natural aversion to adopting new technology. An introduction to glyph-based data analysis can sometimes be bewildering at first glance. Although common tools require far more work to ascertain the meaning of data, they are the familiar options in the market. When the company was established, SynGlyphX® worked to first socialize the idea of the glyph, and this is an ongoing process. Speaking with thousands of people, it quickly learned that once a prospect is given a general understanding of glyphs and how they work, the value of the glyph becomes clear. Through a series of conversations, tests, and campaigns, the SynGlyphX® team determined a simple model for communicating the make-up of the glyph that showed customers how and when to use this new, but truly intuitive, concept of data visualization. As with all software, usability was a key factor in adoption. SynGlyphX®’s team works diligently to ensure that its GUI is intuitive and responsive. The company wants to ensure that its users can focus on the data at hand without the need to jump through hoops to build, see, and interact with glyphs.
The ability to integrate advanced analytics adds to the value of the platform. Looking Ahead at the Future SynGlyphX® plans to continue to introduce innovative features to its software. The focus to date has been on allowing users to reduce the time to go from data to SynGlyphX visualization to insight discovery. The company will continue to enhance the software to shorten this cycle. It is making great strides in automating the creation of a visualization, and in connecting to multiple and disparate data systems so that the user can integrate data visually, and easily access it. Until now, the software has been a client application – it needed graphics acceleration (i.e., GPU of the local hardware) to effectively display graphics. In early 2018, the organization is in the process of beta testing its web version, GLYPHVIEWER®. The release of the web version of GLYPHVIEWER® will dramatically change how and where users can access their data.
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USING
BIG DATA AND
AI
TO COMMUNICA COMMUNICATE WHEN SECONDS COUNT Tara Kelly Founder & CEO SPLICE Software
About the Author A serial innovator, published author, Founder and CEO of SPLICE Software, Tara Kelly is passionate about technology’s potential to change lives for the better. She has consistently channeled that belief into developing technologies that enhance operations, enable better service delivery, and improve the customer experience. This has resulted in creating three customer experience companies and turning an innovative idea into a patented, proprietary technology (US Patent Number 9348812) that harnesses data streams to create personalized, automated messages.SPLICE solutions were included in Gartner’s “Cool Vendors in Insurance, 2016” report and Forrester’s “IoT and Analytics Startups Can Turn Insurers into the Good Guys”brief.
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Insider’s Insight
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rganizations like property and casualty insurance companies, utilities and other businesses that help people recover from natural disasters are gearing up for the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season, which begins on June 1. Everyone is hoping it’s not as active as last year’s hurricane season, which was among the most destructive on record, with six major hurricanes and more than $280 billion in damages. Recovery is still ongoing in many areas, notably Puerto Rico. But hurricanes aren’t the only danger to lives and property that insurers must address. Wildfires can occur at any time of the year, especially under drought conditions and when winds are high. Floods occur year-round and can cause catastrophic damage, as can tornados, hail, blizzards and a range of other weather-related events. Organizations that need to urgently communicate with customers or employees before and after a weather event often encounter difficulties because they don’t have the contact information they need. Either the data they have is out of date, or they’re using a channel (work email addresses, landlines, etc.) that the people they’re trying to contact aren’t monitoring during the emergency. After a disaster, organizations encounter even more difficulties in communicating. Customers may have left the area or are in a location where the infrastructure suffered significant damage. Organizations that are trying to move crews into place to address the damage often have trouble mobilizing their people because of communication breakdowns and difficulty visualizing conditions on the ground. Big Data, Small Data and AI to the Rescue
About the Company SPLICE Software creates stronger connections and improves the customer experience by delivering personalized messages to your customers via their channels of choice, at the most critical points along the customer journey. Our cloud-based Dialog Suite™ uses Big Data & Articial Intelligence to deliver Data-Driven Dialogs® that can be leveraged across phone, SMS messaging, and AI-assisted devices like Amazon Alexa and Google Home. It’s just part of how SPLICE combines art & science to help you connect with your clients in new ways. Our award-winning Suite enables Retailers, Insurance companies, and Financial Services rms to collect and manage customers’ permissions and preferences so you can personalize, communicate, test, and measure like never before.
Fortunately, it’s possible to plan ahead, gather needed data and deploy technologies, including artificial intelligence (AI) and data visualization tools, to enable critical communication when seconds count. For businesses like property and casualty insurance companies, using the right technology assets can
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enable communication with customers before and after disaster strikes. It all starts with data. Companies that need to communicate with customers (or staff) during an emergency should prepare by gathering small data, such as complete contact information, making sure to distinguish between cell phone and landline numbers. They’ll also need to get permission to make contact and ask which channels people prefer, e.g., text, email, voicemail, social media, etc.
With the small data taken care of through pre-disaster outreach and data cleanup projects, organizations can put big data and AI to work before and after a disaster to communicate with customers and employees. Insurance companies can reach out to customers who are in an area threatened by a disaster, providing helpful information on making a claim. Sorting customer information by ZIP code to pinpoint customers in the path of danger, insurers can use big data and AI to send automated messages via the channel customers prefer, reminding them to move to a safe location and including tips on what documentation they’ll need to file claims and instructions on how to contact the insurance company once the danger has passed. This type of outreach is helpful to both customers and the companies that send the communication. It can help insurers avoid losses by warning customers of impending danger, and instructions help customers receive the prompt service they need after a disaster strikes. Personalized outreach also helps strengthen the bond between brands and the customers they serve. Once the immediate danger has passed, organizations like utilities, claims adjusters, emergency response teams, etc., need to deploy field crews. A software solution that can harness AI, advanced data visualization capabilities and mass communications tools can deliver the information decision-makers need with speed and accuracy. Big data is essential, but information alone isn’t enough — decision-makers need to be able to visualize it to make the right calls and communicate with affected
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stakeholders. For example, after a hurricane has moved through an area, power restoration and civil engineering crews may be on hand, but without an accurate view of conditions on the ground, it’s impossible to deploy assets effectively. A weather event that knocks out power and damages infrastructure can delay recovery efforts, leaving customers stranded and crews idled just when the need for help is most acute. However, a data visualization app that takes in big data from multiple sources can provide clarity on conditions on the ground, allowing leaders to make informed decisions. Picture utility team leaders with several power restoration crews in a disaster zone. Data pouring in from social media, weather services and other sources can help them pinpoint which crews to send to address specific sites with infrastructure damage. But data visualization tools that show conditions in real time, such as road and bridge closures, can help them take decisive action immediately. The Secret Sauce Is Simplicity Emergency management tools that integrate big and small data and leverage the power of crowd knowledge and AI can provide critical information that can be visualized and understood in seconds. The ability to send mass communications is also important. Automated voice messages can deliver catastrophe warnings, postcatastrophe service updates, office closure notifications and much more. Speed and accuracy are important, but simplicity is the secret sauce. A software platform that integrates all of these elements and allows the people who are managing critical events to visualize complex, evolving factors in real time can be a game-changer. Whether communicating with customers or employees, when seconds count, big data and AI are indispensable allies.
Systweak Software: An Iconic Utility and Gaming App Developer
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ystweak Software has established itself as one of the leading IT service and solutions providers. The company was founded in 1999 and is currently based in Jaipur, Rajasthan. In its short journey,Systweak has received several honors including the prestigious “100 Most Promising Microsoft Service Providers” recently. Encouraged by widespread recognition and users spread across North America, Europe, UK and several countries in Asia, the company continuously strives to make consumer tech and digital devices more user-friendly, thus bridging the gap between developers and users. A Vision with a Rare Insight The Founder of Systweak Software, Mr. Shrishail Rana has been instrumental to this organization’s success for more than 19 years of its existence. It was his idea to provide various resources to PC users, so they could easily optimize and maintain their computers, removing the barrier of a technical expertise.
Mr. Shrishail Rana
His leadership provided the stepping stone for Systweak to expand beyond the confines of its home city and become a promising IT brand. Over the years, Systweak’s products have also expanded from Windows to Mac, iOS and Android.
Founder
Mr. Rana has instilled a vision in his employees to enable users to get the best out of their digital devices and computers. Hence most of the products offerred by Systweak are quick and easy solutions for users to maintain and optimize their devices. The company currently offers a wide range of software and apps that span across various niches in technology such as device security, backup and
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‘‘
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Ideas come to life when they’re implemented with passion and it is this passion that helps us build brilliant computer & mobile apps in an increasingly digital-centric world.
recovery services, file organization, junk cleaning, performance optimization, photo editing tools and a lot more. A Unique Competitor The team at Systweak firmly believes that focusing on the end-user is exponential for any business, regardless of the industry. Hence, instead of trying to sell the customer something they might not want, its products provide easy solutions for complicated issues that technolgy users are likely to encounter. The company invests heavily into R&D to solve challenging problems consumers are unable to deal with and provides convenient and user-friendly solutions. The company has progressed as a unique solution provider due to the expertise and contribution of the entire Systweak team. However, its foundations were laid by a personal experience. It was Mr. Shrishail Rana’s experiences with his Pentium II powered Windows PC. Back in 1999, he created a freeware named “Shrishail’s Memory Optimizer” that allowed users to run several programs simultaneously without crashes. He was soon approached by several companies including who were interested in the software, and the rest as they say is history. The program was renamed “Memory Zipper Plus” becoming the number one memory optimizer for Windows that year. A Proven Mantra for Success Systweak culture fosters a sence of belief and ownership for learning among its employees. When in doubt, Systweak employees are often encouraged by a quote from Elon Musk,“failure is an option here”. Systweak employees learn from their mistakes to develop an original and true understanding of their work.
Additionally, the company culture also nurtures the value of customer feedback and constantly strives to mold its products and services according to their requirements. Mr. Rana said, “In order to hold our work sacrosanct, we would rather fail than provide a product or service that holds no value for the end-user. And it is this mindset that has brought us this far.” Moreover, Systweak is solely focused towards customer satisfaction and providing top-notch products and services. It not only want to provide solutions for tech related issues, but also make technology much easier to understand and use for consumers across all ages. In doing so, it uses technology to solve problems that arise from technology itself, thus creating a sustainable business model. A Bright Future Ahead Since it has already expanded its services to most popular platforms, Systweak aims to focus on delivering top-notch quality in the future. Alongside optimization, cleaning and performance boosting apps, it has also been working on newer niches such as IOT and games. Apart from these, Mac security is another area where, it will be direct its attention as it is a largely unexplored territory. So, users around the world can definitely expect more games, IOT apps and security solutions for Mac and iOS from an outstanding solution provider in the near future. Mr. Rana was gracious while speaking with Insights Success and spoke frankly about some industry trends. He said it is difficult to understand and predict the next big thing on the horizon. The digital industry is disrupting many established models that software professionals need to only remember one thing. He added, “in order to change the world, all you need to do is ‘Tweak the source code’.
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TheMarketsTrust: Building Trust through Next-generation Products, Expert Consulting, and Solutions Integration
heMarketsTrust was established to evaluate the credit risks of listed and non-listed companies, SMEs and large corporate organizations. Its specialty lies in its ratings, which are recalculated on a daily basis. The ratings include an index which reflects the sentiment/perception of end users. This index, known as the TMT-Index, is extracted from sources like the daily news as well as social media. The company’s methodology is non-intrusive and relies only on openly-available data that is collected from over 20,000 different sources. TheMarketsTrust makes use of advanced machine learning algorithms (neural networks) for scoring. TheMarketsTrust advisory board has vast experience in the development of highly complex, state-of-the-art and mission critical solutions. Recently, the company has been approached to integrate its corporate credit scoring technology on the blockchain via smart contract. Such opportunities enable the company to contribute to the next revolution. TheMarketsTrust recently won two awards, RegTech 100 and RegTech 50, which have contributed significantly to its worldwide branding. The explosion of cloud services, coupled with the need for artificial intelligence (AI) as infrastructure services, has allowed TheMarketsTrust to reduce its time to market as well as the operational cost of its solution. About the Trailblazer Evangelos Papadopoulos, the CEO of TheMarketsTrust, is married to Rusiko, a Constitutional Lawyer, and is the father of two daughters, Elizabeth and Stephanie. He loves music, has learned to play the piano, devotes his free time to family life, and has recently adopted two cocker spaniels.
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We focus on making a more transparent financial system that will protect our investors, whether they are big or small. — Evangelos Papadopoulos CEO
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Evangelos has always been passionate about science and technology and began programming when he was just 13 on a TRS 80, where he learned BASIC and other assembly languages. He now holds a Master’s degree in Engineering, a DES in Computer Science, a certificate in Quantitative Finance (CQF Wilmot), and an Executive MBA (PLD14) from Harvard Business School. Beginning his career as a developer, Evangelos has accumulated over 28 years of experience, including 18 years in finance, where he worked as an IT architect and project manager for Major Exchanges. He has managed projects with budgets as large as 50M € and virtual teams of up to 250 people. For the past 10 years, Evangelos has been fascinated by new developments in Behavioral Finance, Artificial Intelligence, Mathematical Fractal Modeling, and their applications in everyday life. He is particularly passionate about the ability of neural networks to understand non-linear relationships, as well as the application of fractal geometry in day-to-day financial modeling. The Differentiating Factor Incumbents are still using mostly human-driven manual processes, which are very time intensive and sometimes subjective. In addition, with the explosion of the data economy, humans are unable to effectively analyze very large quantities of data. For instance, an Analyst requires an average of two days to get the data and give an opinion on a corporate. On the other hand, TheMarketsTrust’s approach simplifies the original data so one only needs an average of two hours to complete an analysis. All incumbents currently use the same approach for risk valuation, which makes it is impossible to get an independent second opinion of any consequence.
TMT stresses that this is a major shortcoming. Their solution is to provide a real second opinion that is based on machine learning (AI) and advanced quantitative models reevaluated on a daily basis. The company’s models are far more accurate than existing ones. It has been established that classical models have an accuracy ratio of 65%, whereas TMT’s AI approach offers an accuracy ratio greater than 90%. This is a major achievement that allows it to be more predictive, as well as to create new types of loans that rely on a continuous assessment. Out of the Woods The last two financial crises have changed TheMarketsTrust’s perception of the financial world. Both crises pushed millions of individuals and companies into bankruptcy and people began to question why nobody had predicted such catastrophic events. As a technologist, Evangelos was intrigued by the pursuit of a technological answer to financial crisis prediction. After a year of research, Evangelos built the first risk model that combined quantitative and behavioral data. The results were promising; Evangelos and a group of friends decided to launch a startup dedicated to financial risks analysis. The result was TheMarketsTrust. Five major institutions have already found TheMarketsTrust’s technology to be very promising and have expressed their interest in pilot projects. Hurdles Crossed “Getting the first paying customer is one of the most critical and challenging tasks for a startup. Most startups have limited funds and often build a Minimum Viable Solution (MVS), which requires an additional year of development. However, the
financial industry is looking now mostly for production grade products. To me, that explains why so many startups are failing”, says Evangelos. Evangelos explains that the major stumbling block for him during the initial days was to identify early adopters. This can take months and requires a global network that, as a startup, he did not have. Furthermore, four years ago, artificial intelligence technology was not as reliable; most frameworks have now improved radically and many are provided ‘As a Service’. Lastly, funding was an extremely difficult exercise and required a full-time dedicated resource. TheMarketsTrust has grown by leaps and bounds over the years after having tackled these challenges. Future Endeavors TheMarketsTrust has developed a new scoring model for SMEs. It will be integrated within a new credit marketplace for serving SMEs by providing them a lending service while also providing social interaction features. The new platform targets five million entrepreneurs in the U.S. and another five million in Europe. TMT plans to launch the MVS by Q4 of 2018. It is looking for additional partners and institutional investors to support the commercialization of this new platform whose services can be accessed via cloud APIs. Furthermore, the integration of its offering within the blockchain would disrupt the current credit lending industry. Evangelos says, “We are open and willing to work with the current industry and anticipate major foreseen impacts. I believe also that the banking industry is undergoing a major transformation and most of the current jobs will vanish in the next 10 years!”
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U VISION: Defining Next Generation Technology
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t present, technology is involved in every single market segment and vertical so it comes as no surprise how technology is changing every aspect of the business world. These rapid advancements that have impacted the world are remarkable and have revolutionized business operations. By adopting next generation technologies, UVision helps innovation-minded organizations to develop a competitive advantage. In this era of digital evolution, UVision has defined its purpose to build smart, scalable and secure next generation technology solutions for consumers and organizations. Headquartered in Reston, VA, UVision provides advanced technology solutions, R&D, consulting and advisory services for clients spanning from small business, enterprises & government. UVision also builds game changing products for consumers and enterprises. UVision aids the evolution of next generation technologies through custom data, web, mobile, IoT, AI & cloud technologies. By leveraging agile processes, a multi-disciplinary collaborative environment, design thinking and results driven execution, UVision excels in developing ideas and concepts into market-focused technology products and customer-driven solutions.
Delivering Smart Solutions UVision develops custom solutions and implements advanced solutions to help its customers transform, innovate & grow their organization. They begin by assessing their needs through strategic gap analysis assessments and by tailoring strategies and roadmaps as well as advisory services. It provides superior capabilities to help small and large organizations alike in building smart, scalable & secure technology solutions. Using cutting edge technologies, it develops new products to accelerate innovation for organizations & improve people’s lives to drive meaningful change in the world. The Company’s broad range of solutions includes: Ÿ AI, Machine Learning, Machine Intelligence
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Big Data, Analytics & Data Science Custom Web, Mobile, IoT & Enterprise Software Cloud, SaaS, PaaS, IaaS & IoT Platforms Threat & Cybersecurity Solutions Regulatory Intelligence & Compliance Solutions
UVision utilizes advanced approaches to help organizations make sense of data, enhance productivity, improve bottom line, mitigate risks and be more resilient along with full application life-cycle management. It also helps its clients to engage their customers across a broad and ever-growing digital ecosystem that includes interactive applications, social media, search, video, media, sensors and IoT platforms. An Ingenious Mind UVision has grown under the leadership of Omar Uddin, the Founder and CEO. Apart from being CEO, Omar is also a technology executive, inventor, advisor, technologist, and entrepreneur with a successful track record of building technology solutions from ideas to implementations. He has gathered more than 20 years of experience spanning public and private sectors and in the technology industry including advising startups, businesses, government contractors as well as corporations such as Microsoft and Google. Under Omar’s leadership, UVision has developed and integrated solutions for organizations in mission-critical sectors such as defense, homeland security, and government as well as solutions for high-tech startups and enterprises including intranet, secure mobile communications, Software as a Service (SaaS), e-commerce, m-commerce, elearning, asset management, risk management, gap analysis assessments and business intelligence. Drawing from his extensive background in emerging technologies and experience in multiple platforms, architectures and projects in various industries, Omar has helped define UVision’s management, engineering, development and technology consulting approach.
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We build smart, scalable and secure next generation technology solutions. — Omar Uddin Founder & CEO
A Novel Approach UVision provides clients a tiered approach of assessments and advisory services in addition to consulting and application development services combined with various technology solutions. Tailored assessments and advisory services help clients de-risk organizations by avoiding mistakes, accelerating a path to success as well as to help them streamline their process, reduce cost and improve bottom lines. UVision also provides solutions for cloud and on-device edge computing with secure architectures and smart systems built with artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning & machine intelligence. Uvision combines smart systems, scalable platforms and secure solutions into every new project and opportunity. It is not only limited to IT, IoT and software stacks, but also help its clients by leveraging proprietary technology solutions including patented technologies from their own portfolio as well as through partnerships. A Flexible Strategy Over 14 years of operation, UVision was required at times to alter strategic plans due to changes in markets,
competition and to pursue bigger opportunities. In turn, this often led to changes in personnel, capabilities, IP and offerings as well. According to UVision, developing new products and working with constrained resources is a common, but challenging task. Thus, the company adopted a hybrid of flexible strategies and methodologies combined with learning, agility and continuous innovation. This strategy helped the company grow and stay relevant by creating new models for the problems. Leveraging Technological Advancements Advancements in AI, analytics, machine intelligence and cloud computing have made it important for small and large companies to build, support & grow often by acquiring or developing critical game changing advantages over competitors. UVision helps organizations prepare for their new concepts and new growth strategies by working in a consultative and collaborative approach to solve difficult business challenges. The company enables its clients to improve operations and develop strategies for reducing costs through tailored strategic planning and risk identification. By doing so, UVision empowers clients to grow through
data-driven solutions and reengineering, providing capabilities and resources with more ROI, business value and new opportunities. Through this process, clients are able to leverage a variety of solutions that leads to results & value for their end customers. Future-driven Vision UVision is focused on developing and integrating solutions to enable clients to engage their customers, empower employees, optimize operations, and transform their business using innovative methods such as artificial intelligence, machine learning, data science, VR and AR, and the Internet of Things. UVision also aids clients in maintaining compliance within their operations and platforms through compliance mapping & auditting solutions that can benefit the entire organization for governance, risk and regulatory compliance concerns. UVision is also developing innovations in information intelligence, business intelligence, artificial intelligence and immersive realities which are important technology advancements in the world today. By doing so, the company is aiming to provide more useful solutions and value to people and organizations in the future.
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Zeid Husban Founder & CEO
POSRocket
Entrepreneurs, Brace yourselves for the
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Expert’s Viewpoint
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he Fourth Industrial Revolution Is Here
We first started using steam and water to boost production. We then moved on to using electricity, oil and steel to create mass production. After that, we were introduced to information and communication technology (ICT) in the 1980s, around the time the Digital Era started. Finally, we reach a point in time that served (and continually serves…) as a turning point for many people; the Fourth Industrial Revolution a.k.a Industry 4.0. The technological breakthroughs that have accompanied the Fourth Revolution include artificial intelligence, 3D printing, The Internet of Things, robotics and many other technological developments. We, more often than not, underestimate the speed and rate of change that is occurring in today’s world and how fast we’re branching out of the Digital Revolution into something bigger and more ambitious. We therefore tend to overlook or rather dismiss how these technological advancements have shaped our daily lives and not to mention the impact they have from a business perspective. How’s This Important for Businesses?
have to go to China or the USA to get certain products you can’t get locally, all you have to do is order it online and it’ll be there at your threshold without you taking one single step outside the door. Because of all the services that we can now obtain without much effort on our part, customer expectations have definitely increased over the past few years. Google, YouTube, Uber, Anghami (or Spotify), Amazon and many other online services have raised the bar for customer expectations by a lot. The upcoming generation of consumers are millennials who grew up with technology, so you can’t expect them to do whatever was tolerable for people a few decades ago; like reading instruction manuals, ordering food on the phone or be placed on a waiting list. Why do that when they have Google there to answer their every question whenever they want? Or book a hotel room on phone when you can just use Airbnb to book one in seconds? Businesses and industries are seeing a rise in new technologies that are being created to enhance existing services. This is why many startups and freshfaced entrepreneurs today are thriving and growing faster than ever, pushing aside all bigger competitors by providing better quality and faster services for convenient and reasonable prices.
With the approach of the Fourth Revolution, long commutes, physical labor and low pay have long been a distant memory. With the available technology, people can now spend more time with their loved ones while also working full-time jobs and receiving steady incomes. You can now connect with your coworkers and managers from across the globe with a click of a button or communicate with them through a small device.
The reason for the success of these businesses is also because they’re veering away from the traditional methods of providing services and putting emphasis on strengthening their relationships with their consumers (B2C) and businesses (B2B). Businesses should therefore place more focus on building a deeper connection with clients whether that client is a company or just a regular customer.
Likewise, e-commerce and online shopping have transformed our lives on a whole different scale. You don’t
Adaptation in this age and era is key. The demands and focus of customers are shifting more towards mobile and
online services, like accessing certain data or using platforms that meet their social needs. We’re talking about things like day-to-day activities of ordering food, shopping and traveling that are easily accessible via mobile or computer. Furthermore, this forces companies to start considering providing services and designing them to the costumers’ liking so they can get themselves back on the business market. The Bottom Line The Fourth Revolution has a major effect on businesses from customer expectations to organizational forms. It’s fact; economy revolves around the consumers, therefore, how they are served and what kind of services they’re getting should become the most important aspect businesses and entrepreneurs need to take into consideration. Businesses need to be able to turn their physical products into online-based or automated services that enhance customer experiences. Nowadays, anything online or technological will be automatically viewed by the client as more durable and long-lasting. The new era has forced companies and start-ups alike to re-examine how they run their businesses or the services or products they provide. Both entrepreneurs and executives need to understand and stop underestimating the evolutionary changes that are constantly happening in the world around us. Customers are becoming more demanding, they want more and expect more from companies. The bottom line is simply this; we need extremely creative business leaders and entrepreneurs to take the rails, because they’re the ones who will truly improve the economy and provide innovative ways to make life for your average Joe easier.
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