Marketplace Tech

Host Molly Wood speaks with Joseph Steinberg, a cybersecurity consultant, about why some state and federal computing infrastructures are still running on the decades-old coding language COBOL. New Jersey’s recent surge of unemployment benefit claims overwhelmed the system. It might need to be replaced or at least scaled up, Steinberg says, and that can be expensive.

Host Molly Wood speaks with U.S. Rep. Ro Khanna of California, a Democrat whose 17th District includes Silicon Valley, about how the coronavirus pandemic is affecting business for tech companies. Many of these companies, he says, have been pitching various tech-based solutions, and many are still not being used. Right now he is also working with Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and other legislators to help gig workers maintain their flow of income.

Host Molly Wood speaks with Aziz Gilani of venture capital firm Mercury Fund about why venture-backed startup companies are not included in the coronavirus relief bill, which allows small businesses to apply for loans. Congress did not intend to leave startups out, he says, but the oversight means his company is scrambling to find ways to support some 40 companies in Mercury’s portfolio.

Kimberly James, 46, of Rome, Georgia, is a gig worker who has delivered food and transported passengers. But she has health problems, and has had to stop working to minimize her exposure to COVID-19. But, as a gig worker, not an employee, she has way fewer options for how to keep herself afloat financially.

Host Kimberly Adams speaks with her sister, Nichole Adams-Flores, psychology supervisor for CHE Behavioral Health Services, about how telehealth has changed during the pandemic to allow her to continue offering mental health care to the elderly patients she works with. Now, Adams-Flores says, they are allowed to use popular apps like WhatsApp or FaceTime to stay in touch with loved ones and doctors. It does pose some patient privacy questions, and Adams-Flores says that’s been a big topic of conversation.

Host Kimberly Adams speaks with Matt Day, a tech reporter at Bloomberg, about Amazon’s current state as it is still shipping out products during this pandemic when people are being ordered to stay at home. Workers at Amazon warehouses, Day says, have organized walkouts and speaking out about their working conditions — working more to ship out both essential and nonessential goods. Day notes, however, that Amazon’s core business model isn’t only e-commerce, but also anything regarding Amazon Web Services, so they will survive business-wise this pandemic.

Host Molly Wood speaks with Kim Zetter, a cybersecurity journalist, about the spike of Zoom bombing — a new phenomenon where strangers obtain Zoom meeting IDs and barge in digitally to disrupt the meeting. Zoom is also facing different scrutiny, Zetter says, now that it was discovered that the platform had been sharing data to Facebook without being fully transparent. Zetter adds that Zoom users — especially those hosting digital meetings — should be mindful of the privacy breaches the platform may have and start requiring passwords for Zoom guests to wait and be let into the e-meetings.

Host Molly Wood speaks with Rajiv Shah, president of the Rockefeller Foundation. Back in 2014, Shah was in charge of leading the Ebola response in West Africa, and only with data metrics, he says, was his team of epidemiologists able to identify those who had tested positive with the disease and those who at least had symptoms of the disease. With that in mind, Shah says the U.S. should create some sort of data-driven response to identify the same issues with COVID-19 — who’s tested positive, who’s symptomatic, what is working with social distancing (or not) and what health care workers need.

Host Molly Wood speaks with Chris Giattina, CEO of the Alabama-based manufacturing and design firm Blox, which specializes in modular medical facility construction. During this time of crisis, when hospitals are reaching their capacity to treat regular patients on top of treating those with COVID-19, Blox is beginning production on its mobile isolation care units, or MICUs, to help alleviate hospital space. With Blox’s technology, these modular medical facilities are built in only weeks, rather than months — and they have everything a doctor needs to keep treating patients. They’re also cheaper than traditional hospital beds.

Host Molly Wood speaks with Jacqueline Linnes, a professor of biomedical engineering who runs a lab at Purdue University, about what sort of tech is needed to produce COVID-19 tests in the face of a shortage. She says production at scale during the pandemic is the biggest challenge. Linnes also says academia may be prompted by the accelerated work during the pandemic to rethink how peer reviews are conducted. A lot of peer reviewers are usually excited to read about the next big thing around biosensors, for example, but pay little attention to more mundane things regarding manufacturing.