Tech Talks Daily

I'm excited to have Josh Rogers, CEO of Precisely, joining us today. We last spoke in 2020, but I was intrigued to learn that he has led the company through seven acquisitions. So I invited him to join me again to share his unique perspective on the current Mergers and Acquisitions (M & A) market.

As we all know, today's business leaders are facing a complex and challenging economic environment, with many facing the decision to either move forward or cease M&A activity completely. In fact, PwC reports that in comparison to the first half of 2021, deal values have declined by 20 percent.

However, buyers can experience better returns during a downturn and achieve outsized growth as valuations come down, according to the same analysis from PwC. Josh touches on this and the current economic environment, evaluating risk, and how leaders should proceed with M&As. He also shares his experience leading Precisely through seven acquisitions and the company's acquisition plans in the current market. Additionally, we discuss how leaders should communicate acquisitions to customers and the acquired company's employees.

Listen in as one of the most experienced M&A leaders in the tech industry shares his insights.

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On today's edition of Tech Talks Daily Podcast, I'm joined by Vinay Joosery, CEO of Severalnines. The database industry veteran shares with me how Severalnines has built its reputation around open-source database operations, driven by a values-driven approach to building products that deliver "Wow!" moments to customers.

Vinay also delves into data sovereignty and how organizations often center their discussions around data residency for compliance purposes. He explains that true data sovereignty is an extension of sovereignty over an organization's stack and that heavy users of public clouds and their services, such as DBaaS, are not truly sovereign. However, it's not a binary proposition, and there are varying degrees of sovereignty.

Vinay also touches on the importance of stack decisions being made based on balancing capabilities and risk tolerance, not convenience. He also points out the risks of cloud deployment models, including vendor, environment, ecosystem lock-in, database license type and stability, key-man risk, cost predictability, etc.

Vinay shares that the landscape has evolved to enable organizations to get the convenience of cloud deployment models and the reliability and scalability of DBaaS without sacrificing their sovereignty wholesale. Please tune in to learn more about data sovereignty and how organizations can make informed decisions about their data stack.

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On today's episode of the podcast, we're discussing the importance of innovation in warehouse safety as workers in states like New York, Illinois, and California speak up about poor safety protocols and high injury rates. I am joined by Beemal Vasani, Director of Ansell's Inteliforz, a connected workplace safety solutions brand.

Beemal believes that a company's safety program directly reflects its workplace culture and explains how investing in safety solutions technology and employee engagement tools can encourage safer workplaces, speed up training, and reduce onsite injuries. According to the National Safety Council, every $1 invested in injury prevention returns between $2 and $6.

We'll also discuss how wearable technology can act as the eyes and ears of employees, especially when staffing and training courses are tight, to ensure the correct personal protective equipment is being used at the right time. Additionally, we'll explore how communication platforms or apps can help workers quickly identify and report unsafe conditions and provide real-time feedback.

Beemal also shares how Inteliforz can tailor its platforms to a company's specific needs, making them as large and robust or as simple and minimal as needed. In addition, with customizable haptic technology based on a company's dataset, Inteliforz enables solutions to be tailored to a company's specific needs.

Tune in to learn more about how technology can improve health and safety in the warehouse industry and how organizations can better equip their staff through wearable and connected technology.

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Theta Labs is the company behind Theta Network, the leading chain for media & entertainment. Theta has partnered with brands and personalities such as Katy Perry, Sony, Samsung, Google, American Idol, World Poker Tour, and many more. So, the recent launch of Metachain seemed like an excellent opportunity to learn more about it. ]

Metachain is the new customizable, highly scalable blockchain designed for media and entertainment businesses, built from the ground up to be a user-centric, simple, and intuitive platform. It's developed for the needs of video platforms, ticketing companies, metaverses, and other enterprises as they evolve to decentralized models.

Among two of Theta's biggest fans — and two of its advisors — are Steve Chen, co-founder of YouTube, and Justin Kan, Co-Founder of Twitch. Steve Chen has said, "Theta's innovation is set to disrupt today's online video industry much in the same way that the YouTube platform did to traditional video back in 2005."

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Andrew De La Torre is the Group Vice President of Technology at Oracle Communications. He is responsible for making strategic decisions that improve the company's competitiveness and leads the technical sales, business development and acquisitions teams. He has over 20 years of experience in the telecommunications industry, including leadership roles at Vodafone, and has also consulted in other industries such as oil and gas and construction. He has experience in corporate governance, finance, strategic planning, and technology transformation.

Today, he joins me on Tech Talks Daily to discuss the upcoming trends in 5G technology and what communication service providers are looking for. I also learn more about how Oracle Communications offers integrated comms & cloud solutions for service providers & Enterprises to accelerate their digital transformation journey.

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SOURCE Global is an Arizona-based organization founded by world-renowned Engineering professor Cody Friesen whose mission is to make drinking water an unlimited resource. The brand is backed by Bill Gates Breakthrough Energy Ventures, Microsoft's Climate Innovation Fund, and Blackrock.

I invited Neil Grimmer to join me on Tech Talks Daily to discuss how the company's hydropanels use the sun to draw pure water vapor out of the air and transform it into fresh, high-quality, perfectly mineralized drinking water. I also want to learn more about the technology that makes it al possible and how it has impacted the citizens of remote communities in 50 countries worldwide.

About Neil Neil Grimmer is an entrepreneur with a rich history of disrupting categories by bringing to market innovative products and human-centered brands. Leading with an exceptional blend of intuition and data-driven strategy, he has been an architect and accelerator of impact-driven companies for over two decades. Currently, Neil is the Brand President for SOURCE Global, PBC, a technology company harnessing the unlimited resources of sunlight and air to produce clean drinking water globally.

Prior to his current role, Neil served as the first- ever Brand President for Harley Davidson where he was responsible for all consumer-facing global touchpoints. For over a decade, Neil solidified his passion for brands with a social purpose when he founded two successful health and wellness companies, Habit and Plum Organics. Both companies share a progressive approach to food innovation and nutrition science with disruptive products that revolutionized their industries.

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Intel's Ignite program is one of the most competitive and challenging accelerator programs for early-stage startups, providing the winners with everything they need to compete and succeed in the tech industry. The program offers access to world-leading experts in technology and business, a preferred path to top investors, as well as the knowledge, resources, and association that comes with being accepted into the program.

The 12-week program focuses on mentorship and is designed for the 10 most diverse and impressive early-stage startups. Tzahi "Zack" Weisfeld, the program director, joins md on Tech Talks Daily to discuss how the Ignite program stands out from other startup accelerators and the recent expansion in Boston. He also shares insights he's gathered from the program since its launch in 2019.

I also learn how they are helping turn cutting-edge ideas into industry-disrupting technologies by giving entrepreneurs hands-on mentorship, technical support, and the business acumen they need to build world-changing companies.

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Quasar is a new app-chain built in the Cosmos Ecosystem, optimizing inter-chain value capture with a human-centric design. Its mission is to provide sustainable, sovereign, and ergonomic investment vehicles for digital assets. Quasar's flagship product will be yield-aggregating vaults that enable users to easily deposit Cosmos-based tokens, and passively earn yield generated from automated strategies. It will function like a decentralized, permissionless hedge fund.

Valentin Pletnev, the 23-year-old CEO and co-founder of Quasar Finance, discusses how Cosmos represents the future of blockchain and why he beives it's the best way to deliver on the decentralization blockchain has promised from the start. He also discusses the Appchain thesis, Permissionless vaults, Non-custodial trading, Defi native inter-chain strategies.

Listen in to learn more about Quasar and how it plans to bring simplicity, fairness, and ease of use to the DeFi sector, with the aim of opening the sector to much wider adoption.

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Karoli Hindriks, an Estonian entrepreneur, has made a major pivot in her business that has proven to be a game-changer for her company, Jobbatical. In 2018, the company was recognized by Forbes as one of Europe's 10 most exciting technology SMEs. However, as Karoli noticed that the biggest problem for her clients in international hiring was not the hiring process but getting people into the country, she decided to take an incredible leap of faith.

Karoli decided to focus on automating the immigration and relocation process, providing businesses with a way to retain talent amidst a growing global skills shortage. Her new business model, which removes the friction of labour mobility, became more critical than ever in 2022 as worker priorities continue to shift in favor of borderless working in the wake of the pandemic.

As a result, business has been booming for Jobbatical, with 8x ARR growth in the past 12 months alone. Karoli's entrepreneurial spirit began early, founding her first company at 16 and becoming the youngest inventor in Estonia to have a registered patent. By the age of 23, she became the youngest-ever CEO at MTV. In 2021, she gave a talk at TED@Monterey, becoming the first person from Estonia to ever speak on the main TED stage in the US.

Karoli's TEDtalk, "Why Passport Needs an Upgrade," has been translated into twelve languages. In 2020, the EU Council named her one of 8 most inspiring women in Europe, and this year EU-Startups named her one of the 50 most influential women in the European startup and VC space for the seventh year running.

Karoli shares her story, Jobbatical's journey, the importance of hiring beyond borders, why being resilient in business is critical for success, and her famous Happy Dance in Times Square.

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In today's data-driven world, staying aware of the latest trends and strategies in data management and innovation is essential for success. Unfortunately, many chief data officers (CDOs) and business leaders must understand what other organizations and industries are doing with data. However, with this awareness and a basic curiosity, CDOs may be able to innovate and improve their business operations.

On this Tech Talks Daily podcast episode, Roman Kucera discusses this issue and the importance of staying informed about other companies' data strategies and practices. He emphasizes that while there are rarely entirely new ideas for using data, there are often opportunities to borrow and adapt ideas from others.

I also learn more about the story behind Ataccama. Recently spun off from Adastra, the company also secured $150 million in funding from Bain Capital to fuel its worldwide expansion. As a provider of master data management (MDM) and data quality solutions, Ataccama understands the importance of high-quality data that is appropriately managed.

We discuss the need for data quality and proper management, as well as the art of telling effective stories using data (hint: pie charts aren't always the answer). With the right strategies and tools in place, businesses can turn data into a powerful asset for driving growth and innovation.

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