Tech Talks Daily

CesiumAstro builds high-throughput, plug-and-play phased array communication payloads for space and airborne platforms. Cesium's full-stack, multi-mission hardware and software products enable a diverse range of commercial and defense objectives.

Backed by Airbus Ventures, Kleiner Perkins, and additional key investors, CesiumAstro is at the center of this evolution, with a configurable, adaptable product portfolio that extends the quality and cost of terrestrial data networking to new frontiers.

Shey Sabripour is the founder and CEO of CesiumAstro, Inc. Shey has nearly three decades of leadership success in design, development, and execution of LEO and GEO telecommunication satellites, launch vehicles, and other interplanetary space vehicles.

During his 24 years of continuous career with Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Shey served as a design engineer, technology innovator, program manager, and ultimately, the Director of Spacecraft Design responsible for an organization of 370 engineers, scientists, and business professionals in missions ranging from $100M to $1B.

From 2001 through 2005, Shey served as the Director of Agile Payload Program, where he led a multidisciplinary team for design, development, qualification and successful flight of the first Lockheed Martin Commercial Active Phased Array Payload. His last program at Lockheed Martin was in the design, development, qualification and production of the United States Navy's first MUOS communication satellite. Shey was recognized 14 times by Lockheed Martin Corporation as a visionary innovator and program leader. He was named person of the year in 2005 at Lockheed Martin Commercial Space Systems.

From September of 2014 to December of 2016, Shey served as the CTO for Firefly Space Systems, a startup rocket company in Austin Texas. In that role, Shey was responsible for technical and program management of the Alpha Rocket. He was instrumental in growing the small team of 11 engineers to more than 160 in 2016. His team successfully bid and won the NASA VCLS mission and two DARPA contracts at Firefly.

It all began at a hackathon in 2015. RapidAPI was made by developers for developers so they could have one place to access APIs and Microservices and build applications more efficiently and easily. Today, RapidAPI is the world's largest API Marketplace where over 1 million developers can find, test, and connect to tens of thousands of APIs — all with a single account, single API key, and single SDK.

Software developers can also share and collaborate on internal APIs using RapidAPI for Teams, a common workspace to publish internal APIs and share public API subscriptions. In turn, organizations can use RapidAPI Enterprise to create a centralized hub environment to help developers reuse and connect to existing APIs faster while providing IT with enterprise-wide visibility and governance of API consumption.

Iddo Gino, CEO of RapidAPI joins me on the Tech Talks Daily podcast. We talk about the Growth of the API Economy through the pandemic and beyond. I lear how developers are not just using APIs to connect apps and services, they are using them to build new digital business models and services and to drive innovation.

They use APIs like Lego blocks, putting them together in different ways to create new products and services. This is how companies will transform their business - by empowering the developer. We discuss how RapidAPI helps developers and their organizations accelerate digital transformation efforts and API use cases they are seeing.

New Orleans is becoming a hotbed for entrepreneurial activity, and Patrick Comer intends to contribute to the growing startup energy in the region. With a background in research, data analysis, and technology development, the next new thing of course, combines all three.

Patrick Comer founded Lucid with a vision to democratize data collection by applying programmatic technology to market research. Lucid is now the worldwide leader in enterprise marketplaces for sampling. Since its inception in 2010, Lucid has become one of the most successful tech startups in New Orleans, with hundreds of employees across the globe.

The company has evolved to democratize market research through programmatic technology -- effectively helping global brands (like Spotify) understand changing consumer sentiments and how to best market to these new personas. All through data provided at what was previously an unprecedented pace and scale for the market research industry.

Patrick also coined the term ResTech. ResTech is a comprehensive term for the software and tools that help platforms, agencies, and brands target, deliver, and analyze their insights initiatives. Patrick shares the story behind the company that now far exceeds $10 million in annual revenue.

Patrick shares his belief that ResTech has the power to provide marketers with a clear roadmap to success. It helps marketers remain on the pulse of their customers' changing sentiments so that they can understand what makes them tick, what they care about, and how to best appeal to them through personalized and targeted messaging.

I used to hear parents proudly discussing screen limits they imposed on their kids. But fast forward 12 months when those same screens are essential to their education and entertainment, most parents would agree things have changed.

When researching the topic, I came across an inspiring story of Estelle and Douglas Lloyd, the husband-and-wife entrepreneur duo & founders of kids' edutainment app Azoomee, who are on a mission to make all childrens' screen time count. As new parents, Doug and Estelle quickly realized that the most innocuous search terms on their kids' computers could result in utterly inappropriate and even psychologically damaging web pages being served to their young children. Azoomee was born out of the necessity to allow the couple's kids to browse and enjoy the internet freely without the risk of stumbling upon adult content.

The topic of children's online safety has never been more pertinent than during lockdown. The fact is, the internet remains an incredibly dangerous playground unless carefully curated for young people. Screen-time is suddenly all the time, with most children now relying largely or entirely on their tablets, phones, and laptops for their education - so this needs to be an absolute priority for parents. The couple are advocating for a wholesale reimagining of education, driving for a holistic approach to learning, bringing it out of the drudgery of 'go to school/go home', and making learning something that happens organically, enjoyably, round-the-clock, and most importantly of all - safely.

Azoomee is a global media company, and app development studio focused on engaging entertainment applications for kids. Available across connected devices and platforms, Azoomee offers a vast library of inspiring and imaginative TV shows that foster curiosity and wonder in kids.

BAFTA-nominated and winner of multiple awards, the Azoomee app delivers a unique selection of action-packed games, brainteasers, puzzles and creative activities so that kids can build their imaginations and sense of wonder.

Everything's handpicked, so kids are safe to explore. Azoomee is loved by children worldwide and can be downloaded for free from the App Store and Google Play store, and found on connected TVs and via our partnerships with Amazon, O2, Vodafone, and many other platforms around the world.

Douglas Lloyd shares the story behind Azoomee and how it helps keep kids safe online by ensuring all screen time is positive screen time. We also discuss the potential of 5G and AR to bring education to life for kids.

Many technology leaders struggle to be highly connected to their teams and fully engaged with their families. They are wicked smart, high IQs, and know their business like the back of their hands. They live in a tech world that is rapidly changing; and unfortunately, many are under tremendous stress.

It is not their fault - they don't have time, energy or knowledge to think about engagement, connectedness or emotional intelligence with their teams. Fortunately, it is possible for them to become deeply self-aware of their behaviors, identify solutions for their specific challenges and fully engage and connect with their teams and their families.

After spending 20+ years in corporate software and security companies, Tenice Wehmeyer began partnering with security and software leaders to create curiosity of the ripples and level of engagement they have with those around them – both inside and outside of the office. Then using this self-awareness, we create new ripples of productive impact with their team, peers, and key stakeholders and the energy to devote to their life outside of work.

After reading how Tenice coaches Cybersecurity leaders to have a greater impact by being connected and engaged with those who matter most, I invited her on to the podcast to learn more. Tenice shares her story and how she is helping others

Dan McGaw is an award-winning entrepreneur and speaker. He is also the Founder and CEO of McGaw.io, an analytics and marketing technology consultancy. Coined as one of the original growth hackers, he has led the teams at Kissmetrics.com, CodeSchool.com, UTM.io and more.

In 2015, Dan was selected to be a United States Ambassador of Entrepreneurship by the United States Department of State, where he had the privilege to advise the government, universities, and private corporations on how to build entrepreneur ecosystems.

Dan takes a deep dive into MarTech and discusses how to leverage Amazon-like automation & and personalization strategies without having an Amazon-like budget. When people think of advanced personalization, they often assume it is complex and out of reach for them. However, with the right data taxonomy and structure, 1 to 1 personalization across email, text, ad campaigns, and on-page optimization, can be achieved, a lot easier than you think.

As each customer enters the funnel at different stages, Dan shares how companies can build an advanced personalization journey that increases conversions through each stage, without the need for expensive back-end developer resources.

Emarsys empowers digital marketing leaders and business owners with its omnichannel customer engagement platform built to accelerate business outcomes. By rapidly aligning desired business results with proven omnichannel customer engagement strategies — crowdsourced from leading brands, their platform enables their customers to accelerate time to value, deliver superior one-on-one experiences, and produce measurable results.

This industry-specific, outcome-driven approach combined with a customer-centric personalization, actionable AI, and a fully integrated Customer Engagement Platform (CEP) can deliver transformational results.

Alex Timlin is the senior vice president of verticals at omnichannel customer engagement company Emarsys. Alex leads the company's world-class client success organization to drive adoption and growth across 2,000+ clients in more than 100 countries — empowering them to better communicate with their contacts and customers across billions or engagements.

Alex joins me on the Tech Talks Daily podcast to discuss how technology has changed the retail industry, the rise in online shopping, and digital channel engagement mean for brands. We also discuss the latest news on the impact of the ASOS acquisition of Arcadia brands Topshop, Topman, Miss Selfridge, and sports brand HIIT.

Raffi Jamgotchian has been in the cybersecurity and IT field for over 25 years, first in corporate finance and later as the owner of his own firm. Currently, Triada Networks supports boutique investment firms. Raffi recently co-authored an Amazon bestseller called "On Thin Ice" with 30 other cybersecurity experts.

Raffi shares insights from the book and his journey in tech. We also discuss how you can learn from making mistakes and taking losses in business, and you can overcome challenges in business.

Triada Networks provides data security, business continuity, and IT solutions. Boutique investment firms and small businesses deserve cybersecurity and IT solutions that give them a competitive edge, not take it away. I learn more about their mission to empower businesses and employees to leverage the best technological solutions so they can grow.

Le Wagon is a coding bootcamp that teaches students to develop web applications from scratch. Our cutting-edge curriculum and world-class teachers give students all the skills and tools needed to kick-start their tech career, land a job as software developers or product managers, or launch their own startup.

Today's guest is Boris Paillard, founder and CEO of Le Wagon. We discuss why we're currently seeing such a high demand for data science skills. As the demand for these skills continues to increase, it's essential to understand what's driving this demand. Boris shares his expert perspective on these factors and can also cover the broader trends shaping the data science sector, including:

• Widespread digital transformation of companies – At a significant pace, across all industries
• Decision making rooted in data, not individual judgment – The scale of large companies prohibits effective, individualized judgments
• The historic data skills gap – Why it existed, and what's changing

Peter Voss is a Serial Entrepreneur, Engineer, Inventor, and a Pioneer in Artificial Intelligence. Peter started out in electronics engineering, but quickly moved into software. After developing a comprehensive ERP software package, Peter took his first software company from a zero to 400-person IPO in seven years. Fueled by the fragile nature of software, Peter embarked on a 20-year journey to study intelligence (how it develops in humans, how to measure it, and current AI efforts), and to replicate it in software. His research culminated in the creation of a natural language intelligence engine that can think, learn, and reason -- and adapt to, and grow with the user. He even coined the term 'AGI' (Artificial General Intelligence) with fellow luminaries in the space.

Peter founded SmartAction.ai in 2009, which developed the first AGI-based call center automation technology. Now, in his latest venture, he is taking that technology a step further with the commercialization of the second generation of his 'Conversational AI' technology with a bold mission of providing hyper-intelligent hyper-personal assistants for everyone. In addition to being an entrepreneur, engineer, inventor and AI pioneer, Peter often writes and presents on various philosophical topics including rational ethics, free will and artificial minds; and is deeply involved with futurism and radical life-extension. Aigo.ai is the first *personal* personal assistant that becomes smarter and more personalized as it learns from you and your network (people, devices, other AIs), essentially becoming your ExoCortex. Based on a highly advanced 'cognitive architecture' – implementing the 'Third Wave of AI,' Aigo will change the way we communicate with each other - and our network of family, friends, and devices.