Author Archive

Uber Turns Passive Data Into Active Earnings

Monday, December 5th, 2016

Rumblings about monetizing passive data have been part of the tech sector conversation for years.

Until recently, however, it hasn’t been easy to point to concrete examples of companies making their passive data work for their bottom line. That’s now changed, and one front-running example is Uber’s Driver API.

With over 1.5 million Uber drivers on the road, logging trip, financial, rating and profile information, there is an obvious market for developers building driver-experience-enhancing apps: a direct, practical step toward monetizing passive data.

This applied data isn’t only boosting Uber’s profile: It’s creating opportunities for enterprise, giving established players and up-and-coming developers a huge market to tap into, and a chance to partner with a massive startup success.

As TechCrunch reports, Uber has already reached out to developers interested in creating tools. Drivers can access a CV-building tool, track their tax owings, or connect to an auto repair rewards system.

Uber’s step into monetizing data won’t just endear them to developers eager to enter a new market. This is a partnership-building tool, and a vanguard example to other companies looking to transform data into new business opportunities.

Postmates, On-Demand Delivery App, Now Worth $600M

Friday, December 2nd, 2016

San Francisco-based Postmates, an on-demand delivery app that competes with UberEats and DoorDash, has just secured $140 million in funding led by Founders Fund, valuing it at $600 million.

It wasn’t an easy process for Postmates CEO Bastian Lehmann, who told TechCrunch that the “fundraising environment…has cooled, specifically in the on-demand space.” Nevertheless, Postmates succeeded, likely thanks to its proven track record.

While many other on-demand companies have struggled to grow revenues beyond a delivery-fee-based model, Postmates has been able to bring in extra money by selling premium placements to some 6,000 merchants.

The company plans to use the new funding to improve engineering and expand to new markets.

Postmates currently completes over 1.5 million deliveries a month and claims it’s on track to hit profitability at some point in 2017. Lehmann says an IPO is one option he’s considering for the future, but not in the next 12 months.

Blockchain Breaks New Boundaries: Insurance and Authentication

Tuesday, November 29th, 2016

Bitcoin dominates social media discussion about blockchain, but insurance and security are growing in the conversation. How are these frontiers being explored in the world of startups?

Blockchain Wordcloud

According to Market Realist, the U.S. insurance industry is worth $1.2 billion. The decentralized ledger technology of blockchain, which can instantly prove asset ownership, offers new markets to the industry.

For example, parametric insurance could be paid out automatically with blockchain technology given external triggers, such as earthquakes. One early implementation of this is the San Mateo-based startup Rainvow, which pays out in the event of poor weather.  TechCrunch has more about how blockchain is transforming the insurance industry.

Blockchain technology is also joining forces with biometric security. HYPR recently closed out $3 million of funding for a solution that addresses a weak spot in blockchain security by allowing transactions to be authenticated with biometric signatures.

Developer FYI

Tech Heads West

Friday, November 25th, 2016

A booming tech scene is not only transforming B.C.’s economy, but the lives of its citizens.

On March 14 – 15, the second #BCTECH Summit will showcase this transformation to an audience expected to number in the thousands.

“The tech industry continues to be a core driver for B.C.’s economy, and has grown by an impressive 14 per cent in the past two years,” says Shahrzad Rafati, founder and CEO, BroadbandTV, “Now is the perfect time for us to evolve beyond Silicon Valley of the North and collectively define who we are and what we stand for.”

Advances in the Internet of Things, artificial intelligence, augmented reality, cleantech, and autonomous vehicles will all be on the agenda, along with keynote addresses from thought leaders such as Ben Parr, author of Captivology, and IBM.

“There is incredible innovation happening in British Columbia,” says Shirley Vickers, president and CEO, BC Innovation Council, “And the #BCTECH Summit will showcase global thought leadership and position our province as a beacon of transformative tech for the world to see.”

Register for #BCTECH before December 20 to take advantage of early bird pricing, and use our promo code TechPORT100 to save an additional $100.

Startups Vie For $25,000 Investment at IBM SmartCamp

Thursday, November 24th, 2016

IBM SmartCamp could provide your startup with “life-changing” opportunities, according to Yoly Avalos, Founder and CEO of Bquate.

But if you are one of the global top ten winners, it could be worth $25,000 of investment and a spot in the LAUNCH Incubator in San Francisco.

IBM SmartCamp is a global pitch competition for early-stage startups hosted by IBM and LAUNCH. From Amsterdam to Wilmington, DE, chosen startups will take part in a startup bootcamp and compete in a round of live pitches.

If you want in at this early stage, sign up to IBM Bluemix today.

Ten semi-finalists selected from around the world will exhibit at the LAUNCH Festival, San Francisco’s biggest startup conference, before the IBM SmartCamp Global Finals kick off. They will demonstrate their solutions to top founders and investors, and gain priceless networking opportunities.

Three finalists will emerge from a round of onstage pitching to win a spot in the SmartCamp Global finals and an interview with Jason Calacanis, host of This Week in Startups. The overall winner will win a place in the LAUNCH Incubator and a $25,000 investment from the LAUNCH Fund.

If your city is below, there’s still time to sign up.

Deadlines remaining

Cairo — November 26
Denver — November 30
Dubai — December 8
London, Ont. — December 1
Singapore — November 27

Related

Why developers should sign up to SmartCamp

Ultra-HD Special Effects Powered by IBM Cloud

Wednesday, November 16th, 2016

Prana Studios, the award-winning 3-D graphics and visual effects company behind Disney hits like Planes, is using IBM Cloud infrastructure in the production of an Ultra-High Definition project for an upcoming deluxe theme park attraction.

Over 1,000 bare-metal IBM Cloud servers were used in rendering the photo-realistic 3-D stereo presentation. The project’s resolution was twelve times larger than 1920×1080 Full HD, and designed to be played through 12 projectors on a 400-ft wide screen at 60 frames per second—nearly three times HD’s frame rate.

“Scaling to cloud was the logical next step for us to continue to operate efficiently even on such a complex project,” said Anish Mulani, President and COO of Prana Studios.

With significantly large file sizes involved, Prana Studios also needed the cloud solution to help reduce download times so that it would work within their tight time constraints.

Prana Studios

Rendering files were output from IBM Cloud to Prana’s on-site servers using IBM Aspera high-speed file transfer technology. Prana was able to make creative changes under client direction without dramatically altering the production schedule of the show.

For more on cloud technology on IBM Bluemix, click here.

How Big Companies Can Make Innovation Successful

Tuesday, November 15th, 2016

Every company wants innovation to be a core value, but innovation doesn’t happen on its own.

That was the key takeaway of Kirstine Stewart’s talk at MaRS Verge in Toronto today, an event that attracted 175 people from 20 different sectors.

“Success needs to be praised, but failure also needs to be supported,” said Stewart. “If people don’t believe they can stick their neck out, they won’t.”

Kirstine Stewart is the chief strategy officer of Diply, a social news and content website. Prior to joining the London, ON-based company Stewart was VP of North American partnerships at Twitter.

“Somehow, we think of innovation as being scary and that we have to disrupt everything,” said Stewart.

Stewart believes that the key to taking fear out of innovation is building an environment of trust. 

There can’t be fear of negative consequences if a project or initiative does not have a successful outcome. Failure has to be supported in order to build trust with employees.

“When I worked in the U.S. this was part of their culture I wish Canada had more of,” said Stewart.

Jon Worren, Senior Director of Entrepreneurship Programs at MaRS says culture is critical to making innovation successful.

“People often come to us because they think something’s not working in their company’s approach to innovation and it usually comes down to culture,” Worren told TechPORTFOLIO. “Many corporates recognize that startups have set the model in how to build an innovative company culture.”

What else helps make innovation possible in both startups and large enterprise?

Innovation comes from all employees — not just the IT department

“Innovation doesn’t have a look,” said Stewart. “It’s not about being Steve Jobs in a black turtleneck.”

Tech companies earn a lot of media coverage for being harbingers of innovation, but they can also struggle to scale with it.

“They’re often based on founder culture, and that doesn’t always scale” said Stewart. “Transformation from a startup to a larger company means founder culture needs to expand so everyone feels like a founder of the business.”

Companies that spread power across an employee base are more likely to be successful with innovation.

Innovation might require structural changes

While Stewart was at the CBC, reorganizing the broadcaster’s approach to digital was one of the ways innovation was supported.

The digital team had been siloed and functioned like a hub, rather than being part of everything the organization did. Stewart said the CBC had to dismantle this hub and enable a digital-first mentality across the organization and in every department.

This move fostered innovation.

“You have to empower people with responsibility,” said Stewart. “It has to be embedded into every area of the business and not classed as just an innovation project.”

Look outside, speak up, and manage up

“No matter what size company you’re at, you have to look outside yourself,” said Stewart.

In her time at CBC and Twitter Canada, Stewart learned you have to remind people — who are often talented and have been with a company for a long time — that the world is changing.

As an employee, you also have to speak up even when you think your organization won’t listen: it’s your responsibility to bring ideas forward.

To overcome organizational limitations, Stewart said you have to manage up. Put yourself in your boss’ shoes and think about what he or she has to consider, what the consequences are, and find ways to eliminate risk for them.

“Risk is a scary thing to be signed up for,” said Stewart. “Manage expectations as well as fear of others.”

#WatsonDevCon: The Rise of the Bots

Wednesday, November 9th, 2016

It’s been just two weeks since IBM showed off the power and future of Watson in Las Vegas, and the company is at it again. This time in San Francisco, and this time with a deep developer focus.

Taking place at the Innovation Hangar in downtown San Francisco, IBM’s Watson Developer Conference was home to thousands of developers, coming from all over the world to learn about the power of cognitive technology.

Opening the event, IBM CEO Ginni Rometty set the tone for what’s to come in the world of tech.

IBM Chief Digital Officer Bob Lord made a major announcement, impacting designers, developers, data scientists, and programmers.

While the conversation centered around cognitive technology, attendees were especially interested in the topic of bots.

To say people were excited would be an understatement.

Then again, judging by how far language and tone analysis has come with IBM Watson, “excited” might be just the word needed to appropriately generate a positive sentiment data set.

The top bot-related takeaways from #WatsonDevCon

1) Developers who are building bots need to keep it simple. Don’t throw the kitchen sink at the bot dev process.

Consider the language, tone, and sentiment of users to build-in appropriate responses.

2) What kinds of user experiences should bots create? Conversational or intelligent conversation? These questions generated a few different perspectives from speakers at #WatsonDevCon.

First, developers need to think about how and where someone will use a bot. Some conversations don’t need to appear to be driven by intelligence if they’re just functional.

There are a few things that are important to consider in making a bot feel conversational.

Or maybe it’s more simple than that. Amir Shevat, Director of Developer Relations at Slack, said bots should pass the beer test, not the Turing test.

3) The bot revolution is just beginning.

While bots can already do a lot, panelists on the “Intelligent User Engagement with Chat Bots” panel agreed that there is much opportunity ahead in totally untouched areas and industries.

For businesses that are transitioning to use bots and cognitive technology, the opportunity for developers has become clear.

But opportunity doesn’t stop there.

The final takeaway from #WatsonDevCon: bots are poised to change more than just the world of tech, they’ll soon change tertiary industries and professions as well.

Watson Developer Conference Augments SF’s Intelligence

Tuesday, November 8th, 2016

The IBM Watson Developer Conference kicks off November 9th in the heart of San Francisco, and TechPORTFOLIO will be there delivering live insights.

The three tracks of IBM Watson development content will be delivered in Spotlight and Flash talks, giving attendees and our readers a chance to Envision, Explore, and Engage.

https://twitter.com/Rommel_Rico/status/793833995922345984

From cognitive-enhanced fun in the Watson Beat: Making Music Cognitive session to a crucial security discussion in the Hacking with a Purpose: Safer Communities Through Mobile Tech seminar, this conference will deliver an augmented vision of IBM Watson’s capabilities for developers in all sectors of enterprise and industry.

https://twitter.com/IBMDataScience/status/793087717601120257

Experts from Uber, OmniEarth, Slack, and of course IBM Watson will get to the heart of making business, science, education, and the arts cognitive. As with all great tech revolutions, the cognitive age begins when developers truly get excited.

On-site developers will have access to a brand new Watson Developer Certification.

If you can’t be there in person, make sure to follow along on Twitter.

To learn more about Watson’s capabilities, click here.

Fintech FOMO: Stories for Success on Blockchain and Smart Contracts

Monday, November 7th, 2016

Blockchain is big business: According to CoinDesk, $1.1bn was invested in blockchain and Bitcoin in the first quarter of 2016.

Don’t get left behind.

Here’s a round-up of our coverage of blockchain, smart contracts, and the role of fintech in general.

Developers’ Job Guide: Smart Contracts and Blockchain

Why beginners are at an advantage — and why you should learn Go.

Why Fintech Entrepreneurs Should Make Friends With Regulations

Adam Nanjee, Head of Fintech at MaRS Discovery District, explains the key role of the regulatory environment at each stage of a fintech startup’s development — in animated GIF format.

Visa Testing Blockchain For International Payments

Trials are being planned between several international banks in a challenge to the existing Swift payment system.

https://twitter.com/startuphereTO/status/792745395701092352

Some more stories from our archives:

Ethereum Community Splits After Security Fix
US Postal Service Considers Adopting Digital Currency
As Fintech Spreads, Bank Revenues Are On The Menu for Startups
Behind the Fintech Hype