Former JCPenney, Home Depot Executive and Drop-Ship Expert to Bring Wealth of Retail and Digital Experience to New Role
CommerceHub, Inc. (“CommerceHub”), a leading distributed commerce network for retailers and brands, today announced that Mike Amend has joined the company as Chief Operating Officer. Amend comes to CommerceHub after holding various executive leadership positions at leading retail and technology companies, including serving as EVP Omnichannel at JCPenney, VP Online at The Home Depot, Chief Technology Officer of Global Online at Dell and Deputy Chief Technology Officer at BEA Systems.
“Mike brings a long history of success driving ecommerce growth for top retailers and extensive technology leadership experience to this role. He has a proven track record of transforming business, strategy, technology, and operations at retailers so they can compete effectively in a digital world,” said Frank Poore, Founder and CEO, CommerceHub. “As COO, he will focus on accelerating product innovation and aligning our service and operations teams with our customers to help them leverage CommerceHub’s platform and network to grow revenue and expand merchandise assortments.”
Mike Amend
As EVP of Omnichannel at JCPenney, Amend was instrumental in leading the digital transformation of the brick and mortar retailer with expansion of product selection with drop-shipping, ship-from-store, a new mobile experience and tightly integrating the online and in-store channels. Prior to that, under Mike’s leadership as VP of Online for The Home Depot, online sales grew to over $4 billion. At Dell, Amend led the global online technology organization, delivering best-in-class online experiences that led to billion-dollar growth.
“Retailers and brands are under intense pressure to grow revenue and deliver exceptional customer experiences,” said Mike Amend, COO, CommerceHub. “At the center of ecommerce supply, demand and delivery, CommerceHub is uniquely positioned to help leading retailers and brands grow omnichannel revenue and delight their customers at the same time.”
Lead investors Citi and Goldman Sachs position company to accelerate the application of quantum computing in global enterprises
Matt Johnson
“We welcome Citi, Goldman Sachs, and Fenox as investors and look forward to helping enterprises leverage the power of quantum computing to remove computing bottlenecks and accelerate their businesses,” said Matt Johnson, Co-Founder and CEO of QC Ware.
QC Ware is a pioneer in enabling enterprises to use algorithms designed for quantum computers on multiple quantum hardware systems, by providing access through a single software platform developed by QC Ware. The company has a world-class quantum engineering team that applies quantum algorithms to key enterprise use cases. This financing allows QC Ware to further expand QC Ware’s quantum cloud computing software offering. Unlike quantum computing companies that are focused on hardware, QC Ware is developing software solutions that run on any quantum hardware.
“We are excited to support QC Ware’s vision of offering a single platform to access all types of quantum computing hardware, and QC Ware’s expertise in quantum algorithms complements Citi’s domain expertise,” said Bill Hartnett, Managing Director of Market Infrastructure Investments at Citi.
QC Ware’s current customers and partners include leading financial services companies, aerospace prime contractors, automotive OEMs, power utilities, and multiple government groups. The company counts Airbus Ventures as one of its early and major investors. Luka Tomljenovic, Investment Partner at Airbus Ventures, commented: “QC Ware is helping many industries harness quantum computing technology for a wide range of potential applications. The aerospace industry is full of computationally complex problems, and we are excited about QC Ware being a catalyst for solving them.”
Blockchain was first introduced by the mysterious Satoshi Nakamoto in 2008. At this time, with institutional trust at a low, the power it offered for individuals to bypass traditional intermediaries quickly captured the public imagination. Although cryptocurrencies now draw the most attention, the blockchain protocol enabling these will have a far more wide ranging impact, says George Etheredge, Digital Transformation Research Analyst at Frost & Sullivan.
The blockchain is most commonly defined as an incorruptible digital ledger of economic transactions that can be programmed to record not just financial transactions but almost anything of value. More practically, blockchain gives a way to verify the ownership and authenticity of digital assets. After all, how could cryptocurrencies possibly exist if one could simply make a copy of the relevant file, the digital asset in this case?
“Although blockchain is the technology that enables the existence of cryptocurrency and Bitcoin is the best-known of these, blockchain’s potential extends far beyond just cryptocurrencies,” says Etheredge.
George Etheredge
Blockchain-based applications are becoming recognised as next-generation business process improvement tools with the ability to increase transparency, enable accurate tracking, in combination with IoT devices, and reduce costs for various industries.
“It is in these business improving applications, beyond Bitcoin, that blockchain’s most significant short term value will be found,” says Etheredge.
There are a number of challenges arising from the current design of cryptocurrencies that do not appear, as yet, to be satisfactorily overcome.
Although there is a misconception that crypto transactions are free, transactors often attach fees as a percentage of the value of the transfer. The result of this is that larger transactions are processed by the blockchain network more readily than smaller transactions as big and small transactions require almost the same amount of computing power to process. As currently designed, cryptocurrencies have the potential to crowd out smaller transactions making them impractical for wide-scale adoption in their current state.
Whilst blockchain certainly will, in time, disintermediate various institutions, it is unlikely that these institutions will go down without a fight. In most cases where a new way of doing things is developed, parties with a vested interest in maintaining the status quo attempt to harness (or thwart) the new development. A recent example of this is the feud between Uber and the metered taxi industry. Banks typically earn considerable profits from their roles as intermediaries and it is unlikely that they would willingly accept the loss of this revenue stream. Furthermore, banks wield considerable bargaining power due to their economic importance and thus would be capable of severely delaying the wide-spread adoption of cryptocurrencies if they deemed this in their interest. It is precisely due to this risk of disintermediation that banks are amongst the most prominent investigators of blockchain technology. They seek to own and control the new development and thus mitigate the risk it poses. In addition, the fact that banks are (or even claim to be) investigating blockchain serves as a powerful barrier to entry.
How can my small start-up possibly compete with the resources a big bank can throw at this problem?
Whilst these challenges do not constitute a fatal stumbling block for cryptocurrencies in the long term, they will take a considerable amount of time to resolve. For this reason, the most impactful short term applications of blockchain technology will not involve any form of large scale cryptocurrency adoption. Rather they will revolve around the ability that blockchain gives to verify the ownership and authenticity of digital assets. With blockchain technology, we could be sure that our fair trade coffee really is fair trade, that our perspective employee really does have that master’s degree and that we really will be paid for delivering a piece of programming work.
Small- to Mid-Sized Companies Can Now Gain Access to Today’s Most Powerful Programmatic Advertising Tool
PubWise, a smarter header-bidding technology company providing a better way for publishers to manage ads and increase revenue, has expanded its publisher services by adding AdX to help bring small to mid-sized publishers and ad networks into the Google Ad Manager platform (recently rebranded to include what was previously known as the DoubleClick Ad Exchange).
The Ad Exchange is the most powerful programmatic tool available from Google, delivering a real-time marketplace for the buying and selling of display advertising across the internet. As a Network Partner Manager, PubWise is authorized to offer AdX to publishers and networks. The AdX service is available separately as well as offered as a part of the PubWise Monetization Platform.
“Google AdX is a very powerful and essential programmatic advertising tool that every publisher needs,” said Stephen F. Johnston, Jr., founder and CTO of PubWise. “However, it’s often impossible for small- to mid-sized publishers and ad networks to gain access to AdX on their own because of Google’s strict criteria. At PubWise, we work with publishers and ad networks of all sizes, so we view this as another means to add value for a specific segment of online publishers.”
ROI, Viewability and Brand Safety remain top concerns for digital decision-makers
Trusted Media Brands, one of the nation’s leading multi-channel media companies and home to iconic brands such as Taste of Home, Reader’s Digest, and The Family Handyman, among others, today released the results of its latest study from the Trusted Media Brands Insights Lab, exploring the future of programmatic ad spending.
According to the study, “Programmatic in the Era of Transparency,” conducted among the Advertiser Perception panel of media decision-makers, marketers and agencies reveals that these digital marketers expect to see increased spending in private marketplaces and programmatic guaranteed in the coming year. Marketers expect this shift due to the ability of these platforms to drive better ROI and provide access to premium ad inventory in brand-safe environments.
The survey finds that among top marketers, digital programmatic ad spending is evenly split between private marketplaces (31 percent), programmatic guaranteed (33 percent) and open exchanges (34 percent). However, 31 percent of marketers believe private marketplaces are most likely to see increased spend, as well as programmatic guaranteed (29 percent), versus the open exchange (21 percent). The Trusted Media Brands/Advertiser Perceptions survey also reported that increased ROI and access to premium inventory are the top reasons advertisers use programmatic guaranteed and private marketplaces.
Key takeaways from the research include:
62 percent of advertisers place ROI as a top concern in digital media buying: Following Trusted Media Brands’ previous survey on digital ad spending last year, ROI remains the top concern among advertisers.
Viewability (59 percent), brand safety (58 percent), and programmatic transparency (44 percent) have gained priority over ad fraud and ad blocking, rated as such by 42 percent and 28 percent respectively.
24 percent of advertisers have more optimism for increased spending in private marketplaces and programmatic guaranteed versus open exchanges: Only nine percent of advertisers surveyed expressed optimism for the open exchange. (Optimism score is % increasing spend minus % decreasing spend in the next year)
Advertisers reported the ability to deliver better ROI (43 percent), access to premium inventory (42 percent) and brand safe environments as top reasons for using private marketplaces and programmatic guaranteed.
44 percent of advertisers said they have increased use of programmatic guaranteed/private marketplaces for brand safety reasons, and another 34 percent plan to do so.
36 percent of advertisers expect to see increased use of private marketplaces and programmatic guaranteed as a result of the U.S. implementing European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR): 55 percent of advertisers agree the increasing concerns about consumer privacy and data protection make them more inclined to use private marketplaces and programmatic guaranteed versus the open exchange. Furthermore, 44 percent of advertisers stated more advertisers will use first party data rather than cookies as an effect of GDPR implementation.
“With the recent industry focus on consumer privacy and data protection, brand-safe environments are proving to be increasingly important for marketers in their ad spend decision-making,” saysZach Friedman, Trusted Media Brands’ Chief Revenue Officer.
He notes that creating safe environments for both advertisers and consumers is core to the business strategy at Trusted Media Brands. “Our consumer first approach to creating premium content ensures that regardless of the platform, we are delivering our audiences with the information and ideas they want, need and can trust to achieve their personal and lifestyle goals.”
For the first time, digital marketers can leverage at once and in one place Artificial Intelligence, Collaboration Management, SSL Certificates, and Direct Tracking Pixel Features, as well as customizable Usage Parameters and Services, to optimize online ads ROI and to cost-efficiently scale ad operations
Codewise, the industry’s first provider of AI-powered online ad measurement and management solutions for digital marketers, recognized by the Financial Times among the fastest-growing companies in Europe in 2017 and 2018, today announced that it launched a next generation of its industry-leading Voluum Tracker platform, enriched with multiple new features and with a wide range of new customizable usage parameters and services.
Unique to the AdTech industry, the rich set of new features includes AI powered Traffic Distribution Optimization, Collaboration Management and SSL Certificates and Direct Tracking Pixel based Performance Optimization.
Traffic Distribution Artificial Intelligence (AI): a new technology which helps digital and performance marketers and media buying professionals across agencies and brands get the most out of their online ad management efforts thanks to the real-time automatic matching of traffic to the estimated best offers and landing pages and to their best combinations. This results in double-digit ROI gain, massive time and budget savings to be reinvested back into campaign management operations, and in scalability efficiency thanks to the potentially unlimited volume of offers and landing pages that can be processed in time
Collaboration Management: a suite of new functionalities comprised of Workspaces, Multi-user and Shared Reports that help digital and performance marketers and media buying professionals across agencies and brands to increase overall ROI by enabling cross collaboration. This set of features is also perfectly tailored to create campaign management structures, organize workflows within a team and to securely share the results with any third parties, e.g. business partners
Workspaces enable marketers to effortlessly structure and organize campaigns and campaign elements into separate areas based on selected criteria, like verticals, geo, and media-buying teams
Multi-user helps media and performance agencies to structure team work into easily manageable working groups. The ability to grant specific permissions to associates allows managers to give a certain level of access to chosen entities and at the same time keep sensitive information separated from other team members
Shared Reports let account owners give a read-only access to the predefined set of data to their business partners. Based on the business need, marketers can easily specify which data points should be visible to their associates, business analysts, finance teams or any third parties, such as external consultants, freelancers and ad exchanges they collaborate with
Direct Tracking Pixel based Performance Optimization: a tracking method which allows marketers to track paid and organic traffic without the initial redirect. It also opens the door to ad exchanges, ad networks or any other sources (such as Facebook and Google Ads) requiring non-redirection type of tracking, and at the same time, speeds up the campaign funnel, which is especially important for digital marketers who run mobile campaigns.
SSL Certificates based Performance Optimization: enables optimization of the redirect flow and increases the performance of online campaign by securing the connection of the campaign funnels. Digital and performance marketers can now buy traffic and run campaigns on all desktop and mobile browsers and reduce all the possible interruptions in the redirect flow.
The new set of add-ons Usage Parameters and Services are designed to enable digital marketers to resiliently customize and cost-efficiently scale their ad measurement, management and optimization activities as their business grows.
Customizable Usage Parameters include number of events, users, custom and dedicated domains and data history
Services include a wide variety of resources ranging from Onboarding, to Technical Support, and Account Management, tiered from standard to VIP handling.
“After the successful introduction in April 2018 of the industry-first AI-powered feature that analyses the performance of online campaigns and automatically deploys the optimal traffic distribution among offers, today we proudly launch the next generation of AI that optimizes traffic distribution among both offers, landing pages and the best performing mix of offers and landing pages. Additionally, today we also release Collaboration Management that allows media buying groups, big brands and agencies to efficiently manage campaigns across teams and external 3rd parties. Lastly, we also introduce SSL Certificates for Custom Domains and Direct Tracking Pixel, that powerfully boost the overall performance of the campaign funnel,” said Robert Gryn, CEO and Founder of Codewise. “Furthermore, understanding digital marketers’ need for progressive scalability, from today we are enriching our plans with a wide variety of add-ons that allow a bespoke and cost-efficient expansion of ad operations. The amount of innovation injected in our new platform by the engineering team is extremely significant making Voluum Tracker the most exhaustive tool for online ad marketers in the industry.”
“Consistently with our core value, outside-in centricity, we have been closely listening to our customers through their daily engagements with our sales and customer success representatives,” said Dr. John Malatesta, Chief Revenue and Marketing Officer at Codewise. “The result is the clear demand for ad measurement, management and optimization SaaS plans that are not only richer in features, services and usage parameters but also modularly expandable through add-ons that flexibly serve progressive business and operational growth. Also, having understood the call for cost savings, being equal the plans value, today we also introduce extremely convenient yearly subscription options.”
AppNexus, the world’s leading independent advertising technology company, today announced advertiser spend in its connected TV marketplace grew 748% percent year-over-year in the second quarter of 2018 versus the second quarter of 2017, and grew 69% percent quarter-over-quarter in the second quarter of 2018 versus the first quarter of this year. Client adoption of AppNexus’ connected TV marketplace includes five of the world’s largest sports and news broadcast networks, five of the company’s largest programmatic video buyers, a Fortune 25 marketer, and three of the top ten global ad agency networks. AppNexus now sees more than 20 billion monthly connected TV impressions per month across Smart TVs, set top boxes, and game consoles.
“Programmatic connected TV provides the ideal environment to target audiences in their living rooms with entertaining, high-definition creatives,” said Eric Hoffert, SVP Video Technology, AppNexus. “It’s a perfect fit for many advertisers seeking highly engaged viewers, particularly in the entertainment, news, and sports verticals. We’re thrilled to see an increasing number of clients selecting our connected TV technology platform.”
Clients including Operam, a leader in programmatic buying in the movie and entertainment industry, and Tubi, a leading free movie and TV streaming service with a library of more than 7,500 titles and an average view of 60+ minutes per session, have leveraged AppNexus’ marketplace to reach and monetize audiences on connected TV devices.
“Our movie studio clients come to us to deliver campaigns to promote films to millennials, cord cutters, and pay TV subscribers,” said Brian Lam, Director of Programmatic, Operam. “In less than one year, we’ve ramped our connected TV budget as a percentage of total digital ad spend on AppNexus from zero to approximately 50% or more, making connected TV a critical component of our strategy. With contextual targeting by movie genre and TV network, we’ve seen completion rates of 97.5% or higher on AppNexus connected TV sellers like Tubi while improving cost effectiveness.”
“AppNexus helps us connect our valuable datasets and premium inventory, including Oscar-winning films and Emmy-winning TV shows, to top advertisers,” said Tyler Fitch, VP of Programmatic Partnerships, Tubi. “We’ve seen a 293% revenue increase across this partnership from Q1 to Q2, showing the momentum of AppNexus’ connected TV growth.”
As connected TV viewership continues to rise—eMarketer estimates 181.5 million people in the US will use connected TVs at least once per month in 2018—AppNexus’ video technology and marketplace enables advertisers and broadcasters to reach and monetize engaged audiences on these devices in their homes. The AppNexus Programmable Platform enables connected TV advertising buyers to buy connected TV at scale using high definition creatives. AppNexus Programmable Data enables connected TV buyers to use their own data assets to activate audiences based on real-time signals without reliance on cookies. For connected TV sellers, AppNexus supports client and server-side ad insertion, connected TV SDKs, segmented audience targeting, with access to hundreds of daily active video buyers and industry leading external demand partners.
Google Cloud and Informatica Combine Industry-leading API Management and iPaaS to Accelerate Digital Transformation
Enables users with a wizard-driven drag and drop that allows them to point to any application or data and turn it into a managed API with just one click
Provides full accessibility across hybrid and multi-cloud environments, to enable data-driven decisions and fuel innovation cycles
Accelerates user ability to connect data and applications across the enterprise, on-premises and in the cloud, for better business outcomes
Informatica®, the enterprise cloud data management leader, today announced it has partnered with Google Cloud’s Apigee product group, in a best-of-breed alliance to provide enterprises with a unified API management and integration solution. The partnership between these two companieswill allow organizations to quickly leverage data and applications that are deployed in hybrid and multi-cloud environments, creating a continuously connected business that drives enterprise-wide agility through innovations in AI-driven integrations and APIs.
With Informatica Integration Cloud for Apigee, customers can develop APIs for accessing applications, data and metadata more easily and they benefit from AI-driven predictive analysis and recommendations powered by the Informatica CLAIRE™ engine. Informatica Integration Cloud for Apigee, built on Informatica’s industry-leading iPaaS, simplifies developing and managing APIs with zero code. Developers, integrators, and analysts will be able to point to any data or application, turn it into a secure, managed API with the click of a button, and then integrate and orchestrate business processes with a simple, wizard-driven drag and drop.
The partnership between Google Cloud and Informatica includes product-level integrations to help enterprises automatically publish Informatica business integration processes and data as secure, managed API endpoints to the Apigee Edge API Platform and quickly build secure API proxies by automatically discovering Informatica business integration data and processes. Additionally, Apigee will have the ability to offer its customers an Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services integrated edition within the Apigee Edge API Platform.
Supporting Quotes
Ed Anuff
“Modern business isn’t just about adopting a mobile strategy or using the cloud to generate efficiency savings,” said Ed Anuff, director of product management, Google Cloud. “Enterprises are leveraging new integrations for seamless workflows that allow them to use data and applications to create remarkable experiences for their customers, employees and partners. With the product-level integrations between Apigee Edge and Informatica’s Integration Cloud, we can deliver end-to-end API lifecycle management and integration capabilities to help enterprises accelerate their journey to become modern, connected digital businesses.”
“As our customers’ enterprise API programs gain traction and they accelerate their adoption of the cloud, they are required to solve for broader application and data integration challenges,” said Ronen Schwartz, senior vice president and general manager, Big Data, Cloud and Data Integration, Informatica. “Enterprises require both integration platforms and API management to create an advanced, comprehensive integration platform and our partnership with Google Cloud offers the broadest connectivity and integration on the market.”
Maverick AV Solutions, a specialized solution business of Tech Data (Nasdaq: TECD) today announced a new distribution agreement with Zoom Video Communications, Inc. Maverick AV Solutions will support Zoom in expanding its global footprint, beginning with North America and Europe, enabling growth into new customer segments, and supporting the growth of Zoom Rooms, Zoom’s cutting-edge workplace collaboration solution.
The Zoom platform integrates with all hardware systems to ensure that customers can utilize existing room equipment or upgrade to create an experience to suit their meeting and collaboration style. It is ideal for any collaboration space, from small focus rooms or offices to world-class training and broadcasting centers.
Maverick AV Solutions will draw on its ecosystem of market-leading collaboration vendors to work with the Zoom team globally and build tailored solutions to help integrators create simple, intuitive room systems with fast deployment. Zoom already boasts partnerships with a number of Maverick’s vendors including Logitech, Dell and Crestron.
Jon Sidwick
“Zoom Video Communications is one of the most exciting businesses to enter the meeting room space in recent years, and the quality of the user experience is giving it a vital ingredient—rapid user adoption,” said Jon Sidwick, vice president, at Maverick AV Solutions. “Zoom Rooms offer a great opportunity for our resellers, and with our global footprint, Maverick AV Solutions is able to offer Zoom a consistent experience for multi-country roll-outs. Our understanding of and specialization in audio visual technologies will help Zoom deploy quickly through the channel and help integrators to bring Zoom Rooms into the market rapidly.”
“Zoom’s partnership with Maverick will delight our customers by providing consistent packaging of Zoom Room solutions in conjunction with our hardware-optimized partners,” said Laura Padilla, head of business development and channel, at Zoom. “This relationship represents an exciting point in our global expansion plans to extend our footprint into new markets, simplify the solution-purchasing process and grow our ecosystem of partners. We look forward to executing on the value of our partnership with Maverick quickly, and improving our customers’ and partners’ experiences.”
Maverick AV Solutions is a specialized solution business of Tech Data, the world’s leading end-to-end distributor of technology products, services and solutions. Our dedicated experts work with the world’s leading brands to provide customers with specialized audio-visual (AV), collaboration and smart signage solutions, as well as unmatched logistical and financial services. Through product breadth, in-depth knowledge, activation services and e-commerce systems, Maverick AV Solutions is helping customers acquire the most complete AV solutions in the channel.
The 360° Meeting Owl conferencing camera launches following research that finds UK employees waste seven weeks a year in pointless meetings
Owl Labs, the video conferencing hardware company, has announced it is launching the Meeting Owl, the 360° smart conferencing camera in the UK. Arriving from 12th July, the Meeting Owl is one of the first IoT devices for the company conferencing room, designed to improve collaboration and productivity.
The Meeting Owl is a combined 360° camera, mic and speaker that captures conversations so naturally that customers say it feels like being in the room with the team. Remote participants see a 360° panoramic view of the room, while the Meeting Owl automatically highlights different people as they speak, so all members are connected as one cohesive team, regardless where they are.
Max Makeev
Max Makeev, CEO of Owl Labs, said: “In an era of remote and flexible work the need for an effective working process, for those in and out of the office, is crucial. However, UK companies are so far failing to meet the needs of the modern workplace. The Meeting Owl delivers a more inclusive experience that aims to salvage those previously wasted hours spent in unproductive meetings.” Backed by Playground, Andy Rubin’s company, the launch of the Meeting Owl comes on the back of new research that revealed that nearly 80 per cent of UK employees are wasting as much as seven weeks a year in pointless meetings.
The OnePulse study of over 1,000 UK employees also found that an overwhelming number of workers say communication and collaboration declines immensely when working from home, with nearly 80 per cent admitting they have a hard time staying engaged when joining meetings remotely. A further 53 per cent feel their companies aren’t doing enough to meet the needs of modern day and remote flexible working.
The Meeting Owl is also a wifi-connected device and works alongside a free mobile app that includes a number of features such as access to meeting room usage data and manual focus for the camera. Despite the advanced technology, the Meeting Owl itself is extremely easy to use by connecting to the main computer via USB. It is also compatible with all popular video conference products, including Skype for Business, BlueJeans, Google Hangouts and Zoom.
The Meeting Owl is now available for purchase for £799 on Amazon UK starting today.
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