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TikTok

Twitter shows interest in buying TikTok’s US operations by outbidding Microsoft

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ByteDance, a Chinese company is the owner of the very famous video sharing platform, TikTok. With the advent of the global pandemic which emerged out from the Chinese city Wuhan, many nations have turned against China. Whether it’s a serious innocent breakout of an infectious disease or a plotted biological weapon is still in question. But, with almost every country around the globe suffering tremendously, many unpredictable decisions have been taking place.

Last week, Trump announced the ban of TikTok along with other Chinese apps from the U.S. Apart from all the other Chinese applications; TikTok has a very wide user base not only in the U.S. but also around the world. Trump has expressed the need of the hour to ban these Chinese apps as they might be responsible for serious data theft that can put the nation’s security in jeopardy. So, with a 45-days timeline to ban the usage of any Chinese apps by the U.S. citizens, Microsoft showed interest in buying the U.S. operations of TikTok. But, it is only yesterday that Twitter showed interest in buying the same by outdoing Microsoft in bidding.

TikTok by Pixabay

Can Twitter manage to Finance?

Yesterday, the news of Twitter being interested to buy ByteDance owned TikTok was delivered to Reuters from a trusted source. But, it is a big question if Twitter has the capital to buy the U.S. operations of TikTok. The market capitalization of Twitter is around $30 billion which is nearly equal to the assets of TikTok put on sale. On the other hand, Microsoft’s market capitalization is around $1.3 trillion which makes the scenario clear about the bidding.

So, if Twitter is having a serious plan to buy the U.S. operations of TikTok, it needs to raise additional capital. In a normal situation, it would have been easy to raise money, but with the pandemic creating havoc in the financial world and a time strain of 45-days it is a very difficult task.

Due to these two important factors, Microsoft is still on the run and occupy the first place for the bidding. Erik Gordon, a professor from the University of Michigan said that Twitter doesn’t have enough borrowing capacity making it even harder to acquire the U.S. operations of TikTok. Moreover, the current shareholders of Twitter might think that expanding business in this crisis might be a big risk and it will be better if the company (Twitter) focuses on its existing business.

Protecting the Nation

A couple of months back India decided to take strict action against China because of two main reasons, first the outbreak of COVID-19 from Wuhan which might be a strong conspiracy against the world, and second, the dispute regarding LAC. So, Indian banned all the Chinese apps hence taking a big step and protecting the nation’s security from compromising. Now, a similar action was taken by the American president, Donald Trump, thus banning Chinese apps like TikTok and WeChat.

Trump has also mentioned that this is one step forward towards protecting sensitive information and privacy of U.S. citizens from China. These apps are gaining access to information of every user and it can be used against the U.S. for many purposes. He also told that the ban of Chinese apps will also improve Clean Network thus adding five more lines of effort, namely, Clean Carrier, Clean Cable, Clean Apps, Clean Store, and Clean Cloud. And, lastly, he gave a deadline of 45 days and in mid-September, the ban will be imposed completely.

TikTok’s current reputation 

With the novel coronavirus pandemic, the reputation of China as well as its apps is degrading. But, TikTok is used by billions of users around the world, and especially in the U.S., it has millions of fans. Many citizens of the U.S. have expressed outrage towards Donald Trump after he declared the ban of TikTok. But, no matter what a nation’s security should always be the priority. Moreover, it will also become a golden opportunity for the country’s app developers to create something similar and make it a big hit.

The relationship between Twitter and Donald Trump has become sour as the president accused the platform of unfairly censoring him. So, apart from the capital of Microsoft being incredibly bigger than Twitter’s, it is likely Trump will support the acquisition by Microsoft.

CMR Surgical

CMR Surgical’s robotic system for surgery brings a new wave of technology in the medical world

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The rate at which our technology is growing every day, it is difficult to predict what will happen after five years. How will the future look like? Will human labor be completely replaced by robots? AI and ML have transformed our life making unimaginable inventions in every aspect of life. Who could have imagined a decade earlier that we can make machines think like us and make them adapt our behavioral responses? With engineering making the greatest inventions and breaking its record every time, they are very versatile creators. On top of the list is the health industry that is highly benefited due to the inventions of smart devices and heavy equipment used in hospitals. So, some brilliant minds with knowledge in diverse fields came up with the idea of a robotic system to assist medical professionals to perform surgery. In 2014, five founders, namely, Martin Frost, Luke Hares, Keith Marshall, Paul Roberts, and Mark Slack founded CMR Surgical.

CMR Surgical is based on Cambridge and is famous for its robotic surgical system Versius. The company is founded with a vision to bring a robotic revolution in surgery. According to the founders, it would make a dramatic effect in the health industry if they can be assisted in surgeries by the robotic system. But, they also need to keep in mind a cost-effective versatile system that can prove advantageous to millions of common people in need. Let’s have a look at the success of CMR Surgical.

About the Founders of CMR Surgical

Martin Frost went to the Manchester Grammar School followed by the University of Cambridge. He has a great and rich experience in the professional world. Started as an Audit Senior in 1985 he became the Director of Chord Capital in 2005. He was also the CEO of Sagentia for a few years, co-founder of RedCloud Technology Limited, etc. Currently, he is associated with Peek Vision and CMR Surgical (Director).

Martin Frost
Image Source: businessweekly.co.uk

Luke Hares graduated from Cambridge in 1997. Before co-founding CMR Surgical he was a Senior Consultant at Sagentia.

Keith Marshall went to the University of Hertfordshire and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Aerospace Engineering. He worked with Nokia Networks for almost a year followed by PML Flightlink, Xerox, and Sagentia. Currently, he is the Engineering Director of CMR Surgical.

Before co-founding CMR Surgical, Paul Roberts had ten years of experience in product and system development. He worked with Science Group PIc and built many complex medical devices. He is the Chief Customer Success Officer at CMR Surgical.  

Mark Slack is currently the Chief Medical Officer of CMR Surgical. He has a very rich medical background. Mark went to the College of Medicine of South Africa and he is a consultant gynecologist.

Versius Robotic System

Experts and medical professionals from around the world have given positive feedback about Versius. Versius is not like any other robotic system we have come across before. Versius provides maximum flexibility as its engineering allows both the arms to move effortlessly. This helps to save a lot of time and increases the efficiency within the OR suite. Versius is also designed perfectly with a footprint of 38cmX38cm. It doesn’t take up a lot of space and it is also transportable. Versius has ports and provides the freedom of the port placement as well. It automatically chooses a working position that provides the least amount of fatigue for the surgeons.

Apart from many cutting-edge features, the cost is a very essential factor. CMR Surgical claims that Versius can be afforded by who all are in need. It also provides a robotics programme for a fixed annual cost.  

A billion-dollar company

Last year, after the Series C funding of CMR Surgical the company hit a valuation of £1 billion. The last funding round where the company raised £195 million was the largest funding raised in Europe’s medical sector. Apart from launching Versius in the UK, clinical trials were carried out elsewhere in Europe and India. The product, Versius has three active arms during operation. The best part of this robotic system is they can not only be transformed from one O.T to another but also between hospitals.

The main investor for CMR Surgical is Cambridge Innovation Capital which raised £309 million for the company. Some of the other investors also include Escala Capital Investment, Vestland Invest, Watrium, etc.

India and CMR Surgical

In October 2019, India became the first country in the world to install Versius robotic system. Under the leadership of Dr. Shailesh Puntambekar in Galaxy Core Hospital, Pune, Versius successfully performed many surgical procedures which include mainly laparoscopy, myomectomies, and hysterectomies. Dr. Shailesh said that its compactness and cost-effectiveness will help meeting the surgical demand in India.

Convoy

Convoy- Journey to transform the World with maximum capacity and minimal waste

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There are a few businesses that are unknown to common people. But those business plays an important role to make our life easier. Either directly or indirectly, as Convoy does. To form the connection between shippers and carriers Convoy plays an important role. It is set up in 2015 to build the technology that minimizes the waste in the Freight industry. Presently, it acquired the top investors including T. Rowe Price associates and Generation Investment Management. As well,  Y Combinator, Lone Pine Capital, Capital G, and Bezos Expeditions believe Convoy and dream to build a more sustainable future with the help of Convoy. The duo of Dan and Goodale are masterminds behind Convoy’s success.

About Convoy

As said earlier, Convoy is established in 2015. However, just in two years, it raised the Series B funding of 62 million dollars. Also, grabbed the chance to get Continuity Fund from Y combinator. The founders of big firms like Amazon, Starbucks, Hadi, and several other firms have invested in Convoy. Moreover, the founders of Instagram, eBay, and Dropbox also interested to invest in Convoy.

It raised 180+ million dollars investment from CapitalG in 2018. Furthermore, Convoy attracted an investment of 400 million dollars from Generation investment Management in 2019. With this, it valued 2.75 billion dollars firm in the world.

The Backstory of foundation

Convoy’s journey gets started in early 2015. Grant and Dan both were the researchers in the supply chain. That time, they both were at Amazon. However, the actual journey to start Convoy began when Dan visited warehouses and truck stops. They came to know about the fears, uncertainty, and the frustration of truckers.  Researching for two to three months, they set up the firm as a local star up. With this, the service in Washington State gets started. Convoy is solely dedicated to transporting the world with zero waste and maximum capacity.

To bring the positive change and improvise deliver efficiencies and to change truckers’ lives they come up with the idea and set up Convoy. In just two years, it acquired the trust of top investors in the market. In fact, the CEOs of big firms believed Convoy to change the future of the Freight industry. Presently, it is one of the leading firms that transform the world with maximum capacity and minimal waste.

Glimpse to Founders life

The business is the product of the idea and dedication of founders. As well, they invest time to explore the business and work for the betterment of society. No doubt, any businessman set up the firm to gain the profit. But we cannot neglect their agenda to serve society. With an innovative approach, they work to simplify human life. Like Dan and Grant does with their business venture Convoy. Let’s see the journey of Dan and Grant to set up Convoy.

Dan Lewis-Chief Executive Officer

He is the present CEO at Convoy. Prior to that, he worked as a General Manager at Amazon. Also, he served as Vice president of product at Wavvi. Dan has experience as Microsoft’s group product manager. However, he started his career in the supply chain for Oliver Wyman. Coming to his education, Dan attended Yale University to study cognitive science. The contribution of Dan is considerable to change the ways of truck deliveries.

Grant Goodale- CTO

He is the present CTO at Convoy. Before that, he worked at Amazon. Apart from establishing Convoy, Grant set up Massively Fun. As well, he was the CEO of that gaming studio. Coming to his education, he has a computer science degree. For that, he attended Cornell University. Also, Grant went to the University of Southern California. Along with Dan, he is working to explore the business of Convoy. Furthermore, assisting the truckers for smooth and faster deliveries.

Bottom line

Presently, the firm effectively solving the unsolvable problems of the trucking industry. As well, helped to minimize the waste and inefficiency in this industry. The firm is based on a vision to easier the tasks of shippers, truckers, and all other tasks of the trucking industry. With the top professionals, Convoy in fact achieves its vision in a very short period.

Today, the firm successfully optimize dozens of truckloads that move around the country every day. Convoy solved the toughest problems of truckers and shippers. For its excellent work, it awarded as GeekWire’s Startup of the Year in 2017.

Imperva

Imperva- A business venture of Shlomo Kramer who is Godfather of Israeli cybersecurity

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Cybersecurity is becoming the interest of many researchers and top entrepreneurs focusing on this area. In fact, it is important to spread awareness about cybersecurity, and many firms working in this as Imperva do. It is a California based cybersecurity firm working in this field since 2000. However, the firm has been delivering excellent protection to application software and data of several enterprises. Shlomo Kramer, A. Shulman, and Mickey Boodaei set up Imperva to enable security for both data as well as applications.

About the founder of Imperva- Shlomo Kramer

A well-known entrepreneur and tech person, Shlomo Kramer has been working in the field of security for a long time. He belongs to Israel where he recognized as one of the top investors and businessmen in Information Technology. Imperva is one of the companies co-founded by Shlomo. Apart from that, he is a founder of the Checkpoint, Cato networks. These all are deal with cybersecurity. However, he also invested in several startups including Palo Alto Networks, Lacoon Mobile Security, Trusteer, Watchdox, etc.

Achievements of Shlomo

Shlomo is one of the top entrepreneurs of Israel. He helped the nation in the field of cybersecurity. For his work, several authorities and organizations praised him. In 2006, he was on the list of 20 luminaries who changed the network industry. Network World Magazine selected him in this list. As well, SC magazine named him as the CEO of the year in 2008. 7 years back, Shlomo inducted into the Infosecurity Europe Hall of Fame in 2013.

Early Life

Shlomo loves technology more than anything else, which can be seen from activities in his life. During young age, Kramer designed and sold video games. He has been familiar with mainframe and other technologies since then. At the age of 15, he worked at a Tel Aviv shop, he used to sell personal computers in there. Kramer’s passion for technology strengthen when he heard about 17 years old game developer. Thereafter, he never looked back and tried his best to do the best in this field.

Education

He has a master’s degree in computer science. For that, he went to Hebrew University Jerusalem. Also, he has a bachelor’s degree in Mathematics and Computer Science at Tel Aviv University. While studying, he served in the defense force of Israel. Shlomo worked in cybersecurity and intelligence team, that time, he learned analysis and decryption of data. Being a part of the Israel Defense Force’s intelligence team helped Shlomo to develop as a high-tech entrepreneur.

Early Businesses

Shlomo is recognized as Godfather of Israeli Cybersecurity, and an unstoppable entrepreneur to achieve success with each business venture. However, to reach this point has a long story. It all started in 1993 with the establishment of Checkpoint Software technologies. With this startup, he helped to the introduced first firewall in the global market. Kramer became an international leader in protecting the information on the internet.

The first company gave him huge success, and the market value of the firm raised unbelievably. Knowing the fact that how to invest money, he grabs this opportunity and left the checkpoint and raised money from this deal. Further, he used this money to invest in other businesses as well as to start his own firm.

Investments

Kramer is not only a good entrepreneur but also he is an investor. He has been working in the field of data security and helped several start-ups to explore the businesses. Shlomo is investors in the firms including Insert, SafeBreach, TopSpin Security, Splacer, Alicanto, and many more.

The backstory of Founding Imperva

After leaving the Checkpoint, he set up Imperva with Mickey and Shulman in 2002. It is set up for perimeter defenses like firewalls. However, the focus of the firm shifted toward application and data security software.

Exploring the businesses of Imperva

In 2011, Imperva jumped into the stock market and its initial public offering raised 90 million dollars. As well, the shares of the company gained up to 33% on its first day. Thereafter, the firm acquired a cloud security startup called Skyfence. Kramer always focused on investing in cloud-based security startups. Because of his optimistic views in the data security field. In fact, this acquisition helped Imperva to extend its data security through the cloud. However, Skyfence is sold for 40 million dollars to Forcepoint in 2017.

Imperva introduced a free scanner for detecting infected devices in 2016. Moreover, the firm purchased a data masking company called Camouflage in 2017.

Also Read: Gill Shwed: The Israeli Inventor & the Pioneer of the Cybersecurity

carbon black

Seasoned entrepreneurs Todd Brennan, Allen Hillery, John Hanratty’s Journey to set up Bit9 aka Carbon Black

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A cybersecurity firm set up by trio Todd Brennan, John Hanratty, and Allen Hillery is famous on the international level. It is working in the field of endpoint security to protect the client’s information from security threats. Data security is the main priority in the present world. Cybercrimes are increasing day by day. Any kind of hacking or any malicious attack results in a huge loss for any business. Therefore almost all organizations demand total network and data security. For that, dozens of firms are depending upon Carbon Black. In fact, more than 5000 clients trust Carbon black and secure their business. To detect cyberpunk as well as to prevent future attacks, Carbon black offers it’s best to all kinds of organizations.

The backstory of foundation

Bit9 is the output of the productive idea of three serial entrepreneurs Todd, Allen, and John. They transformed computer network technology and IT security with Carbon Black. It is set up in 2002 as Bit9. During the initial days, the company has to face malicious attacks. Apparently, it then becomes the inspiration to save other firms from such types of attacks. The service is getting more advanced after acquiring the unique start-up Carbon Black in 2014. After that, Bit9 renamed as Carbon Black.

About Carbon Black

It is a Waltham(Massachusetts) based cybersecurity firm that creates cloud-native endpoint security software. This software is especially known for detecting malicious behavior. As well, to revert such attacks and saves important data from getting hacked. Carbon black’s PSC platform is best to analyze unfiltered data of clients for threats. As a matter of fact, PSC stands for Predictive Security Cloud. Currently, 5600+ customers trust Carbon Black. Recently, the firm merged into VMware to flourish its service.

The journey of Carbon Black

Since 2002, the firm has been improving its service and adding the clients to its list. In fact, most of the customers of Carbon Black belongs to Fortune industries. It gets started with the name Bit9. However, the firm acquired a security service firm carbon black and became Carbon Black. The combination of Bit9 and Carbon Black.

That time, it also raised E series funding and continue its exploring strategy. Moreover, it gained Objective Logistics in 2015. Similarly many more small to medium startups in the IT security field are acquired by Carbon Black. Including Visitrend, SecureWorks,  Trustwave, Ernst & Young, Kroll, and Rapid7, etc.

Thereafter, it raised to 152 dollars during its initial public offering. Today, it has top investors like Kleiner, Perkins Accomplice, etc. However, Carbon Black decided to get merged into VMware in 2019.

Glimpse to founders life

All founders of Carbon Black are series entrepreneurs who build several milestones in there early days. The trio of Todd, Allen, and John has built several firms together, including Carbon Black and Ampient. However, most of the firms set up are related to cybersecurity, network, and data security.

Allen Hillery

He has specialization in research and development, and he has been working in this field for a long time. Coming to his education, he holds the doctorate at the University of Wisconsin in Electrical and computer engineering. As well, bachelor’s degrees in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the same university.

Apart from that, he is an expert in information security, scalability testing, large-scale computing, etc. Allen is the co-founder of Bit9 and Ampient. At Bit9, he served as VP and shares a great contribution to build a strong base of it.

Moreover, he also helped in founding the Okena endpoint security company.

Other works of Allen

Rather than setting up the businesses, he wrote a number of patent applications. As said earlier, Allen works in the field of Research. Yet, he continues to redefine parallel computing and IT security with his research.

He also worked to design some of the largest supercomputer clusters in his early career. That time, he was a researcher at Shell E&P research Center.

Todd Brennan

He also helped in building the base of Carbon Black in 2002. Having the spirit and tremendous knowledge of technology, Todd set up several startups and runs it successfully. Presently, he is serving as CEO of Ampient, which he helped to found too. In fact, he also set up Okena with Allen. At bit9, he served as chief technology officer and VP engineering. In 2003, he built novel technology to defend against emerging IT security threats. Todd also active in the research field, also he served at MIT Lincon Lab as a researcher.

Education

Brennan has a Master’s degree in Electrical and computer engineering from the University of Wisconsin. From the same university, he earned a Ph.D. However, he attended Cornell University to graduate in electrical engineering.

Awards and recognition of Todd

InfoWorld honored him and include his name in the list of Top 25 CTO in 2006. As well, he is an awardee of several collegiate teaching awards. Also, he is an author of dozens of patents and research papers.

Clubhouse

Journey of Clubhouse towards developing strong customer base and revenue growth!

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Project management involves a lot of planning, execution strategies, controlling the work, meeting deadlines and most importantly working together as a team. No matter what and how things are executed, but it’s success is defined by the team and its working. Now there are many tools available for project management and one such tool is Clubhouse. Let us overlook the journey of the firm to grow revenue impeccably.

WHAT IS CLUBHOUSE?

The Clubhouse has built the project management tools so that software development teams can work in the best way. It provides enjoyable project management teams that help in each stage of project management. This is more about a collaborative approach to project management. Till the date, more than 1500 companies are using Clubhouse.

CLUBHOUSE LAUNCH

The clubhouse was launched in 2016 by Kurt Schrader and Andrew Childs. The idea of Clubhouse sparked into their mind when both of them were working at Intent Media. There were a total of 150 people in that company. While doing their job, they realized that the people fight over the tools instead of working on them. That’s when they decided to build something which will ease people’s job and people will love using. They wanted to do something for making teamwork more effectively and that’s how the idea of Clubhouse emerged.

It wasn’t a one-night job. Andrew and Kurt had to spent almost 8 years for the initial phase of the product. As they were working on project development tools, they were aiming for something big and which could help them in their product building. Initially, a group of 10-30 people was able to use the tool for a project. Right before their fundraising, they already got two customers who decided to use their platform.

HOW CLUBHOUSE GATHERED THE CUSTOMER BASE?

With time, they started explaining their product to people and kept modifying as per their needs. Of course, it was necessary to satisfy customers which is the baseline of every business. They targeted some good companies so that they could grow their customer base faster. For publicizing their products and new features, they used some sites like Hacker news.

Another hack they used for publicity is they looked for the mentions of their competitors on Twitter and tried to promote their product to be used as an alternative. It was never linear progress for the Clubhouse. Someday they would get zero traction and another day a thousand. But later the customer base kept on going up and now they have more than 20000 active organizations on the platform.

HOW CLUBHOUSE GROWN ITS REVENUE

Initially, the Clubhouse was in a trial phase, what we call it beta phase. They almost had 40 customers when they decided to charge money for the service. And organizations agreed without any problem. Clubhouse onboarded many new customers and kept impressing teams with amazing features which helped them earn more revenue even faster.

The common path of revenue generation is the subscription cost to their product. It is per user, per team and per month. They have also designed small plans for the teams which have an annual subscription system.

A key principle they used to grow their business was to make customers happy. They did things like expanding the trial period if someone is taking time in making the final decision to get onboard.

MORE ABOUT FOUNDERS

Kurt Schrader and Andrew Childs founded this company with a vision. Currently, Kurt is the CEO and Andrew works as a chief design officer. Kurt works for the vision & mission-related things of the company. He holds a BSE from the University of Michigan. On the other hand, Andrew takes care of all the design and front-end related activities. He has almost 18 years of experience in this field. Andrew holds BFA in Painting from RSID.

BOTTOM LINE

Clubhouse emerged as a solution for project management teams and the idea sparked from the problems founders noticed among teams while working from another company. It’s a solid example that anyone can do a brilliant job if they focus on solving the problem than cribbing about them. Then the business model they accepted is way too unique for startups. Entrepreneurs can definitely learn from this a lot. If you keep your customers happy, your revenues are bound to go up.