Tech Talks Daily

Otovo is Europe's leading online residential solar marketplace and has assessed over 4 million homes across Europe. They're currently active in 13 markets, serving 90% of Europe's population. Andreas Thorsheim, its founder and CEO, joins me on today's episode of Tech Talks Daily. I learn more about how Otovo uses proprietary technology to connect customers to local, vetted installers, making the process of adopting solar at home as smooth and seamless as possible. We discuss how the online marketplace takes a customer's address and then automatically calculates the size, shape, and specification of suitable rooftop solar products. Using satellites, Otovo also calculates exactly how much sun is shining on a roof and how much energy can then be produced from it. It then runs an automated, 'real time' auction between local solar installers to find the cheapest price for the work required. As a pioneer in solar, Otovo is already the market leader in their native Norway, where they've managed to cut the price of solar in half over the past 5 years alone. They've helped over 10,000 households in Europe transition to domestic solar power already, operating at a pace of 9,000 installations per year.

Pete Sena is a design-led entrepreneur who loves to partner with forward-obsessed founders, entrepreneurs, and business leaders to unlock new possibilities and growth. For nearly 20 years, Pete has built and led cross-functional teams that have delivered many successful multi-channel programs and activations, ranging in scale from venture-backed startups to Fortune 50 companies. Pete joins me in a conversation that covers everything from marketing, branding, entrepreneurship, design thinking, tech (Web3, AI, metaverse), and the importance of a growth mindset. I also learn how he constantly remains curious and the tech trends that excite him in 2023.

2219: EdgeQ - RISC-V: The Linux of 5G EdgeQ is a 5G chipmaker leveraging the RISC-V architecture to open its tech. RISC-V is not only shaping the evolution of 5G, it's also redefining the broader mobile landscape. The mobile/telco industry has historically been dominated by proprietary, closed technologies and vendors. However, with RISC-V's growing popularity, the mobile industry is adopting openness at a massive scale for the first time. Just as Linux drove enterprises to embrace open-source software, RISC-V is driving mobile operators and telcos to adopt open approaches to building networks. This is a necessary shift: For 5G to pay off, organizations need the flexibility and customizability RISC-V delivers. But the impact of this shift will extend beyond 5G and enable the industry to deliver other innovations that would be lost in a proprietary ecosystem. Adil Kidwai shares with me how RISC-V adoption is transforming the mobile industry and what this mean for 5G and beyond.

Neil McGregor, COO at REPL Group, Part of Accenture, has amassed over 15 years of consulting experience – mainly focused on global retail systems integration. Neil has been at REPL for over six years, taking on the role of COO back in 2020, where he leads all people, projects, and operations across the consulting team globally. Before that, he was Consulting Operations Director, where he lead and motivated the delivery team; and Consulting Director, where he was responsible for leading complex change, system implementation and developed teams of solution oriented consultants. Prior to REPL, Neil has held roles at both EY and Accenture – where he kickstarted his career. In today's episode, Neil shares his story and the retail technology trends that excite him along with a few predictions and challenges for the year ahead.

Cyber crime is everywhere, it's on your phone, laptop, it's even seeping into warfare, shutting down entire countries. How many times have you received a notification saying your password has been compromised on a retail website you've spent far too much time on? Usually you change the password as soon as possible, the risk to bank details and other personal information is too great. Yet, the same attention and diligence is not given to cybersecurity for businesses, despite reports of fraud and cybercrime in the UK reaching more than 400 000 in 2021 alone. It is critical that businesses have strong cyber defences in place, much like changing your personal password, businesses need to be on top of threats before they go too far. JP Perez-Etchegoyen, CTO of Onapsis, a cybersecurity provider for business-critical applications, has extensive experience identifying and solving these threats. Onapsis provides cybersecurity solutions to 20% of Fortune 100 companies around the world and has grown 187% over the past three years. JP joins me on Tech Talks Daily to discuss why organizations should be worried about unknown internet-facing vulnerabilities and how they can prevent them.

Ryan Lasmaili is the Co-Founder & CEO of Vaultree, the world's fastest searchable encryption technology for databases. Ryan has been fascinated by technology breakthroughs from space travel to EnviroTech since childhood, and in the last 12 years he has been involved with technology startups developing solutions to major problems. Ryan's background is in financial mathematics with a passion for astrophysics and economics, having also worked in corporate environments in roles ranging from project manager to senior analyst, reporting to executives in listed multinationals. Ryan is always looking for ways to improve and apply his out-of-the-box thinking to solve significant cybersecurity problems, with his biggest undertaking to date solving today's and tomorrow's data encryption and protection challenges.

Surveillance State tells the gripping, startling, and detailed story of how China's Communist Party is building a new kind of political control: shaping the will of the people through the sophisticated—and often brutal—harnessing of data. It is a story born in Silicon Valley and America's "War on Terror," and now playing out in alarming ways on China's remote Central Asian frontier. As a minority separatist movement strains against Party control, China's leaders have built a dystopian police state that keeps millions under the constant gaze of security forces armed with AI. But across the country in the city of Hangzhou, the government is weaving a digital utopia, where technology helps optimize everything from traffic patterns to food safety to emergency response. Award-winning journalists Liza Lin takes listeners on a journey through the new world China is building within its borders, and beyond. Telling harrowing stories of the people and families affected by the Party's ambitions, Surveillance State reveals a future that is already underway—a new society engineered around the power of digital surveillance.

The machines we interact with every day make our lives easier. As they become more intelligent and able to help us in new ways, we need to take a step back and consider whether how third parties govern them is fit for purpose, particularly as we move towards a world with autonomous vehicles. Many machines, devices, and vehicles we use daily are centrally controlled, limiting what the machines can or can't do regarding the provision and rendering of goods and services. Machines built for Web2 exist in a closed, permission-based environment, which massively limits how they can interact with other machines, where they can go, and what they can do. Existing identification numbers are one-dimensional and are used to label machines and their specifications. This does not enable them to leverage their identity to enable movement, service authorization, trade, or payment. Sheridan Johns, Enterprise Lead at Ocean Protocol, and Leonard Dorlöchter, co-founder of Peaq discuss their mission to enable the secure, fast, and frictionless transfer of value and data between humans and machines through Self-Sovereign Machine IDs (SSMIs). I learn how the implementation of SSMIs as digital identities will enable vehicles, machines, robots, and devices to identify themselves with each other, people, and their environment. Decentralized Machine IDs will solve some of our biggest societal and economic challenges while enabling communities to benefit from the increased use of machines and automation within the workplace. We discuss how giving machines Self-Sovereign Machine IDs will change the future of work and how Web3 can ensure that job automation empowers a global workforce. We also explore what a fully decentralized machine economy will look like and how this can benefit individuals.

Push Protocol is a web3 communication network, enabling cross-chain notifications and messaging for dapps, wallets, and services. It powers communication for over 100 of the world's leading dapps and service providers across DeFi, NFTs, gaming, dev tools, and more. Until Push, no solution existed to enable native communication between wallets in response to on- and off-chain data. The result was a fractured dapp ecosystem, held together by antiquated and centralized communication platforms. Push is building the communication network for Web3, addressing a gap in critical infrastructure and improving the everyday experience for blockchain users. Harsh Rajat, CEO and co-founder of Push Protocol (recently rebranded from EPNS), joins me on the Tech Talks Daily Podcast in a conversation about bringing simplicity and ease of use to web3 communications. Listen in as Harsh defines what Web3 communication is and why it matters. He also offers an overview of Push Protocol and PushChat. Finally, we explore the future of decentralized social media and much more.

Sean Farrington, EVP EMEA at Pluralsight – the workforce development platform, joins me on today's episode of Tech Talks Daily to talk about the ongoing challenges around hiring and the role of internal skill development in plugging gaps. We discuss the scramble for talent and how tech companies must still take on high revenue projects, bring new products to market and keep customers happy. This means talent remains critical, but businesses will need to turn to expanding the skillsets of existing teams, rather than relying on new hires or outsourcing work, and support them to deliver on new projects. We also talk about the importance of capitalising on the hunger to learn. For example, 75% of technologists determine whether to stay at their company partly based on how dedicated their employer is to development opportunities. Now more than ever, reducing turnover is key. A commitment to L&D can support this, and develop more engaged team members. Finally, we discuss why tech leaders need to create a culture of learning and why putting this culture of learning in place needn't cost businesses a fortune. In fact, it makes good business sense to invest in upskilling – with estimates suggesting that upskilling could save at least $3,125 per employee.

Steven Furnell, IEEE senior member and professor of cybersecurity at the University of Nottingham, joins me on today's episode of The Tech Talks Daily podcast. Steven discusses the findings of his recently published paper titled 'Assessing website password practices –Unchanged after fifteen years?', which explores how leading websites guide and support users in making appropriate password choices. The paper presents the fifth in a series of studies that have been conducted every few years since 2007, with the aim of examining the level of guidance provided to users before and during the password selection process, as well as examining the nature of the passwords that users are then permitted to choose. We also discuss the enforcement of password rules and applying various tests which determine whether the site filters out common or predictable password choices. About Steven Steven Furnell is a senior member of the IEEE and professor of cybersecurity at the University of Nottingham. His research includes usability of security and privacy, security management and culture, and technologies for user authentication and intrusion detection. He has authored more than 320 papers in refereed international journals and conferences, as well as books including Cybercrime: Vandalising the Information Society and Computer Insecurity: Risking the System.

A recent report has revealed that Google harvests 39 types of private data on its users, which includes users' specific location, their browser history and the emails on their Gmail accounts. Google is constantly invading our personal space thanks to the many formats at its disposal, including: Search, Chrome, Gmail, Youtube, Maps, Workspace, and Android. As Google's oppressive dominance continues to grow, more and more email users are ready to embrace new decentralization tools that are providing private solutions. Skiff is fusing the mail interface that consumers use everyday with Web3 open source technology, to provide a privacy-first, end-to -end encrypted, wallet native workspace. Users will be able to send messages, write notes and share files all while completely owning their own data. Utilizing IPFS, Skiff users will also have the option to store their content, including all Skiff Drive files, fully decentralized and end-to-end encrypted. In light of this, Andrew Milch, CEO and Co-Founder of Skiff, joins me in a conversation about how new technologies can help individual de-couple privacy concerns from a reliance on big tech companies. We also discuss the need to embed privacy into the platforms we use in order to protect against the non-consensual usage of sensitive data by third parties. Finally, we explore the advantages for users of switching from other cloud storage providers to a totally private storage platform that is entirely censorship-resistant and decentralized.

When every business is talking about the power of digital experiences, I want to learn more about what that means and look beyond the buzzwords and toward the business value it offers. Contentsquare, the global leader in digital experience analytics, was recently named a winner of the 2022 Aragon Research Innovation Award for Digital Experience Analytics. So today's guest is Dave Anderson from Contentsquare, which helps brands deliver the power to make the digital world more human. Dave shares his origin story and the path that led him to an AI-powered platform that provides rich and contextual insight into customer behaviors, feelings, and intent at every touchpoint in their journey. I also learn more about the story behind Contentsquare, founded in Paris with offices worldwide and has raised $1.4B in investment funding. We also discuss the emergence of apps and reliability but the lack of focus on the experience. Finally, we talk about the Tech Seeking Human Podcast - a podcast about AI built on the back of working at Dynatrace and exploring where AI is heading.

Draft.dev helps businesses achieve their technical content goals through a team of writers who are also professional software developers and subject matter experts. As a result, they create content that resonates with technical audiences and performs well on search engines. After spending eight years as a CTO, building software engineering teams in venture-funded startups, Karl Hughes started Draft.dev to help companies create authentic technical content that resonates with software developers. Since founding the company in 2020, the team has grown to include marketers, editors, engineers, and over 130 technical writers. Karl joins me on Tech Talks Daily to share his story of transitioning from engineer to team leader to business owner. He also reveals the skills and lessons learned throughout his career. I also learn how he had to learn to sell and closed over $1mm in new business in his first year. Karl also discusses growing a business quickly and going from 1 to 16 employees and 200 contractors in 2 years with no funding.

Jeffrey Partyka, Principal Data Science Engineer at Xactly, joins me on Tech Talks Daily in a discussion about the rise of data scientists and their value for companies. Jeffrey shares how forecasting models work, the importance of statistical analysis, and how wider teams can utilize data to create better business products. He discusses how this role has evolved and is better institutionalized in recent years. We also explore Xactly's survey report - Insights on The Sales Talent Crisis of more than 400 U.S. sales leaders, and the lessons learned from the great resignation. Jeffrey Partyka has been a principal data science engineer at Xactly since July 2020, actively conducting and overseeing numerous machine learning/statistical projects relating to sales forecasting, churn, cross-selling, and other sales areas. Jeff has worked in data science since 2007 as a Big Data engineer, data science team lead, research & development manager, and part-time professor across multiple domains, including geospatial indexing, psychometrics, productivity optimization, and sales performance management.

Continuous digital transformation has created a data explosion that's overwhelming many organisations. Every tap, click, or swipe from a user, new code deployment or architecture change, and attempted cyberattack generates more data that can be captured and analysed. However, there is too much data to store and use cost-effectively. Organizations are therefore forced to discard most data or lock it away in cheaper storage layers where it can't be analyzed. This has led to a tipping point, where the datasets used for observability and security analytics are too incomplete to be truly valuable. The value of observability and security data is in the insights it can provide to help organizations optimize their digital services. However, current approaches to analytics mean they often need help to maximize the detail those insights contain. As well as having an incomplete dataset, most of what they keep is stored and analyzed in silos, so it lacks a crucial ingredient – context. This means any answers from data analytics are often incomplete, imprecise, or even incorrect – limiting its value to the business. Grail is a data lakehouse, purpose-built to solve these challenges. It combines the structure, management, and querying capabilities of a data warehouse, with the low-cost benefits of a data lake. Bob Wambach shares the story behind Grail and how it enables organizations to store vast quantities of observability and security data cost-effectively and analyze it together in context. I also learn how Grail uses a massively parallel processing (MPP) analytics engine, enabling organizations to run thousands of queries simultaneously rather than processing them sequentially. As a result, they can get instant, more precise, and cost-efficient insights from analytics.

The transportation industry is going through a massive digital transformation right now. The changing value proposition of cars is moving software to the center of a legacy business. So it's a great time to get in on an early software trend that will soon redefine driver expectations. In today's episode, I want to learn more about how the advanced technology team at General Motors is doing inspiring work driving the future of transportation, from EVs and AVs to connected cars. Padma Sundaram, director of Software Defined Vehicle Quality and Operations at General Motors, joins me on Tech Talks Daily to share how she played a crucial role in launching a new software platform called Ultifi. I learn more about how Ultifi will leverage a Linux-based operating system allowing third-party developers worldwide to create apps for GM. This will also help expand the capabilities of a customer's connected car long after it's sold and create collaboration opportunities never seen before. We discuss how open source is powering the shift to an era of software-defined vehicles where cars will become much more like our smartphones – a connected device that will regularly update, customize and evolve with their owners over time. Padma also shares how the auto industry might be the next frontier for tech talent looking to build their careers.

Did you know that Biodiversity loss represents a risk to more than half the world's GDP - about $44 trillion? Today, I want to explore what Biodiversity is and technology's role in improving it. Dr Mike Musgrave joins me in a conversation about all this and more. We discuss his work with the School of Wildlife Conservation at the African Leadership University is working with Dalberg Catalyst and Financial Services Deepening Africa to develop a Biodiversity Investment Ratings Agency (BIRA). Dr Mike Musgrave graduated from Rhodes University and the University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa and holds a PhD in Sustainable Development from the University of St Andrews in Scotland. A recipient of the prestigious Frederick Soddy Award from the Royal Geographic Society, he writes broadly on African customary law, common-pool resource governance and nature-based solutions for addressing climate change in Africa. Mike is currently Conservation Leadership Faculty in the School of Wildlife Conservation at the African Leadership University in Kigali, Rwanda where he leads the development of a Biodiversity Investment Ratings Agency for Africa in partnership with Dalberg and FSD Africa. Tech Talks Daily Podcast Sponsor Check out Flippa, who is the show sponsor in December. Find out more information at https://flippa.com/tech-talks

Visibility and detection tools such as Orca, AWS Security Hub, Wiz, Lacework, and others revolutionized cloud security assessment and analysis, inching the world of SecOps towards remediation. The transformation they introduced to risk prioritization and assessment in the cloud brought to the surface valuable indications and alerts that required the attention of security teams. SecOps teams are now swamped with a growing number of security findings but no comprehensive tools or streamlined processes to remediate them. Opus is filling that gap. Meny Har witnessed firsthand the growing need for SecOps orchestration in cloud security remediation. Listen in as Meny shares with me how they have built a solution that will do for cloud SecOps remediation what Orca, Wiz, and others did for cloud risk detection and prioritization. Opus strives to transform cloud SecOps by enabling organizations to effectively respond and remediate in the cloud. About Opus Opus Security is a Cloud Security Orchestration and Remediation startup emerging from stealth with funding in the double-digit millions led by YL Ventures, Tiger Global, and big-name security executives and serial entrepreneurs, including the CEOs of CrowdStrike and Cyber Ark. The co-founders, are experienced, successful executives who come out of Siemplify, acquired by Google in Jan. to boost SecOps. Tech Talks Daily Podcast Sponsor Check out Flippa, who is the show sponsor in December. Find out more information at https://flippa.com/tech-talks

At IDEO, they believe a more sustainable, equitable future is for all of us to design. And there is an urgency to that collective effort, as today's challenges are increasingly global and interconnected. For decades, They have helped individuals, leaders, and organizations navigate such complexity, designing the products, services, and experiences of the future. But what is the role of technology in these efforts? Wes Eugene, CIO IDEO on the podcast, joins me on Tech Talks Daily to share his story. We discuss the Circular Economy and How organizations can tackle the greatest challenge of our lifetime. For example, H&M recently partnered with IDEO to eliminate plastic in its packaging (2,000 tons, in fact). Logitech also turned to IDEO to set new sustainability goals when they decided to become climate positive by 2030. We also discuss how to design inclusion into existing systems and processes. For example, IDEO worked with LA County to create a new voting experience that's more intuitive and accessible, as well as Ford Foundation to elevate frontline workers in the business decision-making process. Finally, we explore organizational transformation and how organizations can evolve around global forces and digital innovation while staying true to their mission and purpose. For example, IDEO worked closely with Ford Motor Company on designing its successful electrified fleet last year. It's also worked with governments such as the UAE on new ways of designing policy when traditional processes fail.

Cipher Skin CEO Phillip Bogdanovich shares the story behind the biometric and motion smart sleeve used for physical rehabilitation. He is a former US Marine Corps Amphibious Recon Medic and was Tactical Medical Chief Diplomatic Protection for the US Dept of State. I learn more about how he launched Cipher Skin after his own physical rehabilitation recovery from combat injuries and success with previous startups. We also discuss how the patented technology has numerous applications, including athletic performance and industrial monitoring (like oil and gas pipelines). We also discuss what biometric and motion data is collected through Cipher Skin and explore the possibilities for future hybrid care and wearable technology.

Stephen Semmelroth was in the Army for 6+ years, and he served in Afghanistan and the Army's Cyber Corps, where he led a red team and a threat intelligence team defending US assets across an entire continent. Unfortunately, he broke his back while on a mission which left him paralyzed, and he had to relearn how to walk. After retiring from the Army, he founded Rainier Cyber, a cybersecurity recruiter that matches Cyber Vets with tech jobs across the county, which was acquired by StrataCore in 2020. Stephen holds CISSP, PMP, GSNA, GCIA, and GPEN cyber security certificates, and he mentors between 200-300 people annually in the cybersecurity space. Stephen shares his story with me and discusses a rise in global conflict necessitates a review of cybersecurity best practices. He also talks about how companies and non-tech professionals can solve the cybersecurity talent problem. Tech Talks Daily Podcast Sponsor Check out Flippa, who is the show sponsor in December. Find out more information at https://flippa.com/tech-talks

Larry Williams is the President and CEO of The Technology Association of Georgia (TAG), one of the largest tech associations in North America with 30,000+ members. His role is to help strengthen the innovation ecosystem of Georgia, a state particularly well-known for its booming technology industry. Through TAG-Ed, Larry also works tirelessly to promote STEAM education and support workforce development for tech professionals. Larry shares with me his insights about supporting the technology ecosystems that help innovative companies bridge the gap between their customers, partners, products, technologies and markets. Larry also shares insights about educating, building and supporting the technology workforce of tomorrow. Finally, he reflects from his experience as the Founder and President of the National Technology Security Coalition, a non-profit, non-partisan trade association serving as the voice of CISOs to help improve national cybersecurity. Tech Talks Daily Podcast Sponsor Check out Flippa, who is the show sponsor in December. Find out more information at https://flippa.com/tech-talks

Issuu is the world's largest SaaS content publishing and marketing platform. The Issuu Story Cloud empowers content creators to transform creative designs from static files into web-optimized assets for every marketing channel, including web, mobile, social, email, and more. Joe Hyrkin, CEO of Issuu, the Omni-channel content tools and publishing platform, joins me on today's episode of Tech Talks Daily. We discuss how the Issuu Story Cloud enables millions of global marketers, brands, creators, and publishers to digitally share and monetize their longer-form quality content and create marketing materials. We discuss big tech's responsibilities for the future of marketing & publishing, the workflow mentality shift among enterprises, and streamlining processes strategically amidst a recession. Finally, we discuss what is driving the creator economy, the future of publishing, and what's next for Issuu and other brands in this space. About Joe Joe joined Issuu in early 2013 after more than 20 years of leading startup/growth companies in executive, business development, and product roles. He served as CEO of Reverb during two rounds of financing; in addition, as head of SingleFeed, Joe oversaw that firm's acquisition by Alibaba. Before that, Joe held sales and leadership positions at Gala Interactive, Yahoo, Flickr, and Virage. He directed the Economist Group's business in China and has extensive board and tech-advisor experience. Joe was educated at the State University of New York in Albany and as a foreign student at Beijing Normal University in China. Tech Talks Daily Podcast Sponsor Check out Flippa, who is the show sponsor in December. Find out more information at https://flippa.com/tech-talks

Linden Tibbets, Founder and CEO of IFTTT (If This Then That), shares the story behind the platform that allows users to integrate different apps, devices, and services to create automated responses and routines. I learned more about his vision to empower everyone to automate and integrate their favorite apps and smart devices to work together by launching IFTTT in 2010. Before that, he worked as a communications designer at IDEO, a renowned product design firm. Did you know there are over 700+ apps, services, and devices, including the world's biggest brands like Google, Discord, Slack, Dropbox, Alexa, and Fitbit, as well as millions of their users rely on IFTTT for their most essential integrations? From notifications (letting your spouse know you've left work and are heading home automatically), to tapping into the Internet of Things (turning on your lights when you unlock the front door) — IFTTT makes it easy to control and customize their world. To date, they've also raised $62.5M from investors, including Salesforce and IBM, and their users perform 1B+ automation and integrations monthly. Listen in as Linden shares how he built his company from the ground up to become one of the leading IoT solution platforms with million-dollar revenues. We also explore the top IoT trends we can expect to see in the next five years and the future of human-computer interaction. Tech Talks Daily Podcast Sponsor Check out Flippa, who is the show sponsor in December. Find out more information at https://flippa.com/tech-talks

On Dec. 3, 1992, a 22-year-old Papworth texted "Merry Christmas" to Richard Jarvis, a director at Vodafone who was at a company Christmas party. It was the first time a cellphone user had ever received words instead of a voice call on their device. Papworth was a developer and test engineer for Sema Group, which was rolling out the world's first short message service (SMS) center for Vodafone U.K. This noteworthy event later led to Papworth being featured in a Best Buy Super Bowl commercial, a Jeopardy! question, a book and the Museum of Global Communications. It also gave rise to an important new medium now used regularly by most Americans and employed by billions of people globally. Neil Papworth discusses the changes he has seen since sending the first text message. Best known as the first person ever to send a text, Neil made his indelible mark on the world of communications – and the annals of tech and text history – early in his career. In addition, Infobip recently revealed insights from their 30th Anniversary of the SMS report, so I invited Ivan Ostojic back on the podcast to join the discussion. In 2020, Infobip became the first Croatian company to reach unicorn status. In the past 12 months alone, over 5 billion people have used Infobip solutions and services. Ivan shares insights from the report and discusses the future of SMS and other means of messaging for business purposes. Tech Talks Daily Podcast Sponsor Check out Flippa, who is the show sponsor in December. Find out more information at https://flippa.com/tech-talks

Arun Kumar is a regional director at ManageEngine, the enterprise IT management division of Zoho Corporation. With almost two decades of global experience in enterprise IT, Arun has a deep knowledge and peer network in the IT management industry. He has been working with ManageEngine since 2003. In his current role, he leads all channel and partner-related initiatives for the company in the United Kingdom (UK) and Asia Pacific (APAC) markets. Arun joins me on Tech Talks Daily to share insights from their global survey around the empowerment and democratization of IT with 3,300 decision-makers from across IT and business decision-makers. On the topics of IT Leadership, Autonomy + Expectations we explore the relationship between IT and the C Suite, and levels of consultation. We also discuss the influence and importance of the IT department and how they collaborate with other internal teams. We also talk abot IT Sovereignty and decentralization in UK companies versus the global average. Why companies are choosing to decentralize their IT, their motivation for doing so, and the levels of independence for IT decision-making. Finally, we discuss the perceived role of IT in preventing security attacks and how the UK compares with the global market regarding educating its workforce about security threats. Tech Talks Daily Podcast Sponsor Check out Flippa, who is the show sponsor in December. Find out more information at https://flippa.com/tech-talks

With a legal and finance background, Andrew Wilkins founded the first international wealth management platform, which he sold in 2015, going on to start an early-stage incubator, Fintecho. Futr.ai was born in 2017 when Andy and co-founder Lee Skyrme saw the massive opportunity to use cutting edge artificial intelligence to transform the way we access public services. Five years later, with the support of an amazing team and fantastic VCs, Futr is proud to include the police, the NHS, and many amazing charities and social services as well as private organisations as valued customers. Over the past year, Futr has accelerated its work with a myriad of organisations as they have all implemented AI chatbots to ensure increased engagement with their end-users and deliver a seamless customer service experience. From government to business, their chatbots are used by over 1,000 organisations across the world. We discuss their work with the NHS, various UK police forces (recently launching the first live chat support service for domestic abuse victims), UK housing associations and the charity CALM. I also learn how Futr is also now integrated with the social media profiles of the UK police divisions as well as CALM (among others), so they not only have access to real-time data, but past historical data as well. Andy shares his knowledgeable insights into current AI chatbot technology as well as practical guidance based on a wealth of experience for implementing digital transformation in the future. Tech Talks Daily Podcast Sponsor Check out Flippa, who is the show sponsor in December. Find out more information at https://flippa.com/tech-talks

William McKnight has been recognized as the #1 global influencer in big data, cloud, and data center by Thinkers 360 and the #1 global influencer in master data management by Onalytica in 2022. He is the Founder and President of McKnight Consulting Group, which advises many of the Global 2000 companies, including Pfizer, Verizon, UnitedHealth Group, Dell, Oracle, and Scotiabank, on ways to grow their businesses with big data faster. They've been recognized as one of the Inc. 5000 fastest-growing private companies in the US two times and their clients in 14+ countries have reaped tremendous ROI and turned data into a real corporate asset. With over 30 years of experience, William is a highly sought-after speaker who has spoken on four continents for various organizations, including IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, Bank of America, Orange South Africa, and SAP. Listen in as we discuss personal data, who's watching you, and how they can use the data collected from you. We also discuss new analytic uses of master data management in the enterprise, how AI will significantly impact users and how organizations think about their data resources. Tech Talks Daily Podcast Sponsor Check out Flippa, who is the show sponsor in December. Find out more information at https://flippa.com/tech-talks

The brains behind Couchbase's leading data platform, CTO Ravi Mayuram, joins me on Tech Talks Daily to discuss how businesses can avoid the $8.75m cloud overspend revealed in the company's latest cloud evolution report. Ravi shares that even though companies now view the move to the cloud as inevitable, enterprises are still caught out by issues such as inflexible pricing plans, ineffective management tools, and data not stored where it needs to be. We also explore how businesses can make the cloud live up to its promise and how new tech adoption impacts companies. Despite the current reputation of Web 3.0 being tarnished by Crypto-bros, NFTs, and Mega – Ravi believes there is definite potential for companies to explore blockchain technology. We also talk about how businesses can unlock this potential and what it will mean for data. While it's no surprise that the decentralization concept has extended to the IT industry, business infrastructure must be in place to achieve the benefits. Finally, Ravi shares his thoughts on how the future of IT must mean managing data anywhere, including on the edge, a server, or the cloud. Tech Talks Daily Podcast Sponsor Check out Flippa, who is the show sponsor in December. Find out more information at https://flippa.com/tech-talks

Cybersecurity is now recognized as a critical priority for businesses around the world. However, cybersecurity threats are evolving as risks, and the responses necessary to mitigate them, change rapidly. As a result, staying ahead of bad actors is a continuous challenge, and businesses, despite their intentions, are only sometimes keeping pace. To solve these problems, IT leaders must understand why. They need answers to questions such as, how is cybersecurity transforming? How are cyberattacks harming businesses? Where must investments in preventative training and tools be focused? Is cybersecurity being prioritized by leadership? And how does cybersecurity fit within an organizational culture? In partnership with Sapio Research, Keeper's second annual Cybersecurity Census report maps the transforming landscape of cybersecurity based on these expert insights. It provides leaders with a forensic assessment of their businesses' threats and details the urgent strategies necessary to overcome them. Darren Guccione, CEO & Co-founder at Keeper Security, returns to the Tech Talks Daily Podcast to share insights from the report. Tech Talks Daily Podcast Sponsor Check out Flippa, who is the show sponsor in December. Find out more information at https://flippa.com/tech-talks

Ben Uprcoft, VP of Technology at Oxbotica, joins me on Tech Talks Daily. Today's guest has extensive experience in perception systems for field robotics ranging from commercial passenger vehicles, all-terrain vehicles, draglines, haul trucks, and underwater platforms to unmanned aerial vehicles. At Oxbotica, Ben is responsible for technology development and our team of skilled engineers, balancing state-of-the-art algorithms with real-world system implementation to achieve intelligence in self-driving platforms - on and off road. Ben's previous life was as a tenured academic in Computer Vision and Robotics at the Queensland University of Technology, Australia where he focussed on machine learning for field robotics. He led the Robotics and Autonomous Systems group of over 150 postgraduate students, postdocs, and academics. Today, we explore delivering safe and sustainable AV technology that will reshape the future of transportation and mobility. I learn more about Oxbotica's software, Oxbotica Driver, which brings flexibility to its fleet customers and partners, such as the Ocado Group, enabling a unique last-mile delivery service. We discuss how Oxbotica is accelerating the adoption of its full-stack Oxbotica Driver by revolutionizing last-mile delivery not just in the UK but in the US, as the company plans to go global and work towards its mission of 'Universal Autonomy.' Earlier this year, the all-electric AppliedEV vehicle, driven by Oxbotica, completed a journey in Oxford with no onboard driver, marking the next step in commercializing AV technology. The target for the first public on-road business deployment with Ocado Group, with a goods delivery variant, completing customer orders will be from 2023 onwards.

Mike McCarron is a partner at PwC, where he helps C-suite executives in a range of industries drive transformation across all aspects of business operations through IT strategy and governance. Mike has spent his career advising and supporting leaders as they navigate technology, investments, and operations. Prior to PwC, he was a CIO at Bain Capital, GE Capital, and Fidelity, among other companies. In today's episode of Tech Talks Daily, Mike discusses why so many CIOs struggle to make an impact (and turnover in the role is so high). He also reveals why so many companies treat technology simply as a series of risks to be managed, not as a key lever of corporate strategy. We also explore why corporate boards should create tech subcommittees, and he reveals the two years in the military (when he was in his early 20s) that taught him more about leadership than any other experience.

It is estimated that the sportswear industry is worth approximately $33bn, and counterfeiting is a growing issue, especially during globally renowned events such as the World Cup which has already seen multiple seizure operations of counterfeit merchandise. Connected garments are the future of sportswear. Innovations in sportwear such as 'smart' numbers and invisible digital triggers which can be scanned with a smart phone. These innovations exist to boost consumer engagement as they have the power to unlock exclusive content such as match day information, quizzes and competitions for fans. They are also used to prove authenticity of the garments. Michael Colarossi is the vice president of Innovation and Product Line Management for Avery Dennison RBIS. In this role, Michael is responsible for RBIS' portfolio of products and solutions, product line strategies, and technical product innovation. He also leads the division's sustainability, social, and product compliance efforts. Listen in as we discuss how digital solutions can help brands and consumers, especially from a sustainability point of view, and stop fake merch.

Aaron Goldman, CMO, Mediaocean joins me in a discussion about "The Golden Crunch Point". As we are all aware, we are entering that time in the marketing calendar where for many brands, the majority of their revenue and sales are made – the Golden Quarter. These three months have always been huge but this year it has been amplified with the continued unpredictable headwinds of cost of living, changing consumer confidence and a potential recession. The crunch point for brands is that, while retail sales are expected to be lower this year - while consumers are more cautious of what they spend their money on - they still to need to make revenue. Aaron discusses "the four must haves" brands and retailers need for their Golden Quarter campaigns this year to entice new and existing customers outside discount and deals. With $200 billion in annualized ad spend running through its software, I also learn more about how Mediaocean provides foundational solutions to connect brands, agencies, media, technology, and data. About Mediaocean Mediaocean is the mission-critical platform for omnichannel advertising. With more than $200 billion in annualized media spend managed through its software, Mediaocean connects brands, agencies, media, technology, and data. Using AI and machine learning technology to control marketing investments and optimize business outcomes, Mediaocean powers campaigns from planning, buying, ad serving, and creative personalization to analysis, optimization, invoices, and payments. Mediaocean employs 1,700 staff across 30 global offices and supports over 100,000 people using its products

Sergio Esteve De Miguel is the co-founder of Bigle Legal, an innovative legaltech startup from Barcelona. Together with his brother, he wanted to combine their expertise in business and technology to transform the legal industry. Sergio believes technology can change how legal professionals approach their jobs and make their work lives much more enjoyable and productive. In today's episode, Sergio shares his story, the problems they are trying to solve, the future of legal operations, and how intuitiveness is critical in a contract lifecycle management or tech solution. About Bigle Legal Bigle Legal is a Contract Lifecycle Management Software, provides an AI-powered, cloud-based solution that automates the legal operations of a company while improving safety and minimizing the risk of legal contingencies. A pioneer tech company and leader in the field of document automation from Spain, with a presence in the UK, Austria, Netherlands and Italy, and has a network reseller across Europe and Latin America. Its clients include real estate companies, corporations, and large law firms. The platform is precise, flexible, and intuitive, providing full control over the entire document life cycle.

Philipp Pointner leads Jumio's digital identity strategy and the initiative to enable multiple digital identity providers in its ecosystem. Prior to Jumio, Philipp was responsible for paysafecard, Europe's most popular prepaid solution for online purchases. As well as sharing his personal experience in the technology industry and the projects he's worked on, Philipp discusses how digital identity for identity verification is a great place to start when it comes to building an ecosystem of trust. Listen in as we explore the different ways digital identity can make everyday transactions safer and easier for consumers while also improving people's online experience with brands Finally, we discuss why it's important to not just 'Know Your Customer' but 'Know Your Business' in order to navigate business challenges without compromising on security.

In July, Gartner introduced Continuous Threat Exposure Management (CTEM). In practice, CTEM is a set of processes and capabilities that allow organizations to evaluate the accessibility, exposure and exploitability of all digital and physical assets. The objective of CTEM is to create an actionable security posture remediation and improvement plan that business executives can understand, and architecture teams can act on. Haggai Polak, CPO of Skybox Security discusses what this new process means for enterprise security. Haggai also shares how Skybox has observed the approach in practice to help organizations better understand how exposure management can help stay ahead of today's cybersecurity threats.

Simon Mellin and his friends founded Modern Milkman in 2018 to reduce waste while making sustainable choices convenient and accessible to all. Modern Milkman set out to tackle the problem of single-use plastic packaging and food waste to ultimately protect the environment by reinventing the milk round. In today's episode of Tech Talks Daily, Simon shares how his inspiration came after watching David Attenborough's 'Blue Planet' TV show and the global aim of cutting single-use plastics from ending up in the ocean in a trash area five times the size of France. I also learn more about how sustainability, supporting independent suppliers, farmers, and plastic waste reduction remain at the heart of his mission. But it's data and AI that make all this possible. We discuss how Modern Milkman uses technology to deliver on its mission and transform the consumer experience. I learn how critical it is for customers to have what they ordered on time and the key to execution is capturing all the data points and running live analytics on the data so that Modern Milkman can map deliveries and predict demand and order flows to ensure no waste. Simon also speaks about the role of ThoughtSpot as part of the Modern Milkman data story and how it powers both business growth as well as Modern Milkman's mission.

Måns Ulvestam and his co-founders, Karl Rosander and Markus Ahlstrand, sold their shares in Acast to launch a new book, audio, and news platform, Sesamy. The platform allows users to buy only what they need, when they need it, and access it on any device or app through single purchases. In addition, no subscription is needed to access (and own) digital content. They've already rolled out in Sweden and Denmark, and have significant expansion plans in place. By using their own unique SmartID software, Sesamy can ensure a single-purchase option does not cannibalize existing subscription income. Instead, it creates an additional, incremental revenue stream to support publishers and provide consumers with flexible options in a time of considerable financial uncertainty. Sesamy have exciting upcoming plans for this software in the news/magazine sectors in particular. With inflation through the roof, and troubles ahead, the worst is arguably yet to come for those wedded to subscription models. It plausibly figures that the publishing sector, already facing a downturn in ad revenues, will also see the same trend as consumers cut back and grow ever tired of 'peak subscription'. Given these developments, subscription-dependent sectors are crying out for an alternative and are now increasingly finding they've optimized their own subscriber numbers. Growth is tailing off, and at risk of declining rapidly with these self-evident economic pressures.

Greg Sloan, CFP®, CEPA, CPM™, is a Chief Purpose Officer and Co-Founder of Go Beyond. This People Development company combines Behavioral Science and Technology to improve well-being in the workplace. With over 25+ years of experience in financial services, Greg is a serial founder who discovered his purpose and wants to share the knowledge of how to achieve this same goal with others. He is a thought leader who centers his time and energy on purpose and people, focusing on purpose in the workplace, the future of work, and financial wellness. Go Beyond's mission is to create scalable, science-based tools and content that can be easily distributed worldwide to enable people to live better lives. They accomplish this by activating purpose in the workplace to help companies recruit, grow, and retain workers. Research shows that aligning company and personal goals improves productivity, retention, and overall wellness in the workplace. After consecutive pandemic years, employee burnout has become a ubiquitous problem, impacting companies of every size, industry, and level. The consequences are devastating and far-reaching, negatively impacting people's personal and professional lives. For example, one employee survey found that a staggering 77 percent of employees are experiencing burnout at their current job. This reality is exacerbating already-high employee turnover rates, which reached historic highs this year, reorienting the workforce in real-time. As a result, four in five HR leaders say that mental health and employee well-being are top priorities for their companies. Today's episode discusses how Purpose Pulse enables companies and coaches to measure individual and organizational well-being. In addition, we explore how the combination of behavioral science and technology can help diagnose the root causes of disengagement, turnover, and burnout to allow organizations to allocate resources effectively to the most needed employee assistance programs.

Businesses across the country are already cutting costs amid the looming recession. From hiring freezes to trimming headcount, difficult decisions are already being made. As customers and clients try to cancel and tighten contracts, Kraig Swensrud shares the hardest questions he's getting in the sales and renewals conversations right now, and how to handle them. Kraig has led two companies through acquisition and is now the CEO of Qualified, which just raise $95M for their Series C. Even with an average 4,000% ROI across customers, Kraig is still having to navigate customers trying to cut costs.

Arjun Rai, serial entrepreneur and founder of the crowdsource-funded HelloWoofy.com joins me on Tech Talks Daily to share his story. His passion for technology and helping entrepreneurs and small businesses compete with the unlimited marketing budgets of their corporate competitors through digital marketing and equity fundraising make him a perfect fit for the show. Arjun offers tips for anyone struggling to keep up with post creation, scheduling, integrations etc. For startup founders, he also shares his experiences with equity crowdfunding, scaling a startup and how to survive and thrive as a founder.

Sparkseeker is a new, healthy alternative to current social apps that combines humane data practices, emotional wellness, and social good in one video-centric platform. It's fully built and launched its crowdfunding campaign earlier this summer, and crowdfunding contributors will receive early access to the app's private beta testing phase. As more and more people look to social media to share and further the causes most important to them, Sparkseeker's unique, action-focused features make online advocacy easy. At the same time, Seekers (the app's term for users) can post freely about their everyday lives without worrying about anonymous comments or bots, thanks to the app's fully video-based model. In addition, Sparkseeker's use of responsible technology and neuroscience-supported features ensures a healthier Seeker experience without invasive data practices, harmful algorithms, or in-stream ads. Sparkseeker's Founder and CEO, Kalista Zackhariyas, shares her incredibly engaging story about building a new healthy alternative to current social media apps.

Claire Vo, Chief Product Officer at Color, shares how she went from tech to healthcare. At Color, Claire leads the engineering, product management, data, and design teams to develop the company's population health platform, services, and technology. She joined Color from Optimizely, where she was Chief Product Officer, building enterprise-grade experimentation and progressive delivery products. After spending her entire career in tech, Claire made the jump into healthcare when she realized how the pandemic revealed just how inaccessible much of the U.S. health infrastructure is for people who need it most. The digital health industry boomed during the pandemic, with a proliferation of new services to address every part of the care ecosystem, but it also revealed just how inaccessible much of the U.S. health infrastructure is for people who need it most. Based on her current position at Color, a company focused on delivering a scalable public health infrastructure for millions, Claire discusses what it means to build a healthcare product focused on increasing access for millions and how companies can build infrastructure for scaled impact. Within digital health, Claire is passionate about the fact that software alone cannot solve public health crises – a notion which was proven through many companies' responses to the COVID-19 pandemic laid bare. There is a tendency to believe better tech is always the answer, but while the right software can reduce friction and drive better insights, healthcare is essentially a human interaction at the end of the day. It requires a hybrid model that incorporates both better technology and the personal touch of a visit to the doctor's office or a pharmacy.

François Candelon, Global Director of the BCG Henderson Institute – BCG's research think tank, joins me in a conversation about the growth of the many metaverses. Listen in as we talk about how the race is on to capture digital engagement. With 30 years in tech and as a global team leader analyzing the impact of the Metaverse through research, François discusses what metaverses actually exist and their purpose in shaping the future, from full-second digital lives (for work and play) to gaming communities and even crypto-centric marketplaces. We also talk about how organizations across industries can and must understand these rival metaverses before engaging. Finally, we look into who is winning the Metaverse and who the wild card contenders will be. About François Candelon: François Candelon is the Global Director of the BCG Henderson Institute, Boston Consulting Group's think tank dedicated to exploring and developing valuable new insights from business, technology, economics, and science by embracing the powerful technology of ideas. He is also a leader of BCG GAMMA's AI@Scale effort for technology, media, and telecommunications companies. GAMMA is BCG's data science and advanced analytics unit. François joined BCG in 1993. He has worked in several European countries, led BCG's global telecommunications work from 2008 to 2012, and spent seven years in China, where he worked with the most advanced tech companies. His research is focused on AI and digital as a source of competitive advantage for businesses and national economies. His work has been published in several prestigious reviews (Harvard Business Review, MIT, and Sloan Management Review). He has also been a speaker in global conferences like Mobile World Congress, TED@BCG, Web Summit, Politico AI Summit, and Wuzhen Internet Conference.

Research from Accenture found that most CEOs list becoming a sustainable and responsible business as a top priority, even at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Moreover, companies with higher sustainability performance also perform better financially than their peers. As meeting ESG benchmarks becomes a requirement, not simply a goal, Accenture recently shared its sustainability roadmap, including priorities, learnings, and best practices. I invited Accenture's internal global IT organization/Accenture CIO Penelope Prett to join me on Tech Talks Daily to discuss her strategy that focuses on three key pillars: Data: Sustainability commitments require greater access to sustainability data and environmental sustainability reporting tools that can identify trends in specific products or locations and build bridges to end goals. Cloud optimization: Optimizing migrations to the public cloud can reduce global carbon emissions by 59 million tons of CO2 annually. Accenture runs 95% of its infrastructure in the cloud, which led to an estimated reduction of 220 metric tons of carbon emissions in only nine months. Value Chains: Driving supplier engagement through data platforms and procurement hubs to influence responsible buying decisions and help businesses optimize their supplier base. We discuss how delivering on the promise of sustainable technology means that CIOs must embed sustainability into the core of operations to help the business achieve sustainability goals while also managing the environmental impact of the technology itself.

Venafi®, the inventor and leading provider of machine identity management, recently announced new research findings that evaluate the security impact of the increasing number of nation-state attacks and recent shifts in geopolitics. The survey of over 1,100 security decision-makers (SDMs) globally found that 66% of organizations have changed their cybersecurity strategy as a direct response to the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, while nearly two-thirds (64%) suspect their organization has been either directly targeted or impacted by a nation-state cyberattack. I invited Kevin Bocek to join me on the podcast to discuss how cybersecurity has become intertwined with geopolitics, with state-backed hackers using cybercrime to advance their nation's wider political, economic, and military goals. I learn how everyone is a target, and unlike a kinetic warfare attack, only you can defend your business against nation-state cyberattacks. There is no cyber-Iron Dome or cyber-NORAD. Every CEO and board must recognize that cybersecurity is one of the top three business risks for everyone, regardless of industry." We also discuss the Venafi research into the methods used by nation-state threat actors shows the use of machine identities is growing in state-sponsored cyberattacks. The digital certificates and cryptographic keys that serve as machine identities are the foundation of security for all secure digital transactions. Machine identities are used by everything from physical devices and to software to communicate securely.

Idit Levine, founder, and CEO of Solo.io, shares her inspirational tech startup story with me on Tech Talks Daily. Her journey took her from playing basketball professionally in her home country of Israel to founding Solo.io in 2017, the modern service connectivity company that's already valued at $1 billion! Idit shares with me the lessons she has learned along the way including how to scale as a CEO, hiring in the current market, and how to monetize open-source services.

Greg Gould is the COO of Dexioprotocol (DEXI), a crypto-based gaming company with several utilities. Their flagship product, DexiHunter, aims to be the "Pokemon Go" of cryptocurrency, and it allows players to earn crypto by hunting and collecting bounties around their cities. I invited Greg to join me on Tech Talks Daily to talk about Dexioprotocol and the worldwide adoption of crypto bounty hunting. We discuss how gaming is helping to get more people interested in cryptocurrencies and the future of blockchain, and we reflect on what's happening in the market.