WebProNews

Tag: mobile

  • Blackberry Selling $600 Million Worth of Patents

    Blackberry Selling $600 Million Worth of Patents

    Blackberry is selling off its legacy patents, primarily covering mobile devices, messaging, and wireless connectivity, to the tune of $600 million.

    Blackberry was once one of the most popular smartphone manufacturers, selling devices with their distinctive physical keyboard. The devices were popular with professionals and consumers alike, since the keyboard made it extremely easy to text, email, browse the web, and more. Like many brands, however, the iPhone spelled doom for Blackberry’s handset business and the company has since pivoted to software.

    The company is now selling its legacy patents, patents that seem to largely cover its old handset business. The patents are being sold to Catapult IP Innovations Inc., a special purpose vehicle formed specifically to purchase Blackberry’s IP.

    Blackberry will receive $450 million in cash, supplied by funding Catapult IP secured, as well as a promissory note of $150 million for the balance. Blackberry will also retain a license to the patents it is selling.

    It remains to be seen what Catapult IP plans to do with the patents.

  • Healthcare Messaging and the Future of Care

    Healthcare Messaging and the Future of Care

    Technology has literally transformed the way we talk to people. Even you, as you read the words that the author has typed, are reading words that have never seen a physical piece of paper. We hear from people around the world or across the house with a few swift movements in real time. What with all the information floating around online at any given moment, it is no wonder that sometimes logging onto another website seems daunting. Not wanting to log on to another site might not seem like a bad thing. A patient portal from a healthcare provider should not be a site that users avoid. Unfortunately, only 10% of patients would prefer to use patient portals to find out medical information. This means that the other 90% are hesitant to find out information regarding their health merely because the format is not what they would like to see. Read on to see how healthcare messaging is the way of the future.

    How Healthcare Can Better Communicate Through Tech

    So how can healthcare providers help to better communicate crucial information to those in their care? The answer is at everyone’s fingertips. By implementing omnichannel communication, providers can communicate with patients through SMS or messaging applications. By using technologies that physicians have already been using to consult each other regarding patient care, the format of this new communication method would already be familiar. The familiarity of the format ensures that there would be a virtually seamless transition on both ends, as both parties are already using these technologies. 

    In addition to an easy transition, using omnichannel communication also has a lot of exciting potential to transform patient care. As is the case with other life issues, many things can be fixed with effective communication. Many patients have expressed dissatisfaction with current methods of communicating with their healthcare providers. Too many cases of malpractice in healthcare have miscommunication between patient and physician to blame. If the methods in which patients and physicians communicate is less daunting to both parties, there’s less hesitancy in reaching out for help.

    Ultimately, this leads to lives saved as physicians can identify and treat problems in a more timely manner. This simplified communication method also allows for physicians to reach out and send reminders to patients. It would ensure that medicines are taken, routines are followed, prescriptions are filled, and appointments are made. This would also allow for the appropriate action to be taken more immediately if patients do not or cannot comply. 

    The Rise of Omnichannel

    Personalized omnichannel communication also has the potential to increase efficiency in doctor’s offices and hospitals. It can instantly rearrange the physician’s schedule as patients reschedule or cancel appointments. This allows for other patients to get off waitlists faster, getting their treatments as soon as possible. Efficiency is also increased when those at the front desk do not have to make repeated phone calls where a message reminder sent to the patient’s smartphone would have been sufficient. 

    Familiarity, improved patient care, and efficiency in the office are just the start of the benefits of implementing omnichannel communication in healthcare. For more information, see the the visual deep dive below:

    The Power of Mobile Messaging
    Source: SopranoDesign.com
  • Blackberry 5G Phone With Physical Keyboard Coming in 2021

    Blackberry 5G Phone With Physical Keyboard Coming in 2021

    It’s the brand that won’t die, as OnwardMobility has announced it is bringing a 5G Blackberry with traditional keyboard to market in 2021.

    Once the king of the smartphone arena, Blackberry was the device of choice for professionals and consumers alike. The company was known for enterprise-grade mobile software, combined with the best QUERTY keyboard in the business.

    Unfortunately for the company, the introduction of the iPhone caught it off-guard and it lost its dominance. Since then, the core company has switched its focus to software, with a strong emphasis on security. Meanwhile, Blackberry has licensed the right to create Blackberry hardware to outside companies, OnwardMobility being the current one.

    According to an interview with Naoki Watanabe, a writer with Nikkei, CEO and Founder Peter Franklin said OnwardMobility is planning to bring 5G-enabled Blackberry phones, complete with the quintessential QUERTY keyboard, to the US and Europe in 2021. While there is not a definite timeline, OnwardMobility hopes to release in Asia as soon as possible.

    “It is a global flagship device, and Asia is very important to us,” Franklin said . “We are in the process of speaking to customers and mobile carriers on a global scale to develop our distribution plan.”

    Franklin and company are hoping to capitalize on the current remote work trends as a result of the pandemic. Because more people are working from home, there is a renewed focus on mobile devices that can help them be more productive, with Franklin touting the new Blackberry as just such a device.

    “Our smartphones equipped with a physical keyboard can help boost productivity”, Franklin added.

    It remains to be seen if OnwardMobility will be able to make a dent in the market, but there’s sure to be at least some demand for a powerful, modern Blackberry, not to mention that legendary keyboard.

  • Qualcomm Intros Snapdragon 888, Promises ‘Breakthrough Performance’

    Qualcomm Intros Snapdragon 888, Promises ‘Breakthrough Performance’

    Qualcomm has announced the next iteration of its Snapdragon line of processors, the flagship Snapdragon 888.

    Qualcomm is one of the leading makers of mobile chips, used in Android smartphones and tablets. Based on ARM designs, Snapdragon is used in some of the premier devices on the market.

    The new Snapdragon 888 makes significant improvement on previous generations, especially in performance, AI and connectivity.

    “Qualcomm’s history of breakthrough technology inventions has paved the way for our continued leadership in the premium-tier mobile segment,” said Alex Katouzian, senior vice president and general manager of mobile, compute and infrastructure, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. “The new flagship Snapdragon 888 Mobile Platform will enable OEMs to further differentiate their devices and allows users to experience the latest cutting-edge mobile technologies.”

    When it comes to performance, the Snapdragon 888 is based on 5nm process technology, giving up to 25% better overall CPU performance and top speeds up to 2.84 GHz. The 888 also includes an integrated 5G modem, unlike the previous generation that had to be paired with a discreet modem.

    Qualcomm touts the Snapdragon 888’s AI abilities as “the biggest architectural leap forward in AI. The completely re-designed 6th generation Qualcomm AI Engine with the new Qualcomm® Hexagon 780 processor enables premium experiences that blend AI with professional cameras, personal voice assistants, elite gaming, lightning-fast connectivity and more.” Meanwhile, “the integrated 3rd generation Snapdragon X60 5G Modem-RF System enables support for 5G sub-6 carrier aggregation and mmWave to deliver the world’s fastest commercially available 5G speeds, up to 7.5 Gbps.”

    The Snapdragon 888 should help smartphone manufacturers push the envelope of what’s possible, and usher in a new generation of mobile devices.

  • Google Search Experiencing Issues With Mobile Indexing and Canonicalization

    Google Search Experiencing Issues With Mobile Indexing and Canonicalization

    Google has confirmed it is dealing with two separate issues with its search, one impacting mobile indexing and the other canonicalization.

    Around September 23, website operators began noticing a change in how sites were being ranked by Google. Originally this was chalked up to a search engine algorithm.

    Google has acknowledged both issues. In the case of the mobile indexing bug, it can result in no page being indexed. The canonicalization could result in a page not being indexed, or the wrong URL being associated with a page.

    Google is working to resolve the issues as quickly as possible. Site owners will not need to do anything, simply wait for Google to fix the issue.

  • How Mobile is Changing Marketing by Creating Value

    How Mobile is Changing Marketing by Creating Value

    Mobile has become the focus of marketers worldwide because it goes with all of us, wherever we are and whatever we are doing. It seamlessly and ubiquitously is with us as we move from work to home and in between.

    At Salesforce Dreamforce, Stephanie Buscemi, CMO of Salesforce, and Susan Prescott, Vice President Product Marketing at Apple discussed how mobile is changing the world of marketing. In particular, how mobility is setting new standards for customer expectations and how the is impacting the customer experience.

    Apples VP of Product Marketing, Susan Prescott, explains:

    An opportunity from a marketing point of view with mobility and with the technologies, the information you have about customers in the cloud and the devices that we have in the hands of customers, is the ability to personalize it. Rather than a marketing world where it’s just about driving awareness and trying to drive a generic action you have the opportunity that will help you deliver an even better more personal experience understanding things about that user.

    From a marketing point of view, the power of combining the Salesforce Cloud and all of the things that are all of the insights and information that are there together with the intuitive familiar experience of the ubiquitous device that brings information to your fingertips all the time, it’s so powerful. This idea of having information when you need it, where you need it, on the device you have with you, is powerful.

    As a consumer, obviously, I have that when I walk in a store I can have information right on my phone about items in the store, some of which have smart tagging so I can see the availability of the item and colors it comes in. Once the consumers have that kind of information we have to be smart as marketers to help them take the next step and not just feed them with generic awareness tools.

    We as marketers have the opportunity to leverage all of that into more personalized experiences that benefit the user and also can benefit businesses. The idea of mobility isn’t just that it’s fun and easy, it’s that it’s creating value, value for the consumer, value for the business, and value for the customer.

  • Mobile Is Finally Coming To the Enterprise, Says ServiceNow CEO

    Mobile Is Finally Coming To the Enterprise, Says ServiceNow CEO

    “Mobile is coming to the enterprise, finally,” says ServiceNow CEO John Donahoe. “It’s been a long time coming. Our release in Q3 will have native out of the box consumer-grade mobile capability. So now any ServiceNow customer can have a brilliant mobile onboarding app so that their new employees can get up to speed quickly and seamlessly. We are very excited about the mobile capabilities coming in Q3, native out of the box so every one of our customers can build them in a low-code or no-code way.”

    John Donahoe, CEO of ServiceNow, discusses their earnings announcement and their major progress in bringing mobile to the enterprise, in an interview with Jim Cramer on CNBC:

    Mobile Is Coming To the Enterprise, Finally

    Our customers are very excited about mobile coming to the enterprise. It’s been a long time coming. Our release in Q3 will have native out of the box consumer-grade mobile capability. So now any ServiceNow customer can have a brilliant mobile onboarding app so that their new employees can get up to speed quickly and seamlessly. You can show a young new employee, a millennial, that you are in fact a modern company that helps get them onboard and productive quickly. 

    Also, the Now Mobile app which will allow employees to get their questions answered, problems reported and then dealt with, and get information. All my approvals are now in one place where I can check them. We are very excited about the mobile capabilities coming in Q3, native out of the box so every one of our customers can build them in a low-code or no-code way. Mobile is coming to the enterprise, finally.

    We feel very good about our growth. We feel very good about our customer and very good about our prospects. We are just focusing and executing so our customers get those great experiences.

    We Feel Very Good About the Relations We Are Building

    We now have 766 customers that are a million dollars and greater. We signed 14 customers that are a million dollars and greater in the quarter. That’s just symptomatic of the fact that we now work with 75 percent of the global 500. We are increasingly a strategic partner with those customers. Of our top 20 deals, 17 had three or more products. We feel very good about the relationships that we are building with our largest customers, which are the world’s largest companies and governments. 

    Our relationship with Microsoft is a very good one. We are initially focusing on US federal business where Microsoft has a strong presence as do we. We have a huge federal business and our datacenters have a certain security clearance. Microsoft Azure has the highest security clearance. Rather than us trying to replicate that, we are going to partner with them to take advantage of that Azure capability and jointly call on US federal customers.

    We are doing the same with federal customers in Australia and increasingly we will look at other government markets. We have 20 different product integrations with Microsoft and a long history with them. We think there is a lot of shared opportunity together. 

    RPO Is the Best Forward-Looking Indication of Our Business

    We do think RPO is a very good indication and probably the best forward-looking indication of our business because it demonstrates what kind of revenue you can expect going forward. Our current RPO grew 35 percent in the quarter. We feel very good about the outlook and future of our business. We raised guidance for the full year, both on revenue and billings. We see a lot of opportunity and we have a lot of strong momentum. We are focused on building those customer relationships that drive that growth.

    Mobile Is Finally Coming To the Enterprise, Says ServiceNow CEO John Donahoe
  • Google Launching Google Play Protect to Help Protect Against Malicious Apps

    Google Launching Google Play Protect to Help Protect Against Malicious Apps

    Android has solidified its position as the dominant mobile operating system (OS) on the market in large part due to its open nature. Any company can license Android and install it on their hardware.

    Similarly, the Google Play Store has enjoyed the reputation of being much easier to publish apps to than the Apple App Store. Unfortunately, that has resulted in a number of instances where malicious apps have slipped through the review process.

    Now, in an effort to combat rogue apps, Google is launching Google Play Protect, a suite of services designed to protect Android phones. The company says the software “is always updating, and automatically takes action to keep your data and device safe, so you don’t have to lift a finger.”

    Play Protect uses machine learning to identify new threats and will proactively remove them. The software also scans for bad behavior from existing apps, letting you know when one accesses data or services it shouldn’t.

    Play Protect also includes features to help users whose phones are lost or stolen.

    “To help in these times of need, we’re launching Find My Device as part of Google Play Protect. With Find My Device you can locate, ring, lock and erase your Android devices—phones, tablets, and even watches.”

    Google’s announcement is a welcome one, and should be a significant security improvement for Android users around the world.

  • Honda Acquires Drivemode, Makers of Smartphone Apps for Drivers

    Honda Acquires Drivemode, Makers of Smartphone Apps for Drivers

    Honda R&D Co., Ltd. (Honda R&D)—Honda’s research and development arm—announced it has acquired California-based Drivemode, Inc., a startup dedicated to creating and operating smartphone-based connected services.

    The two companies had been collaborating since 2015 through Honda’s Xcelerator program. Drivemode is known for their innovative user interface design, as well as cloud-based technologies. Drivemode will work with Honda R&D’s recently created Digital Solution Center to push innovation in the area of connected mobility services.

    From the Press Release:

    “As a step toward the realization of value creation for mobility and enhancing people’s daily lives, which is an integral part of Honda’s 2030 Vision, we decided to further enhance our collaborative relationship with Drivemode,” said Toshihiro Mibe, President and Representative Director of Honda R&D. “We are confident that new value creation will become possible when Drivemode’s outstanding human resources, innovative software technologies and extensive experience as a venture company are combined with Honda’s product development technology and capability. We will strive to offer connected services which will please our customers while leveraging our respective strengths.

    “Since Drivemode began working with Honda in 2015, our entire company has been inspired and impressed by the entrepreneurial spirit driving Honda’s engineering and product development. Guided by our shared culture of innovation and transformation, we are proud to join Honda as their first startup acquisition,” said Yo Koga, CEO of Drivemode. “With the support of Honda, the Drivemode team can have a lasting impact on actual vehicles and drivers around the world at scale. Our focus has always been on providing safe, meaningful software solutions for drivers, and with Honda’s hardware capabilities, we can continue innovating on mobile-based technology for connected cars and motorcycles.”

  • John Legere Not Leaving T-Mobile For WeWork

    John Legere Not Leaving T-Mobile For WeWork

    The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this week that WeWork was in talks with T-Mobile CEO John Legere to take over at the office space company. Now, according to Alex Sherman at CNBC, Legere is not taking the job.

    In many ways, Legere was a natural choice for a WeWork CEO. WeWork is being taken over by SoftBank, the parent company of Sprint. T-Mobile and Sprint are nearing the end of a merger deal years in the marking. With FCC and DOJ approval, the merger only has to survive a lawsuit from a handful of states. In the meantime, however, Legere is a known factor for SoftBank leadership, as they have worked with him throughout the merger process. That first-hand experience no doubt made him a top candidate for the job.

    Sources familiar with the situation, however, said that Legere has no plans on leaving T-Mobile. The news is no doubt a welcome relief to T-Mobile investors. During his time with the company, Legere has taken it from a distant fourth place among U.S. carriers to a solid third place and growing at a record rate. Legere was also instrumental in helping get approval for the merger, and will be a steadying influence as the two companies combine.

    It should be interesting to see how much T-Mobile can grow with the combined revenue, subscribers and spectrum of the two companies, not to mention Legere’s continuing leadership.

  • Microsoft Announces All-In-One Office App For Mobile Devices

    Microsoft Announces All-In-One Office App For Mobile Devices

    Microsoft just announced a major redesign of its Office apps for mobile devices, combining them into a single application.

    For decades, Microsoft Office has been the gold standard for productivity software and is one of the main applications that has helped the iPad become a staple in the corporate world. Now, Microsoft is redesigning its suite of programs to combine them into a single app, improving productivity and integration between the individual components.

    “The new Office mobile app represents our vision for what a productivity solution would look like if first built for mobile devices. In designing this new experience, we first considered how people’s expectations differ when using a phone versus a computer, so we set out to optimize for simplicity, efficiency, and common mobile needs. Next, we explored how to better incorporate the unique ways that people input data and create content on a mobile device – essentially turning the phone form factor from a liability for doing work into an asset. Finally, we needed to ensure that this app met the high expectations people already have for Office solutions. This solution should feel familiar to the people that know and rely on them today and instill a sense of confidence that they can accomplish their work with the high degree of quality and security that they have come to know.

    “We are excited to introduce to our solution to this endeavor. The Office app provides a simple, integrated experience that puts the tools you need for working on a mobile device at the forefront of the experience. We started by combining the existing Word, Excel, and PowerPoint mobile apps into a single app. Doing so brings all of your Office documents together in one place, reduces the need to switch between multiple apps, and significantly reduces the amount of space used on your phone compared to multiple installed apps. We then added new capabilities that harness the strengths of mobile devices, such as the camera, to enable you to create content in uniquely mobile ways. Finally, we added a new Actions Pane that helps you accomplish many of the common mobile tasks you need to do all from one place.

    “Whether using it for personal or professional reasons, Office is designed to be your go-to app for getting work done on a mobile device.”

    The new application is available as a public preview, for both Android and iOS. Initially, the preview will only work on phones, although full tablet support will be available in time. The legacy apps will continue to be supported, although Microsoft is obviously hopeful that individuals and corporations will switch to the new option.

  • SoundHound & Deutsche Telekom Form Partnership For Voice-Driven AI Devices

    SoundHound & Deutsche Telekom Form Partnership For Voice-Driven AI Devices

    SoundHound and Deutsche Telekom have announced a partnership between the two companies to help the latter integrate voices services.

    Deutsche Telekom is looking to differentiate itself in the telecom industry by using voice services to complement traditional, manual interfaces, and is determined to provide the best voice experience to its customers.

    SoundHound, long-known for its music recognition app, has become a leading provider of voice-driven AI solutions.

    “SoundHound Inc.’s Houndify Voice AI solutions are designed to help companies deliver better user experiences than manual interfaces — such as keyboards, remote devices and touch screens — while elevating brand images and creating greater connections with customers. As a global provider of customized voice AI solutions, SoundHound Inc. provides multilingual support through our Houndify platform. We currently support 14+ languages including English, German, Japanese, Chinese, Spanish, and Portuguese — and we’re adding more all the time.

    “Houndify also gives manufacturers the flexibility to develop a custom wake word and custom domains with access to an extensive library of public domains for everything from weather, to navigation, to music. The platform also allows for the integration of multiple voice assistants to live side-by-side, each with its own wake word.

    “The partnership with Deutsche Telekom deepens SoundHound Inc.’s presence in the telecommunications industry. Recently, SoundHound Inc. partnered with Motorola to integrate the Houndify Voice AI platform into the company’s products, including moto g6, moto g6 plus, moto z3 plan, and moto z3. Houndify’s Voice AI platform brings speed and accuracy to users of Moto Voice when they make calls, send messages, and access information on weather, navigation, sports, and more.”

  • Rakuten Rolling Out Revolutionary 5G Mobile Network In Japan

    Rakuten Rolling Out Revolutionary 5G Mobile Network In Japan

    Building World’s First Fully Virtualized Cloud-Native Network

    With our new mobile network, all these network services are directly connected to the internet,” says Rakuten founder and CEO Hiroshi Mikitani. “Our firewall is probably much stronger than any other hardware-dependent mobile network. It is a pretty wrong idea that hardware is stronger in terms of security than software. It’s kind of a syndrome.”

    Rakuten is in taking a revolutionary approach to building out Japan’s fourth major mobile. Network. “The journey that we are embarking on in Japan will enable a complete transformation in the telecom infrastructure buildout,” explains Rakuten Mobile Network Chief Technology Officer (CTO) Tareq Amin. “We are building the world’s first end-to-end fully virtualized cloud-native network.” At the Rakuten Technology Conference, last October, Amin said that they are deploying a very different architecture and leveraging Rakuten IT skills.

    “The majority of the telecommunication companies in the world have been on this journey of transformation. And yet I would argue that very little progress has happened to deploy a true end-to-end cloud-native network,” says Amin. “In fact, there is not a single telco in the world that has moved all of its workloads to the cloud. I think Rakuten is going to be the only company in the world that’s going to enable this.”

    Rakuten Mobile Network Chief Technology Officer (CTO) Tareq Amin Announcing New Mobile Network for Japan.

    Last night on CNBC Rakuten CEO Hiroshi Mikitani discussed how the network is set to deploy 5G nationwide in Japan by June 2020:

    Rakuten Rolling Out Revolutionary 5G Mobile Network In Japan

    We are rolling out our 4G network before we launch 5G. We are going to deploy what we call mobile edge computing in Japan. We are going to have over 4,000 edge servers all over Japan. Therefore, we do not have to create a new network for 5G. What we need to do is modify our edge servers a little bit. Our core network throughput is really fast. What we have to do is just add a 5G antenna, which we already have developed together with Qualcomm as well as NEC. We will be rolling out 5G in June 2020.

    As 5G rolls out consumers will understand the benefits. The key is an edge computing. There is a very low latency between your device and edge. It’s just a millisecond latency, so it’s almost like you have artificial intelligence. You hold your own artificial intelligence in your hand. Definitely, the speed is going to be much faster, maybe 1,000 times faster than 4G. Of course, latency is going to be much shorter. So autonomous driving and other autonomous applications are going to be really becoming true.

    Rakuten Rolling Out Revolutionary 5G Mobile Network In Japan, Says Rakuten CEO Hiroshi Mikitani
  • We Expect To See the Peak of 5G In 2023, Says Ranplan Wireless CEO

    We Expect To See the Peak of 5G In 2023, Says Ranplan Wireless CEO

    “With respect to rollouts, what we expect, and there has been a lot of trials going on and a lot of demonstrations going on, but the initial trials were in-building last year,” says Alastair Williamson, CEO of Ranplan Wireless. “We expect these to accelerate in 2019 and we expect to see the peak of 5G coming through in about 2023.”

    Alastair Williamson, CEO of Ranplan Wireless, discusses the complex challenges of rolling out 5G in an interview with RCR Wireless News:

    We Expect To See the Peak of 5G In 2023

    5G was the main theme in Mobile World Congress 2019. That was not just with operators, but also with vendors. Let’s put it into perspective from where we come from and look at the 5G themes with respect to wireless network planning. What’s become apparent is that all the initial deployments in 5G are going to be within buildings and in dense urban areas, which is a key focus for Ranplan.

    Our tool is designed for planning and building wireless networks in conjunction with outdoor urban environments. With respect to rollouts, what we expect, and there has been a lot of trials going on and a lot of demonstrations going on, but the initial trials were in-building last year. We expect these to accelerate in 2019 and we expect to see the peak of 5G coming through in about 2023.

    Complex Challenges to a 5G Rollout

    Just to focus on the Japanese opportunity, we did secure a large order in Japan through our reseller early this year. The main challenges that operators are going to face when it comes to rolling out 5G networks can really be split into two different categories. The first challenge is 5G is complex. There is new feature functionality that is being brought into 5G such as beamforming and massive MIMO. These are all new capabilities that the planning tool has to cope with. We’ve invested a lot of money in 2018 to get our tool 5G ready so we’re compliant with all the 5G NR standards. We can actually demonstrate that capability now and customers are actually using our tool now to deploy trial 5G networks.

    The second complexity that our customers taught us about is how to plan networks in the millimeter wave space, so 28 gigahertz and above. Radio waves interact very differently the higher spectrums compared with traditional lower spectrums that mobile networks have been deployed in, so at Ranplan we’ve developed a propagation engine and that allows you to propagate all the way up to about 60 gigahertz. We’re way into the millimeter wave space. From a propagation perspective, we can support these high frequencies. We’ve also done a lot of work on understanding how those radio waves interact with different materials such as concrete, brick, wood, trees, people, and water. We’ve done all of that investigative research and we’ve put that information into our tool to allow us to actually predict very accurate 5G planning.

    More 5G Focus on Public Safety and Industrial IoT Markets

    We repositioned our products a bit at Mobile World Congress to specifically fit to specific markets. Ranplan Professional is still our flagship products allows you to design in-building wireless networks in conjunction with dense urban outdoor wireless networks. But we also launched a new product called Ranplan In-Building where we’ve taken the outdoor capability away from it and it focuses solely on customers who just want to design and plan in-building. wireless networks. We also launched another product called Ranplan In-Building Light which is focusing on the public safety market. We took a lot of the feature functionality that was not required for public Safety and put in new feature functionality that the public safety market demands and we launched that product at Mobile World Congress 2019.

    Our plans for 2019 I split that into two separate areas with a look at the business first and then the market. In 2018 we doubled our revenues from 2017. In 2019, we’ve already received purchase orders which are in excess of our total 2018 revenue. From a business perspective it is about keeping that momentum going. From a market perspective, a lot of our focus has been in Japan, the US, South Korea, and Asia-Pac We’re going to continue that focus but we’re also going to put a lot more focus onto public safety and a lot more focus on the Industrial Internet of Things. There’s a real pent up demand in those markets to look at a planning tool to help roll these networks out.


  • Western Union CEO on Amazon Partnership: Buy Globally and Pay Locally

    Western Union CEO on Amazon Partnership: Buy Globally and Pay Locally

    Western Union has partnered with Amazon to white label their cross-border money transfer platform. “Amazon engaged us to use our platform to service their customers in a better way in order to give access to the millions of customers who don’t have an access today to buy online and pay,” said Hikmet Ersek, the CEO of Western Union. “In the future, they will have the capability to buy globally and pay locally.”

    Hikmet Ersek, President, CEO, Western Union, recently discussed the new partnership with Amazon, competition with Zelle and Vinmo, and the overall health of the business:

    Western Union Digital Business is Growing Very Well

    Our digital business is growing very well year over year. We are now in 50 countries with our digital business sending money to over 200 countries. We pretty much cover the world with digital. Our digital growth is very strong. Our retail money transfer business has been stable. In some countries, we have been a little bit slower like in the Middle East, but we had very strong growth in Europe and US outbound business. Our US domestic business has been a little bit slower than we thought. Generally, I would say that we had a very stable solid quarter and we are very excited about the future.

    You Can’t Send Money From Your Mobile

    US to Domestic there has been some competitive environment. Nothing changed like last quarter. We have certain customers that like to pick up cash immediately. Nobody can beat that. You can’t send (cash) money from your mobile. We pay out in cash immediately. There are also competitors like Zelle and Vinmo who have been capturing some market share there with their zero fee environment. That has definitely been US dominated but is only a small part of our business, seven percent of our revenues. We are more focused on the outbound business, global cross-border business. That has been growing very well.

    Western Union is White Labeling Platform to Amazon

    Amazon has engaged us, over the years we have been building a cross-border platform, which is unique. We are moving transactions in 132 currencies globally and we do about 32 transactions every second. We have a network of 550,000 locations. We are reaching out to about 4 billion accounts globally. This is a unique platform where today we serve our customers with this platform.

    Companies like Amazon engaged us to use our platform to service their customers in a better way in order to give access to the millions of customers who don’t have an access today to buy online and pay. In the future, they will have the capability to buy globally and pay locally.

    The Amazon partnership is for us very exciting because now suddenly we are opening our platform to new customer segments, white labeling to other organizations like Amazon. Today, we are serving our existing customers with our branded transactions. In the future, we will be able to serve huge organizations like Amazon, or Amazon will engage us with other organizations, to engage our platform and to use our platform to serve their customers.

    Paying Amazon Has Been a Real Obstacle for Some

    “There are people in the world who want greater access to Amazon’s huge product selection but paying for those purchases has been a real obstacle for many customers,” said Hikmet Ersek, president and CEO of Western Union. “We’re leveraging our money movement platform to make it easier to shop global and pay local. By facilitating the complex foreign exchange and settlement process, we’re opening up more consumer choices and access to online shopping for tens of millions of potential new Amazon customers.”

    Forrester Research estimates that cross-border shopping will make up 20% of e-commerce by 2022, with sales reaching $630 billion. Choice, quality and cost are the main motivations for consumers to shop online from overseas, but there are challenges and concerns about the lack of payment options for consumers who prefer to pay in person or consumers who are not comfortable using online payment methods.

  • Chipotle CEO Going Digital to Create a ‘Frictionless Experience’

    Chipotle CEO Going Digital to Create a ‘Frictionless Experience’

    Chipotle is moving in a digital direction, with their digital business up 48 percent over last year. The company has introduced a new app, digital lines, digital pickup shelves, and a mobile pickup window in an effort to create a “frictionless experience” for its customers, according to Chipotle CEO Brian Niccol.

    Brian Niccol, Chipotle Mexican Grill CEO, discussed their digital strategy this morning on CNBC:

    Chipotle App Creating a Frictionless Digital Experience

    What we’re trying to do is remove any friction and get people more access and we’re having a lot of success with that. Our digital business is now up to 11 percent, which is up 48 percent over last year. What’s really exciting is we’re seeing people continue to adopt the utilization of the app and then all the new access channels that we’re creating, whether it’s these digital pick-up-shelves or delivery, we’re just getting a tremendous response from our customers.

    Introducing Digital Lines and Shelves

    One of the things that are really powerful for our company is we’ve got what we call a Digital Make Line and it is completely separate from the Customer Facing Line. When you come into the restaurant and you go down that Customer Facing Line if you’ve placed a digital order it doesn’t get in the way of that experience. We’re also putting in place these Digital Pickup Shelves so that when you order ahead, you literally can walk in grab your food and go, a completely frictionless experience.

    Our digital line requires fewer people to run it versus the front line. The thing that’s great is what we’ve seen is this digital business is highly incremental, so the additional labor necessary to support the incremental sales it works really well for us.

    Testing a New Mobile Pickup Window

    We’ve got the new mobile pickup window in four restaurants right now. The way it works is you order ahead and you pick your time and then you know you literally come right by the restaurant, we’ve got a window, your food comes out the window and off you go. We’re seeing tremendous response to that and it’s in a market in Ohio and a market in Texas. We’re gonna start adding more restaurants in 2019, so you’re gonna see us building more restaurants that have the ability for that mobile pickup.

    Second Lines in All 2,500 Stores in 2019

    The thing that is happening right now on a broad scale basis are these second lines. We’ve digitized them, we’re in about 750 restaurants we’ll have all 2,500 restaurants done by the end of 2019. To accompany that we’re putting in these digital shelves so that literally you can skip the whole process.

  • Facebook’s Creative Hub Helps Businesses Make Effective Ads

    Facebook’s Creative Hub Helps Businesses Make Effective Ads

    Facebook has launched Creative Hub, a platform for its mobile advertisers to learn, create and share ad media. Creative Hub is billed as “a new way to create mockups for ads, share them with anyone and experience your work as though it’s live.”

    Creative Hub is already getting rave reviews from advertisers and agencies. “I am in no way exaggerating when I say that when I first used it, I sent an internal email to the whole department declaring (and I quote) ‘it is sick… IT WILL CHANGE OUR LIVES’,” exclaimed Ben Shaw, Head of BBH Live at BBH London.

    “We designed Creative Hub to be a faster, easier way to produce ideas that capture attention and delight people where they’re spending their time—on mobile,” noted the Facebook ad team in a recent blog post. “Today, the Creative Hub is available to the entire global advertising and marketing community.”

    Facebook has been testing Creative Hub since June with selected ad agencies and is just now making it available for all advertisers. They have since added a new Inspiration Gallery showcasing examples of inspiring mobile creative across Facebook and Instagram.

    “We developed Creative Hub in response to the needs we heard from the creative community, who told us they needed a tool to help them experiment with content creation on Facebook and Instagram—including trying new formats, previewing ideas on mobile screens, collaborating internally and sharing mock-ups with stakeholders,” noted Facebook.

    With Facebook Creative Hub advertisers can be inspired by a gallery of creatives from various brands and agencies in all available formats including 360 video, carousel, canvas and video. You can even mock up your own ideas within the various ad formats and save your work to view later, or even share and collaborate on your creative work with your team.

    Once you have mock-ups, you can preview your ad as though it’s live in a mobile feed, and you can also see how it might look on Facebook News Feed or Instagram feed, according to Facebook. The Hub will provide you with a URL of your work to share with staff and clients as well.

  • The State of Artificial Intelligence at Facebook

    The State of Artificial Intelligence at Facebook

    When you think of Facebook, you think of data, but not so much technology. Get ready for an in-depth preview of how Facebook is and is further planning to use artificial intelligence and other key technologies that they see as critical to their future.

    “Facebook’s long-term roadmap is focused on building foundational technologies in three areas: connectivity, artificial intelligence and virtual reality,” wrote Mike Schroepfer, Facebook’s Chief Technology Officer. “We believe that major research and engineering breakthroughs in each of these areas will help us make more progress toward opening the world to everyone over the next decade.”

    Facebook Making AI Research Useful Now

    Tying all of these crucial technology projects together is AI. “We’re conducting industry-leading research to help drive advancements in AI disciplines like computer vision, language understanding and machine learning,” he says. “We then use this research to build infrastructure that anyone at Facebook can use to build new products and services. We’re also applying AI to help solve longer-term challenges as we push forward in the fields of connectivity and VR. And to accelerate the impact of AI, we’re tackling the furthest frontiers of research, such as teaching computers to learn like humans do — by observing the world.”

    Facebook has learned to quickly turn their AI research into productive uses by their development and production teams. “As the field of AI advances quickly, we’re turning the latest research breakthroughs into tools, platforms and infrastructure that make it possible for anyone at Facebook to use AI in the things they build,” said Schroepfer.

    The backbone of their AI product development is FBLearner Flow, which allows their coders to easily reuse algorithms across products. Also, very importantly considering the billions using the Facebook platform, it lets their developers run thousands of experiments to test scaling.

    Another advancement is AutoML, which according to Facebook automatically applies the results of each test to other machine learning models to make them better. This significantly improves the time to market on AI breakthroughs.

    A brand new product that they developed based on their AI research is Lumos, a self-serve platform that enables teams that haven’t been exposed to the technology a way to “harness the power of computer vision” for their products and services.

    How is AI Impacting Facebook’s Users?

    Facebook is quickly and sometimes quietly adding AI capabilities right into the products that Facebook users love. For instance, AI is used to help translate posts automatically from foreign language speaking friends. It also behind the one time controversial ranking of everyone’s News Feed. Remember when this used to be in chronological order?

    Facebook says that over the next 3-5 years AI will be used in features all across the platform.

    AI Being Used to Improve Aspects of Video

    Facebook sees video communication as its future and is working on ways to use AI to improve this experience.

    “We started working on style transfer, a technology that can learn the artistic style of a painting and then apply that style to every frame of a video,” said Schroepfer. “This is a technically difficult trick to pull off, normally requiring that the video content be sent to data centers for the pixels to be analyzed and processed by AI running on big-compute servers. But the time required for data transfer and processing made for a slower experience. Not ideal for letting people share fun content in the moment.”

    “Just three months ago we set out to do something nobody else had done before: ship AI-based style transfer running live, in real time, on mobile devices,” he added. “This was a major engineering challenge, as we needed to design software that could run high-powered computing operations on a device with unique resource constraints in areas like power, memory and compute capability.”

    All of this work has resulted in a new deep learning platform called Caffe2Go, which can capture, analyze and process pixels in real time on a mobile device, according to Facebook.

    “We found that by condensing the size of the AI model used to process images and videos by 100x, we’re able to run deep neural networks with high efficiency on both iOS and Android. This is all happening in the palm of your hand, so you can apply styles to videos as you’re taking them.”

  • Google Launches ‘Get Trips’ Mobile App

    Google Launches ‘Get Trips’ Mobile App

    Google has created a comprehensive new travel app, Get Trips, available for both Android & iOS mobile devices, that push it further into the travel industry. The new travel app, targeted toward sight seeing consumers, is both a trip planner and coordinator, giving you helpful suggestions on things to see nearby a destination as well as keeping your reservation info in one convenient place.

    Just Be Happy

    Google pointed out a study that concluded 74% of travellers are most stressed with the logistics of travel. “Most of the happiness gleaned from vacation is dependent upon the stress level of the vacation,” said Shawn Achor, CEO of GoodThink which conducted the study and author of the book Before Happiness. “Poorly planned and stressful vacations eliminate the positive benefit of time away. The less the stress, the more likely you will experience a positive benefit from the time off. A positive, well-managed vacation can make you happier and less stressed, and you can return with more energy at work and with more meaning in your life.”

    screen-shot-2016-09-21-at-3-41-33-pm

    Personalized Tour Guide in Your Pocket

    “Knowing what to do when your holiday starts can turn what’s supposed to be fun into a lot of work,” said Stefan Frank, Product Manager for Google Trips in a blog post. “You might get recommendations from friends, travel guides, or online reviews — but figuring out how to squeeze everything you want to do into a finite window of time can be stressful, especially when you’re in a new place, often with limited access to the web.”

    Google Trips according to Google is a “personalized tour guide in your pocket” with each trip organized by day plans, reservations, things to do, food and drink, and much more. Google says that all of the apps features work offline too, which is incredibly helpful to those traveling without the benefit of expensive phone connections and inconsistent wifi. You can create the trip entirely in advance and simply download it to your phone.

    Planning a Day is Easy

    Google Trips includes day plans for the top 200 cities in the world and features the most popular itineraries, automatically generated from data Google has gathered from other travellers. It may sound creepy, but Google knows where just about everybody is at all times and keep a record of it, just in case it decides to build an app like this one. Don’t forget, you agreed to it when you added any Google app to your mobile device.

    screen-shot-2016-09-21-at-3-46-32-pm

    “Say your friends told you that you have to see the Sagrada Familia — and you’re looking for suggestions on things to do around that spot,” says the Google Travel team. “Press the “+” button in the day plans tile to jump into a map view containing all the top attractions in your destination. If you’re time constrained, you can specify above the map whether you have just the morning or afternoon, versus a full day. Then simply tap and pin the Sagrada Familia to build your itinerary around it. Google Trips automatically fills in the day for you.”

    It Keeps Your Info Too

    Google Trips ensures that you don’t have to scramble or have an internet connection when you have to find your reservations for planes, trains, automobile or hotels. This eliminates the panic we know that many of you feel when you just can’t connect, the data is hard coded into your phone!

    screen-shot-2016-09-21-at-3-50-04-pm

  • Georgia Prison CIO Gives Google Cloud Credit for Saving Millions

    Georgia Prison CIO Gives Google Cloud Credit for Saving Millions

    Georgia’s Department of Community Supervision has gone virtual via Google Apps and Chromebooks. With staff increases and with significant amounts of time outside of their offices, The State of Georgia was looking for a more economical and cost-efficient solution to getting things done in their offender supervision programs. They made the decision to go 100 percent virtual office and 100 percent Google.

    “We decided to try something that had never been done in Georgia state government history: eliminate the majority of our offices entirely and allow hundreds of our 2,100 staff members to work remotely instead,” said Phil Sellers, Director, Information Technology Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles, writing in the Google for Work Blog. “Our existing desktop computers and office applications didn’t have the features to support remote workers, so we started looking into alternatives. I was familiar with Google’s cost-cutting, collaborative and mobile-friendly features, so my team led the switch to Google Apps for Work and Google Chromebooks.”

    He says that they have saved literally millions of dollars by not paying for expensive hardware and enterprise licensing contracts, not to mention the increased productivity of employees who can now work anywhere, anytime. “We no longer have dedicated IT services for routine storage and email support, and our small IT staff of 35 doesn’t need to roll out patches and antivirus software. If an officer closes her Chromebook or loses power, she doesn’t have to worry about trying to recover lost data. If we need to replace a device, it’s inexpensive and fast to get someone back up and running.”

    Many government agencies and large corporations have been leery of cloud solutions because of possible security breaches, which could include crucial data exposures. Georgia’s Department of Community Supervision believes the opposite is true. “Officers used to store their data on laptops, so if their device was lost or stolen, they’d lose sensitive information about parolees and probationers,” said Sellers. “With Chromebooks, we store everything in the cloud and can easily wipe and replace a device if needed. Officers use a 2-step authentication to enter our systems, which adds another layer of security.”

    The agency is often field-based away from the office, so using Chromebooks and Android phones lets their officers work wherever they are and collaborate with colleagues via Google Docs, Google Drive and Google Hangouts. “Since we’ve adopted the policy, officers are more productive, and sick leave and employee turnover have decreased,” added Sellers.

    Google is pushing the concept of Chromebooks, Google Drive Apps and Android as one enterprise level platform for businesses to operate. They are competing with established players such as Microsoft, Salesforce and to some extent Amazon. They are working to distinguish the Google approach by tying in their Android OS and phones, Chromebook tablet, the Google Cloud Platform and their many office related apps and chat tools so that businesses have a much less expensive alternative than the competitors.

    Google recently touted how its platform is the most secure. “We’re talking about stuff that you’ve seen in “Mission Impossible”– biometrics, lasers, vehicle barriers, bollards. All of this is custom-built, also, to make the data center more secure,” said Neal Mueller, Security and Networking lead for Google Cloud.

  • New Facebook Ad Tools Help Businesses With Global Marketing

    New Facebook Ad Tools Help Businesses With Global Marketing

    Facebook has added a feature within their Lookalike Audiences tool that helps businesses reach target customers in new countries who are similar to their existing ones. With the tool, a business can upload a list of leads or their current customers and Facebook will find potential similar leads. Prior to today, this was not available cross-country.

    With the Lookalike Audiences tool, marketers can find potential customers to target their Facebook ads, now to many countries, based on:

    • People who like your Page
    • Custom Audiences derived from email or phone numbers
    • Custom Audiences created from website or app data
    • Similar location
    • Age
    • Gender
    • Interests

    Facebook sees this as primarily a mobile advertising opportunity, where the majority of its ad revenue now comes from. According to an August 2016 eMarketer report, by 2018 there will be an estimated 2.3 billion people worldwide accessing the Internet via mobile devices. Facebook is one of the few platforms on earth that can market to almost all of these people, excluding Communist China. Although, Mark Zuckerberg is not giving up on China, having started his personal quest to learn Mandarin Chinese in 2010.

    “On mobile, and on Facebook, people engage with the things that matter to them, even in other countries,” posts Facebook. “More than 1 billion people on Facebook are connected to at least one business in a foreign country, and 1.57 billion people visit Facebook monthly on mobile. In the US, 60% of people on Facebook are connected to a business in a foreign country.”

    Facebook has also added extended location targeting capabilities, where advertisers can expand their website conversion or mobile app install targeting objectives to a worldwide region or trade zone. Facebook says it will “optimize delivery to the countries with the greatest return.”

    They have added training tools as well to help businesses get started with global marketing including webinars and a handbook.