Investing with Purpose – CG Tech’s Niall Carroll and the Long Buck Revolution

NY Weekly Staff on June 28, 2022

Image Caption: Niall Carroll, Chairman of CG Tech, is helping overturn long-held beliefs about shareholder primacy, with a winning formula placing people and planet before profit.

Today’s leaders are taking stock and rethinking how they want to do business. Spurred on by challenges including climate change, the COVID-19 pandemic and the soaring cost of living, impact or ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) investments are gaining traction and procuring allies in both government and businesses alike.

According to a December 2021 article in Reuters, “a record $649 billion [was] poured into ESG-focused funds worldwide through Nov. 30 [2021], up from the $542 billion and $285 billion that flowed into these funds in 2020 and 2019, respectively.”  

With words like ‘sustainability’ and ‘community’ increasingly cropping up in all aspects of our lives, the logistics of integrating these concepts into rigorous investment criteria isn’t always clear. For many businesses, historical concepts around shareholder primacy continue to muddy the waters.

In the United Kingdom, one campaign is hoping to change this. The UK Better Business Act is a proposed amendment to section 172 of the Companies Act and would ensure all businesses align their interests with those of wider society and the environment. Through their research, betterbusinessact.org found that 76 percent of voters and consumers in the UK want businesses to be legally responsible for their impact on the environment and broader community.

An investor who has been quietly championing the idea of sustainable venture capitalism for well over a decade is Niall Carroll, the Chairman of CG Tech, an investment holding company with global interests in a variety of traditional industries. Carroll has made a successful career out of purpose-driven investment. Taking the lessons learned during his time in investment banking as well as running Royal Bafokeng Holdings, a community-owned investment company for the Royal Bafokeng Nation, Carroll established CG Tech in 2015 with business partner Andrew Jackson. The goal? Investment with purpose.

The group operates with a unique approach to investing. Acquiring businesses that on paper don’t seem to match up, but through the use of disruptive technologies, all form a larger ecosystem in which success for one company equals success for them all. For Niall Carroll and his partners, the objective is all about building something that will have an enduring impact and less about investing in the next unicorn.

It’s a position close to what those supporting the Better Business Act are hoping to make a standard for companies and leaders in the future. The amendment has the backing of more than 1,000 UK businesses and a number of high-profile CEOs including Douglas Lamont of Innocent and Mary Portas, a retail consultant, broadcaster and Co-Chair of the Better Business Act campaign.

Speaking at the Women of the World Festival back in March, Portas said, “We have to unlearn all that we have learnt in business. Here’s the thing. The world isn’t filled with bad people doing bad things. It’s filled with mainly good people misguided under the sway of bad ideas. People are incentivised badly. Growth and profit needs to be replaced with People. Planet. Profit. In that order.”

Placing people before profits is something Niall Carroll strongly believes in. During his time at Royal Bafokeng Holdings, Carroll’s visions on the importance of community and culture were clearly shaped. In 2007, Carroll found himself brokering a deal between the Royal Bafokeng Nation and Impala Platinum, an arrangement that was decades in the making and saw RBH become the single largest shareholder in the world’s second-largest platinum producer. Carroll recalls that there were resentments on both sides, but by coming together and ensuring that a fair deal was agreed for all parties, common goals were established and an ability to work together was created. The irony? Outdated notions of shareholder primacy be damned. As it turned out, profit and positive impact were not mutually exclusive.

It’s a blueprint for sustainability that Niall Carroll continues today. The CG Tech motto Serve. Solve. Uplift. weaves its way throughout the group’s portfolio. Carroll believes that a culture steeped in community and one that looks after the overall health of their ecosystem is also better prepared when times of crisis hit.      

The book, “Making Money Moral: How a New Wave of Visionaries is Linking Purpose and Profit,” by Judith Rodin, the former president of the Rockefeller Foundation, and Saadia Madsbjerg, former managing director of the Rockefeller Foundation, discusses how the shareholder-first approach to investing has affected society over the years. The book, a decade in the making, seeks to re-imagine capitalism where impact investing reigns supreme. 

In an interview with McKinsey, Madsbjerg explained that, “Since the 1970s, we have followed a shareholder primacy mantra, where our focus has been on short-term profits.” Adding, “we haven’t looked at the environmental impact of the way we have run our businesses and the way we have made our investments. We now know that what we do in business has a strong impact on society, and the other way around as well. So the argument for rethinking how to invest isn’t an ethical one. It really has to do with creating long-term value for not only our portfolios, but also for society.”

The book goes on to list a number of businesses and leaders already employing sustainable investment strategies, including DreamBox Learning, Goodlife Pharmacies, GPIF and The Nature Conservancy. Much like CG Tech, these companies and nonprofits are steadfast in their long-term goals, repurposing business models and driving transformational change to ensure not only returns on investments, but also positive impact on the environment and societies in which they operate. Goals that the people behind the Better Business Act hope to make law, not optional.

Digital Privacy Is The Next Frontier

NY Weekly Staff on June 21, 2022

While the initial goal of social media was to connect an ever growing world, the rise of Meta (Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp), has largely been driven not by connecting people, but by turning them into commodities. Private information has been sold over and over for billions of dollars, leaving people (especially children and teens) behind in a wake of depression, anxiety and tragedy. However, new technologies are focusing on protecting user privacy as a primary goal. Can these new disruptive companies unseat the old order?

She was only 16 when she started receiving messages on Snapchat. A “boy” started being complementary and flirty. She had never met him, and he didn’t go to her school. After a couple of weeks, this girl met the “boy”, only to discover that he was a 25 year old man with a hidden, violent agenda. 

The teen had been “groomed” by a predator who discovered her Snapchat account simply by accessing the map feature on the popular app. After she started to balk at some of the more extreme requests he made, the 25 year-old man imprisoned the girl in his home, starved her and essentially enslaved her. 

A random Google search of the terms “Snapchat’ and “dangerous” returns 120,000 news stories, mostly relating to young children being preyed on by adults. While Snapchat is commonly thought of as a harmless and fun app, it can lead to some of the most brutal crimes against kids.

Unfortunately, this is an all-too common story, one that happens increasingly often with the use of social media. While stories about the problems about social media are abundant, it is not always clear that there is a solution available.

European Concerns

The European Union has taken exception to Meta’s data practices, and has gone so far as to demand that Meta keep all data collected on their platforms on servers within the EU. Meta, in response, threatened that they would shut down their platforms in Europe if they were not allowed to transmit this data to servers based in the United States.

The EU government has passed a bevy of laws in recent years to protect the privacy of the citizens of Europe. The General Data Protection Regulation passed in 2018 caused any website operator to change their use of browser tracking codes to help mask the browsing behavior of individuals. This was a monumental step in the protection of privacy, and has thrown a monkey wrench into the business models of Meta, Google and other tech giants.

The Meta threat to leave Europe was largely seen as empty, as Europe is a $6.8 billion dollar market for the company, and that loss of revenue would be hard to make up. But the threat does showcase the lack of concern for individual privacy by the Meta braintrust. 

The Meta Studies & The Impact On Mental Health

Amongst the news about social media companies were internal reports released by Facebook and Instagram’s parent company, Meta. These reports that the company conducted internally, showed a direct connection between teen anxiety, depresssion and suicide and use of the popular Instagram app.

The Meta study concluded that teen users, especially girls and minorities, “felt immense pressure to achieve popularity on Instagram” in the form of likes and other metrics. The lack of this created a growth in unhappiness which was expressed in high rates of “anxiety, depression and even suicidal ideation.”

The use and encouragement of engagement and posting content to social media platforms is the bedrock of the business model of Meta. The more engagement Meta can showcase, the more they can command for their advertising platform. The profit motive for Meta is directly tied to the engagement and content being produced by their platforms. Not to be outdone, Snapchat recently became profitable for the first time in ten years, primarily by following the model that Meta had set forth years ago: Drive user engagement and use to astronomical levels, and then use that data to sell to advertisers for direct targeting purposes. 

In addition, the users studied by Meta expressed feelings of “extreme social isolation” and a “lack of meaningful relationships” in their lives. One of the other findings in the study expressly stated that the efforts put forth in 2014 to “improve meaningful connections among users” failed miserably and led to more division among users than ever before.

The use of user data has been on the wrong side of the law in recent months. Meta was sued by the state of Texas for violating a state law that requires explicit consent to use biometric identifiers for any commercial purposes. Meta had been using their facial recognition technology for commercial gain, from any and all users, even children, who cannot consent to the agreements in the first place.

The commercial purpose of facial recognition data? To build the Metaverse.

The Metaverse: Using the Cause of the Illness to Provide a Cure

In 2021, Mark Zuckerberg made headlines when he announced that “Facebook” would now be a company called “Meta.” In one of the most publicized rebrands in history, the Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp companies would be part of a parent company dedicated to the promotion and use of the Metaverse.

The Metaverse, in layman’s terms, is a digital world in which interactions and experiences are virtual rather than physical. In essence, you could take a “trip to Hawaii” virtually, without ever having to get on a plane, book a hotel, or even leave your house. While it has been billed as the “next frontier” of the internet, many are concerned about the implications of this, especially in the wake of the studies mentioned above.

Proposing to solve the social isolation problem with more social isolation seems counterproductive. If a teen is already having trouble making friends, how can a world in which they never have to leave their own homes provide them with the “meaningful connections” Facebook was so desperately trying to create in 2014? 

The truth of the matter is that the problems being created by social media can’t be solved by social media. The profit motive and model that has turned social media into a billion dollar industry is so embedded at the core of their being, that there is no real way to untangle the mess. 

The other part of the problem is the resignation people feel. The power of tech giants has essentially given people the impression that there is no alternative. However, the trend in tech has been toward privacy, and some new platforms have emerged to challenge the existing order. 

The Disruptors Are Coming

There are significant challengers on the horizon for the current tech giants. Google has been the dominant force in search for years, but their tracking practices have been no better than those of the social media companies. Enter DuckDuckGo, a completely private search engine. By not exposing your search behavior to advertisers, this company has proven itself as an effective tool, and has caught the attention of investors, to the tune of $171 million dollars in funding. 

In the communication space, CircleIt is positioned as a new technology that privately connects users to their inner circle. Long before Whataspp was running advertisements to promote their end-to-end encryption, CircleIt founder Art Shaikh had military grade end-to-end encryption built into the chat function of the “generational platform” he built. Billed as a healthy alternative to social media, CircleIt connects users to their “inner circle”, providing a much more nurturing and safe community for users. CircleIt, too, has caught the attention of investors, and has garnered $7.1 million in funding through Series A alone. For a young company, this is a monumental vote of confidence.

Technologies that are focusing on privacy are cropping up in many spaces. Treating users as people rather than commodities might sound like an old-school way, but it is becoming the new school of technology startups. 

A Founder’s Journey Starts With Love From His Father

NY Weekly Staff on June 21, 2022

How an act of love by a father led to the creation of a technology with potential to change the world. 

Every September on her anniversary, Zeenat gets flowers delivered to her with a special message from her husband Arif.  On the surface, this seems like a typical act of marital love. However, what makes this unique is that Arif passed away more than a decade ago. 

Before he passed away in 2012, Arif Shaikh asked his son to do some special things on his behalf long after he was gone. He gave his son, Art, a box filled with photos, cards, gifts and mementos, and instructed him how and when to disburse them. Art was trusted with sending his mother flowers on their wedding anniversary every year and delivering a hand made card to his granddaughter Alisha on her wedding day. At the time, Arif was healthy; he was simply thinking about the future. Then, a year later, Arif passed away unexpectedly. 

Art’s mission to fulfill his father’s wishes suddenly became of utmost importance. Since his death, Art has shared countless cards and gifts on his father’s behalf. One day a question popped in his head – what if I am not here tomorrow. How will all these treasures get delivered? He started thinking that there had to be a better way, a modern way, to deliver these priceless keepsakes to future generations. Some people keep a box of cards on a shelf. Others have a stash of old movies hidden away, collecting dust in the darkened corner of a drafty attic. Some keep various mementos, only to see them destroyed by fire or flood. Art’s father had a wealth of knowledge and a lifetime of wisdom to pass along. Ultimately, Art realized that if he was no longer here to care for and carry on his father’s requests, everything his father created could be lost. 

At first, he sought to build a technology that could deliver messages to any future date so his mother could send birthday cards to her grandkids. As Art started talking to friends about his idea, he was surprised to find that many of them were doing similar things on their own for their spouses and kids, but in a manual way that required assistance from other people to be their messenger, just like his father. His close friend, Matt, was diagnosed with cancer the same week he found out he was going to have his first child. Matt told Art he had been putting advice and wisdom into a Google Doc for his child to open once they were old enough. Stories in the news cropped up of husbands arranging for Valentine’s Day flowers to be delivered to their wives after they passed away. Seeing and hearing these numerous stories, he knew this was a much bigger problem and no one was focused on solving it for those who were running out of time. 

“The problem wasn’t unique to my father. It was something nearly everyone struggled with at some point.”

From the act of love of a husband/father, his son stumbled upon a problem that had yet to be addressed by modern technology. Delivering cards and gifts to family members from those who are no longer with us is not new, but the way we’ve done it hasn’t changed for the last one hundred years. Art wanted to take this tedious, manual process and bring it into the 21st century. From there, the idea of CircleIt was born. 

While still in a fast-paced career in enterprise software sales at Salesforce, Art spent most of his free time working on building a technology that could give families around the world the opportunity to stay connected across generations. He came to the conclusion early on that the real story of our past wasn’t hidden deep in our DNA, but rather was kept in the stories, wisdom, and love that families share. It’s in the touching story of how grandma and grandpa met. It’s in the special recipe that has been served at countless holidays. These are the things that need to be preserved so one can truly understand and appreciate their heritage. 

He also noted problems with social media – the short-lived connections and cruel nature of social platforms were not geared toward families. The world needed something that would last and be permanent. How safe are your family photos that could disappear in the cloud when your credit card stops working upon death? How private is your personal communication when it is being monitored and sold to advertisers? 

CircleIt grew from these observations and quickly transformed into a generational platform that family members can use to create cards to celebrate milestones, regardless of how far into the future, just as Art’s father created a wedding card for his granddaughter’s future wedding day. Now, an uncle can create a card full of wisdom to be delivered on his young nephew’s college graduation day. A grandparent can schedule a flower delivery for the birth of their great-grandchild, decades in advance without a specific date. CircleIt’s technology assures these treasured gifts are delivered into the future on the occasion of your choosing. 

The desire to pass down advice and knowledge is strong, but the burden of collecting and curating these memories is great, and the danger of loss is real. Often individual digital videos and photos are scattered between many family members. With CircleIt, a grandchild can listen to the voice of his grandfather, who passed away while still a toddler, reading a bedtime story. A new mother can receive advice from her mother, who was lost to cancer years prior. A spouse can receive love letters on their anniversary, even after their beloved has passed on. A lasting legacy full of irreplaceable memories is stored in one centralized place when building out your digital family tree with CircleIt. Unlike the traditional flow chart, this family tree is a more interactive experience, giving members a real time look at where their family members are around the world. 

Another truly remarkable characteristic, the platform is completely free to use with no intrusive ads, contrary to standard social media. “This is something that the world needs. How can anyone charge someone to privately chat with their loved ones, or send cards to their family on the holidays? It’s absurd,” Shaikh said. 

What began as a way to preserve his own family’s legacy became a passion to solve this same problem for others. Art’s father created a way to connect with his family, even once he had passed on. Now CircleIt can create the same generational link for others, preserved for eternity. CircleIt was born from Arif Shaikh’s love of his family. His continued documentation from behind the lens of a camera provided countless photos and videos of special family moments to be shared. His desire to be there for his family gave him the drive to create handwritten cards for his granddaughter’s wedding, long before she could even fathom getting married. This love was passed on to his son to carry forward. Art’s father knew he wanted to share his love with his family for years after he was gone. What he couldn’t have known was that the world would soon be using the technology that was created from his selfless acts to do the same for theirs. 

ABOUT CIRCLEIT

CircleIt, available in the App Store and Google Play, was inspired by the story of a unique gift left from beyond the grave. CircleIt was built to replicate this unique gift – a gift that continually reminds his family of his love and allows him to be there to celebrate milestones and inspire future generations even after he’s gone. Shaikh shares that “CircleIt was built for my mother to help carry on his legacy. Built so that others can experience the joy it has given all of us. Built in memory of my father, Arif Shaikh.”

CircleIt, founded in 2018, is a Chicago-based startup with 29 employees.Shaikh previously worked at Salesforce, leaving the company mid 2020, to dedicate his life to delivering CircleIt to the world. Since its app launch, CircleIt has attracted interest from Silicon Valley investors who believe in the importance of legacy preservation in a secure, private environment. So far, they have raised $ 7.1M in funding. 

For more information, visit https://circleit.com/

Rustam Gilfanov: Epigenetics disposes where genetics proposes: the ways our approach to the human health has been changing in the 21st century and involvement of CRISPR-Cas

NY Weekly Staff on June 16, 2022

According to P. Spork, a German neurophysiologist, a lifestyle change causes a chain of biochemical modifications that insensibly but persistently help both you and all next generations until the end of life on Earth. The scientist is sure that epigenetics is the breakthrough science and will forge progress in the 21st century.

The aim of genetics is to study those processes that transform DNA and genes, and epigenetics research how gene changes as compared to the previous DNA structures. This science is looking for the answers to the following questions: What are the specifics of epigenetic mechanisms functioning? Are they able to overcome social inequality? What genomic interventions could save the world from incurable diseases? Is big data a burden or blessing for scientists?

Epigenetics — a younger sister of genetics

Epi- is a Greek prefix meaning “upon” or “over”. It means that we are dealing with something above genetics. The role of epigenetic mechanisms in embryonic development cannot be overestimated: embryonic cells sharing the same DNA are used to grow specialized cells of an adult body. According to scientists, genetic activity is responsive to external stimuli, e.g. physical activities, diurnal rhythms, and stress levels.

Diving into the history of the discipline development, initially it was treated with total disregard, although it was discussed for quite a long time. Back to the 1940s, C. Waddington, an English biologist, suggested the “epigenetic landscape” concept where he explained how a body was formed [1]. Metaphorically the notion can be described as following: if body development were a river, the fertilization would be its source, physical maturity would be its mouth, and the landscape around the river would represent external conditions that have an impact on the body development.

At the turn of the 21st century, it became apparent that epigenetic mechanisms of genomic impact both control a single body’s system and are also transferred to the next generations. In 2003, R. Jirtle and R. Waterland, American scientists introduced the diet supplemented with B12, folic acid, methionine, and choline to pregnant agouti mice. It resulted in healthy offspring born from obese yellow mice [2]. The supplements happened to inactivate the gene triggering the disorders. The vitamins displayed a long-lasting effect: all further generations of agouti mice were healthy, as well.

In 2005, M. Skinner, a scientist from Washington University, published an article in Science journal where he described the experiment carried out in relation to pregnant rats fed with a pesticide. This diet de facto caused infertility of the male progeny, because the number of their viable sperm cells decreased dramatically. What is important, this effect passed on four subsequent generations [3].

Both the rodents and infants

The hypothesis was gradually becoming more and more evident. In late 2000, US and Dutch scientists researched Dutch individuals born after WWII. Those were conceived in 1944-45 known as the period of great stress and dearth. As a consequence, the babies were born underweight, and when growing older, they had diabetes, obesity, and cardiovascular diseases more often than those people who were born several years earlier or later [4].

Ultumately, P. Gluckman and M. Hanson, New Zealand academics, introduced the “mismatch concept” explaining this phenomenon [5]. They suggested that the fetus could forecast the future environment and adapted to it (if the mother is eating badly, it means that there is not much food, and thus it is necessary to become metabolically provident). In case the predictive adaptive response is correct, when born the child has an improved immune system. If this response is incorrect, the adaptation turns into maladaptation, a disease, e.g., obesity.

In the 1970s, B.F. Vanyushin, a Russian professor, stated that DNA methylation directly related to food, emotional background, and other aspects was one of the epigenetic mechanisms [6]. It is considered to be capable of “switching on and off’ certain genes. This process can be effective only if B12, folic acid, and methionine act as methyl group donors. Besides, methylation inactivates the embryo’s X chromosome, takes part in cellular differentiation and genomic imprinting, and protects the child from disorders during gestation, such as Down syndrome. And if the future mother starts taking iodine pills, this has a direct impact on the future child’s intellectual abilities.

Therefore, it became vivid that when planning the pregnancy and during gestation it was possible to influence future life of the baby, i.e., mental activity, emotional stability, and physical capacity. In its turn this enables obtaining higher social status in an extremely highly competitive labor market.

There is good news about this: unlike relatively stable genetic data, it is possible to reverse the epigenetic information. That is why modern science is making an attempt to stop the most common diseases and mutations that are caused by epigenetic malfunctions. This is not a coincidence that a lot of experts call the 21st century as the age of epigenetics.

The CRISPR/Cas panacea

If epigenetics has already done its dirty deed, there are still opportunities to use so-called “molecular scissors” of the CRISPR/Cas gene editing system that for the first time was described by Y. Ishino, a Japanese scientist.

If taken in nature, CRISPR/Cas is the adaptive immune system that is used by bacteria for countering various pathogens. It works according to the following principle: once a bacterium is attacked by a virus, its specialized Cas proteins rapidly cut out parts of the virus and insert them into the CRISPR cassette in a certain order. This process aims at “learning the enemy’s face” and developing a specialized response of the immune system.

Afterwards, scientists began to hope that they could use the CRISPR-Cas9 system of Streptococcus bacteria for editing genomes of other organisms and fighting genetic disorders. CRISPR-Cas9 is already applied to treat various diseases. In spring 2020, scientists informed about the first intraretinal injection of a changed virus to a patient who suffered from Leber congenital amaurosis (a disease-causing blindness). The new method engages point base editing of RPE65 gene mutations.

Two years ago, the results of the first successful editing of P-Thalassemia sickle cell anemia mutations were published in The New England Journal of Medicine [9].

Discovering the CRISPR/Cas9 “genetic scissors” and their potential for point editing was the object of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2020 awarded to E. Charpentier (France) and J. Doudna (USA).

However, CRISPR/Cas9 abilities go far beyond the above: gene editing can be also helpful against cancer. In 2019, scientists conducted an experiment on mice: a new therapeutic was applied to destroy Lipocalin 2, a breast cancer-promoting gene [10].

Moreover, a lot of scientists focus their efforts on fighting viral diseases, e.g., hepatitis and HIV. It is supposed that the pathogen lives in the body as viral DNA built in the cell genome and can be merely cut away. The US biologists did it by “removing” HIV-1 from human T-cell cultures [11]. In September 2021, Excision BioTherapeutics company announced that the Food and Drug Administration had cleared its clinical trials of a CRISPR/Cas-based therapy for chronic HIV infection by involving volunteers with HIV-1. We are sure to soon find out whether the scientists managed to outwit this trickiest virus.

Big Data in science: advantages and disadvantages

Genetic or epigenetic research seem to be unimaginable without information technologies. Bioinformatics methods are widely used in computational epigenetics, as well as experimental studies. Due to the explosive growth of epigenomic data sets, computational methods are getting more and more important.

For example, experimental ChIP-seq, ChIP-on-chip, and bisulfite sequencing methods are used for genome-wide mapping of epigenetic data. They all produce large amounts of data and require efficient ways of processing and quality control. In one respect, big data immensely helps scientists. Some time ago, the whole genome sequencing took years and demanded millions of dollars. However, the next-generation sequencing method provides the same results for $1,200 within a day.

In other respect, there are experts who have a skeptical attitude to big data, because it is impossible for scientists to keep up with great volumes of information. Moreover, the use of supercomputers monitors the scientists’ work. In 2015, F. Mazzocchi, an Italian biologist stated that classical methods used in the science are already outdated in the age of data and supercomputing, where theories, hypotheses, and discussions become obsolete [12]. Scientists do not search for models any more, while correlations offered by big data are replacing causality. M. Fricke also warns his colleagues not to trust machines too much. He insists that “data-driven science will or would find many spurious connections. Data-driven science could easily lead to apophenia and a wild outbreak of hornswoggling” [13].

This is only the time that will tell the actuality of these concerns. However, there is something that is entirely clear: there will be no way back to the old ones, because treatment of the most complicated diseases is on the verge of a breakthrough.

               About the Author

               Rustam Gilfanov is an IT entrepreneur and a venture partner of the LongeVC fund.

Meet Making Sense: The Innovative Code & UX Company Disrupting Their Industry

NY Weekly Staff on June 14, 2022

When César D’Onofrio started working as a software engineer, he realized a critical problem with how everybody around him built software: a complete blindness to user experience. 

Developers didn’t think about how users feel while operating their programs. This was astonishing for him, but nobody else seemed to be aware.

César resolved to see software like the users and to become an expert on user experience concepts. Soon, that called the attention of his bosses and colleagues.

“20 years ago, no one was talking about UX and how to incorporate it into software development. When I started thinking about it to create the products I was in charge of,  that gave me a competitive advantage,” he tells us.

After learning everything he could about UX, César was working for Y&L Consulting, in Texas. He decided to incorporate screenshots to the proposal of a project (at that time, there was no mockup software).

When the team presented the proposal, the clients were amazed because they could already see themselves using the software and the company closed the deal right away.

César D’Onofrio explains: “I was confirming then what many developers still don’t know: that a visual click-through prototype was far more effective than a software architecture diagram.”

Shortly after, having noticed how César’s innovative approach to making software was paying dividends, one of the top executives offered him the opportunity to develop a project for the company with an independent team. César asked his brother to recruit a team of young designers and programmers.

That was the beginning of Making Sense, his UX/software development company that has built an international reputation by building software with an unparalleled focus on user experience.

Making Sense’s unique UX perspective

César makes it clear: 

“Other companies can say that they incorporate user experience as part of their development process, but few are capable of doing it at the level we can.”

César has designed the company to put the users in the driver’s seat from the beginning. Every team in charge of a new project is composed of developers and UX specialists, and the concepts of user experience take prime importance from the first stages of the design.

“The perspective of user experience is at the center of how we imagine digital solutions. That’s why we have built a strong UX department whose members have a protagonic role in every project,” César states.

A Digital Transformation Powerhouse

They have taken advantage of this unique approach to transform their partner clients’ businesses.

Making Sense is not a simple software manufacturer. César has built Making Sense as an innovation hub, a company that crafts digital solutions to change businesses to their core, making them evolve to greater success.

Their unique approach to UX and business transformation has made Making Sense a groundbreaking force in every industry they come in contact with. In over a decade, they have revolutionized businesses in areas as diverse as marketing, healthcare, law or agriculture.

They have also used this disruptive power to create proprietary products and build flourishing ventures around them.

“We created very successful products. One is a novel easy-to-use landing page software which was sold to a Silicon Valley company. Another is an email marketing platform that ranks among the top five in LATAM, and we keep focused on developing more,” the CEO reveals.

Their Innovation Lab is the powerplant from which everything generates: “This is where we create new technologies, imagine and test novel solutions and improve our ability to serve clients and their customers,” César explains.

A Work Culture That Puts People First

Making Sense has also transformed the work culture of the software dev world, where developers are often jumping from one company to another because they feel like interchangeable pieces of a coding machinery.

The company has changed that by putting people first. Through their culture program Making Us Better, they have achieved high levels of job satisfaction by creating a work environment where all Making Sensers feel their needs are also a priority.

One of the pillars of this program is team member support. Martina Massa, Marketing and Communications Manager of Making Sense, explains: “we have a philosophy of taking care of each other. If a team member has a problem or a particular need, everyone else and the company does what’s necessary to support them”.

The other one is values. The challenge of permeating values into any organization becomes greater as it grows. Regardless of that, the permanent effort to transmit those values through Making Us Better has successfully kept the company acting on them every day, even when Making Sense is getting close to 400 collaborators.

“We try hard everyday to transmit to our people how we do things. We are always sharing best practices, communicating our values and acting according to them.

We can sleep when we know people feel that being in Making Sense is something different than being in other software development or IT firms,” Martina states.

Do Everything With Passion

One of the central values of Making Sense is passion. Passion has driven César D’Onofrio’s long and successful career: “Whatever you do, if you don’t put passion into it, you’re gonna fail,” he says.

César is convinced that creating anything worthy in life is not only a matter of intelligence, it is also about going at it with passion to become better. César makes sure each day that every Making Senser remembers this.If you’d like to know more about Making Sense’s passionate journey and unique perspective on software development, we invite you to visit their website, Facebook and Instagram.

New Hear+Hi Acuity Duo Wireless Earbuds Set the Bar High With Upgraded Features

NY Weekly Staff on June 2, 2022

Wireless products drifted to become a craze; it has brought outstanding innovations and practical applications. With so many choices, it can be hard to keep up with the unequal standards for every true wireless earphone produced.

When you’re looking for fitted wireless earphones, you’re faced with an overwhelming number of choices. Yes, you can select from numerous brands – but the question is, which  one should you purchase from?

Hear+Hi, a subsidiary of GMEMS Technologies, has assembled a team of expert acoustic engineers and hearing medical professionals to develop an assistive smart headset which helps users to hear better, faster and more securely. So, if you’re done with the more generic types of earphones, the new Acuity Duo Wireless Headphones will set the bar high.

Listed below are the reasons of how the Acuity Duo will exceed your expectations:

Hear better through sound amplifier and noise canceling features

The integrated sound amplifier and dual processor feature of this product allow you to hear better. You can adjust it according to your needs with the three presets: the Standard Mode which is best utilized in quiet areas, the Noise Canceling Mode which is suited in public places and the High-Level Noise Canceling Mode which reduces the loudest frequency recorded usually in public transportation.

Through Acuity Duo, you will enjoy a high-quality sound amplifier and accurate management features that allow you to communicate better and increase your productivity to the max

Communicate clearly with speech enhancer

The audio enhancement feature will assist you communicate more clearly – to make your exchange with someone feel like you are having a close one-on-one meeting with them. Acuity Duo is programmed to reduce noise from other people during phone calls, web meetings and other audio activities.

Extended battery duration of up to 30 hours

Unlike most headsets, Acuity Duo definitely lasts longer than your workday shift.  A single charge allows Acuity Duo to last for 10-hours straight.

When used with the charging case, that simultaneously stores and recharges the earbud headphones, operating time can be extended to 30 hours. With a day-and-a-half of energy storage on your fingertips, you no longer have to worry about battery drainage.

Self-tunable personalized hearing application

Acuity Duo has a surprise in store for you. Acuity Duo  possesses a mobile application! That’s right, a personalized mobile application purposely created to offer a high quality experience for you.

By utilizing the application called “My Hearing Acuity”, Acuity Duo can be programmed and customized according to your own unique hearing profile. You can now conduct specialized hearing tests to find out the most suitable settings for your hearing.

Ear-sealing and convenient

Last but not least, choosing Acuity Duo isn’t just practical; it’s also the smarter judgment. Losing the wired cord will feel so liberating, allowing your body to have that extra locomotive movements. The earbuds would perfectly fit your in-ear, effectively sealing your fear of dropping, losing or damaging them during intense motions.

And not to forget; with its portable size and extremely lightweight load, you will be able to utilize the product anytime and anywhere you want. Ideal for those who are often on the go.

Acuity Duo is a game changer – combining the latest Bluetooth technology with a dedicated Digital Signal Processor, Acuity Duo can fit comfortably inside your ear while still delivering high quality sound. It has a dual-microphone system and hearing profile customization app that provides the most advanced individualized hearing experience for mobile calls, web meetings, media streaming and sound amplification tasks.

With Acuity Duo Earbud Headphones, your expectations would be exceeded.

For more information, please visit: https://hear-hi.com/ 

Broadus Palmer: The Tech Founder Who Is Disrupting The Cloud Computing Space

NY Weekly Staff on May 29, 2022

As more individuals see the lucrative opportunities that the tech industry has to offer, many are looking for ways to transition out of their current careers and into a more fulfilling role in tech. Cloud computing and cloud engineering is a world that Tech Founder, Broadus Palmer understands intimately, having transitioned himself from a banker of 14-years, on a $42,000 salary, to a 6-figure cloud engineer and cloud career coaching expert.

Broadus Palmer is the founder of Level Up In Tech which was created to help people from all backgrounds advance in the cloud industry. The company is built on Broadus’ belief, which is “In order to be something you haven’t been before, you have to be willing to do things you haven’t done. Don’t be scared to take advantage of the new technology.”

A Fulfiling Career In Cloud Computing

Level Up In Tech is offers cloud coaching career programs to help aspiring tech workers land their dream roles with ease. Broadus created this program following the lessons learned through his own experience in transitioning into the cloud computing industry. Passionately focused on helping others succeed in the way he has, the program also includes mindset development and learning real-world problem solving skills.

Broadus Palmer and his team have a 6-step process that takes aspiring tech workers from where they are, right into a cloud computing role. He shares, “Through learning and gaining the experience needed as a cloud engineer in our program, this saves people the time and energy they would spend figuring it all out on their own. By working alongside team, they get to learn what they need to do, how they need to do it and even how they would feel when they do it.”

Mastering The Mind  

Aside from studying and becoming certified, Broadus approached cloud computing from the perspective of practicality. He shares, “Employers want to see experience, and that’s what we help to create. We provide hands-on projects that can be used to juice up your resume and set you apart from other applicants. We provide real-world projects to help you expand your skills.”

Broadus emphasizes to his guests in his program to not see obstacles as frustrations and challenges, but opportunities to learn and get better at what you’re learning to do. This foundational approach where mindset development takes place is what sets Level Up In Tech apart from its competitors.

We are undoubtedly shifting to a world where technology is to be utilized and adopted by more businesses, meaning workers will be required to fill new roles in tech. When it comes to future trends and predictions of the tech industry, Broadus says, “I believe, in 10 years’ time, we will be in a time of autonomous technology and a lot of industries will be cut out because of that tech. So right now is the perfect time for people to learn the cutting edge tech that will be taking over.”  

TECOBI: The Innovative Auto Software Empire Founded by Jason Girdner

NY Weekly Staff on May 20, 2022

Jason Girdner started his business, then failed, restarted, then failed again. Then started again. And it was this real and relatable journey that bore the colossal success he and his wife have today. TECOBI is a Hybrid-Intelligence software that pairs a human’s ability to personalize a conversation with a robot’s ability to consistently communicate with customers. This approach helps to ease the burden of lead follow-up for automotive sales through text message support and is Girdner’s third attempt at entrepreneurship.

This familiar pattern is not-often talked about in the entrepreneurial sphere in such authentic terms but is a fact that every business owner knows is true. Girdner’s rags-to-riches story inspires many, a reminder that success does not happen overnight but is attainable if you work hard and don’t give up (cliches become thus for a reason, folks.)

Girdner, a high school dropout with a disruptive past, started his sales career the way many do, at a desk with a phone. He realized that sales was his ticket out of his former life, one produced by a toxic childhood filled with negativity and loneliness. In Girdner’s words, God gave Girdner a ‘golden tongue,’ which is the key to massive success in the sales world.

“I found a new lease on life in sales,” said Girdner. “The avenue of commission earnings isn’t for everyone, but it gave me a second chance — I never imagined I would become a software developer, but here I am!”

After quitting his job in 2009 and falling flat on his face during his first attempt at entrepreneurship (as a software developer, go figure), Girdner met his now-wife Scarlet Mick.

“She brought me out of my slump and did more for me than anyone could ask for,” Girdner gushed. “If it weren’t for her kindness and selflessness, I would never have come up with the idea for TECOBI.”

Late Night TV Sesh Turned Business Light Bulb Moment

Girdner developed the concept for TECOBI when he saw a car commercial on television one evening. The couple had moved to Denver, Colorado, with their five children and struggled to make a living. When he saw the car ad, Girdner realized the vast disconnect between buyers and sellers.

“‘Why do I have to pick up the phone and call about this truck?'” he explained. “That’s what I thought when I saw the ad. I wanted the truck, but I didn’t want it bad enough to dial the phone number and speak to somebody. If you want me to spend such a large amount of my hard-earned money, you’ll have to make it a lot easier for me.”

That was when he realized, quite simply, that texting would be so much easier. It would offset the pressure that comes with car sales: The salespeople are pressured to close deals, often without concern for the buyer’s ultimate satisfaction, because they want to take home a paycheck. The buyers are constantly on high alert for the wool being pulled over their eyes and either get pressured into buying something they aren’t happy with — or pressured right off the lot and never to return.

First, Girdner began advertising himself as a marketer to car dealerships, offering to take their sales funnels to cell phones through text messages and answer them personally. It worked but became massively overwhelming quite quickly.

Girdner gained 130 dealership clients in the first year but couldn’t keep them due to the startup struggles. So, he concocted a plan using his sales and software development expertise.

Determined to make his company work, he brought Mick into the fold.

“She helped with answering the texts all day, every day,” said Girdner. “The volume was just so much that I needed a helping hand. She is modest, but she was truly fantastic at it and got the hang of it super fast.”

Phase Two: If You Can’t Do It, Get a Computer to Do It

As their client base grew, the volume of text messages overflowed. Girdner decided to build software to solve this problem. Girdner built the TECOBI software that it is today, with just the background of web development he had. 

Since its inception, TECOBI has won the AWA Award and served thousands of automotive companies.

Girdner has been through it all and back again. Fighting to be able to use his combined sales and software development skills to run a business he is genuinely passionate about and to feel the security of its success is something of which many budding entrepreneurs only dream. TECOBI is rightfully at the forefront of automotive sales because of Girdner’s unrelenting determination.

About TECOBI

Jason Girdner and Scarlet Mick are the Founders of TECOBI, an advanced communication and advertising solution of SMS and text conversations for the automotive industry. TECOBI has served thousands of automotive companies through their industry-changing software. To learn more, please visit www.tecobi.com.

Hard Times in Software Land: The King of Activist Hedge Funds Hits a Rough Patch

NY Weekly Staff on May 16, 2022

Is the tide turning for activist hedge funds? Judging from one of the largest player’s recent woes, the answer may be yes.

Only a few years ago such funds, which take large positions in publicly traded companies and then aggressively call for major changes to unlock value, were being touted as a panacea for underperforming companies. In 2015, The Economist called them “Capitalism’s Unlikely Heroes.” 

But the bloom may be off the rose. Activist funds are facing more resistance from stakeholders who may be skeptical that proposed “reforms” are really in their interest. Most notably, leading activist hedge fund Starboard Value, which boasts more than $7 billion in assets and has muscled its way into more board of directors seats of publicly traded companies than any of its peers, has found itself in an unaccustomed place: on the losing side of a high-profile proxy battles – not once, but twice. 

In March 2022, shareholders of specialty chemicals maker Huntsman Corp. declined to elect any of Starboard’s five nominees to board seats, opting to elect all 10 candidates endorsed by Huntsman’s current management team. And in September 2021, software company Box Inc. easily defeated Starboard’s slate of board candidates, ending the hedge fund’s bid to assume control of the company.

Huntsman was able to push back against Starboard’s arguments by pointing to impressive revenue, earnings and margin growth and management promises to enhance shareholder value through share repurchases. Box also posted solid earnings shortly before the shareholder vote, but it probably didn’t go unnoticed by shareholders that Starboard’s record of influencing or running software companies after assuming board seats has been anything but impressive.

Over the past five years, Starboard has assumed board seats on four software companies: Comscore, Symantec, Commvault and eHealth. The average return for the four stocks since Starboard’s involvement is -37.8%; the longest holding, Comscore, has lost 94% of its value since Starboard began lending its expertise in July 2017.

It’s a sharp contrast to Starboard’s most famous success story. The activist hedge fund took over Darden Restaurants, owner of the Olive Garden chain, by winning all seats on its board in October 2014. The sweeping shareholder coup was preceded by a now-legendary 294-page presentation by Starboard that called, in granular detail, for such changes as changing the number and frequency of breadsticks served in the Italian restaurants. In the years after Starboard’s power play, Darden performed significantly better, boosting the hedge fund’s reputation. Darden stock is up nearly 200% under Starboard’s management.

It could be that the intricacies of the software business could be more complicated than counting breadsticks. Starboard essentially took over security software company Symantec (now Norton LifeLock) in November 2018, and Starboard Managing Member and Head of Research Peter Feld continues to sit on its board. Yet after a series of asset sales and restructurings, Norton stock is almost flat since then – a period during which the broad stock market is up nearly 50%, even including this year’s correction.

A High Stakes Game

The playbook for Starboard is fairly standard: the hedge fund declares a stake in a company in an SEC filing, then quickly moves to force change – often with a letter or presentation outlining its diagnosis of the company’s supposed underperformance. In January 2022, for example, Starboard declared a 7.3% stake in aerospace and defense tech giant Mercury Systems. At the same time, it demanded the company drop its shareholders’ rights plan and pushed for greater corporate control. The next step, if history is any guide: Starboard will nominate its own slate of nominees for Mercury Systems’ board and present detailed proposals promising impressive returns if Starboard gains control.

But observers are starting to question who benefits from these attacks: shareholders, or the activist hedge fund? 

While the push for profits from an activist shareholder may sound like a win-win situation for companies and their staff, this often means prioritizing short-term wins over longer-term strategies for business success. The self-serving approach taken by Starboard and other activists has led to less than stellar track records of creating flourishing businesses. The Harvard Business Review reported that once activist hedge funds take over a company, “activists reduce employee headcount by an average of 12%, while R&D gets cut by more than half.”

Experts  who specialize in helping companies fight hedge funds like Starboard Value warn that activist investors risk losing everything when they remove key experienced directors or upend long-term COVID recovery strategies. Overreaching for a win in the post-pandemic crisis, says Sabastian Niles of Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz to CNCBC, will ultimately mean Starboard (and others like it) will be remembered as “failing to meet the moment.”

Indeed, history may look back at this moment as a turning point when shareholders woke up to the failure of activist hedge funds to keep their promises and, like consumers dealing with spam marketing, hit “unsubscribe.”

DR. ROBERTO CREA – SERVING HUMANITY THROUGH BIOTECHNOLOGY

NY Weekly Staff on May 10, 2022

A new era has begun in the medical industry since Drs. Watson and Crick discovered the unique DNA structure and function in 1953. Advanced medical biotechnology has made it easy for doctors to diagnose diseases and treat them effectively. Without the use of scientific advancements and biotechnology, it is challenging to meet the medical requirements in the healthcare industry. Biotechnology has become a prominent part of the medical world, whether it produces diagnostics and treatments for diseases or improves the immune system against diseases. It influences the medical industry in several ways. The advancement of technology has reduced the gap between biology and engineering. Biomedical technologies are becoming more and more advanced with time and development, making it easier for doctors and medical professionals to perform their procedures effectively.

The new inventions provide proven benefits for the patients and the entire healthcare system. The credit for the modernization of biotechnology inventions and innovations goes to several scientists and researchers who aim to positively change the healthcare industry. These researchers and scientists have discovered inventions that have made lengthy medical processes less complicated and provided great relief to the patients. Among such great individuals who created an impact in creating medical biotechnology solutions are Dr. Roberto Crea. He is well-known as one of the fathers of synthetic (or recombinant) human insulin.

Dr. Roberto is a pioneer in biotechnology who has more than 40 years of work experience in Biotechnology and Nutritional Sciences. Dr. Crea’s unconventional ideas and innovations have brought many advancements in the field of biotechnology.

Born on July 1st, 1948, Dr. Roberto Crea is an Italian American scientist and entrepreneur. He attended the University of Pavia, Italy, for graduation in Biological Chemistry. He had an interest in this field since the beginning of his graduate studies. Dr. Crea had a passion for helping the patients and improving healthcare systems through his innovations in healthcare technology. In order to pursue his dream, he chose to study Biological Chemistry and completed his graduation in 1972. Dr. Roberto’s journey in biotechnology started with new discoveries, intellectual thoughts, and innovative approaches. After his graduation, Dr. Crea went to the University of  Leiden in Holland to master the synthesis of DNA and RNA. He gave multiple innovative ideas and shared his intellectual thoughts with the fellows in the world working with chemically synthesized genes.

His ideas soon caught the attention of one of the first biotech companies in the U.S.A, Genentech, Inc, in 1976, where he was offered to work with other scientists in the “Gene synthesis” team at City of Hope Medical Center in California. There, he worked with fellow scientists from Japan, China, and Poland. He made significant improvements to the synthesis of DNA that resulted in the first two U.S. Patents assigned to Genentech. Due to his scientific discoveries and with the help of other scientists in Molecular Biology and Protein Biochemistry, Dr. Crea and his colleagues at Genentech successfully produced 1978 the first human insulin from bacteria, which was brought great relief to diabetic patients saluted as a milestone event by the medical industry and the scientific world.

The discovery of synthetic, recombinant DNA human insulin added a new life to the therapy of diabetic patients worldwide. Before discovering human insulin, thousands of diabetic patients were allergic to animal insulin, causing a high number of deaths among diabetic patients. The production of human insulin by Genentech and City of Hope did not just provide relief to the patients and saved many lives but also created the beginning of the whole industry of biotechnology worldwide. Dr. Roberto’s contribution to this great discovery has been pivotal to the success of Genentech, Inc. and opened the gate to the hundreds of new biotech Companies that followed the success of Genentech. This Italian American scientist has indeed made a great contribution to the success of modern medical biotechnology. Dr. Crea has also co-authored the first report on recombinant DNA production of the mammalian hormone in bacteria, called Somatostatin. It was also the first time that “synthetic” DNA had a fundamental role in recombinant DNA and biotechnology. As the sole inventor of the first two U.S. patents for synthetic DNA at Genentech and because of its original approach to gene synthesis, Dr. Crea received the Rumbough Award by the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation in 1979.

Dr. Crea also contributed by teaching science to University students. Leiden University appointed him as an Associate Professor in DNA Chemical Synthesis. He also worked as a faculty member of Chemistry Gorlaeus Laboratoria in Leiden. His lecture at UCSF convinced many people to get involved in synthetic. DNA. Notoriously, Dr. Kary Mullis, a Berkeley American student, became a Nobel Price in Chemistry in 1993 for his discovery of DNA chain polymerase. Because of his scientific creativity, unconventional ideas, and great contribution, Dr. Roberto Crea was appointed as the First Director of the Nucleic Acid department at Genentech. He also joined the University of Messina as a visiting professor, where he taught Human Molecular Genetics.

The vision of combining chemistry, biology, and engineering by the two Genentech founders, Robert Swanson and Prof. Herbert Boyer, at UCSF became a reality with Dr.Crea’s new ideas on how to improve and streamline the synthesis of DNA in 1978 and opened many opportunities in modern Medicine by paving the way for many companies worldwide that today collectively are recognized as part of the “synthetic biology” revolution. Dr. Roberto Crea’s substantial experience and scientific creativity at Genentech led him to start his long-time entrepreneurship career. He set foot in business with his first company, Creative Biomolecules, which he started in 1982. He started the company to utilize synthetic DNA for developing effective health products for soft and hard tissue repair and cancer treatment. In 1991, the company merged into Curis, Inc. – a NASDAQ publicly-traded company. He then founded various medical biotechnology companies to bring relief to many patients affected by devastating diseases, like cancer, cardiovascular and malignant pain. Later he founded Bioren, Inc., one of the first Monoclonal antibody engineering companies globally. This and the numerous patents developed by Bioren prompted Pfizer, the largest pharmaceutical company in the world with more than 3 billion dollars in internal R&D spending, to acquire Dr. Crea’s company in 2006 and incorporate Bioren’s numerous discoveries in its own R&D organization.

Out of this successful event, Dr. Crea formed one of his latest biotech organizations, Protelica, Inc., to explore how to use innovation in protein engineering to help in cancer immunology therapy. His efforts may lead soon to some very exciting new drugs for ovarian and other solid tumors!

Dr. Roberto Crea’s discoveries and contributions have made him one of America’s greatest researchers and scientists. He is an idol in Biotechnology and an inspiration for the individuals aiming to help humanity with the help of science.

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