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Annasha

Annasha Dey is an NIT student, who apart from studying engineering is also a content writer. She has a great interest in photography, writing, reading novels, and travelling as well. She is a foodie who loves socializing and hanging out with her friends. She is also a trained Kathak dancer and a big fashion enthusiast. Dey also loves watching TV series, which includes F.R.I.E.N.D.S. and Big Bang Theory. To be a better writer she prefers to read more

Snowflake Inc

Snowflake Inc – An Eight Years Old Cloud Computing Company to top the Forbes Cloud 100 List

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Cloud Computing in today’s era is a very promising field to both launch a business and get employed. Data storage based on cloud computing has escalated first and it makes access centralized for big enterprises as well as for individuals. Snowflake Inc is a very successful company in the sector of cloud computing-based data warehousing. Benoit Dageville along with Thierry Cruanes and Marcin Zukowski formed the company in July 2012. The company, however, was in stealth mode for two years and was officially launched in 2014. Currently, the company provides cloud-based data storage services and runs on Google Cloud Platform since 2019.

About Snowflake Inc

Benoit along with the other co-founders worked from scratch to build a data platform that will harness the power of cloud storage. The company claims that its platform leverages the two most important elements of the general cloud platform,i.e., elasticity and performance to develop a more flexible product. Snowflake makes sure that the customers can share data both in and out of their organization with the utmost security and without actually copying or moving the data.

Snowflake Inc
Image Source: siliconangle.com

The platform of Snowflake is used by many renowned companies including Adobe, Overstock, Capital One, etc. Over the years, the company has expanded on international grounds and currently, it has more than 1300 partners helping to strengthen the presence of Snowflake Inc. According to the statistics of last year, it had 3,400 active customers in 2020.

The Beginning of Snowflake Inc

Benoit and Thierry knew each other before co-founding Snowflake as they were colleagues while working for Oracle. Back in 2012, Benoit and Thierry discussed how the development of Hadoop will bring change in scenarios for processing large datasets. It was most likely to make the work of Benoit and Thierry obsolete that they were doing in Oracle. So, these led both the co-founders of Snowflake to think about the future and how big data was gradually taking over the data storage service sector. Benoit also realized that even Hadoop is having a few shortcomings like missing key features and overall less efficient. This led to the idea of building a new platform that would overcome both the shortcomings of Hadoop and data warehouses back then.

So, Benoit, Thierry, and Marcin started working on this new data platform from zero and were finally successful in developing it. The system that they created ran ten times faster as compared to any other data storage platform back then for the same cost. After they created the product, they gradually moved forward to the next step and founded Snowflake Inc. The company was named Snowflake because all the co-founders have a love for winter sports. Though the product was successfully developed in 2012, it was two years later that the company was launched publicly by Bob Muglia. In 2015, the product was eventually available and 80 organizations used it back then.

Success of Snowflake

Snowflake has always been one of the top companies in the data storage sector to continuously evolve their product. They are well known for their work culture and innovation that has kept them in business with a strong ground. When the product was developed in 2012, the co-founders started looking for investors and it was a bit difficult to convince people how a data storage platform will evolve in the future and why their system was superior. But, both Benoit and Thierry had a professional background which strengthened their game of networking. So, in August 2012 the company was successful in raising $5 million in Series A funding led by Sutter Hill Ventures.

After it came out of stealth mode in 2014, the company raised another $26 million followed by $45 million in 2015. The next two years were followed by raising a huge amount of money and in 2018 the company’s net valuation became $1.5 billion. Snowflake reached unparalleled heights as it gained unicorn status only after four years of the official launch. Last year, the company became public via an IPO and raised $3.4 billion.

Due to its innovative products, Snowflake has been the recipient of multiple awards and honors including “Cool Vendor” in Gartner’s Magic Quadrant, acquired the first position at the 2015 Strata + Hadoop World startup competition, ranked No. 1 on LinkedIn’s 2019 U.S, etc.

The Founders

Snowflake Inc Founders
Benoit Dageville, Thierry Cruanes, and Marcin Żukowski
Image Source: twitter.com, qconsf.com, and cwi.nl

Benoit Dageville is a French computer scientist who started his career at Bull Information Systems. Before co-founding Snowflake Inc, he worked at Oracle for more than fifteen years. Thierry Cruanes is also a computer scientist who worked at two leading companies, IBM and Oracle before developing Snowflake. Marcin Zukowski also has a very impressive professional career which includes working in multiple companies like Microsoft, Google, CWI, Actian Corporation, etc. Apart from co-founding Snowflake, he also founded Vectorwise.

Teradata Corporation

Teradata Corporation – A Data Analytics company formed by the significant contributions from Caltech and Citibank.

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Back in the late 1970s, the researchers in the California Institute of Technology along with an advanced tech group of Citibank collaborated to establish Teradata. Teradata Corporation is a company in the data warehousing sector that offers database analytics software and services as its main products. The three main services provided by the company are business analytics, cloud products, and consulting. Teradata’s headquarters is based in San Diego, the US, and its market is expanded to America (North and Latin), Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. The idea behind Teradata was born more than forty years ago, so let’s have a look at how the company was built.

Founding History of Teradata Corporation

From 1976, the researchers of Caltech and an advanced group of Citibank were working together to develop an unparalleled database management system. The team finally made a breakthrough in 1979 when they made a database management system capable of parallel processing with multiprocessors for design support. The company was launched in July 1979 named Teradata as the system had the ability to manage terabytes of data. A group of seven people opened the office of the company for the first time in a garage at Brentwood, CA. After struggling for a year, Teradata gathered a fund of $150,000 which helped the company make progress.

Teradata Corporation
Image Source: teradata.com

Growth of Teradata Corporation

After one year of establishment, the company successfully raised $2.5 million and with this funding hired the R&D team. After three years of research and testing its products, the company offered its first beta system to Wells Fargo in 1983. The company was making an impressive amount of profit and it was named “Product of the Year” by Fortune magazine in 1986. Next year, the company filed an IPO and it is traded in the NYSE as TDC. In 1989, the company went into a joint venture with NCR Corporation to build powerful database computers. After a couple of years, AT&T acquired NCR which in turn acquired Teradata Corporation in the same year.

The company made a great achievement in 1992 when it offered a database system of over 1 terabyte at Wal-Mart. In 1997, NCR was spun off from AT&T and thus it became an independent company once again. This year Teradata received two prestigious awards, namely, The Data Warehouse Institute’s Best Practices Award and DBMS Readers’ Choice Award.

Beginning of a New Era

In 2000, Teradata built its first enterprise-class application called Value Analyzer. This software was built so that the customer can check thorough profitability measurement and the first customer who used this application was the Royal Bank of Canada. The same year, Teradata acquired Stirling Douglas Group of Canada and added Demand Chain Management software to the list of its enterprise applications. Next year, the company introduced another new solution called Financial Management which included both hardware and software services.

In 2002, Teradata launched Teradata Warehouse 7.0 which extended the company’s decision-making just beyond corporate management. In 2003, more than 120 companies switched from Oracle to Teradata as the company launched the Oracle-to-Teradata Migration Program. A huge network was built by the company which involved academic institutes as well. The next year witnessed Teradata’s partnership with SAP and also with Siebel Systems to build integrated and optimized products.

In 2005, the company brought the Linux operating system to its enterprise-class data and next year launched the Enterprise Master Data Management (MDM) solution. With every step Teradata took into the realms of the management system, it delivered products with better performance, easy enterprise integration, etc. In 2007, Teradata and NCR became two separate entities, and the former established a partnership with Agilent Technologies.

Present Day

In 2010, the company was named as one of the world’s most ethical companies by the Ethisphere Institute highlighting the quality of the company in doing ethical business. In 2011, the company acquired Aprimo and launched many new brands. The company has recently partnered with Google Cloud and also joined the NVIDIA partner program to take the company forward in terms of AI and Deep Learning as well.

The company is currently under the leadership of Steve McMillan (President and CEO of Teradata since 2020). He worked at F5 Networks before joining Teradata and also worked with Oracle and IBM.

Teladoc Health

Teladoc Health – An Online Healthcare Company Providing On-Demand Medical Supervision Since 2002

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Established in 2002, Teladoc Health is a US-based company providing remote healthcare, medical supervision, telehealth devices, etc. The company has a very broad customer base as it serves more than 130 countries. A virtual healthcare platform like Teladoc Health comes very handy during times of emergency situations. The founders of Teladoc Health are Bryon Brooks and Michael Gorton. Currently, the company has more than 2,000 employees providing healthcare services to around 27 million people around the world.

The idea of Teladoc Health is very unique and it is the first and the largest virtual healthcare company in the US. With time, Teladoc has expanded and rolled out a variety of new products including AI and analytics. The primary way of providing medical supervision to its users is done via telephone, video conferencing app, and also using mobile apps. The importance of online healthcare service will always be on-demand but in situations like a global pandemic, its usability is increased by several folds.

Establishment of Teladoc Healthcare

Bryon and Michael founded the company, Teladoc Health in Dallas, Texas in 2002. The idea of developing an online platform for medical consultancy was first brought to the US by these two people. When the company was founded, the business model was such that it allowed patients to consult state-licensed doctors through the Teladoc platform. While the patients or the users needed to pay a sum of $35 or $40 for every consultation, the company paid a monthly amount for their employees so that they can also have access to the services of Teladoc Health.

Teladoc Health
Image Source: static.seekingalpha.com

With this business model, Teladoc decided to move forward and launched the company nationally in 2005 during the Consumer Directed Healthcare Conference in Chicago. At this time, Michael Gorton was both the Chairman and CEO of the company. After it was launched nationally, many big companies started providing Teladoc services to their employees as a part of their healthcare benefits. By the end of 2007, Teladoc hit 1 million users.

Growth and Expansion

Soon Michael Gorton was replaced by Jason Gorevic and the funding rounds of the company began. In December 2009, Teladoc conducted its initial private funding rounds and raised $9 million. After a couple of years, it raised another $22.6 million. In 2011, Teladoc and Aetna embarked on a joint venture as Aetna started offering Teladoc exclusively to its insured members from Florida and Texas. In 2013, Teladoc acquired a company called Consult a Doctor for $16.6 million to bring more versatility to its platform and give small companies access to the service of Teladoc. By the end of 2013, Teladoc’s total funding money summed up to $46.6 million.

After the Affordable Care Act passed in 2010, many companies signed with Teladoc. The company witnessed a great increase in the number of users during 2013 and 2014. Many famous companies like Blue Shield, Oscar, Home Depot, T-Mobile, etc signed in with Teladoc. In 2014, Teldoc acquired AmeriDoc which was one of the biggest competitors of the company during that time. Another private funding round was conducted in 2014 where the company raised $50 million.

The company again made two big acquisitions in 2015, namely Better Help and Stat Health Services. Teladoc became a public company on 1st July 2015 and it was the only telemedicine company in the NYSE. Teladoc acquired the highest number of companies in 2015 and 2016 which includes Compile Inc, HealthiestYou, etc. Teladoc also started to expand its expertise in new fields such as dermatology, sexual health, and behavioral health.

Current Day Teladoc

In 2017, Teladoc made the biggest acquisition in its history as it bought a medical consultation firm called Best Doctors. In 2018, the company changed its name from Teladoc Inc to Teladoc Health. For the next couple of years, Teladoc also focused on acquiring international companies to strengthen its market in other nations. Last year, Teladoc made another big acquisition as it purchased Livongo Health for $18.5 billion.

Teladoc has always intended to stay clear of any major competitors by eventually acquiring them and thus it today has a huge number of services for every kind of patient. In Teladoc Health, there’s a huge diversity in types of medical consultation and virtual care.  The company is currently thriving in the healthcare sector under the leadership of Jason Gorevic. He continues to be the CEO of the company since 2009.

Square Inc

Square Inc – An American Company providing Digital Payment Services since 2009.

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Square Inc is a company booming in the realm of financial technology and services. The company was founded by Jack Dorsey and Jim McKelvey in 2009. Started off as a company to help small retailers and vendors accept credit cards but slowly ITV started expanding and broadened its customer base to big enterprises as well. The company’s headquarters is based in San Francisco, California and it is one of the largest companies in the financial technology sectors across the globe. So, let’s have a look at where it all began.

The Founding Story of Square Inc

Before co-founding Square Inc with Jim McKelvey, Jack Dorsey served as the CEO of Twitter. He stepped down from the position to establish Square Inc. The main idea behind founding this company was to make credit cards with tech that will be able to transmit data through the headphone jack of a smartphone.

To get the company up and running, both of them needed funding from investors. Since the co-founders hailed from a highly rich professional background, they were able to raise a total of $10 million in Series A funding. Some of the investors include Biz Stone (co-founder of Twitter) and Marissa Mayer (former CEO of Yahoo!). After receiving this funding, Square Inc developed its first product which was a square-shaped credit card reader. So, after a year of establishment, Square Inc rolled out its first product and also launched an app for both iOS and Android.

Square Inc
Image Source: logos-download.com

The company eventually started booming as it witnessed transactions worth millions of dollars every week. So, the co-founders decided to conduct another round of funding in January 2011. The money raised in this round was $27.5 million and the net valuation of the company became $230 million. During this time, Visa bought a small stake in the company.

Growth of Square Inc

In the early months of 2011, the company processed around $3 million per day. Seeing the number of users increasing per day, Square Inc made a deal with Apple so that the devices of the company are sold at Apple Stores. This increased the visibility of the brand and attracted more investors. After the next funding round, the valuation of the company became $1 billion. So, a young brand became a billion-dollar company within a span of three years and that was just the early days.

Since Square focused mainly on retailers, businesses, and small vendors, it built a lot of apps over the years to enhance digital payment processing, creating online stores, etc. One of the best services provided by Square Inc is Square Capital which analyzes data from merchant’s sales and provides advance loans using Square’s credit card processor. With the services provided by Square Inc, more businesses were able to create an online presence. In 2012, the company hosted Series D funding and raised $200 million and after two years it conducted Series E making a total worth of Square Inc $6 billion.

Uncertain Times

The company was making good money but its partnership with Starbucks led to a huge monetary loss. The company also went through some turmoil in 2015 when it was planning to file an IPO. During this time, Jack Dorsey became the interim CEO of Twitter and he had to handle both companies at the same time. So, after Square Inc started trading as a public company, the share prices dropped at the beginning and for one year the journey was a bit rocky.

Though the company lost millions in the partnership with Starbucks and found it difficult to trade as a public company after a year it was all getting back on track. From 2017 the company started recovering from its failure and decided to go international by expanding its services in the UK market. Given that the shares of Square were falling in 2016, the shares grew to 150% in 2018. In time, the company has also made a few acquisitions like Weebly and most recently gained majority ownership in Tidal.

About the Founders

Jack Dorsey is mostly famous as he served as the CEO and co-founder of Twitter. He went to New York University but dropped out before graduating. He started working on the idea of Twitter while he was a student at NYU.

Square Inc
Image Source: images.mktw.net and grupobcc.com
Jim McKelvey and Jack Dorsey

Jim McKelvey is an American billionaire famous for co-founding Square Inc. He went to Washington University at St Louis and after graduating started working as a contractor for IBM.

Gemalto

Gemalto – A Renowned Digital Security Company recently purchased by the Thales Group.

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Gemalto is a famous electronic company providing services in the digital security sector. The main two products of the company are software applications and smart cards along with services related to them. Gemalto was formed in 2006 as a result of a merger between two companies, Axalto and Gemplus. In 2019, Gemalto came under the acquisition of the Thales Group and until then it was the biggest producer of SIM cards across the globe. Currently, the company’s headquarters are based in Amsterdam, Netherlands. It operates in more than 45 countries and has plenty of production sites and R&D centers. So, let’s have a look at the parent companies and how they became a single big entity, Gemalto.

The Founding Story of Gemplus

Gemplus was founded in the late 1980s and it started trading in the prepaid phonecards field. In the 1990s words spread about the brand and hence Axalto tied up with Gemplus to create a strong presence in the market and grow its business. Before 1999, Gemplus conducted its business through a french limited partnership called Gemplus SCA but in 1999 it merged with Gemplus Associates and formed Gemplus SA, a joint stock company. The company filed for an IPO in December 2000 and after a few years, it restructured its corporate divisions. During this time, most of the subsidiaries of Gemplus SA were transferred to Gemplus International SA. In 2005, Gemplus acquired a Finland-based company for Setec Oy, and next year it merged with Axalto.

Schlumberger renamed as Axalto

Schlumberger Smart Cards & Terminals renamed the company in 2003 to Axalto to add more versatility to its brand. Schlumberger was a big hit in the chip technology market in 1979 and it developed its first telephone chip card in the 1980s. The company used to establish partnerships with several telecom operators in many nations and started developing a digital era of communication. In the 1990s the company designed its first SIM card which was used for the launch of GSM in Europe.

In the 21st century, the company has made breakthroughs by designing java-based microprocessor cards and smart cards. Long before Axalto merged with Gemplus, the former thrived in the electronics industry creating various products and applications for telecommunication, IT, healthcare, retail, and other sectors. Axalto was spun off as a different company from the parent company Schlumberger for the smart cards and POS terminal activities.

After The Merger

The merger between Axalto and Gemplus took place in 2006. During the next ten years, Gemalto acquired a series of companies in many countries. In Taiwan, it acquired Leigh Mardon’s personalization center, in South Africa, it acquired Multos International and NamITech, in Sweden, it acquired Todos AB, etc. In 2017, the Thales Group showed interest in acquiring Gemalto and as approved by the board of directors the acquisition was completed in 2019. The deal was closed for €4.8 billion. Gemalto today is famous for supplying software solutions, SIM, and managed services in the telecommunication market. The company has around 700 million subscribers spread internationally. Since it also partners with telecom operators, Gemalto has more than 400 telecom operator customers in the world.

Gemalto
Image Source: upload.wikimedia.org

Gemalto also delivers EMV cards to several financial institutions after it partnered with Garanti Bank in Turkey. This partnership was established in 2008 after which it rolled out 300,00 Gemalto EMV contactless bank cards. In 2016, the National Commercial Bank of Saudi Arabia also partnered with Gemalto for the same. Gemalto has also rolled out biometrics cards in recent years. The company has significant contributions in the public sector as it provides e-passports, e-driving license, e-government IDs, etc.

The CEO: Philippe Vallee

Since 2016, Philippe Vallee has been serving as the CEO of Gemalto. Before becoming the CEO, he worked as Chief Operating Officer and also in the EVP Telecommunications Business Unit of Gemalto. Philippe Vallee also worked at Gemplus before he became a part of Gemalto. He has a very rich background in marketing, sales, and product management and served at many positions in these units in Asia and Europe.

Yamaha

Yamaha has rolled out SR-C20A and SR-B20A soundbars with in-built Subwoofers and Bluetooth 5G connectivity

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Yamaha has launched two new models of soundbars, namely, SR-C20A and SR-B20A in the Indian market. These soundbars can be controlled via an app which increases the convenience to use them. The name of the app is the Sound Bar Remote app which is newly developed to control the soundbars, change content, sound volume, switch on/off, etc from our tablet or smartphone. Both the soundbar models are equipped with an HDMI out port which supports TV ARC (Audio Return Channel) so that the audio from the connected TV is transmitted easily. The Yamaha SR-B20A is a bit more powerful than SR-C20A as it delivers 120W of total sound output. So, let’s have a detailed look at all the other specifications of these two new soundbars.

Specifications and Features of Yamaha SR-C20A

The sound technology in the Yamaha SR-C20A is the Dolby Audio and has four different modes, namely, stereo, standard, movie, and gaming. The model has a 2.1 channel setup provided with two 20W speakers for the left and the right channel. There is also a 60W subwoofer (in-built) provided with this model and offers a total sound output of 100W. The brand new Yamaha SR-C20A is also provided with an Analogue Input Port but there is no subwoofer output port.

Along with the built-in subwoofer, the model also has passive radiators which together create a very wide and impressive bass range. If someone wants to give the bass an extra boost, they can also use the Bass extension feature. With the help of the Virtual Sound Technology connected with the television, one can get a movie theatre-like experience as it reproduces immersive sound effects. The Clear Voice tech enables the users or the audience to hear sounds clearly especially movie dialogue even when the surrounding has high sound effects.

Yamaha
Image Source: cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net

The soundbars can be easily mounted on the wall and it is advised to install them below your TV screen to get the best experience. You can expand your entertainment as it offers the choice to connect not only with television but also with any other Bluetooth-compatible device. So, you can turn on you’re relax mode listening to your favorite music album, or be attentive to those class lectures. You can also pair it with your game console to experience a rich gaming battle.

Specifications and Features of SR-B20A

As mentioned earlier, the sound output of SR-B20A is 120W which is more than C20A and has two 30W channel speakers for the left and right sides. Though both the models have Digital Optical In ports, they do not support 4K pass through. In this model, the subwoofer has an output port which is absent in the case of SR-C20A. Speaking of sound quality, the new Yamaha SR-B20A has DTS Virtual:X which provides virtual 3D sound mode. So, along with experiencing the rich sound quality from four sides, you can feel it all over the room giving the true immersive feeling.

Like SR-C20A, this model can be installed on the wall, accessed with an app on your smart devices, and can transmit TV audio with the ARC. The uniqueness of this model comes with the rich bass reproduction with a dual built-in 75 mm (3 “) subwoofer unit combined with the dual bass reflex port (Yamaha.com). The sound modes are the same for this model as that of SR-C20A and you can swap between any modes according to your mood and convenience. Yamaha SR-B20A weighs 3.2kg which is heavier than SR-C20A (1.8kg).

Both the newly launched soundbars are priced at Rs 20,490. But, both models are currently available at a discounted prices. So, grab them at the earliest from the online site of Amazon (SR-C20A) and on the commercial site of Yamaha (SR-B20A).