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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

NetSuite

The Acquisition Of Netsuite Made Oracle A Bigger Company

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With the emerging IT industry in India and abroad as well, many new companies are coming up rapidly. Some of the dreams of making their company bigger and some of them after earning dollars sell the company. But, the immense potential of internet, data, and telecommunication has increased the scope for employment as well. Especially went it comes to services like data storage, data security, cloud computing, etc.

Oracle has always been a very famous company in the IT sector. But, after the acquisition of NetSuite in 2016, it has become a more prominent service provider in the world. NetSuite is a cloud computing company founded in 1998. Evan Goldberg founded the company to improve the services provided by a business. Zachary Nelson joined the company in 2002 and under his leadership, the company filed its first successful IPO. It built software that helped the business to manage their finance, improve relationships with customers, etc.

Currently, NetSuite operates under the parent company, Oracle. It is exclusively a company based on cloud-based management.

Evan Goldberg

Evan Goldberg went to Harvard University to acquire his bachelor’s degree in Applied Mathematics. Evan’s career started with joining Oracle in 1987. His position in the company was a Software Engineer at the beginning and eventually, he became the Vice President of the company. He left the company in 1995 and founded mBed Software in the same year. Evan founded NetSuite in 1998 and currently, he is the EVP of the company (Oracle NetSuite).

Zachary Nelson

Born into a family in Nebraska, Zachary belonged to a very huge family. Zachary pursued his higher studies in biology and acquired both his bachelor’s and master’s in the same from Stanford University. His field of higher studies and careers were diametrically opposite of each other. After completing his studies, he went for marketing, finance, sales, etc.

He worked at companies like Sun Microsystems, McAfee, Oracle Corporation, Cunningham Communication, etc. Zachary worked at Oracle for many years and he became the VP, World Wide Marketing at Oracle. Also, he broke the record of becoming the youngest VP in the history of Oracle. He joined NetSuite in 2002. Apart from running big companies, he is also a big investor.

The History

When Evan initially founded the company, he named it NetLedger. Evan, from his past experiencing, was evidently from a finance background and hence NetLedger focused on accounting as well. In brief words, NetLedger provided web-hosted accounting software. But, there are a lot of operations under the finance section of a company. So, to make sure NetLedger can provide a company’s all these essential functionalities, Evan decided to expand.

He kept on adding features, and the company eventually became more versatile. And, all these products were added in the list before the term “cloud computing” even came into play. But, it seems like an idea always existed, new terms just came in. Evan established the company with financial support from Oracle.

Funding and Growth

Then CEO of Oracle, Larry Ellison, helped Evan in many ways to set the company. Evan was provided with both the seed funding as well as employees from Oracle to start NetLedger. He received a seed funding of $125 million from Oracle. Initially, Oracle licensed the company. But, it didn’t seem like a good idea and they called it off.

NetSuite gained unexpected popularity because it is considered as the first-ever company to come up with cloud computing. The company started providing related services even the term was introduced. So, the clients of NetSuite were in a very advantageous position of using such software.

In July 2002, Zachary Nelson became the CEO of the company. And, he drove NetSuite’s annual revenue to $1 billion from $1 million.

The company under Zachary Nelson

Under Zachary Nelson, the company’s first successful IPO was led by him in 2007. NetSuite then was no more a start-up but a big powerful company. By 2017, the company’s annual revenue summed up to $1 billion. Under his leadership, the company made many big acquisitions which include OpenAir in 2008, TribeHR in 2013, and Bronto Software in 2015.

In July 2016, Oracle announced that it will be acquiring NetSuite for $9.3 billion. The deal was closed in November. The headquarters of the company is in California and currently, it has around 600 employees.

Bol.com

Daniel Ropers’s Entrepreneurial Journey Takes A Pause After Springer Nature

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Daniel Ropers says it becomes a great commitment towards professional work especially when it comes to education. The former CEO of Springer Nature captured the attention of one and all when he decided to step down. Daniel Ropers is very famous in the business world especially as the former CEO and co-founder of Bol.com other than Springer Nature. He stepped down from his position at Springer Nature in September 2019. We come across a lot of great personalities in our daily lives. And, in the business world, it has become quite common to spot business tycoons rising from nothing. Daniel Ropers, the former CEO of Springer Nature, has created a very significant position for him in the business world. He has recently left the company and his resignation took place very smoothly. So, let’s have a look into his entrepreneurial journey.

Education of Daniel Ropers

Daniel went to ESSEC Business School in 1995 to study Global Economics and Business Studies. He also completed his master’s in Business Economics and graduated in 1997. He always a niche for business development and thus established his career by serving infamous companies around the world.

Professional World

Daniel started his career with McKinsey & Company. In 1997, he joined the company as a Management Consultant and continued for a couple of years. In 2000, Daniel after co-founding Bol.com joined the same as the CEO of the company. He worked at the company for seventeen years. In 2010, he became a Supervisory Board Member of the Telegraaf Media Groep.

After leaving Bol.com, he joined Springer Nature which he left after two years. Daniel witnessed the growth of Bol.com from the beginning as it was founded in 1999. While he served at Bol.com, it emerged out as one of the most popular retailers in the Netherlands and Belgium.

Daniel’s Leadership in Bol.com

The newly built company of 1999 excelled under the leadership of Daniel Ropers. Daniel showed great interest in companies related to academics. Bol.com started its business as a company that sells books online and Springer also encompasses academic publishing.

When Bol.com was established in 1999 it only had a handful of customers which after three years turned to millions. Once landing bigger customers, the company decided to expand its business and started selling electronics as well. So, in 2004, the company expanded its product range and witnessed more than 5 million orders in total.

The company didn’t entertain a huge number of employees. Bol.com comprised of fifty team members in 2006. This year, the annual revenue of the company summed up to €100 million. In 2008, the company launched its first personalized newsletter. Bol.com expanded its business to Belgium, thus collaborating with the local retailers and expanding their products.

Once Bol.com started going international, they needed more employees for the abroad offices. In 2014, the companies employees increased by twenty times as it was ten years ago. Eventually, the company also introduced same-day delivery. This was a good strategy for a company like Bol.com as it also started selling products needed in everyday life. Under the leadership of Daniel, the company went international, expanded its products, improved its delivery timings, etc.

Springer Nature

Springer Nature is a company or rather academic publishing exclusively for journals, academic researches, scholarships, etc. Daniel joined the company in 2017, two years after its founding. Springer Nature was formed by merging more than a couple of companies. It includes Nature Publishing Group, Palgrave Macmillan Education, Springer Science, and Business Media. The merging was finally completed in May 2015 and the maximum shareholder was Holtzbrinck (Macmillan Education).

Daniel was already a business mastermind when he joined Springer Nature. So, it was expected of the company to grow bigger under his supervision. Under Daniel’s rule, the company developed excellent group strategies and planning for the future.

Daniel said that education is the foundation of every step we take today. We might have become huge business tycoons, but without proper education, it wouldn’t have been possible. Within two years, Daniel was greatly attached to the company and more than that with the purpose served. He said it is hard to leave the company. But, at the same time, he needed a break from twenty-five years of this life.

Takeaway.com

Jitse Groen’s Start-Up Has Pioneered Britain’s Online Food Delivery Market

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It is just a myth that people have good food only on weekends. Though one doesn’t get the time to visit a posh restaurant every day, the craving for good food is a real struggle. Moreover, our everyday busy schedule doesn’t allow anyone of us to prepare good food and cherish a meal. But, that doesn’t mean we are going to be deprived of those robust mouth-watering meals from our favorite restaurants.

You already know the hack, don’t you? Indian population has already become a huge fan of online food delivery services like Zomato, Uber Eats, Swiggy, etc. Similarly, the English people have Takeaway.com to their rescue. Jitse Groen, a Dutch student, founded his online food delivery start-up in 2001 which has now become a billion-dollar business.

Education and Early Career of Jitse Groen

Jitse Groen went to the University of Twente for acquiring his bachelor’s degree in Business Information Technology. He founded Takeaway.com while he was a college student. Apart from founding his business, he served his role as the CEO of GRIB BV from 1998 to 2006. He also worked at HotelSpecial as an Advisory Board Member, worked at Funda as a Board Member, as the CEO of Thuisbezorgd.NL BV (which later became Takeaway.com), etc.

How Jitse founded Takeaway.com 

Back in 1999 when Jitse was a college student, the idea of making a website came into his mind. He was attending a party at Noord-Holland and wanted to order a pizza. But, unfortunately, the online service showed that it won’t be able to deliver his choice of food at the given address. And, that’s how this tech guy came up with the idea of founding his online company to serve his nation.

Most of the successful start-ups come from just an idea. Well, it is true that to make a business establish successfully one needs to have patience and proper planning. But, only a few have the guts to take a risk and step out of the boundaries. Jitse decided to create a website that will connect as many restaurants as possible to the people, and he did it.

He registered with the domain name Thuisbezorgd and embarked as a young entrepreneur in 2000.

Jitse’s opinions on online food service

Though the idea of founding a business came within twenty seconds, Jitse did a lot of market research before going international. Moreover, he worked for another nineteen years in different companies. And, after that Takeaway.com finally emerged as the top online food delivery company in Belgium. Jitse knew he needs proper funding and planning before he can place Takeaway on the firm ground.

But, once he established the business he succeeded rapidly. In 2003, he changed the domain name to Takeaway.com because he wanted to go international. He knew it would be tough for him to compete with the other billionaire companies. But, his strategies played the ace for him.

Jitse, in an interview, said that maximum customers look for restaurants that don’t take delivery charges. So, even if they find one out of three hotels charging zero delivery charge they will go for it. And, it happens even if the food is a bit expensive. So, a food outlet selling through the website of Takeaway.com made more profit as compared to any other websites.

Takeaway.com

When Jitse founded the company in 2000, he mainly opened it for delivering kebabs and pizza. Bit, eventually his business expanded and emerged as one of the top online food delivery companies in the Netherlands. Jitse continued working for other companies and didn’t devote all his time to Takeaway.com at the beginning. So, his first big fundraising happened in 2012.

In 2012, Jitse received funding of €13 million from Prime Ventures and started accepting bitcoins from next year. The company raised another round of €74 million in Series B funding from Macquarie Capital and Prime Ventures. By the end of 2016, the valuation of the company almost reached a billion. This year, the company stooped its business in the UK.

The acquisitions of Taleaway.com escalated from 2018. It acquired 10bis, an Israeli company for €135 million and also a Belgium company called BGmenu.com. The company made a major acquisition in July 2019 which is Just Eat. While doing business in the UK, it was one of its biggest competitors. To date, the company successfully delivers around 800,000 orders per month from 10,000 different restaurants.

George-Samuel-Hurst-Touchscreen-Founder

George Samuel Hurst- One Of The First Scientists To Come Up With Touchscreen Technology

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Though scientists conducted thorough experiments and research regarding touchscreen technology, the implementations took a very long time. Theoretically, the concept of touchscreen dates back to the 1940s but the application in the real world wasn’t possible until 1980. For a long time, the ability of touchscreen didn’t cross the boundaries of the laboratory, but today the scenario is different. We can’t imagine surviving one day without using our smartphone or a tablet. But, now we have said no to the annoying “qwerty” keypads. It is amusing how bewildered we use to be seeing the high-tech touchscreen technology in science fiction. And, today we are part of the society where most of us using the technology like a jigsaw puzzle. We should be grateful to this physicist for bringing our life to a whole other technological dimension.

The early life of George: Touchscreen Founder

Born on 13th October 1927, George belonged to a very rural area of Ponza, Bell County, Kentucky. Their family had a farm where he grew up with other siblings. From a very young age, he had a very keen interest in physics and Thomas Edison in particular. But, who knew this zeal to learn new things would make this farm boy so famous one day.

Education

George attended Bell County High School and went to Berea College to acquire his bachelor’s degree. He got admitted into college at the age of fifteen and received his degree in 1947. He graduated with a degree in physics and a minor in mathematics. For pursuing higher studies, he went to the University of Kentucky and completed his master’s in physics.

While pursuing his higher education, he made a friend called Rufus Ritchie with whom he worked on various physics projects. After graduation, both of them decided to go to ORNL (Oak Ridge National Laboratory). After George’s significant contribution to the field of Physics, he received his Ph.D. from the University of Tennessee. The name of his paper was “Attachment of Low-Energy Electrons in Mixtures Containing Oxygen”.

Area of Research

In the world of science, capacitive touchscreens were invented first followed by resistive touchscreens. E. A. Johnson is known for inventing the capacitive touchscreens in the early 1960s. He published an article, “Touch display- A novel input/output device for computers”. The features and technology of such touchscreens are incorporated in some of today’s smartphones.

But, eventually, the resistive touchscreens suppressed the concept of capacitive touchscreens. And, the inventor of this type of touchscreens is none other than George Samuel Hurst. The story of his invention is very interesting and took place at Berea College.

George and some other Ph.D. scholars were working on a project of atomic physics using an overworked Van de Graff accelerator. Rigorous analysis slowed down there pace. So, George thought of using electrically conductive paper to read a few two-dimensional coordinates. This saved time and gave a spark to the idea of touchscreens for computers.

His Big Invention

When George went to the University of Kentucky, he wanted to file a patent so that his work stays secure. But, the origin of this theory and his later laboratory works weren’t that convincing. So, the chapter was slightly closed then, but he had plans in his mind. After he went to ORNL, George along with his nine other friends researched his basement.

Since what happened in the laboratory of Berea College was completely sudden and accidental they wanted to take it further. The team called this technology “Elographics” and they started working on developing a proper interacting touchscreen for computers. He finally came up with what we call today’s resistive touchscreen technology. It is called so because the computer or smartphones respond because of the pressure we exert and no electrical conductivity. Moreover, resistive touchscreen and more cost-effective and hence widely used by mobile phone companies today.

Awards and Recognitions

George Samuel Hurst is the recipient of Union Carbide (Corporate fellow) and American Physical Society (fellow). He is also a part of the University of Kentucky (Alumni Association Hall of Distinguished Alumni), received an honorary degree from Berea College (D.Sc.), etc. He also bagged the Distinguished Alumni Award of 2005 from the University of Tennessee.

He is also well-known for founding Scientists and Engineers for Appalachia (SEA) and Institute of Resonance Ionization Spectroscopy. He was a professional health physicist.

Buzzsumo

BuzzSumo – Providing Insights Of Better Content Since 2013

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The power of appropriate content is immeasurable in the world of digital marketing. With online advertising taking the high ground, every content creator should know about SEO. Moreover, freelancers also have a chance of making a good amount of money through content marketing. The craze for creating content has recently gained popularity which led to the establishment of many new companies. If one does proper market research, he or she can find limitless websites providing content marketing research. But, the transparency of a business procedure, better content matters more than advertising about the company. In the case of any new start-up, digital marketing plays a very crucial role but the quality of the product is more important to the customers. Buzzsumo is a start-up founded in 2013 to provide content marketing research. The fact that its annual revenue summed up to $2.5 million after the first year proves it became a huge success. The founders of the company are James Blackwell and Henley Wing.

About the Founders

James Blackwell went to the University of Plymouth for acquiring his bachelor’s degree in business studies. He graduated in the year 2009 and joined Proper Digital Ltd. as a Full Stack Web Developer in 2011. He continued his job till the end of 2013 and then focused entirely on founding Buzzsumo.

Both James and Henley started working for the project in 2013 but the first product launch took place in 2014. Currently, he is the VP Product of Brandwatch.

Henley to date is well-known as the co-founder of Buzzsumo.

The Early Days

Initially, both James and Henley were creating the first version of Buzzsumo in their spare time. Both of them had a job so they weren’t fully focused on building a new business. But, at the end of 2013, they resigned from their jobs and decided to launch the company in 2014. So, they officially founded Buzzsumo in 2014 with no investors.

Steve Rayson provided some initial funding and that is how they launched their Buzzsumo Pro product in late 2014. But, the rate of success was surprising as no one saw it coming.

Lessons Learnt

After one year of the official launch of its first product, Buzzsumo entertained more than 2,000 paid subscribers and over 160,000 freemium subscribers. The once spare time product development turned out to be a profitable start-up with annual revenue of $2.5 million.

Things started getting more serious after this. And, now the team was exclusively focused on creating engaging content for the audience. They realized the right way of pursuing a product launch is making a great quality product then going for marketing.

Strategies for Growth

One of the prime rules for maintaining a proper growth rate of the company is setting small goals. When a company is launched the monthly recurring revenue is expected to be higher because one is starting from zero. But, to maintain the same growth is harder. So, Buzzsumo fixed its target to maintain a monthly growth rate of over 10%.

The challenge becomes more difficult when the existing subscribers leave the company. This problem can only be eradicated if one provides fresh content daily. So, Buzzsumo always focuses on creating fresh catchy blogs on a day-to-day basis and keep the customers engaged.

Have Patience

The bitter truth about running a business is it depends on your luck to some extent. No business with content research tools can expect such revenue within a year. But, Buzzsumo proved that it is possible when you deal with the business in the right way. Or maybe they just got lucky.

But, once a big goal has been reached, you have to be patient because the weekly traffic takes a much longer time to grow and rise steadily. It is harder to drive new customers than selling your products to existing customers. By 2016, the top contents of Buzzsumo received more than 30,000 views and 2,000 shares. Buzzsumo by this team comprised a team of seven members.

Partnership

Within a couple of years of its establishment, Buzzsumo came into a joint venture with many companies. Some of them include Moz, Buffer, Wordstream, Canva, Uberflip, etc. Steve Rayson also received advice from some great businessmen as he was from a business background. Some of the supporters were from Eden Ventures, Brandwatch, etc. Over the past three years, Buzzsumo has grown rapidly and the main reason behind it is a very flexible team.

Revolar

Jacqueline Ros Assures Personal Safety With Revolar

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No matter how much our world is marching towards a more civilized environment, some social issues always pull us back. It is a matter of fact that crimes related to assaults are increasing day by day. For example, India is well-known for its rich IT sector skills and at the same time accused of brutal assaults. And, these harassments mostly take place in case of women.

Not only in India, but in the entire world women are not safe. If a few try to ensure their safety, a thousand does it otherwise. In this scenario, we need to step up instead of sloganeering and protesting. Jacqueline Ros, an entrepreneur came up with a product called Revolar to ensure personal safety, especially for women.

She founded this Denver-based start-up in 2013 and served as the CEO of the company. This personal safety device gained a lot of popularity. An idea turned into a big project only because she had the passion to bring a change.

About the Founder

Jacqueline went to the University of Florida to acquire her bachelor’s degree in International Studies & Spanish. She graduated in the year 2012 and the next moment she is the founder of a successful start-up.

While pursuing her degree she worked as an intern (Trained Legal Representative) at Guardian Ad Litem. In 2014, she was a part of the Candidate Support Team of Leadership for Educational Equity. She was also a Content & Transformative Series Facilitator at Teach for America and Board Treasurer at AXL Academy.

Jacqueline Ros
Image Source – Google

She performed her role as the CEO of Revolar until May 2018. After that, she became the Regional Director (America) of Techstars.

Why Revolar

The safety of women is a very crucial factor for the social upbringing of any nation. Jacqueline promised herself to create something for the safety of women when her sister was attacked twice. Jacqueline said that while her sister was only seventeen she became the victim of two assaults. And, she decided to develop a safety device which will be easy to carry and affordable as well.

The Beginning

Jacqueline just graduated from college when she thought of creating Revolar. She is a graduate student who is not from a very influential family background. So, she tried her best to pitch about her product and participated in start-up programs. She participated in a Kickstarter campaign, two start-up accelerators, and also a university pitch contest.

The idea of Revolar was very assuring and seemed like a need of the hour. So, she received a funding of $156,000 from the state of Colorado and a huge amount of $3 million from one of the start-up accelerators. The funding was led by a Denver Venture Capitalist firm.

Advantages of Revolar

In the initial days, Revolar helped to send location information to once contacts in case of emergency. Once the device is connected with the Revolar app it would immediately send location details to every contact saved in the app. So, just with the click of a button the safety level upgrades.

The device was very simple and minimalistic as Jacqueline wanted something that any woman can handle. Because it is the right of every woman to live freely without having the fear of such dreadful assaults.

Currently, the company is trying to introduce new features cost-effectively. Every step is taken to make the Revolar part of sustainable business and to make the world a better place.

Bad Days

In late 2017, Revolar all of a sudden went out of business for a month. This was caused due to the ineffective supply chain and production unit. The company didn’t have any other option so they filed bankruptcy saying the company is unable to repay its debt.

But, luckily this wasn’t the end. Two investors, namely, Empowerment Capital and Volante Capital Advisors were impressed by the aim of Revolar. They didn’t want a project with such a good cause to shut down and hence decided to fund them. All this happened within one month and Revolar was again back in business.

The New Business

Once Revolar was back in business it also decided to launch new products with some added features. First of all, the price of the product was cut by $40 and the launch of a new device took place. Apart from showing the location, the contact would receive a message about the person reaching the destination safely or not. Another feature added in the app is step counting.

She received a funding of $2 million for her new product. But, currently, she is not playing her role in Revolar anymore. Brian Thomas has taken her position and after he joined the company the reported revenue of Revolar is around $2 billion.