Category: News

As previously reported, Twitter has officially launched its Ads API. Initial partners include: Adobe, HootSuite, Salesforce, SHIFT and TBG Digital.

Adobe shared some early results, as its Media Optimizer tool (which manages over $2 billion in annual ad spend) utilizes the API. The company worked with a few of its customers, including Levi Strauss and Threadless as well as its own Adobe account, and shared these results:

• By using granular targeting, testing different bid levels and segmenting campaigns by regions, Media Optimizer was able to increase the follower base (number of followers on Twitter) by 63%
• Adobe saw the total Cost Per Follow (CPF) decrease by close to 60% or approximately $2.00
• Prior to the campaign Adobe saw steady organic growth at around two dozen followers per day. With Promoted Accounts Adobe saw the growth rate spike dramatically to an average of over 400 new followers per day
• Since the completion of the campaign Adobe saw its follower growth revert to a new, higher baseline of about 115 followers per day. Postings and promotions have not changed significantly, which indicates a possible ongoing benefit of Twitter’s Promoted Accounts and new followers being highly engaged with the brand

“Our customers have been asking us to include Twitter in the Media Optimizer solution,” says David Karnstedt, Senior Vice President, Media and Ad Solutions at Adobe. “Promoted Tweets and Promoted Accounts are important assets in creating a holistic digital marketing campaign. The performance gains Media Optimizer produced during our beta period, such as lowering cost-per-follow by 60%, are indicative of the value we offer our customers for their Twitter campaigns.”

The company discusses its early campaign results more here.

HootSuite is offering a new integration for Twitter, providing customers with amplification of owned into paid media, agency collaboration, real-time social campaigning, and layered social media reporting.

“HootSuite provides our clients with the ability to amplify their owned content, keeping them at the forefront of social advertising opportunities. This process is now a simple and efficient one,” says Ryan Holmes, CEO of HootSuite. “The new integration allows stakeholders in social businesses to instantly buy Promoted Tweets and Accounts from their HootSuite dashboard using our secure, role-based team workflow.”

More on HootSuite’s new integration here.

Satori Capital said Wednesday it has invested in Longhorn Health Solutions. Financial terms were not announced. Austin-based Longhorn is a direct-to-home provider of consumable medical supplies, durable medical equipment, and pharmaceutical prescriptions. Brookside Group provided debt financing while Allegiance Capital Corp. provided financial advice to Longhorn.

PRESS RELEASE

Satori Capital (“Satori”), a Dallas-based private equity firm, announced today that it has invested in Longhorn Health Solutions, Inc. (“Longhorn”). Headquartered in Austin, Texas, Longhorn is a leading direct-to-home provider of consumable medical supplies, durable medical equipment, and pharmaceutical prescriptions serving the Medicaid, Medicare, and privately insured populations across Texas.

“Longhorn is intently focused on reducing total cost-of-care for managed care organizations by streamlining billing processes, improving patient utilization and compliance, enhancing product quality, and heightening transparency throughout the patient, provider, and payor ecosystem,” said Sunny Vanderbeck, Managing Partner at Satori. “We believe in the team’s service-based approach, and look forward to partnering with them to further serve the growing needs of their stakeholders.”

Longhorn offers customers a comprehensive range of high-quality disposable medical products, incontinence supplies, durable medical equipment, enteral nutrition products, and diabetic testing supplies. The company is a contract provider for managed care organizations within Texas Medicaid STAR+PLUS, STAR, and Medicare. Longhorn also recently launched a pharmacy division that serves the entire state of Texas. The company employs nearly 150 team members, and leverages its ten branch locations to utilize a high-touch delivery model. Britt Peterson, founder and CEO of Longhorn, will continue to lead the company.

“Longhorn has earned a reputation for excellence through its reliable performance, dedicated customer service, statewide presence, and commitment to integrity and kindness across everything that we do,” said Britt Peterson, Longhorn CEO. “Our partnership with Satori provides access to a deeper network of healthcare expertise, a valuable collection of operational best practices, and ample resources for both organic expansion and growth via acquisition. Collectively, these resources strengthen Longhorn’s ability to provide higher quality products and services that improve patient outcomes, while also providing manufacturers with cost-effective access to a highly fragmented home health patient base.”

The Brookside Group provided debt financing for the transaction, and Allegiance Capital Corporation acted as exclusive financial advisor to Longhorn. Patton Boggs LLP and Munsch Hardt Kopf & Harr, P.C. acted as legal counsel to Satori Capital and Longhorn Health Solutions, respectively. Specific terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

About Satori Capital

Dallas, Texas-based Satori Capital is the preferred capital partner for companies building significant long-term value through a sustainable approach. Satori’s team has a long and successful track record as private equity investors and founders and CEOs of both private and public companies. Satori partners with talented management teams to accelerate the growth of companies that are “built to last” and meet a set of criteria described as “sustainability.” These businesses deliver strong returns by operating with a long-term perspective, committing to their mission or purpose, and focusing on creating value for all stakeholders. For more information, please visit www.satoricapital.com.

About Longhorn Health Solutions

Longhorn Health Solutions is a leading service-oriented, direct-to-consumer distributor of durable medical equipment, consumable medical supplies, and pharmaceutical prescriptions to home-based Medicaid, Medicare, and privately insured patients across Texas. Based in Austin, Texas, the company offers statewide distribution from its ten locations in Austin, Beaumont, Corpus Christi, El Paso, Fort Worth, Harlingen, Houston, Lubbock, San Antonio, and Waco. For more information, please visit www.longhornhealth.com and www.lhsrx.com.

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Google announced Wednesday that it’s making Google Glass, its augmented reality smart glasses, available to a lucky few “creative individuals.” U.S. residents can apply now to receive — or, rather, have the chance to buy — a pair of Google glasses. They have to make their case on Twitter or on Google+ in 50 words or less (plus up to five photos and one video) by February 27.

If selected, applicants will have the option to pay $1,500 plus tax and then head to “a special pick-up experience in New York, Los Angeles, or the San Francisco Bay area.” Applications are judged based on “how creative, compelling, original, useful, and influential the applications and their proposed uses for Glass are, and how broad a spectrum of user interaction they would provide.”

So far it seems as if Google Glass’s Twitter account @projectglass is fielding a lot of complaints about the U.S.-only requirement. The company also tweeted that it’s working on a solution for people who wear prescription glasses, and that available colors will be “Tangerine, Charcoal, Shale, Cotton and Sky.”

Google also released a video taken through Google Glass, showing that users can take pictures, record video and get translations, answers and other info by asking.

Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
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• Analyzing the wearable computing market
• Takeaways from mobile’s second quarter
• NewNet Q4: Platform mania and social commerce shakeout

Brian Wade has joined Atlantic-Pacific Capital as a partner. He will work with institutional investors in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeast United States. Wade was previously an MD in Credit Suisse Asset Management’s institutional distribution group.

PRESS RELEASE
Atlantic-Pacific Capital, the largest independently owned global placement agent and advisory firm, announced today the addition of Brian Wade as Partner. Mr. Wade will continue to work closely with institutional investors in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeast United States, including public and corporate pension plans, endowments, foundations, financial institutions, fund-of-funds and family offices.

Mr. Wade has over 15 years of experience in limited partner, general partner and third-party distribution roles during his alternative investment career. Prior to joining Atlantic-Pacific, Brian was a Managing Director in Credit Suisse Asset Management’s institutional distribution group. Before Credit Suisse, he was the Director of Investor Relations at JLL Partners, a middle-market private equity firm. Previously, Mr. Wade worked at the Virginia Retirement System, where he was the Director of Private Equity after beginning his alternative investment career at the New York State Common Retirement Fund. Mr. Wade earned a Bachelor of Science from Union College and an MBA from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

“I am excited to join Atlantic-Pacific’s global independent platform and to contribute to its established and focused execution-oriented model. I have been particularly impressed with the firm’s track record, quality of mandates, and tenacity demonstrated by the Partner team since the global financial crises,” commented Mr. Wade.

Mark Bourgeois, CEO and President, said, “I have worked with Brian in various capacities for over 13 years and believe that his prior experience as a limited partner and an investor relations professional complements our current strengths and will be a tremendous asset to our clients.”

About Atlantic-Pacific Capital www.apcap.com
Atlantic-Pacific Capital is the largest independently owned global placement agent and advisory firm dedicated to raising capital for alternative investments. Since 1995, the firm has executed over 70 capital raising assignments aggregating over $50 billion for an extraordinary group of alternative asset managers. Typical mandates include private equity, real estate and infrastructure fund placements, as well as secondary advisory assignments and direct private placements. With experienced professionals located in New York, Greenwich, Chicago, San Francisco, London and Hong Kong, Atlantic-Pacific maintains a global network of trusted relationships with influential institutional and high-net-worth investors.

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Pearson said it launched an incubator program for startups addressing the education market. The Pearson Catalyst program seeks to match startups with Pearson brands to promote pilot programs and provide resources. Startups need to be less than three years old with products ready to launch. The program will incubate 10 teams of founders for at least three months starting in mid April. Startups will continue to work out of their existing offices and receive up to $10,000 for travel.

PRESS RELEASE

INTRODUCING PEARSON CATALYST, THE EDTECH INCUBATOR PROGRAM FOR STARTUPS

World’s leading learning company to help education startups jumpstart their companies and break through on a global scale

LONDON AND SAN FRANCISCO – February 20, 2013 – Pearson, the world’s leading learning company, today announced the launch of Pearson Catalyst, a new startup incubator program to identify the most promising education startup companies that share Pearson’s commitment to improving people’s lives through learning, and help enable them to break through on a global scale. The Pearson Catalyst incubator program aims to match startups with Pearson brands to deliver pilot programs and offer access to Pearson resources and product experts, including the opportunity to work closely with a Pearson brand over the course of the program.

“Pearson Catalyst reflects our desire to be more open and work with forward thinking companies to solve the biggest challenges in global education,” said Diana Stepner, Head of Future Technologies at Pearson. “We believe the future of learning is digital, personal and driven by data – and bringing together Pearson and startups is the perfect combination to build the best future of education today.”

The Pearson Catalyst incubator program is looking for dynamic, technology-centric, startup teams with a mix of talent, that have been up and running for less than three years and who have viable products that are ready for launch in the market. The ideal startup companies will have a product or products that complement or enhance a Pearson brand. Pearson Catalyst will incubate and accelerate up to ten teams of founders for at least three-months starting in mid-April. Startups will continue to work and be based out of their existing offices, with the potential to meet at Pearson offices as well.

Startups selected to participate in Pearson Catalyst will receive:

•    Access to Pearson executives and product experts and the opportunity to be matched with a Pearson company, including a top Pearson executive as key sponsor
•    The opportunity to present at a Pearson demo day in November 2013 to Pearson executives and technology leaders
•    Up to $10K for travel and related costs

Interested education and edtech startups can apply now by emailing [email protected]. .

About Pearson

Pearson is the world’s leading learning company, providing educational materials and services, business information through the Financial Times Group, and consumer publishing through the Penguin brand. Pearson serves learners of all ages around the globe, employing 41,000 people in more than 70 countries. For more information, visit www.pearson.com and watch our video here.

Follow @PearsonAPI on Twitter to get the most up-to-date news about Pearson Catalyst or email [email protected] for more information.

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In June of 2012 Microsoft purchased Yammer, a social networking site geared towards enterprise. The service allows employees to collaborate across buildings and geographic locations. Now the company has released its 2012 numbers in an effort to show that the investment paid off.

The fourth quarter ended on January 31, and Microsoft reports that sales have “nearly tripled year-over-year”. The service has more than seven million users. The numbers bragging continues with the addition of 290 new companies coming on-board with the service, including big names like TGI Fridays, Woolworth and Trek Bicycles. In fact, the announcement says Yammer now has “85 percent of the Fortune 500”.

“Yammer experienced banner growth in 2012 and grew particularly fast in the fourth quarter. Our momentum is definitely accelerating following the Microsoft acquisition,” states David Sacks, a Yammer co-founder and now a corporate vice president at Microsoft Office Division.

According to Adam Pisoni, another Yammer co-founder, there is more growth on the way — “the development teams are coming together quickly, and we are leveraging existing technologies such as SkyDrive Pro and Office Web Apps to swiftly deliver greater value for customers”.

This is all good news for Microsoft after some questioned the investment of 1.2 billion dollars, or at least questioned the timing of it. Now we just have to wait and see if the ceiling for this endeavor can go a bit higher in 2013. Investors will certainly be waiting to know that as well.

Photo Credit: Oleksiy Mark/Shutterstock

Today, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, his wife Priscilla Chan, Google co-founder Sergey Brin, Biologist and businesswoman Anne Wojcicki (Brin’s wife), and investor Yuri Milner have announced a brand new yearly prize that rewards “excellence in research aimed at curing intractable diseases and extending human life.”

It’s called the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences. Apple Chairman Art Levinson with chair the new foundation.

“Our society needs more heroes who are scientists, researchers and engineers. We need to celebrate and reward the people who cure diseases, expand our understanding of humanity and work to improve people’s lives. That’s why Priscilla and I are honored to partner with Sergey Brin, Anne Wojcicki, Art Levinson and Yuri Milner to create the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences. At $3 million per prize, it’s the largest prize for this work in the world. I’m hopeful this serves as a blueprint for prizes and philanthropy in other fields as well,” said Zuckerberg in a Facebook post.

“Curing a disease should be worth more than a touchdown,” added Sergey Brin.

The inaugural winners have been announced as well, and here’s the full list:

Cornelia I. Bargmann

Torsten N. Wiesel Professor and Head of the Lulu and Anthony Wang Laboratory of Neural Circuits and Behavior at the Rockefeller University. Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator.
For the genetics of neural circuits and behavior, and synaptic guidepost molecules

David Botstein

Director of the Lewis-Sigler Institute for Integrative Genomics and the Anthony B. Evnin Professor of Genomics at Princeton University.
For linkage mapping of Mendelian disease in humans using DNA polymorphisms.

Lewis C. Cantley

Margaret and Herman Sokol Professor and Director of the Cancer Center at Weill Cornell Medical College and NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital.
For the discovery of PI 3-Kinase and its role in cancer metabolism.

Hans Clevers

Professor of Molecular Genetics at Hubrecht Institute.
For describing the role of Wnt signaling in tissue stem cells and cancer.

Titia de Lange

Leon Hess Professor, Head of the Laboratory of Cell Biology and Genetics, and Director of the Anderson Center for Cancer Research at the Rockefeller University.
For research on telomeres, illuminating how they protect chromosome ends and their role in genome instability in cancer.

Napoleone Ferrara

Distinguished Professor of Pathology and Senior Deputy Director for Basic Sciences at Moores Cancer Center at the University of California, San Diego.
For discoveries in the mechanisms of angiogenesis that led to therapies for cancer and eye diseases.

Eric S. Lander

President and Founding Director of the Eli and Edythe L. Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT. Professor of Biology at MIT. Professor of Systems Biology at Harvard Medical School.
For the discovery of general principles for identifying human disease genes, and enabling their application to medicine through the creation and analysis of genetic, physical and sequence maps of the human genome.

Charles L. Sawyers

Chair, Human Oncology and Pathogenesis Program at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator.
For cancer genes and targeted therapy.

Bert Vogelstein

Director of the Ludwig Center and Clayton Professor of Oncology and Pathology at the Johns Hopkins Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center. Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator.
For cancer genomics and tumor suppressor genes.

Robert A. Weinberg

Daniel K. Ludwig Professor for Cancer Research at MIT and Director of the MIT/Ludwig Center for Molecular Oncology. Member, Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research.
For characterization of human cancer genes.

Shinya Yamanaka

Director of Center for iPS Cell Research and Application, Kyoto University. Senior Investigator, Gladstone Institutes, San Francisco.
For induced pluripotent stem cells.

Although the inaugural winners total 11, there will only be 5 winners per year moving forward. Each winner receives a $3 million (U.S.) prize. Winners will be selected with the help of previous year’s winners. It will also be a transparent process, allowing for online nominations. There are no age restrictions when it comes to who can be nominated and ultimately win the prize.

Mere hours remain until Sony is expected to unveil its next-generation video game console at a major event in New York. The excitement is building while the rumors and leaks surrounding the console have filled gamers’ imaginations this past week. Sony itself has even added to the hype with a series of retrospective videos on past consoles and games that have been posted to the event’s web page.

This evening the speculation will end and Sony will either usher in a new era of video games or disappoint millions of gamers across the world. The company is obviously confident, as the presentation will be streaming live online. Sony clearly wants the entire world to be watching.

The presentation will be streaming in several different locations. The event website will, of course, host the stream, as will the latest PlayStation Blog post about the event. The PlayStation Facebook page will also have a stream available, and PlayStation 3 owners can watch the presentation live on their consoles through the PlayStation Home app or through the “What’s New” section of the PS3 Media Bar.

The presentation begins at 6 pm EST / 3 pm PST / 11 pm GMT, which is also 10 am in Sydney and 8 am in Tokyo on February 21, for those gamers on the other side of the world.

Don’t be late. Console announcements don’t come often.

I have a confession to make. My views on SEO have changed.

Were I a politician, I would surely be accused of flip-flopping, waffling, and “being against something before I was for it” by pundits. But I am a business person, and I believe that businesses that fail to adjust course when presented with new facts will ultimately fail.

I famously claimed back in 2006 that “SEO isn’t Rocket Science.” By that I meant that most firms could obtain most of the benefits of SEO by simply following the guidelines posted by Google without the need to resort to obscure and expensive SEO tactics. Many disagreed, the debate about the proper role of SEO produced a lot of commentary, and ultimately an SEO competition for SERP domination using the keywords “Dave Pasternack.” (The competition resulted in a SERP draw between myself and the famous seafood chef).

2006 was eons ago in Internet time and I think most people would agree with me that the SEO landscape has changed radically. Google polices its SERP real estate much more methodically than it did in 2006 and its penalties for violation of certain of its rules — especially related to content and linking policies — are severe and unforgiving. The Wild West Days are over — civilization — for better or worse — has tamed the Frontier.

Part of me wants to gloat because the Google Guidelines really do rule the Frontier now. At the same time, however, the claim that “SEO Isn’t Rocket Science” may no longer be true.

Why? Because everything we do now — in this era of big data — is rocket science. The level of complexity that’s required to run multi-channel, multi-device, geo-targeted campaigns requires more human and computation power than a 1968 Moon Launch. Many firms (including my own) are required to hire Data Scientists to make sense of all of the volume, velocity and variety of data.

So what’s ahead for SEO? Well, take a look at what’s happened in the past two years. Panda and Penguin have forced the SEO industry into a completely new, very healthy course heading — toward quality content creation/curation and general competitive webmastering. “Gaming the system” is still part of the DNA of SEO, but the focus is on sustainable results — not quick ranking bumps. Consequently, within Corporate America, SEO is increasingly being appreciated strategically — in terms of where it fits into the total paid/earned/owned media mix environment. For the first time, expectations – and budgets — for SEO are being set correctly — as something that every firm must concern itself with if it wants online visibility. SEO careers — because they are multi-disciplinary, multi-skill, and team-based, will continue to thrive.

So call me a flip-flopper, but I’m as bullish on the future of SEO as anyone. SEO has a great future. (And by the way, if I didn’t believe in SEO I wouldn’t have agreed to acquire an SEO firm last year).

There are certain perils to watching a TED Talk live from the audience – occasionally you’ll be asked a stumper of a philosophical question or made the brunt of a speaker’s joke. Then again, you might be given seven and a half extra minutes to live, so it’s really a toss-up. In these talks, pulled from a range of TED and TEDGlobals, watch for audience members getting in on the fun.

And make sure to tune into the TED Blog staring Monday, February 25, for our live coverage of TED2013. We’ll be writing about every speaker, as well as all the action on-site in Long Beach, Califorinia.

Arthur Benjamin does "Mathemagic" Arthur Benjamin does “Mathemagic” Armed with standard calculators, audience members at TED2005 race mathemagician Arthur Benjamin through a dizzying maze of digits – and lose. At 8:05, he matches audience members’ DOB with the day of the week they were born.

Jane McGonigal: The game that can give you 10 extra years of life Jane McGonigal: The game that can give you 10 extra years of life Game designer Jane McGonigal’s SuperBetter helped her recover from a head injury. At TEDGlobal 2012, she passes on the healing to the audience, granting them 7.5 extra minutes of life. At 13:00, watch the life-extending action begin.

Michael Sandel: The lost art of democratic debate Michael Sandel: The lost art of democratic debate For philosophy professor Michael Sandel, lively debate is the key to a strong democracy – so he calls on the attendees of TED2010 to bring it back. Throughout the talk, audience members share thoughts on Aristotle and on a then-recent Supreme Court decision.

Charles Hazlewood: Trusting the ensemble Charles Hazlewood: Trusting the ensemble “Did you know that TED is a tune?” asks conductor Charles Hazlewood at TEDGlobal 2011. Starting at 8:48, he leads the audience in rousing chorus inspired by the letters T-E-D.

Beau Lotto + Amy O’Toole: Science is for everyone, kids included Beau Lotto + Amy O’Toole: Science is for everyone, kids included Neuroscientist Beau Lotto pulls the audience into some moments of playful discovery onstage at TEDGlobal 2012. In this talk about the joy of scientific inquiry, his slides show off a language gotcha!. At 12:35, he calls a fellow TED Speaker up to be experimented on.

Evelyn Glennie: How to truly listen Evelyn Glennie: How to truly listen Music can be heard with your whole body, says Grammy-winning deaf percussionist and composer Evelyn Glennie. At TED2003, she asks the audience to listen differently, to rethink music and, at 12:15, to clap the sound of falling snow.

Keith Barry: Brain magic Keith Barry: Brain magic One after another, audience members are bedazzled and baffled by Keith Barry’s psychokinetic hijinks at TED2004. He creates phantom sensations, guesses names of ex-boyfriends and narrowly misses one very sharp object.

The infrastructure investment arm of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. has acquired three solar photo-voltaic energy projects (SSM Solar) based in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario. SSM Solar, which has a total capacity of 69MWdc and 60MWac, was sold to KKR for an undisclosed price by Starwood Energy Group Global LLC, an affiliate of Starwood Capital, a private equity firm based in Greenwich, Connecticut. During its period of ownership, Starwood Energy oversaw the construction and operation of the Ontario solar facilities. The final phase of development was concluded in 2012.

KKR to Acquire Ontario Solar Projects

NEW YORK–(BUSINESS WIRE)– KKR today announced the acquisition of three solar photovoltaic (“PV”) energy projects (“SSM Solar”) from an affiliate of Starwood Energy Group. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Located in Sault Ste Marie, Ontario, SSM Solar has a total capacity of 69MWdc and 60MWac, representing one of the largest PV facilities in North America and the second largest in Canada. SSM Solar is fully contracted to sell its energy output to the Ontario Power Authority (“OPA”) under 20-year power purchase agreements entered under the authority’s Renewable Energy Standard Offer Program (“RESOP”). SSM Solar powers approximately 7,000 households.

“Ontario has been at the forefront of encouraging new development to bring additional renewables capacity online, and with this acquisition, we are playing a meaningful role in the growth of renewables in the province,” said Raj Agrawal, KKR’s Head of North American Infrastructure. “When it comes to infrastructure, renewable energy is one of our top priorities; not only is the sector a critical part of energy supply diversity, but these investments can also provide investors with highly predictable long-term income streams.”

Overall operations and management of the solar projects will continue to be handled by EDF Renewable Energy under three separate long term operations and maintenance agreements.

Ontario, with a population of 13.5 million, is the largest power market in Canada with 38.3GW of installed capacity and peak demand of approximately 24 GW. The Ontario solar market is one of the fastest growing utility scale solar markets globally. Starting in 2006, Ontario put in place specific programs to encourage development of renewables capacity, including OPA RESOP and FiT programs, which offer economic incentives in the form of long-term power purchase agreements. These programs also standardize environmental approvals and offer priority access to renewables to connect the electric grid.

SSM Solar represents KKR’s eighth infrastructure and its fourth renewables investment through KKR investment vehicles. Other renewable investments include a partnership with Sorgenia, one of the largest wind farm operators in France by installed capacity, a partnership with T-Solar, the largest owner/operator of solar photovoltaic generation assets in Europe; and SunTap Energy, a partnership with Recurrent Energy that is focused on acquiring solar photovoltaic electric generating facilities in North America.

About KKR

Founded in 1976 and led by Henry Kravis and George Roberts, KKR is a leading global investment firm with $77.5 billion in assets under management as of December 31, 2012. With offices around the world, KKR manages assets through a variety of investment funds and accounts covering multiple asset classes. KKR seeks to create value by bringing operational expertise to its portfolio companies and through active oversight and monitoring of its investments. KKR complements its investment expertise and strengthens interactions with investors through its client relationships and capital markets platform. KKR & Co. L.P. is publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE: KKR), and “KKR,” as used in this release, includes its subsidiaries, their managed investment funds and accounts, and/or their affiliated investment vehicles, as appropriate. For additional information, please visit KKR’s website at www.kkr.com.

Media:
KKR
Kristi Huller, 212-230-9722
[email protected]

Source: KKR

Photo courtesy of Shutterstock.

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Enterprise 2.0, Social Media, Social Business, Social Innovation, Social Era — are they all the same, or are they quite different? Do you know?

If you don’t know, you might be using the wrong term in the wrong context. Which doesn’t sound so bad, but the risk is misunderstanding, or quite possibly sounding stupid. It’s like using poor grammar; if you use “you’re” when you really mean “your,” some people are going to notice. Beyond looking silly, the much bigger risk — the risk to the business — is that when we throw terms around imprecisely, we risk introducing confusion into the strategy we’re trying to execute. So let’s try to disambiguate the terms so we all know what we’re talking about.

The term “social media” was popularized by Chris Shipley in 2004, as she described the impact of influencers and bloggers in shaping product adoption, more so than traditional media outlets. Because it includes the word media, and the genesis is marketing, most people think of this as the stuff the CMO and their team worry about. It’s like describing electricity by tying it to what came before it. Saying Social Media is like saying “electric candle.” It points to the new, but is still anchored in the old.

Andrew McAfee coined the term Enterprise 2.0 about six years ago, and the emphasis was on the on software tools and platforms that increase information flow. The idea was that if we use social tools, we would share information freely both within the organization and external marketplaces. The specific definition in his book of the same name was how “how the Web 2.0 technologies could be used on organizations’ intranet and extranets”. It’s like describing electricity by describing the wires instead of the light — it’s a technologist’s point of view.

Social Business (sometimes going by the hashtag #socbiz) was a term first created by Mohammed Yunus but more recently claimed as a popular way to describe the way companies can generate greater value for all the constituents (stakeholders, employees, customers, partners, suppliers) — the idea being to add a social overlay to the existing enterprise, and thus more meaning. This second generation of Social Business terminology was coined by the Dachis Group, a marketing organization, and specifically by Peter Kim, who consults on it. Some experts use the Social Business term as the evolution of Social Media as the same tools used for marketing efficiencies can be applied to product development, customer care, or supply chain work. Some people tie it to Michael Porter’s Shared Value concept. Sometimes people use the term Social Capitalism to get to this same idea.

And Open Innovation or Crowdsoucing are often linked to any of these three terms – enterprise 2.0, social media and social business. Organizations can use social tools to improve how others work with you to create value together.

With all of these definitions around, you might wonder why I even added to the terminology when I wrote a book and coined the term #socialera. I didn’t want to create a new term, and yet I felt that none of the terms to date capture the key shifts. The term “Social Media” is limited by its connection with marketing and communications. “Enterprise 2.0” is too technological. And “Social Business” simply added an overlay to the existing framework rather than challenging the premise of an organization. “Social Era” then captures two distinct power shifts:

1. Organizational. Connected individuals can now do what once only large centralized organizations could. This fundamentally alters the structural core and role of “the firm,” and of working people. As more and more freelancers and solopreneurs enter the market, work is increasingly freed from jobs. The shift is from “value chain” to “value flows.” (An earlier post of mine on this idea can be read here.)
2. Individual. Anyone can be a game changer by using the power of their ideas. They need not first be vetted or chosen to be powerful. These largely unheard voices are essential for solving new problems, as well as for finding new solutions to old problems. Without celebrating what anyone — quite possibly everyone — can offer, people are simply cogs in a machine: dispensable and undervalued. By celebrating each person and the value only they can create, economic power is unlocked. And it’s not that everyone will, but that anyone can. (See earlier talks and posts on this idea).

Sometimes it helps to see distinctions side by side:

Term	Origin	Implication
Social Media	Chris Shipley and ClueTrain Manifesto	Moving marketing from a monologue to a dialogue.
Enterprise 2.0	Andrew McAfee	Tools can speed information flow and tear down siloes.
Social Business (1.0)	Mohammed Yunus	Make profits and meaning (at the same time). (Also referred to as Social Innovation or Social Entrepreneurship.)
CrowdSourcing / Open Innovation	Clay Shirky / Henry Chesborough	Leverage others to create value for you.
Social Business (2.0)	Peter Kim (and Dachis organization)	By being more connected, (i.e. using social tools), a company can generate greater value to all its constituents.
Social Era	Nilofer Merchant	Connected individuals can now do what once only large centralized organizations could do, which changes organizational structures and individual power.

In some cases, we’re talking about tools. In others, we’re talking about how the marketplace economy changes. And, in some ways we’re talking how the organization changes. When we use the terms interchangeably, confusion is prevalent and meaning is lost. Unless you’re talking about marketing specifically, don’t use the term “Social Media.” The electric light bulb wasn’t a new kind of candle. Not to mention, CEOs and boards think of “social media” as the stuff their marketing team drives. If you are discussing ways social tools can be applied to all parts of a value chain, “social business” is probably the term you are looking for, although there’s still plenty of confusion with social enterprise. If you describing a reconstitution of work and institutions, then use Social Era.

No term is ever complete. Each of us are building on each others’ ideas as we collectively grapple with understanding and decoding what is happening, and what we think it means. We are all seeking clarity but are limited by our own understanding, our vantage, and by, of course, the examples we witness.

But this is not about semantics. When we focus on tools alone, I think we’re making a mistake. It’s geek chic, it’s even interesting, but it’s not talking about what is possible. The bigger point is that major changes are afoot that change value creation, the meaning of work, and the structures for our institutions.

When we conflate the tools with the outcomes, I think we risk meaning and impact. When we all use more precise language, each of us will find that people understand our meaning, and more clearly see the light.

Toronto’s Upverter is a startup that’s poised to effect change that could reshape the landscape of entrepreneurship. That’s not something you can say about most of the businesses we cover on a daily basis, whether or not they have good ideas. But it’s definitely true of Upverter, the company that’s hoping to build a cloud-based hardware engineering platform that can match and overtake its desktop-based counterparts within the next few years.

So what would that mean for the messy, expensive business of hardware prototyping and product creation? Nothing less than the beginning of a new era, according to Upverter CEO and co-founder Zak Homuth.

“The three of us that founded the company all kind of come from a mixed hardware/software background, we all studied electrical engineering, we all worked co-op jobs at startups all around the world, did a little bit of hardware and a little bit of software,” he explained in an interview. “And then we got together to try to improve the rate of innovation with hardware. We all ran away from it, because it was easier to build software than to build hardware, and we wanted to fix that, because we wanted to build hardware personally.”

The idea was to make tools that would allow Homuth and his co-founders to build a hardware company as their next startup venture, so they quit their jobs, sold their possessions to get some working capital and moved to Homuth’s parents basements, with the nascent idea of building an engineering platform that lives entirely in the cloud. For the fledgling startup, the question was whether or not they could build a GitHub for hardware, how cloud-based it could be, and whether that was something anyone even wanted. Flash forward four months.

“Then we got into Y Combinator, picked the company up, moved it down to Mountain View and got this shitty little townhouse across from YC,” he said. “By that time we’d figured out that the solution to the version control problem, the innovation problem, the crowdsourcing problem was to move it all to the cloud, and specifically the tools. Because if you move the tools to the cloud you make it possible to control the file format, so that you can do version control, you can control consumption, you can control the viewer.”

Upverter launched a very simple version to a very controlled group before coming out of YC, and then took that MVP-style product into something that could be used by the general public in September of 2011. “It couldn’t really do much,” Homuth admits. “But it was the line in the sand that allowed us to say ‘Does anybody wanted to do engineering this way, instead of the way you’ve been doing it for 30 years?’ and we got enough ‘yesses’ that we kept working on it.”

The company has since been tracking down money, building out its tools to a point where they actually compete with existing design tools, via a release just a few short months ago. Upverter has raised $650,000 so far from angel investors, including YouTube founding team member Christina Brodbeck, and Xobni co-founder Adam Smith, and that has managed to allow them to build a software tool that begins to be able to compete with existing tools. But there’s still a long way to go, Homuth says.

“It’s not at parity by any means, it can’t do everything that $100,000 software can do yet, but you can do non-zero stuff,” he said. “You can actually get stuff manufactured, you can actually simulate, you can actually manage a product’s life cycle, you can actually design. And that was step one in our three step plan to change engineering.”

Step two is to get the platform to parity with existing tools

Step two is to get the platform to that parity point, where it can compete with existing tools on an equal footing with legacy software. Getting to a point where they can design equally well in a browser as with a desktop tool is around six months away, according to Homuth, at which point Upverter will be able to start building out its sales and marketing team. Once it gets there, Upverter will have built in a little over three years what legacy CAD companies have taken 30 years to create. The next goal, beyond that, is to become the “Rosetta Stone of engineering,” meaning that no matter how you come at engineering, no matter what tools you’re using, it’ll translate and you can work with anyone else in the world on the same files and on the same projects.

Upverter’s ultimate goal is still at least a couple of years away, Homuth says, and the time it takes to get there will be dependent on what kind of money the startup can raise. He’s actively looking for fresh investment now, while also continuing to add to the 10,000-strong user base it has managed to attract so far.

The rise of Upverter means a potential explosion on the horizon for hardware startups, which is why the company is hosting a hardware hackathon with Y Combinator on February 23rd. Making hardware engineering collaborative, affordable and easy to access can have a tremendous impact on the cost of doing business and risks associated with creating new hardware, which is why Upverter achieving its goals could lead to a new revolution for hardware startups, incubators and investors alike.

If you happen to be one of those hardware startups, Upverter is offering free team accounts to TC readers. Just follow this link to sign up.

ARM cores pretty much have the mobile applications processor market locked up, though Intel is trying to peck away at the dominance. But ARM isn’t content with its single mobile kingdom. It’s encroaching on the neighboring realm of mobile infrastructure as well, aiming to make its cores the workhorse processors in cellular base stations.

This week LSI announced its first ARM-based chip for the mobile base station. You thought Nvidia and Qualcomm’s quad-core smartphone processors were impressive, well LSI is embedding 16 ARM Cortex A15 cores, along with LSI’s networking accelerators and ARM’s low-latency CoreLink interconnect technology, onto a single 28-nanometer chip.

The chip family is designed for base stations of all sizes, scaling from the macrocell down to the picocell, making similar to the flexible and modular platforms offered by competitors Texas Instruments (TXN) and Freescale. Both Freescale and TI have begun incorporating ARM cores into their base station chips, though neither one is a complete ARM convert. Freescale leans heavily on the PowerPC architecture, while TI is pairing ARM cores with its bread-and-butter digital signal processors (DSPs). But ARM is definitely taking bigger and bigger strides into the mobile network with its increasingly powerful but energy-efficient silicon designs.

One company that’s hoping to join ARM within the guts of the mobile network is Intel, which is no stranger to skirmishes with the U.K. silicon giant in the infrastructure market. Intel is trying to establish a foothold for itself in the emerging technology cloud-RAN (RAN stands for radio access network). Cloud-RAN would separate the base station from the tower and move baseband processing into the cloud.

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The owner of a website that was a conduit used by hackers to breach employee computers at both Facebook and Apple has come forward to explain the events that took place last month. Ian Sefferman, co-founder of the iPhoneDevSDK website, said Wednesday in a blog post that he’d found evidence that the targeted attack came from an administrator account on his website that was compromised.

Though Sefferman says he believes the site is no longer infected, it’s safer not to visit the site for now — hence no link. Here’s how MacRumors reported Sefferman’s statement:

What we’ve learned is that it appears a single administrator account was compromised. The hackers used this account to modify our theme and inject JavaScript into our site. That JavaScript appears to have used a sophisticated, previously unknown exploit to hack into certain user’s computers.

We’re still trying to determine the exploit’s exact timeline and details, but it appears as though it was ended (by the hacker) on January 30, 2013.

He says he doesn’t believe any his site’s user data was actually compromised.

AllThingsD was the first to report iPhoneDevSDK’s involvement in the attack.

Both Apple and Facebook blamed Java: each reported recently that some of their employees’ computers were infected by malware from a vulnerability in a Java browser plug-in. Apple has since released a software patch for Java for OS X. Both companies say no user data was stolen.

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The indoor location market is heating up nicely, as various players in the mobile industry start to contemplate the marketing potential of mapping the places where GPS doesn’t help. But it’s still a young market, with room for new entrants with bright ideas.

The Austrian startup indoo.rs, which has just picked up an undisclosed high six-figure seed round, may be one such company. Very much a technology rather than marketing firm, indoo.rs is developing a platform that it hopes will be picked up by silicon vendors and handset manufacturers. Apart from locating the user based on nearby Wi-Fi and cellular signals – as Google does, for instance — the indoo.rs platform also draws on other data sources such as the handset’s accelerometer, gyroscope, barometer and compass to improve accuracy.

If that reminds you of what Qualcomm is trying to do with its IZat platform, you’re right to pick up on the similarity, only Qualcomm is hardwiring its technology into its mobile processors. Indoo.rs is taking the software angle.

Indoo.rs business development chief Marcel van der Heijden — who joined the team from investors SpeedInvest (the other backers are tecnet equity and Techinvest) — freely admitted to me that the IZat hardware approach has its advantages, particularly in terms of speed and power efficiency. However, he suggested that the software angle provided hardware independence and greater release flexibility.

What’s more, he pointed out, IZat is supported by around 12 percent of today’s Android devices, while indoo.rs’s software development kit (SDK) can target 95 percent.

So what are we looking at here, anyway? Indoo.rs’s platform has three elements. The first is a client SDK for Android devices, allowing developers to build indoor navigation capabilities into their apps – a conference organizer might use this in their show-floor app, for example.

The second is a measurement tool, for Windows and Linux, that makes it possible to import maps of a venue, annotate the map with physical features such as walls and staircases, define zones and then measure Wi-Fi “fingerprints” throughout the location. The final piece is the cloud-based back-end, which matches the user’s surroundings with a predefined map.

The hard work here is in balancing all the variables that go into accurate positioning: not only the quality of the Wi-Fi and cellular networks that are involved, but also the quality of the sensors in the handset. If indoo.rs is to succeed, it will need to produce superior algorithms.

Whether that happens remains to be seen. Qualcomm may have a lot of heft behind it, but indoo.rs isn’t going up against Qualcomm as such – indeed, it would probably quite like to gain it as a customer for its IP. In the meantime, the Austrian startup is busy joining the ARM Connected Community and, soon, the In-Location Alliance, so it’s connecting with the right people.

This story was updated at 1:30pm to correct the spelling of indoo.rs’s name.

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The team behind CyanogenMod 10.1 announced a new camera feature for “(almost) everyone” running the popular custom Android distribution on their smartphone or tablet — support for HDR mode.

The CyanogenMod 10.1 implementation for HDR mode “captures multiple pictures, and then renders them together to form one HDR image”, similar to the functionality currently available on the LG-made Google Nexus 4. The software snaps three photos, at minimal, neutral and maximum exposure, and displays a single image at the end of the process, through “some fancy algorithms”.

The developers behind CyanogenMod 10.1 warn that results using HDR mode may vary depending on the physical camera module and may deliver “some oddities” due to the software rendering. As a result it is recommended to hold the device steady, by using a tripod or stand, for the best possible results.

Likewise, snapping pics of moving targets will not be of the highest possible quality, more so on devices with slow camera shutters. Same goes for long capture times, which also result in photos of inadequate quality. That said, this should not effect Android smartphones and tablets with zero shutter lag cameras and “decent sensor and optics”.

Even though the software snaps three pictures the user will only see the final result, with the in-between shots being deleted. On older devices, such as Samsung Galaxy S, using HDR mode will result in an out-of memory type of error, which the team behind CyanogenMod 10.1 says will be fixed in an upcoming release.

CyanogenMod 10.1 nightly builds are available to download from CyanogenMod Downloads page.

Photo Credit: Imageman/Shutterstock

Comcast opened Upware, an app store featuring nine services for its small and mid-sized business customers on Wednesday. The app store isn’t a new idea, but it’s one that will bring in a new line of revenue for the ISP and serve one of its fastest growing customer bases.

Comcast’s business services brought in $2.4 billion in 2012, up 34 percent from the previous year. That’s only 6 percent of the company’s cable sales, but it’s growing at almost 6 times the pace of total sales. And those customers were asking Comcast for choices on document storage, security and other resources, which led to the ISP building Upware.

While spokesman Charlie Douglas declined to give specific financial details associated with the app store, he did say it would be a revenue-generating service for Comcast. It will also be great for the partners who will have their services listed for Comcast’s business customers. Those companies so far include:

• Data Backup – Carbonite, DigitalSafe and Mozy.
• Data Security – Norton and Websense.
• Collaboration – Box, Microsoft, Soonr and YouSendIt (see disclosure.)

This is a good example of how a service provider can add value for its end users — value that it can monetize beyond a monthly broadband fee. Comcast has been pretty aggressive about adding connected home products on the residential side as well as beefing up it’s pay TV service to compete more with web-based on-demand services.

Disclosure: YouSendIt is backed by Alloy Ventures, a venture capital firm that is an investor in the parent company of this blog, Giga Omni Media.

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Third in a series. For Valentine’s Day, Wayne Williams and I explained why we love Kindle and Surface Pro, respectively. We’ve decided to extend the concept into an ongoing series, which I continue about Chromebook and in many more ways Chrome OS.

My Chromebook journey began in December 2010 when Google dispatched 60,000 Cr-48 test units. I used the computer as my primary PC for a week, but no more, being a concept. But, then, my 11.6-inch MacBook Air failed in March 2011, and I reverted back to the Cr-48 during the emergency. In June 2011, Samsung released the Series 5 Chromebook, which I used as my only PC for two solid months. But performance couldn’t meet my needs — that is until the successor, the 550, launched in May 2011. I abandoned MacBook Air and didn’t look back. Performance and features met my needs. I traded performance for better ergonomics when switching to the ARM-based Series 3 Chromebook in October.

Life Changing

Five months ago, I explained how “Chromebook changed my life“. For example, I went from relying on software running locally to that consumed in a browser connected to some service’s data center. I’ve used desktop software my entire computing life. Letting go concepts that cloud services couldn’t be enough proved challenging at first. My preconceptions limited how rapidly I received cloud benefits. But I found most of the web apps I needed, even for tasks like photo-editing, which surprised me.

Often these apps performed better than those run locally, which is contrary thinking — or to me. But it makes sense really. Distant datacenter does the heavy-lifting rather than the local computer, which is a major reason Chromebooks are so underpowered compared to Windows PCs or Macs. Consider the specs of the ARM Chromebook to the MacBook Air I sold last year.

Series 3 Chromebook: 1.7GHz Samsung Exynos 5250 dual-core processor (ARM); 11.6-inch matte display, 1366 x 768 resolution, 200-nit brightness; 2GB RAM; 16GB SSD; SD-card slot; Webcam; USB 2.0 and 3.0 ports (one each); WiFi A/N; Bluetooth 3.0 compatible; HDMI port; Chrome OS.

MacBook Air: 1.8GHz Intel Core i7 processor; 11.6-inch glossy display (1366 x 768 resolution); 256GB flash memory; Intel HD graphics; 4GB SDRAM; webcam; two USB ports; Thuderbolt port; WiFi N; Bluetooth 4.0; iLife ’11; and OS X.

Performance is not comparable, although size and ergonomics are. I initially moved from the Mac to the 550 Chromebook and found them to feel similarly speedy and responsive — that with 1.3GHz Intel Celeron 867 dual-core processor and 4GB of RAM. I recently switched back to the 550, because the Series 3 isn’t speedy enough for my needs.

My Chromebook Life

Chromebook is really about Chrome OS. The major benefits are about software and supporting services. For me what matters:

1. Sync changes everything. In March 2008 I asserted: “Synchronization is today’s killer application.” I warned: “Should Google get synchronization right before Microsoft, it would be game over. Google would be able to extend the relevancy of the Web platform back to the desktop on its terms — think invading army — and across many devices or services”. Google sync is that good now, and automatic, Chrome to Chrome OS and also from Android. Chrome OS syncs tabs, web apps and other stuff from Google’s cloud. That’s it. Because of Chrome sync, the experience follows me to other computers or should I switch Chomebooks.

2. Setup is so-o-o easy. Log into Google account. That’s it. When switching Chromebooks, settings immediately sync and migrate. Apps and desktop used on one follow to another — or from Mac or Windows PC if using Chrome. Setup is that simple and maintenance about equally.

3. Computer gets better with age. Google dispatches new Chrome OS versions, with new features, about every two months and most content automatically saves to the cloud. My Chromebook is better today than it was last week. I can’t complain about that. By comparison, Apple or Microsoft make me wait years to get new features.

4. Lifestyle is amazing. Since Larry Page took Google’s CEO reigns 22 months ago, the company has dramatically increased cross-integration of products and services around the browser as hub, and that means Chrome OS, too. Right now I live a fulfilling digital lifestyle because content, services and social click so well. Integration is tight and satisfying.

5. Value is huge. Consider the Series 3 Chromebook, which sells for $249. Size and ergonomics are similar to $999 MacBook Air. I can outfit the whole family (four of us, including mom) for the cost of the Apple laptop. Google and its partners provide a good-enough experience that satisfies for the money spent. MacBook Air offers more options, for sure, but for four times the price.

Easy is the best way to describe any Chromebook, from setup to ongoing management to daily use. If you can navigate a browser, you can use Chrome OS and content and settings follow you from device to device. The computer is by no means perfect, just more than good enough for my particular computing needs, which is why I love Chromebook.

I can only hope that rumors about Google-designed Pixel Chromebook are true. There’s love, and then there’s true love.

Photo Credit: Joe Wilcox