Philly Tech News

Inside the Curious Mind of John Malone (Multichannel News)

Inside the Curious Mind of John Malone
(Multichannel News)
Must read for anybody in cable, content, or any other business.

Philly's Matthew Botos, Salesforce MVP and independent consultant, sees the world beyond Salesforce as well

Tom Paine

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Salesforce’s lead in the Software as a Service (SaaS) market has been orchestrated by CEO Marc Benioff, but also fueled by evangelistic, independent external entrepreneurs like Philadelphia’s Matthew Botos. He’s been a Salesforce MVP since 2012, a prestigious designation held by only 90 professionals worldwide. While he's completely on board with Salesforce's direction, he's not hesitant to go his own way and question it.

A South Jersey native who literally studied rocket science at Cornell, Botos started his career at Lockheed Martin in Valley Forge. His seven-year Salesforce career has included stints with Mavens, Salesforce itself, and Cloud Sherpas (recently acquired by Accenture). Mavens was an early consulting partner of Veeva Systems, whose Salesforce software tailored for pharmaceuticals led to its successful IPO, and it was called “one of the most efficient SaaS companies in history” in terms of capital use by a leading SaaS VC. He currently heads his own Salesforce consulting firm in the Philly suburbs, Alvorden.

Until recently, Botos also led the PhillyForce community, the preeminent Salesforce technical user group in the Philadelphia area. During his 3-year tenure, membership grew from 200 to 800 local Salesforce professionals. Diverse and opinionated speakers ranged from Salesforce executive Peter Coffee to IDC analyst Michael Fauscette. While the group counts many Salesforce fans, discussions often highlight how Salesforce both helps and hinders external developers.

While showing obvious leadership and organizing skills, Botos is also an iconoclast. He has a vision of how things should work and is intent on fulfilling it. While he's completely on board with Salesforce's direction, he's not hesitant to question it and point out shortcomings. He’s developed open source tools to solve Salesforce software testing gaps, edited an independent Salesforce certification book, and recently published his own eBook of 10 Salesforce Survival Tips.

Botos says he's delivered over 30 complex Salesforce integration projects over the past 7 years. He describes himself as a 'Salesforce Integration Consultant', with integration and deep Salesforce technical expertise as the key words. His projects show experience with a broad range of software and SaaS offerings, and the tools to integrate them with Salesforce. Traditional tools have been custom web services code or expensive integration middleware from Informatica and Boomi (started in the Philadelphia suburbs and acquired by Dell). But as the generic Salesforce integration market saturates, he sees a demand for more industry-specific solutions and services.

For now, Botos is happy running his own show at Alvorden in a manner he prefers. He's developed a broader range of business skills from the experience, he told me in an interview. Though he likes the independence of consulting, he has a keen knowledge of which markets don't have a Salesforce solution yet. The first on his list is integrating complex supply chain data in Salesforce with a standard set of consulting projects.

Data Center startup Steel ORCA files for bankruptcy

Tom Paine

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Steel ORCA, which had plans to build a huge data center in Bucks County, filed for bankruptcy this month, Data Center Knowledge reported, according to documents it discovered online. It was a Chapter 7 filing in New Jersey, which usually means distribution of assets.

Steel ORCA had ambitious plans to build a data center in the former Fairless Hills Steel Works, somewhat analogous to Keystone NAP's plan, although Keystone NAP, which launched in 2014 at the same site, chose a modular approach which may have significantly reduced upfront capital outlays.

Steel ORCA later changed plans to a former Pfizer plant in Monmouth Junction, Middlesex County (NJ). Information about that facility is shown on its website though its not clear at this time how much of the buildout was actually completed. The website Data Dynamics reported seeing the completed first stage of the buildout in July of this year.

Steel ORCA is in no way related to Keystone NAP, although Keystone NAP's president once represented Steel ORCA as an attorney. Attempts to reach Steel ORCA by phone resulted in busy signals.

"I don't think this is what the Linux community means by 'Open Source' "

Links 12/29: Newtown-based Data Center Provider Steel Orca Files for Bankruptcy

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Newtown-based Data Center Provider Steel Orca Files for Bankruptcy (Data Center Knowledge)
Steel Orca is not related to another nearby data center startup, Keystone NAP.

Pep Boys says Icahn offer is superior, moves to terminate Bridgestone deal (Reuters via CNBC)

DuPont to cut 1,700 jobs in Delaware (Delaware Online)

Why Fitbit, Rovi, and InterDigital Rose Today (Fool.com)

Complaint factory: Angry Internet subscribers tee off against Comcast, Verizon, AT&T (Ars Technica)

Dear Bradley Cooper, this is how you pronounce 'Lancaster' (PennLive)

Philadelphia health care analytics firm raises $3 million (Phillelelphia Business Journal)

SAP Anywhere Moves Beyond eCommerce to Provide Complete Front Office (Mint Jutras)

Qlik to Ride ‘Robust Demand’ in ’16, Says Citi, But Microsoft a Risk (Barron's Tech Trader Daily)

Oracle Acquisition Spurs Cloud Competition (Wall Street Journal: Digits)

Pew: Home broadband subscriptions dip in U.S. as smartphone-only Americans reach 13% of population
(FierceWireless)

Philly Tech People News 12/27/2015: Josh Elliott Leaving NBC ; Newsworks on Comcast's Danielle Cohn

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She and Comcast grew up together, now she's repping Philly tech (Newsworks)

Josh Elliott Leaving NBC After Less Than Two Years (Hollywood Reporter)

Former Vice Chairman of Salesforce Frank van Veenendaal Joins Coupa Board of Directors (Business Wire)
Coupa, which the Wall Street Journal has reported is preparing for a 2016 IPO, competes against SAP"S Ariba in the spend management space.

Meduski, McMillin Join TierPoint Executive Team (Business Wire)
TierPoint has six data centers in the Greater Philadelpia area.
The new executives joined TierPoint from cable systems operator Suddenlink, which just completed being acquired (70%) by Altice. Jerry Kent, former CEO of Suddelink, has put together St. Louis-based TierPoint through a series of of acquisitions.

Unisys Announces Key Vertical Industry and Regional Leadership Appointments in Enterprise Solutions Organization (Business Wire)

SAP National Security Services Announces Ross Ashley as Senior Vice President (Washington Exec)

Morgan Stanley: Comcast top large cap pick for 2016 (Bloomberg TV)

phillytechnews bytes 12/27/2015

Sunday Highlights: Jet.com tries to keep employees happy; Comcast says Telemundo ready to compete

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Jet.com’s Strategy: Low Prices, Fast Delivery, Happy Workers (New York Times)

With Comcast's backing, Telemundo ready to compete (Philadelphia Inquirer)

Nooruddin "Rudy" Karsan, Grand Poobah (really) of Karlani Capital (Philadelphia Inquirer)

MapAnything raises $7.3M in Series A funds, plans to boost sales and marketing for Salesforce product (FierceCIO)

Hybrid cloud thingies, new media and everything is software-defined: Storage reinvents itself (The Register)

Oracle Acquisition Spurs Cloud Competition (Wall Street Journal: Digits)

Saturday Highlights: India-based outsourcing/SI firms face some tough choices; Karsan: Three cardinal sins in executive interviews

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2016: The year the freight industry goes online (VentureBeat)

Rudy Karsan: Three cardinal sins that condemn CEOs (Philadelphia Inquirer)

Traumatic 2016… Survive the race to the bottom!
(Horses for Sources)
Indian outsourcers/SI firms face some tough choices.

SIDECAR LAUNCHES SOLUTION FOR FACEBOOK DYNAMIC PRODUCT ADS (getSidecar Blog)

These digital health deals in 2015 illustrate how the patient experience is evolving (Med City News)

5 policies that shaped the Pentagon (Federal Times)

Links 2/24: AT&T License Renewal Sets Up Rovi For Comcast, Dish; Harbour Group Acquires Warminster's SP Industries

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Israeli video ad startup Innovid raises $27.5 million (Globes)
NewSpring Capital led the round in the New York/Israel-based adtech company.

Harbour Group Acquires SP Industries, Inc. (PR Newswire)
SP Industries, based in Warminster, designs and manufactures state-of-the-art scientific equipment, biological drug manufacturing solutions, and precision labware.

Suitors Bid For Dell's Perot Systems (Fortune)

AT&T License Renewal Sets Up Rovi For Comcast, Dish (Investor's Business Daily)

Uber rival Lyft bags $248m as Saudi investor and pals buy a slice (The Register)

Get ready for Google to buy a bunch of cloud startups in 2016, says top cloud investor (Business Insider)

ServiceWhale Receives $1M Follow-On Funding; Expands into New York City (Business Wire)

Links 12/23: Alteva acquisition completed; Susquehanna Growth Equity backs Malvern-based HMP Communications

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Momentum Telecom completes $28.7M acquisition of Alteva, enhances Northeast U.S. reach (FierceTelecom)

Maivern-based HMP Communications Holdings, LLC Announces Susquehanna Growth Equity, LLC as Majority Equity Holder (PR Web)

Amazon’s Complete Retail Domination in One Tiny Chart (Re/code)

Univision Takes Next Step Toward IPO (Hollywood Reporter)

Salesforce Grabs Quote To Cash Vendor SteelBrick for $360 Million (TechCrunch)

NetSuite CEO: The cloud is the last computing architecture (PCWorld)

When a Unicorn Start-Up Stumbles, Its Employees Get Hurt (NY Times)

Google vs. Uber and the race to self-driving taxis (The Verge)

Joy, opening Christmas Day, brings early QVC days back to life

Tom Paine

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Update 12/29: Dear Bradley Cooper, this is how you pronounce 'Lancaster' (PennLive)

Joy is a film about a real-life woman of that name, Joy Mangano, who became a best selling inventor, designer snd marketer of products, first on QVC snd later on HSN. Directed by David O. Russell and starring Jennifer Lawrence, Robert De Niro and Bradley Cooper, it opens on Christmas Day from 20th Century Fox.

Mangano, a Long Island native, became a merchandising superstar on QVC, first with the 'Miracle Mop' and then with a succession of other products. She sold her company to QVC rival HSN (originally Home Shopping Network) in 1999. The film portrays the long period of struggle in both her personal life and in achieving her career ambitions.

O.Russell apparently strayed from the straight biopic format, fictionalizing or in some cases slightly altering details of her life. He also created an amalgam of a character in the QVC executive played by Cooper, in part intended to portray founder Joseph Segal. The late Joan Rivers is played by her daughter Melissa.

There won't be a premiere in West Chester (it was held in New York). There doesn't seem to be a great deal of local buzz. Joy is going up against a film named Star Wars. And it was filmed in Boston, so don't expect any local scenery. Still, Joy has generated considerable attention.

Another aspect of the film's production was the emphasis placed on recreating the QVC studio environment of the time. "It was a huge push to get that done on camera. It was like The Wizard of Oz, going from black and white to color and also the feeling of going to the Emerald City,” explained Joy production designer Judy Becker to The Hollywood Reporter.

Some have made an issue of Comcast's role in the film. Since I have not seen it, I can't say to what extent Comcast factors into it, but its reign as majority owner lasted from 1995 to 2003 when it sold its stake to John Malone's Liberty Media, and my understanding is that the film covers mostly an earlier period. So it will probably not end with a dramatic showdown between Joy and Brian Roberts before her deciding to sell out to HSN.

I asked QVC for comment on Joy snd got no response, but of course QVC's involvement with her ended a long time ago. Joy Mangano is still a big star at HSN, however. The shopping network recently celebrated her 15th anniversary there, and a new line of her products is scheduled for a January 9th launch in selected stores, a first for her company.

I've written before about how the home shopping network business is like an insular, somewhat dysfunctional family, though Amazon may pose a distant external threat to break up the party.

But Mangano's career path might come full circle. QVCA, the tracking stock created by Liberty Media to hold QVC and related assets, owns 38% of HSN. And Liberty Media management has made it clear that if the price and tax impact are right, and the stars are properly aligned in the universe, they would like to buy the rest of HSN and combine it with QVC.

Links 12/22: Comcast pumps 1Gbps over existing cable using DOCSIS 3.1 to Philly residence

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ITV shares fall as investors cool on bid after Comcast denies holding talks (The Guardian)

Comcast 'rolls out' 'world's first' DOCSIS 3.1 modem, pumping 1Gbps over existing cable (The Register)

A 'street battle' is brewing between Amazon and Microsoft (Business Insider)

Links 12/21: ChargeItSpot raises $5M; Analyst: ESPN cordcutting major Disney concern

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Phila's ChargeItSpot raises $5M for shopper-tracking tools (Philadelphia Inquirer)

Add Britain's ITV To Comcast NBCU Deal Speculation (Investor's Business Daily)

Beyond ‘Star Wars,’ a Dark Force Looms for Disney: Cord-Cutting (NY Times)

NBC Sports Renews Deal With Yahoo (Multichannel News)

Researchers confirm backdoor password in Juniper firewall code (Ars Technica)

SAP S/4HANA release, roadmap led the SAP news in 2015 (SearchSAP)

phillytechnews bytes 12/20

UK report: Comcast considering $16 billion bid for broadcaster ITV (Comcast:Not So)

Tom Paine

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Update 12/22: Comcast has poured very cold water on this.
This Is Money, which appears to be the business section of the MAIL ON SUNDAY, is reporting that talks have been held between ITV and Comcast’s NBCUniversal, and that Comcast is considering making an €11 billion ($16.4 billion) bid for the UK broadcaster.

Comcast been signalling clearly its international ambitions for the past year, and other news sources have suggested that ITV could be its intended target, though no other report indicated anything so advanced.

John Malone's Liberty Global is ITV's largest shareholder at 9.9%, though Malone has indicated he has no interest in bidding for control.

ITV is primarily a broadcaster like NBC rather than a distributor. Comcast once owned cable systems in the UK, but exited from the UK market in 1998. Liberty Global is one of the largest cable distributors (or broadband poviders) in the UK.

Morgan Stanley's Americas M&A chief, Bob Eatroff, is joining Comcaast officially in January. He has frequently advised Comcast in the past, including on its NBCU acquisition. Eatroff's title at Comcast, notably, will be Executive Vice President, Global Corporate Development and Strategy.

The impending Unicorn death march (VentureBeat)

Newly discovered hack has U.S. fearing foreign infiltration (CNN)

Philly Tech People News 12/18: Troy Carter's venture activities; IBC's Dan Hilferty to head national Blue Cross group

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I'm not too up to date with popular culture, but West Philly native (now LA-based) Troy Carter made a singular impression on me in this Studio 1.0 interview on Bloomberg TV from a few days ago.

In sddition to his music activities, he's a tech investor and runs an LA incubator he founded, The Atom Factory.

There seems to be a range of opinions about him in the music business, but as I said I don't really know that world. I'm just basing my impression on how he handled the interview. I was particularly interested on his views on current private valuations.

There was also considerable talk of Lady Gaga and Taylor Swift's views on Spotify.

IBC's Dan Hilferty to head national Blue Cross group (Philadelphia Inquirer)

New head of Philly Startup Leaders vows to "pay back" (Philadelphia Inquirer)

Blockchain Startup Digital Asset Hires SWIFT and SunGard Veterans (CoinDesk)

Digitas Health LifeBrands Taps Annie Heckenberger As VP, Group Director, Brand Communications Strategy (MediaPost)

New Philadelphia Start-Up CLVmetrics Hires Scott Samios As COO; Plans to Grow Company Immediately (PR Web)

Vicki Lins Named CEO and President of CTAM
(Variety)

Paul Chamberlain Joins Veeva Systems’ Board of Directors (Business Wire)

QVC Appoints Mike Fitzharris as the New Leader of QVC Japan (PR Newswire)

Links 12/18: Cardinal Health subsidiary buys RightCare Solutions; Jet.com CEO Lore explains it all

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Comcast Deploys More Versatile ‘XiD’ Device (Multichannel News)

‘Re/code Decode’: Jet.com CEO Marc Lore Explains Why Fighting Amazon Isn’t a Stupid Idea (Re/code)

Cardinal Health subisidiary buys Montco health analytics firm RightCare Solutions (Philadelphia Business Journal)

Juniper warns of backdoor spying code in firewalls (PCWorld)
I have my suspicions.

Lawyer, M&A Master, CFO: SAP’s Arlen Shenkman (CFO)

New SAP Digital Moves Customer Engagement Beyond Traditional CRM (CIO Today)

LifeLock will pay a record $100M to settle FTC allegations it didn’t protect customer data (GeekWire)

Microsoft pursues analytics ambitions with acquisition of Metanautix (PcWorld)

Oracle just bought a tiny, year-old cloud computing startup called StackEngine (Business Insider)

Links 12/17: Regulators want to talk to AT&T, Comcast and T-Mobile about sponsored data; Oracle needs another way into the cloud market

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Arris gets UK court approval, setting $2.1B Pace acquisition to close Jan. 4 (FierceCable)

Regulators want to talk to AT&T, Comcast and T-Mobile about sponsored data (Washington Post)

WOW! Deal Could Preview Next Cable Consolidation Wave (Bloomberg BNA)

Jefferson, Philadelphia University to merge (Philadelphia Inquirer)

Oracle needs another way into the cloud market (USA Today)

Oracle Touts Cloud Revenue Growth In Tough Second Quarter (Information Week)

Why Sanofi chose Workday to replace SAP HR (Diginomica)

Salesforce is in talks for a $600 million acquisition, its biggest deal in more than two years (Business Insider)

Uber Is `Probably' IPO Bound, But Don't Hold Your Breath (Bloomberg]

You Can Now Call an Uber in Messenger, Facebook’s Window to the World (Wired)

Philadelphia CIOs Reveal Hiring Plans For First Half Of 2016 (PR Newswire)

Philadelphia Fed manufacturing index returns to negative level for December

First Round Holiday Video - Down Round?

Princeton-based Heartland Payment to be acquired for $4.3 billion; Carr's patience pays off

Tom Paine

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Heartland Payment Systems (NYSE:HPY), Princeton, one of the extended Philly area's most innovative tech-oriented firms, agreed to be acquired yesterday by Global Payments Inc. (NYSE:GPN), an Atlanta firm, for $100 per share, or $4.3 billion.

The payment processing industry is consolidating as new technologies emerge, reshaping the market. Bloomberg noted that Global Payments had about 2.9 percent of the global transactions processing market in 2014, while Heartland had about 2.1 percent, citing to the Nilson Report.

Heartland shares doubled over the past year, trading at $94.36 at midday today.

Robert O. Carr (from his blog)

Give a great deal of credit to Robert O.Carr, Heartland founder and CEO, who started the company without a whole lot of cash and saw it through to an excellent exit, despite its share of bumps along the way.

Founded in 1997, Heartland received a major boost in 2001 when Philadelphia's LLR Partners teamed with Greenhill Capital Partners to invest $40 million in the company. Heartland did its IPO in 2005.

The biggest crisis in Heartlsnd's history was the 2008 hack into Heartland's system, at the time the largest data breach in recorded history. One estimate was that 100 million cards and more than 650 financial services companies were compromised. Heartland recovered, and Carr became a leading activist against hackers, and for instituting tougher standards to battle data breaches.

Carr also keeps an interesting blog. The son of a waitress who worked night shifts to help support the family, Mr. Carr attended the University of Illinois, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in mathematics and a master’s degree in computer science, according to his blog.

Heartland specializes in providing payment processing services to small and medium-sized merchants. It also serves specialty niches, such as college campuses. Heartland has also been trying to becpme more of a player in the retail point-of-sale market, perhaps with mixed results.

In 2014, Heartland had revenue of $2.3 billion and net income of $33.9 million. On a combined basis, the businesses are expected to generate in excess of $3.0 billion of adjusted net revenue and $1.0 billion of EBITDA annually, Global Payment said in its release.

Links 12/16: 'Joy' brings early days at QVC to big screen

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Sequoia Capital Just Put $35 Million Into This Health Tech Company (Fortune)
San Francisco-based Clover Health received early funding from First Round Capital; its available in "only 9 New Jersey counties"(NJ only has 21).

Bradley Cooper On His Instant Chemistry With Jennifer Lawrence And Why He Tried To Talk His Way Out Of Doing ‘Joy’ (Deadline)
'Joy' relives earlier days at QVC, when Comcast owned it.

'Joy': How Production Design Made QVC the Emerald City (Hollywood Reporter)

Steven Spielberg, Jeff Skoll Talk Amblin Partners Deal: "We Are Hitting the Ground Running" (Exclusive) (Hollywood Reporter)
NBC's Universal will distribute, but not invest at this time.

DuckDuckGo, the search engine that doesn’t track its users, grew more than 70% this year (Quartz)

Oracle Q2 Results Beat Street; Ellison Says Cloud Business on Track (Re/code)
Ellison: on track to book $1.5 billion in software-as-a-service and platform-as-a-service business in the fiscal year. But
Oracle's annual revenue should be around $38 billion, as its pretty much been for the previous 4 years.

Links 12/14: Unisys Looks to Unify Distributed Computing at Scale; Seattle-based Tableau Software set to hire another 1,000 employees in 2016

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VMware Walks Away From Virtustream Joint Venture With EMC (Re/code)

Unisys Looks to Unify Distributed Computing at Scale (IT Business Edge)

Area firm is a leader in personalized marketing (Philadelphia Inquirer)

Rackspace Costs Seen Rising In Cloud Transition (lnvestor's Business Daily)

Tableau Software set to hire another 1,000 employees in 2016; CEO says business ‘flourishing’ (GeekWire)

Salesforce Has Acquired MinHash, Creators Of The AILA Virtual Marketing Assistant (TechCrunch)

TiVo strikes deal with Comcast/NBCU to measure Summer Olympic
audiences in 2016 (FierceCable)

Corporate IT strategies: Did Dow's win out over DuPont's in merger plans?

Tom Paine

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The Inquirer's Joe DiStefano nailed it.

In early November, he picked up a good deal of talk and confirned with the company that DuPont had suddenly put on hold its 'One DuPont' IT upgrade, a major SAP overhaul. The decision came just three weeks after Tyco chairman Edward D. Breen was named interim CEO of DuPont, replacing Ellen Kullman, who resigned under obvious pressure.

DiStefano correctly surmised that the holdup could be related to prospects for a possible DuPont merger with Dow Chemical. But even he may not have realized how fast things were moving.

Dow CEO Andrew Liveris called Breen on his first day in the offIce at DuPont in early October, and Breen was receptive to further discussions, as was widely reported. So it would seem plausible that the holdup of the IT project was related to the developing merger strategy.

But the differences in IT strategies between Dow and DuPont could be more fundamental. DuPont ex-CEO Kullman, in her July earnings call, was quoted by DiStefano as saying: ""Over the last three years we have undertaken a program that we call One DuPont, and it basically changes the fundamental transactional backbone of the company into a simplified, standardized to SAP standards, not to DuPont standards, and moving to standard costs, common chartered accounts, the whole thing, across our globe."

But Dow's CIO Paula Tolliver, in a Wall Street Journal blog post just days before the merger was announced, had a much different vision. Having spent eight years and $1 billion on a wall-to-wall SAP ERP implementation compLeted in 2014, Tolliver had some doubts about the results.

Would Dow undertake another such huge implementation? "Not in today's world," she said, implying that Dow would be looking at more flexible Cloud and SaaS solutions in the future.

So it sounds as if there were two visions of the future, and Dow's apparently won out. Though it's worth noting that to this point, the two companies' environments are virtually the same. If the deal goes through, it will be interesting to see what changes are implemented, both at the corporate level and at the three proposed business units.

Third Point's Loeb calls for removal of Dow Chemical chief Liveris: WSJ (Reuters)

SAP's bold new goal: making precision medicine a reality (PC World)

Comcast's Brian Roberts on what Steve Jobs told him, whether Comcast will go national, and why everyone hates cable companies

West Philly native Troy Carter talks valuations and other things on Bloomberg TV

Tom Paine

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I'm not too up to date with popular culture, but West Philly native (now LA-based) Troy Carter made a singular impression on me in this Studio 1.0 interview on Bloomberg TV from a few days ago.

In sddition to his music activities, he's a tech investor and runs an LA incubator he founded, The Atom Factory.

There seems to be a range of opinions about him in the music business, but as I said I don't really know that world. I'm just basing my impression on how he handled the interview. I was particularly interested on his views on current private valuations.

There was also considerable talk of Lady Gaga and Taylor Swift's views on Spotify.

Dow, DuPont agree to merge: Some highlights

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Dow Chemical and DuPont Set Merger and Plans to Split (New York Times)

Dow's Survivor CEO Liveris Closes on Most Elusive Deal of All
(Bloomberg)

Dow Chemical CIO Says Another 8-Year ERP Project Is Unimaginable
(Wall Street Journal: CIO Journal)

Exclusive: 'One DuPont' IT upgrade frozen amid review (Phily.com)

Dow, DuPont deal could impact Bucks, Montgomery counties (Bucks County Courier Times)

Link 12/11: Reddi, Gabriel fund Indian startup; Linode buys landmark Philly building

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EureQa raises $600,000 from SRI Capital, Gabriel Investments (Livement)

EXCLUSIVE: South Jersey firm buys MTV's 'Real World' house (Philadelpia Business Journal)

CIOs aren't loving SAP's HANA. Yep, somebody's afraid of commitment (The Register)

Amazon Web Services clears fog with public cloud fee price list API (The Register)

Has Workday ceded the cloud platform to Salesforce and Microsoft? (Diginomica)

GoPro: CEO Woodman’s QVC Show a Bad Sign, Says Citi, Cutting to Hold (Barron's Tech Trader Daily)

Crestview Pumps $125M Into WOW (Multichannel News)

EPAM completes Alliance Global Services acquisition; reports put price at $50 million

Tom Paine

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I haven't seen an SEC filing from EPAM Systems (NYSE: EPAM) yet, but two sources in the Indian press are placing the price for the Newtown-based system integrator's acquisition of Conshohocken-based Alliance Global Services, now closed, at $50 million. The deal was announced last month.

A large portion of AGS' workforce is in India, as India's Business Standard reports that "Alliance Global Services has more than 1,100 engineers, testers and designers in its India delivery centres — at Hyderabad and Pune."

“The acquisition extends the company’s Global Delivery Platform by adding strong solution delivery capabilities in North America and in India and expanding EPAM’s expertise in software engineering productivity and automation services,” EPAM Chief Executive Officer Arkadiy Dobkin said, according to The Hindu Business Line .

Then there is this enthusiastic post on Google+ by EPAM'S CMO:

Links 12/10: Global Payments Said to Be in Talks to Buy Princeton-based Heartland Payment

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Global Payments Said to Be in Talks to Buy Heartland Payment (Bloomberg)

November Pre Series A Deal Data May Show Early Evidence of VC “Slowdown” (Mattermark)

Hipchat-Maker Atlassian Begins Trading Up 32% at $27.67, Valued At $5.8 Billion (TechCrunch)

SnapLogic Raises $37.5 Million To Help Legacy Data Play Nicely In The Cloud (TechCrunch)
A Boomi competitor, in some respects.

Paul DePodesta Named Keynote Speaker for Phorum 2016 (Press Release)
That's the Money Ball guy, not the guy running the Clinton campaign, just to be clear.

Links 12/9: Perspectives on Dow/DuPont; Atlassian's going public in the morning

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Why the Dow-DuPont Merger is Bad For America (Fortune)

DuPont-Dow: 'Why merge merely to break up?' (Philly.com: Philly Deals)

Dow, DuPont soar on prospect of $130 billion merger 'Christmas present' (Reuters)

Dow-DuPont Merger: Better Living Through Layoffs (Wall Street Journal)

Sling TV Suppliers Say The Company Has Less Than 500,000 Subscribers, Decelerating Signups
(Dan Rayburn/Streaming Media Blog)

Apple’s New TV Ad for Apple TV: We Don’t Need TV, Because We Have TV! (Re/code)

Why Apple Walked Away From TV (For Now) (Re/code)

Analyst Sounds Warning Bells for Cable Broadband (Multichannel News)

Atlassian Sets Its I.P.O. at $21 (NY Times: Dealbook)

Universal Display Facing 'Frothy' OLED Expectations (Investor's Business Daily)

Meet the company moving into the Heer's building
(Springfield Missouri News Leader)
AmerisourceBergen software subsidiary.

Links 12/8: WSJ: DuPont, Dow Chemical in advanced merger talks

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DuPont, Dow Chemical gain after report of merger talks (MarketWatch)
Dow Chemical was worth more than $60 billion, DuPont $59 billion. The two would combine and then split into three companies, the report says.

X1 Licensing Not a ‘Big Financial Mover’ for Comcast (Multichannel News)

Comcast Might Sell Phones as Part of Wireless Offering, CEO Says (Bloomberg)

Rutledge: ‘We’re Ready’
Charter Chief Says Ready to Roll With TWC, Bright House (Multichannel News)

Google Fiber talking to Chicago and LA about gigabit deployments (Ars Technica)

Disney Invests $200 Million More in Vice Media to Support New Programming (NY Times)

IBM Acquires Clearleap to Advance Cloud Video Services (IBM Press Release)

SAP Unveils Software for Doctor Data-Sharing After CEO Accident (Bloomberg)

Phila's NextFab plans 3d 'Makerspace', in Del. this time (Philly.com: Philly Deals)

Philly Tech People News 12/7/2015: NRG head with controversial agenda departs; Meredith Perry takes on uBeam critics

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Chris Bastian Named SCTE’s New CTO (Multichannel News)

Franklin Square hires Bassuk as MD and liquid alternative strategies head (Press Release)

UDel's new president: How he could change the university (Philadelphia Business Journal)

Meredith Perry Responds to uBeam's Critics (Fortune)
Perry started work on uBeam while a grad student at Penn.

David Crane Leaves NRG, Replaced by Mauricio Gutierrez (NY Times)

Google Taps VMware Founder to Chase Amazon in the Cloud (Re/code)

Lawrence Lenihan Leaves FirstMark Capital for Fashion Venture (Wall Street Journal: Venture Capital Dispatch)
FirstMark has been an active investor in the Philly area.

Links 12/7: Streaming Video Now Accounts for 70 Percent of Broadband Usage; AT&T says it plans to expand its fiber internet service to 38 new cities

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Streaming Video Now Accounts for 70 Percent of Broadband Usage (Re/code)

Sling TV Boss Says Comcast Usage Caps Hurt Competition (Broadband Reports)

Verizon could explore Yahoo's Internet business, CFO says (Reuters)

AT&T expands its fiber internet service to 38 new cities (Engadget)

SAP NS2’s VC Arm Invests in ThreatConnect; Mark Testoni Comments (GovConWire)

Wall Street thinks Salesforce could fix one big flaw in its business by following Oracle (Business Insider)

Salesforce's Benioff ‘doesn’t believe in unicorn theory anymore’, cites market manipulation (New York Business Journal)

New Salesforce tool lets users have their way with external data (PCWorld)

Salesforce catching up to SAP? Not so quickly, perhaps

Tom Paine

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With all the hype given to Salesforce, with which on substance I certainly to a degree buy in to, there's been much talk (led by Marc Benioff himself) about the inevitability of Salesforce 'catching up' to SAP one of these days. But in the past few months the stock market results haven't reflected a closing of the gap. Quite the opposite.

I looked at SAP (NYSE: SAP) and Salesforce (NYSE: CRM) share prices from the day Dreamforce ended (9/18) up through the close of business Friday,December 4. Of course, the other significant financial event during that period was its earnings report on November 18.

SAP reported preliminary results on October 12 that exceeded estimates, also offering a bouyant outlook for Q4.

Of course, Salesforce is growing at a much faster rate, but for SAP even the slightest upward blip could make a big difference. SAP also touts its cloud growrh, although cloud revenue still accounts for a relatively small percentage of
overall revevue, and it was cacquired mostly through pricey acquisitions and the payback on these remain to be determined.

Salesforce now has a market capitalization of $54.5 billion, up from $47.1 billion at the end of Dreamforce, versus $96.4 billion for SAP, up from $77.6 billion at the end of Dreamforce.

	Salesforce	SAP
9/18	$71.40	$64.96
12/4	$82.13	$78.98
% change	15 %	21.6 %

phillytechnews bytes 12/6

Comcast, Samsung, others invest in VR company Baobab Studios (Telecompaper)

Google Ventures Dials Down Seed Deals, Urges Mature Startups to Go Public (Wall Street Journal: Venture
Capital Dispatch)

Links 12/4: Now Seattle wants a Comcast deal like Philly got

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Comcast, Philly Agree to 15-Year Franchise Deal (Multichannel News)

Seattle to Comcast: We want a contract deal like Philly got (Seattle Times)

Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2016 now available worldwide (ZDNet)

U.S. appeals court hears challenge to net neutrality rules (Reuters)

With $42M Deal, Evariant Goes Big in Health Marketing, Analytics (Xconomy)
Pursuing a different segment of healthcare market than Veeva Systems, but potential collision points exist, initially in the area of data sources. For all I know, Veeva may already see this as additional opportunity for its data. In any event, I think Salesforce controls franchise boundaries for its verticals to some degree.

Qlik and Veeva Systems Partner to Offer Unprecedented Visibility into Customer Data for the Pharmaceutical Industry (Business
Wire)

Jacoby, First Round back new Philly adtech startup, Circulate

Tom Paine

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Ari Jacoby / Circulate
(LinkedIn)

Solve Media, the Philadelphia/New York adtech company which revolutionized the use of the CAPTCHA by turning it into valuable advertising real estste, was acquired recently by Somerville, NJ-based Adiant , price so far unknown. But Solve's founder, Ari Jacoby, one who's truly earned the "serial entrepreneur" designation, had already started another venture, Circulate. Its website states: "Founded in the City of Brotherly Love, Circulate now has offices in Philadelphia & NYC." Its received funding from First Round Capital (according to FRC 's website), which also backed Solve and Jacoby's previous venture, VoiceStar.

Circulate describes itsef as "The World's First Data Supply Side Platform (DSSPP)". "Circulate helps publishers (Web and App), networks and SDK providers maximize their first-party data monetization strategies with one simple integration, on a privacy friendly basis. Circulate advances the science of targeting and media attribution by enabling industry partners to utilize match Data as a Service." Examples given include website onboarding and cross-device targeting. I don't pretend to completely understand all of this.

Circulate has been operating in an early startup stage for a while, snd Jacoby has been CEO since the middle of last year, aacording to his LinkedIn profile. Most of the founding team members came from Solve Media.

I reached out to Circulate for more information but have yet to receive a response.

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