Thought Leaders in Mobile and Social: Interview with Alex Bratton, CEO of Lextech (Part 1)

Alex Bratton is the chief executive officer of Lextech, a company that creates custom mobile apps for organizations to optimize their workflows. Alex has a BS in computer engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He founded and lead several successful companies in the past, including EmailRx, The Net Squad, and WebRPG. In this interview he provides several use cases of how Lextech adds value to businesses and their processes by designing customized mobile apps, and he gives us his views on the mobile app space and what entrepreneurs should be focusing on to be successful.

Sramana Mitra: Alex, let’s start with introducing Lextech to our audience as well as giving them some of your background. >>>

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Thought Leaders in Mobile and Social: Interview with John SanGiovanni, Co-Founder and VP of Product Design at Zumobi (Part 1)

John SanGiovanni is co-founder and vice president of product design at Zumobi, a company specialized in creating innovative apps and in-app advertising for the mobile industry through its platform called ZBi (Zumobi Brand integration). John has more than 13 years of experience in mobile interface design. Prior to Zumobi he worked at Microsoft Research. In this interview he talks about Zumobi applies native advertising methods to drive brand content and awareness in the mobile space and talks about the exciting future of mobile advertising.

Sramana Mitra: John, let’s start with some of your background as well as background about Zumobi. What do you do? What kinds of customers do you cater to? >>>

Thought Leaders in Mobile and Social: Interview with Calvin Carter, Founder and President, Bottle Rocket (Part 1)

Calvin Carter is the founder and president of Bottle Rocket, one of the market leaders in high-end mobile app development. In this interview he describes the development of mobile apps from his company’s standpoint and shares his vision of mobile apps and the future of mobile apps. He also gives us an interesting definition of the mobile space, describing it as not only just apps, but user experiences.

Sramana Mitra: Calvin, let’s start with providing our audience with some background about Bottle Rocket as well as yourself. >>>

Thought Leaders in Mobile and Social: Interview with Kelly Passey, EVP of Business and Product Development at Access Development (Part 1)

Kelly Passey is the executive vice president of business and product development at Access Development, a company that manages one of America’s largest discount and rewards networks. Kelly has more than 20 years of experience as an executive, having worked for Fidelity Investments and Visa USA previously. In this interview he talks about Access’s incentive system, provides interesting use cases of how merchants and consumers benefit from this system, and discusses trends within the industry.

Sramana Mitra: Kelly, let’s familiarize our audience with both yourself and the company.

Kelly Passey: My name is Kelly Passey. I have been with Access Development for about eight years and for 20 years I have been in financial services related support – a lot around incentives, loyalty, rewards, etc. >>>

Thought Leaders in Mobile and Social: Interview with Gil Dudkiewicz, CEO of StartApp (Part 1)

Gil Dudkiewicz is the chief executive officer of StartApp, a monetization and distribution platform for mobile apps. Gil holds an MBA from UC Berkeley and a B.Sc. in engineering from Technion. In the past he founded several successful companies and helped build up SweetIM, which achieved more than 100 million downloads and ended up being acquired for $41 million. In this interview Gil talks about the mobile ad space and gives us very interesting insights into open gaps in the industry.

Sramana Mitra: Gil, tell us a bit about yourself and StartApp. The audience hasn’t met you before, so it would be great if you introduced yourself and the company. >>>

Thought Leaders in Mobile and Social: Interview with Dave Maquera, CEO of EdgeWave (Part 1)

Dave Maquera is the chief executive officer at EdgeWave, a leading company in cloud-based security solutions. Dave studied at Harvard Business School and has more than 15 years of experience in the technology business. In this interview he talks about Edgewave’s unique approach to security solutions and addresses open problems in the industry.

Sramana Mitra: Dave, let’s start with setting some context about what EdgeWave does. >>>

Thought Leaders in Mobile and Social: Interview with Dan Hickey, SVP of Products at Alliance Health (Part 1)

Dan Hickey is the senior vice president of products at Alliance Health, a social networking company that provides a community platform for people with health conditions. Dan has almost 17 years of experience in digital media, having worked for AOL and Meredith Corporation. In this interview he talks about how people are able connect with and share their issues and experiences through the Alliance Health platform and what benefits the company’s service brings to healthcare providers and patients.

Sramana Mitra: Dan, let’s start with what Alliance does. Introduce us to Alliance, tell us what the company does, what you are doing and especially what you are doing in the mobile and social area. >>>

Thought Leaders in Mobile and Social: Interview with Nick LeCuyer, VP of Strategy and Distribution at Western Union Digital (Part 1)

Nick LeCuyer is the vice president of strategy and distribution at Western Union Digital. He holds an MBA from the University of Michigan and a BSE in civil engineering from Princeton University and had more than 13 years of experience in corporate strategy as well as consulting. In this interview, Nick talks about the role of mobile in Western Union and the company’s business model and gives us detailed insights into the future of mobile payment services.

Sramana Mitra: Nick, let’s start with setting some context about yourself as well as what you are doing at Western Union Digital in the domain of mobile and social technologies. >>>

Thought Leaders in Mobile and Social: Interview with Kristin Muhlner, CEO of newBrandAnalytics (Part 1)

Kristin Muhlner is the chief executive officer of newBrandAnalytics, the global leader in social market intelligence. Kristin has worked at companies such as Rollstream, webMethods, Deloitte Consulting, and Andersen Consulting and has more than 20 years of experience in this space. In this interview she talks about how newBrandAnalytics helps companies extract intelligence from online conversations and talks about open gaps in the industry.

Sramana Mitra: Kristin, let’s start with setting some context for newBrandAnalytics. What do you do? Who is your target customer?

Kristin Muhlner: Fairly simply, what newBrandAnalytics does is take social information and turn it into operational intelligence. What I mean by that is we gather data about our customers, we analyze that using sophisticated natural language processing, we code it to industry-specific categories, grade it for sentiment, and then we present it back to them in a way that really helps those customers get a deep, rich understanding from a business perspective about the conversation about them online. >>>

Thought Leaders in Mobile and Social: Interview with Khris Loux, CEO of Echo (Part 1)

Khris Loux is the CEO and co-founder of Echo, the world’s first and largest real-time web platform. Khris has a bachelor of science with a double major in economics and finance and a minor in computer science from Mount Saint Mary’s College in Maryland. In this interview he talks about how the web is transforming from a static web to a real-time streaming web and how his company provides a platform to create apps that allow other companies to adapt to those changes. Furthermore, he gives interesting insights for entrepreneurs who want to become a part of this industry.

Sramana Mitra: Khris, let’s start with some context about Echo. Tell us what you do, what the company is all about, and a little bit about yourself. >>>

Thought Leaders in Mobile and Social: Interview with Oliver Bussmann, CIO of SAP (Part 1)

Oliver Bussmann is executive vice president and chief information officer of SAP AG. He counts 20 years of executive experience and previously worked for Allianz of America Corp. and Deutsche Bank. He is a pioneer of social media deployment for business-building and has received several awards, including the 2012 Social CIO and European CIO in the same year. In this interview, Oliver talks about how SAP applies social media in its business operations and how he envisions the merging of business and social life with new technologies in the future.

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Thought Leaders in Mobile and Social: Interview with Bobby Yazdani, Founder and CEO of SABA (Part 1)

Bobby Yazdani is the chief executive officer of SABA, one of the industry’s leading learning and talent management providers. Bobby holds a BA in applied mathematics from the University of California at Berkeley. In 1997 Bobby founded SABA, and he took the company public in 2000. Today the company has revenue of more than $100 million. In this interview Bobby talks about different ways of learning through mobile and social platforms and the adoption of his technology in enterprises today. Further, he shares insights into what he believes the future of education will look like.

Sramana Mitra: Bobby, let’s start with some context about SABA. I have been following the company for many years, so this would be an opportunity to introduce the company to the audience as well as bring me up to speed about your evolution.

Bobby Yazdani: A number of colleagues and I founded the company back in 1997. The core catalyst behind the company and our products was the introduction of the Internet and the subsequent shift of many enterprise business processes to the Internet. >>>

Thought Leaders in Mobile and Social: Interview with Miko Matsumura, Senior Vice President, Developer Relations, Kii Corporation (Part 1)

Miko Matsumura is the senior vice president of developer relations at Kii Corporation. He studied at San Francisco State University. In this interview, Miko talks about how Kii Corporation helps entrepreneurs develop mobile apps and introduces us to an interesting and innovative business model that bears new and exciting possibilities for mobile app creators.

Sramana Mitra: Miko, let’s start with some context. The audience may not know the company. They are going to be confused about whether this is a software company or a venture capital firm, because it seems to be both. Help us understand your company as well as your background. >>>

Thought Leaders in Mobile and Social: Joe Langner, EVP of Mid-Market Solutions for Sage, North America (Part 1)

For the past 15 months, Joe Langner has been the executive vice president of mid-market solutions for Sage North America. He comes with an extensive management background which includes strategic planning, operational excellence, and profitable growth. In this interview he discusses mobile and social applications and Sage’s current position on the market regarding those applications.

Sramana Mitra: Hi, Joe, and welcome to the series. It would be helpful to give our readers some context about Sage. Then we will dive in to specific topics. >>>

Thought Leaders in Mobile and Social: Marty Beard, CEO of LiveOps (Part 1)

We’ve featured LiveOps on the blog before, when I interviewed then CEO Maynard Webb for my Entrepreneur Journeys series. Now, the company has a new CEO, Marty Beard, and has gone through many other interesting changes over the years.

Sramana Mitra: Hi, Marty. We are speaking with LiveOps for a second time. I spoke with the previous CEO a little while ago. So, let’s start with some context.

Marty Beard: Sure. There are two parts to LiveOps’ business. There’s the agent outsourcing, virtualized workforce part, which Maynard did a fantastic job of growing. We also have the cloud applications part of the business, which is selling our customer service solutions directly to any call center or customer service organization looking for a cloud alternative to an on-premises solution. We are focused on the platform and cloud applications part of the business. We’ve been working hard to grow that aggressively and innovate our solutions in that space. That is the primary focus of the company at this point. >>>