Month: September 2021 (Page 3 of 3)

Databricks closes series H with more participation from AWS and Microsoft

September 9, 2021 / NewsShark

Databricks, the Data and AI company known for their data lakehouse architecture, announced the final closing of their recent Series H funding. Cloud leaders and existing investors Amazon Web Services (AWS), CapitalG, and Microsoft will participate in Databricks’ $1.6 billion round of funding, which puts the company at a $38 billion post-money valuation. The Series H funding will be used to accelerate innovation and adoption of the lakehouse as the data architecture’s popularity across data-driven organizations continues to grow at a rapid pace.

Databricks has a simple and open architecture for data and AI, which brings the reliability, governance, and performance of a data warehouse directly to the data lakes that most organizations already store all of their data in. Rather than being forced to move data out of the data lake, and between various disconnected and legacy systems for different use cases, Databricks customers are building analytics platforms on AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud to support every data and analytics workload in a single, unified location.

https://databricks.com/company/newsroom/press-releases/databricks-closes-series-h-with-additional-participation-from-strategic-partners

Acquia to acquire Widen

September 8, 2021 / NewsShark

Acquia announced that it has agreed to acquire Widen, a cloud-native maker of digital asset management (DAM) and product information management (PIM) software. Widen unites digital assets such as rich media, product information and marketing copy in a single workflow and provides an intuitive interface to democratize access for marketers to all of a brand’s resources. By providing a foundation for collaboration, coordination and control of the full digital content lifecycle, Widen will enable marketers and website builders to create richer and more distinctive customer experiences using Acquia Open Digital Experience Platform (DXP).

Widen solutions simplify how marketers create, review, manage, distribute and analyze content across the content lifecycle. Its design and architecture make it able to support complex marketing workflows and enterprise DXP requirements. These encompass use cases that go beyond managing creative assets to include storing unstructured data such as legal documents, insurance claims and contact lists. The marketing-friendly Widen PIM solution brings product data from creators to customers, centralizing it for syndication across websites, catalogs and ecommerce channels. Widen will be available as part of Acquia Open DXP or as a standalone offering.

https://www.acquia.com ■ https://www.widen.com

Google Workspace updates to improve hybrid work

September 8, 2021 / NewsShark

Google announced advancements for hybrid work with a single connected experience in Google Workspace, helping employees to collaborate equally regardless of location, device preference, role or language. These advancements include the rollout of spaces in Chat, along with new meeting enhancements and conferencing hardware to help organizations bridge the gaps as they navigate new hybrid work environments.

Spaces are the central place for team collaboration in Google Workspace and spaces are now live for all users. Spaces are unique in that they are tightly integrated with Google Workspace tools like Calendar, Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides, Meet, and Tasks, providing a way for people to engage in topic-based discussions, share knowledge and ideas, move projects forward and build communities and team culture. With spaces, it’s easy for users to see the full history, context and content of conversations, so everyone can follow along and jump in to contribute at any time.

Google also announced an expanded Google Meet hardware portfolio, equipped with two new all-in-one video conferencing devices, third-party Meet-certified devices, and interoperability with Webex by Cisco.

https://cloud.google.com/blog/products/workspace/enabling-hybrid-work-with-google-workspace

Tableau launches new data analytic capabilities

September 2, 2021 / NewsShark

Tableau, an analytics platform, unveiled new data and analytics platform capabilities. The new enterprise capabilities and new enterprise subscription plans will help customers advance their digital transformations by empowering everyone in an organization with trusted and governed data.

Managing the data chaos and enabling data governance. New capabilities are making data challenges easier to manage, scale, and trust
- Data Prep: Reduce loads/costs of server resources automatically and generate rows to more map out trends in data
- Governance: Help ensure/maintain data quality by alerting you of any potential issues and provide easier visibility into the type of data you have and where it came from
- Centralized row level security: Increased flexibility and segmentation by allowing Tableau administrators to centrally configure which users and groups have access to which slices of data configure access.
Ensuring analytics scales with enterprise demand
- Enterprise reference architecture: Enterprise Deployment Guidelines (EDG) provides the Tableau reference architecture to enterprises to achieve requirements around availability, scalability and security.
- Dynamic Scaling: Helps enterprises appropriately resource their deployment and ensures enough containers are available during peak demand times and scale down during low demand times.
- Resource Management: IT teams can better optimize the performance of Tableau Server by defining application resource limits.

https://www.tableau.com/products/our-platform

Sitecore acquires Reflektion

September 2, 2021 / NewsShark

Sitecore, a provider of digital experience management software, announced the acquisition of San Mateo-based Reflektion, an AI-powered digital search platform that understands and predicts patterns, context, and needs in order to convert shoppers into buyers. The combination of Sitecore and Reflektion enables Sitecore to engage, educate, and empower shoppers to make purchase decisions faster to increase buyer confidence, long-term revenue, and overall customer satisfaction and loyalty.

The acquisition will help marketers solve the information overload that is characteristic of traditional search solutions, which leave customers unable to find and select the right product. 93% of all online experiences start with search, making it an integral part of the customer buying journey, and Reflektion elevates search into a conversational, guided experience that provides more personal, accessible, and tailored answers for the customer. Reflektion’s platform can be leveraged across all aspects of the Sitecore digital experience platform, from transforming product data into understandable consumer-friendly language to understanding shopper intent, behavior, and product preferences.

https://www.sitecore.com ▪︎ https://reflektion.com

Crownpeak and Webscale partner

September 1, 2021 / NewsShark

Crownpeak, a digital experience platform, announced it has entered into a strategic partnership with Webscale, a cloud platform for modern commerce. The partnership will see Webscale become the preferred cloud delivery engine for Crownpeak’s roster of global brands. Joint Crownpeak and Webscale customers will benefit from a managed cloud delivery platform, offering predictive auto-scaling and disaster recovery for highly available infrastructure, flexible cloud deployment options in any public cloud provider around the globe, and comprehensive 360-degree security for protection against the latest cyber threats. In addition, all customers will have access to Webscale’s 24×7 team of DevSecOps cloud-certified experts, as well as the Webscale Customer Portal, which offers visibility and insight into traffic, events, security policies, user experience and more.

https://www.crownpeak.com/resources/datasheets/crownpeak-powered-by-webscale ▪︎ https://www.webscale.com

Gilbane Advisor 9-1-21 — Privacy-what to do? ML explained

September 1, 2021 / Frank Gilbane

This week we have articles from Benedict Evans and an educational video starring Hillary Mason. News comes from Apache, Bridgeline, Qumu, Apple, Wondershare, Otter ai, and TransPerfect + Webcertain.

We’ll be on vacation next week so our next issue will be September 15th. We were kidding last week when we said we would probably be back :).

Opinion / Analysis

Privacy, ads, and confusion

Privacy is coming to the internet and cookies are going away. This is long overdue – but we don’t know what happens next, we don’t have much consensus on what online privacy actually means, and most of what’s on the table conflicts fundamentally with competition.

Benedict Evans’ description of where we are and what we don’t know is on target, and is a rewarding read for those who know they don’t know, as well as those that think they do know – perhaps a colleague.

https://www.ben-evans.com/benedictevans/2021/8/27/understanding-privacy

Watch a computer scientist explain machine learning in 5 levels of difficulty

Hillary Mason does a delightful job of explaining machine learning to, in order, an 8 year old, a 9th grader, a college student, and a grad student, and then discussing the current state of ML with a fellow computer scientist. This 26 minute video (with transcript) is a valuable learning tool for anyone not versed in computer science. It is just as valuable to those who are proficient in ML but looking for short helpful ways to explain it to a child, parent, spouse, boss, whoever. Plus, it is fun to watch.

https://www.wired.com/video/watch/5-levels-machine-learning

Content technology news

The Apache Drill Project releases Apache Drill v1.19

Open Source, enterprise, schema-free Big Data SQL query engine designed for rapidly evolving data on modern Big Data applications.
https://gilbane.com/2021/08/the-apache-drill-project-releases-apache-drill-v1-19/

Bridgeline expands investment in BigCommerce partnership

Hawksearch is an AI-powered search, personalization, and recommendations app that optimizes the online buying experience for B2C & B2C.
https://gilbane.com/2021/08/bridgeline-expands-investment-in-bigcommerce-partnership/

Wondershare releases EdrawMind Version 9.0

The multifunctional collaborative mind mapping and brainstorming tool brings a new UI, and advanced features.
https://gilbane.com/2021/08/wondershare-releases-edrawmind-version-9-0/

Qumu adds on-demand transcriptions and AI-powered captions

Asynchronous video transcriptions make it easier to review video content and aid in regulatory compliance for meeting transcript requirements.
https://gilbane.com/2021/08/qumu-adds-on-demand-transcriptions-and-ai-powered-captions/

Apple introduces the News Partner Program

Designed for subscription news publishers that provide their content to Apple News in Apple News Format.
https://gilbane.com/2021/08/apple-introduces-the-news-partner-program/

TransPerfect acquires Webcertain

Webcertain will complement TransPerfect’s TPT Digital division which shares a common focus on targeted campaigns beyond language translation.
https://gilbane.com/2021/08/transperfect-acquires-webcertain/

Otter.ai launches Otter Assistant for Microsoft Teams, Google Meet, and Cisco Webex

Users can access all of their notes, regardless of video conferencing platform, through Otter.ai’s web app or mobile apps on iOS and Android.
https://gilbane.com/2021/08/otter-ai-launches-otter-assistant-for-microsoft-teams-google-meet-and-cisco-webex/

All content technology news

The Gilbane Advisor is curated by Frank Gilbane for content technology, computing, and digital experience professionals. The focus is on strategic technologies. We publish recommended articles and content technology news weekly. We do not sell or share personal data.