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ibble Launches Social Networking App Landing One Of The Largest Series Seed Funding In Texas History

ibble

ibble, a new social media app empowering people to spark conversations and ignite new ideas has received $12.7MM, the largest series seed funding round in Texas history. Leading the seed round was Drive Capital followed by TTV Capital, Unknown Ventures, and Get Engaged Media. The investment in ibble comes amidst societies overwhelming frustrations with current social media platforms as they increasingly cut content; remove conversations and restrict engagement. “ibble is a Social Media App built on the idea of learning through conversations and having the ability to talk directly with the experts without the friction that currently exists on traditional social media apps and platforms,” said Raymond Kaminski, CEO and Co-founder of ibble. “We believe that talking with your community, not at your community, through the power of audio and video can spark more meaningful conversations and create more insightful engagement." ibble’s mission is to help people connect with and learn from experts through the power of video and audio conversations. Users are able to ask experts questions directly as well as spark conversations with their peers, naturally expanding candid conversations without friction. Is an expert always right? No, of course not. We believe what makes someone an "expert" is their relentless pursuit of the truth about a certain subject and their willingness to share it. For people who have been frustrated by structured and ad focused social media platforms that stifle conversations and are not easily suited to video and audio conversations, the solution is ibble – the social media app built by a distinguished team of entrepreneurs who believe that conversations and connections must have a healthy environment to thrive and grow in this digital age. “Brands, celebrities, influencers, the news, sports figures and more are looking for new ways to engage but that is almost impossible when dealing with the limits of current social media apps and platforms,” said Irving Lee, Co-Founder and Head of Partnerships at ibble. “We built ibble knowing that authenticity is not found in a like, comment or status update, and how could it? ibble provides a platform that celebrates real conversations with real people and threads that mirror real life conversations; conversations you can jump in and out of." With ibble anything is possible through the power of conversation. Users can start a video or audio conversation about their favorite show. They can also ask their favorite influencer or celebrity a question and get a response back with a simple click of a button. ibble makes conversation easy because ibble has made conversation through social media possible, with a focus on the natural flow of conversations and questions. For brands, shows, influencers, celebrities and others, ibble has made it easy to talk with their community members directly while not having to worry about being throttled or competing brands advertised to them while they are communicating with them. About ibble ibble is the social media app that enables experts and their communities to directly engage through audio and video conversations. ibble makes events more accessible and adds depth through back-and-forth video and audio posts. Learn more at https://www.getibble.com/ Contact Details ibble Jason Jepson +1 949-394-7033 press@ibble.io Company Website https://www.getibble.com/

March 10, 2022 09:00 AM Eastern Standard Time

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CSG Inspires Social Impact Through Partnership with We Make Change

CSG

DENVER, March 10, 2022 – CSG ® ’s (NASDAQ: CSGS) purpose is to envision, invent and shape a better, more future-ready world. Through community partnerships, the company is giving back and channeling the power of all to make a difference in the communities CSG serve around the world. Today, CSG joined forces with We Make Change, a global volunteering platform that connects skilled volunteers with social enterprises, to host a series of Change Days that allow CSG employees to share their knowledge and skills with social enterprises to help drive social change. Over two Change Day, CSGers dedicated more than 150 hours to support nine social enterprises committed to reducing inequalities and increasing digital inclusion. Most participants signed up to continue their volunteer service with their dedicated social enterprise. In 2022, CSG aspires to reach 40,000 hours of employee volunteer time. “As a global technology leader, CSG aims to dream bigger, where we create a more connected, inclusive and future-ready world that delivers greater impact for our colleagues, customers, and communities,” said Channing Jones, chief diversity and social responsibility officer, CSG. “By volunteering with organizations like We Make Change, our employees gain a better understanding of critical issues facing our communities while leveraging their experience to drive more meaningful impact. Adding social enterprises to our social impact program empowers us to not only serve with our time and intellectual capital but measure the positive impact CSG is making in communities across the globe. We are proud to think globally and act locally with partners like We Make Change that helps us accelerate real-world progress towards solving some of the most vital issues facing our world today.” The two CSG Change Days supported a total of nine social enterprises, including: Empowr: Teaches black youth students about software development foundations, how to build simple apps, and critical leadership techniques to showcase how their skills can impact the world and help increase the number of black-owned businesses. Leiho: Connects essential goods to vulnerable communities that are living without them - from socks that help the homeless stay warm to groceries that feed children in need. LocalPurse: Local Purse connects travelers with experienced local guides and artisans globally through virtual cultural and shopping experiences, having a minimal carbon footprint, and providing a sustainable way of supporting the travel industry. ZigWay: Gives low-income families and disadvantaged populations access to the everyday goods and services they need to break free from poverty. "This Change Day was a game-changing opportunity for Leiho to reignite our confidence and motivation towards making a difference where it truly matters,” said Joey Li, co-founder, Leiho. "Connecting with kind-hearted, sharp-minded CSGers helped us to make our brand messaging clear and concise and inject the transparency we desire for our mission. The added value of having access to the rich skills and expertise Leiho needs to implement greater change is critical for our young organization. CSG's originality and commitment to our success primed our imagination to evolve Leiho for massive social impact and influenced our vision of organic growth." “Employees giving just four hours of skilled volunteer time as part of a Change Day can significantly accelerate the positive impact of a social enterprise,” said James Sancto, co-founder and CEO, We Make Change. “For the social enterprise, they gain access to a vast pool of knowledge and expertise that can help advance their cause and deliver faster results to groups in need. For conscientious companies like CSG, it’s a chance to do more for the world and give their employees meaningful ways to give back to their communities and connect deeply to social issues where they have the power to affect change.” The upcoming CSG Change Days will focus on improving gender equality. By year’s end, CSG will have supported dozens of social enterprises from all corners of the world. # # # About CSG CSG is a leader in innovative customer engagement, revenue management and payments solutions that make ordinary customer experiences extraordinary. Our cloud-first architecture and customer-obsessed mindset help companies around the world launch new digital services, expand into new markets, and create dynamic experiences that capture new customers and build brand loyalty. For 40 years, CSG’s technologies and people have helped some of the world’s most recognizable brands solve their toughest business challenges and evolve to meet the demands of today’s digital economy with future-ready solutions that drive exceptional customer experiences. With 5,000 employees in over 20 countries, CSG is the trusted technology provider for leading global brands in telecommunications, retail, financial services, and healthcare. Our solutions deliver real world outcomes to more than 900 customers in over 120 countries. To learn more, visit us at csgi.com and connect with us on LinkedIn and Twitter. About We Make Change We Make Change connects skilled volunteers with Social Enterprises changing the world. We enable individuals and employees to volunteer their skills online to support the causes they care about with the time they can give. Our Change Day online volunteering events bring together corporate teams to develop their skills, connect with colleagues, and make change in just a few hours. With a fast-growing community of over 25,000 volunteers supporting more than 650 Social Enterprises in over 100 countries across the world, We Make Change enables anyone, anywhere to contribute to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. To learn more or get involved, visit us at wemakechange.org and connect with us on LinkedIn. Copyright © 2022 CSG Systems International, Inc. and/or its affiliates (“CSG”). All rights reserved. CSG® is a registered trademark of CSG Systems International, Inc. All third-party trademarks, service marks, and/or product names which are referenced in this document are the property of their respective owners, and all rights therein are reserved. Contacts: Kristine Østergaard Public Relations +44 (0)79 2047 7204 kristine.ostergaard@csgi.com John Rea Investor Relations +1 (210) 687-4409 john.rea@csgi.com Contact Details Kristine Østergaard +44 7920 477204 kristine.ostergaard@csgi.com Company Website https://www.csgi.com

March 10, 2022 06:30 AM Mountain Standard Time

Luxury without compromise: OPPO's engineers pioneered the ceramic back for Find X5 Pro

OPPO

SHENZHEN, CHINA - Media OutReach - 10 March 2022 - The new OPPO Find X5 Pro — a premium flagship handset born from never-before-seen pioneering engineering methods. Available in stunning ceramic and vegan leather, the curved nature of Find X5 Pro's rear wraps elegantly and organically around the camera housing in an innovative volcano-like design to create an utterly seamless experience, look, and feel, that no other device comes close to matching. Building on the knowledge of creating a similar curved glass rear for Find X3, engineers had to overcome even more substantial challenges to help create a zero-compromise result that met the exact specifications (while surpassing and creating many industry standards in the process). Find X5 Pro's ceramic back is made from a microcrystalline material that's calcined at a temperature of 1000-degrees Celsius to create a texture that reduces fingerprints while being twice as strong as glass, with double the heat dissipation. The downside, however, is that due to its strength, it's a very tricky and unforgiving material to work with. The thought of creating Find X5 Pro's precise, organic curved back from such a material seems impossible, but OPPO's engineers have invented a process which sees the ceramic rear panel carved like a work of art with over 2,000 individual control points used to create its seamlessly organic curves. Taming the ceramic panel posed some crucial hurdles for engineers to solve, and it took six months of research and development in molding, machining and polishing process to create Find X5 Pro's iconic curved rear. A material that's both incredibly strong and resistant to scratches and drops, ceramic is superior to glass in multiple ways, and was therefore the natural choice for a premium handset like Find X5 Pro, further pushing the boundaries of Find X3's glass design. The downside to ceramic's robust properties, however, is that it's difficult to machine, which is clearly problematic when it comes to producing Find X5 Pro's unique curved rear design. Using known existing manufacturing methods resulted in too large a cap between the ceramic rear cover and the camera housing, with less of a smooth curve gradient to boot — an unacceptable outcome. To combat this problem, engineers created a more precise machining method using two blades arranged at a precise 90-degree angle. While this improved the accuracy of the final product, however, the appearance of a straight-edged cutting line surrounding the sides of the ceramic cover, along with visible cutting marks from the machine blade lines. The solution was the creation of a completely new lift edge polishing process which refined the machined edges for a smoother, properly finished look. Initially, however, it was apparent that removing the manufacturing marks also ended up taking away too much of the ceramic material itself away, making the rear panel too small to properly fit the handset. To overcome this, engineers had to meticulously polish the ceramic's edges in multiple stages, using a four-axis polishing machine and micron-level diamond powder. Results from polishing stages were checked at regular intervals to then make minute, precise adjustments down to a staggering 0.005mm. A perfectly machined, premium ceramic rear cover that takes five whole days to produce, with a yield of 97% compared to 87%. One of the major design pain points in smartphones are their camera housing solutions. Most phones have unsightly raised bumps that dominate the design without adding excitement or finesse. Beyond the shape, OPPO's engineers had to decide how to blend the lenses into the housing itself without any ugly protrusions or camera rings. Removing the camera lens ring for a cleaner look means that the lens itself must be precisely positioned so that it's neither too high nor too low. Too high and the lens will be vulnerable to damage. Too low, it will lose the premium feeling of flushnessflow, while being able to feel a dip in the surface. The upshot of this is that the perfect placement of the camera lenses under the ceramic housing was determined to be 0.10mm, or the thickness of a human hair. As a result of direct assembly, however, this number would often reach the thickness of two hairs. This seems utterly insignificant on paper, but anything less than perfect was simply not good enough. To combat this, ceramic battery covers were split into three groups based on their incredibly small variations of thickness. The three lenses for Find X5 Pro were also grouped based on their thickness, and then matched to their closest ceramic cover to reach the perfect, precise depth in the camera housing. OPPO has invested millions to develop specialised automated equipment to group matching lenses and rear covers automatically. In a world where smartphones are churned out to offer a minimal viable experience, however, OPPO's commitment to precision and perfection stands out. Devices like Find X5 Pro are the embodiment of hard work, dedication, and countless hours spent in the pursuit of the absolute very best product possible. With new strides and discoveries being made continuously, OPPO will continue to lead the way for smartphone innovation, with new generations being built on the years of experience and learning before them. #OPPO Contact Details OPPO Media Contact press@oppo.com

March 10, 2022 08:00 AM Eastern Standard Time

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imimobile and SMARTY Partner to Bring End-to-End Personalised Communication to Its Growing Customer Base

imimobile

imi mobile, the global cloud communications software and solutions provider (part of Webex by Cisco), has announced that SMARTY, a UK SIM-only mobile network, has deployed imi connect and imi campaign to support its growing subscriber base and drive a more seamless customer experience across its marketing journeys and digital channels. With imi mobile’s communications platform as a service (CPaaS) solution – imi connect - at its core, SMARTY can now better support seamless customer engagement across its customer onboarding programme as well as throughout its in-life and retention campaigns which required greater need for effective, cross-channel, personalised communications. This has allowed SMARTY to replace disparate services and vendors, consolidating these channels and services to minimise costs, maximise operational efficiencies and improve campaign response rates. Replacing the manual processes of previous solutions with imi mobile’s multi-channel CPaaS technology has provided SMARTY with better automation through one central platform to manage all its customer interactions. Its teams now have real-time insight into the communications customers are receiving and how they are interacting and responding to these, which in turn offers the ability to add further levels of automation and intelligence throughout the customer journey to improve the overall experience. “As we continue to grow our customer base, it was becoming apparent that we needed to change the way in which we interact with customers,” said Sayed Hajamaideen, Head of Marketing & Propositions at SMARTY. “Our ethos is simple, honest mobile and we found that imi mobile aligned very strongly to this with its easy, straightforward, and intelligent technology. SMARTY is in an extremely competitive industry, and we are an ambitious company – we were looking for a highly personalised, automated customer experience solution that would keep pace with the speed at which we are moving. imi mobile has helped overhaul our entire approach to customer communications through its CPaaS platform and multi-channel capabilities to ensure a frictionless experience for our growing customer base.” imi connect sits at the heart of SMARTY’s customer communications, from welcome and onboarding to loyalty and retention campaigns. It directly integrates with SMARTY’s existing systems, including its CRM platform, which allows SMARTY to automate communications with customers at key moments to, for example, ‘refer a friend’ or ‘leave a review’. This integration also provides a complete view of the customer and helps SMARTY’s teams to craft appropriate communications specific to their journeys. The platform also syncs with SMARTY’s Trust Pilot reviews programme, using rich communication services (RCS) to make it even easier and more convenient for customers to leave reviews, with SMARTY now reaching a 70% 5-star rating. This end-to-end journey orchestration allows for more interactive conversations that better relate to each individual customer and their needs at that time. “We know that customer experience is becoming a board-level discussion, as more and more business leaders understand its increasing impact on the bottom line,” said Jay Patel, VP & GM, Webex CPaaS. “SMARTY is at the forefront of this curve, seeing the critical importance for implementing a CPaaS solution to manage its customer communications. They needed a better solution to support their customer base, one that could help evolve marketing-led journeys to an end-to-end customer experience. The imi connect platform acts as a central hub, delivering automation, personalisation, innovation, and a multi-channel approach to support how SMARTY is able to engage their customer base at each and every stage of their journey. Using this approach to reaching out across the most appropriate channel, SMARTY has unsurprisingly seen up to a 500% uplift in campaign engagement compared to the traditional single channel approach.” With automation, personalisation, and the ability to innovate with agility at its core, imi mobile enables seamless 'two-way' communications for SMARTY’s customers, giving customers the ability to respond directly in the same channel where they have received the messages from SMARTY’s team. This joined up communication across all channels has made it extremely easy and efficient for SMARTY to continually communicate with its customers in a place and time that suits them best so that they can be kept up to date with new products and services, while also be able to make informed decisions on tariffs and packages. For more information on imi connect, please visit imimobile.com/products/imiconnect About SMARTY: All of SMARTY’s plans are jam-packed with data, unlimited calls and texts and are flexible 30-day plans. With SMARTY, EU roaming is included (up to 12GB) and, as there’s no contract and no tie in, customers are never forced into accepting price rises, giving customers complete honesty, flexibility and simplicity. SMARTY is powered by Three’s strong and reliable 3G, 4G and 5G network, which delivers super-fast speeds for browsing, streaming, gaming, downloading, and emailing. The SIM-only network is on a mission to put the trust back into the mobile industry, by doing things properly. SMARTY believes there’s a better way to do things; great value, simple plans, transparent pricing and flexible 1-month plans. On SMARTY, customers don’t need to worry about a hefty bill or nasty surprises at the end of the month – it’s simple, honest mobile. For more information on the new plans, visit www.smarty.co.uk About imimobile imi mobile, part of Webex, provides cloud communications software and services that manage business-critical customer interactions at scale. We believe that customer experience is the key competitive advantage for consumer businesses. So, we're creating a world where enterprises can stay constantly connected to their customers. A world where every touchpoint, on every channel, is an opportunity to deliver rich, engaging, intuitive experiences. Our API and low-code Communications Platform-as-a-Service (CPaaS) offering, imi connect, enables large enterprises to automate, orchestrate and monitor their customer interactions all on one platform. This helps businesses to lower costs, reduce complexity and accelerate IT roadmaps. Our innovative platform and applications are being used at scale today by blue-chip global enterprises and leading public-sector organizations to deliver smarter customer interactions, such as AA, Best Buy, BT, Capitec Bank, Centrica, EE, IHG, Mercedes, Orange, O2, Vodafone and Walgreens. The business was acquired by Cisco Systems in February 2021 and has global offices across the UK, USA, Canada, India, and South Africa. www.imimobile.com Contact Details Michael Kocher +1 704-960-2295 michael@kitehillpr.com Caroline Brunton +44 7796 274416 caroline@kitehillpr.com Company Website https://imimobile.com/gb/products/imiconnect

March 10, 2022 04:00 AM Eastern Standard Time

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Telos Blockchain Joins Bloktopia’s Metaverse

Telos Foundation

Telos Blockchain (Tlos) has become a virtual tenant of Bloktopia and is already organizing to put that space to good work. With Bloktopia now ready to launch its Alpha, the Telos team will be able to use the space as a virtual meeting room for all its AMAs (ask me anything - meetings). Telos has plenty to talk about regarding its recently launched Ethereum Virtual Machine (tEVM ), its decentralized file storage system ( dStor ), its roadmap and a metaverse environment just seems like the perfect setting for these talks. After all, both the tEVM and dStor can and will be used to power the needs of Web 3.0 based dApps. “Bloktopia’s metaverse is a positive step in Web 3.0 adoption and the Telos team is eager to jump in feet first. This is just the beginning of a multi-trillion-dollar industry, and this is just the first step of our grand metaverse ambitions.” Justin Giudici, Acting CEO at Telos Foundation. Introducing the tEVM: Telos is a 3rd Generation, ESG compliant layer 1 blockchain that has been executing energy-efficient smart contracts uninterrupted since 2018. Every transaction on the Telos Network uses less than 0.000002 kWh of energy per transaction and costs end users zero to near zero in gas fees. Telos can generate blocks / smart contracts for Solidity, Native C++ and Vyper faster than any other chain. The network’s core strength stems from its tight use of C++ and custom Wasm runtime environment. It is super-efficient and is one of the main reasons why Web 3.0 dApps can deliver instant transactions while using Telos. Telos is already capable of sustainably delivering hundreds of millions of almost fee-less transactions per day before any future sharding / rollups. The Metaverse will need this level of capacity to thrive. Telos' current capacity is sufficient to handle the transaction needs of every single existing layer 1 chain, including all their future forecasted growth for the next decade. With any one of the following third-party comparisons, one can clearly see for themselves some of the proven strengths of Telos. Cardano, Solana, Polkadot, Fantom and Telos vs the Clock Telos vs Fantom Telos vs Avalanche vs Binance Smart Chain vs Ethereum *Visit links above For Web 3.0 commerce and entertainment to thrive, dApps need speed, capacity, affordability, energy efficiency, decentralization and even decentralized file storage. P2P file storage is precisely why Telos dStor was developed. dStor is a decentralized peer-to-peer cloud-based file storage system that is fully integrated into the Telos architecture. With dStor, individual users, collectors, digital graphic artists, musicians, filmmakers and gaming companies can store all their digital Web 3.0 content seamlessly and simultaneously. This storage capability is available in all global regions, in a decentralized environment and for prices far lower than conventional services that only have single-region availability. *Developer Alert: Telos Spark Hackathon - 100,000 Tlos for First place! Live now! - Register Here Telos Ignite Grant Program - 12 million over 4 years! Live now! - Register Here The next era of blockchain will be very exciting for both developers and end users alike. Keep an eye out for our virtual meetings on bloktopia! About Telos Telos is a 3rd generation smart contract platform that offers compatibility with Solidity, Vyper and Native C++ smart contracts, providing full EVM/Solidity support as well as a fee-less native smart contract layer upon which the EVM is built. Telos performance is unrivaled in the industry and was purpose-built to offer speed, scalability, cost-effectiveness, decentralization and end-user fairness. The network can sustainably support hundreds of millions of transactions per day, produces blocks in 0.5 second intervals on a first-in-first-out basis (eliminating frontrunning on the network), offers a fee-less native and low per transaction cost EVM (<$0.10), and a fully decentralized block producer network. About The Foundation The Telos Foundation is a Decentralized Autonomous Organization established as a promotional and funding body to advance the Telos Blockchain Network and provide support to network applications. Contact Details The Team hello@telosfoundation.io Company Website https://www.telos.net/

March 09, 2022 03:26 PM Eastern Standard Time

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BLUEPEAK TO BRING A FASTER, MORE RELIABLE INTERNET TO LAWTON, OKLAHOMA

Bluepeak

Bluepeak, an innovative internet provider, announced today that it has received franchise approval from the city of Lawton, Okla., to build a high-speed fiber network to meet the growing needs of the community, today and in the future. The approximately $40 million expansion – the largest such investment by Bluepeak in the state of Okla. – will bring Bluepeak service to more than 40,000 residences and businesses in Lawton. “The city of Lawton has been a steadfast partner in our work to bring a next-generation, fiber-to-the-home network to the community,” said Rich Fish, CEO of Bluepeak. “At Bluepeak, we take pride in being relentlessly for our customers and we can’t wait to show the good people of Lawton what that means for them.” With Bluepeak’s advanced fiber connection, residential customers can get up to 5 gigabits-per-second (Gbps) of symmetrical bandwidth (upload and download) and businesses can get up to 10 Gbps and beyond of symmetrical bandwidth. Bluepeak’s fiber network will provide faster speeds, better connectivity, and the bandwidth to connect more devices for internet, streaming, gaming and more. “The City of Lawton is thrilled to see industry in Lawton growing with the investment from Bluepeak,” said City Manager Michael Cleghorn. “Access to high-speed internet, such as fiber connection, is vital to the growth of communities. We look forward to the possibilities this kind of access will present Lawton citizens.” “We are excited to have Bluepeak coming to Lawton to provide high speed internet services,” said Okla. State Rep. Rande Worthen. “One of the goals for the legislature has been to expand high speed internet to all four corners of the state. Just as exciting is, this is being done without the expenditure of any state dollars and solely by private capital.” “I am looking forward to Bluepeak expanding to Lawton in the near future,” said Okla. State Rep. Daniel Pae, a native of Lawton. “As we have learned during the pandemic, Lawtonians need access to affordable and reliable high-speed broadband, and I believe Bluepeak will help us accomplish this objective.” Bluepeak has coordinated with the city of Lawton and will begin construction on the new network within the next 90 days. For more information and to receive the latest updates, visit www.mybluepeak.com. About Bluepeak Bluepeak is building a faster, more reliable internet without the things that get in the way of great service — like red tape, hidden fees, and slow response times. Offering up to 5 gigabits of speed for residential customers and 10 gigabits for businesses, Bluepeak is a whole new ballgame — from internet to TV, to connecting every device in a home, to powering a business, Bluepeak not only provides the best fiber connections in the communities it serves, but also meets the growing needs for how its customers live. Contact Details Bluepeak Jesse Granger +1 720-703-4315 mediaqueries@mybluepeak.com Company Website https://www.mybluepeak.com

March 09, 2022 12:10 PM Mountain Standard Time

DataWeave Releases Report on Grocery Private Label: Finds Inflation-Driven Explosion

DataWeave

Private label packaged foods up 38% in value sales share in 2021 5 of the Top 14 grocery categories are private label 8 of the Top 10 brands with the most SKUs are private label DataWeave, a global leader in retail data, pricing and AI analytics, today releases its report on the ascent of private label brands in the grocery space, Inflation Accelerates Private Label Share and Penetration. The study digs deep into the reasons behind and numbers backing the rise in popularity of private label food brands and products resulting from the pandemic, and now rising inflation. “Across the ten major grocery retail chains we analyzed, private label brands were more economical compared to national brands, which is likely one of the key factors contributing to the private label’s increased penetration across grocery categories, said DataWeave CEO Karthik Bettadapura. “We will continue to watch private label closely, as it seems to be impacting many decisions across the retail value chain, from margins to merchandising.” The report looks at top private label brand penetration, ranks brands by category, and tracks price variations across regions, along with private label ratings, reviews and ranks. It finds that on average, retailers in the U.S. carried more than 4,500 private label products online and had private label brand penetration of more than 13 percent. DataWeave analysts feel this trend will only continue to grow at a historic rate as inflation pushes consumers to buy more affordable private label products in the months ahead. “Availability and affordability amid prolonged economic uncertainty furthered the power and presence of private label brands in 2021, increasing market penetration beyond all expectation. Our data found that eight of the top ten brands with the highest number of SKUs carried across all grocery retailer websites in our analysis were private label goods, signaling the strength of their Share of Voice and verifying a shift in consumer preferences,” said Krish Thyagarajan, president and COO of DataWeave. DataWeave’s methodology draws on more than 500 billion global data points, looking at both external sources and their own internal banks to explain that data. This Private Label report is the latest to compare prices and popular differences by brand, category and retailer, in light of inflation and market-driven economic changes. Watch next for a DataWeave report on the shrinking price disparity between organic and regular food products, with an interesting private label twist. DataWeave is a leading provider of advanced sales optimization solutions for e-commerce businesses, consumer brands and marketplaces. The AI-driven proprietary technology and language-agnostic platform aggregates consumable and actionable Competitive Intelligence across 500+ billion data points globally, in 25+ languages, with insights to drive performance for more than 400,000 brands across 1,500+ websites tracked across 20+ verticals and ensure online performance is always optimized. Learn more about the power of big data and global level analytics in understanding the rapidly changing retail industry at DataWeave.com. Contact Details Amy Fieber +1 917-837-3724 amy.fieber@dataweave.com Company Website https://dataweave.com

March 09, 2022 11:00 AM Eastern Standard Time

Kolleno raises £4M seed to help businesses solve their cash flow struggles

Kolleno

Kolleno, a London-based fintech start-up specializing in Accounts Receivable (AR) management for SMEs, has attracted £4M ($5.4M) in seed funding led by Eurazeo and Stride.VC, with participation from Euler Hermes, HubSpot and several angel investors including Michael Pennington, Mark Ransford, and Will Neale. Founded in 2020 by Dimitri Raziev, CEO (ex-Goldman Sachs, Fasanara Capital) and Ron Danenberg, CTO (ex-Expedia Group, Vatglobal), Kolleno simplify B2B credit control and collections for SMEs by automating the management of receivables on one single platform. The idea to form Kolleno was born from their experience observing the impact that manual processes and poor cash flow management were having on SMEs. In less than 18 months of operation, the start-up has already acquired customers across several markets in Europe, the UK, the US, Canada, and South Africa. The platform does cash reconciliation, prioritises the workflow and provides tailored collection strategies by advising the most effective communication channels using AI and machine-learning technology. The customers are approached via omnichannel, in-app communication methods (including email, SMS, and call.) Moreover, the platform has a Payment Portal, which is accessible straight from the email or text received by the customer. The user-friendly dashboard provides data insights and credit analysis helping to mitigate risks and reduce the number of bad debts. As a result businesses get paid faster and reduce manual work and processes by 100%. Kolleno has already p rocessed over 170,000 invoices across the USA, Canada, South Africa, UK, and Europe since it launched. “Previously, businesses had to hire credit control specialists or give extra tasks to existing members of their team to manually monitor the payment dynamics of customers. An employee had to identify late payers, then prioritize, contact and follow up with individual clients to ensure late payments were received. This was not only time-consuming but also stressful for business owners and often prone to errors,” remarks Kolleno CEO and co-founder Dimitri Raziev. “Kolleno has been designed to alleviate these challenges by automating manual legacy processes to eliminate errors, ensure that businesses get paid faster and improve cash flows for our clients, some of whom have reported greater than 90% recovery using our platform.” In addition to automating and streamlining processes, Kolleno’s software offers added convenience by partnering and offering an Open API integration with leading ERP and software solutions, including Xero, QuickBooks, and Clio to better meet the needs of its clients. The software is also equipped with machine-learning technology capable of automating and optimizing the timing, method and delivery of client communications, and offers a variety of efficiency-improving features, such as an actions board and payments portal to simplify follow-up and receipt of payments. “The technology has reached a level where it is able to remove repetitive tasks from employees and perform them faster and more accurately, freeing up time for staff to focus on higher value-added activities and speeding up the sales-to-cash timeframe. We are excited to build something that saves time and money for businesses” says Ron Danenberg, CTO and co-founder of Kolleno. “The B2B payments market is far bigger than the B2C. However, the level of digitalization in the B2B sector is lagging behind. That is why we are excited to invest in Kolleno - I firmly believe that the biggest opportunities in the B2B payments sector are yet to come”, says Chloé Giard, investment director at Eurazeo, the lead investor in the round. "Kolleno has demonstrated a relentless focus on helping business owners manage their cash and receivables simply and swiftly using software, in stark contrast to the current status quo: working with clunky and expensive agencies who are misaligned with their clients", explains Pietro Invernizzi on the decision of Stride.VC to back Kolleno. As the company continues to build towards the future, initial seed funding will be used to scale up Kolleno’s capabilities and offerings. To assist with these efforts, the company has recruited Djibrane Larrabure (ex-Deloitte consulting) as Chief of Staff and onboarded a team of nearly ten professionals to expand its product, marketing, sales and partnership offerings across regions. “This achievement is the result of the team’s tireless efforts to build a leading platform to help businesses thrive. As a team, we look forward to continuing to support the long-term success of our clients and are grateful for the faith that our investors have put in us to deliver on this promise. Stay tuned – because we are excited for what is to come!” say the company’s founders. Contact Details Kolleno Bilal Mahmood +44 7714 007257 b.mahmood@stockwoodstrategy.com Company Website https://www.kolleno.com/

March 09, 2022 09:30 AM Eastern Standard Time

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Dalmore Group and North Capital Talk Secondary Market Opportunities

Dalmore Group

As one of the leading Broker Dealers in the crowdfunding space, Dalmore Group is uniquely positioned to facilitate and support issuers who seek to leverage secondary markets. Having seen what is working well in the industry, Dalmore regularly provides the benefit of that knowledge to its clients, including the provision of access to secondary trading solutions through Alternative Trading Systems (ATS), such as PPEX ATS, operated by North Capital. According to Etan Butler, Chairman of Dalmore Group, “We are seeing an increase in Regulation A+ issues seeking to incorporate secondary market trading functionality as part of their model. Up until now, we have seen a lot of secondary trading activity in connection with our fractional share ‘series issuers’ in the collectible, art, NFT, and real estate space. But now we expect the trend to expand to other areas as issuers look to provide a path to liquidity to their investors while leveraging the benefits of secondary trading activity under Regulation A+.” Butler credits The Jumpstart Our Business Startups (JOBS) Act, signed in 2012, for these opportunities because it loosened regulations to encourage the funding of small businesses and democratized investing in private companies for almost anyone over the age of 18. Through Regulation A+ and CF, investing in high potential companies at the earliest stage is no longer limited to accredited investors, funds, or high net worth individuals. The opening of these funding opportunities to early-stage companies gives them access to capital from the crowd in their primary issuance. “We see more and more companies inquiring about secondary market opportunities at the earliest stages of their capital formation. In fact, companies working with Dalmore Groups' secondary markets have completed 54,000+ trades from July 2021 to January 2022. The challenge is to have the right guidance and support of a Broker Dealer such as the Dalmore Group from day one, as decisions in how offerings are structured and brought to market in primary issuance can impact future secondary market opportunities,” explains Butler. In analyzing what is fueling growth within the secondary market, Butler says that “a built-in secondary marketplace, accessible via the issuer’s own website and app, is a natural progression for funding availability. The involvement of an ATS in the process gives investors an immediate path to liquidity and takes away an investor’s need to rely on a future liquidity event to exit their investments and potentially realize gains.” James P. Dowd, CEO of North Capital, agrees. “Prior to the passage of the JOBS Act, exempt securities transactions were called private placements and they were just that: private transactions organized as one-off, bespoke agreements between an issuer and investors or between a buyer and a seller. The ability to conduct public, exempt offerings has changed the landscape. Now issuers can solicit accredited and non-accredited investors using traditional advertising and digital marketing techniques. As a result, the overall direct market for exempt securities has grown exponentially. It is only natural that this growth would lead to a demand for liquidity via the secondary market.” Looking ahead to where the secondary market is going, Butler feels that “as more and more companies see the opportunity and power of raising capital from the crowd, including their own audiences and customer base, more issuers will focus on both Regulation A+ and Regulation CF offerings. We believe that the increased supply from early-stage companies will be met with the increased demand from investors. The growth in crowdfunding activity in primary issuance should also lead to the expansion and growth of secondary market opportunities.” By expanding access to capital for issuers, companies like Dalmore Group and North Capital enable more small businesses to grow, which leads to more job creation and greater economic activity. “Overall, it is great for the economy and for entrepreneurs who have traditionally lacked access to capital,” says Dowd. “Markets are a wonderful thing if they are free, fair, and transparent. Open markets encourage participation, which is good for both business and investors. I know that not everyone agrees with this view, which I have advocated for two decades, but we are betting that we are correct, and the naysayers are wrong.” Butler agrees. “Providing liquidity to investors in early and mid-stage companies is very exciting. In the past, only later stage companies provided a credible path to liquidity to their investors. Now, even the smaller guys can compete – and that’s a very good thing.” ABOUT DALMORE Dalmore Group specializes in helping companies raise capital online at scale through Regulations A+, CF and D, and has onboarded over 200 Regulation A+ issuers since 2019. Learn more about how Dalmore Group is leading the way for primary issuance and secondary market trading of private securities at www.dalmorefg.com and keep up to date on the latest company news and information directly via Dalmore Group’s LinkedIn page ABOUT NORTH CAPITAL North Capital Investment Technology provides comprehensive digital platform technology, brokerage, and advisory solutions for private and other exempt securities, supporting issuers, broker-dealers, funding platforms, and investment advisors. Through its registered broker-dealer North Capital Private Securities Corp., the firm offers technology-enabled escrow, streamlined investor vetting and compliance management (KYC/AML, suitability and accredited investor verification), transaction processing, online payments, clearing, custody, and secondary trading through the PPEX ATS. For more information, visit www.northcapital.com. Contact Details North 6th Agency Trisha Larocchia +1 516-225-5932 tlarocchia@n6a.com Company Website https://dalmorefg.com/

March 09, 2022 09:16 AM Eastern Standard Time

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