Technology, Capital Markets, Corporate Governance, Leadership, Entrepreneurship
Category: Information Services
Debt remains cheap. Strategic acquirers and PE firms are flush with cash. It doesn't take a genius to arrive at the conclusion that Software & Services M&A activity will remain healthy in 2020 all else held equal. (tickers mentioned: ACN, AVGO). Today's news that Accenture (ticker: ACN) agreed to acquire Symantec's CyberSecurity Services business from … Continue reading One M&A Prophecy Fulfilled. More to Come.
There were too many quality CEOs to choose from when we went about selecting the "CEORater Technology CEO of the Year" for 2019. Rather than selecting a single "Technology CEO of the Year", we elected to select five top CEOs across five Technology categories: 1.) "PropTech", 2.) "FinTech: Payments", 3.) "Platform Companies", 4.) "FinTech: Capital … Continue reading CEORater 2019 Technology CEOs of the Year
With Michael Bloomberg throwing his hat into the ring for the 2020 Democratic nomination, many have speculated as to how Bloomberg would divest his equity stake in his namesake firm were he to win the Presidency. We don't expect Mr. Bloomberg to win the Office of the President nor would a sale necessarily be required … Continue reading Prospective Bloomberg LP Acquirers
Our CEORater equal-weight mock Technology portfolio leverages various CEORater investing principles and has outperformed by a significant margin. (tickers mentioned: ADBE, AMZN, CSGP, GOOG, MA, MSFT, NOW, SSNC, TWLO, VEEV, VRSK) We kicked off an experiment in Q1 of 2019. This experiment - not to be confused with the CEORater Technology Founder CEO Index - … Continue reading High Quality Tech Names – Steady as She Goes
We look at a few leading FinTech and Information Services companies from a cash flow perspective. (Tickers mentioned: CSGP, FDS, INFO, MSCI, SSNC, VRSK). I reflect on a few names I used to cover during my equity research days. For purposes of this exercise we review SS&C Technologies, Verisk Analytics, IHS Market, FactSet Research Systems, … Continue reading FinTech and Info Services
Microsoft's proof-of-concept "Project Silica" stores Warner Brothers' original Superman movie on a piece of quartz glass measuring 75x75x2 millimeters thick. It is estimated that more than 100 Zettabytes of data will be stored in the cloud by 2023 (from a data volume standpoint one Zettabyte represents as much information as there are grains of sand … Continue reading Mirosoft’s Project Silica stores ‘Superman’ movie on quartz glass using lasers and machine learning
The Industrial CRE sector remains strong as Amazon and other e-commerce players acquire industrial properties to extend delivery capabilities. Amazon (tkr: AMZN), is investing to make one-day delivery standard for Prime members which in turn is driving the need for more local industrial space near high population density areas. "We’re currently working on evolving Prime … Continue reading E-Commerce Continues to Drive Demand for Industrial Space
AI is a scale game. Massive amounts of data and a large number of data scientists are required to build and train machine learning models and neural networks that underpin products such as Google Assistant and many others we've grown accustomed to. Google has never been great at selling to the enterprise. If it ever … Continue reading Google – Keeping Tabs on the AI Leader
Last Week I Participated on an AI-focused Panel at the SS&C Deliver Conference The panel - “Practical Applications for AI in Investment Operations & Accounting” - was especially enjoyable because the audience engaged. While much has changed since I last worked in an Investment Operations capacity in 1998, much remains the same - meaning there … Continue reading It’s “Early Days” for NLP. The Opportunities Are Many
Incentivize Prospective Participants with A Seat at the Table MoviePass shut down on September 14th. We do not have first-hand knowledge of MoviePass’ ever-evolving business model. However, we do know that MoviePass never quite figured out how to properly incentivize movie theaters to drive audience participation. When building new network businesses, it makes sense to … Continue reading If You Build It They Won’t Necessarily ComePremium
