FinanceIt Doubles Its Lending Muscel to $75m
This week, Financeit announced that it doubled its lending program partnership with Pacific & Western Bank of Canada, increasing the total from $35M to $75M this year.
Financeit offers a compelling point-of-sale customer financing, taking on the industry focused on big-box retailers and large deals. As a result, smaller merchants are able to compete with large retailers and offer customers an easy online application to get loans approval on the spot. On the other hand, Financeit helps banks find new borrowers, so it’s a win-win all around.
“We started our partnership with Pacific and Western Bank of Canada last year on a $35M lending program that proved to be very successful,” Casper Wong, Financeit COO and co-founder told BetaKit. “This year, we were able to double that commitment to $75M, which will allow us to continue focusing on growth and building out our Canadian lending program for small to medium sized businesses.”
Today, Financeit has more than 3,800 merchant partners offering loans ranging from $500 to $100,000. Since its 2011 launch, the company has processed $825 million in loans in Canada and the United States.
All these numbers add up to two major wins: validation and growth. For smaller businesses, Financeit offers a compelling white-label solution to offer loans and minimal risk and make that sale, especially when the sale amount is relatively large. For banks, the company offers a way to expand lenders’ base. As an intermediary, there is technology doing what it does best: addressing pain-points at scale and solving complex problems simply.
“We look forward to the continued growth of our partnership with Financeit and are delighted to be assisting small to medium-sized Canadian businesses prosper by empowering Canadian retailers with the ability to offer financing options to their customers,” said David Taylor, President and CEO, Pacific & Western Bank of Canada.
More banks should take note of how FinTech startups like Financeit can play the game in a way that benefits all stakeholders involved to inject a healthy dose of competition and innovation into mature, slow-moving industries.
Source: http://betakit.com/financeit-doubles-its-lending-muscle-to-75m/
Dejero Launches New HD Version of LIVE+ Mobile App for iOS
WATERLOO, Ontario — March 4, 2015 — Dejero, award-winning creator of the industry’s most powerful and versatile family of mobile newsgathering and live event products, today released the latest version of the LIVE+ Mobile App for iOS devices. Ideal for mobile journalists (MoJos) and professional video contributors covering breaking news or live events, the LIVE+ Mobile App transforms an Apple iPhone or iPad into a powerful tool for broadcasting live video, recording content for later broadcast, or importing and uploading edited video files. With the new release (Version 3.1), the app now supports high-definition (HD) video in resolutions up to 1080p for live streaming on iPhone 6 devices. Also, the app’s maximum bitrate for transmissions has been increased to 9 Mb/s to enable exceptional picture quality.
“Our LIVE+ Mobile App is a great example of Dejero’s ongoing commitment to simplify the remote acquisition, cloud management, and multiscreen distribution of professional live video over IP,” said Brian Cram, CEO of Dejero. “As LTE networks and Wi-Fi hotspots become more ubiquitous, it’s easier than ever to cover breaking news and stream live events from a mobile phone or tablet in full HD. As a result, more and more news organizations, video professionals, and live event production companies are adopting our app to supplement their remote video acquisition capabilities. Many are also using it in innovative ways to transmit content that would otherwise be too expensive to capture using traditional technologies.”
The easy-to-use LIVE+ Mobile App is ideal for covering breaking news, impromptu interviews, and live events, and provides an excellent backup system if the primary camera or transmitter fails. Using Dejero’s patented Intelligent Connection Management technology, the app transmits low-latency video with exceptional picture quality over bonded cellular and Wi-Fi connections, even when bandwidth is limited. In situations where the available bandwidth is fluctuating, the app will automatically adjust the resolution to deliver the optimal picture quality for the network conditions. As with the other mobile encoding and transmission solutions in the LIVE+ platform, live video feeds from the app are monitored with the LIVE+ cloud management tool and then routed either to broadcast servers for TV playout or cloud servers for web and mobile distribution.
At the 2015 NAB Show, Dejero will highlight the latest features and enhancements of the LIVE+ Mobile App including support for video resolutions up to 1080p. Dejero will also demonstrate how live content from multiple app-enabled smartphones and tablets can be managed in the cloud and combined with cloud servers to deliver compelling live broadcasts to online viewers. In addition, attendees at the RTÉ Mobile Journalism Conference (MojoCon), on March 27 in Dublin, Ireland, will be able to see a demo of the latest version.
Version 3.1 of the LIVE+ Mobile App for iOS is now available from the Apple App Store. A license is required to send live feeds and recorded or edited files to server destinations.
source: http://www.dejero.com/news/view/dejero-launches-new-hd-version-of-live-mobile-app-for-ios
CogniVue Announces Next Generation APEX Vision Processing Core
Mobile World Congress 2015: CogniVue Corporation, which licenses its automotive and consumer market proven APEX™ Image Cognition Processor (ICP) technology to semiconductor vendors, announced its next generation of APEX ICP technology with a 10x performance increase over its current APEX. The automotive market continues to drive the need for high performance vision processing at low power. Building on its expertise in automotive safety applications and working collaboratively with major automotive Tier-1s and OEMs, CogniVue’s team has further improved APEX ICP architecture, hardware blocks and added new features for this next-gen core that provides the best performance per area per power for vision and image processing. For instance, the next-gen APEX will enable simultaneous processing of multiple feature detectors (i.e. Canny, FAST, SIFT, SURF etc.), complex classifiers (i.e. SVM, CNN, etc.) and motion analysis (i.e. trackers, optical-flow, etc.) on multi-camera 2k video streams at a fraction of the power of competing processors. In addition CogniVue expands on APEX scalability by enabling not only performance scalability inside APEX, but also improved multi-core processing between APEX cores. Customers may license a range of APEX configurations to best suit their application requirements by scaling both the vector and scalar performance, and now also connect multiple APEX cores together for even higher performance. CogniVue also continues to invest in providing the most comprehensive solution with support for C/C++ language, OpenCL programming as well as the APEX Core Framework, CogniVue’s powerful algorithm development tool, and the ever expanding APEX-CV kernel and value-add algorithm software libraries. Combined together this comprehensive offering reduces time to market and development cost for CogniVue’s customers.
“Freescale’s S32V234 automotive vision processor is already benefitting from the performance per power advantage of the APEX image cognition processor technology with support for OpenCL ” commented Matt Johnson, Vice President and General Manager – Automotive MCU at Freescale. “We see the need for continuous improvements in performance and expect this to continue with CogniVue’s next generation APEX core.”
“Neusoft has already developed ADAS applications on the existing APEX ICP core,” said Prof. Huai Yuan, Director of Advanced Automotive Electronic Technology Research Center, Neusoft. “We expect new autonomous vehicle applications will take full advantage of the additional performance per power improvement in what is already a leading vision processor technology.”
“Our collaboration with CogniVue enables designers to develop their next-generation APEX-enabled SoCs in advance of silicon,” said John Koeter, Vice President of Marketing for IP and Prototyping at Synopsys. “The combination of CogniVue’s APEX SystemC Model and Synopsys’ leading Virtualizer™ and Virtual Development Kit (VDK) tools help customers accelerate software development of automotive and vision and imaging SoCs.”
“Innovation is part of CogniVue’s DNA. CogniVue has been providing the most comprehensive open platform fully programmable purposely built embedded vision processor technology from the start.” commented Simon Morris, CEO of CogniVue. “CogniVue has been anticipating the need for higher performance per power for autonomous driving, robotics, internet-of-things and mobile devices; and our next-generation APEX ICP core technology addresses this need.”
Source: http://www.cnbc.com/id/102470863
AcuityAds and SlimCut Media Announce Partnership to Deliver Innovative In-Article Native Video Ad Unit
AcuityAds Inc, (TSXV: AT) a leader in online and mobile advertising, today announced that it has been selected by SlimCut Media as a Preferred Partner for its Innovative In-Article Native Video Ad Unit “SplitBox™.”
This partnership will provide AcuityAds with the ability to deliver in-stream video ad units across the SlimCut Media platform ‘Premium Private Marketplace’, consisting only of premium publishers across North America. The SlimCut ‘SplitBox’ In-Article Ad Unit provides AcuityAds with preferred partner access with the ability to deliver video inventory for advertisers with 100% Guaranteed Viewability, 100% Transparency and within 100% Premium Inventory.
“The SplitBox™ is a video ad unit that only loads when readers scroll down in an article. It plays an ad in between paragraphs and closes at the end,” says Damien Véran, President of SlimCut Media. “The unit creates a large, 100% viewable video ad inventory, with a strong reader engagement.”
Access to SlimCut Media private marketplace gives AcuityAds the ability to provide advertisers with:
- Access to expanded video inventory not limited to video only sections
- Contextual Targeting capabilities at the article level
- Robust analytics and performance reporting by vertical and content type
- Brand safety via 100% Premium Private Marketplace
SlimCut Media SplitBox™ creates inventory on both desktop and mobile.
“Quality video inventory is scarce in the marketplace today and ends up exposing advertisers to tremendous risk in their attempts to achieve scale and quality targeting for their online video advertising needs,” says Tal Hayek, CEO of AcuityAds. “The SlimCut Splitbox Ad Unit eliminates the risks associated with current online video by offering advertisers with guaranteed 100% transparency and viewability across a network of 100% premium inventory that meets the needs of both advertisers and publishers.”
Launching in Canada initially, the AcuityAds and SlimCut partnership will be expanding into the US market starting in Q2 of this current fiscal year with the launch of a new network of US premium publishers representing leading news, business, lifestyle, and entertainment publishers.
AcuityAds Inc, utilizes its proprietary Programmatic Demand Side Platform technology to enable some of North America’s leading advertisers, representing various verticals ranging from financial Services, automotive manufacturers, consumer packaged goods, pharmaceutical, and retail among many others in order to intelligently target and connect with consumers to drive brand awareness, engagement, and conversions to meet their respective business goals.
About SlimCut Media
SlimCut Media creates new premium advertising opportunities for publishers through video advertising. With offices inToronto, Paris and New York City, SlimCut Media is at the forefront of innovative efforts to monetize content for digital publishers. www.slimcutmedia.com. Damien Véran, co-founder of SlimCut Media, is available for interviews in French and English.
Source: http://acuityads.com/press-release-march-3-2015/
Novus Health introduces Stay Healthy at Work™ – A new targeted health management program for the workplace
Novus Health, Canada’s leader in health navigation and wellness solutions for workplace health, has announced a nation-wide roll-out of the Stay Healthy at Work™ program, its innovative disease management service for insurers and third-party administrators seeking to manage employee health risks.
Stay Healthy at Work™ proactively tackles today’s most prevalent health conditions and concerns before they lead to extended employee absence and disability claims. The program equips at-work employees to manage their symptoms, navigate health care resources, and improve their health.
As part of an integrated, web-based wellness strategy, Stay Healthy at Work™ represents an affordable, turnkey solution for Canadian insurance suppliers to offer employers and plan sponsors a highly effective health management program. The integrated program gives employees telephone and online access to engaging health tools and resources. In addition, it provides support from health care professionals, thereby helping employees better manage health conditions that affect their daily life. With proactively triggered coaching, Stay Healthy at Work™ specifically targets repetitive strain injuries, stress, anxiety, depression, back and neck pain, pre-diabetes and diabetes, high cholesterol, and high blood pressure—all of which contribute to rising health plan costs.
According to the 2013 Sanofi Canada Healthcare Survey, 69% of employees felt their employers should take greater steps to help prevent disease, illness, and injury among their employees, rather than simply pay for treatment. Likewise, 91% of plan sponsors surveyed felt they should do more for their employees by taking a more proactive approach by focusing on prevention.
The Stay Healthy at Work™ program provides proactive intervention and outreach to at-risk employees with online health education and personalized telephone support with a health care professional who is there to prepare and activate the employee toward improved self-management. “We are living in a new era in which individuals are able to drive their own health care. And employers are in a unique position to equip employees with powerful tools and services to help them better manage and improve their health. Stay Healthy at Work™ is an ideal solution for organizations to have a real impact” says Dr. Richard Heinzl, Novus Health’s Medical Director.
Source: http://www.novushealth.com/2015/02/novus-health-introduces-stay-healthy-at-work-a-new-targeted-health-management-program-for-the-workplace/
Signals Company’s Growing Global Presence as Premier Provider of Mobile Newsgathering Solutions
Dejero, award-winning creator of the industry’s most powerful and versatile family of mobile newsgathering products, today announced reseller/distributor partnerships with Videodata in Brazil, SRSG in India, Axioma Video in Mexico, and BPS Broadcast & Production Services in the U.K. The deals illustrate Dejero’s ongoing expansion into new international markets, with each company representing the Dejero LIVE+ Platform of products and services to broadcast news and media organizations in its respective country.
Videodata is a leading system integrator and equipment supplier to the Brazilian broadcast, production, telecommunications, and government market. SRSG serves Indian broadcasters and media companies with a full range of systems integration, consulting, and broadcast IT and media technology products. In Mexico, Axioma Video provides broadcasting equipment to TV professionals throughout the country, and BPS Broadcast & Production Services is one of the U.K.’s largest suppliers of leading-edge broadcast video and audio equipment.
“Signing resellers in Brazil, India, Mexico, and the U.K. is further proof of Dejero’s rapid international growth,” said Brian Cram, CEO, Dejero. “Our LIVE+ Platform of mobile transmission solutions has worldwide appeal because it enables any news organization or video content contributor, anywhere, to transport high-quality HD video from remote locations at a fraction of the cost and complexity of traditional microwave and satellite vehicles, while also managing transmitter devices and content in the cloud. Each of these highly respected and expert resellers have been chosen based on its excellent reputation and ability to provide top-notch service. We are excited to partner with them to help us expand our reach in their regions and provide a valuable local presence for Dejero.”
Re-posted from: http://www.dejero.com/news/view/dejero-signs-resellers-in-brazil-india-mexico-and-the-u.k
AcuityAds Provides Q4 Preliminary Unaudited Results: 46% Revenue Growth and Anticipated Reduction in EBITDA Loss
AcuityAds Holdings Inc. (TSXV:AT) (“AcuityAds” or “Company”), a leader in online and mobile advertising, today announced that its fourth quarter (Q4 2014) unaudited revenue, for the period ended on December 31, 2014, grew by 46% to $4.4 million, compared to $3.0 million in Q4 2013. Although the Company has yet to complete its year-end audit, it is anticipating at this time that the EBITDA loss will be less than that reported in the third quarter of 2014.
“The significant growth in our quarterly top-line results is a clear testament to the success of our growth strategy,” said Tal Hayek, CEO of AcuityAds. “We are seeing our revenue growth accelerating as the result of our earlier investments in both the US market and our SaaS self-service offerings. While our revenues have continued to increase on a year over year basis, we have recently intensified our focus on cost management with a view to positive EBITDA in the next few quarters following our significant, but very important investments made in the US market.”
The Company is also pleased to announce the hiring of David Andrews CA who will be assuming the role of Chief Financial Officer of the Company, effective February 2nd, 2015. Mr. Andrews has more than 30 years of experience in the information technology sector, working with a wide range of companies, from Fortune 500 companies to Canadian ‘small cap’ companies. He was the former Chief Financial Officer of Redline Communications, Sun Microsystems of Canada, OnX Enterprise Solutions, Insystems Technologies and Compaq Computers Canada. He was also the former Chief Operating Officer of Coss Systems, and Managing Partner at Magna Partners Ltd. Mr. Andrews will be replacing the Company’s current Chief Financial Officer, Cathy Steiner.
“We appreciate Cathy’s many contributions to Acuity’s growth, and I speak for the broader management team and Board of Directors in wishing her the best of success with her future endeavours,” continued Mr. Hayek. “We are also very excited to have Dave join our team. Dave has wealth of experience and success working with public and private companies, and we believe that his experience and hands on approach will add significant value to our future growth as one of Canada’s fastest growing technology companies.”
Source: http://acuityads.com/press-release-january-28-2015/
Dealer-FX Announces Integration Agreement with MyDealerLot
Today, Dealer-FX officially announced that they have collaborated with MyDealerLot in a third party integration initiative. This partnership will provide dealerships using MyDealerLot and Dealer-FX’s Retail Service Solution enhanced efficiencies and streamlined processes to enhance the customer experience. It will also evolve in the future to account for emerging connected service drive and connected vehicle technology.
The focus of this integration initiative is between MyDealerLot’s Service Drive Concierge™ and the Dealer-FX Advisor Dashboard solution. Service Drive Concierge™ uses RFID technology to provide automated customer arrival information and targeted messaging to anyone within your store. Now, with the integration with Dealer-FX’s Advisor Dashboard, when a customer pulls into a dealership, all of the customer and vehicle information is automatically loaded into the Advisor Dashboard. That provides a Service Advisor with all the vital vehicle information they need to start the write-up process right at their fingertips, such as: customer information, VIN, service history, recalls, warranty information and more.
“The formal integration of these two technologies enables dealerships to provide an accurate, consistent and transparent service experience at every service visit. This will help to build trust and loyalty with your customers as it reduces data input to make the process more efficient and ensures a consistent message about service procedures regardless of receiving the information from their owner’s manual, the dealer’s online service scheduler or the Service Advisor,” said Gary Kalk, President & CEO of Dealer-FX Group Inc. “Not only does it enhance the customer experience, but it also makes your service department more efficient and profitable.”
The next phase of this integration partnership will see Dealer-FX’s new Route Sheet 3.0 linking with MyDealerLot’s Zonal Tracking system to allow dealers the ability to identify where in the service process each vehicle is and provide proactive status notifications to the customer. Both Dealer-FX and MyDealerLot are committed to this collaboration and are proud to offer dealers a streamlined business process.
Source
Dealer-FX Announces Integration Agreement with MPK Automotive Systems
Today, Dealer-FX officially announced that they have partnered with MPK Automotive Systems in a third party integration initiative. This partnership will provide dealerships using the MPK Data Management System (DMS) enhanced efficiencies and streamlined processes on the service drive.
The technology behind Dealer-FX’s Retail Service Solution and the MPK DMS will give dealerships the benefits of “push and pull” integration. That means service advisors will be able to “pull” a customer’s service, sales and appointment history to make the initial stages of the write-up as efficient as possible. In addition, the service drive can automatically “push” service appointments and repair orders directly into the DMS while capturing the correct mileage, Op Codes, pricing and descriptions – along with customer and vehicle details.
“We are thrilled to partner with MPK in this initiative,” said Gary Kalk, President & CEO at Dealer-FX. “Our service drive solutions, coupled with their integration capabilities, give dealers a powerful tool to improve the write-up process. This enhances customer experience, supports retention and generates additional revenue and profits.”
Service drive processes utilizing integration and Dealer-FX’s solutions give advisors the ability to quickly and simply complete the write-up process and minimize data entry duplication. All of this can be initiated from the convenience of a tablet device or desktop PC.
Source: http://www.dealer-fx.net/dealer-fx-announces-integration-agreement-with-mpk-automotive-systems/
TransGaming Announces Monetization of GameTree™ TV Across Smart TVs Globally
TransGaming Inc. (TSX-V: TNG) today announced at CES 2015 that it will be monetizing its on-demand cloud gaming service GameTree™ TV across its global Smart TV ecosystem, in partnership with leading global monetization platform Paymentwall.
TransGaming’s GameTree™ TV holds the largest connected TV distribution footprint in the world, currently accessible on over 100 million Smart TV’s across its TV OEM partners including: LG, Samsung, Panasonic, VIZIO, Philips, Toshiba, and Sharp. The partnership will allow TransGaming to monetize its monthly active users via subscription and in-game micro-transaction payments using Paymentwall’s all-in-one Smart TV payment suite.
“In partnership with Paymentwall we are able to monetize GameTree TV’s rich catalogue of HTML5 games across our global Smart TV distribution channels in new and innovative ways,” said Dennis Ensing, COO & Interim CEO at TransGaming. “We have demonstrated our industry leadership within the rapidly expanding Smart TV gaming market by securing partnerships with every major TV OEM provider on the planet. Now, by becoming the first company in the world to introduce sophisticated payment capabilities on Smart TVs, we are capitalizing on the opportunity to unlock the full monetization potential of the massive addressable market we have secured.”
TransGaming’s GameTree™ TV HTML5 service is ubiquitous across all its Smart TV partners, making connected TV gaming a mainstream activity by delivering an entertaining and interactive experience that can be enjoyed by everyone with access to a Smart TV. HTML5 games & applications solve hard problems for developers who are increasingly targeting a multi-device, multi-platform world. GameTree TV works directly in any browser or platform without additional plugins or installations, utilizing one code base that allows games to run on any device supporting HTML5, including TV, Mac, PC, and mobile.
“This partnership facilitates the monetization of TransGaming’s service through Paymentwall, while allowing GameTree TV to expand into new markets worldwide,” said Honor Gunday, CEO & Founder at Paymentwall. “TransGaming’s bigger-picture thinking will enable the company to become one of the first to successfully monetize their Smart TV user-base worldwide.”
Paymentwall’s secure card tokenization makes one-click checkout a breeze, simplifying recurring billing for GameTree TV subscriptions with an intuitive UI requiring only numeric input that allows users to quickly and effortlessly complete their purchases. Alternate checkout methods are also available on a secondary device like a laptop, tablet or smartphone by visiting a unique URL or scanning a QR code to easily complete the purchase. Once subscribed to GameTree TV the service will feature a new selection of top rated games and features as part of an updated catalogue.
Source: https://www.transgaming.com/news/transgaming-announces-monetization-gametree-tv-across-smart-tvs-globally