Alation is recognized for its modern approach to data governance that empowers business and data leaders with the knowledge and context they need to be data-driven

Alation, the data intelligence company, today announced that it has been named 2023 Data Governance Partner of the Year by Databricks, the Data and AI company. Databricks recognized Alation for its continued leadership in delivering data governance for the lakehouse.

Organizations produce and store vast amounts of data across on-premises, cloud, and legacy systems. This can make finding, understanding, and trusting data more difficult. Databricks Unity Catalog is a unified governance solution for all data and AI assets that empower organizations to quickly find and understand reference data in their lakehouse.

With Alation, Databricks customers can seamlessly integrate Unity Catalog with Alation’s Data Intelligence Platform to provide unified governance across both Databricks and non-Databricks data sources. Organizations now have the ability to search for and discover the knowledge and information they need to make data-driven decisions across their entire technology landscape.

“There’s an undeniable shift in how organizations address data governance,” said Diby Malakar, VP of Product Management at Alation. “Alation enables a federated approach that enforces centralized governance policies while also granting everyone the autonomy to self-serve – a stark contrast to traditional control-oriented governance. Our partnership with Databricks empowers everyone to independently search for and discover trusted data and build a data culture.”

“We are excited to name Alation the 2023 Databricks Data Governance Partner of the Year,” said Roger Murff, VP of Technology Partners at Databricks. “Data is no longer restricted to technical teams, and Alation’s approach to governance makes trusted data accessible by anyone, which is instrumental in our customers unlocking true value from the lakehouse. We look forward to deepening our partnership with Alation and continuing to enable joint customers to leverage trusted data as a valuable tool.”

OneSignal State of Customer Messaging in 2023: Companies Are Reducing Marketing and Product Spending and Focusing Too Heavily on Customer Acquisition

OneSignal, the world's leading customer engagement platform, today announced the findings of its State of Customer Messaging in 2023 Report, a qualitative and quantitative look at messaging across the one million businesses that use OneSignal. The survey of more than 1,000 product and marketing professionals, engineers, and C-suite executives from small startups to international brands found that 88% of respondents have adapted their marketing and engagement strategy for 2023 in response to the economic downturn and 82% have reduced marketing and product spending in an effort to improve ROI.

While most respondents acknowledged the need to adjust their marketing and engagement strategies for 2023, the majority still allocated more resources toward customer acquisition than retention. This trend is particularly concerning - industry studies show that acquiring a new customer can cost five times more than retaining an existing one. Ignoring retention strategies is a missed opportunity for ROI and revenue growth.

"Companies need to resist the urge to make cuts in the wrong places - our survey shows that many are making decisions that can hurt retention in today's economy. Customers expect highly relevant, timely, and personalized communication and engagement at every touchpoint - this should be your customer retention strategy for the market we're in right now," said George Deglin, CEO of OneSignal. "In a tight economy, increasing customer retention rates by just 5% can increase profits by 25% to 95%. Focusing on best practices like segmentation, personalization, multichannel engagement, and real-time, automated messaging will play a pivotal role in growth."

The Power of Customer Retention 
Customer retention was top of mind for most survey respondents - 95% said customer retention was very important or somewhat important to their business and 71% said customer retention will become more important in the next three to five years. According to industry estimates, the average success rate of selling to an existing customer is between 60 and 70%, whereas the rate of selling to a new one is between five and 20%.

This shift in focus is fundamental for subscription-driven industries such as the mobile app and SaaS industries, where user retention and engagement are critical to survival. This is true for more traditional industries as well, including finance and healthcare, where customers who feel valued and engaged with a brand are more likely to recommend it to others, leading to increased organic growth. By reducing customer acquisition spending a marginal amount and shifting savings into customer engagement, companies can significantly impact customer lifetime value (LTV) and improve profitability through leaner times.

Additional Key Findings from the OneSignal State of Messaging 2023 Report:

Driving Engagement and Boosting Long-Term Retention

• Personalized communication was identified as the most effective customer retention tactic by a majority of respondents.
• Personalizing messages based on customer behavior and preferences improves click-through rates (CTR) by up to 58%.
• User segmentation leads to 21% higher CTR.

The Role of Omnichannel Engagement

• Companies using an omnichannel engagement strategy see more than three times higher click-through rates than those using just one channel.
• In-app messages achieve click-through rates 25 to 30 times higher than average push notification rates.
• By leveraging multiple communication channels, businesses can cater to user preferences, enhance the user experience, and foster stronger brand loyalty.

OneSignal is used by 20% of all new apps. The customer engagement platform currently delivers more than 12 billion notifications a day.

The report found 76% of marketers are skeptical that their marketing tools will generate the ROI they are hoping for

Optimizely, the leading digital experience platform (DXP) provider, today unveiled a new research report Confessions of a CMO: Uncovering Hidden Costs Impacting ROI that reveals 72% of marketing leaders feel that their tech stacks don't function as seamlessly as they should.

Based on a survey of over 300 U.S. senior marketing executives at companies with 100+ employees, the report uncovers hidden marketing costs, technological deficiencies, pain points, and potential solutions.

No one likes to waste money, and marketing leaders have shown they are far too often spending on tools they know don't fully address their pain points," said Shafqat Islam, Optimizely's Chief Marketing Officer. "This data supports what we understand at Optimizely — marketing tech should not be a burden, but empower greater creativity, collaboration, and productivity within teams. We believe that teams should have the option to leverage these capabilities from consolidated, high-quality vendors that reduce TCO and improve interoperability."

Beyond that, the survey looked ahead at where marketing teams are aiming to invest, and found 92% of senior marketing executives say they are looking to adopt generative AI capabilities.

Additional key takeaways from Optimizely's new study include:

Hidden costs are holding marketers back

• 76% of senior marketers are skeptical that their marketing tools will generate the ROI they are hoping for.
• Senior marketers report that about 23% of their un-integrated tech results in unnecessary redundancy.
• 70% of senior marketers admit their organizations approve investments in new technology solutions without a defined ROI plan sometimes, very often, or all the time.

The new martech stack tools are being left to rust

• 53% of senior marketers report companies use older solutions rather than investing in new tools because of the cost and time it would take to retrain staff.
• The other main reasons teams' martech stacks aren't up to date:
• 43% say leaders are too attached to the old solutions.
• 42% say the team is afraid to let go of a few specific functions.
• 39% say the rollout was disrupted and never resumed.

Overburdened with too many tools, marketing teams rely heavily on IT professionals

• 95% of senior marketers whose companies use 20+ tools agreed: marketers are leaning too heavily on the IT team.
• 52% of senior marketers are very or extremely reliant on their IT team for the day-to-day use of marketing tools.
• 85% of senior marketers said their IT team is left to make marketing decisions despite a lack of relevant experience.

In search of efficient creativity, marketers are jumping into generative AI

• 44% of marketers report their company will adopt generative AI quickly, while 48% will adopt it later once bugs are worked out.
• The most beneficial generative AI abilities according to senior marketers:
• 48% - Code generation
• 48% - Image generation
• 48% - Audio generation
• 44% - Automated conversations
• 41% - Text generation

CDP earns prestigious industry recognition

BlueConic has once again been named the best customer data platform as part of the 2023 SIIA CODiE Awards, which recognize the companies producing the most innovative Business and Education Technology products across the country and around the world. The recognition comes on the heels of several other notable awards BlueConic has received over the past year, including the People’s Choice Stevie® Award.

“We are extremely proud that the SIIA CODiE Awards have named BlueConic the top CDP in the industry for the second year in a row,” said Cory Munchbach, CEO, BlueConic. “As a company, our mission is to deliver both a world-class product, and a customer experience characterized by expertise, partnership, and empathy. We firmly believe that the unstoppable combination of our people and our platform powers our customers to achieve the highest performance.”

“The 2023 Business Technology and Education Technology CODiE Award winners exemplify the outstanding products, services and overall innovation that enables learners of all types to connect with educators and educational materials,” said SIIA President Chris Mohr. “We are so proud to recognize this year’s honorees – the best of the best – that provide solutions to many of the critical challenges facing learners today – from access and equity, to personalized and tailored learning and beyond. Congratulations to all of this year’s CODiE Award winners!”

The Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA), the principal trade association for the software and digital content industries, announced the full slate of CODiE winners during a virtual winner announcement. Awards were given for products and services deployed specifically for education and learning professionals, including the top honor of the Best Overall Education Technology Solution.

A SIIA CODiE Award win is a prestigious honor, following rigorous reviews by expert judges including educators and administrators whose evaluations determined the finalists. SIIA members then vote on the finalist products, and the scores from both rounds are tabulated to select the winners.

ThoughtSpot, the AI-Powered Analytics company, today announced it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Mode Analytics, the modern Business Intelligence (BI) platform that brings data teams and business teams together to drive impact, in a cash and equity deal valued at $200M. Upon close of the acquisition, Mode will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of ThoughtSpot. By combining their respective technology as a versatile suite of analytical tools, the two companies are empowering data teams around the world to confidently transform business intelligence with generative AI and deliver value to the business quickly, securely, and at scale.

The announcement comes on the heels of a record breaking year for ThoughtSpot, and will further accelerate the company's growth. Over the last fiscal year, ThoughtSpot has seen 100% growth in its SaaS ARR, driven by the company's success in helping both global enterprises like Verizon, CVS, Anthem, Capital One, Snowflake, and Comcast and digital natives like Wellthy, Modern Milkman, and Huel, more effectively leverage their data in the cloud.

With the acquisition, ThoughtSpot's ARR will grow to over $150M, while doubling its customer base. With very little customer overlap, this transaction will create new opportunities for each company to bring their respective products to customers, while further scaling Mode across ThoughtSpot’s international market presence and broad channel and partner alliances.

Turning data into dollars with complementary capabilities
Every organization, regardless of size, maturity, or industry, knows they need to build their business on data. By putting trusted, contextual insights into the hands of every employee, businesses have seen revenue grow 10-30% faster than their peers. Despite this benefit, the challenge of delivering self service analytics for business users, without overwhelming data teams, has remained out of reach for most organizations. Generative AI promises to accelerate data democratization but comes with added pressure for data teams to prepare data and deploy governed, secure, and accurate systems to business users.

The combination of ThoughtSpot and Mode lets data teams transform their business intelligence to be AI-first, while reducing bottlenecks and increasing access to insights that drive tangible business results. With Mode and ThoughtSpot, companies can go from code-first analysis to code-free data exploration and back again quickly, giving customers both the speed and flexibility of code with governed, trusted self service analytics.

Data teams at hundreds of innovative companies leverage Mode’s code-first experience to answer novel questions as quickly as they arise from the business. With connected, code-first tools like SQL, R, and Python and advanced visualization tools, analysts have flexibility and choice to work with raw data, from any cloud data platform, in highly impactful ways. Now, leveraging ThoughtSpot’s industry-leading AI capabilities, data teams will soon have expanded access to AI to help every analyst feel like they’re pair programming with the best analyst they know, right in Mode.

They can also quickly and efficiently develop robust, reusable data models called datasets. This modeled data can then be served up in ThoughtSpot’s intuitive platform, where every kind of user, from executives to frontline decision makers, can use AI-powered natural language search to ask data questions, get answers, and take action as easily as they chat with a friend or colleague. And with Mode’s extensive visualization library, business users and data teams have more options to visualize data and communicate insights as they build Liveboards.

Making insights pervasive
Cutting edge organizations want to bring data-driven insights into the processes and tools their teams use every day. With Mode and ThoughtSpot, customers embed this analytics experience in the apps they use, or build entirely new data apps. Customers will be able to further extend the new functionality Mode brings to ThoughtSpot into productivity tools like Slack, Google Sheets, Excel, and Microsoft Teams, embed directly into products and apps with ThoughtSpot Everywhere, or be consumed on the go with ThoughtSpot Monitor for Mobile, giving business users access to insights everywhere they make decisions.

For partners across the ecosystem, the acquisition of Mode will create new ways for these partners to provide value to the data teams they support. Partners will be able to use SQL to quickly build new self service analytics capabilities and use cases. These can then be quickly deployed to customers, enabling them to get insights ten times faster than any other comparable solution.

Thoughts from the Top
“Unless you’ve had your head in the sand, every leader in every organization knows they need to figure out how to leverage generative AI to move more quickly and deliver personalized, bespoke experiences to customers. Failing to do so is tantamount to admitting defeat,” said Sudheesh Nair, CEO, ThoughtSpot. “For too long, data teams have been held back by the last generation of archaic data visualization tools like Tableau that forced them to endlessly tweak and update dashboards. With this acquisition, we’re giving both data teams and business users the tools they need to efficiently and quickly turn data into insights and those insights into actions. Whether you want to be code-free for your business users or code-first for your analytics engineers, now is the time to rethink business intelligence if you want to maximize value from your investments in the modern data stack. If you don’t, your competitors will.”

“Today we celebrate the beginning of a new and exciting chapter, not only for Mode, but for the modern data stack, which has been sorely lacking a truly modern business intelligence platform - until now. As part of ThoughtSpot, we will help supercharge the business impact of data teams, empowering them to deliver trustworthy AI-powered insights to their organizations quickly,” said Gaurav Rewari, Mode CEO. “Together, we are bridging the gap between data teams and business users in a unified, dependable, and governed platform that meets the evolving needs of the modern data landscape, where data teams are liberated from mundane tasks and business users are empowered to explore freely.”

“At Mode, we've always focused on helping data analysts, and worked hard to remove the frustrations that interfered with their day-to-day workflows. By providing data teams with an integrated, code-first experience, we’ve enabled our customers to move far more quickly and find much more value in their data than they previously could. Business users, however, haven't been able to explore data with the same power or flexibility. That's why we're combining forces with ThoughtSpot,” said Benn Stancil, Mode Founder and CTO. “Together, we'll not only continue to help our customers accelerate the work that their data teams are already doing, but also deepen its impact. By combining Mode with ThoughtSpot's natural language search and leading generative AI capabilities, data teams will be able to deliver more than just dashboards; they'll become the stewards of the generative AI revolution, and lead their companies' efforts to implement this powerful technology in a way that is safe, reliable, governed, and secure.”

• Half (50%) of CEOs surveyed report they are already integrating generative AI into digital products and services, but more than half (57%) of CEO respondents are concerned about data security and 48% worry about bias or data accuracy 

• Fewer than one in three CEOs (28%) surveyed have assessed the potential impact of generative AI on their workforces, and 36% say they plan to do so in the next 12 months

A new global study by the IBM Institute for Business Value found that nearly half of CEOs surveyed identify productivity as their highest business priority—up from sixth place in 2022. They recognize technology modernization is key to achieving their productivity goals, ranking it as second highest priority. Yet, CEOs can face key barriers as they race to modernize and adopt new technologies like generative AI.

The annual CEO study*, CEO decision-making in the age of AI, Act with intention, found three-quarters of CEO respondents believe that competitive advantage will depend on who has the most advanced generative AI. However, executives are also weighing potential risks or barriers of the technology such as bias, ethics and security. More than half (57%) of CEOs surveyed are concerned about data security and 48% worry about bias or data accuracy.

There is also a disconnect between CEOs and their teams when it comes to AI readiness. Half (50%) of CEOs surveyed report they are already integrating generative AI into products and services, and 43% say they are using generative AI to inform strategic decisions. Yet, just 29% of their executive teams agree they have the in-house expertise to adopt generative AI; only 30% of non-CEO senior executives surveyed say that their organization is ready to adopt generative AI responsibly.

"Generative AI can reduce the barriers to AI adoption and half of CEOs interviewed are actively exploring it to drive a new wave of  productivity, efficiency and quality of service across industries," said Jesus Mantas, Global Managing Partner, IBM Consulting. "CEOs need to assess their company requirements around data privacy, intellectual property protection, security, algorithmic accountability and governance in order to plan their deployment of emerging use cases of generative AI at scale."

Key study findings include:

CEOs say productivity – and the technology that will help deliver it  – is a pressing priority

• Almost half (48%) of CEOs surveyed pinpoint productivity as a top priority for their organization – up from sixth place in 2022; technology modernization follows as their second highest priority (45%) but CEOs also indicate this is among their top challenges.
• For the fourth consecutive year, CEOs surveyed say technology factors remain the top external force impacting their organization over the next three years.

CEOs are increasingly looking toward operational, technology and data leaders as strategic decision makers

Additional data gathered during the survey indicates the following:

• When asked which C-Suite members will make the most crucial decisions over the next three years, CEO respondents identify COOs (62%) and CFOs (52%).
• The influence of technology leaders on decision making is growing – 38% of  surveyed CEOs point to CIOs (up from 19% a year ago), followed by Chief Technology or Chief Digital Officer (30%) as making the most crucial decisions in their organization.

CEOs indicate they are ready to adopt generative AI, but other executives have reservations

• Three out of four (75%) CEOs surveyed believe the organization with the most advanced generative AI will have competitive advantage.
• Half (50%) of CEOs report they are already integrating generative AI into products and services; 43% say they are using generative AI to inform strategic decisions, with 36% using the technology for operational decisions.
• While 69% of CEO respondents see broad benefits of generative AI across their organization, just 29% of their executive teams agree they have the in-house expertise to adopt generative AI.
• Only 30% of non-CEO senior executives surveyed say that their organization is ready to adopt generative AI responsibly.

Generative AI is fueling workforce changes, but broader assessments of its impact on the workforce are lagging

• About 43% of surveyed CEOs say they have reduced or redeployed their workforce due to generative AI, with an additional 28% indicating they plan to do so in the next 12 months.
• At the same time, 46% of CEOs surveyed have hired additional workers because of generative AI, with 26% saying they have plans for more hiring ahead.
• Yet, fewer than one in three CEOs (28%) surveyed have assessed the potential impact of generative AI on their workforces, and 36% say they plan to do so in the next 12 months.

With Mailchain, BNB Chain users and builders can now email with their .bnb identities.

Mailchain, the communication layer for web3, has launched support for .bnb names as Web3 email addresses. This integration streamlines communication between users, projects, and software developers in the rapidly growing BNB Chain community.

The BNB Chain community actively engages in building and deploying innovative decentralized applications (DApps), including decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols, blockchain-based games, and non-fungible token (NFT) projects and marketplaces. Without the addition of web3-native communication, developers struggle to foster stronger connections with their users and increase engagement.

Web3 email presents a familiar, yet powerful way for users and developers to communicate. Using .bnb identities as email addresses within Mailchain’s unified, web3 inbox, BNB Chain users and builders have a familiar and intuitive way to communicate securely, privately, and efficiently, peer-to-peer and project-to-community. With Mailchain, BNBChain users can now send and receive messages, notifications, and transaction information directly using their .bnb identities or wallet addresses. Mailchain's communication protocol ensures that messages are end-to-end encrypted by default, enabling seamless and secure communication.

BNB Chain DApps can now deliver an enhanced web3 user experience: By leveraging the power of web3 email, Mailchain simplifies communication between BNB Chain users, enabling them to stay connected and informed effortlessly via a unified inbox. Builders can integrate the Mailchain SDK in a few lines of code, offering a cohesive user experience for communication from DApps. Because Mailchain is blockchain protocol-agnostic, it supports cross-chain sending between other blockchain network addresses. BNB Chain users can communicate outside their network, with other web3 blockchain addresses or identities.

"We are thrilled to extend Mailchain's capabilities into the BNB Chain ecosystem," said Tim Boeckmann, CEO of Mailchain. "The addition of .bnb names in Mailchain means BNB Chain users can now use their preferred web3 names to communicate. Using the Mailchain SDK, developers can now easily reach their users. In turn, users can keep up to date with their favorite projects and communities, both inside and outside the immediate BNB Chain community.”

• Snowflake increases investment in Microsoft partnership, focusing on new product integrations with Microsoft’s Azure OpenAI, Azure ML, and more

• The partnership will significantly elevate field collaboration and joint go-to-market initiatives to benefit joint customers, including State Street

• Snowflake and Microsoft will be demonstrating their latest joint product integrations at Snowflake’s annual user conference, Snowflake Summit 2023, June 26-29 live in Las Vegas, Nevada

Snowflake, the Data Cloud company, today announced an expanded partnership with Microsoft, enabling new product integrations across AI, low code/no code application development, data governance, and more. The two companies will also implement new programs to enhance joint go-to-market strategies and improve field collaboration, bringing joint solutions directly to customers. As part of the partnership, Snowflake will increase its Azure spend commit, with both companies jointly supporting go-to-market efforts.

“Snowflake’s partnership with Microsoft is evolving and focused on improving our field collaboration to help our customers enter the next wave of generative AI,” said Chris Degnan, Chief Revenue Officer, Snowflake. “Our integrations with Microsoft’s generative AI and LLM services will enable joint customers to leverage the latest AI models and frameworks, enhancing the productivity of developers.”

"Microsoft is the most trusted platform in enabling partners and customers to innovate seamlessly and securely, especially in this next generation of AI,” said Judson Althoff, executive vice president and chief commercial officer, Microsoft. “Through our expanded partnership, we will combine Snowflake’s Data Cloud expertise with Microsoft’s cloud technologies and AI capabilities to help customers across industries build intelligent solutions to better manage, understand, and govern their data.”

Snowflake will expand its strategic initiatives with Microsoft to empower data scientists and developers with industry-leading AI solutions, build new integrations between the Data Cloud and Azure ML, and leverage integrations with Azure OpenAI and Microsoft Cognitive Services. With the Azure ML integration, joint customers will be able to accelerate the entire development to production workflow for machine learning with access to the latest frameworks, integrated CI/CD, and more. Additionally, to leverage the latest in AI innovation to build intelligent data products, both companies are committed to working toward enabling Snowflake customers to easily and securely leverage Azure OpenAI and Microsoft Cognitive Services with Snowflake data.

Snowflake will continue to create seamless experiences for customers through new and improved product integrations across complementary Microsoft products. These products include Purview for data governance, Power Apps & Automate for low code/no code application development, Azure Data Factory for ELT, Power BI for data visualization, and more.

“Investment management decision-making depends on timely access to a complex ecosystem of data. Delivering this information to our clients with quality and speed, while simultaneously providing advanced analytical capabilities and a sophisticated user experience is what State Street Alpha is all about,” said John Plansky, Head of State Street Alpha. “Partnering with Microsoft’s Azure Cloud and Snowflake, our teams can bring data together with a natural language question and answer type solution. We are able to aggregate content at scale, integrate it with a large language model, make it available in a secure way, and remove friction for our customers, giving them information in near-real time.”

At Snowflake’s annual user conference, Snowflake Summit 2023, Snowflake and Microsoft will be demonstrating the latest product integrations during the following breakout sessions:

• Scale and Operationalize AI with Snowflake and Azure Machine Learning
  • Tuesday, June 27 from 12 - 12:45pm PST
  • Caesars Palace, Julius 5, Breakout Room #04
• Unified Digital Transformation with Microsoft and Snowflake
  • Tuesday, June 27 from 1:30 - 1:50pm PST
  • Caesars Forum, West Theater B, Theater Room #04
• Predictions on Gen AI and LLMs in the Enterprise
  • Thursday, June 29 from 9 - 9:45am PST
  • Octavius Ballroom