Aptoide, the leading alternative app distribution and monetization platform, surged forward in 2023, achieving critical milestones that cement its leadership in the mobile gaming industry.

The platform amplified its catalog by partnering with gaming giants like Gardenscapes, Matchington Mansion, Evony: The King's Return, The Walking Dead: Survivors, Age of Apes, Infinite Magicraid and Triple Match 3D. These collaborations underline Aptoide's commitment to delivering diverse, high-quality gaming experiences to its global user base.

Aptoide's exceptional 75% year-on-year revenue growth stands as a testament to its innovative approach and unwavering dedication. This significant increase not only reflects user satisfaction but also highlights the platform's appeal to developers, reinforcing its industry foothold.

Building on this momentum, Aptoide secured a €8.5 million investment from Digital Turbine (DT), marking a key development in their strategic partnership. This funding reinforces DT's initial investment in October 2022, emphasizing their joint determination to revolutionize app distribution and monetization.

Playing a crucial role in the partnership is GamesHub, a joint effort between Digital Turbine and Aptoide. GamesHub is a game app store that is fast becoming the relevant platform for the main operators in the United States. The platform's strategic partnerships with mobile carriers like ATT, Verizon, USCellular, Tracfone, Cricket and BLU US position it for significant growth in 2024.

Paulo Trezentos, Aptoide's Founder and CEO, remarked, "Our accomplishments in 2023 validate our commitment to delivering exceptional experiences. The expansion of our gaming catalog and substantial growth underscores our relentless pursuit of innovation".

Álvaro Pinto, Aptoide's Founder and COO, added, "We are proud of our team's dedication in achieving these milestones. Our collaborative efforts have empowered us to redefine app distribution, offering unparalleled solutions to both users and developers".

Aptoide's expansion in 2023 showcases its success in driving change in the app distribution landscape, providing ever-stronger, cutting-edge solutions for both users and developers. With several landmark regulatory decisions expected in the coming months, 2024 should see the company further extend its leadership in the mobile gaming industry.

Based on a ground-breaking study by Reach3 Insights and The Keller Advisory Group, Reach3 developed and launched the world's first and only, holistic and fully-integrated solution to predict and measure the engagement, cultural relevance, shareability and brand impact of experiential brand activations. The study revealed compelling statistics, emphasizing the emotional connection and uniqueness of brand experiences. To address measurement challenges, Reach3 uncovered three foundational pillars: pre-testing for risk reduction, in-the-moment engagement for real-time insights, and post-event reflection and behavior to connect activations with tangible business impact. The solution produces a predictive performance score based on a proprietary index bolstered by a new set of norms that can be used to benchmark impact and ROI.

Vitruveo announces a significant milestone, having exceeded $1 million in NFT (Non-Fungible Token) sales

Vitruveo, the groundbreaking blockchain platform designed exclusively for creators, proudly announces a significant milestone, having exceeded $1 million in NFT (Non-Fungible Token) sales. The achievement marks a momentous step forward for the ecosystem, which has rapidly gained traction within the creator and Web3 community.

This remarkable accomplishment reflects the growing demand for Vitruveo's unique approach to empowering creators in the digital age. Vitruveo's innovative blockchain ecosystem enables artists to tokenize and monetize their work securely, providing them with new avenues for revenue generation and audience engagement.

Vitruveo achieved the milestone through the sales of its Booster and Super Booster NFTs. Embedded in every NFT is a piece of art by renowned global artists, and each artwork is Augmented Reality (AR) -enabled so that the buyer gets their own unique experience of the art they collect. In December 2023, all Booster and Super Booster NFT artworks got showcased at Times Square, New York.

On top of receiving a set amount of $VTRU tokens, Vitruveo’s native cryptocurrency, holders of the NFT earn 30% of the commission fee from art sales. They can also take advantage of Vitruveo’s early adopter rewards through the protocol’s unique built-in rebasing function where holders can see their $VTRU tokens compound over time without having to worry about inflation.

In a recent statement, Nik Kalyani, Founder and CEO of Vitruveo, expressed gratitude for the overwhelming support from both creators and the broader community. "We are thrilled to have crossed the $1 million mark in NFT sales, and we are deeply grateful to our vibrant community who trust in Vitruveo’s vision to become the most trusted blockchain for creators in existence. This success reinforces our commitment to providing creators with a blockchain platform that empowers them to thrive in the digital economy."

The funds raised through the NFT sales will be strategically allocated to strengthen and evolve Vitruveo's ecosystem. Key areas of focus include enhancing platform features, expanding partnerships, covering exchange liquidity, and deploying cutting-edge decentralized applications (Dapps) to ensure a seamless and secure experience for creators and collectors alike.

Buxton, a market leader in retail customer analytics, and Elevar, a dynamic conversion tracking solution for fast-scaling e-commerce brands, have joined forces in an exciting acquisition by Buxton. While the deal's financial terms remain undisclosed, Buxton believes this strategic collaboration can revolutionize the landscape of data-driven consumer insights. 

Founded in 1994, Buxton aims to redefine the realm of customer analytics by incorporating psychographics and buying behaviors, providing businesses with a holistic understanding of their customers. Elevar, since its inception, has sought to empower e-commerce brands with a comprehensive conversion tracking solution that helps optimize ad campaigns and maximize customer re-engagement.  

"Understanding customers and predicting their needs is critical for consumer-oriented businesses to thrive in today's omnichannel, rapidly changing environment," emphasized Jim Swift, CEO at Buxton. "Elevar and Buxton both place customer journey and behavioral analytics at the core of their products. While our platforms have historically varied in approach, our complementary capabilities are a winning combination. As an omnichannel powerhouse, we aim to deliver intelligence that can help to shape the future of both online and in-store experiences." 

The collaboration deepens Buxton and Elevar's commitment to customer-centricity, seeking to usher in an era of unparalleled insights that foster a perpetual, interactive exchange between brands and customers. Buxton believes this partnership will enable a profound understanding of buyers and their behavior, allowing companies to provide invaluable intelligence and conversion events to leading marketing platforms, boosting engagement across omnichannel touchpoints.  

"As the lines of in-store and online shopping continue to blur, we believe this synergy will enable our customers to orchestrate extraordinary customer journeys and true personalized one-to-one marketing," noted Brad Redding, CEO and Founder of Elevar.  

The combination of Elevar’s data capture ingenuity and Buxton’s analytics prowess unlocks powerful consumer understanding, and the integration with Shopify and other POS and marketing systems empowers marketers to act on that information seamlessly. Moving forward, Buxton will continue to focus on delivering AI powered intelligence solutions to brands. 

Tanner Austin, Senior Vice President at PSG, expressed enthusiasm about the partnership, stating, "We believe that the complementary combination of Buxton’s innovation in analytics and Elevar’s conversion tracking platform will better serve customers across core end-markets. We are excited to partner with Buxton and Elevar during this next phase of growth.”  

This strategic move marks a pivotal moment in the evolution of data-driven insights, positioning Buxton and Elevar as leaders in shaping the future of customer engagement across multiple channels. 

QuantaSing Group Limited (“QuantaSing” or the “Company”), today announced the appointment of a new independent director and a change to the audit committee of the Company’s board of directors (the “Audit Committee”).

Mr. Chenyang Wei was appointed as an independent director of the Company and as a member of the Audit Committee, effective on January 22, 2024.

Mr. Chenyang Wei has served as the Associate Dean of Institute for Fintech Research, Tsinghua University and Director of China Insurance and Pension Research Center, the National Institute of Financial Research, Tsinghua University PBC School of Finance since April 2019. From December 2016 to March 2019, Mr. Wei served as a senior managing director and chief U.S. economist in Zenity Asset Management Inc., a Silicon Valley-based asset management firm focusing on multi-sector asset allocation in the U.S. financial market. Prior to joining Zenity, Mr. Wei served as a director and head of credit research at AIG from August 2012 to December 2016. From June 2011 to August 2012, Mr. Wei was a senior economist with Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia. From 2006 to 2011, Mr. Wei was an economist with Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Mr. Wei is also an independent director of PICC Property and Casualty Company Limited, HSBC Life Insurance Company Limited and Waterdrop Inc. He also served as an independent director of China Index Holdings Limited from May 2022 to April 2023. Mr. Wei received a bachelor’s degree in finance from Tsinghua University in 1996, a master’s degree in economics from McCombs School of Business, University of Texas at Austin in 2000, and a Ph.D. in finance from Leonard N. Stern School of Business, New York University in 2006.

Acquisition Bolsters Qlik’s Ability to Deliver Comprehensive Answers from Structured and Unstructured Data

Qlik^®, a global leader in data integration, analytics, and AI, today announced the acquisition of pivotal intellectual property (patents and technology) from Kyndi, an innovator in natural language processing, search, and generative AI. This acquisition will support a transformative approach to how organizations interpret and process unstructured data. Kyndi's CEO and leading AI experts will join Qlik as part of the acquisition. This move signifies a substantial advancement in Qlik’s vision of delivering precise, contextually-rich answers to complex business questions. The acquisition leverages the combination of Qlik Cloud’s structured data mastery with Kyndi’s pioneering unstructured data technologies, reinforcing Qlik's position as a transformative market leader in how organizations utilize data.

By embracing Kyndi's expertise and proprietary technology, Qlik steps forward in unlocking valuable insights from customers’ ever-growing reservoirs of unstructured data, integrating these insights seamlessly with structured data analytics. This move not only continues Qlik's extensive track record in AI leadership, but also emphasizes its commitment to providing comprehensive, enterprise-wide solutions that address the critical need for in-depth analytics across all forms of data.

Addressing challenges in current answer engines, Kyndi's expertise enables Qlik to offer innovative solutions for managing and curating answers, unlocking new use cases for decision-making from a vast spectrum of data sources. This empowers users with comprehensive, quality-assured insights, setting a new benchmark in the data analytics landscape.

James Fisher, Qlik Chief Strategy Officer, said, "The acquisition of Kyndi's assets represents a key step in Qlik’s AI vision, supporting our ability to deliver rich, trusted answers from complex business questions. It enhances our established leadership in AI, ensuring that Kyndi's innovative unstructured data processing combined with our powerful structured analytics will unlock richer and more actionable insights for our customers."

Ryan Welsh, Founder and CEO of Kyndi, expressed, "I’m thrilled to join the Qlik team. Qlik is perfectly positioned to deliver on the promise of generative AI. We have a unique opportunity to enhance how AI-powered insights create value for customers. Introducing our innovations into Qlik's technology will enable the merging of structured and unstructured data, thereby empowering users with deeper insights and more informed decisions across a wide range of business scenarios."

Nathan Hoover, Innovations Supervisor at UPS, said, “The evolution of Qlik's AI portfolio demonstrates the remarkable potential for ongoing collaboration. Qlik's dedication to driving innovation in AI aligns with UPS's commitment to leveraging cutting-edge technology for business transformation. The future looks promising.”

This acquisition directly addresses the rapidly growing volume of unstructured data in the world. Qlik's incorporation of Kyndi's technology into its cloud solutions enriches decision intelligence by providing more comprehensive answers with enhanced context and relevance. This advancement strengthens the management and curation of enterprise data, fostering trust and consistency across organizations while upholding stringent governance and security standards.

Mike Leone, Principal Analyst at Enterprise Strategy Group commented, "Qlik's acquisition of Kyndi’s assets is a significant move that reinforces its already established AI credentials and vision in the decision intelligence space. Recognizing the criticality of enabling the combined analysis of structured and unstructured data, Qlik has positioned itself at the forefront of innovative analytics. By anticipating the surge in unstructured data analysis, this will enable Qlik’s customers to gain better insights that enhance decision-making across various industries."

This acquisition lays the groundwork for innovative future product announcements, to be revealed at Qlik Connect in Orlando, Florida from 3-5 June 2024. It underscores Qlik's leadership in Generative AI, expanding its capabilities and market presence.

Pivotree Inc., a leading provider of frictionless commerce solutions and services, today announced the appointment of Cliff Isaacson as Chief Product Officer. Mr. Isaacson joined the company on January 15, 2024.

As Chief Product Officer, Cliff Isaacson will be responsible for building winning product strategies focused on the evolution of existing products and supporting the development of new products. He will lead product teams and manage the overall solution introduction and product strategy for Pivotree.

“We are thrilled to welcome Cliff Isaacson to Pivotree," said Bill Di Nardo, CEO of Pivotree. "His experience in leading product strategies and expanding solution offerings for large scale enterprise retailers, distributors, and manufacturers will be invaluable as we continue to support our customers with adapting to the ever-changing market and striving to digitally transform their business and retail experience."

Cliff brings over twenty years of industry experience with supply chain and product management expertise. Prior to this role, Cliff led product strategies as Senior Retail Business Consultant for o9 Solutions, as well as leading the implementation of price optimization and supply chain management solutions at Blue Ridge Global as Executive Vice President of Product Strategy.

Prior to joining Pivotree, Cliff founded Prolific Virtue and played a key role in its growth and acquisition by Blue Ridge. He also co-founded CarrierPoint and served as Chief Technology Officer until its acquisition by TransCore, managing strategy and all aspects of pricing and syndicated data management across retail, distribution, manufacturing, and aftermarket sales.

Cliff holds a Bachelor of Science (BSc) in Computer Science from Northwestern University and a Master of Science (MSc) in Industrial Administration from Carnegie Mellon University, Tepper School of Business.

The past year saw developments and updates to privacy regulations across the globe—from India’s Personal Data Protection Bill to Brazil’s General Data Protection Law. However, only 34 percent of organizations say they find it easy to understand their privacy obligations and only 43 percent are very or completely confident in their organization’s privacy team’s ability to ensure data privacy and achieve compliance with new privacy laws and regulations, according to ISACA’s Privacy in Practice 2024 survey report.

More than 1,300 global professionals in data privacy roles responded to the survey, weighing in on privacy topics such as staffing, organization structure, policies, budgets and training.

Privacy Challenges

In addition to difficulty understanding the privacy regulatory landscape, organizations also face other data privacy challenges, including budget. Nearly half of respondents (43 percent) say their privacy budget is underfunded and only 36 percent say their budget is appropriately funded. When looking at the year ahead, only 24 percent say that they expect budget will increase (down 10 points from last year), and only one percent say it will remain the same (down 26 points from last year). Over half (51 percent) expect a decrease in budget, which is significantly higher than last year when only 12 percent expected a decrease in budget.

For those seeking resources, technical privacy positions are in highest demand, with 62 percent of respondents indicating there will be increased demand for technical privacy roles in the next year, compared to 55 percent for legal/compliance roles. However, respondents indicate there are skills gaps among these privacy professionals; they cite experience with different types of technologies and/or applications (63 percent) as the biggest one.

When looking at common privacy failures, respondents pinpointed the lack of or poor training (49 percent), not practicing privacy by design (44 percent) and data breaches (42 percent) as the main concerns.

“When privacy teams face limited budgets and skills gaps among their workforce, it can be even more difficult to stay on top of ever evolving and expanding data privacy regulations and even increase the risk of data breaches,” says Safia Kazi, ISACA principal, privacy professional practices. “By understanding where these challenges lie, organizations can take the necessary measures to remedy them and change course to strengthen their privacy teams and programs.”

Taking Action

One of the ways that organizations are mitigating both workforce gaps and privacy failures is through training. Half of respondents (50 percent) note they are training to allow non-privacy staff to move into privacy roles, while 39 percent are increasing usage of contract employees or outside consultants.

With employee training, 86 percent indicate their organization provides privacy awareness training for employees, with 66 percent providing training to all employees annually, and 52 percent of respondents providing privacy awareness training to new hires. Interestingly, respondents note that their organizations are most often looking at the number of employees completing training (65 percent) as the main metric used to track effectiveness of privacy training, not a decrease in privacy incidents (56 percent).

Despite the challenges faced, 63 percent of organizations say they did not have a material privacy breach in the past 12 months, and 18 percent are not seeing a change in the number of breaches they are experiencing. Respondents are also optimistic: less than one in five (16 percent) say they expect a material privacy breach in the next 12 months.

Value of Privacy by Design

Organizations that practice privacy by design experience some key advantages:

• They have more employees in privacy roles (median staff size 15 vs. nine among all respondents) and are more likely to say their technical privacy department is appropriately staffed (42 percent vs. 34 percent among all respondents).
• They strongly believe their board of directors prioritizes organization privacy (77 percent vs. 57 percent total).
• They are much less likely to see organizational privacy programs as purely compliance driven (35 percent vs. 44 percent total), and more likely as a combination of compliance, ethics and competitive advantage (39 percent vs. 29 percent total).
• Feel their privacy budget is appropriately funded (50% vs. 36% total)

Ultimately, organizations that always practice privacy by design are also much more likely to be very or completely confident in their organization’s privacy team’s ability to ensure data privacy and achieve compliance with new privacy laws and regulations (71 percent versus 43 percent).

Kazi and Jon Brandt, ISACA director, professional practices & innovation for content development and services, will discuss further in an upcoming webinar, The State of Privacy 2024, taking place 25 January at 12:00 PM (ET) / 11:00 AM (CT) / 9:00 AM (PT) / 16:00 (UTC). It is free for members and US$75 for non-members and will be available on-demand for a year afterward.