Inspired by personal experiences to connect across language barriers, Waverly Labs was founded in 2014 at the convergence of wearable technology and speech translation

Waverly Labs

Without a doubt, initial coin offerings (ICOs) changed the investment landscape all around the globe. This more open form of investing gave a huge jolt to the crowdfunding movement and in turn has raised nearly $ since 2014, spread across thousands of companies. ICOs were exactly what the blockchain world needed to launch itself into the mainstream, but what it didn’t need were all the negative ramifications that came along with ICOs: fraud, pump and dump schemes, outright theft. 14 billion Because ICOs offered little to no rights to token holders, governments struggled to step in and assert their control over the situation. On top of this, ICOs were missing out on major investment opportunities from VC funds and angel investment firms ( ). The solution to these problems came in the form of STOs, or security token offerings. STOs focus on both retail and institutional investors while abiding by all legal regulations and restrictions. Because of this legal compliance, STOs open the door of VC funding opportunities that were previously restricted to select groups. essentially because laws dictate that VCs can only invest in securities Just as we saw ICO agencies popping up overnight during the boom in 2017, we’ll see STO agencies pop up overnight as they grow in popularity. Beware, however, of the agencies that once offered ICO services and are all of the sudden “STO experts” now. Remember, just because a company provided ICO services in the past doesn’t mean they can also provide STO services, since the processes are quite different (not only legally, but also in terms of marketing strategies, investor outreach protocols, and much more). It’s important to look at a company’s track record and investigate how they are planning to offer STO services; if they are actively changing to accommodate this new type of offering then we’ve included them in the list provided below. Section One These are agencies that became well known as ICO agencies and are now working toward becoming STO agencies. They are improving their marketing, outreach, and legal services to provide STO services with the same efficiency as their ICO counterpart. These companies will certainly improve over time, and their past track record with ICOs guarantees them some legitimacy in the market. Priority Token Fundraising, Investor Relations, Legal Framework, Tokenization/STO Dashboard and Incorporation Guidance, PR and Marketing Priority Token has proven their reliability in the ICO market with many successful projects ( , , , , , , , ), a strong investor network, heavy community involvement, and great reviews. They manage a huge chain of investors and funds in the Far East, Middle East, and Europe and also have partnerships with credible exchanges, such as . As they move into the STO market they focus more on fundraising and cater their STO services appropriately. Founders can expect a full suite of STO services from Priority Token that have been specially designed to fit this new market. Their legal framework is one of the strongest services on the market. Faceter Modultrade PlayKey BitRewards SharPay SkyfChain EiraCube LipChain Coinsuper X10 Agency STO Launchpad, Legal Framework, Investment Package, Marketing/PR, Community Management, Fundraising, Post-ICO and Exchange Assistance Some clients that the X10 Agency has successfully worked with in the past include Faceter, Securix.io, Blockchain in Telecom (BubbleTone), CGCX, Paygine, and more. As their primary focus is on marketing in general, their STO services are oriented towards marketing, but also includes special investment packages, PR, and exchange assistance. X10 has proven success with STOs in their portfolio and have plans to focus on the STO niche during 2019 with their “from scratch” approach, which involves creating legal frameworks with a strong legal team, fundraising assistance through their investor network, the investor’s dashboard, and much more. Blockchain App Factory Exchange Listing, Tokenization, Turnkey STO Service, Consulting, Marketing, Blockchain Development Some of Blockchain App Factory’s previous clients include , , , and . Blockchain App Factory has plenty of industry experience, offers an extensive suite of services, and has worked with many reputable companies. Their emphasis on STO legal services, STO specific marketing, and STO asset management make them favorable in a market where many ICO companies are dipping their toes into STO services without having the necessary experience. Shell McDonalds Dash DasCoin AmaZix Community Management, Translation, Advisory, Community Rewards, Turnkey Solutions AmaZix’s portfolio is primarily focused on community management, with clients such as , , , , , and . They have a lot of industry experience, and although their primary focus is geared toward community management (that is what they like to flaunt), they also focus on STOs when consulted for advisory services. AmaZix “specializes in helping clients structure security token sales, while navigating the quickly changing regulatory environment. Meet and exceed the high level of scrutiny for your upcoming security token offering.” Babb Bancor GBX Hdac WePower GoChain TokenAsia Marketing, Consulting, Investor Outreach, Community Management, Smart Contracts, KYC/AML, Security Audits TokenAsia is a bit of a hybrid, offering a variety of services as well as a platform creation service on which founders can host their STO. Their past clients include , , , , , and more. TokenAsia works globally and has been in the industry since 2016. They made their place in the market doing ICOs and as trends are starting to shift they began to specialize in STOs as well, using their STO specific platforms to help founders stay within regulations and legal limits. Zagg GeoMain GoEureka JustPowerIt DigitalBits TSM Global Investor Relations, Consulting, Content Creation, Advertising Management, Token Listing Because TSM Global oversees many smaller companies, it doesn’t directly list clients. However, they have industry partnerships with , , , , , and . TSM Global, and its predecessor, have been in the industry for over eight years and have served over 80 clients. They are essentially a middleman that connects founders to the appropriate services around the world, based on needs. Because of this, they are useful for STOs as they can connect founders with the appropriate legal guidance based on their local laws. Top ICO List Coindesk Tech Racers Bitraffic Deloitte Blockchain Marketing Asia Indiegogo Listing and Marketing Platform, KYC Vetting, Investor Outreach Being a household name has helped Indiegogo move into VC, ICO, and now STO markets. They successfully worked with the (18 million USD raised through STO) and have plenty of market credibility. They offer compliance services to ensure that the STO meets legal requirements (the hardest part of STOs), and they actively vet companies that apply to be on their listing. They also offer a global platform (on which over $1 billion has been raised) by pairing with . St. Regis Aspen Resort Templum Section Two The following are VC firms, lesser known STO agencies, and other advisory companies that provide solutions for companies looking to structure, launch, or trade STOs. New Alchemy Token Design, Token Issuance Platform, Raising Capital Being a bit smaller on the scene, New Alchemy may not have the same press coverage as the entries above, but they still have an impressive client list: , , , , , and more. New Alchemy was founded by , who was the co-founder of the , which helps lend credibility to the agency. New Alchemy has roots in VC funding, which is one of their key services, and this ensures they know the inner workings of securities law. Bittrex AirToken OvCode Agorai Xriba Peter Vessenes Blockchain Foundation Satis Group Token and Offering Structuring, Legal, Tax and Accounting Advice, Token / Smart Contract Creation, Investor Outreach and Marketing The Satis Group claims to have over $100 million in token issuance experience, and when you couple that with the experience of the team it’s a win-win. Emma Channing, the founder and CEO of Satis Group, has over 15 years of experience in-house as well as at some of the leading national law firms. The Satis Group focuses on securities law, has been working with VCs for many years, and is a great choice for advisory services. DLT Capital Investor Relations, Research, Advisory, Corporate Finance Being an official sponsor of the Gibraltar Blockchain Exchange ensures that DLT Capital knows their business when it comes to security token offerings. The GBX is EU regulated and has to maintain the same regulatory standards as the Gibraltar Stock Exchange. DLT Capital has worked with such clients as , , , , , and more. Aside from that, DLT Capital also offers investor matching services to help STOs find more success. iampass Hycon Vreo Arxum CoinMirror Securitonomy Turnkey Token Solutions, Exchange Listing Assistance, Legal Advisory and Strategic Partnership Securitonomy is based in Malta, but given that Malta has one of the most ICO/STO-friendly governments in the world, this is far from a bad thing. Securitonomy partners with , , and to bring clients a full range of services that operate within Maltese regulation. With over six years of blockchain development and 35 successfully issued tokens under their belt, Securitonomy is well equipped to tackle even the most difficult STOs in Malta. TokenBackers Cryptovest Krypton Capital Polymath Tokenization, Platform Listing, Advisory Services Polymath is one of the industry leaders in token issuance, but in conjunction with that they also offer token creation services that ensure the tokens meet all legal and exchange requirements. Because of this, companies can launch their own STO using Polymath’s services to ensure they are legally compliant and pass all appropriate KYC/AML protocols. For the most complicated cases, however, founders may still have to contact a lawyer for legal guidance when creating a security token. StartEngine STO Launching, Issuance Platform, Advising StartEngline, like Polymath, is a combination issuance and advising platform. They help their clients create compliant tokens, list them within StartEngine’s platform, and showcase them to investors. StartEngine has had successful STOs already, such as and , both compliant STOs that raised over $1 million. Waverly Labs ElliptiGo Section Three This last section is a hybrid, listing the most common STO issuance platforms and a small collection of specialty lawyers who focus primarily on securities law. When in doubt, contact a securities professional to ensure your token is within regulatory standards. Swarm Fund Token issuance for SRC20 Compliance Swarm Fund is also one of the industry leaders for token issuance and the SRC20 token ensures compliance with all securities laws and regulations. Swarm aims to simplify the corporate stock trading process by decentralizing and globalizing it, and they already have some trading on their platform ( , , ). big-name clients Robinhood Spark Labs Farm Coin Securities Compliance Advisors, and Lawyers , a VC investor with a background in law (mergers and acquisitions), compiled the following list in her popular Medium post “ .” Tatiana Koffman 4 Security Token Structures and the Lawyers to Help You Execute Them , Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton LLP James G. Gatto , Sheppard Mullin, Richter & Hampton LLP James A. Mercer III , Sheppard Mullin, Richter & Hampton LLP James J. Thompson , Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP Deborah S. Thoren-Peden , DLA Piper Curtis L. Mo , Smith, Anderson, Blount, Dorsett, Mitchell & Jernigan, LLP Margaret N. Rosenfeld , Smith, Anderson, Blount, Dorsett, Mitchell & Jernigan, LLP Heyward D. Armstrong , Goodwin Procter LLP Grant P. Fondo , Polsinelli LLP Richard B. Levin , Dentons Charles A. Gelinas , Perkins Coie LLP J. Dax Hansen , Perkins Coie LLP Kyle Wood , Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati Robert H. Rosenblum , Cooley LLP Patrick Murck , Cooley LLP Michael McGrail , FisherBroyles LLP Adam T. Ettinger , FisherBroyles LLP Marc Boiron , White & Case LLP Pratin Vallabhaneni Conclusion STOs are still very new, so be wary of companies offering “full service” solutions. This isn’t to say that they don’t exist, but do a bit of background research to ensure the company isn’t just repackaging their standard ICO services as an STO one. It is important to remember that these two offerings are very different. If you are planning to raise a large amount of funds, it is always best to contact a lawyer to make sure you are following regulatory standards. No matter how expensive the lawyer is, they are always cheaper than the expenses brought on by being shut down by government regulatory bodies and having your company’s assets seized. About the author: — Founder of Geekforge.io and Howtotoken.com. Interviewing the top 10,000 worldwide experts who reveal the biggest issues on the way to technological singularity. Join my . Kirill Shilov #10kqachallenge: GeekForge Formula

Top 15 STO Agencies and Resources

A recent nationwide aiming to better understand the “before and after” of emotions in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic has found that people’s #1 emotion now is , and before the outbreak, the #1 emotion was . survey anxiety calm Now when people all over the world are facing challenges that the Coronavirus has brought to their health, wealth, business, and relationships, how can they push back the chaos and build resilience? “By using Emotional Intelligence skills,” says , a tech industry veteran who loves building innovative products that make a difference for humans. Matt Kursh Matt Kursh, CEO and Founder, Oji Life Lab. (Image Source: twitter.com/mattkursh) The better we regulate feelings that are driving us, the better we can match our mood to our mission and the better we can reach our goals, both personal and professional. Decades of research show that as we improve our emotional intelligence (EI), we can boost our decision-making, attention, memory, creativity and relationships. With that knowledge in mind, Matt Kursh and his business partners started , a digital platform combining micro-learning and live video coaching into a powerful system for lasting habit formation and emotional intelligence development. Their goal was to help people in business learn the essential skills that drive performance and life satisfaction – skills that schools and universities don’t cover. Oji Life Lab Before embarking on a journey to build a one-of-a-kind digital learning system for teams, organizations and individuals, Matt launched, ran and sold companies to Apple and Microsoft, was responsible for when it was one of the top 3 websites on the planet, led the Blue Planet Run Foundation 2006-2008, a non-profit organization focused on delivering water to the developing world, and served on the boards of numerous public, private and non-profit organizations. MSN.com I just couldn’t miss the opportunity to interview Matt and share his story and entrepreneur tips and inspiration with fellow Hackernooners. Enjoy the reading! Matt, I've read that you started your very first business when you were a teenager, and it was a croissant bakery offering door-to-door delivery. Where do you think you got that entrepreneural touch? What's your key driver as an entrepreneur? There are different types of entrepreneurs. Some entrepreneurs just love doing business as a fascinating activity. Some like the intellectual challenge that comes with it. Others just want to make a bunch of money. And there’s another kind of entrepreneur that loves the creative process and its outcome. While you may have a mix of all types, for me, being an entrepreneur has always been about that creative component. With croissants, I literally just wanted to eat croissants, because in the 1980s you could not buy them in Ohio. So I wanted to make some, and that’s how I came up with the . idea to start business Over the years, I’ve become very interested in personal skills that help us perform and help us live a rich life. Soft skills development gave me an excellent opportunity to create something new. For me, it’s about a creative process: creative not in the sense of coming up with novel ideas  but in the sense of making things. Like a carpenter likes going to the workshop and constructing things, I like making things. In your fantastic career spanning over 30 years, you’ve had a chance to work both at large companies and small startups. What most important lesson(s) have you learned from working in each company type? That’s an interesting question. Some things that come to mind – and they may not be the most important things – are as follows. When you work in a startup, you get accustomed to working on things that make a difference in a context where there’s not a lot of room for waste or error. That was a great way for me to learn how to be ruthless about prioritization and focus. On the other hand, my experience of working at large and established companies like Microsoft has helped me learn how to deal with diverse resources and really big teams, as well as how to tackle issues related to achieving goal alignment across a lot of people. At the same time, when you work in those big companies, it’s not always clear how what you’re doing necessarily ties to business success. Do you personally feel more comfortable working in large or small organizations? As for me, I enjoyed working at Microsoft, and I also enjoy working in small companies. I think every person on the planet has their own style of thinking, own values and customs and it’s hard to join a big organization that has its own customs and values because you have to adapt to their way of doing things. That’s difficult for me. But when I worked at Microsoft, I worked there long enough, so my team and I sort of converged on the same values - and it was incredible fun. There is a saying that . You know, that storming phase in a big company is really long and cumbersome. It takes a long time to get that many people to converge. That part I didn’t love. But once you get through that storming, it doesn’t matter to me if the company is big or small. teams form, storm, norm and perform Oji Life Lab has been a brainchild you and your business partners have been working on in the past two years. Let’s talk about the project. For starters, what does the word Oji mean? It comes from an Italian word , which means . That’s a common word in Italian. I was thinking of a word that would symbolize the present and focus, and I liked the Italian word for today. In English, if you have , no one could spell that, so we changed the spelling to something we could pronounce more easily. That’s how Oji was coined. oggi today o-g-g-i How did you get involved in this project? So, a really short version is – several years ago, I started working in the space of soft skills development, and I first started working with teenagers. That didn’t work very well. Then I met my co-founder [ , Chief Learning Officer], and we decided to work together to build a digital program for a workplace. So, we were working on that concept together. By that time I’d already had a great working relationship with , PhD and , PhD, from the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence. Andrea Hoban Robin Stern Marc Brackett Once, when Marc was in town for a conference, he explained to me that when he talked about emotional intelligence around the world, people would often approach him and say something like: “ ” He had a solution for them – his that was successfully launched in more than 2,000 American schools. This is wonderful, I’d like to teach EI in my school district. RULER program But when entrepreneurs approached him saying they wanted to train their employees on emotional intelligence, he just didn’t have anything to offer other than a Powerpoint presentation. He asked me if I was interested in working with him and Robin Stern to do something for the business market. It was a perfect time because Andrea and I were already thinking about something similar. So we came together around that and spent a lot of time on product concepts that changed a lot over time. Now, we've spent over two years building that product with our tech partners in Ukraine, fulfilling and refining that vision. Is your product being developed entirely in Ukraine or do you have a core product team in the United States and using an outsourced team as an auxiliary unit to build some functionality? We’re building a whole thing with my old friend Matt Brown (CEO of Waverley) and his . I worked with him in my first company, so I trust him a lot. It was very exciting when we started, and we have pretty much the same team now, two years in. We don’t have any technical people anywhere else. team in Ukraine What’s your product status now? Are you still in the MVP stage or have you moved to a full-fledged product release? I hope we’re no longer in the MVP stage! It’s been 15 months or so since the release, and it’s quite a robust product now. Customers feel like our product has better content and more compelling features than other products. We started with an MVP and then had our team fix the bugs and fine-tune and polish it. It took six months of hard work. When we got through it, the customers were delighted with the outcome. Are you making it more robust now? What are your product scaling plans? Now we’re thinking of building additional Life Labs. When we first started working with the development team, they named the project something like “Emotions” for internal reference. I told them I didn’t want them to think they’re building the emotions product. I wanted them to think they’re building a platform that will be used for a lot of products in the future. They, of course, understood it completely and built a software system from the ground up to be good at delivering programs to develop soft skills. We internally call it . We call it that because it re-imagines monolithic workshops as a sequence of bite-sized learning steps experienced on a user’s phone. MESH So, in a nutshell, we’re going to make the Emotional Life Lab better while also building and scaling new labs on different subjects. Do you already know what topics will be added to the platform next? There are several topics in the soft skills space that we’re already working with some experts on. I can’t say yet what they are, but what I can say for sure is that they all will help develop soft skills. When a lot of people hear the words “soft skills”, they believe the skills are not important. Like if you’re an engineer, you need to write great code. And soft skills are viewed as extra skills that may not necessarily be needed to write the code. “Our belief is that soft skills are just as important or may be even more important.” If you think about, let’s say, learning a new programming language, that’s what’s called declarative learning, i.e. you learn what the syntax is, what the programming paradigm is – you get the facts and the more facts you know the better you can program in that language. Soft skills are skills that are basically habits. They require practice, new ways of habit formation, and personal knowledge. So if you’re looking to learn how to lead a better conversation with your colleagues regardless of whether you’re a software engineer or anything else, you need to learn how to manage your personal emotional state and know how to manage other people’s emotional state. You need to know how to respond when people act aggressively, calmly or anxiously. You need to learn all those things, and you can’t read that in a programming manual. You need to do work. You need to explore that. So we’ve built from the ground up a learning system to help people do that. And it’s really different from other learning systems because we have different goals from other learning systems. We’re not teaching you how to use Photoshop or Excel. We’re not teaching you machine learning skills. We’ve built a different learning system to teach you how to use emotions and develop better soft skills to have a better life. So you don’t see any major rival in the market right now, do you? There’re many people today offering soft skills training programs. They are doing it in two modes: in-person workshops or in-person workshops done virtually. This is basically a traditional classroom model. This model implies that, for instance, I shoot a video and tell you about emotional intelligence or leadership or whatever. As such, this model suffers from several issues. The work to be done is not to transfer knowledge from the experts to the students. The work to be done has a lot to do with the students learning about their own personal behavior and ideas. You can’t read it in a book. You have to go out and do it. So that’s one issue. And then another issue is that for decades, people have known that learning in small bursts spaced over time is the best solution for retention and comprehension of information. When you go to a 4-hour workshop, any scientist will tell you that 90 days later, your retention of that information will be almost zero, because you need repetition for retention. So, we’ve built a new kind of program that takes all that learning, breaks it into little 5 to 10 minute chunks and spaces it over several months, and includes many different types of experiences and also includes live learning. When put together, all of these elements will lead to people gaining lasting skills so that one, two or three years later they’re still using those ideas and getting benefits out of it as opposed to the feeling many people have days and weeks after attending a workshop and remembering nothing about it. Blended with traditional classroom models for hard skills acquisition, your soft skills learning product can boost significantly how people learn and develop. Are you considering any future collaborations with traditional learning product makers? We’re always eager to find points of collaboration. For instance, we have customers who take the Emotional Life Lab and incorporate it into their leadership training programs or their mentoring programs. In this case, we love that! If it’s useful, it’s great! We just try to focus on what’s good for the learners and believe the business model will follow behind it. We are always happy to combine our program with something else. As you spend time working in this space, you realize that all of the soft skills are interconnected. If you become more emotionally intelligent in general, you’ll automatically become a better communicator and performer. And we’re always looking for those relationships to build better user experiences. How many coaches do you have now, and how is their work structured? I don’t know the exact number but we have a small group in the Bay area, and we’re also starting to train people around the world to be better situated to help customers outside of the U.S. We have a group of talented people supporting users as they go through their learning process. That’s a responsibility of my co-founder Andrea to grow that pool of coaches and train and coordinate them. So you have special training for coaches and not every EI specialist can be accepted? Absolutely. We onboard them so they work for us. Many businesses use an open model in which anyone can apply and contribute. That’s not how we work, as we’re very selective in whom we hire. We’re looking for people who have the personality, who understand the material. Andrea is really good at picking and training the right coaches. Do you think the product can be a good fit for the consumer market as well? It’s open to the consumer market: any user can go to our website and buy the product. And we know that people do have great experiences of working with it. As the Coronavirus is becoming more of an issue, we see a real increase in app downloads by individual users, and we’re delighted they can make use of our solution. However, our focus on the corporate market reflects that a lot of people focus on their learning and performance development to achieve professional goals, so the workplace seems like a great place to promote our product and make the best use of it. It’s just perfectly suited for the corporate world. As you get more user data and can observe particular trends, are you thinking of generating some kind of intelligence reports in the future to help build new knowledge and share trends on how soft skills help people perform and reach professional goals better? Are you considering becoming a Think Tank for EI data collection and sharing? We do have data aggregation analysis capabilities. However, the most important thing for us is to provide as great an experience for the individual as we can, and it has to be totally private. We’re very careful about not doing anything to cause the user to feel like their data is somehow used and shared. So there may be opportunities like that later, but we need first to figure out how to do it in a way that would provide 100% confidence to users that their data is safe with us. One of the taglines we use to describe what we’re doing is we deliver personal breakthroughs at digital scale. And that first part – personal breakthroughs – requires a real focus on our part on that one person, before the company. If we can do it a 1,000 times for the company then it’s great for the company, but it’s so important that the individual will get that personal breakthrough and that’s what we focus on. And then we can do it at digital scale in terms of costs and efficiency of rolling it out and managing it. It’s a great combination. For instance, many HR technology companies today are focused on testing a group of employees to see what their engagement is. That’s not about the individuals, that’s about gaining data about the company. And it’s a great business model; it’s just not ours. Let’s look into a crystal ball. How will COVID-19 change this world? What’s your gut feeling about the future of technology and business models? In my lifetime, this is certainly the biggest disruption in the status quo and I hope that it’s the last disruption like this I’ll ever see. I think it won’t get back to where it was. I’ve no idea how it’ll change further, but every sector and every part of society has already changed. I think the workplace will never be the same again. I know that many people have got a chance to work remotely for the first time and they like it! They aren’t going to go back to 250 days in the office again. They may cut it to 150 days in the office a year. I believe there will be a lot of employees that will refuse to go back to work in the office. I don’t know what the new equilibrium will look like, but it’ll be different. It’s worth pointing out that our product model fits very well in this “new normal”. If 50% of training in the workplace continued to be delivered with a teacher in front of a classroom, a lot of things would just not be possible in the future, for a variety of reasons. It turns out our product will be an even better fit in a changing workplace reality. What is your advise to startups and entrepreneurs that have been hit badly by the pandemic and are frustrated about the future? Tenacity can be the best asset. When you’re holding on tight for a great idea, tenacity is what will drive you forward. But it can be disastrous to be tenacious about a bad idea. Maybe the idea is bad because you can’t fund it right now or because the market isn’t ready for it. This is a time when a lot of us have to be careful and focused on things that are going to work. There’s so much mythology in the startup world. Tenacity is a key ingredient that applies to all success stories but it’s also a part of many failures. So good luck! Matt and his business partners believe that in the turbulent and uncertain times like we’re having now due to the COVID-19 pandemic, everyone can use the EI skills to take better care of themselves, their teams and family. Check out Corona Care Toolkit developed by Oji Life Lab. Are you a tech entrepreneur or innovator with a great inspirational story that's worth sharing with the rest of the world? Let me know and I'll be happy to interview you for my next article!

How To Create Personal Breakthroughs By Mastering EI: Interview With Matt Kursh

No more than a dozen years ago reliability of the blockchain technology was doubted, but by the start of 2020, most professionals have recognized it as a smart solution to business challenges. According to Deloitte’s 2019 Global Blockchain Survey of more than 1,300 senior executives at companies with the annual revenue of $100-500 million, 40% of respondents said their companies were willing to invest $5 million or more in blockchain initiatives. What’s more, the number of companies considering blockchain crucial for their business increased by 10%. The continuously growing demand for blockchain development companies gave a chance for many custom software providers to succeed by including the blockchain technology into their services. How to find a trustworthy blockchain development company? The blockchain expertise is made up of multiple factors, that’s why finding a proficient blockchain services provider appears to be a challenge — unless you know which criteria to consider. To make the task easier for you, we’ve analyzed a number of blockchain consulting companies and compared their characteristics across the five points below: Blockchain expertise Major clients Offering strategy Market responsiveness Client reviews Explority presents the best blockchain development companies of 2020 1. Itransition Launched in 1998, Itransition has grown from 25 passionate professionals into an international company delivering its services in custom software development all around the globe. Itransition’s experience is based on 1,500+ projects completed for 800 clients, the major of them including PayPal, Cisco, adidas, Xerox, and Philips. Full-cycle blockchain solution development, smart contract deployment and audit, and ICO development are by far just a fraction of the services Itransition delivers. By implementing the blockchain technology, the company helps its clients to secure transactions, prevent fraud, and better control data. Key facts: Since 1998 Headquartered in Denver, CO​ Team: 1000-9999 Clients include startups and Fortune 500 companies 30+ countries served On the Clutch list of Top Custom Software Developers since 2014 2. MobiDev MobiDev is a full-scale mobile software company with more than 350 successfully completed projects for clients from 20+ countries. With about 300 professional developers on board, it delivers a number of IT services, including blockchain development. MobiDev focuses on Hyperledger and Ethereum blockchains for its decentralized enterprise-level applications. Key facts: Since 2009 Headquartered in Atlanta, GA Team: 250-999 Offices in the U.S., UK, and Ukraine Featured as #1 Machine Learning Development Company of 2019 by Clutch 3. Aplana Software Services Aplana Software Services is a custom software development company with about 1,500 projects carried out over the course of more than 20 years. With a team of 500 developers, the company creates solutions based on emerging technologies in such industries as Finance, Food, and Logistics. Among their services, Aplana offers custom blockchain solutions, including smart contracts, ICO platforms development, and more. Key facts: Since 1999 Headquartered in Huntingdon Valley, PA Team: 250-999 Partnership statuses with IBM, Fujitsu, Oracle Received IBM Group Business Partner Award in 2007 Became the Microsoft Smart Client Development Partner of the Year in 2008 4. Softeq With their headquarters in Texas, Softeq has been providing full-stack development services for companies all over the world for almost 23 years now. This includes the following blockchain solutions: smart contracts, ICO, decentralized apps, and blockchain ecosystems. Above other reasons, Softeq is listed among top blockchain consulting companies for its experience of working with clients in Sports, Healthcare, Finance, and Real Estate. The company specializes in such blockchain platforms and languages as Ethereum, Hyperledger, Solidity, and more. Key facts: Since 1997 Headquartered in Houston, TX Team: 50-249 75% of employees at expert and senior levels Offices in the U.S., Germany, and Belarus A Microsoft Gold Partner 5. Waverley Software Waverley Software was established in 1992 in Silicon Valley. Besides providing full-cycle custom software engineering services, Waverley presents itself as a blockchain development company. The company offers blockchain consulting, ICO, smart contract and blockchain-powered mobile app development using such blockchain frameworks as Hyperledger, Ethereum, and Monax. Key facts: Since 1992 Headquartered in Palo Alto, CA Team: 50-249 80% of clients are long-term 20% of team members with Ph.D. degrees 6. Parangat Technologies Paragant Technologies has won their position among top blockchain consulting companies due to the high quality of their blockchain consulting, product audit and testing, ICO creation and smart contract development. In almost 10 years, the team of 75 professionals have carried out more than a hundred projects, focusing mostly on such industries as Ecommerce, Healthcare, Logistics, and Food. Key facts: Since 2010 Headquartered in Noida, India Team: 50-249 Listed among Top Developers of 2019 by Clutch Locations in India, Australia, the U.S., the UK, and Ireland 7. JatApp JatApp was launched eight years ago and grew into a full-cycle enterprise software development company that performs mobile apps development, UI/UX design, and blockchain-powered product development. The company implements smart contracts, exchange platforms, and transparent payment systems for Manufacturing, Finance, Supply Chain and other industries, and has successfully completed more than 200 projects overall. Key facts: Since 2010 Headquartered in Miami, FL Team: 50-249 Featured among Top App Developers in Ukraine in 2020 by Clutch Offices in the U.S. and Ukraine 8. *instinctools Among many other blockchain companies, *instinctools is sure to be mentioned. The company has grown to 200 employees in five years, and now delivers blockchain solutions to such industries as Healthcare, Education and Finance. *instinctools specializes in blockchain consulting, end-to-end blockchain development, smart contracts, and ICO. Key facts: Since 2015 Headquartered in Stuttgart, Germany Team: 250-999 Implements Ethereum, MultiChain, Corda, Solidity, and Hyperledger Offices in Germany and Belarus 9. AXIOMA AXIOMA is a blockchain development company based in Latvia. Founded in 2009, the company has successfully introduced a number of blockchain solutions for Gaming, Fintech and Ecommerce industries. Blockchain development provided by AXIOMA includes smart contracts for Ethereum, RSK network implementations, fork development, ICO, and consulting. Key facts: Since 2009 Headquartered in Riga, Latvia Team: 10-49 Listed in Top B2B Companies in Latvia in 2019 by Clutch Offices in Latvia and the UK 10. Venture Aviator Venture Aviator was established nine years ago as a startup, and now it’s a team of more than 50 professionals who completed 100+ projects. It became one of the leading software development companies in the U.S., providing such blockchain solutions as ICO, smart contract and Dapp development, consulting, and product support. Venture Aviator’s offices are based in the United States, from where they deliver blockchain solutions to companies all over the world. Key facts: Since 2011 Headquartered in New York, NY Team: 10-49 Listed among the Fastest Growing Companies in the U.S. on the Inc. 5000 list in 2017 Over $150 million raised by their blockchain development clients via venture funding Offices in Los Angeles, New York, and San Francisco The rest of the top blockchain companies in 2020 look like this: 11. Accubits Technologies Inc. Accubits Technologies is a software development company with the headquarters in Washington, D.C. and 10 offices all around the globe. Their services include smart contracts, Dapps, and crypto token development using such technologies as Ethereum, Hyperledger, Corda, and others. The company has successfully carried out about 600 projects for more than 140 clients. Accubits’ major targets are Retail, Finance and Manufacturing industries. Key facts: Since 2012 Headquartered in Vienna, VA Team: 50-249 Listed among Top B2B Companies in Norway in 2018 by Clutch Offices in 10 countries, including Australia, Canada, India, and Switzerland 12. DevProvider Established nine years ago in Pakistan, DevProvider is one of the few blockchain companies that employ a full range of blockchain technologies and platforms in their development services. Among their solutions are cryptocurrencies, Dapps, wallets, blockchain-powered apps, and more. Using Solidity, Golang and other languages, the company delivers high-quality solutions for Retail, Gaming and Real Estate industries. Key facts: Since 2011 Headquartered in Islamabad, Pakistan Team: 10-49 The full stack of blockchain technologies and platforms Named the Best Blockchain Company in Pakistan in 2020 by Clutch 13. Ionixx Technologies Providing various blockchain solutions, such as Dapps, ICO, smart contract and wallet development, Ionixx Technologies deserves to be mentioned along with other blockchain technology companies. The company has offices in four countries and provides blockchain solutions for Logistics, Retail and Finance industries. Key facts: Since 2013 Headquartered in Chennai, India Team: 50-249 One of the top blockchain companies in India according to Clutch Listed among top software development companies on GoodFirms 14. 4IRE Labs 4IRE Labs is a team of professional developers who deliver high-quality blockchain services, including smart contracts and Dapp development based on Truffle, Solidity and Aragon. With headquarters in Ukraine, the company completes projects for clients all around the globe. 4IRE Labs implements the blockchain technology in Real Estate, Insurance, Finance and Agriculture industries. Key facts: Since 2010 Headquartered in Kyiv, Ukraine Team: 10-49 Listed among Top Blockchain Companies of 2019 on Techreviewer.co Locations in Ukraine, Estonia, and Sweden 15. Inn4Science A blockchain development company based in Nevada, Inn4Science specializes in Dapp and blockchain-powered platform development. The company also offers consulting, smart contracts and wallet development, and 24/7 support. Inn4Science’s team comprises over 40 professionals capable of providing their clients with excellent support during all project stages. Key facts: Since 2016 Headquartered in Las Vegas, NV Team: 10-49 Listed among Top Blockchain Development Companies by Clutch Works with 10+ blockchain technologies The last 5 blockchain consulting companies to keep in mind this year: 16. IdeaSoft Founded just four years ago, IdeaSoft has already worked with such companies as IBM and Bits Of Gold. The services of this software development company include private and public blockchain development, smart contracts, and hard forks, carried out by more than 100 developers. IdeaSoft focuses on providing their services for Fintech, Healthcare, and Logistics industries. Key facts: Since 2016 Headquartered in Kharkov, Ukraine Team: 50-249 200+ projects completed in 4 years Locations in 7 countries, including Norway, Israel, and Canada 17. Pixelplex Established in 2007 in New York, Pixelplex is one of those blockchain companies that never stands still, constantly mastering new technologies. With 80+ experts on their team, the company completed more than 50 blockchain projects for a number of industries, including Media & Entertainment, Gaming, Healthcare, and Fintech. Among Pixelplex’s blockchain-related services are custom development and integration, Dapp, wallet and ICO development, consulting, and audit. Key facts: Since 2007 Headquartered in New York, NY Team: 50-249 Offices in the U.S., South Korea, Switzerland, and Belarus Listed among Top Enterprise App Development Companies of 2019 by Clutch 18. LimeChain Not all blockchain development companies offer UX/UI design as a part of their services, and that’s what gives LimeChain an advantage. Founded less than three years ago, the company quickly gained respect for its creative approach and blockchain solutions powered by UX design. LimeChain delivers the following services: public and private blockchain development, audit, smart contract and Dapp development. The company’s portfolio includes such clients as Arxum, Raiffeisen Bank, and Procter & Gamble. Key facts: Since 2017 Headquartered in Sofia, Bulgaria Team: 10-49 Listed among B2B Leaders in Bulgaria in 2019 by Clutch 19. Around25 Around25 is a full-stack product development company founded in Romania more than 14 years ago. The company delivers high-quality blockchain solutions, including smart contracts, ICO, and in-app Bitcoin payments. The team of 30+ specialists has successfully completed about 80 projects, focusing on such industries as Ecommerce, Real Estate, and Consumer Products. Key facts: Since 2006 Headquartered in Cluj-Napoca, Romania Team: 10-49 On the Clutch list of Top App Developers in Romania 20. MixBytes Established in Moscow, Russia, only three years ago, MixBytes have already made a name for themselves among blockchain technology companies. The services provided by the company include smart contract audit and development, Dapp and ICO development, mostly based on such languages as Solidity, Rust, and Python. MixBytes’ most notable clients are Trust Wallet, Kickico and Poa Network. Key facts: Since 2017 Headquartered in Moscow, Russia Team: 10-49 Listed among Top Web Development Companies of 2019 on Techreviewer.co On theClutch list of Top Blockchain Companies & Startups

Top 20 Blockchain Development Companies to keep tabs on in 2020

Machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies can hardly be called emerging in 2019. For the last decade, domains of all sorts have been leveraging them, and speaks to the fact. Today, ML and AI create value for organizations across Consumer Services, Automotive, Agriculture, Retail, Healthcare, and other major industries. the visualization by McKinsey Global Institute As businesses realize these technologies are a boon, the demand for machine learning consulting companies is skyrocketing, which predictably influences the supply. In such a way, today’s IT market is literally larded with ML vendors tackling projects of any scope and budget. To help you make your way through this enormous and diverse offering, we assembled a list of today’s most trustworthy vendors of machine learning consulting and development services. Our IT market analysts assessed an extensive range of companies according to the following objective criteria: Proven machine learning expertise Prior projects: size and complexity Diversity of business domains served Client references Speed and quality of customer service As a result, we got a list of 30 companies worthy of attention. For readers’ convenience, we present the vendors in descending order. 1. Itransition A recognized custom software development company, Itransition has delivered 1,500 projects over the span of its 20-year market presence. With more than 2,000 IT experts on board, the company has served 810 clients from 30 countries. Among the ML services the company provides there are data mining, natural language processing, computer vision, robotic process automation, and machine learning consulting. To deliver its ML solutions, Itransition uses such technologies as Python, R, Azure, Google Cloud, and AWS. Location: Denver, CO Established: 1998 Project budgets start at: $10,000 Key clients: Expedia, Xerox, Toyota, eBay, PayPal, Shell, adidas Other, non-ML services: custom software development, CRM consulting, ecommerce development Website: https://www.itransition.com/ 2. Tooploox EU-based Tooploox has around 100 skilled experts on board. For seven years of the company’s operation, they delivered 150+ successful projects. Tooploox is a machine learning consulting company using this technology to deliver computer and 3D vision, sensor fusion, deep learning, natural language processing, reinforcement learning, and other ML-related services. The company has expertise with other emerging technologies, such as blockchain. Location: Wrocław, Poland Established: 2012 Project budgets start at: $25,000 Key clients: CoinDesk, DTS, ING, Spire Health, Group Nine Other, non-ML services: mobile app development, product design Website: https://www.tooploox.com/ 3. Skim Technologies London-based Skim Technologies is an internationally recognized machine learning consulting company delivering a wide range of related services. The company’s data scientists offer chatbot development, custom ML model creation, and NLP engineering. Skim Technologies also delivers AI workshops as well as ML and AI consulting services. Location: London, United Kingdom Established: 2014 Project budgets start at: $10,000 Key clients: Jones Lang-Lasalle, Breast Cancer Care, Quant Insight Other, non-ML services: business intelligence consulting, custom software development Website: https://www.skimtechnologies.com/ 4. ThirdEye Data US-based ThirdEye Data has been delivering its ML development services for nine years. The company specializes in chatbot development, custom ML algorithms, and machine learning consulting. Among the data science technologies the company works with, there are Spark, TensorFlow, Caffe, and others. Location: Santa Clara, CA Established: 2010 Project budgets start at: $25,000 Key clients: Microsoft, Amazon, Nokia, Ford Direct, Getty Images, Amgen Other, non-ML services: business intelligence consulting, cloud consulting Website: https://thirdeyedata.io/ 5. Chatbots.Studio As its name implies, Chatbots.Studio is a company focusing on AI-powered chatbot development. It builds multichannel conversational platforms, automates business processes, and designs conversations. The company’s technology stack includes React, Redux, Angular 6, Node.js, Express.js, Botkit, and others. Location: Lviv, Ukraine Established: 2016 Project budgets start at: $5,000 Key clients: Visa, Unibot, Aldi, Digital Flex Other, non-ML services: custom software development Website: https://chatbots.studio/ 6. Azati Software Since 2001, Azati's experts have cooperated with 330 clients globally. Among the ML competencies of the company there are supervised and unsupervised learning, distributed computing, natural language processing, digital signal processing, and machine learning consulting. Azati’s tech toolkit includes CuDNN, Scikit Learn for Python, and Tensor Flow. The company mainly targets clients in the Insurance domain. Location: Livingston, NJ Established: 2001 Project budgets start at: $1,000 Key clients: MedPro Group, SequenceBase, Casio, Thomson Reuters Other, non-ML services: mobile app development, web development Website: https://azati.ai/ 7. Hidden Brains Since its foundation in 2003, Hidden Brains has cooperated with clients from 107 countries. The company delivers AI, ML, deep learning, and data science services. It also specializes in developing natural language processing software. Hidden Brains also delivers chatbots, including those for Facebook, Telegram, WhatsApp, and Slack. Location: Ahmedabad, India Established: 2003 Project budgets start at: $10,000 Key clients: McAfee, Raymond, Maxtor, SanDisk Other, non-ML services: mobile app development, web development Website: https://www.hiddenbrains.com/ 8. InData Labs Established in 2014, InData Labs houses 50+ data scientists, engineers, and analysts. The company develops ML algorithms and natural language processing solutions. Besides, InData Labs specializes in computer vision and predictive modeling. The company's stack includes Python, SpaCy, TensorFlow, Keras, and more proven languages and frameworks. Location: Minsk, Belarus Established: 2014 Project budgets start at: $5,000 Key clients: Captiv8, Flo Health, Wargaming Other, non-ML services: business intelligence consulting Website: https://indatalabs.com/ 9. Arcanys Since 2010, Philippines-based Arcanys has been delivering its ML and AI services to clients from all over the world. The company specializes in sentiment analysis, recommender systems, and image recognition. As one of its cooperation models, the company provides dedicated teams of highly experienced data scientists and developers. Location: Cebu City, Philippines Established: 2010 Project budgets start at: $100,000 Key clients: General Electric Korea, Enfo, Payment Logic, L’Oreal, Spinetix Other, non-ML services: custom software development, mobile app development Website: https://www.arcanys.com/ 10. MobiDev Since 2009, MobiDev’s IT experts have delivered 350+ software solutions. While headquartered in the US, the company provides its services globally. MobiDev uses the following machine learning technologies: Python, R, C++, Go, TensorFlow, ONNX, and Keras. MobiDev’s mobile ML toolkit includes Core ML, TensorFlow Lite, and Cafe2Go. On top of that, the company provides machine learning consulting. Location: Atlanta, GA Established: 2009 Project budgets start at: $10,000 Key clients: Verizon Media, Comcash, Quality Bridge, SmartTab, SMS Group Other, non-ML services: IoT development, web development Website: https://mobidev.biz 11. Spire Digital For over 20 years that Spire Digital has been providing IT services, it has cooperated with 600+ global customers. Among the ML and AI development services the company offers, there are natural language processing, supervised and unsupervised learning, and sentiment analysis. Also, Spire Digital creates chatbots for Facebook Messenger, Slack, Skype, and Cisco WebEx. Location: Denver, CO Established: 1998 Project budgets start at: Undisclosed Key clients: TomTom, Lockheed Martin, US Navy, USDA, Western Union Other, non-ML services: custom software development, mobile app development Website: https://www.spiredigital.com/ 12. Icreon New York-based Icreon is a digital innovation agency mostly targeting medium-sized businesses. The company uses AI and ML technologies to create innovative applications, platforms, and ecosystems. The company’s technological expertise in ML includes Amazon Web Services, Azure, Caffe2, Google Cloud, Keras, and more. Location: New York, NY Established: 2000 Project budgets start at: $25,000 Key clients: National Geographic Channel, FOX Movies, Harry Winston, Nokia Other, non-ML services: custom software development Website: https://www.icreon.us/ 13. Miquido For eight years, Miquido's team has successfully completed more than 100 projects, including in machine learning. The company offers solutions for AI-based personalization, predictive and behavioral analytics, and churn prediction. Miquido also develops chatbots. Recognized by Deloitte as one the fastest growing companies in Europe, Miquido also offers UI/UX design creation and mobile apps development. Location: Kraków, Poland Established: 2011 Project budgets start at: $25,000 Key clients: Skyscanner, Abbey Road Studios, HelloFresh Other, non-ML services: mobile app development, web development Website: https://www.miquido.com/ 14. Neoteriс Founded in 2005, Europe-based Neoteric offers a wide range of ML solutions, including predictive analytics, recommendation engines, NLP, robotic process automation, and machine learning consulting. The company also specializes in such AI platforms as SaaS Manager, SoapBox, AppOrchid, and RapidSOS. Location: Gdańsk, Poland Established: 2005 Project budgets start at: $10,000 Key clients: LunchBadger, Arvata, IT Trans Other, non-ML services: custom software development, web development Website: https://neoteric.eu/ 15. Unicsoft Established in 2005, Unicsoft employs more than 100 specialists in emerging technologies and software development. Within its ML tech stack, the company offers development of predictive and behavioral analytics solutions, neural networks, and recommendation engines, among other ML applications. The company also delivers consulting services, and maintenance of existing ML platforms. Location: Kiev, Ukraine Established: 2005 Project budgets start at: $5,000 Key Clients: Hoodifood, Executive Eye, GOFORIT, Intellica Group Other, non-ML services: blockchain Website: https://unicsoft.com/ 16. Abto Software With 12 years of its market presence, Abto Software’s has worked with 200+ global customers. Specializing in AI and ML, the company offers custom enterprise solutions for advanced and predictive analytics, virtual assistants, recommendation systems, and intelligent business process automation. Abto Software works with the following tools and frameworks, among others: TensorFlow, Keras, Caffe, OpenCV, and AWS. Location: New York, NY Established: 2007 Project budgets start at: Undisclosed Key clients: Just Answer, Skybow, Medikit, Up Great Other, non-ML services: web development, enterprise app modernization Website: https://www.abtosoftware.com/ 17. Accubits Technologies, Inc. US-located Accubits started in 2012 and has already cooperated with 140+ clients. The company’s ML capabilities include development of conversational and classification tools, video, image and text analytics solutions, as well as predictive analytics software. Besides, Accubits offers machine learning consulting. The company’s experts work with NumPy, PHP, Python, SpaCy, Spark, and several other platforms. Location: Vienna, VA Established: 2012 Project budgets start at: $5,000 Key сlients: Dubai Land Department, Smart Dubai, Eduvalue, Landmark Other, non-ML services: blockchain, custom software development Website: https://accubits.com/ 18. BotsCrew Established in 2016, BotsCrew is a global leader in chatbot development, delivering to mid-sized companies and startups. BotsCrew has its own enterprise chatbot platform that is ready to be customized and optimized according to customers' needs. Besides the proprietary platform, the company offers development of voice assistants and IoT bots. Location: London, United Kingdom Established: 2016 Project budgets start at: $10,000 Key clients: Ailira, IVA, ReVA, Dr. Dean Other, non-ML services: None Website: https://botscrew.com/ 19. STX Next Founded in 2005, STX Next is a custom software development company that specializes in streamlining IT solutions with AI and ML technologies. The company’s main technological advantage is in its exceptionally skilled Python developers. For 14 years on the market, STX Next has delivered over 250 successful projects. Location: Poznań, Poland Established: 2005 Project budgets start at: $25,000 Key clients: Seerene, Verve, Hogarth WW, Pixomondo, Unity Technologies Other, non-ML services: web development, custom software development Website: https://stxnext.com/ 20. Dogtown Media California-based Dogtown Media specializes in delivering mobile applications, enhanced with ML and AI technologies. Besides ML-powered mobile apps, the company provides machine learning consulting. For the last eight years, Dogtown Media has brought to life at least 200 applications. Location: Venice Beach, CA Established: 2011 Project budgets start at: $25,000 Key clients: Google, Lexus, United Nations, Citibank, Red Bull, YouTube Other, non-ML services: mobile app development, IoT development Website: https://www.dogtownmedia.com/ 21. Sigmoidal Sigmoidal is a New-York-based consultancy specializing in machine learning and data science, mostly for companies in Finance, Trading, and Pharma. The company integrates these technologies into web and mobile applications and APIs. It also offers solutions for NLP, computer vision, and predictive analytics. Location: New York, NY Established: 2016 Project budgets start at: $1,000 Key clients: Undisclosed Other, non-ML services: business intelligence consulting Website: https://sigmoidal.io/ 22. Cyber Infrastructure Established in 2003, Cyber Infrastructure is a custom software development company with 100+ clients worldwide. Its ML expertise includes development of virtual assistants and chatbots for a variety of domains. Cyber Infrastructure also provides machine learning consulting and employs Python, Java, C++, Lisp, and R as its primary ML and AI stack. Location: San Francisco, CA Established: 2003 Project budgets start at: $5,000 Key clients: Mannatech, Bell Other, non-ML services: custom software development, web development Website: https://www.cisin.com/ 23. Azilen Technologies US-headquartered Azilen Technologies has 250+ IT experts on board distributed across four offices worldwide. They employ ML technologies to deliver customer service, survey, and informational bots. On top of that, the company delivers facial recognition and predictive analytics solutions. Location: West Bloomfield, MI Established: 2009 Project budgets start at: $25,000 Key clients: Samsung, Pizza Hut, Sodexo, ICICI Bank Other, non-ML services: custom software development Website: https://www.azilen.com/ 24. Stermedia Stermedia has been delivering its ML and data science services since 2007. The company’s dedicated teams of data scientists and software architects design ML algorithms and models for extracting knowledge from big data sets. The company also provides NLP solutions and uses such technologies as TensorFlow and Keras, to name just a few. Location: Wroclaw, Poland Established: 2007 Project budgets start at: $10,000 Key Clients: Family Fabric, WorkService, ISOK Other, non-ML services: custom software development, web development Website: https://stermedia.ai/ 25. Belatrix Having five offices with 600+ professionals all around the world, Belatrix is one of the most fast-evolving machine learning consulting companies on the market today. Its machine learning experts have a proven track record of building various solutions, from predictive modeling to communication automation. Location: Mendoza, Argentina Established: 2003 Project budgets start at: $5,000 Key clients: Disney, Adobe, AOL, FIS, Chatman Financial Other, non-ML services: custom software development, mobile app development Website: https://www.belatrixsf.com/ 26. DataRoot Labs DataRoot Labs is an agency focusing on ML and AI development. It delivers full-cycle ML software development, including project evaluation, machine learning consulting, strategy development, architecture, integration, and support. Besides, DataRoot Labs helps enterprises with digital transformation with AI at the core. Location: Kiev, Ukraine Established: 2016 Project budgets start at: $5,000 Key clients: Servers.com, Everad, ABM Cloud, Cargofy Other, non-ML services: custom software development, mobile app development Website: https://datarootlabs.com/ 27. Softengi Since 1995, Softengi has completed 900+ projects for clients across six continents. The company’s ML services include chatbot engineering and NLP algorithms. For these purposes, Softengi uses R, Hadoop, and Python, among other tools. Location: Kiev, Ukraine Established: 1995 Project budgets start at: $10,000 Key clients: Boeing, Zeppelin, Enviance, OneRoof Energy Other, non-ML services: custom software development, AR/VR development, IoT development Website: http://softengi.com/ 28. Waverley With 27 years of software development experience, Waverley is a company housing 370K talented engineers. Among other services, they offer ML-centric solutions such as data clustering and unsupervised algorithms. On top of that, the company offers NLP and computer vision solutions and chatbots. To deliver ML products, Waverley’s engineers use Java, Python, Scala, and R. Location: Palo Alto, CA Established: 1992 Project budgets start at: $50,000 Key clients: Mozilla, Qualcomm, Swisscom, American Express Other, non-ML services: custom software development, mobile app development, IoT development Website: https://waverleysoftware.com/ 29. Imaginovation Founded in 2011, Imaginovation is a software development agency that has successfully completed 300+ IT projects of various complexity. As for ML and AI, the company develops recommendation and effectiveness assessment engines as well as solutions for speech and text processing automation. Location: Cary, NC Established: 2011 Project budgets start at: $10,000 Key clients: MetLife, Nestle, UNC Pembroke, Contractor Score Other, non-ML services: custom software development, mobile app development, web development Website: https://www.imaginovation.net/ 30. E2logy Established in 2005, E2logy has delivered 300+ projects to businesses of various sizes. Being a leading Amazon Web Services and Azure AI vendor, the company develops ML algorithms and chatbots. They also offer machine learning consulting. In addition to their ML services, E2Logy brings custom IoT solutions to its global customers. Location: Ahmedabad, India Established: 2005 Project budgets start at: $5,000 Key clients: McMillan Publishers, Polaris Industries, Vodafone Other, non-ML services: custom software development, web development Website: https://e2logy.com/ This was a full list of the top 30 machine learning consulting companies in 2019. If you cooperated with any of the presented vendors, please do get in touch and share your story.

Top 30 Machine Learning Consulting Companies

Top Custom Software Development Companies

THE CORNHILL MAGAZINE AND FRAMLEY PARSONAGE.

The Underground City; Or, The Black Indies by Jules Verne, is part of the HackerNoon Books Series. You can jump to any chapter in this book . LOCH LOMOND AND LOCH KATRINE here CHAPTER XV. LOCH LOMOND AND LOCH KATRINE Harry bore Nell carefully down the steeps of Arthur’s Seat, and, accompanied by James Starr and Jack Ryan, they reached Lambert’s Hotel. There a good breakfast restored their strength, and they began to make further plans for an excursion to the Highland lakes. Nell was now refreshed, and able to look boldly forth into the sunshine, while her lungs with ease inhaled the free and healthful air. Her eyes learned gladly to know the harmonious varieties of color as they rested on the green trees, the azure skies, and all the endless shades of lovely flowers and plants. The railway train, which they entered at the Waverley Station, conveyed Nell and her friends to Glasgow. There, from the new bridge across the Clyde, they watched the curious sea-like movement of the river. After a night’s rest at Comrie’s Royal Hotel, they betook themselves to the terminus of the Edinburgh and Glasgow Railway, from whence a train would rapidly carry them, by way of Dumbarton and Balloch, to the southern extremity of Loch Lomond. “Now for the land of Rob Roy and Fergus MacIvor!—the scenery immortalized by the poetical descriptions of Walter Scott,” exclaimed James Starr. “You don’t know this country, Jack?” “Only by its songs, Mr. Starr,” replied Jack; “and judging by those, it must be grand.” “So it is, so it is!” cried the engineer, “and our dear Nell shall see it to the best advantage.” A steamboat, the by name, awaited tourists about to make the excursion to the lakes. Nell and her companions went on board. The day had begun in brilliant sunshine, free from the British fogs which so often veil the skies. Sinclair The passengers were determined to lose none of the beauties of nature to be displayed during the thirty miles’ voyage. Nell, seated between James Starr and Harry, drank in with every faculty the magnificent poetry with which lovely Scottish scenery is fraught. Numerous small isles and islets soon appeared, as though thickly sown on the bosom of the lake. The steamed her way among them, while between them glimpses could be had of quiet valleys, or wild rocky gorges on the mainland. Sinclair “Nell,” said James Starr, “every island here has its legend, perhaps its song, as well as the mountains which overshadow the lake. One may, without much exaggeration, say that the history of this country is written in gigantic characters of mountains and islands.” Nell listened, but these fighting stories made her sad. Why all that bloodshed on plains which to her seemed enormous, and where surely there must have been room for everybody? The shores of the lake form a little harbor at Luss. Nell could for a moment catch sight of the old tower of its ancient castle. Then, the turning northward, the tourists gazed upon Ben Lomond, towering nearly 3,000 feet above the level of the lake. Sinclair “Oh, what a noble mountain!” cried Nell; “what a view there must be from the top!” “Yes, Nell,” answered James Starr; “see how haughtily its peak rises from amidst the thicket of oaks, birches, and heather, which clothe the lower portion of the mountain! From thence one may see two-thirds of old Caledonia. This eastern side of the lake was the special abode of the clan McGregor. At no great distance, the struggles of the Jacobites and Hanoverians repeatedly dyed with blood these lonely glens. Over these scenes shines the pale moon, called in old ballads ‘Macfarlane’s lantern.’ Among these rocks still echo the immortal names of Rob Roy and McGregor Campbell.” As the advanced along the base of the mountain, the country became more and more abrupt in character. Trees were only scattered here and there; among them were the willows, slender wands of which were formerly used for hanging persons of low degree. Sinclair “To economize hemp,” remarked James Starr. The lake narrowed very much as it stretched northwards. The steamer passed a few more islets, Inveruglas, Eilad-whow, where stand some ruins of a stronghold of the clan MacFarlane. At length the head of the loch was reached, and the stopped at Inversnaid. Sinclair Leaving Loch Arklet on the left, a steep ascent led to the Inn of Stronachlacar, on the banks of Loch Katrine. There, at the end of a light pier, floated a small steamboat, named, as a matter of course, the . The travelers immediately went on board; it was about to start. Loch Katrine is only ten miles in length; its width never exceeds two miles. The hills nearest it are full of a character peculiar to themselves. Rob Roy “Here we are on this famous lake,” said James Starr. “It has been compared to an eel on account of its length and windings: and justly so. They say that it never freezes. I know nothing about that, but what we want to think of is, that here are the scenes of the adventures in the . I believe, if friend Jack looked about him carefully, he might see, still gliding over the surface of the water, the shade of the slender form of sweet Ellen Douglas.” Lady of the Lake “To be sure, Mr. Starr,” replied Jack; “why should I not? I may just as well see that pretty girl on the waters of Loch Katrine, as those ugly ghosts on Loch Malcolm in the coal pit.” It was by this time three o’clock in the afternoon. The less hilly shores of Loch Katrine westward extended like a picture framed between Ben An and Ben Venue. At the distance of half a mile was the entrance to the narrow bay, where was the landing-place for our tourists, who meant to return to Stirling by Callander. Nell appeared completely worn out by the continued excitement of the day. A faint ejaculation was all she was able to utter in token of admiration as new objects of wonder or beauty met her gaze. She required some hours of rest, were it but to impress lastingly the recollection of all she had seen. Her hand rested in Harry’s, and, looking earnestly at her, he said, “Nell, dear Nell, we shall soon be home again in the gloomy region of the coal mine. Shall you not pine for what you have seen during these few hours spent in the glorious light of day?” “No, Harry,” replied the girl; “I shall like to think about it, but I am glad to go back with you to our dear old home.” “Nell!” said Harry, vainly attempting to steady his voice, “are you willing to be bound to me by the most sacred tie? Could you marry me, Nell?” “Yes, Harry, I could, if you are sure that I am able to make you happy,” answered the maiden, raising her innocent eyes to his. Scarcely had she pronounced these words when an unaccountable phenomenon took place. The , still half a mile from land, experienced a violent shock. She suddenly grounded. No efforts of the engine could move her. Rob Roy The cause of this accident was simply that Loch Katrine was all at once emptied, as though an enormous fissure had opened in its bed. In a few seconds it had the appearance of a sea beach at low water. Nearly the whole of its contents had vanished into the bosom of the earth. “My friends!” exclaimed James Starr, as the cause of this marvel became suddenly clear to him, “God help New Aberfoyle!” About HackerNoon Book Series: We bring you the most important technical, scientific, and insightful public domain books. This book is part of the public domain. Jules Verne (1998). The Underground City; Or, The Black Indies. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved October 2022 https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/1353/pg1353-images.html This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at , located at . www.gutenberg.org https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html

LOCH LOMOND AND LOCH KATRINE

The A B C of Relativity by Bertrand Russells, is part of the HackerNoon Books Series. You can jump to any chapter in this book here . I. TOUCH AND SIGHT: THE EARTH AND THE HEAVENS I. TOUCH AND SIGHT: THE EARTH AND THE HEAVENS Everybody knows that Einstein has done something astonishing, but very few people know exactly what it is that he has done. It is generally recognized that he has revolutionized our conception of the physical world, but his new conceptions are wrapped up in mathematical technicalities. It is true that there are innumerable popular accounts of the theory of relativity, but they generally cease to be intelligible just at the point where they begin to say something important. The authors are hardly to blame for this. Many of the new ideas can be expressed in non-mathematical language, but they are none the less difficult on that account. What is demanded is a change in our imaginative picture of the world—a picture which has been handed down from remote, perhaps pre-human, ancestors, and has been learned by each one of us in early childhood. A change in our imagination is always difficult, especially when we are no longer young. The same sort of change was demanded by Copernicus, when he taught that the earth is not stationary and the heavens do not revolve about it once a day. To us now there is no difficulty in this idea, because we learned it before our mental habits had become fixed. Einstein’s ideas, similarly, will seem easy to a generation which has grown up with them; but for our generation a certain effort of imaginative reconstruction is unavoidable. In exploring the surface of the earth, we make use of all our senses, more particularly of the senses of touch and sight. In measuring lengths, parts of the human body are employed in pre-scientific ages: a “foot,” a “cubit,” a “span” are defined in this way. For longer distances, we think of the time it takes to walk from one place to another. We gradually learn to judge distances roughly by the eye, but we rely upon touch for accuracy. Moreover it is touch that gives us our sense of “reality.” Some things cannot be touched: rainbows, reflections in looking-glasses, and so on. These things puzzle children, whose metaphysical speculations are arrested by the information that what is in the looking glass is not “real.” Macbeth’s dagger was unreal because it was not “sensible to feeling as to sight.” Not only our geometry and physics, but our whole conception of what exists outside us, is based upon the sense of touch. We carry this even into our metaphors: a good speech is “solid,“ a bad speech is “gas,” because we feel that a gas is not quite “real.” In studying the heavens, we are debarred from all senses except sight. We cannot touch the sun, or travel to it; we cannot walk round the moon, or apply a foot rule to the Pleiades. Nevertheless, astronomers have unhesitatingly applied the geometry and physics which they found serviceable on the surface of the earth, and which they had based upon touch and travel. In doing so, they brought down trouble on their heads, which it has been left for Einstein to clear up. It has turned out that much of what we learned from the sense of touch was unscientific prejudice, which must be rejected if we are to have a true picture of the world. An illustration may help us to understand how much is impossible to the astronomer as compared to the man who is interested in things on the surface of the earth. Let us suppose that a drug is administered to you which makes you temporarily unconscious, and that when you wake you have lost your memory but not your reasoning powers. Let us suppose further that while you were unconscious you were carried into a balloon, which, when you come to, is sailing with the wind in a dark night—the night of the fifth of November if you are in England, or of the fourth of July if you are in America. You can see fireworks which are being sent off from the ground, from trains, and from aeroplanes traveling in all directions, but you cannot see the ground or the trains or the aeroplanes be cause of the darkness. What sort of picture of the world will you form? You will think that nothing is permanent: there are only brief flashes of light, which, during their short existence, travel through the void in the most various and bizarre curves. You cannot touch these flashes of light, you can only see them. Obviously your geometry and your physics and your metaphysics will be quite different from those of ordinary mortals. If an ordinary mortal is with you in the balloon, you will find his speech unintelligible. But if Einstein is with you, you will understand him more easily than the ordinary mortal would, because you will be free from a host of preconceptions which prevent most people from understanding him. The theory of relativity depends, to a considerable extent, upon getting rid of notions which are useful in ordinary life but not to our drugged balloonist. Circumstances on the surface of the earth, for various more or less accidental reasons, suggest conceptions which turn out to be inaccurate, although they have come to seem like necessities of thought. The most important of these circumstances is that most objects on the earth’s surface are fairly persistent and nearly stationary from a terrestrial point of view. If this were not the case, the idea of going a journey would not seem so definite as it does. If you want to travel from King’s Cross to Edinburgh, you know that you will find King’s Cross where it always has been, that the railway line will take the course that it did when you last made the journey, and that Waverley Station in Edinburgh will not have walked up to the Castle. You therefore say and think that you have traveled to Edinburgh, not that Edinburgh has traveled to you, though the latter statement would be just as accurate. The success of this common sense point of view depends upon a number of things which are really of the nature of luck. Suppose all the houses in London were perpetually moving about, like a swarm of bees; suppose railways moved and changed their shapes like avalanches; and finally suppose that material objects were perpetually being formed and dissolved like clouds. There is nothing impossible in these suppositions: something like them must have been verified when the earth was hotter than it is now. But obviously what we call a journey to Edinburgh would have no meaning in such a world. You would begin, no doubt, by asking the taxi-driver: “Where is King’s Cross this morning?“ At the station you would have to ask a similar question about Edinburgh, but the booking-office clerk would reply: “What part of Edinburgh do you mean, Sir? Prince’s Street has gone to Glasgow, the Castle has moved up into the Highlands, and Waverley Station is under water in the middle of the Firth of Forth.” And on the journey the stations would not be staying quiet, but some would be travelling north, some south, some east or west, perhaps much faster than the train. Under these conditions you could not say where you were at any moment. Indeed the whole notion that one is always in some definite “place” is due to the fortunate immovability of most of the large objects on the earth’s surface. The idea of “place” is only a rough practical approximation: there is nothing logically necessary about it, and it cannot be made precise. If we were not much larger than an electron, we should not have this impression of stability, which is only due to the grossness of our senses. King’s Cross, which to us looks solid, would be too vast to be conceived except by a few eccentric mathematicians. The bits of it that we could see would consist of little tiny points of matter, never coming into contact with each other, but perpetually whizzing round each other in an inconceivably rapid ballet-dance. The world of our experience would be quite as mad as the one in which the different parts of Edinburgh go for walks in different directions. If—to take the opposite extreme—you were as large as the sun and lived as long, with a corresponding slowness of perception, you would again find a higgledy-piggledy universe without permanence—stars and planets would come and go like morning mists, and nothing would remain in a fixed position relatively to anything else. The notion of comparative stability which forms part of our ordinary outlook is thus due to the fact that we are about the size we are, and live on a planet of which the surface is no longer very hot. If this were not the case, we should not find pre-relativity physics intellectually satisfying. Indeed, we should never have invented such theories. We should have had to arrive at relativity physics at one bound, or remain ignorant of scientific laws. It is fortunate for us that we were not faced with this alternative, since it is almost inconceivable that one man could have done the work of Euclid, Galileo, Newton, and Einstein. Yet without such an incredible genius physics could hardly have been discovered in a world where the universal flux was obvious to non-scientific observation. In astronomy, although the sun, moon, and stars continue to exist year after year, yet in other respects the world we have to deal with is very different from that of everyday life. As already observed, we depend exclusively on sight: the heavenly bodies cannot be touched, heard, smelt or tasted. Everything in the heavens is moving relatively to everything else. The earth is going round the sun, the sun is moving, very much faster than an express train, towards a point in the constellation “Hercules,” the “fixed” stars are scurrying hither and thither like a lot of frightened hens. There are no well-marked places in the sky, like King’s Cross and Edinburgh. When you travel from place to place on the earth, you say the train moves and not the stations, because the stations preserve their topographical relations to each other and the surrounding country. But in astronomy it is arbitrary which you call the train and which the station: the question is to be decided purely by convenience and as a matter of convention. In this respect, it is interesting to contrast Einstein and Copernicus. Before Copernicus, people thought that the earth stood still and the heavens revolved about it once a day. Copernicus taught that “really” the earth rotates once a day, and the daily revolution of sun and stars is only “apparent.” Galileo and Newton endorsed this view, and many things were thought to prove it—for example, the flattening of the earth at the poles, and the fact that bodies are heavier there than at the equator. But in the modern theory the question between Copernicus and his predecessors is merely one of convenience; all motion is relative, and there is no difference between the two statements: “the earth rotates once a day” and “the heavens revolve about the earth once a day.” The two mean exactly the same thing, just as it means the same thing if I say that a certain length is six feet or two yards. Astronomy is easier if we take the sun as fixed than if we take the earth, just as accounts are easier in a decimal coinage. But to say more for Copernicus is to assume absolute motion, which is a fiction. All motion is relative, and it is a mere convention to take one body as at rest. All such conventions are equally legitimate, though not all are equally convenient. There is another matter of great importance, in which astronomy differs from terrestrial physics because of its exclusive dependence upon sight. Both popular thought and old-fashioned physics used the notion of “force,” which seemed intelligible because it was associated with familiar sensations. When we are walking, we have sensations connected with our muscles which we do not have when we are sitting still. In the days before mechanical traction, although people could travel by sitting in their carriages, they could see the horses exerting themselves and evidently putting out “force” in the same way as human beings do. Everybody knew from experience what it is to push or pull, or to be pushed or pulled. These very familiar facts made “force” seem a natural basis for dynamics. But Newton’s law of gravitation introduced a difficulty. The force between two billiard balls appeared intelligible, because we know what it feels like to bump into another person; but the force between the earth and the sun, which are ninety-three million miles apart, was mysterious. Newton himself regarded this “action at a distance” as impossible, and believed that there was some hitherto undiscovered mechanism by which the sun’s influence was transmitted to the planets. However, no such mechanism was discovered, and gravitation remained a puzzle. The fact is that the whole conception of “force” is a mistake. The sun does not exert any force on the planets; in Einstein’s law of gravitation, the planet only pays attention to what it finds in its own neighborhood. The way in which this works will be explained in a later chapter; for the present we are only concerned with the necessity of abandoning the notion of “force,” which was due to misleading conceptions derived from the sense of touch. As physics has advanced, it has appeared more and more that sight is less misleading than touch as a source of fundamental notions about matter. The apparent simplicity in the collision of billiard balls is quite illusory. As a matter of fact, the two billiard balls never touch at all; what really happens is inconceivably complicated, but is more analogous to what happens when a comet penetrates the solar system and goes away again than to what common sense supposes to happen. Most of what we have said hitherto was already recognized by physicists before Einstein invented the theory of relativity. “Force” was known to be merely a mathematical fiction, and it was generally held that motion is a merely relative phenomenon—that is to say, when two bodies are changing their relative position, we cannot say that one is moving while the other is at rest, since the occurrence is merely a change in their relation to each other. But a great labor was required in order to bring the actual procedure of physics into harmony with these new convictions. Newton believed in force and in absolute space and time; he embodied these beliefs in his technical methods, and his methods remained those of later physicists. Einstein invented a new technique, free from Newton’s assumptions. But in order to do so he had to change fundamentally the old ideas of space and time, which had been unchallenged from time immemorial. This is what makes both the difficulty and the interest of his theory. But before explaining it there are some preliminaries which are indispensable. These will occupy the next two chapters. About HackerNoon Book Series: We bring you the most important technical, scientific, and insightful public domain books. This book is part of the public domain. Bertrand Williams (2004). THE A B C OF RELATIVITY. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved October 2022, from https://www.gutenberg.org/files/67104/67104-h/67104-h.htm This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org , located at https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html .

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