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Q&A with Matt Amundson, VP of Marketing at Everstring

Q&A with Matt Amundson
Matt Amundson, VP of Marketing at EverString has over 10 years of sales and marketing experience. Matt has held roles in Demand Generation and Sales Development at TIBCO, Marketo, FGXI and Red Bull. His primary focus has been on creating processes that generate a consistent, pipeline.

MEDIA 7: Could you tell us about your mantra “Go for the run”?
MATT AMUNDSON: On December 29th of 2017, I decided to change my lifestyle habits and decided that I’m going to run a minimum of one mile every single day. So, every day since that day I’ve got up and ran. It’s been a seminal moment where my approach on life and work has changed dramatically. And as a result of that, it’s become a personal mantra, which is to not be afraid of where you might be today. If you’ve got some lofty goals or if you want to try something new, just get out there and give it a try and see what the results of it could be. On a personal level, whether you’re physically tired or don’t feel like doing it, just give it a shot and go for it. On a professional level, if it’s something that can benefit you or your brand give it a try, go for it and see what happens.

M7: What is your favorite part about working at EverString?
MA: I really love the people that I work with and I’ve been at the organization for about four and a half years. Some of the folks that I’ve worked with since the beginning are still here and it’s just been an awesome journey to be on with some incredible colleagues and that’s just on a personal level. On a professional level, I think we’re all solving a major problem that a lot of organizations are suffering from – which is related to data. As a marketer who has existed in the mar tech space for the broader part of my career, we often think of our process improvements and workflow improvements to gain more efficiency. Whether that’s marketing automation system or a cool new technology like conversational AI most people fall into two camps when it comes to data, either they’re just not conscious of data or they are. The data that they purchase or the data they acquire ultimately powers everything they do from a marketing perspective or they’re used to the status quo of current data providers that provide low quality of data and are sort of mired in the “well I guess that’s the way it is and that’s just the quality level that I have to deal with”. The fact that we’re changing that for some of the world’s biggest brands like Capital One, FedEx, Staples, Autodesk, Oracle as well as the smaller brands is really exciting to me.


"The world’s largest businesses do really large contracts with much bigger deals because they are so data focused and we can provide not only the data but also data science to go along with that."

M7: How does EverString’s data platform stand out from the rest in delivering high coverage as well as accuracy for data vendors?
MA: The high-quality of our data lies in the way that we collect data versus the way that traditional data vendors collect. The traditional route for collecting data is by using a couple of different ways, but the most traditional would be to have a call from somewhere where people are just dialing into an organization and asking them for data about their companies. That’s problematic for a lot of reasons, one being – you’re essentially relying on people to give you accurate answers to the frequency at which you’re updating. This is fairly sparse because you’re not always going to get a hold of somebody as businesses are changing.

The way EverString does it is by taking a more digital approach to it – we use machine learning and artificial intelligence not only to go out and scrape and collect data and update that data on a monthly basis but we also use artificial intelligence to say, if these companies are similar, the likelihood that they have the same attributes or technology or number of sales employees or engineering employees is probably true as well. So, we’re able to predict that type of data and then feed it back through people to go in and verify. So essentially, we’re able to collect data on a much broader set of companies in a much faster fashion and we’re able to update that data much more frequently than any of our competitors. 

M7: What marketing channels do you use and which ones do you see as the most promising given your target customers?
MA: We have a fairly small marketing department; we only have five people on the team. But I think the team that we have here is very efficient, and the channels that we generally lean into are the traditional channels of email, digital marketing through both PPC display advertising as well as using platforms like LinkedIn and Facebook which have actually been successful for us.

One of the things that we do is we’re very heavy direct mail marketers and we’ve found a lot of efficiency gain from that. We’re also very well–known for doing really great events, we did a party at Marketo summit in 2016 that had about 3000 people there and luckily, we had Will Smith as the keynote presenter from Marketo summit come and perform in the party. So, that was an amazing event that we’ve been very well known for.


"There’s just a lot of in accuracy and incompleteness in data so modelling that data to try to predict outcomes is problematic."

M7: Since you joined the company EverString in 2015, what paradigm shift do you see in the company today?
MA: In the early days of the business we really focused on being primarily a data science company where we wanted to roll out our customer’s data to essentially model and predict outcomes. And the problem with that was a lot of what I talked about at the top of our conversation. There’s just a lot of inaccuracy and incompleteness in data so modelling that data to try to predict outcomes was problematic. And what we realized three years ago was we couldn’t just be a data science company we also had to be a data company and so we set out on this journey to become the data company and realistically about 18 months ago we saw the fruit of that work. For about the last six quarters we’ve been able to go into some of the world’s largest businesses and do really large contracts with much bigger deals because they are so data focused and we can provide not only the data but also data science to go along with that. So, it’s not just that they consume raw data from us but also let us use our own internal data science capabilities to make sense of that data to help marketers do better segmentation, for sales people to have better insights into why they should be reaching out to an account when they should be reaching out to an operations teams to be able to provide their go-to-market teams with just a much higher quality of data.



"Everstring makes sense of data to help marketers do better segmentation and for sales people to have better insights into why they should be reaching out to an account or operations teams."

M7: How old were you when you had your first paying job?
MA: I think I was about 10 years old and I fall into like the fairly regular category of a lot of people that I know in the professional world who began their careers as adolescents with a paper route. So, I was like the neighborhood paperboy for a number of years and that was interesting because that taught me a lot of lessons and how to ask people for money which is fairly difficult. It also taught me discipline and building routines and processes around making sure you get up early making sure papers are delivered on time. So, it was a great learning lesson for me. I didn’t necessarily think about it in the time I just kind of thought about the 50 bucks a month that I was getting to go spend on candy and toys.

ABOUT EVERSTRING

EverString’s AI SaaS solution is designed for B2B sales and marketing professionals to drive pipeline growth, help close new customers, expand into new markets, prioritize accounts, and provide actionable insights – all without the need for an administrator.

EverString is backed by leading investors including Lightspeed Venture Partners, Sequoia Capital, IDG Ventures and Lakestar. For more information, visit www.everstring.com.

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GlobeNewswire | January 04, 2024

CoTec Holdings Corp. and Mkango Resources Ltd. are pleased to announce that CoTec and Maginito Limited ("Maginito") have formed a 50/50 joint venture entity which will roll out HyProMag Limited’s (“HyProMag”) Hydrogen Processing of Magnet Scrap (“HPMS”) recycling technology into the United States. The newly formed joint venture company, HyProMag USA, LLC (“HyProMag USA” or the “Joint Venture”), plans to develop a low cost, low carbon, sustainable rare earth magnet recycling and production business underpinned by HPMS. HyProMag has sublicenced the HPMS technology to HyProMag USA. HyProMag is 100 per cent owned by Maginito, which is owned on a 79.4/20.6 per cent basis by Mkango and CoTec, and is commercialising rare earth magnet recycling in the UK, Germany and United States. Revenue from the Joint Venture is targeted for 2025/2026. HyProMag USA will initially focus on completing a bankable feasibility study (“Feasibility Study”) through a hub and spoke model using three HPMS vessels and one magnet manufacturing hub (together the “US Project”). The Joint Venture has recently initiated a “Request for Proposal” process from leading Engineering, Procurement and Construction Management (“EPCM”) providers and has ordered three HPMS reactors to expedite the development of the US Project. Following completion of the Feasibility Study, CoTec and Mkango will make a joint decision as to whether the Joint Venture will proceed with the construction of the US Project. Julian Treger, CoTec CEO commented: “HyProMag is supported by the Minerals Security Partnership1 and we are looking forward to working with leading EPCM providers to design and build these facilities using HyProMag’s considerable experience from the plants being developed in the UK and in Germany. CoTec and Mkango are focused on delivery and will be exploring US Government funding and strategic partnerships for feed supply and rare earth element (“REE”) magnet offtake in the first half of 2024. “We look forward to working and collaborating with local, state and federal stakeholders targeting the completion of the feasibility study”. Will Dawes, Mkango CEO commented: “We see the United States as a core component of our growth strategy and look forward to progressing the US feasibility study over the course of the year, in parallel with further development of operations in the UK, Germany and other jurisdictions. HyProMag’s recycling technology has major competitive advantages versus other recycling technologies and is a key enabler for cost effective and energy efficient separation, recycling and production of rare earth magnets with a significantly reduced carbon footprint. We are receiving strong interest for recycled magnets from potential customers and for recycling solutions from original equipment manufacturers (“OEMs”), and automotive and recycling companies.” HPMS technology was developed at the University of Birmingham, underpinned by approximately US$100 million of research and development funding, and has major competitive advantages versus other rare earth magnet recycling technologies, which are largely focused on chemical processes but do not solve the challenges of liberating magnets from end-of-life scrap streams –HPMS provides the solution. Maginito Maginito is owned 79.4 per cent by Mkango and 20.6 per cent by CoTec. It is focused on developing green technology opportunities in the rare earths supply chain, encompassing neodymium (NdFeB) magnet recycling as well as innovative rare earth alloy, magnet, and separation technologies. Maginito holds a 100 per cent interest in HyProMag and a 90 per cent direct and indirect interest (assuming conversion of Maginito’s convertible loan) in HyProMag GmbH, focused on short loop rare earth magnet recycling in the UK and Germany, and a 100 per cent interest in Mkango Rare Earths UK Ltd (“Mkango UK”), a company focused on long loop rare earth magnet recycling in the UK via a chemical route. About Mkango Resources Ltd. Mkango's corporate strategy is to develop new sustainable sources of neodymium, praseodymium, dysprosium and terbium to supply accelerating demand from electric vehicles, wind turbines and other clean technologies. In parallel with development of its mining assets, Mkango plans to become a market leader in the production of recycled rare earth magnets and alloys via its interest in Maginito. This integrated Mine, Refine, Recycle strategy differentiates Mkango from its peers, uniquely positioning the Company in the rare earths sector. Mkango is listed on the AIM and the TSX-V. Mkango is developing its flagship Songwe Hill rare earths project (“Songwe”) in Malawi with a Definitive Feasibility Study completed in July 2022 and an Environmental, Social and Health Impact Assessment approved by the Government of Malawi in January 2023. Discussions regarding the Mine Development Agreement (“MDA”) for Songwe Hill are ongoing with the Government of Malawi. In parallel, Mkango and Grupa Azoty PULAWY, Poland's leading chemical manufacturer have agreed to work together towards development of a rare earth separation plant at Pulawy in Poland (the Pulawy Separation Plant) to process the purified mixed rare earth carbonate produced at Songwe Hill. Mkango also has an extensive exploration portfolio in Malawi, including the Mchinji rutile exploration project, the Thambani uranium-tantalum-niobium-zircon project and Chimimbe nickel-cobalt project. About CoTec Holdings Corp. CoTec is a publicly traded investment issuer listed on the Toronto Venture Stock Exchange (“TSX- V”) and the OTCQB and trades under the symbol CTH and CTHCF respectively. CoTec is an environment, social, and governance (“ESG”)-focused company investing in innovative technologies that have the potential to fundamentally change the way metals and minerals can be extracted and processed for the purpose of applying those technologies to undervalued operating assets and recycling opportunities, as it transitions into a mid-tier mineral resource producer. CoTec is committed to supporting the transition to a lower carbon future for the extraction industry, a sector on the cusp of a green revolution as it embraces technology and innovation. It has made four investments to date and is actively pursuing operating opportunities where current technology investments could be deployed.

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Government Business

Kratos & Rancher Gov Solutions Partner for Easy Deployment of Virtual Ground Systems with OpenSpace

GlobeNewswire | January 05, 2024

Kratos Defense & Security Solutions, Inc., a technology company in Defense, National Security and Global Markets and Rancher Government Solutions (RGS), the leading provider of enterprise Kubernetes management solutions to the U.S. Government, announced today a strategic partnership to enable customers to seamlessly deploy and scale virtual ground systems using Kratos’ software-based OpenSpace® Platform. With increasingly complex and dynamic satcom and Earth Observation missions, satellite operators and government agencies are transitioning from fixed and proprietary hardware to flexible and scalable generic compute-based cloud environments. This enables a virtualized and software-defined ground system like Kratos OpenSpace Platform to more cost effectively and securely support multiple missions simultaneously, deliver services faster and streamline operations. Today, customers leverage a range of computing environments from bare metal, virtual machines to the cloud, making the deployment of software-based ground systems more complex and time consuming. Working together, Kratos and Rancher Government Solutions have enhanced the ability of the OpenSpace Platform, the first commercially available, fully virtualized and software-defined satellite ground system to be deployed more easily across customer environments. “With Rancher, the OpenSpace Platform deploys its virtual functions including modems, channelizers, combiners, and more, as Kubernetes-based containerized software applications that act as independent and portable computing environments that can run and scale on any infrastructure,” said Brandon Gulla, Chief Technology Officer at RGS. “We are proud to be working with Kratos to support this truly transformational platform that will free satellite operators from proprietary hardware architectures and move to software-defined, flexible and extensible virtual platforms.” By the nature of it being software-defined and containerized, the OpenSpace Platform is already much faster, and more flexible to deploy than traditional hardware-based satellite ground systems. As customer demands grow, the software-based OpenSpace Platform can reconfigure on the fly and deploy new services automatically and cost effectively in minutes. Software containers can be spun up and down and scaled on demand elastically using a single management interface from the Rancher Platform. “Rancher serves as the Kubernetes management technology that supports the OpenSpace Platform’s ability to automate the deployment, scaling, and management of our containerized workloads,” said Anthony Semiao, Chief Solutions Architect of the OpenSpace Platform. “The combined technologies support hybrid and multi-cloud environments enabling OpenSpace customers to run in the data center and cloud environment of their choice such as Google, Amazon or Microsoft and to easily switch from one cloud provider to another.” About Kratos OpenSpace Kratos’ OpenSpace family of solutions enables the digital transformation of satellite ground systems to become a more dynamic and powerful part of the space network. OpenSpace® is the industry’s only commercially available digital transformation solution that enables operators of satellites, Ground Systems-as-a-Service (GSaaS) providers, teleports and others in the satellite services supply chain to capitalize on dynamic ground capabilities. The OpenSpace family consists of three product lines: OpenSpace SpectralNet for converting satellite RF signals to be used in digital environments; OpenSpace quantum products, which are virtual versions of traditional hardware components; and the OpenSpace Platform, the first commercially available, fully orchestrated, software-defined ground system. These three OpenSpace lines enable satellite operators and other service providers to implement digital operations at their own pace and in ways that meet their unique mission goals and business models. About Kratos Defense & Security Solutions Kratos Defense & Security Solutions, Inc. is a technology, products, system and software company addressing the defense, national security, and commercial markets. Kratos makes true internally funded research, development, capital and other investments, to rapidly develop, produce and field solutions that address our customers’ mission critical needs and requirements. At Kratos, affordability is a technology, and we utilize proven, leading edge approaches and technology, not unproven bleeding edge approaches or technology, with Kratos’ approach reducing cost, schedule and risk, and enabling us to be first to market with cost effective solutions. Kratos is known as the innovative disruptive change agent in the industry, a company that is an expert in designing products and systems up front for successful rapid, large quantity, low cost future manufacturing and as a competitive differentiator to our large traditional prime system integrator partners and also to our government and commercial customers. Kratos’ primary business areas include, virtualized ground systems for satellites and space vehicles including software for command & control (C2) and telemetry, tracking and control (TT&C), jet powered unmanned aerial drone systems, hypersonic vehicles and rocket systems, propulsion systems for drones, missiles, loitering munitions, supersonic systems, space craft and launch systems, C5ISR and microwave electronic products for missile, radar, missile defense, space, satellite, counter UAS, directed energy, communication and other systems, and virtual & augmented reality training systems for the warfighter. About Ranger Rancher Government Solutions (RGS) is specifically designed to address the unique security and operational needs of the U.S. Government and military as it relates to application modernization, containers, and Kubernetes. Rancher is a complete open source software stack for teams adopting containers. It addresses the operational and security challenges of managing multiple Kubernetes clusters at scale, while providing DevOps teams with integrated tools for running containerized workloads. RGS supports all Rancher products with U.S. based American citizens who are currently supporting programs across the Department of Defense, Intelligence Community, and civilian agencies.

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Emerging Technology

InfoSec Global Federal Added to Department of Homeland Security Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation Approved Product List

PR Newswire | January 09, 2024

InfoSec Global Federal, the leader in cryptographic vulnerability management, today announced the company has been added to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation (CDM) Program's Approved Product List (APL). InfoSec Global Federal's AgileSec Analytics product helps U.S. federal agencies defend against the exploitation of cryptographic vulnerabilities. The inclusion of AgileSec Analytics to the APL strengthens national cybersecurity by protecting government agencies' most sensitive secrets and data from sophisticated attacks and breaches. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency's (CISA) CDM program provides cybersecurity tools, integration services, and dashboards to participating federal agencies to help them improve the security posture of civilian government networks and systems by strengthening real-time risk monitoring and defense. "The implicit trust of a privileged cryptographic ecosystem has resulted in the infamous SolarWinds hack and other high-profile attacks against federal agencies," said Philip George, Executive Technical Strategist of InfoSec Global Federal. "One aspect as to why these attacks were so successful can be directly attributed to poor visibility and analysis of privileged cryptographic assets, specifically certificates and tokens. Joining the APL underscores the value that InfoSec Global Federal's technology can deliver to reduce risk to critical federal infrastructure, a priority highlighted in OMB Memo 23-02, which requires federal civilian agencies to capture an inventory of all cryptographic assets in order to uncover vulnerabilities and to take immediate steps towards achieving post-quantum safety." InfoSec Global Federal specializes in providing cryptographic discovery, remediation, and management solutions from the silicon firmware up through endpoint applications. Its secure software enables federal agencies to facilitate cryptographic vulnerability management, assure compliance, enrich software bill of materials with a cryptographic bill of materials (CBOM), and expedite post-quantum readiness in alignment with OMB Memo 23-02. AgileSec Analytics offers essential tools for U.S. federal agencies aiming to enhance their cybersecurity and cryptographic posture. This solution is particularly crucial for conducting comprehensive cryptographic inventories, a vital process for government entities to deliver the following key advantages: Enhanced Cryptographic Visibility: AgileSec Analytics empowers agencies with the ability to thoroughly scan their digital environments to identify and catalog all cryptographic assets. This includes keys, certificates, and cryptographic protocols deployed across various systems and networks. Cryptographic Vulnerability Identification and Management: AgileSec Analytics assists agencies in pinpointing vulnerabilities within the cryptographic landscape. By analyzing the inventory, agencies can identify outdated or weak cryptographic practices, non-compliant assets, and potential areas susceptible to breaches. Compliance with Federal Regulations: Aligning with mandates like OMB Memo 23-02, AgileSec Analytics aids agencies in ensuring that cryptographic assets adhere to federal cybersecurity standards. This compliance is critical for safeguarding sensitive government data and communications. Preparation for Quantum Computing: As the threat landscape evolves with the advent of quantum computing, AgileSec Analytics positions agencies to be proactive. It helps in assessing the readiness of current cryptographic standards and facilitates a strategic shift towards quantum-resistant algorithms. The inclusion of InfoSec Global AgileSec Analytics in the DHS CDM APL empowers federal agencies to conduct thorough cryptographic inventories, an integral part of maintaining a robust cybersecurity defense strategy. About Infosec Global Federal InfoSec Global Federal is a cryptographic security company that specializes in providing next-generation cryptographic discovery, agility, and management solutions from the firmware up through endpoint applications. Their secure software enables the management and agility of all cryptographic assets across a digital ecosystem, enabling government agencies to automate and orchestrate cryptography usage, shut down cryptographic vulnerabilities, facilitate compliance, and achieve post-quantum safety.

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