The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Google

  • Google, Accel and Jay Z invest in life insurance start-up Ethos valued over $100m

    Ethos has raised $35 million in a funding round led by Accel and backed by Google Ventures.

    That investment has been valued at more than $100 million, a CNBC report said..

    Ethos has seen a more than 400 per cent jump in revenue, customers and applications in the last four months.

    It is a start-up, which can process life insurance applications in a matter of minutes, and  has raised $35 million in a funding round led by Accel and backed by Google’s venture capital arm.

    The latest investment raises the San Francisco-based firm’s total funding to over $46 million, and  the firm is now valued at more than $100 million.

    The deal, which marks Ethos’ second major round of investment, saw Accel’s partner, Nate Niparko, join the firm’s board of directors, while Google Ventures General partner, Tyson Clark, will act as an advisor to the board.

    Existing investors, Sequoia Capital and Arrive, the venture fund of United States’ rapper Jay Z’s entertainment firm, Roc Nation, also  participated in the funding round.

    Accel’s Niparko said the insurance sector is a $1 trillion industry that is still largely dependent on pen and paper, pushy salespeople, doctor office visits, and legacy systems.

    He said this is why “we believe there is a tremendous opportunity to simplify the process through technology and that’s exactly what Ethos has built”.

    He highlighted other bets the firm has made on insurance technology start-ups like Shift Technology, which uses artificial intelligence to detect fraudulent insurance claims, and The Zebra, a car insurance marketplace.

    “We believe that Ethos is the first player in the life insurance space that’s truly poised to make a difference in how Americans purchase and interact with their insurance provider,” Niparko added.

    Ethos, which uses data analytics to predict a person’s life expectancy, said it is able to cut the time normally taken to apply for life insurance policies from 10 weeks to just 10 minutes, and that insurance claims are paid out “within weeks.” It also claims that more than 99 per cent of its customers do not require a medical examination or blood test in order to get a policy.

  • EdoJobs, UNESCO, Google train 200 Edo children

    ..47 teachers on digital literacy

    …over 500 others to benefit from digital training programme

    EdoJobs, in collaboration with Google, Cape Town Science Centre, and United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO)’s Youth Mobile, has completed training for over 200 Edo youth on computer coding, to advance Governor Godwin Obaseki’s tech revolution in the state.

    Senior Special Assistant to the Edo State Governor on Skills Development and Job Creation, Mrs. Ukinebo Dare, in a chat with journalists said the training tagged Tekly Code Camps afforded participants hands-on skills on coding through which they can provide solutions to everyday problem.

    Dare noted that, “The Tekly Code camps supported by Google is an initiative of Curators University aimed at preparing African children for the future through coding and digital skills. This October, we are training over 700 youth which will include children and teenagers as well as over 50 teachers. So far, we have trained over 200 students. 47 teachers have been trained at the Edo Innovation Hub in Benin City.”

    Read Also: EdoJobs, business owners mentor Edo youth on entrepreneurship

    She said the programme is “to introduce children and teenagers to coding as a first step to equipping them with 21st century skills which, unfortunately, are not catered for in the current school curriculum.”

    Dare added that school teachers are also expected to benefit from the programme, noting that there are concrete plans to sustain the training.

    “More training will be organised by the host, EdoJobs through holiday and weekend camps. This will provide opportunity to primary and secondary schools to bring in their children to learn the basics of coding so that these children will gain the rudiments of computing and develop interest in pursuing careers in computer programming. It will ensure that we have a sure supply of youth who will provide solutions to problems with the use of digital technology.”

  • Technology firm launches app that locates advertising targets on internet

    Technology Company, Dochase, has developed computer application software that is capable of locating consumers of certain kind advertisement on the internet and delivers it to them.

    Dochase is co-founded by two young Nigerian programmers, Chibuike Goodnews and Saint Germaine Onwukeme.

    “Over the years, we have discovered that 75 percent of media spending, especially on adverts is wasted, and this is because the advertisers are probably advertising to people that have no connection with what they want to project. You are probably advertising diaper to everybody in the society, whereas diaper is supposed to be advertised to nursing mothers,” Goodnews said.

    He said nursing mothers visit sites and consume media that talk about taking care of babies and how to handle infant issues. He said through the key words they use in their search; the technology can get insight of all the people who fall within the group of nursing mothers and push the diaper advert to them on those places they spend their time on the internet.

    He said when adverts are pushed out on the internet without identifying or having insights of the people the advert is intended for, it gets wasted.

    “We now looked at how we can solve all these things. We saw that a major way to solve it is let’s apply data to it. That is, we harness data of people who fall within that expected potential customer of each product and target them,” he said.

    Read Also: How innovative technology is driving retail industry

    He explained that while Nigeria probably has about 45 million people on the internet, “you cannot be advertising to 45 million people. You need a fraction of those people who are your direct and potential customers. And how do you know them, you need to get their insights. And that’s why we developed this technology that use data to bring out those kinds of insights,” he said.

    He explained that with the huge number of people on the internet, the technology is able to take it down to those people who have the potential to buy the products.

    He said an aspirant for instance who wants to reach people in his constituency in Lagos State, won’t need to advertise in Delta or the entire country because such advert will be misplaced.

    “We break it down, using our parameters to target only Lagos State.  For brands, it can be used to do media buying by getting insight of who should be your customers and creating campaign that will appeal to those people and using the right media that those people consume,” he explained.

    He said the technology can also categorize people into those who have the potential to do shopping, those who are likely to travel and other such groupings.

    “For somebody who has the potential to travel, you will be able to target your advert to them. For somebody who is doing real estate, you should be able to target people who have the potential to buy homes,” he explained.

    He said the technology is a win-win for all those involved in the chain.

    “Some media houses’ sources of revenue are dwindling. Some are moving online. This technology locates the niche people that are consuming your product. If the site is dedicated to probably real estate, the person that is targeting real estate will pay you more because he is targeting niche customers, that is real estate customers. Then the real estate publisher is earning more because he is getting more adverts that is targeted at specific people that his content appeal to,” he said.

    Onwukeme, on his part, said it is regrettable that a good number of publishers in Nigeria and Africa are still operating on the old form of media buying and media sales, while Europe and America are moving into programmatic.

    “Publishers need to understand that when you open up your website, which is like a piece of land you sell every day, you have 10,000 people that visit your website, so you have 10,000 people you can optimize.  Using Dochase, it helps you to open your inventory to multiple sources, whereby as we know the benefit of a free market, people tend to compete and get the best benefit,” he said.

    Dochase started its programmatic business two years ago as a Nigerian business, now becoming a programmatic influencer in Africa. It recently represented Africa in the global gathering of advertising technologies including Google, Facebook, LinkedIn which held in Germany.

  • Belgium to sue Google for not blurring images of defense sites

    The Belgian defense ministry will sue Google for not complying with its requests to blur satellite images of sensitive military sites, a ministry spokeswoman said on Friday.

    Citing national security, the ministry said it had requested that sites such as air bases and nuclear power stations be obscured on Google’s satellite mapping services.

    “The Ministry of Defence will sue Google,” the spokeswoman said, without giving further details.

    Google has complied with similar requests from other governments over concerns its geomapping Google Earth, Google Maps and granular Street View services could compromise security.

    Google, a unit of Alphabet Inc said it had been working with Belgium for more than two years to respond to issues flagged by the defense ministry.

    “It’s a shame the Belgium Department of Defense have decided to take this decision,” said Michiel Sallaets, a spokesman for Google in Belgium.

    “We have been working closely with them for more than two years, making changes to our maps where asked and legal.”

  • Edojobs, Google, Gidimobile to deploy learning app to students

    Edo State Government has concluded plans to partner Google and Gidimobile, Africa’s first mobile learning platform, to deploy a learning application called gidimo to at least 20,000 Senior Secondary School students in Edo State, to improve learning outcomes.

    The partnership is being anchored by Edojobs, Edo state’s job creation and skills development platform, which will work with the companies, to mobilise not less than 150 ‘activators,’ to deliver the mobile software to the students.

    Senior Special Assistant (SSA) to the Governor on Skills Development and Job Creation, Mrs. Ukinebo Dare, who disclosed this to journalists, said that the partnership is aimed at providing innovative learning solutions to secondary school students as well as empowering those who would work as activators across the state.

    She said the programme is the offshoot of gidimo’s rollout of the app to 100,000 disadvantaged youths across the world, after winning a $1million grant from google.org. She said the deployment of the software will be piloted in Edo State, after which it will be rolled out across the country.

    According to her, “Governor Obaseki’s reforms and style of governance has once again attracted a landmark project to the state. This time, secondary school students will be the beneficiaries.

    To start the campaign in Edo State, 20,000 students will be granted free access to the gidimo application for a period of one year. A 45 mins to one-hour playtime after school (Monday to Saturday) will be needed to cover the syllabus, after which each user gets 300MB of data at the completion of their syllabus weekly. A competition amongst users/students with the application will be held every week, with the best user rewarded.

    Read Also: Google overhauls gmail to lure businesses

    She noted that teachers and National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) members will participate in the programme and will be assigned to schools as activators for the exercise, to sensitise students about the application, how to access and use the app for free.

    “This will come with a small remuneration (about N16,000) from funds allotted for data in the grant received from Google. The app will also allow for activators to earn some money from the retail sales/activation they do.”

    On the mode of operation in the pilot phase, she said, “A sample of 5-10 public schools in the state will be selected to pilot the campaign. The academic performance of students using the gidimo app in these schools will be compared with those not using the application to identify the efficacy of the application on the students under survey.

    “National competition will be held weekly across various subjects on the application. This is can be in an organised event platform, which can be used to spread the government’s message on its effort towards improving the educational sector in the state.”

  • Google plans news IT solutions to connect more Africans – Official

    Mr Taiwo Kola-Ogundale, the Communications and Public Relations Manager of Google West Africa, on Thursday said Google was working on new solutions to connect more Africans to the internet.

    Kola-Ogundale said that the project would be perfected in collaboration with some partners, in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria in Abuja.

    Google is a U.S.-based multinational technology company that specialises in internet-related services and products, including online advertising technologies, search engine, software and hardware.

    “Google recognises the fact that connectivity to the internet has been a challenge to the increasing population of Nigeria and Africa in general and Google Station cannot solve it alone.

    “Google Station alone cannot solve the problem of connecting the major population of Nigeria and Africa to the internet.

    “No single technology or company can tackle the variety of connectivity challenges in Africa alone. Access is a major challenge for many living in countries like Nigeria.

    Read Also: Google to launch free Wi-Fi hotspots across Nigeria

    “For the many Nigerians and over four billion people who are offline around the world, because they cannot afford the solutions or they have poor connections, so we have to invest in a wide range of new technologies.

    “We have the Google Station to Project Link in Uganda and through access-related projects like Google Station; our aim is to help more people get a reliable and consistent web experience during their daily routines.

    “Our plan is to keep working on new solutions with partners who will work with us to enable as many people as possible to get online,” he said.

    Kola-Ogundale recalled that in July, Google announced its plans to launch 200 Google Station sites in five major cities across Nigeria by the end of 2019 to provide free Wi-Fi to millions of people.

    According to him, the cities are Lagos, Abuja, Port-Harcourt, Kaduna and Ibadan.

    He said that the organisation was working with more Internet Service Providers to explore possible opportunities in extending the range within the country.

    The News Agency of Nigeria reports that Google launched free Wi-Fi hotspots in July, 2018, in Lagos as part of its efforts to increase internet access in Nigeria and Africa in general.

  • Trump accuses Google of hiding ‘fair media’ coverage of him

    U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday accused Google’s search engine of hiding “fair media” coverage of him and said he would address the situation, without giving any details.

    In a pair of tweets, Trump said Google search results for “Trump News” showed only the reporting of what he terms fake news media.

    “They have it RIGGED, for me & others,” he said, blaming Google, part of Alphabet Inc, for what he said was dangerous action that promoted mainstream media outlets such as CNN and suppressed conservative political voices.

    “This is a very serious situation-will be addressed!” Trump added, without offering any details.

    Representatives for the White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

    Google also could not be immediately reached.

    Trump has long criticized news media coverage of him, frequently using the term fake news to describe critical reports.

    He has made social media, particularly Twitter, an integral part of his presidency.

    He has previously accused social media companies, which include Twitter and Facebook, of censorship.

    Trump’s accusation of bias on the part of Google comes as social media companies have suspended accounts, banned certain users and removed content as they face pressure from the U.S. Congress to police foreign propaganda and fake accounts aimed at disrupting American politics, including operations tied to Iran and Russia.

    Read Also: Trump under attack for Buhari ‘lifeless comment’

    Companies such as Facebook and Twitter have also been pressed to remove conspiracy driven content and hate speech.

    Tech companies have said they do not remove content for political reasons.

    Some Republican U.S. lawmakers have also raised concerns about social media companies removing content from some conservatives, and have called Twitter’s chief executive to testify before a U.S. House of Representatives committee on Sept. 5.

    Earlier in the month, Alphabet’s YouTube joined Apple Inc and Facebook in removing some content from Infowars, a website run by conspiracy theorist Alex Jones.

    Jones was also temporarily suspended on Twitter.

     

    NAN

  • #GoogleForNigeria: How to use Google ‘Go’ initiatives

    Google  announced the update of several products from its “Go” initiative on Thursday at the Google for Nigeria Conference which held in Lagos.

    “Go” (often referred to as Golang) is a programming language created by Google in 2009 by Robert Griesemer, Rob Pike, and Ken Thompson.

    The Goproduct suite aims to give people with low bandwidth connections and low-RAM devices the best possible Google experience. Although it was launched in the past year, it has new features which are:

    Google Go:  It is described as a lighter and faster way to search. It will soon read web pages out loud and highlight each word so users can follow along. It is a new app which makes it easy for people to discover the best of the internet, even on low-RAM smartphones or unstable network connections. It’s available for devices running Android v4.3 (Jelly Bean) and above, and delivers the same seamless experience whether you’re on a high-end or low-end phone.

    YouTube Go: It enables users to be able to browse downloaded YouTube Go videos, saved as .yt files, right from the gallery on their phones.

    Read Also: Google to launch free Wi-Fi hotspots across Nigeria

    It helps to discover popular videos: ? comedy, ? fashion, ? cooking, ? ‘how-to’s and many more!, helps to control your data and watch more videos it helps you to share  videos Instantly. For YouTubeGo, you need no data to transfer.

    Google Maps Go: will now provide users with turn-by-turn directions, whether they’re travelling by car, by bus or on foot. It is designed to run quickly and smoothly on devices with limited memory. It helps you search for a place, get more information about a place, get directions and see what is nearby.

    Android Go: Launched in Nigeria and 29 other African countries earlier this year, the Go OS gives people coming online for the first time a powerful and reliable smartphone experience.

  •  Google introduces new features for users of Gmail 

    Google has introduced new features for Gmail users which includes several new features designed to increase productivity and more security.
    Google made this known on it official blog (blog.google) on Friday.
    According to Google, among the newly implemented features on Google are smart replies and snooze feature in the inbox.
    It said that the smart reply would provide suggestions to quickly reply emails.
    “While the snooze feature lets users temporarily remove emails from their inbox until a certain time and also avoid certain email threads until a later time.
    “This can be done by hovering over a message in the Gmail inbox.’’
    “The new design also features a new sidebar where users have the option of using Google’s calendar, a note-taking app and perform other tasks side by side with your email,’’ said.

    It says the new Gmail also provides three new layouts to choose from which includes a default view that highlights attachments like documents and photos.
    Others are comfortable view that does not highlight attachments and a compact view that increases the amount of messages one can see on a single page.

    Read Also:   Google overhauls gmail to lure businesses

    Google said the feature referred to as the display density also allows users to collapse the left side panel.
    Matthew Izzat, the product manager for Gmail said Google’s redesign was done with the intent for “ making people safe and more productive’’.
    Izzat said “ Google is not removing any Gmail features in its redesign, it’s just an addition.’’
    “It’s going to be an invitation to users to opt into the new design rather than just being available right away,’’ he said
    “Another good feature of the new Gmail is the new confidential mode where the sender of an email is allowed to set expiry dates for the emails, and this can prevent recipients from forwarding or copying them.
    “In this feature, the sender is in charge of how long the other party can access the message,’’ it said.

    It says on the new Gmail, Google introduced high priority notifications where it makes use of artificial intelligence to select emails that are of top priority to a user and this has helped to filter and cut down spam messages.
    “One helpful additional feature is the one-tap unsubscribe prompt for newsletters a user may have signed up for and may no longer be interested in,’’ it said.
    The last interface design unveiled by Google was back in the year 2014.

    NAN

     

  • Google overhauls gmail to lure businesses

    Alphabet Inc’s Google on Wednesday unveiled its first Gmail redesign since 2013, capping what the company said was an expensive overhaul.

    It will include offline functionality and resemble Microsoft Outlook.

    It is Google’s most extensive update to software in its G Suite workplace bundle.

    It is accelerating efforts to steal business from Microsoft Corp’s dominant Office workplace software suite.

    Previously, G Suite added instant-messaging and spreadsheet features.

    With Gmail, Google said it restructured email storage databases, unified three-dueling-systems for syncing-messages across devices and upgraded-computers underpinning the service.

    That shift to Google’s self-developed Tensor processing chips enables smart-assistant features such as “suggested replies” to messages and “nudges” to respond to forgotten emails.

    “This is an entire rewrite of our flagship, most-used product,” said Jacob Bank, Product Manager Lead for Gmail, which 1.4 billion people use each month.

    Unreliable offline access to email has long discouraged would-be customers.

    Meanwhile, recent high-profile corporate data breaches have increased desire to lock down email.

    Analysts estimate G Suite generated about $2 billion in revenue last year, 10 times behind Office.

    Google declined to specify costs associated with the redesign.

    But parent Alphabet reported on Monday that first-quarter capital expenditures nearly tripled year-over-year to $7.3 billion.

    Chief Financial Officer, Ruth Porat, told analysts that half of the spending resulted from hardware purchases to support expanding use of machine learning.

    This expansion describes automated programmes that can, among other things, identify spam and predict which emails users would find most important.

    Reuters/NAN