Startup Roundup: State Invests in Tabtor Math; Vidyo Partners with NCR, Jet.com Expands Offices in Hoboken
Tabtor Math: Prazas Learning (Kendall Park), which does business as “Tabtor Math,” received an $800,000 loan through the New Jersey Economic Development Authority’s Edison Innovation VC Growth Fund. The loan was announced earlier this month. NJTechWeekly.com has covered Tabtor over the years. In April 2012, the company attracted an angel investment led by Morristown-basedSoundBoard Angel Fund. In December 2015, we published Tabtor Math CEO Raj Valli’s take on what’s in store for educational technology in 2016.
Tabtor Math is an educational technology platform for iPads and Android tablets. The patent-pending platform provides teachers and students with a highly individualized learning experience focused on the learning activities a student is involved in at that moment. The digital platform combines personalized teaching with a learning program that supports multiple subjects. “It is tailored to every student using a combination of patent-pending digital-paper technology that allows sharing and review of handwritten work, automatic grading, video tutorials and adaptive analytics,” the company said on its website.
As part of its growth strategy, Tabtor Math has pledged to maintain its current staff and to create up to 10 more jobs in New Jersey over the next two years. In fact, creating jobs in New Jersey is one of the conditions of receiving a loan from the Edison Innovation VC Growth Fund. To be eligible, companies must be a developer/owner of protected proprietary technology, employ 75 percent of its employees in New Jersey or commit to growing 10 high-paying jobs over two years, and occupy physical commercial office space, the New Jersey EDA said in a release. A complete list of eligibility requirements can be found at: www.njeda.com/VCGrowthFund.
Vidyo: It means a great deal when growth-stage startups land large deals with big enterprise clients, and that’s what’s happening at Vidyo, the Hackensack-based company that delivers in-the-cloud software-based video conferencing.
Vidyo and NCR (Duluth, Ga.) announced their original equipment manufacturer (OEM) agreement to bring Vidyo’s video communication technology to NCR’s Interactive Teller and other omni-channel video solutions worldwide. This strategic agreement allows NCR to integrate Vidyo’s technology directly into NCR’s product lines.
According to a blog post by Jed Taylor, NCR’s vice president and general manager of interactive banking, the product fits NCR’s needs on three levels. “The main reason we selected Vidyo as a preferred partner for NCR Interactive Teller and our other services and products was, first and foremost, security. Security is essential when dealing with banking transactions and NCR provides 99 million ATM transactions every day!
“The second reason was scale – we wanted something that would work in a scalable environment; that could be deployed in the small community banks up to our largest customers. Vidyo’s software-based platform provided this and it works across different levels of bandwidths. With the growth of banking on personal devices we wanted to ensure the customer had a high quality video experience and we wanted to be able to do that in such a way that we didn’t have to always control video bandwidth. Vidyo’s adaptive technology provided this capability.
“Another reason Vidyo stood out from the pack was the company’s investment in forward thinking IP. As we’re looking to create and build upon a base of video technology to create new and innovative solutions we wanted to make sure that we’re working with a company that can and will innovate with us.”
Jet.com. NJTechWeekly.com learned last week from various sources that Hoboken-based Jet.com was expanding its office space by 40,000 square feet at the Waterfront Corporate Center III. That brings the space to be occupied by Jet.com to 80,000 square feet.
Author Teresa Novellino, writing in New York Business Journal, said that she had interviewed Deena Gianoncelli, chief people officer at Jet.com, via email. Gianoncelli told her that the expansion would be used to accommodate a rapidly growing corporate employee base, as well as additional amenity spaces and a conference room. The company expects to hire 200 more people, including engineers, data scientists and UX/UI designers, in addition to employees for all other corporate functions, Gianoncelli told Novellino.
Right now, Jet.com employs about 1,200 people. Three hundred of them are at headquarters and 400 are in members’ services, in Salt Lake City. The company has one fulfillment center in New Jersey, in Swedesboro.
A month ago, Jet.com bought a home goods brand called “Hayneedle,” which is located in Omaha. That company is operating in stand-alone mode and employs about 500 people. Jet.com has raised about $630 million so far, with the latest round of $350 million coming from Fidelity Investments.
