The goals behind an application modernization project are generally very clear – better technology, a more efficient process, more security and better outcomes. But there are multiple round blocks to meeting those goals. There are disconnects between what agencies say they want and what and how they buy. First is the question of what is application modernization. The term is too often used synonymously with digital transformation, according to executives we gathered for a discussion around the challenges and opportunities of application modernization. Our conversation was on-the-record, but not for attribution. See the sidebar at the end of this article for a list of attendees. Digital transformation takes a much broader view of the technology lifecycle. App modernization is usually a significant portion of a digital transformation project. But not understanding the nuances between the two can lead to problems and is a barrier to success, the group largely agreed. The disconnects and misunderstandings result in a success rate of just 30% for application modernization projects, one exec said. One risk is that the approach to an application modernization project can be too narrow. The customer often doesn’t articulate the goals it wants to achieve. “If you have a path forward, you have a higher chance of success,” one participant said. A critical need is a technology roadmap that ties into mission objectives. “If that’s not there, you are just throwing your money away,” another said. Industry also can be to blame because they view an application modernization project as a transaction. “The customer sees it very differently,” an executive said. A thorny question is how you modernize a system that must continue delivering on a mission, they said, likening the challenge to changing the engine in a car while it is driving. Many agencies are relying on 20-year-old technologies that have become harder and more expensive to maintain, but the end users are saying: “Don’t touch it. It’s working. Don’t break it.” Several executives focused their remarks on the importance of a technology roadmap. While acknowledging its importance, many agencies are challenged to create that plan. “How do you build a roadmap when you don’t understand the technology and, in some cases, you don’t understand the problem,” one said. Agency leaders often come in with plans for upgrades and replacements, but there isn’t a discussion about the why, executives said. There also are concerns that this issue will be exacerbated at least in the short term with the new administration coming in with new leaders across the agencies. “Strategies are going to change, and everybody will have to figure out what that means, so no one is going to have that road map we are looking for,” an exec said. Putting the administration change aside, industry needs to understand that different agency officials look at application modernization through a different lens. Chief information officers look at app modernization in terms of security, cost and the platform. From the operational side, the agency thinks about whether the application does what is needed for the mission. Contractors often need to be the conduit that communications between those two sides and those conversations come back to what the agency is trying to accomplish. “The outcome can get misunderstood,” one said. No matter what the outcome the customer is looking for, many said a critical element is being able to measure that outcome. One participant said the government needs to stop buying software and services and labor all as separate items. The person added agencies should shift toward buying measured, service-based outcomes. But that shift is hard and expensive because it moves away from the traditional labor-based model and toward a cloud-based, as-a-service model. The funding mechanism will change as well. One example given was a financial system that moved from labor hours and software licenses to an as-a-service model. Under the traditional model the government has some discretion on how much it spends. But one said that in a consumption model, “you don’t have a choice, it's a must fund." Agencies face a technical debt that drives the need for application modernization and also have a workforce debt at the same time. “When the government doesn’t have the ability to discern the value of the next technology, they rely on the contractors they have in place,” one executive said. Many of those contractors rely on a business model the is labor-based, which many said makes moving to the model challenging because the contractor doesn’t have an incentive to change themselves, While the executives were quick to describe the many challenges and roadblocks, they also cited some examples of successes. The key here is also taking a wholistic approach. One agency has been using a service model for a decade and they are meticulous about documenting their process, what has worked, what hasn’t, etc. A second element is the cooperation across the agency. “The director, the platform owner, the business analyst all worked together,” an exec said. Leadership and relationships are critical. “There has to be courage and trust,” another executive said. “We must have government people with the courage to try something new and the trusted relationship with their contractors to go ahead and do it. And when they run into problems, they lean on that relationship.” PARTICIPANTS Seth Abrams, Leidos Alex Adamcyk, LMI Jeff Bateman, Veeam George Batsakis, Groundswell Robert Carey, Cloudera Government Solutions Chris Copeland, ManTech Angel Davis, Presidio Federal Brian Drake, Accrete AI Chrystal Hair, A-Tek Mia Jordan, Salesforce Dennis Lucey, Akima Jay Olsen, General Dynamics IT Mike Raker, Maximus Nic Skirpan, Bravium Consulting Barry Snyder, ATi Don Styer, Serco Conrad Symber, CGI Federal NOTE: Washington Technology Editor-in-Chief Nick Wakeman led the roundtable discussion. The November gathering was underwritten by Veeam, but both the substance of the discussion and the published article are strictly editorial products. Neither Veeam nor any of the participants had input beyond their comments.How China Became the World’s Largest Gold Consumer and ProducerYouth shot to death outside bar in Cayo; police seek one
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Fortis Group Advisors LLC lowered its holdings in Amazon.com, Inc. ( NASDAQ:AMZN ) by 1.8% during the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 44,988 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock after selling 820 shares during the quarter. Amazon.com accounts for about 1.5% of Fortis Group Advisors LLC’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 17th biggest position. Fortis Group Advisors LLC’s holdings in Amazon.com were worth $8,383,000 as of its most recent SEC filing. Several other hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in AMZN. PayPay Securities Corp grew its holdings in shares of Amazon.com by 64.6% in the 2nd quarter. PayPay Securities Corp now owns 163 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $32,000 after purchasing an additional 64 shares during the last quarter. Hoese & Co LLP acquired a new position in Amazon.com in the third quarter valued at about $37,000. Christopher J. Hasenberg Inc grew its stake in Amazon.com by 650.0% during the second quarter. Christopher J. Hasenberg Inc now owns 300 shares of the e-commerce giant’s stock worth $58,000 after buying an additional 260 shares during the last quarter. Koesten Hirschmann & Crabtree INC. acquired a new stake in shares of Amazon.com during the first quarter worth approximately $69,000. Finally, Innealta Capital LLC bought a new position in shares of Amazon.com in the second quarter valued at approximately $77,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 72.20% of the company’s stock. Analysts Set New Price Targets A number of research firms recently commented on AMZN. Rosenblatt Securities increased their price target on Amazon.com from $221.00 to $236.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, November 1st. Jefferies Financial Group raised their target price on Amazon.com from $225.00 to $235.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, November 1st. Barclays lifted their price target on Amazon.com from $220.00 to $235.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, August 2nd. Telsey Advisory Group raised their price objective on shares of Amazon.com from $215.00 to $235.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, November 1st. Finally, Piper Sandler upped their target price on shares of Amazon.com from $215.00 to $225.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, November 1st. Two analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, forty have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $235.77. Amazon.com Stock Performance Shares of AMZN opened at $197.12 on Friday. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $193.00 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $186.31. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.21, a quick ratio of 0.87 and a current ratio of 1.09. Amazon.com, Inc. has a twelve month low of $142.81 and a twelve month high of $215.90. The firm has a market cap of $2.07 trillion, a P/E ratio of 42.21, a PEG ratio of 1.33 and a beta of 1.14. Amazon.com ( NASDAQ:AMZN – Get Free Report ) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, October 31st. The e-commerce giant reported $1.43 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.14 by $0.29. The firm had revenue of $158.88 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $157.28 billion. Amazon.com had a net margin of 8.04% and a return on equity of 22.41%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 11.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $0.85 EPS. On average, analysts forecast that Amazon.com, Inc. will post 5.27 EPS for the current fiscal year. Insider Activity at Amazon.com In related news, Director Daniel P. Huttenlocher sold 1,237 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, November 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $199.06, for a total transaction of $246,237.22. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now owns 24,912 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,958,982.72. This represents a 4.73 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink . Also, SVP David Zapolsky sold 2,190 shares of Amazon.com stock in a transaction on Tuesday, September 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $195.00, for a total transaction of $427,050.00. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now owns 62,420 shares in the company, valued at $12,171,900. The trade was a 3.39 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here . In the last quarter, insiders have sold 6,011,423 shares of company stock valued at $1,249,093,896. 10.80% of the stock is owned by insiders. About Amazon.com ( Free Report ) Amazon.com, Inc engages in the retail sale of consumer products, advertising, and subscriptions service through online and physical stores in North America and internationally. The company operates through three segments: North America, International, and Amazon Web Services (AWS). It also manufactures and sells electronic devices, including Kindle, Fire tablets, Fire TVs, Echo, Ring, Blink, and eero; and develops and produces media content. See Also Five stocks we like better than Amazon.com Best of the list of Dividend Aristocrats: Build wealth with the aristocrat index Vertiv’s Cool Tech Makes Its Stock Red-Hot Roth IRA Calculator: Calculate Your Potential Returns MarketBeat Week in Review – 11/18 – 11/22 Canadian Penny Stocks: Can They Make You Rich? 2 Finance Stocks With Competitive Advantages You Can’t Ignore Want to see what other hedge funds are holding AMZN? Visit HoldingsChannel.com to get the latest 13F filings and insider trades for Amazon.com, Inc. ( NASDAQ:AMZN – Free Report ). Receive News & Ratings for Amazon.com Daily - Enter your email address below to receive a concise daily summary of the latest news and analysts' ratings for Amazon.com and related companies with MarketBeat.com's FREE daily email newsletter .Preview: Hoffenheim vs. RB Leipzig - prediction, team news, lineupsSAN FRANCISCO , Dec. 5, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Silicon Valley's seasoned veterans in retail and e-commerce are rallying behind Jingo , a bold leap forward in transforming the online shopping experience. By blending personalization with advanced technology, Jingo is rethinking the way shoppers discover products and how brands connect with their audiences. A Powerhouse Backing Founded by e-commerce veterans, Ujjal Pathak and Rohan Bhanot , who bring years of experience building online shopping platforms, Jingo has secured backing from a powerhouse group of investors and advisors with expertise from leading companies such as Pinterest, Walmart, Minted, eBay, Square, Nike, Klarna, and Intuit. Their collective knowledge in e-commerce, retail, and fintech provides the strategic guidance needed to bring Jingo's vision of a smarter, more equitable shopping platform to life. Solving the Real Problem in E-Commerce Amazon has been shaping online shopping for nearly 30 years, while Walmart has stood as a retail giant for over 60. While these platforms revolutionized e-commerce for past generations, Jingo is built from the ground up to meet the needs of today's digitally native consumers. Designed with Gen Z and Millennials in mind, Jingo delivers a shopping experience that feels intuitive, personal, and deeply connected to modern lifestyles. For customers, the challenge isn't simply finding products—it's making better decisions . Endless choices often lead to decision fatigue and frustration. Jingo tackles this by prioritizing relevance over sheer quantity. Using machine learning, the platform curates and presents personalized assortments early in the shopping journey, showing the most relevant products at the right time. This thoughtful approach fosters confidence and transforms decision-making into an enjoyable process. For brands and sellers, major marketplace platforms often tie visibility to significant advertising spend, creating barriers for smaller players. Jingo flips this model by leveraging advanced machine learning to surface products only to customers with genuine interest. This precision eliminates waste, reduces noise, and ensures that every connection between brands and customers feels meaningful. Empowered by tools like real-time insights, predictive analytics, and curated discovery, brands can optimize inventory, anticipate trends, and connect with their ideal audience without relying on costly campaigns or third-party tools. Jingo is creating a marketplace where both customers and sellers thrive, redefining how value is delivered in online shopping. A Transformative Vision for the Future Jingo's ambitions go far beyond optimizing today's online shopping experience. The platform is building toward a future where commerce is redefined through intelligent systems that seamlessly integrate into users' lives. Imagine a world where shopping evolves from a process you initiate to an experience that happens intuitively. Jingo's end-state vision is to create intelligent systems capable of learning, adapting, and acting on behalf of users , delivering personalized, proactive, and effortless commerce. This approach points to a future where products appear at your doorstep before you even think about shopping, making commerce an invisible yet integral part of daily life. By designing systems that dynamically adapt and provide proactive support, Jingo aims to fundamentally change the way consumers and brands interact, setting a new standard for convenience, personalization, and connection. Flipping the Script for Brands and Sellers Beyond offering better targeting, Jingo is reimagining the commission structure to create a fairer and more seller-focused marketplace. For the first 1,000 brands and sellers who join, Jingo introduces a groundbreaking model: These incentives, coupled with Jingo's advanced tools like predictive analytics and real-time insights, empower sellers to focus on delivering quality products while Jingo ensures they reach the right customers. By reducing the noise-to-signal ratio, brands can build lasting, loyalty-driven relationships in a transparent and equitable ecosystem. Brands and sellers interested in being part of this transformative journey can contact the Jingo team at partner@jingo.app A Bold Vision for E-Commerce With the support of Silicon Valley's leading minds, Jingo is setting a new benchmark for what online shopping can achieve. By addressing decision-making challenges for consumers and creating deeper, more equitable connections for brands, Jingo is leading the next wave of e-commerce innovation. To celebrate its launch, Jingo is running a referral campaign from December 6, 2024 , to February 28, 2025 . Participants can earn credits to shop on the platform once it's live, with prizes of $50,000 for the top referrer, $30,000 for second place, and $10,000 for third. Jingo is more than a platform—it's a movement toward smarter, more personalized, and intuitive commerce. By building systems that anticipate, simplify, and deliver, Jingo is shaping the future of shopping for consumers and sellers alike. Get in Touch For PR inquiries, strategic partnerships, or more information, contact contact@jingo.app View original content to download multimedia: https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/redefining-the-future-of-shopping-jingo-gains-silicon-valleys-backing-302324337.html SOURCE Jingo Technologies, Inc.
Former officials urge closed-door Senate hearings on Tulsi Gabbard, Trump's pick for intel chiefWASHINGTON — President Joe Biden is weighing whether to issue sweeping pardons for officials and allies who the White House fears could be unjustly targeted by President-elect Donald Trump’s administration, a preemptive move that would be a novel and risky use of the president’s extraordinary constitutional power. The deliberations so far are largely at the level of White House lawyers. But Biden himself has discussed the topic with some senior aides, according to two people familiar with the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity Thursday to discuss the sensitive subject. No decisions have been made, the people said, and it is possible Biden opts to do nothing at all. Pardons are historically afforded to those accused of specific crimes – and usually those who have already been convicted of an offense — but Biden’s team is considering issuing them for those who have not even been investigated, let alone charged. They fear that Trump and his allies, who have boasted of enemies lists and exacting “retribution,” could launch investigations that would be reputationally and financially costly for their targets even if they don’t result in prosecutions. While the president’s pardon power is absolute, Biden’s use in this fashion would mark a significant expansion of how they are deployed, and some Biden aides fear it could lay the groundwork for an even more drastic usage by Trump. They also worry that issuing pardons would feed into claims by Trump and his allies that the individuals committed acts that necessitated immunity. Recipients could include infectious-disease specialist Dr. Anthony Fauci, who was instrumental in combating the coronavirus pandemic and who has become a pariah to conservatives angry about mask mandates and vaccines. Others include witnesses in Trump’s criminal or civil trials and Biden administration officials who have drawn the ire of the incoming president and his allies. Some fearful former officials have reached out to the Biden White House preemptively seeking some sort of protection from the future Trump administration, one of the people said. It follows Biden’s decision to pardon his son Hunter — not just for his convictions on federal gun and tax violations, but for any potential federal offense committed over an 11-year period, as the president feared that Trump allies would seek to prosecute his son for other offenses. That could serve as a model for other pardons Biden might issue to those who could find themselves in legal jeopardy under Trump. Biden is not the first to consider such pardons — Trump aides considered them for him and his supporters involved in his failed efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election that culminated in a violent riot at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. But he could be the first to issue them since Trump’s pardons never materialized before he left office nearly four years ago. Gerald Ford granted a “full, free, and absolute pardon” in 1974 to his predecessor, Richard Nixon, over the Watergate scandal. He believed a potential trial would “cause prolonged and divisive debate over the propriety of exposing to further punishment and degradation a man who has already paid the unprecedented penalty of relinquishing the highest elective office of the United States,” as written in the pardon proclamation. Politico was first to report that Biden was studying the use of preemptive pardons. On the campaign trail, Trump made no secret of his desire to seek revenge on those who prosecuted him or crossed him. Trump has talked about “enemies from within” and circulated social media posts that call for the jailing of Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, former Vice President Mike Pence and Sens. Mitch McConnell and Chuck Schumer. He also zeroed in on former Rep. Liz Cheney, a conservative Republican who campaigned for Harris and helped investigate Jan. 6, and he promoted a social media post that suggested he wanted military tribunals for supposed treason. Kash Patel, whom Trump has announced as his nominee to be director of the FBI, has listed dozens of former government officials he wanted to “come after.” Richard Painter, a Trump critic who served as the top White House ethics lawyer under President George W. Bush, said he was reluctantly in support of having Biden issue sweeping pardons to people who could be targeted by Trump’s administration. He said he hoped that would “clean the slate” for the incoming president and encourage him to focus on governing, not on punishing his political allies. “It’s not an ideal situation at all,” Painter said. “We have a whole lot of bad options confronting us at this point.” While the Supreme Court this year ruled that the president enjoys broad immunity from prosecution for what could be considered official acts, his aides and allies enjoy no such shield. Some fear that Trump could use the promise of a blanket pardon to encourage his allies to take actions they might otherwise resist for fear of running afoul of the law. “There could be blatant illegal conduct over the next four years, and he can go out and pardon his people before he leaves office,” Painter said. “But if he’s going to do that, he’s going to do that anyway regardless of what Biden does.” More conventional pardons from Biden, such as those for sentencing disparities for people convicted of federal crimes, are expected before the end of the year, the White House said.