André V. Demarest, Interim CEO How to make it to the U.S ...

André V. Demarest, Interim CEO

How to make it to the U.S.?

February 12, 2014 (Riga)

Overview • American Business Philosophy

• No Excuses

• Norwegian IT Companies • Fast Search & Transfer (FAST)

• Birdstep Technology

• Latvian IT Companies • Fastr

• ClusterPoint

• Other U.S. Go to Market Strategies • NEST

General George S. Patton, Jr.

Speed

Boldness

Simplicity

General George S. Patton, Jr.

Boldness

Technology/Product

Strategy

Speed

Sales & Marketing

Execution

Simplicity

Finance, HR, IR, etc.

Corporate controls

Innovation – Key Starting Point

Technology/ Product

Sales & Marketing

Finance, HR, IR, etc.

• FAST Announces World´s Largest Search Engine; New Index of 575 Million Web Pages Covering 32 Languages

• OSLO, Norway: FAST, a leader in Internet search and compression technology today launched a new version of its popular FAST Search found at http://www.alltheweb.com.

• The new FAST Search, the world´s largest search engine service, with over 575 million full-text web documents, provides users with highly accurate and relevant results and is built by crawling and examining over 1.5 billion web documents, the most of any search engine.

FAST – Oct. 12, 2000

FAST Team (until August 1, 2006)

CEO & Founder (Oslo)

John M. Lervik

CTO (Oslo)

Bjørn Olstad

President & COO (Boston)

Ali I. Riaz

Senior VP, Finance & Admin. (Oslo)

André V. Demarest

• Web Search (B2C)

• www.alltheweb.com

• Sold to Overture(Yahoo) in 2003 for $70m

• Enterprise Search (B2B)

• Grew from $25m(2002) to $100m(2005)

• Lycos & Dell – initial U.S. based customers

• David Burns – formerly (Director of Product Marketing) from Lycos became initial head of Boston office – U.S. headquarters

• 2/3 of revenue & growth initially from U.S.

• Maintained a Norwegian mother company

• Corporate tax rate of 28%

• Listed on Oslo Stock Exchange

• Sold to Microsoft for $1.2 billion in 2008

FAST – from B2C to B2B

Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Search 2008

Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Search 2013

H-P says it was duped,

takes $8.8 billion charge

• The anti-bribery provisions of the FCPA make it unlawful for

a U.S. person, and certain foreign issuers of securities, to

make a payment to a foreign official for the purpose of

obtaining or retaining business for or with, or directing

business to, any person.

• The FCPA also requires companies whose securities are

listed in the United States to meet its accounting provisions,

• which require corporations covered by the provisions to make

and keep books and records that accurately and fairly reflect the

transactions of the corporation and to devise and maintain an

adequate system of internal accounting controls.

Foreign Corrupt Practices Act

• 1996, established

• 2008, IT/HQ centers moved from Oslo to Stockholm

• Until 2011, high percentage of customers in Europe only

• San Francisco office

• effectively a cost center through 2010

• To date, +$100m in total losses

• U.S. customer wins

• Sprint, 2011

• Another leading one, 2012

• H-P OEM deal, 2013

Birdstep Technology

Fastr nomaina biznesa modeli Anda Asere, [email protected], 2013. gada 3.

septembris 08:50 http://www.db.lv/mazais-bizness/sekojot-idejai/fastr-nomaina-biznesa-modeli-400379

Fastr izstrādātāji Aleksandrs Bičkovs, Aleksejs Siņicins, Eldars Loginovs un Anatolijs Ressins. Foto: Edmunds Brencis, Dienas Bizness

• Apple’s App Store (B2C)

• Global distribution channel

• Intense competition

• IRA conference/exhibition in U.S. (B2B)

• Forced to meet deadlines - rented booth space

• Launched latest version of app for both iPad & iPhone

• Posted YouTube promotional clip

• Met a potential U.S. based partner for white labeling

• Gather important market intelligence

• Prepared us to have discussions with Penguin (U.K.)

• Invited CEO to panel discussion at Frankfurt Book Fair

World’s Fastest Searchable XML Database Software

Featured use cases: ClusterPoint’s NoSQL database software is driving the

business of market leaders in their sectors (24/7 web & mobile services)

LETA.lv - National News Agency IUB.gov.lv - Procurement Monitoring Office

1188.lv – Business Information Service Firmas.lv - Data from Company Register

ClusterPoint Team (today)

Chairman & Founder (Riga)

Gints Ernestsons

CTO & Founder (Riga)

Jurgis Orups

Sales, Baltics (Riga)

Martins Berzins

Interim CEO (Riga)

André V. Demarest

Market Drivers

The market is being driven by the growing enterprise demand for more flexible,

scalable and affordable data management solutions (both analytical and

transactional) than currently offered by the relational database management

market, which is dominated by Oracle.

• Nest is a combination soft landing and launch pad

for proven North European, Russian and other

foreign startups to enter the US market.

• Can join (i) their co-working space, (ii) take

advantage of their partner network, or (iii) hop into

their accelerator program –

• can start today by completing the application from its

web-site (www.nestnewyork.com)

Partner Network

Co-Working

Office Space

Accelerator

Program

• Ismo Rantala

• Founder and CEO

• Founder of Finnish

Mobile Association

(FinnMob)

• Has over 15 years of

experience from

Telcom industry and

multinational

environments.

Summary

• Boldness, Speed & Simplicity

• No Excuses

• Expand direct sales in U.S.

• Recommend getting that 1st satisifed customer

• Establish partnerships in U.S.

• Reach out (i) at relevant trade shows & (ii) to U.S. embassy

• Other full service options

• NEST in NYC