With crops being grown indoors under controlled environments, a selling point used by multiple vertical farms is that they can grow crops anywhere – even in the heart of a city. This has led to proponents of the industry envisioning “smart cities”, where vertical farms in city skyscrapers help feed the urban population. While this is achievable in principle, the truth is that the choice of location for vertical farming is much more involved and intricate than it may appear from these claims alone. Choosing an ideal location can be one of the most important factors in determining the success of a vertical farm.

Some vertical farms may choose to set up their facilities in pre-existing facilities, such as abandoned warehouses. In these cases, identifying the suitability of the venue is the first point of consideration: vertical farms are very energy intensive, and it is important to ensure the facilities chosen can support these energy loads. In addition, the ergonomics of the facility is also important; should the layout not be given proper consideration, this can impede workers and decrease worker efficiency. As labor costs are typically among the largest sources of expenditure for a vertical farm, improving labor efficiency to reduce these costs is of paramount importance.

While growing crops in the center of a city may seem ideal, the reality is that this may be counterproductive. Obtaining and maintaining such a location is expensive and can contribute significantly to the operating expenditure of a vertical farm while presenting logistical challenges in distributing produce; the “last mile” of food distribution is often the hardest. Having a farm right next to the consumers themselves may also be less ideal than instead choosing a location near food distribution centers, as this allows for more efficient delivery of produce. As distribution centers are typically located on the outskirts of cities, the cost of land is also much cheaper. This is the approach chosen by UK-based Jones Food Company, which chose Scunthorpe as a location for its vertical farm – this is a relatively low-cost location located near food distribution centers and a network of motorways that can reach many consumers in a day, even if it isn’t right in the middle of the capital city. Vertical farms should carefully consider their place in the supply chain before establishing a base.

On a larger scale, vertical farms may prove more profitable in different geographical regions. Vertical farms can reduce water usage significantly over conventional agriculture, and the high degree of control over the growing environment allows them to grow crops in extreme climates – where such crops may otherwise be unable to grow. In return, vertical farms demand more energy to carry out growing operations. To maximize their potential, vertical farms would ideally be located in regions of water scarcity, such as Sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East, or in areas with extreme climates, such as in Scandinavian countries, where the low amounts of sunlight and high costs of regulating greenhouse environments single out vertical farms as an optimal solution. The amount of agricultural land available is also an important factor – regions looking to increase food security and reduce reliance on imports while facing challenges in acquiring sufficient agricultural land would find vertical farms to be ideal. A particularly prominent example of such a country is Singapore, which has demonstrated much interest in vertical farming over the last few years.

Beyond the considerations of water scarcity and temperature, the general availability of fresh produce and the distribution networks of given countries should also be considered. Vertical farms use the added freshness and higher quality of their crops as a primary selling point, but these are typically offset by higher prices. Should there already be a large supply of high-quality produce available at lower costs, vertical farms will find it hard to distinguish their own produce and may struggle to establish a significant market share. The converse would also be true; should a country lack easy access to fresh produce, vertical farms are expected to see much demand for their produce. An example of such a region would be the Middle East: leafy greens typically travel several thousand miles to reach stores, resulting in consumers facing high prices and low-quality products. The high price of conventionally farmed leafy greens, alongside government subsidies, makes it easier for vertically farmed produce to approach price parity while providing much fresher, higher-quality products.

While the choice of location is an important consideration, it is only one of many others that must be given proper thought. Only through proper optimization of growing operations to improve efficiency and reduce costs can vertical farms reach their true potential. In the IDTechEx report, “Vertical Farming 2022-2032”, many further important factors for consideration are discussed in detail, and the future of vertical farming is evaluated through 10-year market forecasts.

The post Research Finds Location Is Key to Success of Vertical Farms appeared first on Grit Daily News.

At issue is what’s been deemed a “technological blackout” in Brazil that has already seen more than 100,000 tech jobs go unfilled this year due to a lack of qualified, educated talent. That number is expected to grow by more than 5x by 2025 to about 530,000 tech jobs – including software developers and coders, data scientists, AI engineers, and U/X designers – going unfilled unless there are more people trained in STEM disciplines to fill those roles. 

On July 20, iFood and XP unveiled the tech-education initiative and announced the two founding companies (a.k.a. “Maintainers) have invested BRL $5 million and 18 other companies or institutions have committed BRL $10 million to the various projects. The goal is to raise and invest a total of BRL $100 million (US $18 million) between now and 2025. 

“In the last year, we saw many companies investing in education, but these efforts are still very dispersed. Thus, we realized the importance of joining forces with others to help solve this deficit in this area that hinders the development of Brazil. Even expanding isolated efforts will not solve the problem. With this union of forces, we hope to promote the meeting between talented people who are just waiting for an opportunity, while contributing to a social transformation and the development of the country,” said Fabrício Bloisi, CEO of iFood.

The main beneficiaries of the coalition’s efforts are underrepresented populations in the tech industry today, including women, Black and low-income people. The Tech Movement’s initiatives range from high school students to adults. The member companies will be able to act at different levels, whether through investments, projects, or execution.

“Our objective is to contribute to making Brazil a prosperous country and a protagonist in terms of technology, with job and career opportunities for all Brazilians. Our big dream is to make a difference in the training of young professionals, so they’re prepared for the challenges of the new digital economy in terms of technology, innovation, and business. We believe that, through social investment, we can generate a structural impact in Brazil that is transformational,” said Thiago Maffra, CEO of XP Inc.

To learn more about the Tech Movement initiative, Grit Daily recent sat down to speak with Gustavo Vitti, Chief People and Sustainability Officer at iFood, to learn more about the progress the collective has made so far, and what to expect next from the coalition’s efforts to increase the diversity and preparedness of Brazil’s future tech-industry workforce:

Grit Daily: Tell us more about how the Tech Movement initiative came about. 

Gustavo Vitti: The Tech Movement is a private, social-investment platform for technology. It started a year ago, in a conversation between companies who were suffering from the tech-talent scarcity combined with a shared ESG goal of developing and hiring professionals from non-privileged backgrounds. In other words we have a mutual dream of transforming Brazil into a technological power through diversity.

Today, Brazil is a country with 10 million people who are unemployed, and at the same time, there are plenty of job opportunities in the tech sector that are not being filled due to a lack of qualified labor. This is not because Brazilians don’t want good jobs or higher levels of education, but because opportunities aren’t finding the right people; for example those who live in the favelas. This challenge is exactly what this movement aims to tackle.

So, with this dream in mind and a pinch of reality, we all know this is a marathon and not a sprint. We need to inspire our children to think and dream about working in technology fields which are forecast to see significant growth in the years ahead. In addition, we need to foster easy access to training for these jobs of the future and build bridges between these freshly qualified tech professionals and the Brazilian big tech companies.

What we’ve done so far: we’ve launched two initiatives that have already impacted more than 150,000 people. The first one is the Tech Marathon, for high school students at public and private schools. Set up as an Olympiad-style tech competition between educational institutions, teachers, and students, the first edition in May, earlier this year, had more than 80,000 students compete, including schools from 21 Brazilian states. The second one is Tech Power that has already awarded more than 6,000 intensive scholarships for tech education to underprivileged groups. There’s another two new initiatives being baked that we will launch over the next 3-6 months and the  Movement will continue to seek out or create similar initiatives and provide funding to accelerate them.

Today, iFood and XP Inc. are the two original maintainers and there are 20 sponsor companies and institutions in the collective that can contribute to the cause with investments or services, including: Accenture, Arco, Buser, CI&T, Cubos Academy, Descomplica, Digital House, English First (EF), F. Behring, Gama Academy, Grupo Boticário, Instituto Localiza, Kenzie, Let’s Code, ONE Oracle, Raia Drogasi, Rocketseat, Semantix, Telles Foundation, and VTEX. 

GD: What are the roles iFood and XP play as founding members? 

GV: Companies can take part in the Tech Movement as either Maintainers or Sponsors. For the Maintainers, they play a role in the strategic agenda of the initiative and in the decisions of the projects, being part of the Strategic Council. Sponsors play a role in the execution and funding projects. They also take part in the Consultative Council.

The Tech Movement seeks to attract more companies and organizations from all segments and areas. Participation can occur as a Maintainer or Sponsor, involving financial commitments as well as services. iFood and XP Inc are the first Maintainers. To find out how to participate and contribute to the Movement, just access www.movtech.org.

GD: Brazil is projected to need around 500,000 more tech workers by 2025 than are expected to be available. How many people do you anticipate can be trained by 2025 with R$100M being raised?

GV: With the initial projects, which are already underway, we expect to train one million people by 2025. The more companies and organizations that join the Tech Movement, the more scale we will gain to benefit an increasing number of people.

In the two examples we mentioned before, Tech Marathon and Tech Power, we believe both projects will have a scale of 10-15x bigger than today as we expand the coalition’s resources and gain more visibility. It’s incredible to see how fast we’ve been iterating and improving on the offerings. As an example, today we can provide high-quality tech learning almost 6x cheaper than we did for our first groups.

GD: The U.S. tech industry is predominantly white and male, with women, Black people and other minorities present in much smaller numbers than in the general population. What is the demographic of the Brazilian tech sector today?

GV: It is a similar situation in Brazil compared to the U.S. today The Tech Movement will prioritize underrepresented minorities and low-income people. As a result of the  “technological blackout,” as the lack of tech professionals in Brazil has been called, there are already more than 100,000 job vacancies open this year, with little prospect of being filled. 

Also, the digitization of the economy and companies, accelerated by the pandemic, has increased the demand for skilled labor, while the number of available professionals remains limited. That’s why our movement is focused on low-income public and non-privileged backgrounds, and prioritizes women and Black people, for example. We want to change the current inequities and have a positive impact on a different future from the one that is projected today.

We believe and invest in education – from basic education, so young people have a better education in Portuguese, Mathematics and Logic, to professional training that is specialized in technology. We also want to develop the technical and emotional skills for those who are already in the marketplace and are seeking new opportunities. That’s why we offer practical tech courses too. We dream to be a quality tech-education platform that will drive the growing tech ecosystem forward so qualified, trained talent are ready to dive into new opportunities and help drive innovation and social transformation.

GD: How and where will you recruit for the program? 

GV: Our purpose is to awaken more people’s interest in working in the tech industry, empower them through training – from basic education to practical knowledge,  and then help employ for the jobs of the future by building bridges between them and tech companies. 

Based on the various programs, courses and partnerships involved, people we’ll be approached from different communication channels as it fits to each initiative invested, and work together with private, public, and non-governmental organizations. We need and we’re calling for others to help with these important efforts.

GD: I can see how cultivating a more diverse workforce could help solve the labor shortage, but what are the less obvious benefits of more diversity?

GV: The inclusion of different people, life stories, and backgrounds is a way to promote more tolerance and societal integration. All innovation, services, products and ways of leading will be enriched by a broader world view; one in which solutions and achievements are sustainable. And most importantly, we will be truly changing lives. We want to reach 2030 with so many lives impacted that we’ll  be able to change social inequality in Brazil, with those who have always been the base of the social pyramids as the main protagonists who are creating the country’s prosperity.

GD: The Potentia Tech Platform, which was initiated by iFood, has awarded 6,000 scholarships over the past nine months and 450 of those people have already been hired. How many of those scholarship recipients are from underrepresented groups?

GV: The scholarships are being offered exclusively for low-income people. We prioritize people who are underrepresented in the society, having at least half of the people inside Potencia Tech being women or Black people.

The post The Tech Movement 2030 Coalition Pledges Millions to Train a More Diverse Talent Pool to Fill a Growing Number of Tech Jobs in Brazil appeared first on Grit Daily News.

Paragon, a startup building a platform that integrates and aggregates various software-as-a-service (SaaS) apps for enterprise clients, has raised $13 million in a series A round led by Inspired Capital, alongside previous investors FundersClub and Garuda Ventures. CEO and co-founder Brandon Foo said that the tranche will be put toward “scaling” and expanding Paragon’s team across the engineering and go-to-market teams.

Paragon, a part of Y Combinator’s winter 2020 cohort, is designed to allow software products to integrate with third-party apps without disrupting existing workflows. Companies can use the platform to build SaaS integrations into their products that are then provided to their end users, with features such as fully managed authentication and prebuilt integration interfaces.

Foo founded Paragon in 2019 with Ishmael Samuel, a former Uber engineer. Paragon is Foo’s second venture after Polymail, an email app focused on collaboration.

“While building Polymail, we had to spend months becoming experts in the different vendor-specific authentication methods, APIs, and documentation for every integration we built. It felt like we were reinventing the wheel every time. Yet customers kept asking for more integrations, which quickly made it impossible to keep up, let alone maintain all these integrations we’d built,” Foo told TechCrunch in an email interview. “I later realized that this is a problem that every SaaS company faces today. When Ishmael and I started Paragon, we sought to solve a never-ending problem we’d experienced firsthand as software developers.”

Foo says that Paragon currently supports around 45 prebuilt integrations with SaaS apps, including Salesforce, HubSpot, Slack and Shopify. Recently, the company launched an integration builder that allows customers to create their own custom integrations on Paragon with public SaaS APIs without needing to write code.

Paragon offers two versions of its service: cloud-hosted and on-premise. Both store and manage end-user authentication credentials so that companies don’t have to manually build and maintain authentication for each app integration individually. They both also store integration data for logging and observability purposes.

“Software companies must offer integrations in order to stay competitive in the market — it has simply become an expectation of SaaS buyers … However, building integrations from scratch requires tremendous engineering resources — not to mention the work it takes to maintain integrations as SaaS APIs constantly change,” Foo said. “Paragon provides a simple, productized solution that abstracts the complexities of every SaaS integration into a single software development kit, which can be natively embedded in any product to provide a seamless end-user experience.”

Foo claims that Paragon is currently servicing about 100 million requests per month across its customer base. That’s an auspicious start, but the challenge will be maintaining growth as rival products emerge. While not tackling exactly the same problem, Pipedream offers an integration platform for building workflows and connecting cloud apps and services. With an eye toward financial applications, Stripe recently launched App Marketplace, a collection of scripts and tools incorporating third-party SaaS apps that work alongside Stripe’s payment processing.

Foo says, though, that the slowdown in tech has been unexpectedly fortuitous (minus the layoffs).

“It’s actually been an accelerant for Paragon, since engineering efficiency has become more crucial than ever before. Software companies need to do more with less, yet can’t afford to continue losing valuable deals by not meeting their customers’ integration requirements,” he said. “The top challenge Paragon solves for is engineering resources. To spend in-house engineering resources focused on external integrations takes valuable time away from building their core product.”

To date, Paragon has raised $16.5 million in capital.

The original article can be found on TechCrunch.

The post Paragon Raises $13M for Its Embedded Integration Platform appeared first on Grit Daily News.

As part of this process, Verdantix says employers will need to consider using a range of technology-enabled mitigation solutions including deploying robotics such as drones that can be used to gather sampling data including air quality, noise and pollutant data, to making employees wear devices that can track their exposure to heat.

Bill Pennington, Research Director, Environment, Health & Safety, Verdantix said: “So far this summer, across Europe we have seen extreme record- breaking heatwaves and the devastation these have brought. Field workers and those exposed to heat risks face increased dangers during these unprecedented times. However, employers have a duty of care towards their staff to ensure they are not at risk of suffering from occupational heat exposure

“Extreme weather health and safety risks are not only applicable to field workers; firms need to have procedures in place to assess the risk of travelling to work and remaining on-site should a malign weather system come in.

“Consider eight workers that were killed in a Kentucky-based candle factory in 2021 following a decision not to let workers leave their shift early to evade an oncoming tornado. A similar situation also occurred in 2021 at an Illinois-based Amazon warehouse whereby six employees were killed.”

“In the US alone, at least 384 workers have died from environmental heat exposure in the last decade, and the three-year average of worker heat deaths in the country has doubled since the early 1990s.”

Verdantix says that while extreme weather is a variable that Environmental, Health and Safety (EHS) functions cannot control, a hierarchy of technology-enabled mitigation solutions can be implemented to stem their impact. These range from the elimination of risk through deploying robotics, to tracking worker exposure using wearable devices.

Four solutions that can be used to manage physical climate health and safety risk are:

1) Critical event management software with weather decision technologies

Critical event management software allows firms to assess the risk of weather events, locate at-risk individuals and act appropriately based on pre-defined processes. For example, Everbridge, a critical event management software provider, offers a SMARTWeather alerting system that uses Weather Decision Technologies (WDT) to automate location-specific severe weather alerts.

2) Wearable devices to track exposure

For individuals conducting manual work, the use of sensors can help track and monitor worker heat exposure in real-time. Consider Kenzen, a climate technology and heat science solution provider, which uses wearable devices to measure core temperature, worker microclimate, and sweat rate, amongst other vital signs.

3) EHS Software to support the management of worker exposure, alerts and training

EHS management systems can provide oversite over worker activities and be used to issue alerts should weather conditions surpass risk thresholds. Finally, an in-built LMS and training solution will help ensure workers are following hot weather working practices.

4) Robotics to eliminate the risk of heat exposure at their source

Consider the use of robotics, such as drones, which can be used to gather sampling data including air quality, noise and pollutant data. Drones can also be used to perform inspections in remote locations to reduce worker exposure to the elements.

Christopher Sayers, Verdantix Analyst said: “Going forward, demand for solutions that support EHS functions in navigating physical climate risks will increase. This is due to the rising prevalence of extreme weather events and employers assuming greater responsibility for worker safety in relation to heat stress and other factors. Organizations will need to be prepared, both through processes and technology, for a range of new physical climate risks.”

Kim Knickle, ESG & Sustainability Research Director, Verdantix said: “Climate-related extremes have caused €14.5 billion in financial losses in Europe per year since 2011, and this will continue to increase, with droughts alone set to cause €12 billion in annual losses if global warming is limited to 1.5C. Firms must react to these increasingly costly climate events and improve their climate resilience. By investing in digital solutions firms can evaluate and manage the climate risk exposure of their physical assets and investments, which should include assessing mitigating actions and transition plans.”

The post Drones and Wearables Can Protect Workers From Extreme Heat and Other Climate Risks appeared first on Grit Daily News.

INCRMNTAL, a leading incrementality measurement platform, which allows advertisers to measure the value of marketing activities without the use of user-level data, has secured $4.1 million in seed funding led by Play Ventures VC and participated by Eric Seufert’s Heracles Capital. Launched less than a year ago, INCRMNTAL’s platform has experienced radical growth over the last 10 months, growing from zero to over $1bn ad spend measured. It is already being used by major brands including Hopper, Outer.com, and Gamehouse to measure the value of their campaigns across mobile app, web, OOH, and linear and connected TV.

Momentum of INCRMNTAL’s product has been accelerated by the privacy-first movement and Apple’s deprecation of IDFA, as it doesn’t require any user-level data. It is the only solution on the market that allows customers to measure campaigns utilizing causal data science while they are running, with no need to pause activity to compare results or perform any user level experiments. It is adaptable to campaigns of any size and 70% of its customers use the platform across multiple channels, allowing them to find activities that cannibalize on their organic userbase to unlock the full value of their marketing budget.

The funding will propel INCRMNTAL into the next stage of hyper-growth as it gears up for its go-to-market. Specifically the investment will enable the tech company to double its engineering team and establish sales and marketing departments to accelerate growth.

Harri Manninen, Founding Partner at Play Ventures, said: “We have been following INCRMNTAL’s growth for the past 18 months due to the platform’s popularity among mobile game developers, including our portfolio companies. INCRMNTAL has experienced impressive and consistent success since its inception and we only see this continuing as the industry moves away from measuring clicks to incremental value.”

Eric Seufert, the owner of Mobile Dev Memo and the General Partner at Heracles Capital, said: “INCRMNTAL solves a problem for mobile advertisers that has become painfully acute with the privacy changes that have upended the mobile advertising ecosystem: trustworthy measurement. INCRMNTAL is the only solution on the market that prevents wasted ad spend across Apple, Android and all other digital advertising channels through robust probabilistic methods. INCRMNTAL is at the very forefront of the changing digital advertising landscape and I am excited to see how INCRMNTAL accelerates its platform with this investment.”

Maor Sadra, CEO and Co-Founder at INCRMNTAL, said: “INCRMNTAL has been growing at an extraordinary speed and this funding will helps us further accelerate our operations. Key to our success is that we truly listen to our customers and have built a product that meets their current needs. We see INCRMNTAL creating enormous value in a world where the paradigm of marketing measurement needs to rapidly evolve from user-level tracking to value measurement.”

Makoto Rheault-Kihara, Head of User Acquisition at Hopper, said: “Measuring incrementality has always been important for us, as incrementality measures the true value of our marketing activities. INCRMNTAL got it right. The INCRMNTAL platform allows us to measure the actual value of our campaigns, while taking seasonality into consideration in every measurement. INCRMNTAL also allows us to measure and understand cross channel influence across all of our activities, including TV, influencers, and more.”

INCRMNTAL was founded by Maor Sadra and Moti Tal and its customers include BOLT, Fastic, Gamehouse, Hopper, LingoKids, Outer.com, Refurbed, Starberry Games and TIER. For more information visit incrmntal.com

About INCRMNTAL

INCRMNTAL is an incrementality measurement platform allowing advertisers to measure the impact of their marketing activities across any medium or platform without needing to create any experiments. The platform requires no user-level data, as the company is applying causal data science to marketing measurement by developing proprietary algorithms capable of measuring the impact of ad spend across mobile, web, TV, OOH, influencers and more. INCRMNTAL is a strategic tool for all marketers and data scientists to unlock the value of your marketing budget.

The original press release can be found on INCRMNTAL’s website.

The post INCRMNTAL Looks to Grow Its Incrementality Measurement Platform with $4.1M In Funding appeared first on Grit Daily News.

As inflation is surging, it is putting pressure on mortgage rates. The Federal Reserve is likely to keep raising rates this year with the goal of containing consumer prices. While the Fed doesn’t control mortgage rates, its policies have an ancillary effect. 

Think Solar

At times like this, homeowners have to use every tool in the toolbox, and solar installation is a vital one to contain/reduce monthly costs.  Buying a home that has a solar energy system, or having one installed upon purchase is a savvy financial move that also benefits the environment.

Home appraisers, who review property for mortgage companies, understand that that the installation of solar panels and solar batteries can increase a property’s market value. In fact, a Zillow study indicated that homes with solar panels sold for 4.1% more than those without.

“The sale premium varies substantially by market,” reports Zillow.  “In Riverside, Calif., for example, homes with solar-energy systems sold for 2.7% more than comparable homes without solar power—a markup of $9,926 for the median-valued home in the metro. In the greater New York City metro, solar-powered homes have a premium that is double that of Riverside. At 5.4%, that’s an extra $23,989 in value for the typical home in New York. In three other coastal metro areas—Los Angeles, San Francisco and Orlando, Fla.—homes with solar power can fetch a premium of around 4%.”

Getting a solar system installed is like creating your very own power plant. Homeowners make energy right on their own property instead of relying completely on the utility company to do it for them. While you can’t disconnect completely from the grid, homeowners have the ability to generate their own power every time the sun comes up.

For homeowners paying $70 or more on electricity bills each month, there are programs available that could permanently lower electric bills up to 75% with no upfront costs.

Smart Solar Financing

According to the U.S. Office of Energy Efficiency And Renewable Energy, the average cost of solar PV panels has dropped nearly 70%. Markets for solar energy is economically competitive with conventional energy sources in most states.

A solar system is either leased or purchased. Whether you buy a system or lease it, the use of solar energy will significantly decrease monthly energy costs and increase the value of the home.

Increase Purchasing Power

An energy-efficient mortgage or green mortgage allows borrowers to finance energy-efficient improvements under advantageous loan terms. A green mortgage offers added funds with the mortgage purchase or refinance that can be applied to energy-efficient home upgrades. To qualify, applicants must meet the standard mortgage requirements of credit and debt-to-income ratio and an energy consultant develops a home energy rating report to estimate potential energy savings.

Tapping into a green mortgage can increase purchasing power and allow home buyers to qualify for a larger mortgage. And, for those people buying a home that already is energy efficient, the monthly bills will be lower.

Other ways to increase purchasing power are reducing debt, reviewing credit scores to see where any improvements can be made, and stash as much money away as you can for the down payment and closing costs and eliminate the need for mortgage insurance.

Explore First-Time Home Buyer Programs

For those who are buying their very first home, there are a variety of homebuyer assistance programs available at the national and local level. On the national level, there are Federal Housing Administration (FHA) loans that are insured by the Federal Housing Administration, a government agency that sets standards for the construction and financing of homes in the United States. With a FICO® credit score at least 580, home buyers are required to put down a 3.5% down payment vs. the 20% that is industry standard.

Home buyers should also investigate their state and city level options for first-time home buyers. In New York City, for example, “the HomeFirst Down Payment Assistance Program provides qualified homebuyers with up to $100,000 toward the down payment or closing costs on a 1-4 family home, a condominium, or a cooperative in one of the five boroughs of New York City.”

Set a Budget

Before starting the housing hunt in earnest, it is important to understand how much house is affordable.  Generally, keeping housing costs to 30% or less of after-tax income is the recommendation. Getting pre-approved for the mortgage is recommended so that the house-hunt can proceed with confidence.

Consider that while mortgage rates today are on the rise, they are still relatively low on historical standards. In 1981, according to Fannie Mae data, the annual average interest rate was 16.63%! There are many benefits that come along with home ownership including tax deductions, financial stability, a permanent home and sense of belonging in the local community. 

The post Why Home Buyers Should ‘Think Solar’ in Post-Pandemic Climate appeared first on Grit Daily News.

São Paulo, Brazil – Brazil is experiencing a labor shortage in the technology sector that is striking given the number of unemployed in the country. A recent study by the Association of Information and Communication Technology and Digital Technologies Companies (Brasscom) states that the deficit of technology professionals should reach 530,000 people in Brazil by 2025. To reverse this scenario and promote social transformation, iFood, XP Inc. and more companies and institutes have come together to create the Tech Movement 2030 with the aim of making social investment in tech education and transforming the future of LatAm’s largest economy. The goal is to raise R$100 million by 2025.

“In the last year, we saw many companies investing in education, but these efforts are still very dispersed. Thus, we realized the importance of joining forces with others to help solve this deficit in this area that hinders the development of Brazil. Even expanding isolated efforts will not solve the problem. With this union of forces, we hope to promote the meeting between talented people who are just waiting for an opportunity, while contributing to a social transformation and the development of the country,” said Fabrício Bloisi, CEO of iFood.

This initiative already accounts for R$5.2 million that will be invested in social impact projects. The Tech Movement will act based on three pillars: to arouse interest in the area of technology while still at school; to train and offer training to anyone interested in a career; and to foster initiatives that support companies in their employability journey. As a priority, the beneficiaries will be people with an underrepresented profile in society and low-income people.

“Our objective is to contribute to making Brazil a prosperous country and a protagonist in terms of technology, with job and career opportunities for all Brazilians. Our big dream is to make a difference in the training of young professionals, so they’re prepared for the challenges of the new digital economy in terms of technology, innovation, and business. We believe that, through social investment, we can generate a structural impact in Brazil that is transformational,” said Thiago Maffra, CEO of XP Inc.

The mobilization of these combined efforts began about a year ago from conversations about how the participating companies and organizations could take responsibility for the development and preparation of young people for the future of work. The Tech Movement’s initiatives range from high school students to adults. The member companies will be able to act at different levels, whether through investments, projects, or execution.

In addition to iFood and XP, the first two corporate sponsors of the initiative, several companies were involved throughout the construction of the Tech Movement, and 18 of them have already become sponsors; they are: Accenture, Arco Instituto, Grupo Boticário, Buser, Ci&T, Cubos Academy, Digital House, Behring Foundation, Gama Academy, Instituto Localiza, Kenzie Academy Brasil, Let’s Code, ONE (Oracle Next Education), RD – RaiaDrogasil , Rocketseat, Semantix, Telles Foundation and VTEX.

The Tech Movement seeks to attract more companies and organizations from all segments and areas. Those joining the collective can do so as active supporters or sponsors via financial commitments as well as services. To find out how to participate and contribute to the Tech Movement, visit www.movtech.org. 

Tech Movement Initiatives

In this first phase, four projects are prioritized, two of which have already started: The Tech Marathon, a technology Olympiad, was launched in May this year, in which 9th grade and high school students from public and private schools learn about logical thinking and are challenged to develop and program a technological solution for the future of society. It works like an Olympiad between educational institutions, teachers, and students. The first edition had the participation of more than 80,000 students, including schools from 21 Brazilian states.

Another initiative already underway, launched by one of the group’s companies, iFood, is the Potência Tech platform , for training and employing underrepresented and low-income tech groups. In nine months, more than 27,000 people signed up for the platform, more than 6,000 scholarships made available in partnership with technology schools and 450 people employed.

The next steps of the Tech Movement will be the expansion of the Empodera Tech Network, a network of organizations that work with young people aged 15-25 in situations of social vulnerability, with the objective of connecting and promoting these organizations. The project led by Arco Instituto aims to increase the number of vacancies in Empodera Tech Network organizations focused on training young people. The Jovem Aprendiz Tech, on the other hand, will be an initiative focused on employability.

Technological talent blackout

The technological blackout, as the lack of technology professionals in Brazil has been called, already leaves more than 100,000 job vacancies open, with no prospect of being filled, according to a study by Brasscom, released in December 2021.

The digitization of the economy and companies, accelerated by the pandemic, has increased the demand for skilled labor, while the number of available professionals remains limited. The answer to this problem is investment in education – from basic education, so that young people have a better education in Portuguese, mathematics, and logic, to professional training specialized in technology.

About the Tech Movement

The Tech Movement is a platform for private social investment in technology education. By encouraging projects, the initiative aims to awaken new generations to technology, train people and employ professionals to minimize the technological blackout. Initially, the Tech Movement has already raised 5.2 million reais and expects to reach 2.1 billion reais by 2030. Led by the sponsors iFood and XP Inc., the Movement has sponsors Accenture, Arco Instituto, Buser, Ci&T, Cubos Academy, Grupo Boticário, Digital House, Fundação Behring, Gama Academy, Instituto Localiza, Kenzie Academy Brasil , Let’s Code, ONE (Oracle Next Education), RD – RaiaDrogasil, Rocketseat, Semantix, Telles Foundation and VTEX.

About iFood

iFood is a Brazilian technology company that is a reference in online delivery, bringing customers, restaurants, and delivery people together in a simple and practical way. And to provide a complete experience to each of them, delivery goes beyond delivery. iFood aims to feed the future of Brazil and the world, transforming society through education and technology, food security, inclusion and with a positive socio-environmental impact.

With more than 65 million orders per month, iFood works with business intelligence and management solutions to promote and develop an ecosystem of more than 300,000 registered establishments, 200,000 connected delivery people in more than 1,700 cities throughout Brazil. In the market for 11 years, it also operates in business fronts that are complementary to its chain, such as market, fintech and benefits, combining technology and convenience in delivering solutions to partners.

iFood has important investors such as Movile, a long-term investor in technology companies in Latin America and aims to be the largest ‘thesis maker’ in the region, and Just Eat, one of the largest online ordering companies in the world. Through the company’s news portal, iFood News, the main current issues and the New Economy, business content, cases, and trends on innovations in the country and in the world are passed on.

About XP Inc.

XP Inc. is a technology platform for investments, financial services and education, owner of the brands XP Investimentos, Rico, Clear, XP Educação, among others. XP Inc. has more than 3.5 million customers and R$873 billion of assets under custody. Over the past 21 years, the company has been transforming the Brazilian financial market to improve people’s lives, ensuring more transparent relationships between clients and financial institutions. For more information, visit the XP Inc.com website .

The post Tech Movement Mobilizes Companies to Raise R$100 million by 2025 to Address Growing Technology Blackout in Brazil appeared first on Grit Daily News.

Fathom Yacht Club (FYC), co-founded by BIPOC female entrepreneur Jessica Hunt and her husband, Jonathan Sands, is the result of a mix of careers that come together perfectly to build and grow an NFT-backed decentralized yacht club.

Hunt holds a Master’s in Hospitality from Florida International University and a web development degree from Wyncode Academy, a well-respected coding bootcamp in Miami. She has also worked in marketing, Web3, and golf clubs where she’s learned about club memberships.

Sands, on the other hand, brings marine expertise as a marine surveyor with a degree in Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering from the University of New Orleans.

As a couple who lives and works in Miami and spends a lot of their free time chartering boats both locally and abroad, one thing they always felt was lacking was a social community that they could share their love for boating with. They didn’t want to join a traditional yacht club because the notion was so stale at this point. “It’s old school. We’re global now, so why not build something global,” Hunt said.

What really intrigued the pair is that through a utility-backed NFT community and a booking app, they could reinvent the yacht club membership model and make it something decentralized, associated with multiple locations, and host exclusive VIP experiences that would cater to their members.

“To me, what’s exciting is that I personally love boating – my husband and I charter boats often,” said Hunt. But as a developer who has been keeping up with the explosion of Web3 and its developments, she also said of FYC: “I love the tech that’s behind it.”

The duo decided that their hometown of Miami was also the perfect place to start FYC; after all, Miami and Ft. Lauderdale are international boating capitals, and the weather is ideal for cruising year-round.

Together, Hunt and Sands have collaborated to enhance the NFT market with Fathom Yacht Club. Three membership tiers are available, ranging from $5,000 – $15,000, each giving you access to bigger boats, the ability to bring more guests, and exclusive experiences and perks. But unlike a traditional yacht club, there are no initiation fees or annual fees, and your membership is leasable and sellable. And you don’t have to worry about any social events being at the dated clubhouse because instead, they’ll be at luxurious and contemporary locations around the world.

The post Meet Fathom Yacht Club the World’s First Tokenized Membership to a Social Yacht Club appeared first on Grit Daily News.

Casavo, the leading European PropTech platform redefining home-selling and buying, today announces a €400 million fundraise.

The latest €100M million Series D equity round proves the strong fundamentals and prospects of the business despite the difficult capital market conditions. The additional €300 million debt brings the Company’s borrowing capacity to €500+ million, securing enough resources to scale its home-buying business for the coming years.

Significant investor demand

The latest equity round was led by Exor NV. New investors include, among others, Neva SGR (Intesa Sanpaolo Group), Endeavor Catalyst, Hambro Perks, Fuse Venture Partners, as well as angel investors such as Sébastien de Lafond (founder of MeilleursAgents). The round setup provides a mix of strategic expertise to support the Company’s future growth. All major existing investors including Greenoaks, Project A Ventures, 360 Capital, P101 SGR, Picus Capital and Bonsai Partners participated in the Series D round.

“We feel honored to strengthen our relationship with Exor, following their initial investment last year, and welcome all new investors alongside our supporting existing shareholders.” says Giorgio Tinacci, Founder and CEO of Casavo. “This combination of equity and debt is a recognition of our relentless focus on sustainable growth and confidence in our long-term vision. The round will allow us to consolidate our leadership in Europe by growing across our existing markets in Italy, Spain and Portugal, while expanding into new ones, with France being a priority. We’ll continue investing in our mission to simplify the way people sell and buy homes, having evolved from a pure home-buying platform to a leading next-generation European residential marketplace.”

“Casavo is becoming the clear European PropTech leader and we are excited to continue the journey with Giorgio. Despite turbulent market conditions, the team has executed extremely well to date and we are optimistic about the future,” said Noam Ohana, Managing Director of Exor Seeds.

A financial war-chest at a reduced cost of capital

The additional €300 million of debt financing includes a €190 million extension of Casavo’s main asset-backed financing facility, supporting Casavo’s expansion into other geographies. New institutional lenders such as Intesa Sanpaolo (IMI Corporate & Investment Banking Division) are joining alongside the Company’s existing syndicate of Goldman Sachs and D.E. Shaw & Co. The additional funding comes with a significant reduction in the cost of capital. The trust shown by institutional investors further highlights Casavo’s healthy fundamentals.

An end-to-end platform for home-sellers and buyers

Since it was founded in 2017, Casavo has been guided by a clear vision: free people from the complexity of selling and buying homes. Casavo started as a home-buying platform, a business known as “Instant Buyer”, becoming the online reference point for the majority of sellers by offering a fast and frictionless proposition – in contrast to the traditional, slow-moving sales process.

Leveraging its proprietary technology stack the Company has since evolved into an innovative marketplace, where homeowners can start their selling or buying journey while being fully supported by Casavo at every step of the process. To date, Casavo has executed €1+ billion in transactions.

Sellers can receive a direct purchase offer by Casavo, or find the perfect buyer on the market through its network of partner agents. Buyers have access to an exclusive inventory of ‘ready to move-in’ properties, a curated user experience, and integrated services such as mortgages. Casavo’s platform also connects real estate operators, including brokers, banks and renovation companies, generating value for all stakeholders within the ecosystem.

Ultimately, Casavo sees itself as a market maker that matches sellers and buyers in a seamless way.

The original press release can be found on Casavo’s website.

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The American Civil Liberties Union has released new Homeland Security data on Monday that details how that threat is no longer a hypothetical. Their data, which was first published by Politico, found the Trump administration used mobile location data to track people and their movements.

Now, a Congressional candidate out of the tech rich Seattle/Tacoma area predicts this surveillance threat is only going to get worse following the Supreme Court decision overturning of Roe v Wade. Grit Daily caught up with Rebecca Parson to hear why she believes women are most at risk.

How do you believe technology can be used against women?

Technology is already being used against women, and with the recent Supreme Court decision, there will be even fewer limitations to its use in prosecution.

Many people don’t know this, but there are no laws to prevent a state from obtaining a search warrant for your internet search history, especially if they suspect abortion. And this isn’t just a hypothetical scenario. Ohio and Mississippi recently used technology and search history to prosecute women who lost their pregnancies; both women were charged with murder. Even period-tracking apps are at risk of being subpoenaed.

There are also other technologies at risk for abuse. “Stingray” technology allows police to track cell phone signals that can be used to validate claims that a woman crossed state lines to get an abortion. Courts can also obtain location data through “geofence” warrants, which force major tech companies like Google to hand over information on where a device was during a given time period.

With the help of big tech, prosecutors can convict women who have crossed state lines to access reproductive care.

What kind of laws do you believe we need to protect against the abuse of these technologies?

Some members of Congress are already calling on the FTC to investigate Google and Apple for the surveillance system these companies have created.

I’d like to take this a step further with a law that prevents tech companies from collecting and retaining location data. Google says they will stop collecting this data, but we need to enforce this, not simply take a company’s word for it.

Do you really believe that these abuses could lead to a broader surveillance society?

Yes. In many ways, we already live in a surveillance society. The question is whether we will allow the surveillance to intensify, or if we will regulate and restrain it.

Google has already revealed that their company received 5,764 “geofence” warrants between 2018 and 2020 from police in 10 states that have banned abortion as of July 5, according to Politico.

Now that abortion is becoming a part of the penal code, we will see even more of these types of cases in which technology is leveraged to prosecute women.

Some people might believe this potential for abuse is a tradeoff for the benefits of technology. What would you say to them?

I don’t agree that abuse must come with the use of this technology. We just need laws in place to prevent the government, lawmakers, and extremists from using this technology against us. We can both have laws in place and benefit from the technology.

100 years ago, Upton Sinclair’s book The Jungle — about abusive and unsafe practices in American slaughterhouses — sparked the passage of the Federal Meat Inspection Act. The choice was not a binary one between zero meat-safety regulation vs. zero meat consumption. Instead, it was to continue meat consumption — but with regulation for the safety of consumers. We need to do this with tech and privacy today: continue to use tech, but regulate it for privacy.

This is where our participation in democracy will make a difference. Public outcry sparked change 100 years ago, and it can spark change again today. And if you’re in the Seattle/Tacoma area, reach out to my campaign if you’d like to get involved.

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