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Category Archives: Technology

S10 Labs Announces the Launch of Innovative Vaporization Cartridge Technology, Zirco – PRNewswire

Posted: October 19, 2021 at 10:14 pm

LOS ANGELES, Oct. 19, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- S10 Labs, a California-based vaporization technology and hardware company, founded upon the mission to advance the cannabis industry through their expertise in material science and relentless pursuit for quality, announces the launch of their latest innovation,Zirco.

As a first-of-its-kind zirconia ceramic 510 thread cartridge, Zirco features Medical Zirconia Ceramics Technology to deliver unrivaled efficacy, flavor and quality while solving the all-too-common problems faced by cannabis operators nationwide. From heavy metal leaching to micro-fracturing, this innovative cartridge technology offers the solution that not only improves the end-user experience but also enhances consumer safety and product compliance.

By utilizing zirconia ceramics, Zirco offers ten times the hardness and strength of conventional ceramics, suitable for use in extreme thermal and pressure conditions such as vaping. Created with medical-grade materials, Zirco cartridges feature:

This high-performance cartridge reinvents vaporization hardware standards and exemplifies S10 Labs' unwavering commitment to quality and safety.

Zirco, the world's premier zirconia ceramic cartridge, is currently offered nationwide and will be showcased in Las Vegas at MJBizCon, October 20th-22nd and in New York at CWCB, November 4th-6th.

S10 Labs puts an emphasis on pairing the best power source with the finest cartridges by offering Draw-Activated and Push-Button batteries, with the latter allowing for variable temperatures to customize every session per the user's needs. Please visit http://www.s10labs.com to learn more about S10 Labs' other product offerings and customization capabilities.

About S10 LabsS10 Labs is a subdivision of a globally renowned organization that has worked with brands around the world, providing them with resources and vaporization hardware that is reliable, innovative, and best in class.

Beyond technical prowess, S10 Labs is truly the first of its kind operation to reimagine what it means to be a vertically-integrated manufacturer across the value chain because we believe our partners should enjoy a simple streamlined experience to help them expand their industry footprint.

SOURCE S10 Labs

s10labs.com

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The BGL Industrials Insider — Scale, Technology, and Competitive Pressures Drive Industrial Distribution M&A – PRNewswire

Posted: at 10:14 pm

CLEVELAND, Oct. 19, 2021 /PRNewswire/ --An appetite for scale and technology, among competitive pressures, is continuing to drive consolidation in Industrial Distribution and fueling a robust M&A market, according to an industry report released by the Industrial Distribution investment banking teamfrom Brown Gibbons Lang & Company (BGL).

Access the BGL Industrials Insider: https://bit.ly/BGLIndDis

Scale and technology, among competitive pressures, is continuing to drive consolidation and fueling a robust M&A market.

BGL examined current dynamics in Industrial Distribution, a market seeing improving business conditions and a return to growth aligned with steady expansion in the U.S. manufacturing sector:

We expect Industrial Distribution M&A activity to continue with the strong capital markets environment and record low interest rates providing the necessary support. Appetite for deal flow in the private equity and lending communities is strong. Balance sheet strength will sustain corporate buying activity, and acquisition pipelines are building.

About Brown Gibbons Lang & Company Brown Gibbons Lang & Company (BGL) is a leading independent investment bank and financial advisory firm focused on the global middle market. The firm advises private and public corporations and private equity groups onmergers and acquisitions, divestitures,capital markets,financial restructurings,valuations and opinions, andother strategic matters.BGL has investment banking offices in Chicago, Cleveland, and Philadelphia, and real estate offices in Chicago, Cleveland, and San Antonio. The firm is also a founding member of Global M&A Partners, enabling BGL to service clients in more than 30 countries around the world. Securities transactions are conducted through Brown, Gibbons, Lang & Company Securities, Inc., an affiliate of Brown Gibbons Lang & Company LLC and a registered broker-dealer and member of FINRA and SIPC. For more information, please visit http://www.bglco.com.

SOURCE Brown Gibbons Lang & Company

http://www.bglco.com

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The BGL Industrials Insider -- Scale, Technology, and Competitive Pressures Drive Industrial Distribution M&A - PRNewswire

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WATCH: LiveWell Behavioral Health in Melbourne Offers Latest Technology to Assist with Depression for All Ages – SpaceCoastDaily.com

Posted: at 10:14 pm

LiveWell Behavioral Health has two locations in Melbourne and Viera

ABOVE VIDEO: Do you or a loved one suffer from depression? Check out the latest technology now available at LiveWell Behavioral Health in Melbourne on Floridas Space Coast where the mental health experts provide hope and healthy living for those with depression issues.

BREVARD COUNTY MELBOURNE, FLORIDA LiveWell Behavioral Healths Dr. Mike Ronsisvalle speaks with Space Coast Dailys Giles Malone on the latest technology available for patients dealing with depression.

LiveWell Behavioral Health is based in Brevard County, Florida, and has been serving our community since 2005. Started by Dr. Mike Ronsisvalle as Florida Counseling Centers in 2005 and then renamed as LiveWell Behavioral Health in 2021, our team has faithfully served the families of Floridas Space Coast and beyond.

At LiveWell Behavioral Health, they believe that healthier individuals lead to happier families and hope-filled communities.

Their mission is to help individuals get healthy, strengthen their families, and impact their communities.

When individuals, families, and communities are living well, it promotes a global catalyst for good. Their vision is to inspire a wellness movement that empowers the world to thrive.

Research has shown that depression can be caused by an imbalance in the brains neurotransmitters, the chemical messengers that send signals between brain cells.

In people with depression, key areas of the brain can become inactive due to this imbalance, including areas that control mood.14,15 By stimulating these areas, NeuroStar Advanced Therapy for Mental Health can have a lasting effect on neurotransmitter levels, making long-term remission from depression symptoms a reality for many patients.

NeuroStar delivers our advanced and unique form of TMS (transcranial magnetic stimulation), a non-invasive therapy that uses targeted magnetic pulses to stimulate areas of the brain that are underactive in people suffering from depression.1,12,15

NeuroStar Advanced Therapy for Mental Health is an FDA-cleared, non-drug, non-invasive therapy that can help you achieve long-term relief from the symptoms of depression.5,8 Over 110,000 patients have been treated with NeuroStar.

Click Here to book an appointment

Frequently Asked Questions

DOES LIVEWELL TAKE INSURANCE?

LiveWell is a private pay practice. For clients who would like to bill their insurance company, we offer a walk-out statement for them to submit.

WHERE ARE YOU LOCATED?

LiveWell has two locations in Brevard County, Florida.

Melbourne 200 S. Harbor City Blvd., Suite 401Melbourne, FL 32901

Viera / Suntree 8249 Devereux Drive, Suite 101Melbourne, FL 32940

WATCH: In a recent interview with Space Coast Daily, LiveWell Behavioral Healths Dr. Mike Ronsisvalle and Dr. Trevor Hislop discussed the recent trends in mental health and how their team at LiveWell Behavioral Health are addressing various cases they are seeing come through their doors.

DO YOU OFFER IN-PERSON AND TELEHEALTH SERVICES?

Yes. Our coaching service is exclusively provided through an app-based solution online. Our clinical individual and family therapy services along with our organizational health services are available in-person and through telehealth. Our group therapy, intensive programming, and TMS services are provided in-person.

DO YOU HAVE COVID-19 PRACTICES AND PROTOCOLS IN PLACE FOR IN-PERSON APPOINTMENTS?

Yes. We adhere to CDC guidelines in the state of Florida to ensure the safety of our staff and clients.

ARE YOU A CRISIS CENTER?

No. If you are in crisis and need immediate attention, please dial 911. LiveWell is an out-patient mental health provider and offers aftercare services for in-patient clients.

DO YOU OFFER FAITH-BASED COUNSELING?

Yes, our clinical team members take into consideration ones spiritual needs when providing a holistic approach to therapeutic care. Many of our clinical team members have a strong faith foundation and are ready to engage in spiritual conversations and provide soul care that is biblically grounded. Our team includes two ordained pastors and others with formal theological training.

DO YOU SEE CHILDREN?

Yes, our clinical team members care for individuals of all ages and stages of life. Our team includes therapists with expertise in child psychology, adolescent counseling, and play therapy.

WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE IN EDUCATION AND EXPERTISE BETWEEN MENTAL HEALTH PROVIDERS?

LiveWell has a large team of licensed, clinically trained, professional mental health providers who treat a wide variety of mental health issues. Our team is well versed in traditional and modern therapeutic modalities. Mental health providers often have many similarities. Provided is a list of their distinguishment by education and expertise:

Clinical Psychologists (PsyD): Clinical psychologists hold doctorate degrees and are able to diagnose and deal with psychoses and other severe mental illnesses.

Mental Health Counselors (MHC): Mental Health Counselors hold masters degrees and are licensed in various specialties, working with individuals and groups to diagnose and deal with everything from mental health disorders to behavioral addictions.

Marriage and Family Therapists (MFT): Marriage and Family Therapists hold masters degrees and are licensed in various specialties, working with individuals and families in psychotherapy sessions to deal with everything from individual mental health, marriage and relational conflict, and family systems.

Social Workers (SW): Social Workers hold masters degrees and are licensed in various specialties, working with individuals and groups in counseling settings to provide therapeutic care and advocate for the support of social and community resources.

CLICK HERE FOR BREVARD COUNTY NEWS

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WATCH: LiveWell Behavioral Health in Melbourne Offers Latest Technology to Assist with Depression for All Ages - SpaceCoastDaily.com

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Natrion Joint Proposal with Medgar Evers College Awarded Small Business Technology Transfer Research Grant from United States Navy – PRNewswire

Posted: at 10:14 pm

BINGHAMTON, N.Y., Oct. 19, 2021 /PRNewswire/ --Natrion, a leader in the research and development of next-generation battery technologies, announced today that a joint proposal that the company prepared in partnership with Medgar Evers College (MEC) has been awarded a Small Business Technology Transfer Research (STTR) grant from the United States Navy's Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR). The Natrion-MEC team responded to NAVAIR's funding opportunity N21B-T023: "High Specific Energy Lithium-Ion Battery with Carbon-Based Nanostructures" and were awarded $200,000 for their six-month project.

Natrion, in partnership with MEC, will be developing and demonstrating a novel carbon/lithium metal composite anode for next-generation high-energy-density lithium-ion batteries for aerospace applications. The anode serves as the component that stores electric charge inside of a battery. Lithium metal-based anodes hold great potential for lithium-ion batteries, as they can provide ten times the power capacity of conventional graphite anodes.

"Making lithium metal work has been a priority for us for a long time. We want to leverage it to vastly improve how quickly an electric vehicle battery can be charged and how long an electric vehicle can operate on a single charge. This STTR is a great opportunity for us to resolve one of the final obstacles that remain in the path of Li-metal anode battery commercialization for all forms of electric mobility applications," said Dr. Duke Shih, Chief Technology Officer of Natrion.

Dr. Michele Vittadello, a Professor of Chemistry at MEC and Director of the M.S. Program in Nanoscience at the City University of New York (CUNY) Graduate Center, will be leading the team collaborating with Natrion. "Our research group at Medgar Evers College has been working with Natrion for well over a year now on the development of solid-state sodium-ion batteries, and there will be a lot that we'll be able to transfer to these ongoing efforts from what we learn with this new lithium-ion battery project for the Navy," added Vittadello.

About Natrion: Natrion is a battery research and development startup based in Binghamton, New York. It was started out of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2018 by founders Alex Kosyakov and Tom Rouffiac, and is currently based in the New York State-sponsored Southern Tier Clean Energy Incubator. The company prides itself on its unique application-driven research approach and expertise in composite material systems. For more information, visit http://www.natrion.co.

About Medgar Evers College: Medgar Evers College is a public college located in Brooklyn, New York that is part of the larger City University of New York system. Medgar Evers is a NASA Space Grant college that is also part of the Thurgood Marshall College Fund as a predominantly black institution. For more information, visit http://www.mec.cuny.edu.

SOURCE Natrion

https://www.natrion.co

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Natrion Joint Proposal with Medgar Evers College Awarded Small Business Technology Transfer Research Grant from United States Navy - PRNewswire

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RepeatMD Shines With Prestigious 2021 Aesthetic Award For Technology Innovation – PRNewswire

Posted: at 10:14 pm

HOUSTON, Oct. 19, 2021 /PRNewswire/ --RepeatMD, a B2B technology company based in Houston, Texas has won the prestigious 2021 Aesthetic Award for Technology Innovation by The Aesthetic Guide. The Aesthetic Guide honors various businesses, doctors and sectors of the cosmetic industry each year.

"The other nominees are amazing companies with a rich history in the Aesthetics industry. For us to win this award in our first year in business really shows our momentum as a company and the level of satisfaction our clients experience with our service," Philipp Sitter, founder and CEO of RepeatMD.

The industry awards honor product manufacturers and management companies that are shaping the future of aesthetic medicine through innovation, new devices and techniques that advance the industry. RepeatMD sells more high-margin services for aesthetic practices by building their own private label rewards app exclusively for plastic surgeons, medical spas, and dermatologists.

The platform allows patients to be introduced to various treatments they may have not known about otherwise. The software provides a suite of patient engagements that includes rewarding a patient for visiting, educating patients on treatments, driving more referrals, financing treatments, and automating patient retention.

The honor was published in the September/October issue of The Aesthetic Guide. The distinguished award is a major indication of the success for the new software company, established in December 2020.

ABOUT REPEATMDRepeatMD is a B2B software company founded in December 2020 by serial entrepreneur, Philipp Sitter. The Houston based technology company is present in 48 states and has hundreds of thousands of users. The software specializes in creating mobile rewards programs for the healthcare industry. The company sells more high-margin services for aesthetic practices by building their own private label rewards app exclusively for plastic surgeons, medical spas, and dermatologists. Sitter has been featured on a variety of national platforms including the Travel Channel, Forbes, Bloomberg, and won awards such as the Top 150 Best Workplaces and the Innovative Leadership Award by the Houston Chronicle. For more information on RepeatMD, visit http://www.repeatmd.com.

SOURCE RepeatMD

http://www.repeatmd.com

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RepeatMD Shines With Prestigious 2021 Aesthetic Award For Technology Innovation - PRNewswire

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The 10 fastest-growing science and technology jobs of the next decade – CNBC

Posted: October 17, 2021 at 5:06 pm

While the coronavirus pandemic has battered some industries, others have thrived despite the ongoing crisis, including technology and science. In fact, according to new data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, demand for jobs in math, science and technology will continue to surge over the next decade.

Hiring in the computer and information technology fields has faster projected growth between 2020 and 2030 than all other fields. The Bureau of Labor Statistics notes that demand for these workers stems from companies' "greater emphasis on cloud computing, the collection and storage of big data, and information security."

The coronavirus pandemic has expedited demand for other science and technology roles as well, including epidemiologists and information security analysts. "The prevalence of remote work has created additional need for network security and operations support," Megan Slabinski, the district president for global talent solutions at recruitment firm Robert Half, tells CNBC Make It. Slabinski specializes in recruiting for technology positions.

While demand for technology talent is high across all industries, Slabinski notes that health care, e-commerce, government and education have the most need. "We've seen an enhanced amount of hiring for technology roles within these three industries as a result of the pandemic," she notes. "We've seen the emergence of telehealth and remote patient monitoring in health care, and with traditional retail stores closed or limiting their hours during the pandemic, companies had to think about selling their goods online and enhancing their web presence to capture revenue from people shopping online." Government and education entities, too, have been forced to update their technology infrastructureas employees and students had to work online.

Even before the pandemic there was a growing interest among companies to incorporate artificial intelligence, machine learning, automation and other technologies into their business practices. "Companies have realized that there's so much power in data and technology to either attract new customers or understand customer behavior," Slabinski says. "New technologies help keep companies relevant and generate more revenue."

Though some jobs like information security analysts and data scientists typically require a bachelor's degree, not all of the in-demand jobs require formal post-secondary education. Slabinski suggests job seekers interested in breaking into the technology field sign up for a coding boot camp, reading books about the industry or volunteering at a non-profit organization to gain real-world experience. "Most importantly, have a clear understanding of what it is you bring to the table," she shares. "Are you creating any programs or products you can share with a potential employer? What are tangible results you can share with them, from your work?"

People also tend to underestimate the power of online networking in securing a technology job, Slabinski adds. "You should look within your professional and personal network and tell people, 'This is the kind of work I'm looking for, who do you know in this industry? How do I go about securing a job?' she explains. "Just be resilient and aggressive in terms of your communication and follow up until you land your dream role."

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Bay City considering liquid activated carbon technology for Middlegrounds Landfill remediation – MLive.com

Posted: at 5:06 pm

BAY CITY, MI - The Bay City Commission will be considering whether or not to approve a contract during its Monday, Oct. 18 meeting with a company for a pilot test remediation of the Middlegrounds Landfill, which is located in the middle of the Saginaw River south of the Lafayette Avenue Bridge. The proposed contract is with Regenesis Remediation Services (RRS) of San Clemente, Cal. for $39,358 to start a pilot testing phase for the remediation of contaminants at the site.

The landfill first was used in 1956 and MLive previously reported that the former dump was closed by the state in 1984.

The landfill was reported to have leaked harmful levels of polychlorinated biphenyls and other industrial chemicals into the river before a combined effort was undertaken to cleanup the environmental risks. In 1998, the city and Honeywell International entered into a consent decree with then MDEQ (now EGLE) to provide for the completion of a Remedial Investigation and Feasibility Study, the implementation of an Interim Response Action, and the submission of an approved Remedial Action Plan, according to the city. Honeywell and the city share costs related to these items, with the citys share clocking in at 60.25%, said the agenda item.

According to the agenda item, the city and Honeywell currently use AKT Peerless Environmental Services as an environmental consultant for the site. AKT Peerless recommended using RSS due to the fact that it offers trademark technology that has proven successful in these types of situations and locations such as that at the landfill, said the agenda item. A bid waiver has been issued regarding this contract. The bid waiver states that the technology used by RSS is a patented product that is only offered by the company.

The proposed contract shows that RRS uses a type of technology called PlumeStop Liquid Activated Carbon. RSS states on the companys website that, PlumeStop accomplishes treatment with the use of a highly dispersible, fast-acting, sorption-based technology which captures dissolved-phase contaminants within its matrix-like structure. Once contaminants are absorbed onto the regenerative matrix, biodegradation processes achieve complete remediation at an accelerated rate.

The contract states that PlumeStop is applied into the subsurface through gravity-fed or low-pressure injection.

Click here to view the rest of Mondays agenda. The meeting kicks off at 6 p.m. with the finance and policy session before moving to the regular session at 6:30 p.m. on Monday.

More from MLive

Middleground Landfill monitoring to cost an additional $2.3 million

After 25 years and $5 million, cleanup at Bay Citys Middlegrounds Landfill is nearly complete

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Bay City approves funding immediate needs with portion of American Rescue Plan Act dollars

Bay City accepts pay raise for commissioners and mayor

Fires, fights, flooding: Bay City Department of Public Safety personnel recognized for 2020 efforts

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Bay City considering liquid activated carbon technology for Middlegrounds Landfill remediation - MLive.com

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The final frontier of space technology – Business Standard

Posted: at 5:06 pm

The space industry is using technologies like 5G, advanced satellite systems, 3D printing, big data, and quantum technology in its activities and operations in space

Topics space technology|space race|Satellite

The final frontier is vast. As commercial space flights gain momentum, other planets appear closer than ever.

Emerging tech is helping leverage space for various terrestrial uses. It is also helping scientists, researchers and entrepreneurs reduce project time and cost. The space industry is using technologies like 5G, advanced satellite systems, 3D printing, big data, and quantum technology in its activities and operations in space, says a report by Analytics Insight. Implementing advanced space technology is critical since several services like weather forecasts, ...

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First Published: Sun, October 17 2021. 23:17 IST

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Building a healthy relationship with technology for your kids – KARE11.com

Posted: at 5:06 pm

Now that kids are back in school, it's a good time to revisit their relationship with technology in order to keep some balance as they grow.

GOLDEN VALLEY, Minn. During the pandemic, it may have been a challenge for parents to limit their kids' screen time amid lockdowns and social distancing.

It's also true that not all screen time is created equal.

Now that kids are back in school, it's a good time to revisit their relationship with technology in order to keep some balance as they grow.

Dr. Sue Inoue is a family physician from Allina Health and joined KARE 11 Saturday via Zoom to share some pointers parents can use to teach their children.

Among the suggestions provided by Dr. Inoue are the following:

Visit Allina Health, online.

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Two new books explore the impact of accelerating technology – The Economist

Posted: at 5:06 pm

Oct 16th 2021

The Exponential Age. By Azeem Azhar. Diversion Books; 352 pages; $28.99. Published in Britain as Exponential; Random House Business; 20

Human Frontiers. By Michael Bhaskar. MIT Press; 432 pages; $29.95. Bridge Street Press; 20

Masters of Scale. By Reid Hoffman with June Cohen and Deron Triff. Currency; 304 pages; $28. Bantam Press; 20

HISTORIANS OF SCIENCE distinguish between useful discoveries, such as dental floss, and general-purpose technologies that can be applied to numerous purposessuch as electricity, which powers everything from factories to streetlights to televisions. These transformative inventions, and the gadgets they spawned, were developed at a swift, industrial pace in the 19th and 20th centuries. Now, though, a new phase of progress is under way: many technologies are not following linear growth rates but exponential ones. This does more than speed up innovation. It poses drastic challenges for businesses, governments and society.

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Many Western institutions are unprepared for this shift because they are stuck in an industrial-age mindset, say three new books. There is good reason for that: people are generally far more familiar with linear growth, in which things change or add up bit by bit, than with the exponential kind, whereby they double or triple (or more) at each increment. For example, if a step is a metre long and you take 25 of them, you have travelled 25 metres. But if each step grew exponentially, doubling from one to two to four metres and so on, your seventh pace would cover a football pitchand your 25th would span 33m metres, or almost the circumference of Earth.

It may initially seem slow and boring, but exponential change suddenly becomes unfathomably dramatic. The world is in the midst of just such a transformation, argues Azeem Azhar. Computer technology, he notes, long observed Moores law, according to which the power of a computer chip (as measured by the number of transistors) doubles every two years, basically with no rise in cost. But, says Mr Azhar, today such exponential growth is also characteristic of other technologies that have been supercharged by digitisation or advances in artificial intelligence (AI). These include solar cells, batteries, genome-editing, augmented reality, 3D manufacturing, online business, even electric cars and urban farmingas well as, alas, online misinformation, cybercrime and warfare.

A slew of superstar firms are emerging on the back of these technologies. They are dominating their sectors because of network effects, whereby using the same platform is widely beneficial. For example, Alibaba, a Chinese e-commerce giant, created an online-payments system in 2004. Nine years later that had become the worlds largest mobile-payment platform, called Ant Financial. By having a plethora of data it could improve its service, which made it more popular, which in turn let it collect more dataa cycle known, in a term popularised by Jim Collins, a management scholar, as a data flywheel effect.

Ant Financials data scientists saw that women who bought skinny jeans were also more likely to pay for phone-screen repairs. They speculated that the handsets were slipping out of the trousers pockets. So the firm began directing offers of screen insurance at skinny-jeans-wearing women. Because of such insights and targeting, 80% of its customers use at least three of its five financial products. Traditional banks that lack such data are at a huge disadvantagewhich Mr Azhar calls the exponential gap.

With his experience as a startup entrepreneur, tech investor, innovation executive at big companies and journalist (including, 25 years ago, at The Economist), Mr Azhar is well-placed to decrypt these digital trends. He has a knack for interrogating and inverting conventional thinking, for example in making the case that the adoption of exponential technology leads to job increases, not cutswitness the rising headcounts of expanding businesses such as Amazon or Ocado, a British online grocer. The unemployment that results, he says, is down to the firms that fail to adapt, not those that do.

The importance of harnessing technology for business is the theme of Masters of Scale by Reid Hoffman, a co-founder of LinkedIn, and his two co-writers. Readers of his book (based on a popular podcast of the same name) will need to look past the stomach-churning clichs with which he implores would-be tech moguls to Shoot for the Moon or Get in the trenches. When he delves into the stories of his fellow entrepreneurs, by contrast, Mr Hoffman adeptly draws out the essence of their strategies.

Kevin Systrom, for instance, launched a photo-sharing app that grew exponentially by reducing its features rather than, as you might expect, expanding them: within ten weeks it had 1m users. The company, later named Instagram, was sold to Facebook for more than $1bn when it had just 13 employees. (Mr Hoffman duly advocates blitzscaling, or doing whatever is necessary to get big quickly.) Often a founders narrative is a mix of myth and pabulum, but beneath those are usually bold decisions that swayed the companys fate. The book illuminates the critical, often eccentric insights that have in some cases led to warp-speed success.

The implications of these technology and business trends for economic growth and the advancement of knowledge are Michael Bhaskars theme in Human Frontiers. He enters the debate over the great stagnation: the idea that innovation is becoming harder because the most graspable advances have been made. According to this provocative thesisa much gloomier one than Mr Azharsresearch is growing costlier and its findings less dramatic. Much of todays innovation aims to deepen understanding of existing science rather than exploring fresh terrain.

Mr Bhaskar used to be a writer for Google DeepMind, a top corporate AI laboratory, and he fluently explains the stakes of the debate, and the way the limits of knowledge have expanded in episodes ranging from the scientific revolution to the upheavals of AI. Yet, maddeningly, he declines to answer the question he poses. Our ideas, he writes bathetically, will either rapidly shrink from the frontier or continue charging towards it. Exponential or bust, in other words.

Cynics may snigger at the hype around tech firms. But exponential-age companies often enjoy the last laugh, whether in Amazons routing of Sears, Netflixs besting of Blockbuster, Apples defeat of Tower Records or Instagrams kibosh of Kodak. In each case, the upstarts were better at co-opting digital tools and applying them creatively. These books make a convincing case that something extraordinary is taking place in business and society. But they are far from the end of the conversation.

This article appeared in the Books & arts section of the print edition under the headline "The ascent of the machine"

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