Digital Innovation July 2020 edition
iSIZE Technologies was interviewed by Digital Innovation to talk about its “New Phase of Growth” with two new members recently joining its executive board: Paul Massara, ex-CEO of NPower, and Maria Ingold, ex-CTO of Disney-Sony joint venture, FilmFlex Movies. Here Paul Massara talks about what attracted him to join the iSIZE team.
What is it about iSIZE that first attracted you?
I invest in companies that I feel can play a role in the transition to a low carbon economy, and iSIZE clearly meets that criteria. In addition, the deep tech has the potential to create a number of innovative products that can reduce bandwidth, which is an ever increasing challenge, and something that has only grown due to Covid-19, with more people working from home.
How is your previous experience proving valuable in your new role?
Having invested in a number of energy-tech businesses, I have seen many of the challenges that start-ups experience; from developing a clear digital roadmap, to winning that first contract, to hiring a sales team and financing. What all start-ups share is that they need to focus, focus, focus! They are all short of time and money, and those issues are linked, so they need to focus on traction on a commercial product ASAP. In addition to bringing that experience, I have also helped to open doors with C-suite executives, which often speeds up the sales process.
How has the Covid-19 pandemic impacted on the business?
In reality, it has had both a positive and negative impact. In the short term, it has been more difficult to get people’s attention to look at something new, when they are focused on getting their core business stable. However, Covid-19 has led to a significant increase in video conferencing, streaming of games, socal media and videos. These are all likely to lead to a long-term sustained increase in demand of bandwidth. iSIZE solutions have never been more relevant than today.
How important is sustainability for iSIZE Technologies?
Sustainability is critically important to the company for many reasons. We recognize that demand for data and streaming is likely to increase, and so being able to play a part in companies reaching Net Zero is critical. All the big digital companies – Microsoft, Amazon, Netflix, Google – are committing to plans to reduce their carbon footprint, and we are approaching all of them.
Sustainability is also important in attracting and retaining the best team possible. There are many people looking at AI and ML, but often go into either fintech or mediatech, where they struggle to see the direct impact they are having on addressing one of the biggest societal challenges that we face, i.e. climate change.
Any final thoughts?
I am very excited to join iSIZE Technologies. Having dedicated much of my career to furthering the environmental cause, I am very much looking forwards to taking iSIZE low-carbon, sustainable technology solutions to new heights in 2020.
