Microsoft
Microsoft unveils strategic AI vision for India; here are the details
Microsoft has announced a comprehensive strategy to spearhead the development of artificial intelligence (AI) in India, aiming to empower AI developers and secure its position as the country's most trusted AI partner.
During a keynote in Bengaluru, CEO Satya Nadella outlined the company's mission to democratize AI access, stating, "AI for everyone. We want to be India's most trusted partner for that," as reported by NDTV. This initiative underscores Microsoft's commitment to fostering inclusivity and accessibility in the AI domain.
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As part of its commitment, Microsoft plans to provide AI training opportunities to 2 million individuals in India by 2025. This initiative will particularly focus on individuals in tier 2 and tier 3 cities, as well as rural areas, aiming to promote equitable socio-economic development across the country. Nadella highlighted the importance of collaboration between India and the United States in establishing AI regulations and laws to guide this technological progression.
Reflecting on the evolution of chat-based AI technologies like GPT, Nadella celebrated the historical advancements in computing and expressed the goal of creating machines that can understand human users to facilitate natural conversations on a variety of subjects, including sports.
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Microsoft's strategy involves leveraging a neural engine for digitizing and processing data to analyze vast information sets and identify patterns. The company anticipates that AI will significantly contribute to economic growth, especially through initiatives like Microsoft Copilots. This new venture is set to be promoted through an extensive marketing campaign, aiming to solidify Microsoft's role in the AI landscape.
Moreover, Microsoft is investing in the development of AI infrastructure, including model training and inference capabilities. Nadella boasted about possessing some of the most advanced big models, such as variations of GPT, and detailed an ambitious plan for expanding the company's AI capabilities.
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Explainer: What may have caused OpenAI board to fire Sam Altman
In a surprising move, OpenAI, the artificial intelligence research lab, ousted its CEO, Sam Altman, raising eyebrows and leaving shareholders in the dark.
While concerns about the rapid advancement of AI technology may have played a role in Altman's termination, the handling of the situation has drawn criticism from various quarters, reports CNN.
The decision to remove Altman, credited with steering OpenAI from obscurity to a $90 billion valuation, was made abruptly, catching even major stakeholders like Microsoft off guard.
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The CNN report suggests that Microsoft, OpenAI's most important shareholder, was unaware of Altman's dismissal until just before the public announcement, causing a significant drop in Microsoft's stock value.
OpenAI employees, including co-founder and former president Greg Brockman, were also blindsided, leading to Brockman's subsequent resignation. The sudden departure of key figures prompted rumors of Altman and former employees planning to launch a competing startup, posing a threat to OpenAI's years of hard work and achievements, said the report.
The situation worsened due to the peculiar structure of OpenAI's board. The company, a nonprofit, harbors a for-profit entity, OpenAI LP, established by Altman, Brockman, and Chief Scientist Ilya Sutskever. The for-profit arm's rapid innovation to achieve a $90 billion valuation clashed with the nonprofit's majority-controlled board, resulting in Altman's dismissal, it also said.
The tipping point appears to be Altman's announcement at a recent developer conference, signaling OpenAI's intention to provide tools for creating personalised versions of ChatGPT. This move, seen as too risky by the board, may have triggered Altman's removal.
ChatGPT-maker OpenAI fires CEO Sam Altman
Altman's warnings about the potential dangers of AI and the need for regulatory limits indicate a clash between innovation and safety within OpenAI. The board's concerns about Altman's pace of development, while perhaps justified, were mishandled, leading to a crisis that could have been avoided.
The aftermath sees OpenAI scrambling to reverse the decision, attempting to entice Altman back. The incident has strained relations with Microsoft, which now demands a seat on the board. OpenAI's future hangs in the balance, with possibilities ranging from Altman's return to a potential competition with a new startup, the report also said.
In the end, OpenAI finds itself in a precarious position, facing potential internal upheaval and external challenges, highlighting the importance of strategic decision-making in the rapidly evolving field of artificial intelligence.
Microsoft hires OpenAI founder Sam Altman to lead AI research team
Microsoft reports boost in profits, revenue, as it pushes AI
Microsoft on Tuesday reported a 9% increase in profit for the January-March quarter, as growth in cloud computing sales helped bolster its plans to expand its use of artificial intelligence.
The company reported quarterly profit of $18.3 billion, or $2.45 per share, beating Wall Street expectations for earnings of $2.24 a share.
The software maker posted revenue of $52.9 billion in the period, its third fiscal quarter, up 7% from the same period a year ago. Analysts polled by FactSet expected Microsoft to post revenue of $51.02 billion for the quarter.
The quarter marked an ambitious push by Microsoft to capitalize on its investments in artificial intelligence and close partnership with San Francisco-based startup OpenAI with the February release of a new AI chatbot feature on its search engine Bing.
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Microsoft is also integrating similar AI tools into the cloud computing and software products it sells to big businesses and organizations, though it's not immediately apparent to what extent the AI features are playing a role in overall sales.
Microsoft’s personal computing business, centered on its Windows software, was widely expected to continue a deterioration that began last year due to economic uncertainties and crimped demand. Quarterly sales from that segment dropped 9% to $13.3 billion, the company said Tuesday.
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Making up for that decline was a 16% increase in revenue from Microsoft's cloud-based business segment, to $22.1 billion for the quarter. Revenue also grew 11% to $17.5 billion from Microsoft's productivity software segment centered around its Office suite of workplace products such as email.
Google hopes ‘Bard’ will outsmart ChatGPT, Microsoft in AI
Google is girding for a battle of wits in the field of artificial intelligence with “Bard,” a conversational service apparently aimed at countering the popularity of the ChatGPT tool backed by Microsoft.
Bard initially will be available exclusively to a group of “trusted testers” before being widely released later this year, according to a Monday blog post from Google CEO Sundar Pichai.
Google’s chatbot is supposed to be able to explain complex subjects such as outer space discoveries in terms simple enough for a child to understand. It also claims the service will also perform other more mundane tasks, such as providing tips for planning a party, or lunch ideas based on what food is left in a refrigerator. Pichai didn’t say in his post whether Bard will be able to write prose in the vein of William Shakespeare, the playwright who apparently inspired the service’s name.
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“Bard can be an outlet for creativity, and a launchpad for curiosity,” Pichai wrote
Google announced Bard’s existence less than two weeks after Microsoft disclosed it’s pouring billions of dollars into OpenAI, the San Francisco-based maker of ChatGPT and other tools that can write readable text and generate new images.
Microsoft’s decision to up the ante on a $1 billion investment that it previously made in OpenAI in 2019 intensified the pressure on Google to demonstrate that it will be able to keep pace in a field of technology that many analysts believe will be as transformational as personal computers, the internet and smartphones have been in various stages over the past 40 years.
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In a report last week, CNBC said a team of Google engineers working on artificial intelligence technology “has been asked to prioritize working on a response to ChatGPT.” Bard had been a service being developed under a project called “Atlas,” as part of Google’s “code red” effort to counter the success of ChatGPT, which has attracted tens of millions of users since its general release late last year, while also raising concerns in schools about its ability to write entire essays for students.
Pichai has been emphasizing the importance of artificial intelligence for the past six years, with one of the most visible byproducts materializing in 2021 as part of a system called “Language Model for Dialogue Applications,” or LaMDA, which will be used to power Bard.
Google also plans to begin incorporating LaMDA and other artificial intelligence advancements into its dominant search engine to provide more helpful answers to the increasingly complicated questions being posed by its billion of users. Without providing a specific timeline, Pichai indicated the artificial intelligence tools will be deployed in Google’s search in the near future.
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In another sign of Google’s deepening commitment to the field, Google announced last week that it is investing in and partnering with Anthropic, an AI startup led by some former leaders at OpenAI. Anthropic has also built its own AI chatbot named Claude and has a mission centered on AI safety.
Job cuts in tech sector spread, Microsoft lays off 10,000
Microsoft is cutting 10,000 workers, almost 5% of its workforce, joining other tech companies that have scaled back their pandemic-era expansions.
The company said in a regulatory filing Wednesday (January 18, 2023) that the layoffs were a response to “macroeconomic conditions and changing customer priorities.”
The Redmond, Washington-based software giant said it will also be making changes to its hardware portfolio and consolidating its leased office locations.
Microsoft is cutting far fewer jobs than it had added during the COVID-19 pandemic as it responded to a boom in demand for its workplace software and cloud computing services with so many people working and studying from home.
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“A big part of this is just overexuberance in hiring,” said Joshua White, a finance professor at Vanderbilt University.
Microsoft’s workforce expanded by about 36% in the two fiscal years following the emergence of the pandemic, growing from 163,000 workers at the end of June 2020, to 221,000 in June 2022.
The layoffs represent “less than 5 percent of our total employee base, with some notifications happening today,” CEO Satya Nadella said in an email to employees.
“While we are eliminating roles in some areas, we will continue to hire in key strategic areas,” Nadella said. He emphasized the importance of building a “new computer platform” using advances in artificial intelligence.
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He said customers that were accelerating their spending on digital technology during the pandemic are now trying to “optimize their digital spend to do more with less.”
“We’re also seeing organizations in every industry and geography exercise caution as some parts of the world are in a recession and other parts are anticipating one,” Nadella wrote.
Other tech companies have also been trimming jobs amid concerns about an economic slowdown.
Amazon and business software maker Salesforce earlier this month announced major job cuts as they prune payrolls that rapidly expanded during the pandemic lockdown.
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Amazon said that it will be cutting about 18,000 positions and began notifying affected employees Wednesday in the U.S., Canada and Costa Rica, with other regions to follow, according to emails from executives. The job cuts, which began in November, are the largest set of layoffs in the Seattle company’s history, although just a fraction of its 1.5 million global workforce.
Also Wednesday, the U.K.-based cybersecurity firm Sophos confirmed it had laid off 10% of its global workforce — 450 employees — on Tuesday. Sophos, known for threat intelligence and detection, was acquired in 2020 by the private equity firm Thoma Bravo for $3.9 billion.
Facebook parent Meta is laying off 11,000 people, about 13% of its workforce. And Elon Musk, the new Twitter CEO, has slashed the company’s workforce.
Nadella made no direct mention of the layoffs on Wednesday when he put in an appearance at the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting happening this week in Davos, Switzerland.
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When asked by the forum’s founder Klaus Schwab on what tech layoffs meant for the industry’s business model, Nadella said companies that boomed during the COVID-19 pandemic are now seeing “normalization” of that demand.
“Quite frankly, we in the tech industry will also have to get efficient, right?” Nadella said. “It’s not about everyone else doing more with less. We will have to do more with less. So we will have to show our own productivity gains with our own sort of technology.”
Microsoft declined to answer questions about where the layoffs and office closures would be concentrated. The company sent notice to Washington state employment officials Wednesday that it was cutting 878 workers at its offices in Redmond and the nearby cities of Bellevue and Issaquah.
As of June, it had 122,000 workers in the U.S. and 99,000 elsewhere.
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White, the Vanderbilt professor, said all industries are looking to cut costs ahead of a possible recession but tech companies could be particularly sensitive to the rapid rise in interest rates, a tool that has been used aggressively in recent months by the Federal Reserve in its fight against inflation.
“This hits tech companies a little harder than it does industrials or consumer staples because a huge portion of Microsoft’s value is on projects with cash flows that won’t pay off for several years," he said.
Among the projects that have been attracting attention recently is Microsoft’s investment in its San Francisco startup partner OpenAI, maker of the writing tool ChatGPT and other AI systems that can generate readable text, images and computer code.
Microsoft, which owns the Xbox game business, also faces regulatory uncertainty in the U.S. and Europe delaying its planned $68.7 billion takeover of video game company Activision Blizzard, which had about 9,800 employees as of a year ago.
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Microsoft will fight US over $68.7B Activision Blizzard deal
Microsoft is headed for a battle with the Federal Trade Commission over whether the U.S. will block the tech giant’s planned takeover of video game company Activision Blizzard.
Microsoft on Thursday filed a formal response to the FTC’s claims that the $68.7 billion deal is an illegal acquisition that should be stopped.
After years of avoiding the political backlash that has been directed at big tech peers such as Amazon and Google, the software giant now appears to be on a collision course with U.S. regulators emboldened by President Joe Biden’s push to get tough on anti-competitive behavior.
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The FTC claims the merger could violate antitrust laws by suppressing competitors to Microsoft’s Xbox game console and its growing Xbox Game Pass subscription business.
At the center of the dispute is Microsoft’s rivalry with PlayStation-maker Sony to secure popular Activision Blizzard franchises like the military shooter game Call of Duty.
Microsoft’s response to the FTC tries to downplay Xbox’s role in the industry, describing itself as the “third-place manufacturer of gaming consoles” behind Sony and Nintendo, and one of just many publishers of popular video games with “next to no presence in mobile gaming,” where it is trying to make gains.
Activision Blizzard filed its own rebuttal to the FTC complaint on Thursday criticizing what it described as the FTC’s “unfounded assumption” that Microsoft would want to withhold Call of Duty from platforms that compete with Xbox. Its CEO Bobby Kotick said he believes the companies will prevail.
The dispute could be a difficult test case for Biden-appointed FTC Chair Lina Khan, who has sought to strengthen enforcement of antitrust rules. The FTC voted 3-1 earlier in December to issue the complaint seeking to block the deal, with Khan and the two other Democratic commissioners voting in favor and the sole Republican voting against.
The deal is also under close scrutiny in the European Union and the United Kingdom, where investigations aren’t due to be completed until next year.
The FTC’s complaint points to Microsoft’s 2021 acquisition of well-known game developer Bethesda Softworks and its parent company ZeniMax, as an example of where Microsoft is making some upcoming game titles exclusive to Xbox despite assuring European regulators it had no intention to do so.
Microsoft on Thursday objected to the FTC’s characterization, saying it made clear to European regulators it would “approach exclusivity for future game titles on a case-by-case basis, which is exactly what it has done.”
The FTC’s suit describes top-selling franchises like Call of Duty as important because they develop a base of loyal users attached to their preferred console or streaming service.
“With control of Activision’s content, Microsoft would have the ability and increased incentive to withhold or degrade Activision’s content in ways that substantially lessen competition — including competition on product quality, price, and innovation,” the FTC lawsuit says. “This loss of competition would likely result in significant harm to consumers in multiple markets at a pivotal time for the industry.”
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Microsoft signaled that it will vigorously fight the case in court with a team led by high-profile corporate attorney Beth Wilkinson, while also leaving open the possibility of a settlement.
“Even with confidence in our case, we remain committed to creative solutions with regulators that will protect competition, consumers, and workers in the tech sector,” said Microsoft’s president, Brad Smith, in a statement Thursday. “As we’ve learned from our lawsuits in the past, the door never closes on the opportunity to find an agreement that can benefit everyone.”
Microsoft’s last big antitrust battle occurred more than two decades ago when a federal judge ordered its breakup following the company’s anticompetitive actions related to its dominant Windows software. That verdict was overturned on appeal, although the court imposed other penalties on the company.
The FTC’s decision to send the complaint to its in-house Administrative Law Judge D. Michael Chappell instead of seeking an urgent federal court injunction to halt the merger could drag the case out at least until August, when the first evidence hearing is scheduled. Microsoft’s agreement with Activision Blizzard requires it to pay the video game company a breakup fee of up to $3 billion if it can’t close the deal before July 18.
The timing and trajectory of the case could change depending on how regulators in the U.K. and Europe rule on the merger next year. If Microsoft wins approval in Europe, it could use that to try to expedite the process in U.S. courts.
The merger faced yet another challenge this week from a group of individual video game players who sued in a San Francisco federal court to stop the deal on antitrust grounds.
The plaintiffs, all fans of Activision Blizzard’s Call of Duty franchise and other popular titles such as World of Warcraft, Overwatch and Diablo, are particularly concerned about how the consolidation would affect future game quality, innovation and output, said their attorney Joseph Alioto.
“When there’s a lack of competition, the quality necessarily goes down,” Alioto said. “By eliminating Activision, it gives such a strong position to Microsoft that they can do whatever they want.”
Benefits of Google Docs over Microsoft Word
Nowadays, writers and editors are facing the dilemma to choose between Google Docs and Microsoft Word, the two popular word processors. Can Google Docs offer better functionality and tools for writing? Let’s take a look at the advantages of Google Docs over MS Word.
What is Google Docs?
The free word processing program Google Docs is completely compatible with Microsoft Word and is part of Google's online office suite, G Suite. Users can collaborate with coworkers in real-time while creating, viewing, and editing documents online using any device, anywhere.
MS Word vs Google Docs
For decades, Microsoft Word was the best word processor for writers worldwide. Since its advent as the first-ever word-processing tool in the 1980s, generations of writers have grown up with it. It’s followed them from school, to university, and even right into the newsroom as well as other workplaces.
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But with the advancement of technology, more collaborative and freely available online tools have emerged on the market. Some new word processors offer up greater efficiency, flexibility, collaborative features, and benefits that Microsoft has simply yet to provide.
For instance, Google Docs is getting huge popularity day by day. G Suite (including Google Docs) has more than two billion active monthly subscribers. This number is increasing at a great pace.
Google Docs can support the writer, editor, or proofreader collaboration on the same material at a time. It mounts over the old time-consuming practice of "back-and-forth" emailing revisions done in the case of MS Word documents. Additional tools for article authoring are available through a variety of Google Chrome extensions, which will help you further optimize your editorial workflow.
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Let's examine some of the other significant advantages Google Docs can offer to a writer, proofreader, or editor's daily tasks.
What are the Advantages of Google Docs over MS Word?
1. Microsoft Word Compatibility
With the help of the Chrome extension, you can quickly open and edit Microsoft Word documents right in Google Docs. Additionally, you may download your Google doc into a Word document (.docx) and vice versa without worrying about formatting changes.
2. Works Through Chrome Extensions
Google Chrome extensions that you download from the Chrome Web Store can also give Google Docs new functionality. By doing so, you'll be able to customize the user experience and give your document new features and functionality.
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3. Ease of collaboration
Teams may easily access and update the same document simultaneously with Google Docs, eliminating any doubt as to which file has the most recent version. Even without a Google account, collaborators can see and modify shared Google documents.
Because of its interactive features, you may select precisely who can make changes to your work and add or delete collaborators by using the Collaborate tab. Adding a comment with "+" their email address will send them a notification, or you can interact with people from inside any document.
from beginning to end a Google Doc is continuously and automatically stored during the entire process of writing and editing. Edits can be undone and viewed in time-sensitive order, comments can be accepted or refused, and all of these features are available in Google Docs.
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4. Accessible from Various Devices
You don't have to worry about emailing your work to yourself and finding it later using Google Docs because everything is kept in the cloud. You can access your document at any time from any device by logging into your Google account.
This increases the degree of flexibility in your style of work as well as your professional life. While on the go, you can write and edit. Examine a section on your phone while riding the train or bus, then complete it when you reach to your office computer. Additionally, the fact that files are not kept on your computer saves RAM.
5. Automated Backup
You never have to worry about files disappearing again because all changes are automatically synced across devices and saved as you write or edit. In order to review previous edits to your document and who made them, you may also view its "revision history."
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6. Diverse Useful Features.
Google Docs is packed with effective tools for producing articles. For instance, voice typing (accessible via Tools > Voice typing) is a straightforward formatting feature for formatting copied and pasted text fast.
It also assists the writer or editor in the selection of fonts available for import from Google Fonts, and bookmarks for less scrolling (accessible via Insert > Bookmark). These are just a few of the popular tools that Google Docs includes to support your best work.
7. Free of Cost
Google Docs is a cost-free Word Processor, in contrast to other word processing programs like Microsoft Word. To use G Suite, all you need to do is create a Google account by generating a @gmail email address.
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How to use Google Documents
-You would need to have a Google account to use Google Docs.
-Depending on your device, there are a few ways to access Google Docs after signing in. The app may be needed to be downloaded from Google Play or the App Store.
-Open Google Chrome if you already have an account and are using a computer. The Google Apps icon may be seen in the top right corner.
- Select Google Documents from the selection menu that appears when you click the Google Apps icon.
- Click on the blank page to start a new document and start writing your content!
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Google Docs Benefits At a Glance
- A free tool.
- Google Cloud Storage makes the doc accessible from anywhere thanks to.
- Collaborates in real-time.
- The system can track document changes automatically, edit document history, and go back to any prior document version.
- Auto-saving.
- Work offline mode.
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- Offers strong document editing options and tools.
- Besides writing, it allows voice-typing
- Enriched with diverse font varieties.
- Tagging in the comment enables users to monitor particular changes.
- Visibility is restricted to those with the proper access.
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Colocity brings Microsoft Azure stack hub hybrid cloud to Bangladesh
Colocity, cloud service partner of Dell and Microsoft, has brought Microsoft Azure stack hub hybrid cloud to Bangladesh to help local businesses increase productivity by protecting data at an affordable cost.
Emaad Ispahani, managing director of Colocity, said many companies in the country are not ready to move from traditional institutional infrastructure to the public cloud. Organisation owners want complete control of their data.
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"Also, according to the law of the country, some information, including financial information, has to be kept within the country. So, cloud capabilities can create great opportunities for businesses in the country," he added.
"Microsoft's Azure Stack Hub can be trusted. And Colocity is the first tier-3 quality commercial data centre in Bangladesh."
Read Palak visits Microsoft firm in USA
Palak visits Microsoft firm in USA
State minister for ICT Zunaid Ahmed Palak has visited the Microsoft firm in USA’s San Francisco, according to a message here on Friday.
During his visit on Thursday, he observed hardware, software, innovations of the tech giant, their activities and exchanged views with the Microsoft team.
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Sonia Bashir, 2 other Bangladeshis among 100 Global Tech's Changemakers
Bangladeshi tech entrepreneurs Sonia Bashir Kabir, Afeef Zaman, and Morin Talukder have been named on the Rest of World (RoW)'s 100 Global Tech's Changemakers' list.
RoW had set out to find 100 of the most influential, innovative, and trailblazing personalities in fintech, e-commerce, policy, digital infrastructure, and a range of other sectors that intersect with and influence technology.
From tech leaders, innovators, and investors to activists, it identified those people outside Silicon Valley and the West, whose efforts directly impact countries where the majority of the world's population lives.
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Among the three Bangladeshis, Sonia Bashir Kabir is the founder and managing director of SBK Tech Ventures, a Bangladesh-focused venture capital fund, which invests in startups that support the digital development of rural areas.
SBK's portfolio includes Dmoney, Solshare, and Praava Health.
Previously, as the country manager of Microsoft Bangladesh, Sonia partnered with donor agencies, banks, telecommunications companies, and students, to mobilise and grow the company's initiatives.
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She also worked to provide microloans to women to start IT businesses.
Afeef Zaman is an expert in problem-solving in emerging markets, especially in Bangladesh.
He is the CEO of ShopUp, the country's largest full stack business-to-business commerce platform for micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises.
Afeef bootstrapped Ice9 – a venture builder providing solutions for emerging economies – to success in his 20s. Following this, he decided to help the entrepreneurs who run the country's 4.5 million popular mom-and-pop stores but struggle to access its formal financial system due to a lack of digital presence.
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Thanks to ShopUp, they can now access digital credit, B2B sourcing, logistics, and business management solutions. After closing South Asia's largest funding round worth $75 million in 2021, the company has added to its funds with a $34 million series B extension round.
Morin Talukder is the co-founder and CEO of Pickaboo, a Bangladesh-based e-commerce platform.
Though still in his 20s, he is a seasoned expert in the booming e-commerce industry, having founded the online shopping platform ehatbazaar.com in 2015, which he sold a year later to focus on Pickaboo.
During its six years of operation and five funding rounds, it has gained the confidence of its customers.
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To stay competitive, Morin has prioritised offering a high-speed delivery service with turnarounds of as little as three hours and has turned Pickaboo into one of the first e-commerce retailers in Bangladesh to introduce monthly payment plans and customer membership plans.
"Together, the individuals featured on our Global Tech's Changemakers list influence how products are made and distributed, how entrepreneurs are funded, and how tech is regulated and its users protected far beyond their local markets," RoW said.
"As a result of the extraordinary headwinds they face, our editorial team believes these leaders are more innovative, more thoughtful, and better at sharing new ideas than most people in the Western world understand."
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