WhiteFox Impresses U.S. DoD At World’s Largest Counter-drone Testing Event

WhiteFox Defense Technologies, Inc., a drone airspace defense and security company, had their flagship product, DroneFox, participate as selected equipment by the U.S. Government for the prestigious Black Dart counter-UAS and Red Teaming exercise last month. It was the first time WhiteFox had performed testing at Black Dart, the largest counter-drone testing exercise in the world. After only a brief training, military personnel were able to operate DroneFox to effortlessly detect, identify and mitigate drone threats that were sent by a contracted Red Team. WhiteFox participated alongside several Department of Defense organizations and civilian companies after passing the rigorous nine-month down-selection process. As UAS pose a unique and complex threat that requires multiple layers of defense to comprehensively protect, public and private entities were encouraged to work together.

Representatives of the U.S. Government saw how WhiteFox engaged with the entities and helped evolve security modeling along with techniques, tactics and procedures. Through the DroneFox user interface, operators were able to perform threat assessments of individual unknown or hostile drones and “whitelist” their own “friendly” drones. The military personnel operating DroneFox then relayed this information to remote personnel performing various ground operations at the exercise.

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Schneider Electric Ups Innovation Drive Via $565M Venture Capital Funding Outfit (QMerit)

Global energy management and automation solutions provider Schneider Electric (EPA:SU) has formally launched its own dedicated venture capital funding outfit.

Initial noises about the move appeared on investors' and analysts' radars in October when the Rueil-Malmaison, France-headquartered company led a $18 million financing for Sense, a developer of home energy monitoring systems.

Announcing the move at its Innovation Summit in Atlanta, U.S. on Tuesday (November 13), Schneider Electric said the dedicated VC funding unit will boost its innovation ecosystem and nurture "tomorrow’s transformational and disruptive innovations."

The unit – 'Schneider Electric Ventures' – will have up to €500 million ($565 million) of dry powder to invest in incubation projects, partnerships with entrepreneurs, and specialized funds, and would "welcome ideas" from innovators and entrepreneurs eager to turn their concepts into reality.

The Sense equity raise might well have caught the public's eye, but Schneider Electric's Chairman and CEO Jean-Pascal Tricoire told your correspondent that his company's VC foray is already well underway with five other equity investments.

These include – Element Analytics (industrial big data analytics firm), Habiteo (3D specialist for new residential housing), QMerit (dubbed the "Uber" for contractors and Maintenance, Repair and Operating spend), KGS, (predictive engine for "just-in-time" maintenance) and Claroty (Cybersecurity company for industrial operational technology networks).

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Pay equity tech startup Syndio names Smartsheet co-founder Maria Colacurcio as CEO, lands $5M in funding

Syndio, a startup whose technology uses data to help companies identify and resolve pay equity gaps for women and minority employees, has landed Smartsheet co-founder Maria Colacurcio as its new CEO.

The nine-person company is mostly based in New York, but with Colacurcio joining as CEO, Syndio plans to build up a Seattle presence.

Colacurcio spent time at Microsoft before co-founding Smartsheet and serving as vice president of marketing and communications. For the last three years, Colacurcio has been at Starbucks, where she held several titles, most recently director of business integration.

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DailyPay Joins ADP Marketplace to Equip Workers with Instant Access to Earned Wages

DailyPay, the pioneer of instant access to earned wages, is now available to ADP customers via the ADP Marketplace through a turnkey integration. ADP customers across the nation can now offer the daily pay benefit to their workforce, improve financial security and benefit from improved employee retention.

Through the ADP Marketplace integration, employers offer a fully comprehensive daily pay solution that adheres to all wage deductions and tax withholding laws. Employers’ current payroll process, including the timing of payroll funds, does not change.

21c Museum Hotel is a contemporary art museum and hotel chain and longtime ADP customer. Given the multiple states it operates in and its ambitious growth strategy, the company required a solution that was turnkey and adhered to wage deductions and tax withholding laws.

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