SM: Let’s say I am wearing a blue shirt which works really well with my skin color. Are you able to figure out that somebody who looks like me likes to wear shirts that are a particular shade of blue? FM: If we have a picture of you we can find at least 25 relevant
SM: Let’s say I am wearing a blue shirt which works really well with my skin color. Are you able to figure out that somebody who looks like me likes to wear that shade of blue shirts? FM: If we have a picture of you we can find at least 25 relevant attributes, include what
SM: How do you make your recommendation software portable to mass utilization? FM: We have been working on something we call “Business Solutions”. The objective is to provide the recommender as a service for third parties. They can easily get recommendations integrated into their websites by utilizing our hosted platform. This is very cost effective.
SM: Had you already built an initial version of the software by the time you received your first round of funding? FM: At that point and time we had launched our first version of Recommender as an online service. We separated the Recommender engine from the final product since the very beginning. However, the best
SM: Did you cash out and make a clean break from Intelligent Software Components? FM: Yes. Part of the deal with Banco Santander was the partial purchase of shareholder equity. I cashed out and took sabbatical leave in September of 2002. In February of 2003 I moved to Oregon.
Dr. Francisco Martin, serial entrepreneur and the CEO/Founder of Strands, has found his niche applying AI solutions to various technology problems. At Strands he has developed an intelligent agent which understands and learns your personal tastes via several different methods.
SM: Have you seen advertisers take advantage of the platforms? RY: Yes, we have. Advertisers are interested in, and this is not exclusive to applications, identifying methods that will result in more users having a higher level of engagement with them. Applications provide a terrific way to do that. It can be accomplished through a
SM: Social networks are becoming the voice of a generation. RY: Another thing to think about is that people are fundamentally social. What is happening online is a reflection of social behavior in the real world. Sites like ours just enhancing natural behavior.