What's Up with Tech?
Tech Transformation with Evan Kirstel: A podcast exploring the latest trends and innovations in the tech industry, and how businesses can leverage them for growth, diving into the world of B2B, discussing strategies, trends, and sharing insights from industry leaders!
With over three decades in telecom and IT, I've mastered the art of transforming social media into a dynamic platform for audience engagement, community building, and establishing thought leadership. My approach isn't about personal brand promotion but about delivering educational and informative content to cultivate a sustainable, long-term business presence. I am the leading content creator in areas like Enterprise AI, UCaaS, CPaaS, CCaaS, Cloud, Telecom, 5G and more!
What's Up with Tech?
Revolutionizing Digital Interactions with Ivan from InfoBip
Interested in being a guest? Email us at admin@evankirstel.com
Are you ready to revolutionize your digital interactions? This episode, featuring Ivan, the Chief Business Officer of InfoBip, not only promises to do just that, but also takes you behind the scenes of one of the leading voices in tech today. Tune in as Ivan decodes InfoBip's mission and the nitty-gritty of their innovative full-stack platform. He shares how their powerful infrastructure is altering the way businesses and customers communicate, touching two-thirds of all mobile devices globally. With over 850 connections with Telcos, 30 natively integrated channels, and a platform layer providing modular APIs, orchestration algorithms, security, and analytics, InfoBip is truly shaking things up in the tech world.
In our next segment, we switch gears to explore the heart of InfoBip - its people. Ivan provides a sneak peek into the dynamic culture and the workings of InfoBip's global engineering team. You'll learn about their agile working style, their focus on ML Ops, and customer back capabilities. Did we mention Ivan's game plan for the future? Brace yourself as he reveals his ambitious plans for the company, which include targeting B2C companies in the US and amplifying brand recognition.
As the episode wraps up, Ivan takes us on InfoBip's transformational journey from a traditional strategy boutique to a tech powerhouse. He discusses Europe's growth in the tech industry, the role InfoBip is playing in this development, and the upcoming Shift Conference and Vaz Telco events in Croatia. If you have any questions about InfoBip or just tech in general, Ivan extends an open invitation for listeners to reach out. Don't miss out on this enlightening conversation that brings a wealth of insights to the table.
More at https://linktr.ee/EvanKirstel
Hey everybody. Good morning Evan here today with a fascinating discussion with a company I've been dying to know more about InfoBip. Ivan from InfoBip how are you? Hi, I'm very good. How are you Well? Thanks for joining. I know you're traveling in India right now in a hotel, so hopefully the Wi-Fi will hold out for us. But perhaps, before we dive in, perhaps introduce yourself and a little bit about the core mission at InfoBip.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I'm Ivan, chief Business Officer of InfoBip. I have broad remit, from strategy through go-to-market marketing, partnership developer experience, and I've been a technologist in my heart for a number of years. I think what attracted me to InfoBip and our overall mission is really to democratize future of digital interactions between businesses and people through breakthrough innovation. So we've been innovators and brought many trends, from A2P messaging to novel engagement tools enabling businesses to chat with their customers like they would chat with friends and now enabling them to drive conversational transformation with the tools that we have.
Speaker 2:And I think one curiosity maybe for many listeners InfoBip. Actually we bootstrapped the company to billion dollar revenue with no external investment, and then we started further expansion in the United States. So pretty unique story, but that's probably for another call.
Speaker 1:I don't know. That is a fascinating story. I think our viewers would be shocked and intrigued to hear that. Let's give a little context. We have a quick video on your YouTube channel. I'll play it. By the way, you have a fantastic YouTube channel. I'm surprised more brands don't do more with YouTube. But let's take a look and I'll get your feedback here.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 1:That's something else. So tell us, how do you, how do you orchestrate these, these conversations? Tell us about the platform and the capability we're looking at behind the scenes there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so maybe we're also reflecting to this video. So there is one interesting KPI that we tracked as InfoBip and that's how many mobile devices in the world have we touched through our services? I mean, we are not B2C company, so we didn't touch them directly, but through other customers that use us. So in principle, last year was two-thirds of all mobile devices in the world that were touched by our services. And the reason why we talk about interactions and not communication is because we are doing things like conversational commerce. So you can it's not just like streaming messages, but actually people can buy things in their chat app or et cetera. So in order to enable that customer experience layer and conversational channels, we have relatively complex what we call full stack platform and every communication and interaction is relying on a powerful infrastructure. So that's where we start.
Speaker 2:We are grounded in infrastructure and strong engineering. We have more than 850 direct connections with Telcos, which means that we terminate our communication in these Telcos, but also we have hardware there so we can expose their network APIs, meaning providing more functionalities like looking if the number exists, phone number, as well as some hardware to protect those networks from spam and fraudulent message. Then in that infrastructure layer. We run 42 data centers 40 are on our private cloud and two are a result of our partnership with MS Azure. This provides high reliability, a high redundancy of our services, because communication has to be uninterrupted every second and we are managing extremely large volumes. Then our partners chat app providers. They also feed their infrastructure through our infrastructure to the customer. That's an infrastructure layer, that is a base of the house. Then the house goes on. Then we have a channel layer. I'll explain. We have a platform layer and we have customer engagement layer, and then we have our ecosystem layer, or what we call exchange. Let me just in three minutes, drive you through these other layers.
Speaker 2:The channel layer is where various companies can simply access channels to communicate to their customers. We have more than 30 channels that are truly natively integrated. It's channels like SMS, mms, voice email, video, live chat, web, push, app push and then chat apps WhatsApp, apple Messages for Business, which is like iMessage for Business, google RBM, so Google RCS Messages for Business, viber Line, kakao, zalo, etc. Then also social media messengers like Instagram Messenger and Facebook Messenger. All of these are available through API. That's why we say democratizing future of interaction.
Speaker 2:If any business wants to talk to their customer through a messaging or other channel anywhere in the world, because we're truly global in one platform. So everything is integrated. All they need to do is to integrate our API of that channel, or they're actually unified API that unifies multiple channel under it. Then they can, with a little registration, depending on the rules of the channel, they can start sending and that's true from a little store down the road to actually major corporations. That's democratization. Then that's in the channel layer. People can just use our channels. They don't need to use anything else. However, on top of that house, we still have a platform layer, and what we mean by platform, that's a. We just launched C-PassX. That's a set of modular API because a lot of our customers are B2B to C companies.
Speaker 2:Take something like marketing automation and so forth. They're onboarding hundreds of businesses and they need to provision to these businesses channels, analytics, security, what they do in this, our platform layer. This is built for them so they can automate their work. In principle, they can register businesses using API, because normally this is manual process, but we have an API for that. It can reduce their engineering time. We also have failover and orchestration algorithms. If you tried to send a RCS to a consumer and platform detects that the message was not delivered. We can failover to another channel to make sure critical communication reaches on time. We have security. We have a product that detects artificial or fraudulent attempts to access the traffic. Then we also have analytics. You can track your campaigns, the customer journey in the messaging channels and so forth, and expose it to your customers.
Speaker 2:That's the third. If you remember, I said infrastructure channels platform and then comes the customer engagement layer. This is, in principle, conversational engagement, because we enable two-way communication, mainly in the messaging channels, between businesses and people. We have a customer data platform that we don't sell as a customer data platform, but it's part of the stack that enable businesses to see real-time communication with their consumers. They can then work with this data to create segments, to create rules and so forth.
Speaker 2:Then we have a conversational marketing automation tool that works in conjunction with other marketing automation tool that enable people that are not skilled in programming to create customer journeys in various channels that we have that are natively integrated. Then we also have something we call Conversations, which is our Cloud Contact Center, where actually we enable consumers to approach businesses for support through conversational channels. Instead of calling, they can start chatting. Then we can put chatbot up front to automate the interactions and we can escalate to an agent chatting or an agent calling. With this, we enable conversational support. Then, finally, we have our bot building frameworks that can enable people to build generative AI bots, rule-based bots or intent-based bots.
Speaker 2:Then our exchanges, where our partner exposed their APIs. When people are building customer journeys in conversational channels, they can easily plug and play other APIs that would create richer journeys. For example, if you're creating a booking flow in something like WhatsApp for a tourist agency, maybe you need an insurance. You can pull an insurance API into that flow from our exchange. That's, in principle, a pretty rich stack but, as you can see, the goal of that stack is really to enable this two-way conversation between businesses and people and further digital transformation. All our engagement tool are getting major AI uplift now. For example, from our CDP, you could create customer segments by chatting to it and then the software can spell out segments, for example, using generative AI and other tools. Anyway, long story short, as you can see, a lot of tools but one goal enabling conversational future One goal indeed, and that's a fantastically rich set of capabilities.
Speaker 1:Let's talk about how you work with customers. Obviously, you're partnering with the telcos, but you're also supporting businesses and developers directly of all sorts. How do you support those folks and how do you go to market really?
Speaker 2:Yes, in principle. Let's call it three major go-to-markets on a very conceptual level. We have our direct Salesforce and that's where also Gartner recognizes us In our industry. They recognize three mega-providers. We are one of the three and then we are the only one which is recognized for its co-creation model. We have a set of conversational UI consultants, for example, implementation consultants and very large network of partners. Our typical customers are large, either platforms or large enterprises, and then we sit with these customers, understand their problem and co-create solution together using our stack. That's direct go-to-market.
Speaker 2:The second one is we call it digitally enabled. We also serve mid-market In principle. We have a growth engine and then there are squads or people who are serving in market with various pre-package solutions. Then, finally, we have a relatively fast growing self-service where we are now exposing all the channels plus engagement tools in the self-service. That's intended for smaller start-ups, smaller companies and as well as developers. We have a developer experience team that's working to bring more developers on the self-service platform. Those are our main three vectors. We separate between B2B2C because platforms require much more technical, like C++ that you just saw on the screen, while enterprises want to talk much more about business value. That we can bring, it's more. What can you do for me? How can you improve my marketing and things like that?
Speaker 1:Indeed Such a variety of use cases and opportunities there. Describe the engineering team and the culture. You've been called an engineering powerhouse. I don't think that's an understatement or is an understatement perhaps. Describe the team when are they? What are they doing? What are the skills to deliver these APIs and platform services.
Speaker 2:That's a great question. We save you an engineering powerhouse because our people like to build things. As you see from the platform, it's really ground up. I think we have a global team. We have engineering centers at various location, but the main hub is in the country from which company originates, from, which is Croatia. So we have a couple of engineering hubs there and one in Bosnia, and then we have various other locations in UK, united States and so forth.
Speaker 2:The culture is really kind of agile Culture. They are real kind of full stack software developers together, combined with design people. Then, as we are building our products, especially in the engagement layer, we're now having cross-functional teams that include also commercial capabilities there to understand the customer. As I said already, design capabilities and then software capabilities. So really, in operating at a kind of a high speed and rapid pace, I would say it's a very open culture. It's a very dynamic and, as I said, agile culture, really jiggling multiple priorities at the very rapid pace.
Speaker 2:People really like to go deep, understand things and build. They're real builders. But what I would say recently we are also investing because of rise of AI is our machine learning operations capabilities. So we want to enable more people who machine learning, so not to have only rely on, let's say, data scientists, but really also software engineers being able to apply this capability as well. We've been working a lot on this customer back because our strength used to be in the historically coming from telcos, building APIs. We are really experts there. But now, as we're moving more into similar to a tech space here with this conversational future, we also need to have this customer back capabilities to rapidly understand the business problem we are solving and then work back to create the solution. So those are two emerging capabilities ML Ops and this co-creation and a tech space.
Speaker 1:That's fantastic, Well, congratulations. So you're known as a global powerhouse and with global reach, but a little bit less well-known perhaps in the US A, so I think you're changing that Also. This marketplace is pretty dynamic and rapidly changing. Traditionally, you've had the Twilio out there with basic SMS setting up the market, but I imagine you're looking to go well beyond the traditional CPAS set of services. Tell us about your plan for the next year or two.
Speaker 2:Yes, let me tell you a secret of the US when you start to pack in different layers of communication actually, in the infrastructure layer and the platform layer, in the SMS space, we're probably the biggest player in the US. Also, due to acquisition. We are one of the biggest, if not the biggest, also invoice through acquisition of peerless network from Chicago. Now, having said what I said, our go-to market in US was largely relying on partners. Some of these partners are also in the same industry that where we are, so they built solution on top of our infrastructure. We were very focused on B2B to see platforms. So we are partnering with some of the biggest companies in the world Some of the logos are on our website as well as Biggest Martek, some of the big Martek platforms in the United States. That's why our brand recognition is very niche. So people in that sort of industry know who we are, but when you move away from it, you're absolutely right, we're not that known and we didn't invest a lot in marketing. I think now, let's say, with the capabilities that we have, but also respecting the partner network that we have in US, like in marketing and so forth, I think we are finding a good area to add value for B2C companies in the US, especially as US is also at the interesting crossroads.
Speaker 2:A lot of rich communication channels look conversational channels like WhatsApp, or have much higher penetration. In other countries like Brazil or India, people don't even almost use email anymore. Us is still very heavy on SMS, which is good, but actually with Apple messages for business, with high penetration of iPhones and potential of Telcos and Google launching RCS, we think then our software can come quite handy, helping digital transformations like enabling support through chat and especially also with GenAI. Also, we think that that would work well in conjunction with our partners, because they usually have either market platforms and so forth, so we can build these experiences, and we even launched the product called experiences within different channels. That would really sit nicely in the ecosystem with their platform. So I think we will intend to do much more now in B2C segments in the US using the conversational toolkit that we have and that will probably also result in a higher brand recognition because we'll move away from a comfort zone, which is a niche that we are pretty strong, into a broader area.
Speaker 1:Yes, as those who have spent many decades in the industry, it's always been ironic to me that the US as a tech powerhouse has always been slow to adopt advanced messaging and communication services compared to the rest of the world. So even when SMS was launched, we were a slow adopter versus the rest of the world. So pretty ironic. Tell us about your personal journey with InfoBip and your background and how that journey has been over the last many years.
Speaker 2:Yes, so I'm a technology aficionado, so I've done a PhD in one like natural science and then also masters in management, actually of technology and economics at Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, which you have a large audience even in the United States.
Speaker 1:I mean that's kind of like for people who don't know. The HHI ATH.
Speaker 2:Yeah, ath, so yeah, exactly so I kind of like. And then I had my own startup in a digital space with some friends and then one of my friends found a job in IBM and somehow the leadership kind of went different ways. And so he told me like, hey, just go to the, you're kind of perfect for a consulting firm and we think McKinsey would like you. So I tried there and I joined McKinsey. So then I worked a lot in McKinsey, but always at this intercept between, like industry vertical I was doing a lot of work in, for example, healthcare and then tech, and McKinsey was also evolving its own business model. So you know it was really at the cusp of that transition from more traditional strategy boutique you know that does slides to a real kind of a tech powerhouse. So in 2015, mckinsey acquired Quantum Black that brought AI capabilities. And then we also I was part of that to build a business building practice called LEAP, where we were partnering with businesses to build like large enterprises, to build new businesses for them. And those were programs where you know you needed a tech talent, a business talent that they would last for a couple of years. So I was pretty much engaged with that.
Speaker 2:And then I met the founders of Infabip and I felt in love with the story but also the opportunities, because we come from Europe and I think it's not for anyone benefit that Europe is falling behind on tech. If you look at last 30 years, there was no single company that was founded in Europe that entered the order of most valuable 100 companies in the world that came from Europe. There were seven from US, they Google, they Kmetah, there were four from China, but zero from Europe. I love the founders, I love the story, I love the technology and the opportunities that it gives, but it's also a mission. Hey, can we work together to raise one notable tech company that comes from Europe but serves whole world? That's another mission.
Speaker 2:As I felt in love with that mission, I decided to join this lovely story and then continue driving impact for various businesses, all like I did in the past of my career In McKinsey. I just want to say one last thing. I actually worked with a group of people at that time, nico Henke, to find something we call McKinsey Technology Council, which people from outside of McKinsey, eminent technologists, and they're publishing yearly McKinsey Tech Trend Index, and it's interesting. As I said, I was always trying to see the tech trends in the future and then derive implications for business. That's where my passion lies in.
Speaker 1:Fantastic story Speaking of which Croatia is, of course, the headquarters, and many Americans just know of Croatia as a fabulously beautiful vacation destination and the background scenes for Game of Thrones many of them, but actually you have a very sophisticated and educated population. Has that been part of your secret to success as well?
Speaker 2:Yes, I have to comment At our engineers. We have a lot of, I think. Officially we are HQed in London, just to be clear.
Speaker 2:But actually the proper campuses we have. Two large campuses are in Croatia and large workforce yes, the part of the success the whole region. I am a Serbian myself. The whole region is actually very strong. In coming from Telco At the beginning and even later, we were able to recruit a lot of tech talent. In Croatia especially, there's strong traditional IT and so forth. People are really working for company with their full heart. They're there really because they're in love in what they do. Our best programmers. They go on holidays and they're solving best engineers. They're solving business problems. Just it shows not that we appreciate that people should also have work-life balance, but it just shows you how passionate they are. I think that was a large part of our success.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, kind of like me with social media. I still am tweeting and posting on vacation, maybe slightly different topics. But also you have a big event coming up in Croatia in September which I can't believe is next month. Next time is just flying by. Tell us about that and what people can expect who might be interested to attend.
Speaker 2:Yes, we have actually two events. One is, I will tell you yes, in September we will host Shift Conference in Zadar. It's a beautiful place on the coast. Shift is actually our event. That even our brand. We have also Shift Magazine we did. Shift in Miami is our conference for developers and startups. There we really are not talking about infobit products. It's not commercial in many ways. It's really eminent tech leaders around the world or from developer community presenting their story. In Miami we had a person who designed a game called Doom and many other Of course.
Speaker 2:That's kind of the thing that's happening in events, and some of our partners are talking about innovation. That's what's going to happen in Shift. That's really for developers, startups, tech people who are passionate about technology. And then we have more focused event, together with Vaz for Telcos. That's going to happen in Sibonik in October. It's one of the largest Telco events related to messaging and so forth. We are also hosts this year. So two big things coming and there will be more topics about network, network APIs, messaging and so forth. That's kind of the point.
Speaker 1:Great topics, great people, great location. Congratulations, that sounds so fun. Well, look, I know it's getting late there in India at the moment. Thank you so much for sharing your vision and all the insights, and thanks so much for watching folks Feel free to reach out to Infobip with any questions, or even Ivan directly on social media, happy to entertain. All right, thanks so much.
Speaker 2:Alan, thank you for hosting.