Perhaps, a misconception is being ingrained in the minds of people that business leaders understand business and IT people understand technology. But this is no longer the case. The lines are now blurred between business and technology and one cannot exist without the other. In the current scenario of the corporate world, technology is the core to business strategy, regardless of the sector and size. It touches all parts of a business and helps drive reachability, enable growth and promote uniqueness amongst competitors. With a view of capitalizing the value of technology to his business, Remko Noteboom, CTO and Co-Founder of Southpaw Technology Inc. is leading the company with the technical excellence, deep business acumen, and his sharp leadership skills.
Shaping the Framework of Business
Remko defines the strategy, operating model, and enterprise architecture and transformation roadmaps of Southpaw Technology by combining his understanding of business strategy and affinity with technology. Prior to Southpaw, Remko has more than fifteen years of software development experience specifically with digital production pipeline design. He holds a Master’s degree in Engineering Physics in the Solid State Physics group from Queen’s University. He has a deep understanding of how to design and architect workflow asset management systems sharpened by his developing various different proprietary systems in large enterprise organizations.
Prior to founding Southpaw Technology, Remko worked with Nelvana Limited and C.O.R.E Feature Animation designing and developing infrastructure and asset management solutions for large scale productions. With extensive international co-production and outsourcing experience for productions and multiple studios, Remko understands the complexities of working with multiple teams, in divergent locations.
Connecting the Digitally-defined World
In the opinion of Remko, a noble enterprise solution has to be flexible enough to adapt over time as its operations adjust with changing technology and global market conditions. It rarely happens that companies develop the right product at the right time. External forces such as available budget, market conditions, and current technical trends swirl around in a whirlwind of technological changes. It is extremely challenging to get all the pieces together in sync to make a successful product.
In this context, Southpaw Technology came up with the ever expanding and open source web framework, TACTIC™. TACTIC is a unique framework in the market, as it offers a way to handle, manage and secure large amounts of data and the workflow associated with the creation, distribution, protection and monetization of these corporate assets across a large global enterprise. Its applications are being used across thousands of companies and organizations to add business intelligence; creating everything from Digital Asset Management (DAM) systems, to order fulfillment systems, and to production and Project Management (PM) systems.
Surpassing Challenges
Being from Physics background, Remko maintains a strong analytical framework that enables him to tackle the most demanding technical challenges. It feels great to succeed at certain points, but it was ultimately the failures that forced him to question his foundations and that often opened the door for him to attempt new directions. Despite having a comfortable, well paid and relatively stable job, Remko built up the courage to become an entrepreneur. He kept on going with personal resilience and confidence, as he knew that he was on the right path even after unconquerable challenges stood in his way. By making the optimum use of the available resources, he overcame from the challenges of cash flow and balancing R&D and consulting work.
Over the years, Remko has taken competition as a driving force for change, rather than feeling threatened by it. He started embracing the competition as a source of new ideas and technologies that can improve his company’s offerings, as the world is a big place and there are always new markets to discover.
Enlightening Budding Tech Strategists
Remko believes that a technical strategist should be eager to learn from even newly arrived employees in the organization, as many new disruptive technologies came to his attention from new people who have had experience in different environments. According to him, the critical attribute a tech strategist should possess is to always keep ears open for interesting developments. Remko also adds, “You will grow older and you are always in danger of getting stuck in your ways. Read constantly. Keep an open mind for new ways and new technologies that are constantly changing how things are done. And listen to the younger generation. They can challenge your set ways and provide new insights on how to do what you are good at even better.
Upcoming Expansion
In the near future, Southpaw will build close relationships with a relatively small number of key, large sized and global customers who have large workflow problems, as the company’s workflow engine is something that is not found in any other solution. The ability of TACTIC products to assist in the vast and constantly fluctuating universe of regulatory environments is one of the rapidly growing applications of its deployment. The benefits of the automation and precise delivery are its core drivers that can serve large corporate operations. Hence, over the time, the company will add more large customers that have complex global requirements in the list.
Source :-The 10 Most Influential Tech Strategist of 2018