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Advancements in Virtual Support Deliver a Compelling Option for Facilities During and Beyond the Pandemic

Real-time remote collaborations with SMEs enable effective hardware and software installations.

The impact of COVID-19 on manufacturing facilities has been significant. While offices across America have largely pivoted to online platforms for web-based collaborations between colleagues, the industrial sector has also had to contend with how to safely startup and commission process control systems in their facilities which have traditionally required timely on-site interventions and communications with product experts.

Commissioning a process control system requires extensive collaborations between an on-site field team and their vendors whose engineering support teams have been largely working remotely. The challenge for vendors has been how to continue to support their customers with effective training and mentoring. According to ARC industry reports, human error is the primary cause of 42% of abnormal events and a secondary contributing cause in over 65% of the cases, so there can be no training or support shortcuts.

Advances in both hardware and software tools enable remote mentoring to be possible where expert knowledge can be delivered to reduce risks and ensure effective startups. This now includes intelligent wearable devices that enable remote experts to see what a field technician sees when working on hardware in a facility. With such advancements, it is now possible for a single remote expert to assist multiple people and facilities at the same time without travel.

Accelerated by the working constraints caused by the pandemic, the adoption of these technologies is now suggesting a bigger role for remote-based training and support of manufacturing and process control system needs after the pandemic is over.

One company that has embraced the capabilities of remote support even before the pandemic is Quakertown, Pennsylvania-based NovaTech Automation - a leading provider of procedural automation solutions for the past 30 years whose patented software is used in high-risk government applications.

Long before COVID-19, such providers of procedural automation solutions were applying advances in web technologies that would enable delivering cost and mission effective remote support services. Today such vendors are doing it at a different level - whether to troubleshoot issues, support a remote startup or collaborate on a commissioning.

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Advancements in Virtual Support Deliver a Compelling Option for Facilities During and Beyond the Pandemic - Occupational Health and Safety

ALPHARETTA, Ga. and SAN JOSE, Calif., March 8, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Priority Technology Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:PRTH) ("Priority"), a leading payments technology company, and Finxera Holdings, Inc. ("Finxera"), a pioneer in the fintech industry that launched and operated one of the first Banking as a Service ("BaaS") platforms, today announced they have entered into a definitive agreement to merge. Finxera will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of Priority. The transaction is expected to close in the third quarter of 2021.

Priority's omni-channel payments platform supports proprietary and third-party software applications built for businesses of any size. Priority's offering combines modern cloud infrastructure and operational expertise to deliver unparalleled Payment Infrastructure as a Service ("PIaaS") to organizations with complex payment operation needs, including low friction merchant boarding, underwriting, risk management, and compliance monitoring. Finxera's BaaS technology allows for the rapid integration of banking services into business applications to establish and manage bank accounts for the collection, storage, and sending of money. When combined, Priority will offer clients turn-key merchant services, payment facilitation, card issuing, automated payables, virtual banking, and e-wallet tools supported by its best-in-class client service, risk management, underwriting and compliance on a single platform.

"The Finxera acquisition accelerates Priority's position as a market leader in the convergence of payments and banking as a service" said Tom Priore, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Priority. "Our combined platform will be equipped to take and make payments whether on card, ACH, or even blockchain and manage all aspects of payment operations like onboarding, risk, compliance, and client service for our clients. Together we will be a one stop-shop for payments and virtual bank account management that today's merchants and modern software companies are seeking in order to manage and monetize their payment networks."

To learn more about the combined technology platform and financial profile please click on the following link.

http://prth.com/assets/Mar-8-IR-Presentation.pdf.

The Company will host a conference call and webcast to discuss the Finxera acquisition. A

question-and-answer session will follow.

Monday, March 8, 2021

4:00 pm Eastern Time

Phone: US/Canada: (877) 501-3161 or International: (786) 815-8443

Internet webcast link can be accessed at https://edge.media-server.com/mmc/p/x36gfbdx

and will also be posted, along with an accompanying slide presentation, in the "Investor

Relations" section of the Company's website at http://www.PRTH.com. An audio replay of the call will be available shortly after the conferencecall until March 11, 2021 at 7:00 pm Eastern Time. To listen to the audio replay, dial (855) 859-2056 or (404) 537-3406 and enter conference ID number 6988859. Alternatively, you may access the webcast replay in the "Investor Relations" section of the Company's website at http://www.PRTH.com.

"Combining with Priority accelerates our original vision to be a disruptive technology in the convergence of payments and banking as a service," said Sanjoy Goyle, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Finxera. "We have been hugely impressed with the breadth of Priority's payments platform, operations, and strategic vision since integrating with the Priority MX platform last year. We look forward to the further combination of the BaaS technology and operations."

Finxera shareholders, including funds managed by Stone Point Capital LLC ("Stone Point") and Finxera management team, will retain meaningful equity positions in the combined enterprise, with Goyle and Finxera's Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer Praveer Kumar, taking on prominent roles going forward. "We are excited to add Stone Point as a new long-term shareholder of Priority," said Priore. "Stone Point has an exceptional track record of success as a financial services investor; their ongoing participation will be tremendously valuable to our growing enterprise."

Financing

The merger financing with Finxera includes up to $50 million of Priority common stock to be issued to certain existing shareholders. Additionally, Priority has executed a commitment from Truist for a total debt facility of $630 million to refinance a portion of Priority's existing debt, to add a new revolving credit facility and to finance a portion of the Finxera closing.

Simultaneous with entry into the merger agreement, Priority obtained an up to $250 million preferred equity commitment from funds managed by certain affiliates of Ares Management to fund a portion of the refinancing of Priority's existing credit facilities and the acquisition of Finxera, with the remainder to be used to fund future acquisitions. "We are pleased to continue our relationship with Truist and to expand our relationship with Ares Management and Stone Point Capital," said Priore.

Pro-Forma Highlights

Based upon forecasted 2021 financial results of Priority and Finxera, the pro forma full year 2021 results of the combined company are expected to be:

Schulte Roth & Zabel served as legal counsel to Priority. Truist Securities served as financial advisor to Finxera and Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel LLP served as its legal counsel. Cowen served as sole placement agent in connection with the preferred equity investment by Ares Management.

Use of Non-GAAP Financial Information

Priority supplements its consolidated financial statements presented on a GAAP basis with certain non-GAAP financial information, including adjusted EBITDA, free cash flow and net leverage ratio, to provide investors with greater insight, increase transparency and allow for a more comprehensive understanding of the information used by management in its financial and operational decision-making. Priority has not provided a reconciliation of the expected adjusted EBITDA, free cash flow or net leverage ratio contribution by Finxera to the comparable GAAP measures because it is unable to quantify certain amounts that would be required to be included in Finxera's contribution to such comparable measures without unreasonable efforts due to the unavailability of the information needed to calculate reconciling items. In addition, Priority believes such reconciliation would imply a degree of precision that would be confusing or misleading to investors. The non-GAAP financial measures disclosed by Priority in this press release should not be considered a substitute for, or superior to, financial measures prepared in accordance with GAAP, and the financial results prepared in accordance with GAAP and reconciliations from these results should be carefully evaluated.

AboutPriority Technology Holdings, Inc.

Priority is a leading provider of merchant acquiring, integrated payment software and corporate payment solutions, offering unique product and service capabilities to its merchant network and distribution partners. Priority's enterprise operates from a purpose-built payments infrastructure that includes tailored customer service offerings and bespoke technology development, allowing Priority to provide end-to-end solutions for payment and payment-adjacent software. Additional information can be found at http://www.PRTH.com.

AboutFinxera Holdings, Inc.

Finxera operates the leading BaaS platform that allows enterprises to rapidly incorporate banking and payment services into their applications. Its API driven approach has enabled the integration into one platform all aspects of banking and payments, including account opening, reconciliation, sub account ledgering, ACH, checks, wires, and card issuance. Using the Finxera BaaS, enterprises are able to collect, store and send money in a simple, secure and compliant manner, including those involving complex financial regulatory frameworks.

Forward-Looking Statements

This press release contains "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such statements include, but are not limited to, statements about future financial and operating results, our plans, objectives, expectations and intentions with respect to future operations, products and services, and other statements identified by words such as "may," "will," "should," "anticipates," "believes," "expects," "plans," "future," "intends," "could," "estimate," "predict," "projects," "targeting," "potential" or "contingent," "guidance," "anticipates," "outlook" or words of similar meaning. These forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, expected timing of the closing of the merger with Finxera, the expected returns and other benefits of the merger to shareholders, expected improvement in operating efficiency resulting from the merger, estimated expense reductions resulting from the transactions and the timing of achievement of such reductions, our 2021 outlook and statements regarding our market and growth opportunities. Such forward-looking statements are based upon the current beliefs and expectations of our management and are inherently subject to significant business, economic and competitive risks, trends and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected, expressed, or implied by such forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements may include, but are not limited to, statements about the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on our revenues and financial operating results. Our actual results could differ materially, and potentially adversely, from those discussed or implied herein.

We caution that it is very difficult to predict the impact of known factors, and it is impossible for us to anticipate all factors that could affect our actual results. All forward-looking statements are expressly qualified in their entirety by these cautionary statements. You should evaluate all forward-looking statements made in this press release in the context of the risks and uncertainties disclosed in our Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC") filings, including our Annual Report on Form 10-K and our Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q filed with the SEC on March 30, 2020 and November 13, 2020, respectively. These filings are available online at http://www.sec.gov or http://www.PRTH.com.

We caution you that the important factors referenced above may not contain all of the factors that are important to you. In addition, we cannot assure you that we will realize the results or developments we expect or anticipate or, even if substantially realized, that they will result in the consequences we anticipate or affect us or our operations in the way we expect. You are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements as a predictor of future performance. The forward-looking statements included in this press release are made only as of the date hereof. We undertake no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statement as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as otherwise required by law. If we do update one or more forward-looking statements, no inference should be made that we will make additional updates with respect to those or other forward-looking statements. We qualify all of our forward-looking statements by these cautionary statements.

View original content:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/priority-technology-holdings-inc-to-acquire-finxera-to-create-the-premier-payments-and-banking-as-a-service-platform-301242149.html

SOURCE Priority Technology Holdings, Inc.

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Priority Technology Holdings, Inc. to Acquire Finxera to Create the Premier Payments and Banking as a Service Platform - Johnson City Press...

The 10 Best Real Estate Marketing Companies

Image contains all logos of companies mentioned.

LOS ANGELES, March 07, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- In a growing & saturated market, it can be hard to find the best real estate marketing companies that can help you grow your brand, get more leads, and simply help you close more deals.

That is why we have selected The 10 Best Real Estate Marketing Companies of 2021.

We would like to thank the team at Authority Sharks for their research and findings in formulating this article.

Our first selection is Digitize Real Estate, a.k.a DGR. DGR is a real estate marketing company that teaches agents how to grow their business online. They teach agents and brokers how to generate their leads, follow up, nurture and convert. DGR also guides agents step-by-step on building a brand that will make them the Go-To Celebrity Agent in their target market. Their company believes in teaching agents how to fish instead of fishing for them. If the marketing company you pay thousands of dollars to every month ceased to exist the next day or decided to charge you double, you would be at the mercy of them. This makes you dependent, not independent, says DGRs CEO. Their track record speaks for itself as their students have followed their system to close 3-7 more deals every month on average.

DGR also teaches agents how to build systems and hire remote teams in-house to scale independently. If you are looking to save thousands of dollars every month and become the go-to agent in your area, book a call here.

Our second selection is BoldLeads, a real estate marketing leader primarily focused on exclusive lead generation. The Bold lead process is simple; you sign up, get onboarded with their team, and now you are ready to receive exclusive leads within your area, all sent to your custom CRM dashboard. Unlike our first selection, BoldLeads focuses on a done for you marketing approach. BoldLeads is a relatively new entrant in real estate marketing, founded by a mother-daughter duo in 2014 and headquartered in Chandler, AZ. The company has snowballed, doubling in size in the past two years. The Propertybase company uses software that allows agents to automate their marketing efforts. BoldLeads focuses on buyer and seller leads. They do the follow-ups on behalf of the agent. If you are looking to outsource your lead generation with a full done for you approach. Click here.

At selection three, we have Tieba Bropleh, Gunnar Kolrud, and Ali Kamel, the founders and owners of The Conversion Academy (TCA). These consultants help Real Estate entrepreneurs and teams implement systems and processes that separate them from the pack. By harnessing the power of publications such as Forbes, ABC, NBC, Entrepreneur, Yahoo Finance, and many more, they can instantly build their clients authority and improve their positioning. Before working with the TCA team, most Real Estate entrepreneurs have relatively poor positioning for their service and are not viewed as the authority in their market. After working with the TCA team, Realtor Estate entrepreneurs are positioned to see 2-10x profitability in their marketing spend over a 6-12 month period from the time of publication. The Conversion Academy prides itself on being one of the few companies in their space that offers a 100 percent money-back guarantee.

At Selection four, we have Generateagentleads.com, a real estate technology and marketing company known to be one of the fastest-growing real estate technology startups in 2020. Through their proprietary CRM, they help real estate agents, teams and brokers generate and convert leads at scale in a complete done for you'' setting. Their software enables agents and brokers to qualify leads and build relationships from A to Z. Their goal: a centralized platform to generate new business at scale with the agent in charge of how much they spend on marketing. Their team recently launched a digital agent accelerator program to accompany agents, groups, and brokers to perfect their sales process in conjunction with the generateagentleads.com CRM. The program includes done-for-you lead generation with real estate coaching from experts within the industry, consulting on lead conversion while scaling up with a real estate team, and being extremely capital efficient.

At selection five, we have Jeffrey Broggeras the founder and CEO of STEEZY.Digital - a real estate digital marketing agency that is known for generating and following-up with leads automatically. Jeffrey has shared the stage as an international speaker with industry leaders, including Neil Patel, Damond John, Ryan Deiss, and more. Jeffrey takes the guess-work out of scaling a real estate or mortgage brokerage by handling all paid advertising so that high-quality buyer and seller leads are generated automatically every day. Meanwhile, automated recruiting funnels help attract top-tier talent to the brokerage. Jeffrey offers free online training, including a 12x return-on-ad-spend case study for a top 1% real estate broker client. Click here to register for this free training today. Feel free to call him at (619) 663-4357.

At selection six, we have Jayde Gorling as CEO and one of the Co-founders of From Cold to Sold, a performance-based appointment generation system for Real Estate Agents. Jayde & her team specialize in setting highly qualified, high intent buyer and seller appointments or live transfers with real estate agents using their proprietary systems & data to attract & qualify prospects while nurturing them to give their realtor clients a brand and authority boost. From Cold To Sold has helped realtors close as many as 3 deals in their first 30 days of working with her team and has helped teams close over 60 deals in a single month. By working with the From Cold to Sold system, you can expect to only pay for qualified appointments & live transfers without having to sign long-term contracts or monthly retainers. This system is exactly what you need if youre looking to quickly boost your pipeline with prospects that are actively looking to buy or sell their home and start expanding sales beyond your sphere.

Brett Ratkowksi, Karan Sanghavi, and Aaron Martinez are the co-founders of our seventh selection, Revamped Real Estate - an agency that helps Real Estate Agents and Brokers set themselves apart from their competition with the power of YouTube, using their 2 Step Blue Ocean Strategy. While they work with agents and brokers of varying experience and annual volume, they currently work with big names in the real estate space like Joshua Smith, Chantel Ray, and a few others. While most agents and brokers are still relying on Facebook, Zillow leads, and even just referrals... Brett, Karan, and Aaron are breaking the mold and paving the path for those who are ready to stand out, and start dominating their market, while setting new standards for whats normal in terms of effective marketing, income, and work/life balance, as an active real estate agent or broker going into 2021. Book a call here.

At selection eight, we have a mother and son duo - Oliver and Julie Borr ofBorr Digital - one of North Americas fastest-growing Real Estate marketing agencies. Borr Digital is young and hungry, with aspirations of becoming the most indispensable marketing agency/platform in Real Estate. They deliver the authenticity youd appreciate from a boutique, family-run company, with the ROI youd expect from the industrys most respected agencies. They deliver clients, not leads. They hate the term lead generation. Their rigorously followed 8-step machine provides more revenue and time for growth-oriented Realtors by scaling their business through qualified appointments.

At selection nine, we have Christian John Orsos, the founder of CJO Marketing, a local marketing agency specializing in helping small businesses rapidly establish a full-fledged online presence. He and his team are committed to creating web and social media strategies for companies who want to go digital. The agencys services include web design, logo design, and social media marketing. After working and delivering results in various verticals, Christian is dedicating 2021 to help real estate agents scale their businesses and close more deals. With his Real Estate Closingssystem, he guarantees 25 live transfers or appointments with potential pre-qualified home buyers in 90 days by implementing social media lead generation and a combination of automated and human follow up to prequalify potential buyers. If youre a realtor looking to break the average barrier and dominate your area, Christian John Orsos is the guy.

At selection ten, we have Sunil Khatri as the founder of Meshroad Marketing and Saabu - an All-In-One Marketing Platform with DIY and Done for your delivery models. He has helped 500+ Businesses in 4+ Continents generate millions of dollars in sales. His company has ranked as the Top PPC Management Company in Canada for 2019 & 2020. Sunil enjoys working with brand-new businesses and helping them thrive in online sales. Sunil helps new businesses generate new clients in hours through his page Get New Clients. During the pandemic, he also founded a close Network of Business Experts on the west coast to help other business owners grow their businesses.

A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/c1dc9bcd-d099-4742-9758-6bafeb135492

Continued here:
The 10 Best Real Estate Marketing Companies of 2021 - GlobeNewswire

LA GRANDE Training & Employment Consortium, La Grande, continues to offer free computer classes, with online interactive Word and Excel courses planned in March and April.

All classes are held 8:30-11:30 a.m., and pre-registration is required. Participants must have on their home computer a version of Microsoft Office 2010 or newer and a microphone. Also, a camera is preferred.

A one-day Intro to Word class is set for Monday, March 8. The class is designed to introduce basic word processing functions. Participants will learn how to create documents; cut, copy and paste information; format documents; know the difference between the Save and the Save As feature; and use the spellcheck and thesaurus features.

Intermediate Word, a four-day course, follows on March 9-11 and 15. Students will review features taught in the Intro to Word class plus learn how to create, format and use the different features of tables, place information into columns, and add graphics to a document. The instruction is entirely hands-on with a lot of exercises.

Excel classes will be offered in April. Intro to Excel will be taught on Tuesday, April 6. The class is designed for the beginning student to learn how to develop spreadsheets; enter formulas that will calculate desired rows and columns; and enhance documents by modifying fonts, font size and color.

Students may then move on to the five-day Intermediate Excel course, held April 7- 8 and 13-15. Participants will learn how to create graphs; use the absolute function, subtotal and comment features; and how to use the softwares more advanced functions.

Call Lynn at 541-963-7942, ext. 4, or email lynn@tecteam.org to register and get enrolled through I-Match.

Training & Employment Consortium is an EOE/Program. Auxiliary aids and services are available upon request (TTY dial 711).

See more here:
Free computer software classes offered | Community | lagrandeobserver.com - La Grande Observer

Perseverance hit Mars' atmosphere at almost 12,000 miles per hour (19,312 kilometers per hour) and a mere seven minutes later NASA landed its latest Mars rover softly and safely.Onboard the one-ton mobile science lab is its tiny flying companion, the drone helicopter Ingenuity. If all goes well, the four-pound (1.8 kilograms) Ingenuity will be the first vehicle to ever fly on another world. At 11-light minutes from Earth, no one will fly the dual-propped Ingenuity with a drone controller. Instead, it will fly itself using a combination of Linux and a NASA-built program based on the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's (JPL) open-source F (pronounced F prime) framework.

This will be no easy task. No one has ever tried to fly on Mars, which has an atmosphere only one-hundredth of the density of Earth's air. True, Mars also has only a third of Earth's gravity, but still, Ingenuity's engineers will be pleased as punch just to get Ingenuity off the ground.

Indeed, Ingenuity is purely a technology demonstration. It's not designed to support the Perseverance mission, which is searching for signs of ancient life and collecting rock and dirt samples for later missions to return to Earth. Its mission is to show that it's possible to fly on Mars using commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) hardware and open-source software.

In an IEEE Spectrum interview, Timothy Canham, a JPL Embedded Flight Software Engineer, explained the helicopter's processor board is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 running at 500 Hz, not MegaHertz, Hertz. While that may sound painfully slow and old, it's far faster than Perseverance's processors. That's because NASA-grade CPUs and chips must meet NASA's High-Performance Spaceflight Computing (HPSC) radiation standards. These customized processors take years of design work and testing before they're certified for spaceflight. For instance, NASA's newest general-purpose processor is an ARM A53 variant you may know from the Raspberry Pi 3. Ingenuity, however, as a demo project can use a more ordinary, and thus a more modern, CPU.

In fact, Canham explained, "we literally ordered parts from SparkFun [Electronics]. This is commercial hardware, but we'll test it, and if it works well, we'll use it."

As for the software, Canham said,

This the first time we'll be flying Linux on Mars. We're actually running on a Linux operating system. The software framework that we're using is one that we developed at JPL for CubeSats and instruments, and we open-sourced it a few years ago. So, you can get the software framework that's flying on the Mars helicopter, and use it on your own project. It's kind of an open-source victory because we're flying an open-source operating system and an open-source flight software framework and flying commercial parts that you can buy off the shelf if you wanted to do this yourself someday.

That open-source software is F. It's a component-driven framework that enables rapid development and deployment of spaceflight and other embedded software applications. F has been successfully deployed on several space applications many times before. It is tailored but not limited to small-scale spaceflight systems such as CubeSats, SmallSats, and, now, a self-flying helicopter.

It includes:

There are, of course, many other open-source NASA programs. There are more than500 NASA Open Source 3.0 license software projects. Long before the concepts of free software and open-source had been articulated, NASA shared much of its code freely under the COSMIC program.

NASA has long used Linux both on the International Space Station (ISS). Linux's path to supercomputer domination started at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) with the first Beowulf supercomputer.

Like Ingenuity the first Beowulf cluster was built with COTS equipment. It was built using 16 Intel 486DX processors and 10Mbps Ethernet for the bus for only a few thousand dollars. While its speed was only in single-digit gigaflops, Beowulf showed you could build supercomputers on a shoestring budget and Linux. Now, Ingenuity is showing that great things can still come from inexpensive hardware paired with Linux and open-source software.

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To infinity and beyond: Linux and open-source goes to Mars - ZDNet