The World of DaaS with Auren Hoffman

With steadily increasing technological advancements and a new way of living with the global pandemic, Data as a service (DaaS) has become a very attractive business model. Taking full advantage of the growing internet is today’s guest, CEO of privately held SafeGraph and the host of The World of DaaS podcast, Auren Hoffman. To paraphrase our guest, SafeGraph sells data about physical places, they sell a collection of facts. Auren’s background as a software engineer launched him into the world of tech, and he explains why he believes DaaS is so important in today’s world. We learn that SafeGraph prioritizes data over analytics, why trading datamay be / appears to be better for business than selling it, and why value and accuracy could be / he believes, etc more important than data quantity. Software tools are leading to both market concentration and fragmentation, and we see how software’s evolution to be more text-prompt-based can be great for the everyday consumer. Auren is also an angel investor and he tells us what he prefers investing in and why he finds the current market so fascinating. Before discussing the slippery slope of universal standards, our guest shares why podcasting brings him joy and why being able to switch between platforms and systems is becoming a major selling point. Auren is encouraged by the competitive nature of the data space and he explains why traditional banks have a tough battle to deal with.

“The most important thing in data is that it’s true because you’re just selling facts. Hopefully, you have a lot of facts. Hopefully, those facts are facts people want.” — @auren Key Points From This Episode:

• Introducing today’s guest, DaaS expert and serial entrepreneur, Auren Hoffman.
• Auren’s business background and how he got into tech.
• What SafeGraph does as a business.
• The definition of a “data as a service” (DaaS) company and why it matters in today’s world.
• How dealing in data is simply working with facts.
• Whether Auren has been tempted to add analytics to his data-focused business.
• How Auren feels about the ever-increasing capabilities of data software tools.
• How his business’s data class differs from the others that prioritize analytics.
• Data-direct monetization and why it’s a bad idea for businesses to adopt the trend.
• Why Auren believes trading data is more beneficial than selling it.
• The difficulties of being in the data business.
• Why Auren’s company needs to provide both the facts and the interpolation between them.
• According to Auren, how data quantity is not enough and why value and accuracy also matter.
• The tipping points within data accuracy.
• SafeGraph’s prototypical customer.
• How Auren bills his clients and why he thinks more people are able to use modern data software.
• Whether software tools are leading to market concentration, fragmentation, or both.
• How Auren’s customers are implementing the data they receive from him.
• Why data software is evolving to be more text-prompt-based.
• How SafeGraph is competing with Google, just like everybody else.
• What Auren is investing in and what he finds interesting about the current marketplace.
• How he approaches the problem of customer acquisition within SafeGraph.
• Why Auren, as a CEO, is running a podcast.
• How to navigate systems that have become resistant to changes in processed data.
• The slippery slope of universal standards, and why Auren believes they are still important.
• What Auren thinks about the competitive nature of the current data space.
• The displacement of customer-sticking in banking.