Makers of The Metaverse: Syed Ahmed Of Act-On Software On The Future Of The VR, AR & Mixed Reality Industries
An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis
Beyond creativity, brands should be willing to take risks and try out different things. There’s a unique opportunity to reach new audience segments in new ways, and companies shouldn’t be afraid to take risks — as long as they don’t compromise their authenticity along the way.
The Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality & Mixed Reality Industries are so exciting. What is coming around the corner? How will these improve our lives? What are the concerns we should keep an eye out for? Aside from entertainment, how can VR or AR help work or other parts of life? To address this, we had the pleasure of interviewing Syed Ahmed.
Syed Ahmed is SVP of Engineering at Act-On Software and has extensive experience leading engineering and operations teams. Prior to Act-On, he most recently served as CTO and VP of Engineering at Contiq. Syed also spent four years leading a high growth period at Tapclicks, a marketing operations start-up. As SVP of Engineering at Act-On, Ahmed brings a wealth of expertise in AR/VR, platform scalability, data analytics, and CRM integrations, which he leverages to bolster Act-On’s ability to develop highly-customizable, unique and innovative solutions.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit. Can you tell us a bit about your backstory and how you grew up?
I grew up in India where there was focus on education, especially STEM. My parents taught me to dream big, work hard and to be persistent. They taught me the value of rolling my sleeves up and working hard to solve problems to get results. Eventually, I came to the U.S. to pursue a graduate degree. I had my early start in marketing more than two decades ago, a time when most marketing was analog. Marketing automation technologies were still in their infancy, yet I was intrigued by the potential to advance how marketers reach and promote their products. Digital transformation over the last decade has fundamentally disrupted the very underpinnings of marketing: how marketers structure their campaigns, reach and inform prospects and customers alike, and measure success across segments.
Is there a particular book, film, or podcast that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?
I have been a big fan of Reid Hoffman’s Masters of Scale podcast. Reid’s concepts of finding product market fit, focusing on customer needs and making your product excel for one customer before scaling, are all very instructive ideas across all industries. I’ve also been a years-long student of Jim Collins and his deep research on what makes successful long-lasting businesses. Jim’s ideas are just as instructive to any practitioner in our industry.
Is there a particular story that inspired you to pursue a career in the X Reality industry? We’d love to hear it.
A few years ago, I got exposed to VR games at an event. It piqued my interest because it is a highly interactive, multi-sensory platform that enables one to experience environments to the extent that their mind and body start to believe what is happening is real. I could see the potential of this technology to bridge the gap between online and offline environments.
Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began this fascinating career?
The shift toward cloud computing has truly accelerated the digital transformation, lowered innovation costs, and shrunk product engineering cycle times. Early in my career, I would often find myself spending a substantial part of my working hours at a data center, tending to servers, swapping out disks, and dealing with other mundane hardware and network issues at odd hours. Now that our workloads are on the cloud, we have scaled up the pace of innovation, and are empowering marketers with AI-based tools to drive effective ways of marketing and reaching their audience. I was working at a company that used to syndicate content to top e-commerce sites in America. Whenever the traffic spiked unexpectedly at these sites, we were impacted as well; when we had an outage they would be affected by it, too. There was a time we had slowed down a Fortune 500 e-commerce site because our servers went down due to a hardware issue. I had to run to the data center in the middle of the night to fix it. It is easy to look back at this now-outdated technology and laugh, but at the time it was simply our reality to endlessly navigate issues with hardware, on-premises servers, and connectivity issues like this. With cloud technology powering our platforms today, running to the data center has become a relic of the past for most people.
Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
In one of my prior roles, I negotiated a compelling multi-year deal with our services vendor at a price point that would have saved us a lot of money going forward. I won a lot of accolades for the deal, and my CEO and our finance team were thrilled. However, the ink had barely dried on the contract when cracks started to appear. In negotiating a great price, I didn’t leave much room for the vendor to deploy the resources warranted to deliver a high-quality service. We were soon facing a steady stream of outages and barely a week would go by without a critical service interruption. Within a matter of weeks, I went from high fives to having to unwind the contract and find us a more stable vendor and reliable services outcome. In driving down the price, I had lost sight of the critical component of the deal: service stability.
None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?
Malcom Gladwell stands out to me as someone whose writings and podcasts have really shaped my thinking and how I approach the world around me. His incisive data-driven approach to looking at popular narratives and understanding deeper undercurrents is instructive to all of us in business and life.
Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?
We see the potential of AR/VR technology as the next frontier in driving engaging experiences. Virtual Reality (VR) allows companies to replace physical experience with a digital one. It lets marketers bridge the gap between experience and action (like “attending” a concert in the metaverse). Augmented reality (AR) allows brands to give customers unique and tailored experiences. Marketers can use AR to increase sales and enhance brand value through mobile devices by allowing customers to try the products before they buy (like “trying on” new shoes from the comfort of your living room). We are working on providing technology to enhance content by allowing our customers to embed AR in channels like emails, SMS etc.
Ok super. Thank you for all that. Let’s now shift to the main focus of our interview. The VR, AR and MR industries seem so exciting right now. What are the 3 things in particular that most excite you about the industry? Can you explain or give an example?
What excites me about truly immersive experiences enabled by AR/VR technologies is how they level the playing field and bring technologies to the masses. I think there’s great potential for AR/VR to modernize our education system and deliver lessons to students in more interactive forms. I believe healthcare and telemedicine also stand to gain from the advances in AR/VR; access to healthcare will not be restricted to cities and towns that have the best hospitals, but will extend to patients across the world. AR/VR will also emerge as a platform for marketers to reach new demographics and engage in new and meaningful ways, enabling their audiences to build deeper relationships with their brands. With augmented shopping experiences brands can use AR to allow consumers to try products before they buy them. From trying a new hair color to testing makeup, there are many ways to engage with a prospective customer.
What are the 3 things that concern you about the VR, AR and MR industries? Can you explain? What can be done to address those concerns?
- Legal framework in the metaverse — The metaverse’s virtual world is still lacking robust integration of laws and legal jurisdictions on the physical world, which leaves the participants vulnerable to cybercrimes. Businesses operating in the metaverse must strive to establish sound operating policies for their participants and deterrents for dangerous and unethical operators.
- Data privacy and security — With new technology comes the need for more evolved security measures. This requires building new methods of data privacy and protection where there was none. As the metaverse takes hold and brings in a new class of business users, there is skepticism about data security. People need to know their personal details (both virtual and physical) are properly secured in the metaverse. The underlying security infrastructure must keep pace with the evolution of the metaverse.
- Property Rights — securing ownership of virtual assets is going to be the key to success of metaverse. Blockchain establishes ownership of digital products; however, it may not be adequate to keep pace with the evolution of the metaverse.
I think the entertainment aspects of VR, AR and MR are apparent. Can you share with our readers how these industries can help us at work?
The deep immersive and collaborative aspect of AR/VR/MR is enabling us to tap into the global talent pool. We are no longer restricted to finding and hiring talent in the tech hubs of San Francisco, Austin, Seattle, but AR/VR is opening up the markets in places such Salt Lake City, Nashville, and Boise and giving us access to a rich talent pool across the country. AR/VR is helping us create deeply collaborative workspaces where our team members are not constrained by their geography. Marketing is one such industry in which collaboration is critical to its success.
Are there other ways that VR, AR and MR can improve our lives? Can you explain?
After-work activities such as going to the movies or simply hanging with friends will be possible in the virtual world. Virtual concerts and other mass-participation events are already being experimented with AR/VR.
What are the “myths” that you would like to dispel about working in your industry? Can you explain what you mean?
While AR/VR experiences hold a lot of promise, they will not supplant the deep benefits we derive from establishing physical presence and investing and building experiences in the physical space. Merely having a presence in AR/VR is not going to be adequate for a marketer in engaging with their audience. Marketers will need to bring some of the same tools from the physical world in segmenting audiences and personalizing experiences.
What are your “5 Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career In The VR, AR or MR Industries?”
- There are no boundaries in AR/VR, so be creative. This is a new frontier where, essentially, anything is possible. Brands should capitalize on this opportunity to stretch their efforts and engage in new, uncharted ways.
- Beyond creativity, brands should be willing to take risks and try out different things. There’s a unique opportunity to reach new audience segments in new ways, and companies shouldn’t be afraid to take risks — as long as they don’t compromise their authenticity along the way.
- Be engaging. The KPIs that worked in Web 2.0 will no longer be applicable. For example, you cannot use banner ads; instead you should be focused on building holistic, engaging experiences.
- Familiarize yourself with blockchain, especially NFTs. NFTs have become one of the key tools in the metaverse, and anyone serious about pursuing a career in this space needs to be well-versed in them.
- You need programming skills to be able to customize the experiences in the Metaverse. Users don’t necessarily need to be coding wizards, but they should have a solid foundation in languages like Python, C++, and Java to have a chance at success in the Metaverse.
You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
STEM education is still lagging in our country, and our students score lower compared to most of the developed world. America is no longer producing the best and the brightest graduates from our high schools. As digital transformation accelerates, we risk leaving behind a large number of students who are not trained adequately to participate in this digital economy. For those of us in the technology world, this is an opportunity to address that gap and bring renewed emphasis on high quality STEM education in our classrooms.
We are very blessed that very prominent leaders read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would like to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them 🙂
I am inspired by Bob Iger and his transformational leadership at Disney, his stellar rise from a weatherman at ABC to the top job at Disney, and how he steered the digital transformation at Disney. The success of Disney+ streaming service is a testament to his acumen and visionary leadership. There is so much more I can learn from Bob at a private lunch.
Thank you so much for these excellent stories and insights. We wish you continued success on your great work!
Makers of The Metaverse: Syed Ahmed Of Act-On Software On The Future Of The VR, AR & Mixed Reality… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
