Technology

Ironclad Taps Former Qualtrics Executive as Chief Product Officer, Launches Strategic Alliance with KPMG Law

Published

2 years ago

June 28, 2024

With enterprise as the company’s fastest-growing segment, key executive hires and new partnerships continue to drive the company’s momentum upmarket and internationally

SAN FRANCISCO, June 28, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — Ironclad, the leading digital contracting platform for modern businesses, today announced the addition of Michel Feaster, former Chief Product Officer for Research at Qualtrics, as its Chief Product Officer.

Feaster joins as a seasoned product strategist and enterprise software executive with nearly two decades of experience. As the former co-founder and CEO of Usermind, she created the customer journey orchestration category and established Usermind as the clear leader. Usermind was acquired by Qualtrics in 2021, where Michel served as the Chief Product Officer for Research.

Michel joins at a time when the company has seen rapid growth in enterprise users, due in large part to adding a Chief Revenue Officer, Jeremy Smith, to its leadership team last year. Smith, who most recently served as CRO at LaunchDarkly, and previously held leadership positions at companies like Flexport, ServiceNow, and Dell, has been critical to the company’s momentum over the past year—resulting in enterprise being the fastest-growing segment of users year over year. Feaster joins a bench of enterprise-minded C-suites with executive experience at companies like Twilio, Google, Salesforce, Zendesk, eBay, and Hootsuite.

“We’ve been laser-focused on building the most usable, impactful enterprise software on the market,” said Jason Boehmig, CEO and co-founder of Ironclad. “Enterprises are completing contracts up to 20 times faster when they use Ironclad. The deep product and go-to-market expertise brought by Michel and Jeremy will help us take that efficiency to new heights.”

“Ironclad is the rare enterprise-grade product that is both powerful yet easy-to-use,” said Feaster. “They’re also bringing AI to the industry in a way that is going to fundamentally change how companies interact not just with their contracts, but with the data and processes that support them. I couldn’t be more excited to join Jason, Cai, and the rest of the team and be a part of this journey.”

Ironclad brings speed and efficiency to enterprise contracting
Ironclad helps enterprise companies like Salesforce, Hubspot, and Zoom increase the speed and velocity with which they create, execute, and manage contracts. After 6 months of use, enterprise companies using Ironclad see a dramatic spike in productivity—averaging a 215% increase in workflows launched, completing those contracts 45% faster, and reducing the back and forth during contract negotiations by 25%.

Ironclad offers a comprehensive, standalone solution to speed up and streamline the entire contract lifecycle—from contract digitization and drafting to negotiation, analytics and visualization, signature, and, ultimately, management. Ironclad uses AI at every step of the contract lifecycle to generate and harness data, ingest and tag high-volume contract data, analyze and visualize that data, and connect it to the rest of the enterprise’s technology stack.

“Contracting is at the core of every business and underpins every relationship across the enterprise—from sales to procurement to HR and beyond,” said Smith. “The market for such a complex and ubiquitous challenge is massive and is one that Ironclad is poised to win. Ironclad’s diverse set of customers—from enterprise giants like Salesforce and Cisco to consumer household names like L’Oréal, demonstrates the level at which this company is operating.”

Ironclad expands partnerships with strategic KPMG Law Alliance
Earlier this month, Ironclad also announced a strategic alliance with KPMG Law, a global legal services provider, to help organizations across EMA regions transform their contract lifecycle management processes. KPMG Law’s Legal Operations Transformation Services (LOTS) team and contracting consulting divisions will assist joint clients in accelerating time to value, maximizing Ironclad’s generative AI offerings, and surfacing business insights from contract data.

“We are incredibly proud to partner with Ironclad to bring its market-leading, AI-powered contracting technology to our clients in the UK and EMA regions,” said Nicola Brooks, Partner at KPMG Law and Head of Legal Transformation, who leads KPMG’s Legal consulting and technology team. “Contracts are core to every business worldwide, and our clients, who range from mid-market to large-scale enterprises, can reap the benefits of faster contracting cycles, unified contracting data and analytics, scaled compliance, and more.”

Ironclad is also a Salesforce AppExchange ISV partner, offering a robust integration that allows users to effortlessly manage contracts within Salesforce and get a holistic view of contract data alongside customer relationship data. Within its Salesforce integration, Ironclad is the only CLM to offer Multi-Org Capabilities, allowing enterprises to easily connect all their Salesforce orgs under one unified Ironclad instance. The company also announced Two-Way Sync, a bi-directional synchronization that allows users to view real-time negotiation and contract data directly within Salesforce.

About Ironclad
Ironclad is the #1 contract lifecycle management platform for innovative companies, powering billions of contracts every year. Salesforce, L’Oréal, OpenAI, and other leading innovators use Ironclad to collaborate and negotiate on contracts, accelerate contracting while maintaining compliance, and turn contracts into critical carriers of operational business intelligence. It’s the only platform flexible enough to handle every type of contract workflow, whether a sales agreement, an HR agreement or a complex NDA. The company is backed by leading investors like Accel, Sequoia, Y Combinator, and BOND. For more information, visit www.ironcladapp.com or follow us on LinkedIn and X.

Contact:
Paul Chalker
paul.chalker@ironcladhq.com

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SOURCE Ironclad Inc.

Technology

Bloomberg Introduces Spread-to-Benchmark Quoting for EUR and GBP Portfolio Trading Baskets

Published

15 hours ago

June 2, 2026

LONDON, June 2, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Bloomberg today announced the launch of Spread-to-Benchmark quoting and trading for Euro (EUR) and Sterling (GBP) denominated portfolio trades through its Portfolio Trading Basket Builder (PTBB). The new functionality expands the range of quoting protocols available for European credit portfolio trading and reflects growing client demand for spread-based execution workflows, alongside increased dealer support for the convention across EUR and GBP markets.

Spread-to-Benchmark quoting is a well-established protocol for USD credit portfolio trades and is used by market participants to evaluate and execute portfolio trades. By extending this workflow to EUR and GBP portfolio trades, Bloomberg enables clients and dealers to transact using a familiar spread-based methodology across additional credit markets.

The introduction of Spread-to-Benchmark quoting for EUR and GBP baskets reflects increased client interest in evaluating portfolio trades through a spread-based lens and the growing adoption of spread-based execution workflows in European credit markets. The workflow provides market participants with an additional framework for assessing the relationship between credit spread risk and underlying government bond yields when pricing and executing portfolio trades.

Additional Workflow Flexibility 
The workflow complements Bloomberg’s existing portfolio trading capabilities, which support the full range of market-standard quoting conventions, including Price, Yield, Spread-to-Benchmark and Spread based workflows that reference Bloomberg’s evaluated pricing service (BVAL). This gives clients flexibility to compare and execute portfolio trades using the quoting methodology that best aligns with their investment objectives, execution preferences and internal risk management processes.

“European credit clients continue to look for execution workflows that reflect how they evaluate risk and monitor portfolio trading outcomes,” said Harry Street, Global Head of Credit and Equities Trading Product at Bloomberg. “By expanding dealer support for Spread-to-Benchmark quoting for EUR and GBP baskets, Bloomberg is broadening the range of workflow options available to clients trading European credit portfolios.”

“Portfolio trading workflows in fixed income continue to become more sophisticated as institutional investors look for ways to evaluate execution quality in changing market conditions,” said Kevin McPartland, Head of Market Structure & Technology Research at Crisil Coalition Greenwich. “Spread-based quoting helps market participants more clearly distinguish between the impacts of credit spread and underlying rates movements when determining how best to execute a portfolio trade.”

Bloomberg’s Electronic Markets solutions are used by leading financial institutions to trade efficiently in over 175 markets around the world. More than 9,000 client firms use Bloomberg Electronic Markets to access industry-leading depth and breadth of liquidity across asset classes from over 800 dealers globally. Bloomberg Electronic Markets provides market participants with comprehensive solutions across the trading lifecycle, including robust price transparency, analytics, automation and execution, powered by Bloomberg’s high-quality, multi-asset class data and tools.

About Bloomberg
Bloomberg is a global leader in business and financial information, delivering trusted data, news, and insights that bring transparency, efficiency, and fairness to markets. The company helps connect influential communities across the global financial ecosystem via reliable technology solutions that enable our customers to make more informed decisions and foster better collaboration. For more information, visit Bloomberg.com/company or request a demo.

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SOURCE Bloomberg L.P.

Technology

Dr. Sunho Kang, a senior battery-technology executive with leadership experience at major global battery and EV manufacturers, joins TeraWatt Technology as Head of Product and Technology

Published

15 hours ago

June 2, 2026

SAN FRANCISCO, June 2, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — TeraWatt Technology Inc. (Headquartered in California, USA) is pleased to announce that Dr. Sunho Kang has joined the company as Head of Product and Technology.

Dr. Kang is a globally recognized battery-technology executive with more than 25 years of leadership experience spanning the United States, Asia, and Europe, and a distinguished track record of advancing innovations from laboratory research through gigafactory-scale production. He has held senior executive positions at world-leading organizations including Samsung SDI, Apple, and Volkswagen Group of America, and brings deep expertise in lithium-ion battery materials, cell engineering, and product industrialization across a broad range of applications, including electric vehicles and energy storage systems.

At TeraWatt, Dr. Kang will lead global product development and the commercialization of TeraWatt’s battery technology platform, aiming to accelerate the delivery of TeraWatt’s competitive products as well as the technology and commercialization roadmap including manufacturing scale-up.

Dr. Kang commented:

“I am thrilled to join TeraWatt Technology as Head of Product and Technology. TeraWatt’s innovative battery platform presents a tremendous opportunity to push the boundaries of lithium-ion technology, and I look forward to working with the team to accelerate product development and commercialization to deliver meaningful impact.”

TeraWatt Technology founder CEO Ken Ogata, Ph.D. commented:

“We are thrilled to welcome Dr. Kang as our Head of Product and Technology. His deep expertise in battery materials, cell engineering, and productization will be instrumental in accelerating TeraWatt’s product roadmap and technology leadership. Together with Dr. Kang, we will continue to drive our mission forward.”

About TeraWatt Technology Inc.
TeraWatt Technology Inc. is a California-based company that produces lightweight, high-power, and safe next-generation lithium-ion batteries.

Company Overview
Name: TeraWatt Technology Inc.
Representative: Co-founder and CEO Ken Ogata
Headquarters: 28 Geary St, Suite 650, San Francisco, CA 94108, United States
Founded: January 2020
Established: December 2019
URL: https://www.terawatt-technology.com/

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SOURCE TeraWatt Technology Inc.

Technology

Tencent Cloud and Soniox Announce Strategic Partnership: Combining Advanced Speech-to-Text (STT) Technology with Global Real-Time Infrastructure

Published

15 hours ago

June 2, 2026

HONG KONG, June 2, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Tencent Cloud, the cloud business of global technology company Tencent, today announced a strategic partnership with Soniox, a San Francisco-based speech AI company that specializes in developing high-accuracy, low-latency speech AI solutions. The collaboration integrates Soniox’s speech-to-text (STT) technology with Tencent Cloud’s Real-Time Communication (TRTC) enterprise-grade global infrastructure, enabling enterprises to build and deploy multilingual voice AI applications across 200+ countries and regions.

Elevating Enterprise Voice AI at a Global Scale

In enterprise voice AI deployments, latency directly affects user experience and application reliability. The integration of Soniox’s high-accuracy, low-latency STT with TRTC’s global transmission infrastructure reduces latency across the entire pipeline, creating a comprehensive end-to-end solution for enterprises deploying conversational AI applications worldwide.

Soniox is the voice platform for every language. Unlike legacy speech AI, which was built primarily for English-speakers, Soniox delivers native-speaker accuracy across 60+ languages. Its technology can handle mid-sentence language switching — a user can switch between English and Chinese in a single utterance, and Soniox will capture every word with complete accuracy. All of this works through a single API that works for both speech-to-text and text-to-speech.

By integrating TRTC, the partnership leverages an enterprise-grade real-time communication backbone featuring more than 3,200 global nodes, sub-300 ms worldwide latency, and advanced capabilities such as AI noise suppression and weak-network resilience. These capabilities enable conversational AI applications to operate reliably across diverse network environments, including regions such as Southeast Asia and Africa.

With the roll out of this partnership, developers can integrate the Soniox STT API directly within the Tencent Cloud console. Whether targeting English-speaking markets or supporting languages such as Arabic, Hindi, and Malay, enterprises can build global voice applications — including intelligent customer service, voice assistants, real-time translation, and meeting transcription — to address the demands of expansion into emerging markets and multilingual scenarios.

Wison Xie, Head of Product at Tencent RTC, stated: “Tencent RTC has always been committed to providing reliable real-time communication infrastructure for global enterprises. Our partnership with Soniox brings together our strengths in enterprise-grade audio transmission and Soniox’s advanced speech recognition technology. Together, we are making it easier for businesses to deploy accurate, low-latency voice AI applications across any language and any market.”

Klemen Simonic, CEO at Soniox Inc., stated “At Soniox, our mission is to help businesses understand every word, in any language, with native speaker accuracy and exceptional speed. Partnering with Tencent Cloud combines our speech AI with world-class real-time infrastructure, enabling enterprises to build voice AI experiences that scale globally with low latency and reliability.”

About Tencent Cloud:

Tencent Cloud, one of the world’s leading cloud companies, is committed to creating innovative solutions to resolve real-world issues and enabling digital transformation for smart industries. Through our extensive global infrastructure, Tencent Cloud provides businesses across the globe with stable and secure industry-leading cloud products and services, leveraging technological advancements such as cloud computing, Big Data analytics, AI, IoT, and network security. It is our constant mission to meet the needs of industries across the board, including the fields of gaming, media and entertainment, finance, healthcare, property, retail, travel, and transportation.

About Tencent RTC:

Tencent RTC provides real-time communication solutions, including audio/video calling, live streaming, and in-game voice. With enterprise-grade security, AI-powered enhancements, and a global network of over 3,200 nodes, Tencent RTC powers mission-critical communication for customers worldwide.

About Soniox:

Soniox is a next-generation voice AI company bringing about the end of English-first speech AI. Most people on the planet did not grow up speaking English and often mix languages mid-sentence; and yet legacy speech AI was built for just English. Soniox is different: native-speaker accuracy across 60+ languages, true mid-sentence language switching, and flawless alphanumeric recognition that legacy providers still can’t match. For developers building global apps, Soniox is the only option. Try it for yourself at soniox.com.

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SOURCE Tencent Cloud