THE recent allegations that Cambridge Analytica harvested Facebook users’ information has made people more aware of the power and misuse of data. This is something Gordon Povey has been concerned about for years. His business, Trisent, aims to make data useful to the individual by putting it in one place and encrypting it.
Name: Gordon Povey
Age: 55
Position: Founder and CEO
WHAT’S YOUR BUSINESS CALLED?
Trisent.
WHERE IS IT BASED
WHY DID YOU SET UP THE BUSINESS?
I SET up Trisent in 1999 but the technology was quite clunky then so I sold the company to Artilium in 2008. In 2016 I noticed that the technology was getting better and the problems with data were getting worse so I set up my own company by going back to Artilium and getting the Trisent name and rights sold back to me. Things like the Cambridge Analytica scandal make people more aware of the power of data. The problem is if you don’t agree to the terms and conditions of social media sites you are denied the service and become disconnected. It will be a long time before these big companies change their business model. I think disruptive companies like ours will change things and the monopoly of big companies will diminish.
HOW DOES IT WORK?
WE are developing a personal data browser which puts data in one place and makes it secure. Then we make the data useful to the individual. The user can view things such as their fitness timeline or old photos.
By using the person’s location we can pull in automated pictures, maps, social media posts and local news stories from that day. That’s the core thing we’re doing now but the future of the company is what you can do with the data after consolidating it. When you sign up to social media sites like Facebook your data is on their terms but this puts you in charge of your own information. Your data becomes powerful for accessing services as a citizen and that is something we can monetise.
HOW IS IT DIFFERENT FROM COMPETING BUSINESSES?
THERE are definitely businesses looking at personal data concerns like Trunomi and Valid.global. A lot of these companies will collect personal data and let you sell your data. I don’t favour that model because it is confusing to people who don’t know how to sell their data. There’s also lots of academic projects looking at this but they are looking to change legislation which is a slow process.
The business model I want is a brokerage service. If we take a brokerage fee as we do the matching process we can continue to do the service for free. A good example of a Scottish company doing this is Skyscanner. It doesn’t charge anything and works well. I haven’t seen any personal data companies looking at that model.
WHAT IS YOUR TARGET MARKET?
A WIDE range of people, specifically people who value their personal data but don’t know how to use it. People have started to get what we’re doing since we started referring to the service as a browser. The market is anyone that uses the internet and wants to collect their data. We are trying to sell it from the point of view of user benefit. A lot of businesses are finding the service useful. A joiner was able to figure out how long he spent at different jobs which helped him with bulling and mileage expenses.
WHAT DO YOU ENJOY MOST ABOUT RUNNING THE BUSINESS?
I HAVE been nominated for Business Man of the Year at the Scottish SME Awards this month. It is always nice to get some recognition especially when you’re trying to do something different. I have learned to enjoy the journey of setting up a business – and that includes the tough times and decisions you regret as well. I like being in control and making progress to a goal on a daily basis.
WHERE DO YOU HOPE THE BUSINESS WILL BE IN 10 YEARS?
I HOPE to have established a tool that people see as useful and access every day. We would like to dominate the market more in 10 years’ time. We have reached 19 million subscribers already. If you look at less serious tools, they have reached much bigger numbers than that so we have aspirations to grow this.
We want to be seen as a company that changed the outdated model of data.
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