As world shuts itself in, value of teleconferencing app zooms
nNEW DELHI: As people shut themselves in to keep from infecting each other, the world has moved closer online: taking classes, rehearsing music, holding quiz nights and sitting in on performances from remote locations. The digital pipelines, abuzz like never before, have raised fortunes for at least one teleconferencing company that has seen its market valuation rise more than twofold in two months: Zoom Communications.
Its prime offering, Cloud Meetings, allows anyone to live stream video to a closed group of 100 participants. A paid version allows the webcast to reach up to 1,000 participants. Once known only in the glass-and-concrete business districts of the world, the tool is now the most-favoured for students and teachers, whether in the West Bank, New Delhi or New York.
Independent artists, playwrights and, in one case, even fire-eater performers are also using the tool to replace what may have once been their only way to earn a living: in-person performances.
“Certain aspects of work and organising will change for good,” Sally Maitlis, a professor of organisational behaviour at Oxford University’s Said Business School told news agency AFP. “People will discover that they can work and communicate in ways they previously didn’t think possible.”
On Tuesday, shares of Zoom Video Communications Inc closed at $159 a piece. On January 24, when the outbreak just begun to draw global attention, the stock was listed $73. The spike in valuation is starker when you consider the Nasdaq, on which it is listed, slumped by 22% in the same period.
“There is such excitement around remote work that brands like Zoom have seen their stock value climb up,” Creative Strategies analyst Carolina Milanesi said, according to AFP.
In an earnings call on March 4, Zoom’s CEO Eric Yuan told analysts the company had seen a “large increase in the number of free users, meeting minutes and new video use cases.”
Zoom’s Cloud Meetings is now the top Business category application on the Apple app store.
Teachers, parents and students reported promising early results in US, said a report by Reuters. There were minimal glitches as some signed into virtual live classes using, but they are being described by many as teething troubles.
“I’m someone who constantly throws out questions to my pupils... but with 26 of them on a screen, raising or not a hand icon, it’s incredibly difficult. So I’m totally changing how I do things,” said English teacher Carole Detemple, who had to create a virtual classroom for her students at the International Bilingual School (EIB) in Paris.
IN TWO MONTHS, ZOOM COMMUNICATIONS HAS SEEN ITS MARKET VALUATION RISE MORE THAN TWOFOLD
nMUMBAI: Celebrated chef Floyd Cardoz, the name behind top restaurants such as Tabla in New York and The Bombay Canteen and Opedro in Mumbai, died of Covid-19related complications in New Jersey on Wednesday. He was 59, and was last in India earlier this month.
A statement by Hunger Inc, the Indian hospitality company he co-founded, said that Cardoz tested positive for the coronavirus disease in the US on March 18, and was being treated for it in New Jersey.
Mumbai-born Cardoz is widely credited with giving Indian fine-dining its due in the US, and for adding a modern, relaxed vibe to Indian cuisine in Mumbai. Trained as a biochemist, he attended culinary school in Mumbai and the Global Hospitality Management School in Les Roches, Switzerland, before moving to New York in 1988.
There, he quickly climbed up the ranks to set up Tabla with restaurant guru Danny Meyer in 1997. It had a successful run in midtown Manhattan, and by 2012, Cardoz, who won Season Three of the show Top Chef Masters and donated his winnings to cancer research, became a prominent member of the city’s culinary set. It was in the 2010s that Cardoz truly came into his own, opening three restaurants in the US, and becoming the culinary director and creating the launch menu for Mumbai’s The Bombay Canteen in 2015.
The restaurant introduced a light, inventive take on Indian dining, serving dishes such as a seafood bhel, a spicy club favourite “Eggs Kejriwal”, and a tuna ceviche with sol-kadi sauce. This, along with the Bombay Canteen’s tapas, and fusion desserts such as the gulab-nut (a gulab jamun-donut hybrid), set the restaurant apart in a market then dominated by comfort
European food and highpriced imports such as Norwegian salmon and New Zealand lamb chops.
Restaurateur Riyaz Amlani, former president of the National Restaurant Association of India and proprietor of dining chains Smokehouse Deli, Saltwater Cafe and Social, says Cardoz’s death has stunned those in the hospitality industry. “He was the first true ambassador of Indian food abroad to a new generation of diners who saw Indian food as trendy and high quality,” Amlani said.
Cardoz authored two books, most recently Flavorwalla in 2016. But to food lovers, he will be remembered as the man who gave Indian food (long considered cheap and stodgy in the West) a fresh, light makeover.