Fyuse is a spatial photography app which lets users capture and share interactive 3D images. By tilting or swiping one's smartphone, one can view such "fyuses" from various angles — as if one were walking around an object or subject. The app blends photography and video to create an interactive medium and was first published for iOS in April 2014. The Android version was released at the end of 2014. == The app == Fyuse lets users capture panoramas, selfies, and full 360° views of objects and allows one to view captured moments from different angles. It has its own personal gallery, social network and standalone web integration. With the app, Fyusion also created a social networking platform similar to Instagram. Fyuses can be shared, commented on, liked and re-shared to one's followers (called Echoes). One can build a network of followers and with engagement tracking, one can see how many times an image has been interacted with The images can also be saved for private, offline view, or shared to other social networks, like Facebook or Twitter, or embedded on a website where the images can be interacted with by desktop users via dragging the mouse. Furthermore, in the compass tab other fyuses can be discovered using the app's system of tags and categories. One's Fyuse feed is prepopulated with top users, and one can follow people to see when they post a new fyuse. The app will also find one's friends if one signs up with Facebook or connects it with one's Twitter account. To create a fyuse one moves around a person or object with one's phone's camera in one direction or moving/tilting one's phone around while holding one's finger on the screen. By combining photography and video the app allows one to capture moments that one may not have otherwise been able to capture by recording not one moment in time but stitched together little moments. According to Fyusion CEO Radu Rusu, a photo freezes a moment in time, while a video captures moments in a linear timeline — both still flat, when viewed. A fyuse image captures a moment in space, where one can not only see one side of something, but also around it. When it is done rendering, fyuses can also be edited – one can trim the fyuse for length and edit the brightness, contrast, exposure, saturation and sharpness. One can also add a vignette and apply a filters, with options to adjust their intensity. After editing, one can write a description, add hashtags, and tag parts of the fyuse before one can (voluntarily) publish and share it. Version 1.0 has been described as "alpha prototype" and version 2.0 was released on 17 December 2014. Version 3.0 introduced 3D tagging by which users can layer 3D graphic that animate accordingly with each interaction to add some context to the content. Version 4.0 was released on December 21, 2016 for iOS. Since January 2016 (v3.2) the app allows the export of fyuses as Live Photos. The app has also been described as a more sophisticated version of 3D stickers and flip images. == Applications == The app has many applications for e-commerce such as for fashion designers who want to showcase a garment from every angle, or real estate listings and Airbnb-type sites that want to make their rental properties seem as enticing as possible. The app can also be used for interactive art, 360° panoramas and selfies. == History == San Francisco-based Fyusion Inc.'s three founders — Radu B. Rusu, CTO Stefan Holzer, and VP of Engineering Stephen Miller — worked together at Willow Garage, the robotics research lab started by early Google employee Scott Hassan in the area of "personal robotics" — Hassan decided to turn the lab into more of an incubator, suggesting that the members spin off their technologies into consumer-facing enterprises. Rusu first set out with an open-source 3D perception software startup called Open Perception. Fyusion was officially founded in 2013, and soon after Rusu and his cofounders patented the technology for spatial photography. The company closed a seed funding round at the end of May, raising $3.35 million from investors, including an angel investment from Sun Microsystems cofounder Andreas Bechtolsheim. In 2014 the Fyuse team consisted of 13 employees, mostly engineers and designers, recruited from around the globe. In March 2015 the team displayed their app at Katy Perry's premiere for the movie "Prismatic World Tour on Epix" where Perry also took Fyuse for a test run. == Augmented reality == In September 2016 Fyusion unveiled its platform for creating augmented reality content using ones smartphone. It takes the images from ones smartphone and converts them into 3D holographic images, which one can then view on an AR headset. According to Rusu "by making it easy for people to capture their surroundings on any mobile device, [Fyusion is] revolutionizing the way that people view the world around them" and also states that for "AR to be successful, anyone should be able to create content for it" opposed to the current "small number of content creators and an even smaller number of hardware players". According to him "the applications of [Fyusion's] technology for consumers and businesses are incredibly limitless". The platform uses the company's patented 3D spatio-temporal platform that uses advanced sensor fusion, machine learning and computer vision algorithms and part of the platform is built into the Fyuse app. Before committing to releasing a separate consumer product the company intends to wait until the HoloLens device becomes available to the public. Until then any Fyuse representation created using Fyuse is AR ready and will be able to be shown in HoloLens in the future. == Fyuse - Point of No Return == Fyuse - Point of No Return is a science fiction short advert for Fyuse 3.0 in which Fyuse's digital medium is extrapolated into the future. In the film a woman uses a mini scanning-drone to 3D scan a tree with Fyuse and later recreate it as an augmented reality object at another place.
Tandem (app)
Tandem is a mobile language exchange and language learning app. == History == Tandem was founded in Hannover, Germany in 2014 by Arnd Aschentrup, Tobias Dickmeis, and Matthias Kleimann. Prior to founding Tandem, the trio had launched Vive, a members-only mobile video chat platform. Tandem has been criticised for not accepting members into the community immediately, as opposed to competitors including HelloTalk, Speaky or Cafehub. In some countries, there is a waiting list and applicants can wait up to seven days for their application to be processed by human moderators. In 2015, Tandem completed its first funding round (seed funding) of €600,000. Participating investors included business angels such as Atlantic Labs (Christophe Maire), Hannover Beteiligungsfonds, Marcus Englert (Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Rocket Internet SE ), Catagonia, Ludwig zu Salm, Florian Langenscheidt, Heiko Hubertz, Martin Sinner, and Zehden Enterprises. In 2016, the company received a further €2 million from new investors Rubylight and Faber Ventures, as well as from existing investors Hannover Beteiligungsfonds, Atlantic Labs, and Zehden Enterprises. Since 2018, the premium membership Tandem Pro has been available, which offers members unlimited access to all language learning features of the app as well as the removal of advertising for a monthly fee.
Onshape
Onshape is a computer-aided design (CAD) software system, delivered over the Internet via a software as a service (SaaS) model. It makes extensive use of cloud computing, with compute-intensive processing and rendering performed on Internet-based servers, and users are able to interact with the system via a web browser or the iOS and Android apps. As a SaaS system, Onshape upgrades are released directly to the web interface, and the software does not require maintenance by the user. Onshape allows teams to collaborate on a single shared design, the same way multiple writers can work together editing a shared document via cloud services. It is primarily focused on mechanical CAD (MCAD) and is used for product and machinery design across many industries, including consumer electronics, mechanical machinery, medical devices, 3D printing, machine parts, and industrial equipment. As of 2025, Onshape is popularly used as a CAD suite for the FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) alongside the MKCad application available in the Onshape App Store. == Company history == Onshape was developed by a company with the same name. Founded in 2012, Onshape was based in Cambridge, Massachusetts (USA), with offices in Singapore and Pune, India. Its leadership team includes several engineers and executives who originated from SolidWorks, a popular 3D CAD program that runs on Microsoft Windows. Onshape’s co-founders include two former SolidWorks CEOs, Jon Hirschtick and John McEleney. In November 2012, former SolidWorks CEOs Jon Hirschtick and John McEleney led six co-founders launching Belmont Technology, a placeholder name that was later changed to Onshape. The company’s first round of funding was $9 million from North Bridge Venture Partners and Commonwealth Capital. In March 2015, Onshape released the public beta version of its cloud CAD software, after pre-production testing with more than a thousand CAD professionals in 52 countries. Included in the beta launch was Onshape for iPhone. In August 2015, the company released its Onshape for Android app. In December 2015, Onshape launched its full commercial release. The company also launched the Onshape App Store, offering CAM, simulation, rendering and other cloud-based engineering tools. The Onshape App Store was launched with 24 developer partners. In April 2016, Onshape introduced its Education Plan, with a free version of Onshape Professional geared for college students and educators. In May 2016, Onshape released FeatureScript, a new open source (MIT licensed) programming language for creating and customizing CAD features. In October 2019, Onshape agreed to be acquired by PTC. The acquisition closed in November 2019 for $470 million. In February 2024, Onshape released iOS support for the Apple Vision Pro, allowing for real world applications of CAD models and prototypes. In January 2025, Onshape released the CAM studio, allowing users to generate G-code for up to 5-axis Simultaneous milling. == Funding == Onshape was a venture-backed company with investments from firms including Andreessen Horowitz, Commonwealth Capital Ventures, New Enterprise Associates (NEA) and North Bridge Venture Partners. Total venture funding amounted to $169 million. == Supported file formats == === Modelling === ==== Importing ==== As of May 2025, Onshape supported importing (opening) the following common CAD file formats: Parasolid X_T (Preferred) STEP (ISO 10303) ISO JT (ISO 14306) ACIS IGES CATIA v4, v5, v6 Autodesk Inventor Part (.IPT) Assembly (.IAM) Presentation (.IPN) Drawing (.IDW) Pro/ENGINEER, Creo Rhinoceros 3D: .3dm .STL .OBJ SolidWorks file formats Siemens NX file formats Drawings (.DXF/.DWG) ==== Exporting ==== Onshape supports exporting to the following formats: STEP (ISO 10303) Parasolid XT ACIS IGES SolidWorks file formats .STL Rhinoceros 3D: .3dm Collada XML-spec based textual file === Drawing === Ordinary engineering or technical drawing can be exported as .PDF file. === Other Formats === In addition to CAD file formats, Onshape supports importing some Non-CAD file formats for viewing and referencing. === Assembly === Assemblies can be imported and exported to: STEP (ISO 10303) Parasolid XT ACIS Pro/ENGINEER, Creo ISO JT Rhinoceros 3D: .3dm Siemens NX file formats SolidWorks Pack and Go zip file File formats that assemblies can be only-exported to, are: IGES .STL Collada XML-spec based textual file
SAP BTP
SAP Business Technology Platform (SAP BTP) is a platform as a service developed by SAP SE that offers a suite of services including database and data management, AI, analytics, application development, automation and integration all running on one unified platform. == Overview == SAP BTP is made up of four components: Application development and automation: to create applications or extend existing applications. Data and analytics: to access and analyze data across SAP and third-party systems using multi-cloud architecture. Integration: to integrate and connect applications and data. Artificial Intelligence (AI): to access large language models (LLMs) to develop AI. == History == SAP BTP was introduced as part of the SAP strategy to unify its portfolio and cloud offerings under a single platform. The platform was evolved from earlier initiatives such as SAP Cloud Platform and now serves as the central hub for cloud, data, analytics, integration and AI technologies. Initially unveiled as "SAP NetWeaver Cloud" belonging to the SAP HANA Cloud portfolio on October 16, 2012 the cloud platform was reintroduced with the new name "SAP HANA Cloud Platform" on May 13, 2013 as the foundation for SAP cloud products, including the SAP BusinessObjects Cloud. Adoption of the SAP HANA Cloud Platform in 2015 stood at over 4000 customers and 500 partners. In 2016, SAP and Apple Inc. partnered to develop mobile applications on iOS using cloud-based software development kits (SDKs) for the SAP Cloud Platform. On February 27, 2017, SAP HANA Cloud Platform was renamed "SAP Cloud Platform" at the Mobile World Congress. On January 18, 2021, the name "SAP Cloud Platform" was retired from the SAP product portfolio to support SAP BTP. As of October 2024, SAP states that SAP BTP is used by more than 27,000 customers and more than 2,800 partners. Recently, SAP Business One has worked on improving the functionalities of BTP to cater for the demands of digital transformation. The platform offers comprehensive services in AI, application development, automation, integration, data management, and analytics.
Coghead
Coghead was a web application company based out of Redwood City, California. The company offered a web-based service for building and hosting custom online database applications. Applications were built around custom data collections and were typically designed to facilitate management of, and collaboration on, business data. Examples of Coghead's "gallery" applications include project management, simple Customer relationship management, bug tracking and extreme programming. Coghead's service was available through a limited-access beta program before "going live" for free trial accounts in April, 2007. Coghead launched a paid subscription plans in June, 2007. On February 19, 2009, Coghead announced that its intellectual property assets (its 'service') had been acquired by SAP AG (NYSE:SAP). == Product == Coghead's product was a fully hosted environment for building, accessing, and maintaining applications and the associated business data. Like other so-called "Web 2.0" companies, Coghead built its product around the idea of "software as a service". The product was intended to allow users to design a range of applications from scratch using only a drag and drop, WYSIWYG user interface, with very limited scripting or coding (if any) required. Coghead also offered its paid subscribers the ability to develop and publish "Coglets," web forms that allowed site visitors to view data in, or submit data into, the host's Coghead database. On February 19, 2009, Coghead announced that SAP AG had acquired the Coghead service through an asset purchase. The SAP asset purchase closed in the 1st Quarter 2009. Immediately upon closing the asset purchase, the public-facing service was taken off-line by SAP as they prepared to integrate the Coghead code with other SAP assets. This forced many of Coghead's customers to find alternative solutions.
Backend as a service
Backend as a service (BaaS), sometimes also referred to as mobile backend as a service (MBaaS), is a service for providing web app and mobile app developers with a way to easily build a backend to their frontend applications. Features available include user management, push notifications, and integration with social networking services. These services are provided via the use of custom software development kits (SDKs) and application programming interfaces (APIs). BaaS is a relatively recent development in cloud computing, with most BaaS startups dating from 2011 or later. Some of the most popular service providers are AWS Amplify and Firebase. == Purpose == Web and mobile apps require a similar set of features on the backend, including notification service, integration with social networks, and cloud storage. Each of these services has its own API that must be individually incorporated into an app, a process that can be time-consuming and complicated for app developers. BaaS providers form a bridge between the frontend of an application and various cloud-based backends via a unified API and SDK. Providing a consistent way to manage backend data means that developers do not need to redevelop their own backend for each of the services that their apps need to access, potentially saving both time and money. Although similar to other cloud-computing business models, such as serverless computing, software as a service (SaaS), infrastructure as a service (IaaS), and platform as a service (PaaS), BaaS is distinct from these other services in that it specifically addresses the cloud-computing needs of web and mobile app developers by providing a unified means of connecting their apps to cloud services. == Features == BaaS providers offer different set of features and backend tools. Some of the most common features include: Database management. Most BaaS solutions provide SQL and/or NoSQL database management services for applications. Developers can store their app data without deploying and managing databases themselves. BaaS usually provides client SDKs, REST and GraphQL APIs for the frontend to interact with databases. File storage. BaaS providers often offer storage solutions for media files, user uploads, and other binary data. Applications can upload, download, and delete files through provided SDKs and APIs. Authentication and authorization. Some BaaS offer authentication and authorization services that allow developers to easily manage app users. This includes user sign-up, login, password reset, social media login integration through OAuth, user group and permission management etc. Notification service. Some BaaS providers such as Firebase and AWS Amplify have notification services that can send custom emails to users and push native notifications on mobile platforms. This is especially useful for applications that need to send messages, alerts, and reminders. Cloud functions. Some BaaS allow developers to deploy and run serverless functions. The functions are usually stateless and can be triggered by various ways including HTTP requests, SDK invocation, background server events, and cloud scheduled executions. Different providers offer runtime support for different languages, some of the popular languages are JavaScript/TypeScript (Node.js, Deno), Python, Java/Kotlin. Cloud functions extend the potential and flexibility of BaaS by allowing developers to write custom functionalities for their apps, working in a way similar to a traditional REST API backend framework. Usage analytics. Analytics data about application usage is often included in BaaS. This allows developers to monitor user behaviors and make decisions correspondingly in marketing strategies and performance optimizations. UI design. Some BaaS providers, such as AWS Amplify and Backendless, offer user interface designing tools that help developers design the frontend UI of web and mobile apps. While this may be useful for small teams and individual developers, UI design assistance may not be conventional in BaaS as it goes beyond the scope of backend infrastructure. Real-Time. Real-time features in a BaaS platform ensure that data updates and synchronizations occur instantly across all clients, making changes immediately visible to users. This is crucial for applications like live chat and collaborative tools, using technologies like WebSockets to maintain continuous server-client connections. == Service providers == BaaS providers have a broad focus, providing SDKs and APIs that work for app development on multiple platforms with different technology stacks, such as JavaScript (for Web apps), Flutter, Java/Kotlin (for Android apps), Swift/Objective-C (for iOS/MacOS/WatchOS/TvOS apps), .NET (for Windows) and others. BaaS providers also come in different types, suiting developers of different needs. === Cloud-based BaaS === Most BaaS providers host backend platforms on their cloud servers. They also manage the infrastructure, security, and scalability of the platforms. Developers can access the backend services via a web interface or the provided APIs. Some examples of cloud-based BaaS include Firebase (hosted on Google Cloud Platform), AWS Amplify (hosted on Amazon Web Services), and Microsoft Azure Mobile Apps (hosted on Microsoft Azure). === Self-hosted BaaS === Self-hosted BaaS allow developers to host backend on their own servers, providing more flexibility and potential to customization compared to cloud-based BaaS, which often is more difficult to migrate from. However, developers are also in charge of managing the infrastructure, security, and scalability of their servers. === Mobile BaaS === Mobile backend as a service (MBaaS) is a type of BaaS specifically for applications deployed in mobile systems. While some references use MBaaS interchangeably for BaaS, BaaS can have a wider variety of support such as for web apps and desktop apps. == Business model == BaaS providers generate revenue from their services in various ways, often using a freemium model. Under this model, a client receives a certain number of free active users or API calls per month, and pays a fee for each user or call over this limit. Alternatively, clients can pay a set fee for a package which allows for a greater number of calls or active users per month. There are also flat fee plans that make the pricing more predictable. Some of the providers offer the unlimited API calls inside their free plan offerings. Another business model that has been used by a lot of BaaS providers is PAYG (pay as you go), which has a flexible cost based on developers' usage of database, storage, bandwidth, function calls, user numbers etc.
Misskey
Misskey (Japanese: ミスキー, romanized: Misukī) is an open source, federated, social networking service created in 2014 by Japanese software engineer Eiji "syuilo" Shinoda. Misskey uses the ActivityPub protocol for federation, allowing users to interact between independent Misskey instances, and other ActivityPub compatible platforms. Misskey is generally considered to be part of the Fediverse. Despite being a decentralized service, Misskey is not philosophically opposed to centralization. The name Misskey comes from the lyrics of Brain Diver, a song by the Japanese singer May'n. == History == Misskey was initially developed as a BBS-style internet forum by high school student Eiji Shinoda in 2014. After introducing a timeline feature, Misskey gained popularity as the microblogging platform it is today. In 2018, Misskey added support for ActivityPub, becoming a federated social media platform. The flagship Misskey server, Misskey.io, was started on April 15, 2019. Misskey, alongside Mastodon and Bluesky, has received attention as a potential replacement for Twitter following Twitter's acquisition by Elon Musk in 2022. On April 8, 2023, Misskey.io incorporated as MisskeyHQ K.K. As of February 2024, over 450,000 users were registered, making it the largest instance of Misskey. Misskey.io is crowdfunded. The administrator of Misskey.io is Japanese system administrator Yoshiki Eto, who operates under the alias Murakami-san. Eiji Shinoda serves as director. In July 2023, Twitter introduced extreme restrictions on their API in order to combat scraping from bots. Some users were critical of the changes, and as a result migrated to other social networks. The number of users registering on Misskey.io, Misskey's official instance and the largest one, increased rapidly, with other Misskey instances also receiving a spike in signups. In response to this trend, Skeb, a platform for sharing art, announced on July 14, 2023 that it would sponsor the Misskey development team. In early 2024, Misskey was targeted by a spam attack from Japan. The cause of the attack is believed to be a dispute between rival groups on a Japanese hacker forum and a DDoS attack on a Discord bot. Mastodon instances with open registration were used in the attack. In November 2025, Eto announced intentions to replace ActivityPub with Misskey's own low-overhead federation system in "a few years". Shinoda later said that this was "fake news". == Development == Misskey is open source software and is licensed under the AGPLv3. The Misskey API is publicly available and is documented using the OpenAPI Specification, which allows users to build automated accounts and use it on any Misskey instance. The service is translated using Crowdin. Misskey is developed using Node.js. TypeScript is used on both the frontend and backend. PostgreSQL is used as its database. Vue.js is used for the frontend. == Functionality == Posts on Misskey are called "notes". Notes are limited to a maximum of 3,000 characters (a limit which can be customized by instances), and can be accompanied by any file, including polls, images, videos, and audio. Notes can be reposted, either by themselves or with another "quote" note. Misskey comes with multiple timelines to sort through the notes that an instance has available, and are displayed in reverse chronological order. The Home timeline shows notes from users that you follow, the Local timeline shows all notes from the instance in use, the Social timeline shows both the Home and Local timeline, and the Global timeline shows every public note that the instance knows about. Notes have customizable privacy settings to control what users can see a note, similar to Mastodon's post visibility ranges. Public notes show up on all timelines, while Home notes only show on a user's Home timeline. Notes can also be set to be available only for followers. Direct messages using notes can be sent to users.