5 ms·

Copy paste of Joe_Doe's comment. Which seems dead but sais "[noobtor]" instead of [dead]. Never seen that before?! However should he have registered via tor to

by lawl 12y ago

Copy paste of Joe_Doe's comment. Which seems dead but sais "[noobtor]" instead of [dead]. Never seen that before?! However should he have registered via tor to leak a bit of insider info I don't want to let this die because of tor flagging. ---------- Palantir is trying to raise another ~400mm to finance their operations. And I honestly think this just another PR stunt to attract investors. The 'secretive' attitude is just a game of deception. They are deceiving investors into believing that the company has a real product. However if you talk to any FDE or Embedded Analyst, you'll immediately realize that this is a consulting company. Which should be valued at far lower multiple than a real product company. Every new contract requires dozen extra people...That's why they are on a hire spree right now, (because of a large 'consulting' contract with a an oil company, that should stay unamed). However, with oil trading at 50s, they are scared and they trying to get some cash to cushion a possible contract cancellation. To be continued...

capkutay 12y ago
"Every new contract requires dozen extra people." I've heard this as well. They essentially hire customer-facing engineers to go out and scope specific contracts and literally implement custom solutions with small generic software frameworks they developed in house.
- fishcakes 12y ago
  On one hand, it is true they deploy people to implement the software. On the other hand, the customer has results after 6-8 weeks. How much software can really be built in that sort of time frame? Not much... In my opinion Palantir is a product company, but the product is deeply integrated in to an enterprise. And doing that takes time and people.
  - capkutay 12y ago
    I would debate that...if your 'product' takes a team of stanford engineers to actually deploy at an enterprise, then it's probably closer to a dev framework.
    - gkoberger 12y ago
      Well, they need a way to get up-to-date data into the system from whatever it's coming from. That alone requires someone to write code. They probably also do some customizing of what data is displayed; maybe via a GUI or maybe via code. But that's just the last mile (on each end) that needs customization. I don't see how you can simplify that into calling it a "dev framework".
    - ethbro 12y ago
      > if your 'product' takes a team of stanford engineers to actually deploy at an enterprise, then it's probably closer to a dev framework Fair enough. But you may be underestimating the value of production-quality fast-development dev frameworks in enterprise. Remember, these are guys who are used to seeing 5-year project timelines for anything that touches more than one system. (And every business case touches more than one system...)
    - jonstewart 12y ago
      No, it's a bog-standard on-premise "Enterprise" product, like Oracle, SAP, etc. This is how that business model works. The customer pays _both_ for the software _and_ for the on-site engineers, usually through the nose.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
  - spacecowboy_lon 12y ago
    so does HPCC from lexis nexis as woudl doing a roll your own solution either using AWS or your own cluster
- technologia 12y ago
  Hey, if it was the 80s/90s I'd call them Oracle. One other thing to note is that while they build these custom solutions, the second you touch their stuff that support policy goes out the window, not unlike what Oracle does.
- atmosx 12y ago
  Hm, I don't see nothing deceptive about this. It goes without saying that some software must be custom given the (rather obscure) market Palantir is in. EDIT: n/m @dang answered this indirectly a couple of comments below.
BinaryIdiot 12y ago
Well, they do actually have a product but it's my understanding that almost every purchase requires a set of engineers to integrate it. So I dunno if you could call it a consulting company but there is truth to this.
abat 12y ago
Honestly, it sounds like traditional enterprise software and should be valued similarly. Software like Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) or Electronic Health Record (EHR) always require very expensive integration/training/support. The contracts take forever to negotiate but are very lucrative with a huge lock in and expensive support contracts.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
rdtsc 12y ago
Wouldn't be surprised if this is an idealisticly minded young employer. I have seen them agressively interviewing on campuses, conferences. Perhaps in light of Snowden's releases and other leaks, maybe some of them were a bit dissapointed in what they saw there and decided to do something about it...
- jsprogrammer 12y ago
  Palantir works for NSA and is a CIA startup.
  - oAlbe 12y ago
    Source?
    - jsprogrammer 12y ago
      https://www.iqt.org/iqt_portfolio/palantir-technologies/ https://www.iqt.org/iqt_portfolio/palantir-technologies/ NSA as a customer has been widely reported in popular press [1]. [1] http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/08/14/agent-of-intelligence-how-a-deviant-philosopher-built-palantir-a-cia-funded-data-mining-juggernaut/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/08/14/agent-o...
      - JonnieCache 12y ago
        Q: Is Palantir a front for the CIA? A: No, the CIA is a front for Palantir. - Peter Thiel
      - Anderkent 12y ago
        NSA as a customer was taken from both companies having a product called prism. Not very strong evidence.
      - TallGuyShort 12y ago
        In-Q-Tel as an investor doesn't mean much, IMO. It does mean the product is of interest / value to the government, but that doesn't imply any sinister motive (or a ton of control). I work for a company that was invested in by In-Q-Tel, and the only influence I've seen from that was really to benefit the users in the community and develop a project for RBAC in Big Data - which is something I really hope the NSA has in place internally. edit: and I'm a Libertarian, so I'm biased against reaching this conclusion based on my own observations.
downandout 12y ago
> Palantir is trying to raise another ~400mm to finance their operations. And I honestly think this just another PR stunt to attract investors. That was my reading as well - Techcrunch essentially reprinted marketing materials as incontrovertible fact for this story (continuing a long tradition of similar journalistic excellence). One particularly troublesome sentence: "...[Palantir] is capable of building comprehensive models of activity to detect suspicious anomalies and is even able to provide immunity to fraud thanks to strategies the founders learned while still at PayPal." Well there's an objective, accurate statement. Even Paypal itself is far from "immune to fraud". Palantir appears to be doing some interesting things, but this article is ridiculous.
rdl 12y ago
I tweeted that I thought it was a plant, and Alexia Tsotsis from TC replied "no".
throwaway2048 12y ago
noobtor is a tor account less than 3 weeks old, all its posts will be auto killed until that time has passed
- dang 12y ago
  Yes, or until we see the account and mark it legit, which usually doesn't take nearly that long. (See my comment upthread for more info.)
dang 12y ago
Comments by new accounts posting from Tor IPs get autokilled because of past abuses by trolls. We restore the legit ones when we see them (or users tell us about them), and mark the accounts legit so future comments won't be killed. That's what I've done here. It is more of an "under moderation" thing than a "dead" thing. It's on our list to make that explicit and to provide a mechanism for the community to make most of the moderation decisions.
- atmosx 12y ago
  So, in case I need to be truly anonymous on HN, I need to register by a non-tor exit node IP (say an I2P address?) post a couple of comments (but how many?) and then I can use tor freely?
  - S4M 12y ago
    Can't you just register from an internet coffee?
    - AngrySkillzz 12y ago
      We don't all have time to run to a coffee shop and post a comment while the article is still being viewed.
mootothemax 12y ago
They are deceiving investors into believing that the company has a real product. To be fair, this description makes it sound like an ETL tool, just like Ab Initio, Datastage or Teradata, where the companies involved all make serious amounts of money from consulting (and the server licenses don't come cheap either!). These tools can be pretty powerful if set up and programmed correctly; it's definitely not as simple as pointing them at a bunch of data sources and expecting magic to happen. If Palantir haven't found a magic way to integrate data sources without any configuration, it does sound rather deceptive. That said, if they manage to get systems up and running without 30-stories-high stacks of never-to-be-read paper, that'd be a revolution in itself.
beatle_sauce 12y ago
Big-data consulting services for secret services and oil companies... mhhhmmm.
bane 12y ago
So that's what....$1.3b in funding over a lot of rounds? I'm not sure I can think of many software companies with that kind of startup investment. WP says they have about 1,200 employees, or a burn rate of about $300m/yr. Those figures are old, so this new round must be for another year of operations. I believe I had heard in a previous discussion that they were planning on going public in 2015, so this is a bit of a surprise. Last I heard they were still also a Java client application for the analytics. They appear to have had an HTML5 client in development several years ago, but that doesn't appear to be the current product (even videos as new as a month old still use the old client which they had up as a free demo for years on their site). [1][2] So is this just for continued expansion or is Palantir some kind of hi-tech charity case people prop with more money than sense continue to prop up? My guess is the former, but there's some arguments it's really the second. 1 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cajoFN6yjB0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cajoFN6yjB0 2 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d298LZd38Kk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d298LZd38Kk
- nilkn 12y ago
  It's interesting to see that the HTML5 client never went anywhere evidently -- I interviewed there for an internship in 2013 and remember that they were showing it off a lot.
totalrobe 12y ago
Ever worked with ERP or other enterprise data products? Nothing is plug and play. These guys have to analyze data sets to first understand how to connect the dots, and then they have to integrate with whatever front-end their "product" is.
- gesman 12y ago
  Well said. I work with Palantir guys and helping them with data sources at a large banking firm. Everything is custom, needs to be customized and then it needs to be changed every month. The magic bullet here is hard work and smart people.
  - totalrobe 12y ago
    On the plus side, it is extremely difficult for another provider to provide a business case for replacing Palantir once they're (Palantir) in place due to the upfront analysis, implementation, and data migrations required.
- stanfordkid 12y ago
  Yeah I have. You know who actually does that low margin work? Deployment companies, consultants and implementors, outsourcing firms. There's a reason why "SAP Certified Specialists" exist. There's a reason that there are programs and credentials that teach people to deploy this stuff. Because SAP and Oracle are actual software companies unlike Palantir. Palantir hires young smart (but not street smart) Ivy league engineers that have no clue how actual enterprise software works ... much like the founders and management team of Palantir.
  - pionar 12y ago
    > You know who actually does that low margin work? Deployment companies, consultants and implementors, outsourcing firms. Not always. A lot of software companies that provide enterprise-level software but aren't the SAPs and Oracles of the world often supply in-house implementors, who work for weeks or months with customers to integrate those products into existing system (at a cost).

by lawl 12y ago

capkutay 12y ago

"Every new contract requires dozen extra people." I've heard this as well. They essentially hire customer-facing engineers to go out and scope specific contracts and literally implement custom solutions with small generic software frameworks they developed in house.

fishcakes 12y ago
On one hand, it is true they deploy people to implement the software. On the other hand, the customer has results after 6-8 weeks. How much software can really be built in that sort of time frame? Not much... In my opinion Palantir is a product company, but the product is deeply integrated in to an enterprise. And doing that takes time and people.
- capkutay 12y ago
  I would debate that...if your 'product' takes a team of stanford engineers to actually deploy at an enterprise, then it's probably closer to a dev framework.
  - gkoberger 12y ago
    Well, they need a way to get up-to-date data into the system from whatever it's coming from. That alone requires someone to write code. They probably also do some customizing of what data is displayed; maybe via a GUI or maybe via code. But that's just the last mile (on each end) that needs customization. I don't see how you can simplify that into calling it a "dev framework".
  - ethbro 12y ago
    > if your 'product' takes a team of stanford engineers to actually deploy at an enterprise, then it's probably closer to a dev framework Fair enough. But you may be underestimating the value of production-quality fast-development dev frameworks in enterprise. Remember, these are guys who are used to seeing 5-year project timelines for anything that touches more than one system. (And every business case touches more than one system...)
  - jonstewart 12y ago
    No, it's a bog-standard on-premise "Enterprise" product, like Oracle, SAP, etc. This is how that business model works. The customer pays _both_ for the software _and_ for the on-site engineers, usually through the nose.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- spacecowboy_lon 12y ago
  so does HPCC from lexis nexis as woudl doing a roll your own solution either using AWS or your own cluster
technologia 12y ago
Hey, if it was the 80s/90s I'd call them Oracle. One other thing to note is that while they build these custom solutions, the second you touch their stuff that support policy goes out the window, not unlike what Oracle does.
atmosx 12y ago
Hm, I don't see nothing deceptive about this. It goes without saying that some software must be custom given the (rather obscure) market Palantir is in. EDIT: n/m @dang answered this indirectly a couple of comments below.

BinaryIdiot 12y ago

Well, they do actually have a product but it's my understanding that almost every purchase requires a set of engineers to integrate it. So I dunno if you could call it a consulting company but there is truth to this.

abat 12y ago

Honestly, it sounds like traditional enterprise software and should be valued similarly. Software like Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) or Electronic Health Record (EHR) always require very expensive integration/training/support. The contracts take forever to negotiate but are very lucrative with a huge lock in and expensive support contracts.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]

rdtsc 12y ago

Wouldn't be surprised if this is an idealisticly minded young employer. I have seen them agressively interviewing on campuses, conferences. Perhaps in light of Snowden's releases and other leaks, maybe some of them were a bit dissapointed in what they saw there and decided to do something about it...

jsprogrammer 12y ago
Palantir works for NSA and is a CIA startup.
- oAlbe 12y ago
  Source?
  - jsprogrammer 12y ago
    https://www.iqt.org/iqt_portfolio/palantir-technologies/ https://www.iqt.org/iqt_portfolio/palantir-technologies/ NSA as a customer has been widely reported in popular press [1]. [1] http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/08/14/agent-of-intelligence-how-a-deviant-philosopher-built-palantir-a-cia-funded-data-mining-juggernaut/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/08/14/agent-o...
    - JonnieCache 12y ago
      Q: Is Palantir a front for the CIA? A: No, the CIA is a front for Palantir. - Peter Thiel
    - Anderkent 12y ago
      NSA as a customer was taken from both companies having a product called prism. Not very strong evidence.
    - TallGuyShort 12y ago
      In-Q-Tel as an investor doesn't mean much, IMO. It does mean the product is of interest / value to the government, but that doesn't imply any sinister motive (or a ton of control). I work for a company that was invested in by In-Q-Tel, and the only influence I've seen from that was really to benefit the users in the community and develop a project for RBAC in Big Data - which is something I really hope the NSA has in place internally. edit: and I'm a Libertarian, so I'm biased against reaching this conclusion based on my own observations.

downandout 12y ago

> Palantir is trying to raise another ~400mm to finance their operations. And I honestly think this just another PR stunt to attract investors. That was my reading as well - Techcrunch essentially reprinted marketing materials as incontrovertible fact for this story (continuing a long tradition of similar journalistic excellence). One particularly troublesome sentence: "...[Palantir] is capable of building comprehensive models of activity to detect suspicious anomalies and is even able to provide immunity to fraud thanks to strategies the founders learned while still at PayPal." Well there's an objective, accurate statement. Even Paypal itself is far from "immune to fraud". Palantir appears to be doing some interesting things, but this article is ridiculous.

rdl 12y ago

I tweeted that I thought it was a plant, and Alexia Tsotsis from TC replied "no".

throwaway2048 12y ago

noobtor is a tor account less than 3 weeks old, all its posts will be auto killed until that time has passed

dang 12y ago
Yes, or until we see the account and mark it legit, which usually doesn't take nearly that long. (See my comment upthread for more info.)

dang 12y ago

Comments by new accounts posting from Tor IPs get autokilled because of past abuses by trolls. We restore the legit ones when we see them (or users tell us about them), and mark the accounts legit so future comments won't be killed. That's what I've done here. It is more of an "under moderation" thing than a "dead" thing. It's on our list to make that explicit and to provide a mechanism for the community to make most of the moderation decisions.

atmosx 12y ago
So, in case I need to be truly anonymous on HN, I need to register by a non-tor exit node IP (say an I2P address?) post a couple of comments (but how many?) and then I can use tor freely?
- S4M 12y ago
  Can't you just register from an internet coffee?
  - AngrySkillzz 12y ago
    We don't all have time to run to a coffee shop and post a comment while the article is still being viewed.

mootothemax 12y ago

They are deceiving investors into believing that the company has a real product. To be fair, this description makes it sound like an ETL tool, just like Ab Initio, Datastage or Teradata, where the companies involved all make serious amounts of money from consulting (and the server licenses don't come cheap either!). These tools can be pretty powerful if set up and programmed correctly; it's definitely not as simple as pointing them at a bunch of data sources and expecting magic to happen. If Palantir haven't found a magic way to integrate data sources without any configuration, it does sound rather deceptive. That said, if they manage to get systems up and running without 30-stories-high stacks of never-to-be-read paper, that'd be a revolution in itself.

beatle_sauce 12y ago

Big-data consulting services for secret services and oil companies... mhhhmmm.

bane 12y ago

So that's what....$1.3b in funding over a lot of rounds? I'm not sure I can think of many software companies with that kind of startup investment. WP says they have about 1,200 employees, or a burn rate of about $300m/yr. Those figures are old, so this new round must be for another year of operations. I believe I had heard in a previous discussion that they were planning on going public in 2015, so this is a bit of a surprise. Last I heard they were still also a Java client application for the analytics. They appear to have had an HTML5 client in development several years ago, but that doesn't appear to be the current product (even videos as new as a month old still use the old client which they had up as a free demo for years on their site). [1][2] So is this just for continued expansion or is Palantir some kind of hi-tech charity case people prop with more money than sense continue to prop up? My guess is the former, but there's some arguments it's really the second. 1 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cajoFN6yjB0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cajoFN6yjB0 2 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d298LZd38Kk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d298LZd38Kk

nilkn 12y ago
It's interesting to see that the HTML5 client never went anywhere evidently -- I interviewed there for an internship in 2013 and remember that they were showing it off a lot.

totalrobe 12y ago

Ever worked with ERP or other enterprise data products? Nothing is plug and play. These guys have to analyze data sets to first understand how to connect the dots, and then they have to integrate with whatever front-end their "product" is.

gesman 12y ago
Well said. I work with Palantir guys and helping them with data sources at a large banking firm. Everything is custom, needs to be customized and then it needs to be changed every month. The magic bullet here is hard work and smart people.
- totalrobe 12y ago
  On the plus side, it is extremely difficult for another provider to provide a business case for replacing Palantir once they're (Palantir) in place due to the upfront analysis, implementation, and data migrations required.
stanfordkid 12y ago
Yeah I have. You know who actually does that low margin work? Deployment companies, consultants and implementors, outsourcing firms. There's a reason why "SAP Certified Specialists" exist. There's a reason that there are programs and credentials that teach people to deploy this stuff. Because SAP and Oracle are actual software companies unlike Palantir. Palantir hires young smart (but not street smart) Ivy league engineers that have no clue how actual enterprise software works ... much like the founders and management team of Palantir.
- pionar 12y ago
  > You know who actually does that low margin work? Deployment companies, consultants and implementors, outsourcing firms. Not always. A lot of software companies that provide enterprise-level software but aren't the SAPs and Oracles of the world often supply in-house implementors, who work for weeks or months with customers to integrate those products into existing system (at a cost).