Jax Painter

Director, Product Marketing

To meet innovation, experience, and security requirements, organizations must establish digital Identity strategies and implement them into every product and service.

## The Multifaceted Challenges of Managing Digital Identities

People leading development, technology, security, and product strategies collectively seek to drive innovation and improve customer and employee experiences. Aligning those teams while managing an increasingly complex technology and security threat landscape is easier said than done.

Without a unified digital Identity strategy, developers and product teams often experience problems balancing customer experience, security, and speed. These challenges create delays and slow product development cycles, from planning and coding to maintenance and scale out. Technology and security teams can also struggle to streamline access for employees in ways that don't create vulnerabilities.

The stakes to get Identity correct are so high that fear often creates additional blockers. No one wants to make a mistake that could jeopardize their career or end up being tomorrow’s headline. An organization's reputation is now deeply tied to how well it protects customer data against rapidly evolving threats. So the bottom line is: Security breaches and regulatory compliance issues can result in devastating costs. In 2024, the global average cost of a data breach was [$4.88 million](https://www.ibm.com/reports/data-breach), a 10% increase since 2023.

To meet today's (and tomorrow's) innovation, experience, and security requirements, organizations of all sizes must establish intentional digital Identity strategies and implement them into every product and service from the ground up.  

## Seamless Experiences Are Driven by Digital Identities

Business efficiency and growth depend on seamless experiences for customers and employees. All of these experiences — from customer-facing digital services and AI-driven innovations to employee onboarding and business intelligence — are driven by scalable Identity and data access controls.

Achieving business efficiency and growth is easier when teams can take advantage of automation, no-code solutions, AI, and other technologies to eliminate rote work and focus on what drives the business forward. Along with equipping developers and product teams with intelligent, integrated tools for managing authentication, a unified digital Identity solution also empowers technology and security teams with flexible, scalable tools for managing customer and employee access. By implementing an integrated strategy for digital identities, organizations can:

* Infuse consistent Identity practices into agile development processes
* Implement critical changes like single sign-on and privileged access management faster
* Scale out solutions with less effort
* Help prevent risks associated with cloud usage, shadow IT, and anywhere collaboration
* Keep up with rapidly evolving cybersecurity challenges and regulations

## A Unified Digital Identity Approach Makes It Easier to Drive Innovation with Data

Effective and easy-to-use digital Identity solutions can empower any organization to fearlessly innovate and readily adapt to changing markets and customer demands. With the right authentication and access management tools, teams can safely leverage data to develop differentiating experiences and products using technologies like AI.

Organizations that successfully implement a unified digital Identity strategy realize measurable benefits across multiple fronts through financial savings and by improving productivity throughout the organization. In a research study, IDC found that companies using CIAM solutions [saved $4.3 million](https://www.okta.com/sites/default/files/2022-06/TheBusinessValueofOktaCustomerIdentityandAccessManagement.pdf) through productivity improvements alone, and for every customer-facing application they saw >$166,000 in combined annual benefits. IDC also found team efficiency benefits throughout organizations, with a 33% time savings for IT and infrastructure teams, 23% for developer teams, and 13% for security teams. 

## Identity Is Everyone’s Business 

When leaders spearheading development, technology, security, and product roadmaps understand how important a unified digital Identity strategy is, they can work together on a comprehensive strategy that equips everyone to achieve their goals. 

Developers can quickly and easily build and maintain required authentication flows that don't break and keep customers happy. Security teams can see who has access to what, when, and under whose authorization — on demand and across silos. 

Product teams can get to market faster while helping to ensure customers that their data is safe. Technology leaders can implement unified solutions that scale, lower risk, and ultimately improve the experiences of employees and customers. 

Interested in learning how to implement a collaborative strategy for digital identities? Stay tuned for the next four blogs in the Innovation Ignited series covering Identity responsibilities that development, technology, security, and product leaders face and the outcomes they can realize with a unified digital Identity strategy.

* Create a culture of synergy with digital identities: This piece explains how development leaders can empower teams to overcome authentication complexity and focus on creating differentiating solutions that improve customer experience 
* Ignite innovation with digital Identity: This piece explores how technology leaders can optimize Identity and Access Management and authentication to create a culture of alignment that fuels collaboration and continuous improvement
* How to keep your developers focused on development: Identity management burdens often overwhelm developers and delay product launches, but leaders can streamline authentication through unified digital identity solutions, allowing teams to focus on core innovation
* Accelerate product workflows and adoption: Learn how product leaders can create ambitious and realistic roadmaps that include differentiating authentication capabilities — while accelerating the journey from ideas to market success

## Accelerate Your Organization's Growth

Improve user experience, security, and innovation with a unified digital Identity solution. 

> [Read more from Auth0 thought leaders](https://www.okta.com/blog/)

## Resources

Auth0 equips organizations with an intelligent, integrated digital Identity solution that makes it easier to meet security and business requirements — and drive growth, differentiation, and impact. To learn more about how Auth0 equips businesses of all sizes with the tools they need for unified digital Identity strategies, check out the following resources.

* [Okta Named a Leader in 2023 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Access Management for Seventh Consecutive Year](https://www.okta.com/press-room/press-releases/okta-named-a-leader-in-2023-gartnerr-magic-quadranttm-for-access/)
* [Okta named a Leader in first ever Forrester Wave™️ for Workforce Identity Platforms](https://www.okta.com/resources/analyst-research-okta-named-a-leader-in-first-ever-forrester-wavetm-for-workforce/)
* [Okta Recognized as a Gartner® Peer Insights™ Customers' Choice for Access Management](https://www.okta.com/resources/analyst-research-okta-recognized-as-a-2024-gartner-peer-insights/)

Innovation Ignited: How to Start Your Digital Identity Management Journey

Empower your team with a unified digital Identity strategy that includes intelligent, integrated auth capabilities that minimize risk while improving experience.

Developers are the backbone of innovation. What they focus on can accelerate or hinder the delivery of new products. Authentication and authorization have always been a top development priority, but increases in data volumes, data usage, mobility, and other factors are creating significant complexity.

Navigating increasing auth challenges with manual, cumbersome approaches —while also trying to keep up with the latest security standards and regulations — can be overwhelming. This situation can result in frustrated developers, delayed launch dates, and an increased risk of security gaps that can cause outages, costly non-compliance fees, and damaged business reputations. AI and [GenAI](https://www.okta.com/blog/2024/10/unlocking-the-power-of-generative-ai-with-identity/) adoption only amplify developers' auth challenges because models require massive amounts of information for accuracy and all data usage must align with evolving security and compliance regulations.

How organizations manage auth also determines their effectiveness in protecting data against evolving threats, complying with regulations, and improving brand reputation. Building auth services from scratch or relying on features in legacy systems can easily lead to compliance and governance missteps caused by Identity fragmentation across applications and systems. After all, siloed Identity management is difficult to track, making it harder to safeguard customer data.

Chief technology officers, directors, and development leaders can empower their teams with a unified digital Identity strategy that includes intelligent, integrated auth capabilities that minimize complexity and risk while improving experience. By building and maintaining authentication with less effort and simplifying governance and compliance, developers can spend the bulk of their time doing what they excel at, bringing new products and services to market faster.

## Moving from Complexity to Clarity — and Ideas to Impact

Authentication and authorization are critical vehicles for creating innovative solutions and differentiating experiences for customers and employees. That’s because users expect scalable, frictionless access to apps, digital tools, and cloud services.

To make this possible while enabling teams to manage all their tasks, developers need easy-to-use auth systems that minimize the need for custom code and specialized security skills. That way, developers have what they need to build flexible solutions that can easily integrate with other technologies, support new authentication methods, and facilitate new use cases including AI and GenAI — all in a way that minimizes risk and delivers positive user experiences.

## How LaunchNotes Uses Authentication to Drive Growth

[LaunchNotes](https://www.okta.com/customers/launchnotes/) equips product and development teams with the tools they need to effectively communicate, understand, and manage the what, when, and why of product roadmaps. To drive growth, especially in the enterprise customer space, LaunchNotes replaced their authentication software with a unified solution from Auth0. It provides the enterprise-grade authentication and authorization capabilities prospective customers were looking for, like [single sign-on](https://www.okta.com/products/single-sign-on-workforce-identity/) (SSO).

Auth0 is also easy to use. With it, developers were able to set up a proof of concept in one hour and deploy their new auth solution, including SSO capabilities, within less than three weeks. Within one week of going live, LaunchNotes’ first enterprise customer signed up and more than 10 customers re-engaged.

Developers are also realizing ongoing efficiencies with their unified auth solution. Today, they spend 95% less time managing password policies for B2B customers. They implemented social logins in just minutes. And now, they onboard new customers up to 20% faster, which improves the experience of customers and employees.

## How Cribl Transforms Auth to Bring New Products to Market Faster

[Cribl](https://www.okta.com/customers/cribl/) helps organizations collect, process, route, and analyze logs, traces, and other telemetry data from their in-house and third-party systems and apps. Because this data is critical in establishing and managing seamless, protected communication between systems, Cribl provides customers with strict access controls. For years, Cribl used [role-based access controls](https://www.okta.com/identity-101/what-is-role-based-access-control-rbac/) (RBAC) to authorize users.

However, when they introduced virtual Workspaces for their customers, Cribl quickly recognized that their RBAC approach could not scale with increasing complexity and growth. Developers were spending too much time manually building and maintaining auth systems. To set up authentication for just one Workspace, they had to manually define up to 400 roles in a JSON Web Token.

After evaluating their best options, Cribl’s teams unanimously chose to adopt a unified auth solution from Auth0. It enables granular RBAC and centralized auth models that are flexible, scalable, and easy to manage. Today, developers input their new products into their authorization model and Auth0 automatically handles the mapping between data owners as directed. As a result, what used to take developers months of manual effort now takes just weeks. And because developers can set up authorization for new products 80% faster, they have more time to spend on innovation.

## How Alma Media Builds and Maintains Identity Security with Less Effort

Media and service company [Alma Media](https://www.okta.com/customers/alma-media/) was struggling with siloed auth solutions. The organization operates more than 100 websites and brands used by millions of customers, and every site had its own login method. This meant customers couldn’t navigate between corporate brand sites without having to log in again. Cumbersome user experiences cut Alma Media's conversions in half. Additionally, developers had to create, manage, and scale each site’s standalone authentication solutions, leaving them little time to work on impactful projects.

To achieve their goals, Alma Media adopted a unified auth solution from Auth0 that has dramatically simplified development. As a result, Alma Media improved their user experience, security, and innovation potential. Customers now have SSO, so they no longer have to manage multiple IDs and passwords across sites. They can also opt to log in to sites using their social media accounts.

Additionally, in-house developers and IT teams now use the same flexible solution for managing auth across sites. This straightforward approach reduces risk,  boosts efficiency, and delivers measurable savings. Alma Media has decreased their total cost of ownership by 30% and license expenses by 10%.

## Ignite Innovation at Your Organization

Maximizing the time your developers have to create differentiating solutions that improve security, experience, and innovation is easier with a unified strategy. Auth0 equips organizations with intelligent, integrated authentication and authorization tools that reduce complexity so developers can turn ideas into impactful solutions faster.

No-code, low-code, and pro-code tools accelerate the development of automated flows that teams can quickly adapt to meet current and future use cases. Built-in capabilities also simplify governance and compliance, including certification and regulatory support, data sovereignty, and centralized controls.

Free your devs and simplify auth management! Learn More about [Customer Identity and Access Management (CIAM)](https://www.okta.com/customer-identity/)

## Resources

- [Check out our Developer Center](https://developer.auth0.com/)
- [Unlock SaaS app growth: Download the Why Customer Identity White Paper](https://www.okta.com/resources/whitepaper-why-ciam/)
- [Learn about Fine-Grained Authorization (FGA)](https://auth0.com/resources/whitepapers/fine-grained-authorization-technical-primer)
- [Discover how Okta secures your Generative AI implementation](https://www.okta.com/blog/2024/10/unlocking-the-power-of-generative-ai-with-identity/) 
- [Explore the Build versus buy question for CIAM](https://www.okta.com/resources/whitepaper-build-vs-buy/)


Innovation Ignited: How Development Leaders Make Authentication an Innovation Engine

Rodrigo Dalcin

Rodrigo is a Senior Research Operations Specialist at Auth0, where he leads research engagement, takes care of process automation, and contributes to research strategy. With over a decade of experience in the tech industry, Rodrigo has also worked as a UX Research Lead at the Canadian National Railway, and as a UX Researcher at Contenful. Outside of work, he enjoys music, travelling, rowing, and good food.

Senior Research Operations Specialist

Carolyn Shetter

Carolyn likes to transform the complex into the simple and to build relationships with their stakeholders. When they’re not at work you can find them exploring new worlds in books, tv or as they travel across the US.

Research Operations Associate

Help shape Auth0 products and uncover opportunities for innovation

Understanding our customers and their needs is both a commitment and a goal for us. In fact, one promise of Auth0 products is to help our customers understand _their_ customers. Knowing how critical the customer experience is, a big part of our Research team’s mission is to listen to and amplify the voices of our customers while establishing a direct channel between them and our product teams. 

This is why we’re thrilled to announce the [Auth0 Research Program](https://auth0.com/research-program). Since its inception, the Auth0 Research team has been committed to developing an ethical, scalable, efficient, and impactful practice in order to help our teams discover and share insights about our customers and users and uncover new opportunities for innovation and product improvements. Our Research Program is the next logical extension of this mission.

## What Is the Research Program?

The Research Program is a way for current Auth0 users to directly interact with the people who build Auth0. Members help us build better products and services by opting into being our first choice for recruiting for future research projects.

## How Does It Work?

Applying to our Research Program means having the opportunity to participate in interviews with our teams, test prototypes, respond to surveys, and provide feedback during product roadmap previews. We periodically reach out to participants who meet different eligibility criteria depending on our projects and the type of audience our teams need to talk to. Studies are often conducted remotely (via Zoom) but may also include asynchronous participation or, on occasion, in-person events.

## Benefits of Joining

In addition to being the first choice for our research needs and having a direct communication line to our Product team, Research Program members get paid for the studies they participate in. Members can also receive year-end gifts and rewards for hitting specific participation milestones, as well as early access to new Auth0 features via product beta programs.

## How Does the Program Affect Auth0 Products?

Customer feedback has a direct and significant impact on the products and services we provide. It helps us make better decisions and guide the creation of new features and make existing ones even better.

We recently completed a series of usability studies to [inform the new Auth0’s Quickstart experience](https://medium.com/auth0-design/redesigning-the-auth0-quickstart-experience-32b15a2baabc). We’ve also applied feedback from the developer community to [improve the structure and navigation of our product documentation](https://medium.com/auth0-design/using-research-to-untangle-our-documentation-db610379519f).

## Notes on Accessibility and Inclusion

As a product unit, Auth0 wants to increase the representation of traditionally marginalized groups in the tech space, and our Research Program is no exception. We want our panel to represent the entire population of our users and are actively working to increase participation from people from diverse backgrounds and locations, people with accessibility needs, and neurodivergent folks. 

We want to [create the most inclusive and accessible authentication solution](https://auth0.com/blog/our-language-reflects-our-values/) that there is on the market, and we can’t do that alone. We hope you will join us in accomplishing this goal.

## Notes on Data Privacy

We take data privacy seriously: the only people who have access to this data are those that need access, and if you would like your data to be deleted at any time, please email [research@auth0.com](mailto:research@auth0.com). Auth0’s Research Program is subject to our [privacy policy](https://auth0.com/privacy) and our [terms of service](https://auth0.com/web-terms).

## Conclusion

We’d love to have you be part of the Auth0 Research Program. If you’re interested, [apply to join the Auth0 Research Program today](https://greatquestion.co/auth0/45ac974bccd2/) or to [learn more](https://auth0.com/research-program)!

Introducing the Auth0 Research Program

Donna Joyce

Donna, a true Auziro, celebrates five years with the organization, leading sales for Charities and Housing in the United Kingdom and Ireland. She is as passionate about the successes of her customers as she is about Auth0 and identity products. DJ is passionate about people, learning from and understanding what motivates them - lifting everyone who encounters her to be the best they can be. She believes every person has the ability to do whatever it is they dream; no dream is too big.

Enterprise Account Executive

Anne Ellegood

Anne is our Social Impact Product Marketer with extensive experience developing & delivering marketing programs for products, services, and partners that enable sales and build brands. In addition to being an amateur archaeologist, Anne is a self-professed data-hoarder fueled by curiosity & the quest for inbox zero zen.

Product Marketing Director

Exploring the Impact of Identity for the Visually Impaired

Since 1931, the National Council for the Blind Ireland has been serving blind or visually impaired persons across Ireland. In fact, NCBI has a proud and long-running legacy as being the first voluntary body dealing with a disability group in the Irish Free State dedicated to supporting, educating, and changing how sight loss is seen in Ireland. 

As the leading vision loss charity in the country serving the approximately 55,000 people who are blind or visually impaired, their rich history and pioneering work have set the precedent in the provision of welfare and educational advancement for disadvantaged people in Ireland. 

Today the team at NCBI continues to raise the bar for innovation in the space through[ NCBI Labs](https://www.ncbi.ie/supporting-you/technology/ncbi-labs/), their technology department. Eager to pursue and bring to life some ideas they had been incubating but mindful of the development cost of such endeavors, NCBI pitched their vision for an application, later named the myNCBI Smart Hub, to The Social Innovation Fund and was awarded capital through their Rethink Ireland fund.


<iframe style="border-radius:12px" src="https://open.spotify.com/embed/episode/4NLrK628utOhlCvo1gTyCm?utm_source=generator&theme=0" width="100%" height="232" frameBorder="0" allowfullscreen="" allow="autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; fullscreen; picture-in-picture"></iframe>



At its core,[ myNCBI Smart Hub](https://www.ncbi.ie/kyran-omahoney-talks-about-the-new-ncbi-smart-hub/) provides users with sight loss a way to leverage smart devices, such as those powered by Amazon’s Alexa natural language processing system. The myNCBI application was designed specifically for visually impaired users. There is no need to purchase a laptop, speech software, or a separate smart device. The all-in-one myNCBI Smart Hub is ready to use straight away with very little to no guidance with existing devices.

Using only their voice, NCBI clients can interact with their device, which is integrated with Auth0’s Customer Identity and Access Management system, to securely login to their NCBI account and connect to the charity’s full suite of services. NCBI’s clients can book appointments and get reminders sent to their assistive devices, learn more information about their particular sight loss, and interact directly with myOwn Technology Support.

Post-launch, myNCBI Smart Hub enabled virtual service access for the thousands of clients of NCBI impacted during the global pandemic. As a result, clients were able to receive uninterrupted support even when lockdowns and stay-at-home mandates were issued. Now that life is returning to a new normal, clients using the myNCBI Smart Hub continue to use the application, if not even more so. The smart hub has introduced a level of efficiency and accessibility that makes daily life for the many users and the NCBI team easier. 

From NCBI Lab’s development team’s research, myNCBI Smart Hub technology has never been undertaken before in the disabilities sector amongst sight loss charities. Suffice to say, the potential for this NCBI Lab’s product could be huge and benefit many others in the years to come.

This ingenuine use of technology recently earned the team a coveted Spider Award nomination in the Best Use of Disruptive Technology category in 2021 and is slated to be awarded on March 31st, 2022.[ The Spiders](https://www.thespiders.ie/) are Ireland’s most prestigious digital awards ceremony and longest running, dedicated to recognizing companies and individuals driving digital excellence.

In addition to this recognition, the team has also been nominated in 4 other categories:

* Digital Transformation in Industry & Infrastructure – NCBI Digital Transformation Project
* Best in Universal Design – ncbi.ie
* Best Podcast –[ Talking Technology with NCBI Labs](https://www.ncbi.ie/supporting-you/technology/talking-technology-with-ncbi-labs/)
* Best Remote Team – NCBI Labs

Regardless of the outcome of the awards, Auth0 is delighted to of played a small part in enabling the NCBI Labs team to bring their vision for this assistive technology application, the myNCBI Smart Hub, to fruition. We look forward to exploring avenues to collaborate and bring safer, unparalleled access to the technology the incredible team at NCBI Labs introduces to the world. 

Cheers & Good Luck, NCBI Labs Team!

We’ll be rooting for you all from around the globe.

Social Impact Innovations: National Council for the Blind Ireland

shiven_ramji

Shiv is an experienced product executive and builder obsessed with creating beautiful products. He is the President of Customer Identity at Okta, managing a $1B ARR business and overseeing the company’s product, data, security, and technology strategy and execution. Before Auth0 and Okta, Shiv was the SVP of Product at DigitalOcean, leading DigitalOcean’s products, pricing, and partnerships. Additionally, Shiv has held product leadership positions at global brands, including Amazon, NBCUniversal, LiveIntent, and The Nielsen Company. Shiv was the recipient of the 2023 Top Global CPO Award by the Products That Count community. 

Beyond his current corporate focus, Shiv is deeply committed to fostering entrepreneurship and innovation, particularly in Africa. He is an active angel investor and startup advisor and also serves on the boards of [Products That Count](https://productsthatcount.com/) and [Aiven.io](http://Aiven.io).

President, Auth0

Shiven Ramji

Bhawna Singh joined Auth0 as SVP of Engineering. Why she plans to focus on mentoring innovation.

Relying on Ask.com for quick answers or researching your next role at Glassdoor? You’re likely leaning on innovations [Bhawna Singh](https://auth0.com/blog/bhawna-singh-joins-auth0-leadership-team-as-senior-vice-president-of-engineering) helped make possible. With over twenty years of helping companies through tech transformations, scaling challenges, and participating in multiple acquisitions, Bhawna brings an understanding of how to deliver growth that serves end users and develops talent on the way to building revenue.

That experience is coming to Auth0 at a critical moment. While we’re seeking to strongly align our product and engineering teams, we’re also working through our recent acquisition by Okta — and we want to do that while sustaining our growth trajectory.

We sat down with Bhawna to learn more about how she grows talent through innovation, what brought her to Auth0, and why she’ll be applying the power of diversity of thought to the global identity market.

### Why join Auth0? 

Three things intrigued me. 

First, you, Eugenio [Pace], Matias [Woloski], were upfront and transparent about challenges. More importantly, though, Auth0’s mission and roadmap was compelling. 

Second, I really enjoy the people interaction that comes from working with a global team. But Auth0’s engineering talent spread across many countries presents an interesting time zone challenge.

Third, the technological challenges presented with Auth0’s high growth. Auth0 needs to work across 21 deployment regions to securely and reliably support billions of logins a month while continuously calling the team and technology to meet growth demands. This is an area where I can help and learn at the same time. Bottom line? I see the high growth and complexity of challenges ahead as an opportunity to make a larger impact.

### Now that you’re here, what are your short-term goals?

In the short term, hiring is my top priority. Even before Okta’s acquisition, Auth0 had big hiring goals. I am currently partnering with multiple teams and leaders on our hiring and onboarding strategy. At Auth0, we are solving hard problems around authentication, security, scale, and a product that needs to be highly available, along with continuous innovation in the identity space. So making sure new engineers understand that when they come to Auth0, they’re going to get to solve hard problems with leadership support (which means mentorship, team building, and securing proper funding) and strong cross-org alignment, specifically with product and process teams.

### Longer-term?

Mid-term, I’m looking to build Auth0’s engineering vision and roadmap to align our technology investments and product innovation plans. This will also play into our longer-term Okta + Auth0 vision. As a team, we are constantly innovating and making big bets. It is important that we build external awareness of key initiatives (watch for more engineering-specific content) to help continue attracting top talent and satisfying evolving customer needs.

### If I’m a new or current engineer at Auth0, what kind of leadership can I expect from you?

Table stakes for me are genuine empathy. But if I am going to ask you to rally behind me, there are really four core qualities that I look for in leaders, whether I am looking in the mirror or at leadership across an org.

1. **High-accountability.** Everyone is going to make mistakes. I hold myself highly accountable for what happens in my org. This helps build team integrity, trust, and collective ethics. The point is never to be mistake-free but to make sure we take the time to learn from our mistakes.
2. **Listening-based communication.** For a lot of people, listening is passive. For me, active listening means checking that you’ve effectively communicated what needs to be communicated and making sure it was received correctly. Information and feedback need to flow both ways, which is also key to building a transparent organization.
3. **Planning long-term.** As we look at our organization and tech stack, we need to invest in our long-term vision and strategy along with making short-term bets and wins. Aligning engineering with our vision and long-term goals means investing in people, investing in our technology, and strengthening innovation. 
4. **Investing in leaders.** The mentors I wanted and needed weren’t right there at the start of my career. If I could go back and change something in my own career, it would be to mentor sooner. Investing in developing team leadership through mentoring, coaching, or providing access to additional training and contacts can make a huge difference in the amount of creativity and innovation that comes out of an org. But more importantly, it helps keep the entire industry growing and innovating. I ensure that I am coaching my leaders to grow, and together we are building an organization inspired by learning and problem-solving. I also make every effort in connecting with underrepresented groups regularly and evaluate how effectively I help them to achieve their goals. If you’re on my team and would appreciate mentorship, I will either mentor you directly or connect you with someone within my network.

### What did it take to break into executive roles? Especially if you’re a woman or underrepresented person in tech, what five steps should you take to break in?

1. **Say yes to stretch assignments.** Mentors or coaches are usually telling you what’s happening, but if an opportunity comes your way, it means someone has vouched for you. Of course, you need to evaluate whether or not this assignment is right for you at this point in your life, but if you can, say “yes”. 
2. **Seek mentors — and trust them to identify your gaps.** We all have self-doubts, but I sometimes see women calling out “gaps” that I don’t really see as their weakness. Finding a mentor who can confirm your true gaps and strengths is critical. Then it’s important to do that homework to actively address the things you need to do in order to reach that goal.
3. **Get comfortable with taking risks and failing.** As an executive, the situations that come your way usually do not have a playbook. Being comfortable with taking risks, failing, and learning from the experience is the only path forward.  
4. **Network.** Look for peers (in addition to mentors) that you can lean on and ask for best practices. This is easier for some than others. Here are concrete steps that work: 
* **Talk to your manager and express interest in mentorship.** Your manager can lean in and help and/or provide recommendations and intros to other mentors.
* **Reach out to your People/Human Resources partner for mentorship.** They can connect you with internal mentors, in addition to external opportunities.
* **Identify your goals.** Work on self-awareness. Avoid an open-ended discussion. Identify two to three areas you’d like to work on. This will make it easier for your network to help you take action that matters. 

### Our security team talks about relying on “diversity of thought” to help secure our product and ensure a stronger security culture that protects our customers and the internet. How does diverse thinking help fuel an effective engineering team?

Security is part of engineering, and the teams collaborate closely to identify solutions grounded in the [Secure by Design approach](https://auth0.com/blog/why-auth0-is-shifting-left-on-security/). Diverse backgrounds bring diverse thoughts with multiple perspectives to get us to the right solution for all our customers. Auth0 was not created for just one company in the US or one company in another country. Our customer space requires a large global setup. One perspective just won’t work.

**Tell me about why you joined [Neythri Futures Fund](https://www.linkedin.com/company/neythri-futures-fund/) (NFF) as a founding Limited Partner.** 

The core reason we all came together to found the NFF was to fuel diversity at the top. We focus specifically on funding companies founded by women and underrepresented groups because we weren’t seeing women investors in this space. If you want to fuel diversity, you have to fund it.

**What makes a good ally?** 

We all feel we should know the answer here, but this is an evolving area. I am a continual learner in this space, so this means making sure I am listening and aware that I am going to make mistakes. Not intentionally, of course, but coming from a place of being comfortable with learning and listening hopefully makes it easier for others to point out my mistakes so I can learn from them. Immediately trying to fix everything is not the answer. The constant learning can’t stop with me. I need to pass it on to my team, leadership, and my network. We need to share what we learn to build collective awareness in this area.

### After being through more than five acquisitions, what kind of leadership does it take to move companies through mergers and acquisitions towards success for both employees and customers?

* **Aligning mission and core values.** How does the acquiree fit in/influence the mission?
* **Bringing people along through communication.** An acquisition is change management at a grand scale. Being clear about challenges and opportunities, especially for growth acquisitions, helps people bring the collaborative vision into reality.
* **Put together a plan for how you will bring people together — and actively communicate that plan.**
* **Understand that this is a complex process.** Know that there are areas that might not work out, while there are people who thrive on complex challenges. Actively choose to let those people lead and bring in those who are looking to work collaboratively. Frankly, I’m excited to be able to help Okta and Auth0 at this time.

## Learn more about identity and opportunities at Auth0

* If you’d like to learn more about how Auth0 can help speed your product to market, reach [out to our team](https://auth0.com/contact-us).
* If you’re interested in helping us solve complex problems, you’ll find [current listings here](https://auth0.com/careers/).

Auth0 Welcomes Bhawna Singh to the Team

auziros:jeana-tahnk

Jeana has been in the tech industry for 15+ years, both as a communications professional and writer. As Director of Global Communications at Auth0, she works with her internal team and external agencies to amplify the company's visibility worldwide and establish its leadership in the identity industry. When she is not working, she can most likely be found on a field watching one of her three kids playing sports, or cleaning up after her one-year-old retriever who chews everything.

Senior Director, Global Communications

Jeana Tahnk

Developer input on purchasing decisions critical for productivity and satisfaction

**BELLEVUE, Wash. – Oct. 21, 2020 –** The [Auth0](https://auth0.com/) Identity Platform, a product unit within Okta, today announced the results of a global survey entitled, "[How Development Teams Purchase SaaS](https://auth0.com/resources/whitepapers/how-development-teams-purchase-saas)," sponsored in partnership with Bessemer Venture Partners(1). This digital research survey, operated by SD Times—encompassing respondents from a range of company sizes, industries, regions, and roles within an application development team—revealed two trends: Companies that implement more SaaS components innovate faster than those that don't, and those that do innovate faster are relying more heavily on developer teams for input in SaaS purchasing decisions. 

Building software has become a necessity for companies to stay competitive in today's highly cloud-dominated market. SaaS components like authentication, monitoring, and payment processing provide invaluable building blocks to development teams, enabling them to build applications faster and smarter. The survey findings show a correlation between using SaaS components and speed and frequency of releasing new services, including:

* More than half of survey respondents (51%) who released new features once a month or faster used SaaS components in more than half of their applications. 
* 80% of respondents who released new features more slowly (between 1-12 months) do not use SaaS components in the majority of their applications.
* Using SaaS components for 'time savings and agility' was cited as the number one reason why they are implemented (76%), followed by 'features and functionality,' and 'utilizing technical expertise.' 

There is still tremendous market opportunity for SaaS component integration that remains untapped, and 58% of respondents say their companies will increase investment in third-party SaaS services over the next year. The application components cited as being the most burdensome to build in-house were: 1) Payment processing; 2) Authentication; 3) Data Management and Storage. Implementing SaaS components for each function are well worth the investment. Of the respondents that use a SaaS platform for authentication, 83% cited a reduction in time-to-market. 

"As early investors in the category, we've been stunned by the massive growth of cloud computing this year, especially during these challenging times," said Ethan Kurzweil, partner at Bessemer Venture Partners. "2020 provided evidence that the cloud is the underlying foundation to digital operations and delivery of software. Now more than ever, enterprises across the globe need to integrate SaaS components to save time, cost and deliver on product innovation. Auth0's survey underscores the value and role developer platforms play in driving the speed and value of software development."

The way in which SaaS components get selected was also an overriding theme of the survey, revealing that developers care greatly about being consulted in SaaS component purchase decisions. The survey also found resounding results around the way in which these companies are integrating development teams' feedback into their SaaS purchasing decisions. Having a say in which SaaS components are selected matters to 91% of developers and results in a vast majority citing overall job satisfaction (88%) and increased productivity (87%).

"The purchasing power [of SaaS components] isn't held exclusively by the executive team at Toast, but rather it's a collaborative effort between the development team's recommendation and the business's requirements," said Chance Kirsch, staff software engineer at Toast. 

"Auth0 was founded on the idea of empowering developers so they can focus on innovation that matters for their customers. This survey only amplifies that belief, and it's fantastic to see their increasingly influential role at their companies when making important business-driving decisions," said Shiven Ramji, Chief Product Officer at Auth0. "This survey reinforces the power that SaaS components have on overall productivity and team collaboration. We are still in the early days of adoption, and services like authentication will continue to see increases in adoption, especially as the use of SaaS components becomes ubiquitous."

Operated by SD Times, this was a blind online survey to a global audience of 352 respondents, 64% from North America, 20% from EMEA, 15% from APAC, and 1% from South America. For more detailed information, please visit Auth0's Resources page to download the full "[How Development Teams Purchase SaaS](https://auth0.com/resources/whitepapers/how-development-teams-purchase-saas)" survey results. 

(1): Bessemer Venture Partners is an investor of Auth0. 

<include src="asides/AboutAuth0" />

### Media Contacts:
Global Communications 
Auth0 
[press@auth0.com](mailto:press@auth0.com) 

Matter for Auth0 
[auth0@matternow.com](mailto:auth0@matternow.com)

Companies That Use SaaS Components Innovate and Launch Products Faster, According to Auth0 Survey

jenny-obrien

I'm a former business journalist who's fascinated by the intersection of tech and business strategy — in particular how the right solution can transform an idea into reality. I specialize in ROI, data privacy, and identity.

Business Content Manager

Jenny O'Brien

Gain cloud flexibility and agility while maintaining security and control

Amazon famously brought [book publishing “to its knees”](https://mashable.com/2014/07/30/amazon-has-killed-publishers-they-just-dont-know-it-yet/) by dominating distribution, creating eBooks, and transforming the publishing world with its own titles and opportunity for authors to self publish. 

In 2018, [Amazon entered the insurance market in India](https://www.insurancebusinessmag.com/us/news/breaking-news/amazon-set-to-file-for-insurance-licence-111581.aspx). [And in 2019, the U.S.](https://www.geekwire.com/2019/amazon-jpmorgan-roll-new-health-insurance-plans-part-haven-joint-venture/) 

After killing off [car insurance comparison tools](https://www.businessinsider.com/google-kills-auto-insurance-comparison-tool-2016-2), Google’s invested in [insurance agency software](https://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2019/01/02/513324.htm) and signaled further interest in the market. 

In other words, digital transformation is already here. 

While industry complexities afford some protection, they offer greater opportunity for insiders, says TechCrunch. 

A recent [J.D. Power survey](https://www.jdpower.com/business/press-releases/2019-us-home-insurance-study) on customer satisfaction with home insurance noted that the home insurance business model was “primed for change” and that “weak points in customer experience offered an opportunity for startups.” 

The other side of the desire for customer experiences that are real-time and online is the fact that FinServs are tasked with protecting hackers’ favorite data targets. And the [global rise in data privacy regulation](https://auth0.com/explore/data-privacy/) makes stronger protections important from customer, legal, and compliance perspectives.

While digital transformation can seem daunting for incumbents relying on decades of legacy code, the right identity solution can create seamless customer experiences while increasing your data protection — even if you’re an incumbent partnering with (or acquiring an) up and coming Insurtech startup.

Forbes expects [XaaS (everything as a service), UX, CX (User/Customer Experience), and digital privacy](https://www.forbes.com/sites/danielnewman/2019/07/14/top-10-digital-transformation-trends-for-2020/#3dfc8bdc76be) to “take center stage” in as a digital transformation trend 2020. Like other industries, the need to streamline services, reduce capital expenditures, and be increasingly agile and innovative is fueling FinServ’s change. But FinServ’s need for security, stability, and high availability kept many systems in On-Prem solutions that have proven expensive to scale and maintain — putting the ability to keep up with evolving customer expectations at risk.

For FinServ’s looking to innovate (or even just keep pace), Public Cloud is often touted as an option, but it isn’t the best choice. Public Cloud outages and uptimes provide a strong reason to go private. Auth0 Private Cloud helps (or eliminate) that risk, by providing a secure, flexible, extensible solution. 

![Deployment Options Diagram](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/23TVeU9N9cKlxxrenpT6hA/ae7991f61be42885833856bed91a74f7/deployment_options_diagram)

## Why Is Private Cloud Particularly Suited for Finserv Environments

For many years, incumbent FinServs have been buffered by deep compliance capabilities and an established customer base. But FinTech disruptors have eroded that edge says a recent PWC [report](https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/financial-services/assets/pdf/technology2020-and-beyond.pdf), in part because successful disruptors are able to offer a stronger customer experience at a lower cost to customers and with less investment. 

To solidify standing and increase the customer base in this environment, FinServ’s need to:

* Improve customer experience
* Keep ahead of evolving data privacy regulations
* Reduce costs without sacrificing cybersecurity

The data that FinServs hold makes them a prime target for hackers — and the sheer company scale usually means millions of breached accounts, rather than thousands. Globally, the increase in data privacy laws like GDPR and CCPA demonstrates that regulators have lowered tolerance for breaches and expect greater protections to be in place. When not implementing features like multi-factor authentication (MFA) can hit an insurer with a large fine, like what happened to [Dutch public insurance company UWV](https://auth0.com/blog/gdpr-fines-hit-these-companies-hard-heres-how-to-avoid-them/), the need for greater security while still ensuring flexibility becomes more appealing.

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="The data that FinServs hold makes them a prime target for hackers — how Private Cloud can help."/>

From an identity perspective, let’s take a closer look at what Auth0 Private Cloud can mean for key digital transformation considerations.

### Performance at Scale
The most innovative solution in the world does zero good if it doesn’t offer you the performance you need. Auth0 Private Cloud offers request-per-second (rps) baseline is higher than public cloud, with the option of adding on capacity up to 1500 rps.

### Reliable High Availability
FinServ is more aware than most industries the dramatic impact of service interruptions, especially given the pressures of changing global conditions. High availability helps guard against those challenges, especially since Private Cloud can be deployed between two regions to provide failover.

### Control & Segregation
Managed Private Cloud offers a fully-isolated development environment that is updated independently from the production environment. Standard Private Cloud is a single instance production environment. Both Standard Private Cloud and Managed Private Cloud meet standards that require all data to be housed within specific regions.

### Free Developers to Improve Customer Experience
For a developer coming up with an innovative solution while working only On-Prem can feel like trying to code while wearing handcuffs — it’s hard to even get your hands on the keyboard. 

To keep up with the pace of customer’s hunger for real-time innovations, streams of data from connected vehicles and smart homes, and the data privacy compliance requirements from laws like GDPR and CCPA, developers need not only the flexibility but also the scale of a [cloud deployment](https://auth0.com/cloud). And they need that deployment to be secure and reliable enough to handle the demands of enterprises whose customers are often interacting during moments of high stress or need.

### Unify Legacy and New Data Stores
Unifying legacy and new data stores can be a giant headache, as well as a source of weeks of downtime without a plug-n-play identity solution that allows bulk imports, but can also streamline user migration without expensive forced password resets – whether unifying stores at a single organization or when an incumbent partners or acquires an insurance startup.

### Support for Different Languages/Architectures (SDK)
Aside from unifying data stores, incumbent companies often rely on a maze of programming languages and architectures. Shutting down one part of the maze can have unexpected consequences if all the interrelationships aren’t fully mapped out or even understood due to poorly commented code or loss of institutional knowledge due to attrition or staffing turnover.

Your devs will be a lot happier (and more productive) when working with an identity solution that can handle multiple programming languages and architectures and already has SDKs (software development kits) that can be dropped into place to provide rapid access to functionality. And the right solution gives you the flexibility to map the maze at your own pace, reducing costs by removing unnecessary middleware, maintenance, and security as you deem appropriate.

### Extensibility
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/kCmU4EMMPf0" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

The real world is a messy place where you might have an out-of-the-box tool that needs to be integrated with custom code. The ability to inject code into the Auth0 Identity solution means that developers can handle the last-mile customizations that execute on the C-suite’s business strategy without weeks of downtime or missed opportunities. To delve into this topic in greater technical detail, you might also check out Auth0 Principal Architect Vittorio Bertocci’s whitepaper “[The Tao of Extensibility.](https://auth0.com/resources/whitepapers/tao-of-extensibility)”

## Support and Failover
Uptimes, updates, failovers, and support can have a big impact on the success of your deployment. 

With Public Cloud coming in with an uptime SLA of 99.90%, Private Cloud offers a stronger uptime SLA of 99.95% with the option to upgrade to maxim uptime guarantees of 99.99%. Geo redundancy can provide resiliency against catastrophic events. As mentioned above, Private Cloud offers failover between two geographic regions. 

For teams that would appreciate additional support, Auth0 offers a support SLA as an add-on, as well as the add-on option to work with the skilled identity experts on our Professional Services team.

## Managed Private Cloud vs. Standard Private Cloud
Let’s take a look at the different deployment Private Cloud models and benefits, including a checklist to help you assess deployment needs.

**Standard Private Cloud** is a low touch engagement model that offers additional power, security and compliance* benefits through an isolated tenant just for a single customer. Uptime SLA is 99.95% with an upgrade possible to 99.99%. PCI compliance is available as an add-on.

**Managed Private Cloud** is a high-touch engagement model where customers are much more involved with all aspects of this deployment model. Our team will work closely with the customer to ensure all aspects of their Auth0 environment are tuned for what best suits their business needs. Uptime is 99.99%. PCI compliance is available as an add-on.

**Reasons to choose Managed Private Cloud** * **Choice of update frequency** Coordinated with Auth0 (required once per 3 months). The update cycle begins with the Pre-Production Environment.
* **A separate DEV (Pre-Production) environment** Fully-isolated and independently updated instance for development and testing (Single Node)
* **On-demand scaling** WIll scale customer environment for any spikes * **Load Testing** 4x Load Testing per year with dedicated Auth0 MSE Support * **Customer-hosted AWS deployment** More **control** over the environment * **GEO-HA deployment option** Datacenter **redundancy** and automatic **failure handling**. 
 
**Reasons to choose Standard Private Cloud**
* ***Doesn’t require any of the Managed Private Cloud reasons***
* **More cost-effective**
* **Less involved with managing the deployment** The customer is looking for an offering that feels similar to a standard Public Cloud SaaS but has isolation and the other advantages of our Private SaaS Deployments. |

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="Legacy code can make #digitaltransformation feel like a high hurdle for FinServs. Find out how Private Cloud can help securely smooth the jum"/>

## Reduce Risk, Increase Innovation With Private Cloud
Like identity, digital transformation is not a one-and-done solution, but an ongoing need to keep pace with the evolution of technological change. Auth0 Private Cloud provides the flexibility, agility offered by cloud deployments but allows FinServ’s to maintain the control and security they need to protect their customers and their businesses. Your IAM solution is a critical component of your security strategy, but even if you’re dealing with decades of legacy code, you don’t need to sit down and build it in-house. The more secure option is to let identity experts protect those critical credentials, freeing your team (and resources) to focus on what you do best. Identity no longer needs to be a roadblock or an afterthought. Identity Access Management (IAM) is an essential component of customer security and privacy. If you’d like to learn more about how Auth0 Private Cloud might work for your particular situation, please reach out to an [Auth0 resource](https://auth0.com/).

How FinServs Can Reduce Risk, Increase Innovation with Private Cloud

auziros:mckenzie-mayer

Customer Identity (CIAM) Product Comms lead, driving collective storytelling across Okta and Auth0. Making technology accessible for everyone.

Customer Identity Product Comms Lead at Okta

McKenzie Mayer

Auth0 will provide identity-as-a-service for Israel’s renowned innovation scene

**LONDON – 10 February 2020 –** The [Auth0](https://auth0.com/) Identity Platform, a product unit within Okta, today announced a strategic partnership with [Malam-Team](https://www.malamteam.com/), Israel’s largest local systems integrator and IT products and services supplier. Team-Software, the software division of the Malam-Team group, will represent Auth0 with local expertise to help Israeli customers accelerate their identity management innovation.

Auth0 is the only identity management platform designed for application builders: product managers, software architects, security professionals, developers, and more. With a modular, extensible design, Auth0 allows builders to simply connect authentication and authorization to any application, whether web, mobile, IoT, or internal. Founded by two Microsoft developers, the company secures 100 million logins per day and protects 11 million applications for 9,000 customers around the world, including Atlassian, [Siemens](https://auth0.com/blog/auth0-powers-centralized-login-for-siemens-hundreds-of-applications-worldwide/), and [Otonomo](https://auth0.com/learn/otonomo-saves-200000-annually-auth0/).

“The addition of Auth0 is a strategic decision to support our clients building the next generation of software. The market in Israel has changed as companies of all sizes have embraced modern cloud, DevOps, and cybersecurity solutions,” said Dror Reifer, Director of Sales at Malam-Team Software innovation division. “Auth0 specializes in the quick and easy integration of identity management into apps and services, and we are delighted to welcome them to our portfolio.”

Israel is recognized as a world leader in innovation, having spent nearly 5% of its GDP on [research and development](https://www.cbs.gov.il/en/mediarelease/pages/2019/the-national-expenditure-on-civilian-research-and-development-in-2018.aspx) in recent years. The partnership between Malam-Team and Auth0 will ensure companies do not have to reinvent or maintain the complexity of identity management solutions themselves, but can instead focus on their core business.

“Malam-Team is unique in that they offer holistic sales, marketing, and product support for their partners,” said Bill Lapcevic, VP of business development at Auth0. “The powerful combination of Malam-Team’s decades of proven expertise and Auth0’s flexible platform helps Israeli companies overcome the complexity of developing homegrown identity solutions for their applications.”

Learn more about the [Auth0 partner program](https://auth0.com/partners), and visit Malam-Team and Auth0 at the [AWS Summit in Tel Aviv](https://aws.amazon.com/events/summits/tel-aviv/) on May 6, 2020.

<include src="asides/AboutAuth0" />

### Media Contacts
Mark Fowler 
 Racepoint Global for Auth0, EMEA  
auth0@racepointglobal.com 
+44 (0) 77 1124 4113

Auth0 Expands to Israel with MalamTeam Partnership

Sporting goods retailer’s commitment to constant digital innovation drives enhanced login

**BELLEVUE, Wash. – December 11, 2019 –** The [Auth0](https://auth0.com/) Identity Platform, a product unit within Okta, today announced that it has been selected by DICK’S Sporting Goods, a leading omnichannel sporting goods retailer, to provide a superior customer login experience for every customer (‘athlete’) who interacts with the online brand. Auth0 will power the login experience for DICK’S digital properties – website and mobile – and enable athletes to access information and merchandise with even more ease and security than before. 

DICK’S is a leading omnichannel sporting goods retailer that offers an extensive assortment of authentic, high-quality sports equipment, apparel, footwear, and accessories. Headquartered in Pittsburgh, PA, DICK’S caters to millions of athletes’ sporting goods needs on its digital website, [www.dickssportinggoods.com](http://www.dickssportinggoods.com). This past year, DICK’S embarked on a digital transformation project that included identity management as a critical component. 

In addition to implementing [Single Sign On](https://auth0.com/single-sign-on/), they also wanted to have a modern identity solution that offers leading-edge options, such as passwordless authentication. 

“Our athletes and their experience on our digital properties is one of the most important factors in retaining our loyal fan base and continuing to expand our business to new audiences,” said Bob Pecina, VP of Technology, DICK’S. “After a solid review of solutions on the market, Auth0 provided us with the ease-of-use and scalability we were looking for in an identity management solution. They could also achieve our time-to-market goals, which was a deciding factor with the upcoming holiday season.” 

DICK’S will roll out new login features across its digital brands in the next few months and continue to leverage Auth0’s many product features to continually enhance the user experience. 

“Working with DICK’S and the scale in which they need to support their massive fan base is so exciting, and is certainly something our platform is designed to handle,” said Ghazi Masood, VP of Americas for Auth0. “We are especially thrilled to support DICK’S during this holiday season, and provide its loyal athletes with the ability to digitally access what they need as easily and securely as possible.” 

Auth0 is proud to help DICK’S and other major enterprises stay ahead of the competition by creating a better login experience. For more information about [Auth0’s customers](https://auth0.com/customers), please visit the company’s website. 

<include src="asides/AboutAuth0" />

### Media Contacts

Kaycie East 
Auth0 Communications 
[press@auth0.com](mailto:press@auth0.com)

Alex Plew 
Matter for Auth0 
[auth0@matternow.com](mailto:auth0@matternow.com)

DICK’S Sporting Goods Turns to Auth0 for Industry-Leading Login Experience

ec1c9350c3d2306e7c42b9307bea93de?s=480&r=pg&d=https%3A%2F%2Fcdn avatar

ec1c9350c3d2306e7c42b9307bea93de?s=480&r=pg&d=https%3A%2F%2Fcdn

I like working at Auth0 because I’m interested in how to scale a startup and training the next generation of identity experts.

Strategic Operations and Technical Field Enablement Director

Yvonne Wilson

Five critical identity features to help you rapidly innovate your business strategy

You can’t buy digital transformation off the shelf.

Digital transformations are driven by a fundamental rethinking of business strategy that creates new business models and innovative services that offer your customers more personalized experience and significant new value.

A few examples of innovative digital transformation:

- **Provide expertise**: A medical insurance company provides a smartphone app that helps people evaluate illnesses and obtain advice on whether they need to visit a doctor. The ability to get immediate advice provides assurance to customers without adding the cost of non-essential visits to doctors offices and emergency rooms.

* **Utilize simulations**: Manufacturers of expensive equipment that is costly to reconfigure such as wind turbines in a wind farm add sensors that feed into simulation apps. Simulation enables customers to experiment faster and with less cost to identify the best configuration to use with a product. This helps customers maximize the benefits they get from products faster, which increases customer satisfaction.

- **Change revenue model**: Vendors of physical products convert a product into a subscription service to create an ongoing revenue stream, with apps to manage the new service. For example, instead of selling lightbulbs, providing lighting as a service so building owners no longer worry about buying and replacing lightbulbs. This provides a helpful service to customers and an ongoing, service-based revenue stream to the lightbulb vendor.

* **Monitor systems**: Manufacturers can add monitoring capability into products to enable remote monitoring via apps to give customers status and early warning of likely failures in equipment or services they’ve purchased. This applies to everything from medical devices to heavy construction equipment to locomotives. Access to granular sensor data helps prevent downtime in critical equipment and increases customer visibility and satisfaction.

* **Multi and Omnichannel**: Almost any business can use digital transformation to integrate customer experience across multiple sales channels and platforms to deliver better customer experience. Orders placed on a website can send alerts with shipping updates or in-store pickup data to a customer’s phone. A customer in a retail store can take a picture of a product in an app that pulls up all the relevant product information from the website. This provides better information to a customer and enables staff to spend time helping customers in other ways.

Digital transformation drives how an organization combines technology, people, and processes to deliver new or creatively updated services that help customers solve problems, gain new insights and save time.

For innovation to provide a competitive advantage, it has to be unique to your business, which often requires some custom applications. The applications created as part of digital transformation require several different Identity Management features.

## **Critical Identity Features for Digital Transformation Apps**

Auth0 has worked with customers in many industries on creating the identity management foundation for their digital transformations. We’ve identified five common identity requirements for successful digital transformation projects.

### Feature #1: Readying Authentication

Almost every digital transformation project involves applications that need to authenticate users, but most teams can’t afford the time to research obscure authentication protocols and it’s highly likely that the project could require consolidating or connecting to legacy systems. Ultimately, teams need a secure authentication platform that’s easy to integrate with applications and that solves the problem of legacy user stores, so the team can focus on delivering innovation and business value.

If a project involves sensitive data, you’ll want to offer your customers the added protection of multi-factor authentication that’s convenient to use.

### Feature #2: Extensible User Profiles for Customized User Experience

Delivering a personalized experience to users requires that applications have access to user profile data. This requires the ability to consolidate or integrate disparate sources of user profile data if they are spread across legacy repositories. It also frequently calls for the ability to customize the user profile information available to your applications.

### Feature #3: Swiss Army Knife of Identity &mdash; Authentication Hub

Many digital transformation projects involve collaboration and the need to authenticate users from partners, business customers, and consumers. Some organizations will demand that you support their chosen identity service (bring-your-own-identity) so they retain centralized control over their users’ accounts. This requires supporting many different authentication protocols such as SAML, OIDC, and myriad custom implementations by different social providers.

### Feature #4: Omnichannel &mdash; Be Mobile Ready

As digital transformation initiatives progress, they need to integrate services across different device channels, known as providing multi-channel and omnichannel service. This demands a similar authentication experience across different device types for an integrated customer experience.

### Feature #5: Authorization

Digital transformation projects require the agility of application architectures based on APIs which can be evolved rapidly. Security demands proper authorization to access those APIs for both applications and users. This requires an extensible authorization platform to govern access for users, applications, and APIs.

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="Find out what are the critical identity features often required for #digitaltransformation wins."/>

## **Auth0 Has You Covered**

Auth0’s authentication and authorization platform can be easily integrated into your applications and provides each of the critical features described above, so your project is successful.

### Authentication

Auth0 provides an authentication service, complete with user login and signup features, that can be customized and branded, as needed, with minimal effort. Auth0 can support authentication against legacy databases or help you migrate users out of legacy repositories if needed. With Auth0 you can also turn on multi-factor authentication with a toggle, immediately offering stronger authentication to protect your customers’ data.

[_Auth0's Lightweight Universal Login_](https://auth0.com/universal-login)

![Auth0's Lightweight Universal Login Auth0](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/54lZ5srDBAM0dqWSRkdxXk/f4260dcf2af6e7b5b4a52c62769e0745/lightweight-login)

### User Profiles

Auth0 provides options for migrating and consolidating user profiles from legacy databases, and the ability to deliver customized user profile data to applications. Auth0 features can optionally be used to migrate users from legacy data stores into one consolidated repository. You can also customize the user profile data within Auth0 and deliver selected custom attributes to applications in signed security tokens. This enables your applications to deliver a more customized experience for each user.

[_Customized User Profile_](https://auth0.com/docs/users/concepts/overview-user-metadata?origin_team=T025590N6#metadata-usage)

```json
{
 "emails": "jane.doe@example.com",
 "user_metadata": {
 "hobby": "surfing",
 "room_preferences": ["king", "finance_news", "quiet"],
 "preferred_language": ["french"]
 },
 "app_metadata": {
 "plan": "full",
 "hotel_addons": ["tour", "laundry", "biz-center", "spa"],
 "last_visit": "2019_05_09"
 }
}
```

[_User Profiles_](https://auth0.com/docs/users/concepts/overview-user-profile)

![Image of Auth0 Dashboard showing the User Details view](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/2g54DuahgxCZudEUI1NY6o/dd7f81ff935b5be0ca273119b19aec82/user1)

> You can use the [Auth0 Dashboard](https://auth0.com/docs/dashboard) to manage your users.

### Authentication Hub

Auth0 supports connections to a wide array of identity providers so your application doesn’t have to directly support different protocols and the implementation specifics of each one. This allows you to easily say, "yes!" to customers and partners who demand a bring-your-own-identity model.

[_Auth0 Social Identity Providers_](https://auth0.com/docs/identityproviders#social)

![An image of Auth0 social identity providers](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/37EouP087RNF0DWID3IlnJ/5348b16e147d1a43e56f4113ed188967/auth0-social-connections)

[_Auth0 Enterprise Identity Providers_](https://auth0.com/docs/identityproviders#social)

![An image of Auth0 enterprise identity providers](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/5rYXcu5W2mlJja6MoI54wl/e19e75742220340589a7bef2a337fa18/enterprise-social-connections)

### Cross-Platform Support

Auth0 provides SDKs for popular languages and platforms, enabling you to deliver a unified authentication experience across both desktop and mobile platforms to support your multi-channel and omnichannel initiatives.

[_Auth0 SDKs_](https://auth0.com/docs/libraries#auth0-sdks)

![An image of Auth0 supported frameworks and languages](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/6JeMxaoncqQuRu0BaW9UPQ/708fa3cadce011d0970c3173dca33124/auth0-sdks)

[_Authentication Platform_](https://auth0.com/)

![Authentication Platform](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/1anAYpgtGaLXDdenMcZRZx/72a706ca6ef5c18d2ae004b5ba7cd385/authentication-platform)

### Authorization

Auth0’s authorization features make it convenient for you to protect the data you manage by controlling exactly what each application and user can do. We provide a convenient configuration interface and deliver carefully scoped security tokens to your applications.

[_Authorization_](https://auth0.com/docs/authorization)

![Image of the Permissions view of the API section from the Auth0 Dashboard](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/6NZD2ZUvbHF2ipeBuENgql/a6e412e9acd339a0d50de089d56df44b/api-def-permissions)

[_API Authorization_](https://auth0.com/docs/api-auth)

```bash
https://YOUR_DOMAIN/authorize?
 response_type=code&
 client_id=YOUR_CLIENT_ID&
 redirect_uri=https://YOUR_APP/callback&
 scope=SCOPE&
 audience=API_AUDIENCE&
 state=STATE
```

> Example of making a [request to the authorization URL](https://auth0.com/docs/flows/guides/auth-code-pkce/call-api-auth-code-pkce#example-post-to-token-url) to get an authorization code.

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="You can't afford to be slowed down by identity management challenges while your team learns obscure authentication protocols. Speed up your #digitaltransformation with Auth0."/>

## Hitting Delivery Dates with Identity

You can’t buy digital transformation off the shelf, but you can buy an identity platform that starts delivering value out-of-the-box. With Auth0, you can easily consolidate legacy repositories of customers without password reset with [_trickle migration_](https://auth0.com/docs/users/guides/configure-automatic-migration), implement [_Single Sign On_](https://auth0.com/docs/sso/current) (SSO) for customer convenience, and take advantage of the latest standards and best practices for authentication and authorization, like OIDC and OAuth 2.0.

Competitive pressures and emerging privacy regulations demand that you innovate or renovate applications and deliver digital transformation at pace. You can’t afford to be slowed down by identity management challenges while your team struggles with complex authentication protocols. Your project team can focus on innovation and hitting delivery dates if you have an identity management solution that is fast to adopt — and easily extended as your project evolves.

In this post we’ve focused on the 5 common identity needs experienced across many different digital transformation projects, and how Auth0 supports those requirements. 

If you’d like to learn more about how Auth0 can help you score an early digital transformation win with identity, please reach out to an [_Auth0 resource_](mailto:sales@auth0.com).

<include src="asides/AboutAuth0" />

Why Identity is an Easy Win for Digital Transformation

Nationwide sub franchise digitally transforms mobile app to improve user experience

BELLEVUE, Wash. -- August 20, 2019 -- [Auth0](https://auth0.com/), a global leader in Identity-as-a-Service (IDaaS), today announced that it has been selected by Jersey Mike's Franchise Systems, Inc. to power the authentication behind its popular [mobile app](https://www.jerseymikes.com/app). The app provides hundreds of thousands of customers around the country with an efficient and engaging way to find locations, order on-the-go, earn and track loyalty points, and more.

Jersey Mike's, a fast-casual sub sandwich franchise with more than 2,000 locations open and under development nationwide, believes that making a sub sandwich and making a difference can be one in the same. As its customer base continued to grow, the company embarked on a digital transformation initiative to reinvigorate its mobile app and increase user adoption. Having previously relied on a proprietary authentication system developed in house, Jersey Mike's knew that one of the primary foundational elements of this transformation process needed to be identity management.

"Not only did we have a specific timeline for the transformation of our mobile app, but were also in need of a secure and efficient way to migrate users to the new platform without any action required on our customers' end," said Scott Scherer, CIO, Jersey Mike's Franchise Systems. "A digital innovation consultancy recommended Auth0 to us as a great fit for our needs, particularly, because of their ability to do bulk migration. This feature alone saved a large amount of time, and more importantly, enabled our customers to access the new app without needing to reset their passwords."

The app provides a seamless and secure login for Jersey Mike's loyal customers and now facilitates them getting information they need, whenever they need it. Auth0's bulk migration eliminated any burden on customers, further easing their overall experience with the Jersey Mike's brand.

"Without the right solutions, app modernization is complex and can be a harrowing process — one that presents a lot of technical and resource-laden obstacles," said Ghazi Masood, VP of Americas, Auth0. "Jersey Mike's was intent on not impacting their customers' login experience with the rollout of the new app and we are happy to have supported that. It is exciting to see the app's user adoption continue to rise."

<include src="asides/AboutAuth0" />

### Media Contacts

Jeana Tahnk 
Corporate Communications 
Auth0 
[press@auth0.com](mailto:press@auth0.com)

Meghan Gardner 
Matter for Auth0 
[mgardner@matternow.com](mailto:mgardner@matternow.com)

Jersey Mike’s Turns to Auth0 for Identity Management

London digital consultancy on why a culture of learning is key to continuous innovation

Founded by digital heavyweight Nuno Job, London-based [YLD](https://www.yld.io/) helps the world's leading organizations like [Canon](https://www.yld.io/case-study/canon-giving-stories-a-new-form), [Joyent](https://www.joyent.com/) (now part of Samsung), Microsoft and Google, build digital products used daily by millions.

Before YLD, [Job](https://www.linkedin.com/in/nunojob/) was Chief Commercial Officer at Nodejitsu responsible for the world's largest Node.js cloud. He joined forces with [Anthony Mann](https://uk.linkedin.com/in/anthony-mann-11251214), an Apple alum and founder of digital product agency, [Make Us Proud, now part of YLD](https://medium.com/yld-blog/yld-announces-a-merger-with-make-us-proud-cc53b8ad00e2). Together they are building a software engineering and design consultancy focused on continuous innovation.

"We embed ourselves within our clients' teams to ensure they learn and develop the capabilities to succeed well beyond our engagement," says Job. "This is how we achieve our goal of helping the world's leading companies stay ahead of the curve."

YLD actively contributes to the [open source community](https://www.yld.io/open-source/) (check them out on [Github](https://github.com/yldio) and [StackOverflow](https://stackoverflow.com/jobs/companies/yld)), proud members of OS foundations, and run meetups and tech conferences to teach new skills to current and prospective clients.

At Auth0, we are democratizing identity knowledge — see our [Learn Identity video series](https://t.co/2tntMIFpip?amp=1) and [Identicons](https://t.co/pKgxaCZFRl?amp=1), an open-source visual language for identity. YLD is a natural partner for us, and we recently hosted a joint training on how to build a [React Native App with Auth0](https://ti.to/yld-academy/auth0-yld-training-react-native-app) integration in two days.

Here we explore two case studies where we worked together to help a joint customer and YLD employees succeed in their digital business strategies.

## Customer Case Study: Gula Adds Auth0 to iOS and Android Apps in One Day

YLD put their culture of learning into practice by creating YLD Labs, a subsidiary company focused on ventures. Their newest venture project is [Gula](https://www.gula.pet/), a mobile app that offers video consultations with a local vet. The app enables timely, affordable, and relevant healthcare that addresses pet health problems and improves owner understanding of their pet.

YLD built Gula using [React Native](https://www.yld.io/speciality/react-native/) and chose Auth0 to cut time to market and offer a great customer experience. [Auth0 Rules](https://auth0.com/resources/videos/learn-how-to-use-auth0-rules) allowed YLD to deeply integrate user signup with Gula's app with no infrastructure needed. Using Auth0, they implemented authentication in Gula's iOS and Android apps [in one day](https://auth0.com/blog/the-real-roi-of-auth0-part-1-time-to-market/).

Auth0 also allowed Gula to offer social login with Google and Facebook with no extra effort.

![Gula's login using Social Login by Auth0](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/XDwzYijcUghAWvEOP00qg/e3c13036dd5e09b14d3a1e8e1fca17fe/gula-social-login-with-auth0)

Thanks to Auth0 and React Native, Gula went from an idea to an app in the hands of consumers in less than two months. The customisable solutions will allow them to swiftly manage change and support additional login capabilities, like [Sign In with Apple](https://auth0.com/blog/auth0-adds-sign-in-with-apple-as-ootb-integration/).

## Employee Case Study: YLD Builds Product Management Tool in Weeks Using Auth0 and PouchDb

With a culture of continuous innovation, YLD is always pushing themselves to improve internal processes by applying emerging technologies. By investing in Auth0 they were able provide frictionless authentication for several employee tools including a product management tool, called the "confidence framework," and a budget manager.

The confidence framework tool is a product management web app that incorporates the core concepts of a product management framework developed by YLD. Using Auth0 and [PouchDb](https://pouchdb.com/users.html), YLD built a working prototype of this tool in weeks. It leverages auth0.WebAuth, allows users to sign in with their company Google email, and is now used by YLD employees at client projects.

![Product Management Tool YLD built with Auth0 and PouchDb](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/29Iw76uADIbTnu4BuDHUtV/66cea262b3ec27ab14a176916cda92f7/yld-product-management-tool-built-with-auth0-and-pouchdb)

Additionally, YLD built a budget manager that leverages auth0.WebAuth, allows users to sign in with their company Google email, and restricts sign-ups to relevant employees. This tool enables employees across the business to access the budget for their department and the finance team to manage all budgets. Auth0 enabled YLD to create access control rules easily and in very little time.

![YLD created access control rules with Auth0](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/5tWi3EZ61ldwPbMnw0thKD/badfb60bc4ccfe41867f9e05b44c24cf/yld-using-control-rules)

## Digital Business Requires Continuous Innovation

According to KPMG, 71% of 1,000 UK workers agree that embracing [digital transformation is a key priority at their workplace](https://www.itproportal.com/news/uk-workers-are-seeing-digital-transformation-happening-at-work/). But becoming a truly digital business is not a quick-fix or one-time project. It requires a company-wide commitment to empowering people with the right tools, skills, and knowledge to succeed today and tomorrow, and Auth0 and YLD can help.

To learn more about how Auth0 and YLD can support your specific project or digital transformation, contact an [Auth0 resource](mailto:%20sales@auth0.com).

For more information on Auth0's Partner Program, visit: <https://auth0.com/partners>.

Partner Spotlight: YLD

Creating continual possibilities can be fast, secure — and still benefit your brand and bottom line

![Photo of the GO1 team that powers user's login experiences with Auth0](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/VqTCg8aa75ucLAOvLZvq5/05284c57fe39aa35892002d40de23b84/auth0-roi-innovation-go1-team)

You might have heard about [GO1](https://auth0.com/learn/go1-adaptable-authentication-service-built-scale/)'s recent VC round from Microsoft's M12 division. "GO1 is one of those rare companies that brings a consumer-led experience to an inherently enterprise product," M12's Principal Priya Saiprasad told [Business News Australia](https://www.businessnewsaus.com.au/articles/go1-bags-over--30-million-in-raise-led-by-microsoft.html). She goes on to compliment GO1's user experience: "GO1 is redefining how enterprises procure training content and how employees in turn consume it via a modern user-experience and a single subscription."

GO1 is powering that scalable user experience with Auth0. "If we didn't have Auth0, we'd probably need seven or eight developers focused on [identity]. Our teams now can spend much more time working on the improvements that our customers actually see and care about. Not having to spend time on that means that we get to spend time on everything else," says Chris Hood, CTO and Co-Founder, GO1.

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="GO1 is redefining how enterprises procure training content, @M12vc’s Principal Priya Saiprasad told @BusinessNewsAus. Find out why GO1 and others turn to Auth0 for innovation."/>

That savings adds up to more than $700,000 annually and enables GO1 to connect with any partner system. "If we were doing it ourselves, we would probably integrate with SAML and that's it," says Hood, referencing one of the languages commonly used to exchange authentication and authorization data. "But the benefit we have here is we get to have all the different types of integration." Those integrations have helped GO1 grow from one million users to 10 million in a single year.

Helping our customers remove repetitive implementation frees them to focus on what they do best &mdash; and, let's face it, seeing our customers rocket through VC rounds is always exciting.

## Recognized for Solving Different Needs

Building innovative products is a great way to inspire, attract, and retain top tech talent while boosting your company's bottom line. While your team is focused on your core mission, our core mission is innovating identity. And we were recently recognized by Frost & Sullivan in their 2019 Global Identity and Access Management Technology Innovation Awards. Auth0 is the only company featured for technology innovation in the corresponding Frost & Sullivan Best Practices [report](https://auth0.com/resources/whitepapers/frost-sullivan-global-iam-technology-award) for Global Identity and Access Management (IAM).

As the report states, "Approaching the market by solving universal use cases helps Auth0 attract customers with many different identity needs, such as increasing end-user adoption of certain applications, increasing security, or dealing with M&A activity. Rather than requiring customers to seek additional vendors when they need authentication for additional audiences, Auth0 supports any use case and can continue to serve as the identity platform."

But just because we've won an award doesn't mean we stop innovating as Auth0 CEO and Co-Founder Eugenio Pace explains in this short video [1:09 secs], innovation is a daily practice:

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/NxSBXVU04JQ" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe> 
 
## Decreasing Project Risk

Innovation isn't just ticking through the customer's ask list. It's thinking through the possibilities presented by identity and creating experiences like our [rolling (or trickle) migration](https://auth0.com/learn/migrate-user-database-auth0/), which makes it easy to move users to our enterprise-class database without losing them to password resets.

[Servcorp](https://auth0.com/learn/servcorp-saves-months-development-time-thanks-auth0/) is a dominant force in the work space industry boasting a presence on 4 continents, 60 cities and 25 countries. Their clients include many Fortune 500 companies and businesses of all sizes. "We were looking for something that would give us not only a single sign on or unified experience down the track, but something that offered us a very clean migration path from the disparate sources we had across Servcorp. [Auth0's] custom login scripts were very important as this meant we could do rolling migrations, which significantly decreased project risk. That whole migration strategy, no one else could do," Matthew Baumgartner, Global CIO, Servcorp

Having Auth0 tailor the authentication experience to specifically fit Servcorp's needs means that the time to onboard new applications has gone from weeks to around a day &mdash; freeing developers up to spend more time delighting Servcorp customers.

{% include tweet_quote.html quote_text="Innovation isn’t just ticking through your customer’s ask list. It’s about helping them see the possibilities of identity when expressed through the Auth0 platform. #realROIauth0"%}

## Collaboration Brings Success

We've been able to help our customers do some amazing things thanks to the benefits of listening and collaboration, but solving 'impossible' challenges is always fun. The Global IT Director Matt Tedder from [Sprinklr](https://auth0.com/learn/sprinklr-achieves-impossible-sso-with-auth0/) was working in a GDoc office, but people needed to access critical Microsoft products &mdash; just not all the time. They kept forgetting their passwords and he found his team wasting a lot of resources on resets. Single Sign On (SSO) for all would solve it, but Tedder was told it couldn't be done.

"I researched this a long time and didn't think there was a solution. I was on a fool's mission to see if I could do it myself. I got 50% of the way there, and then Nico [Sabena] from Auth0 gave me free, crazy good support when I wasn't even a customer, and we figured it out together," says Tedder.

Licenses can now be auto-assigned, even though this isn't an option in Office 365. With Auth0, Tedder handles this programmatically, rendering it seamless to the user.

![Illustration for The Real ROI of Auth0, Part 2: Innovation](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/36TUwtEx3fhy8CMt7ZPPRx/adbc6a106264f69f4b753ac1bbe32f14/the-real-roi-of-auth0-part-2-innovation)

## Supporting (And Providing) 'Continual Innovation'

Handling more than 25,000 business transactions yearly including sensitive capital raises, IPOs, mergers and acquisitions and audits, [Ansarada](https://auth0.com/learn/ansarada/) lands security high on their list of needs. But, as a company perpetually pushing better customer experiences, nearby sits continual innovation, which is part of why they chose Auth0.

"There's a real fine line between building features that customers ask for and providing features that take a leap beyond that and provide an exceptional experience to the customer that they didn't know they could get. Auth0 is innovating in that space and looking at better ways to provide more convenient authentication to customers while reducing security concerns for us and them," Steven Rogers, Chief Information and Security Officer, Ansarada.

We'll cover security in the next post of our Real ROI series.

## Resources

**The Real ROI of Auth0**
[The Real ROI of Auth0, Part 1: Time To Market](https://auth0.com/blog/the-real-roi-of-auth0-part-1-time-to-market/) 
The Real ROI of Auth0, Part 2: Innovation (you're reading Part 2) 
[The Real ROI of Auth0, Part 3: Security](https://auth0.com/blog/the-real-roi-of-auth0-part-3-security/) 
[The Real ROI of Auth0, Part 4: Maintenance](https://auth0.com/blog/the-real-roi-of-auth0-part-4-maintenance/) 

**Guidance**: Our [How to Have a Successful IDM Project series](https://auth0.com/blog/how-to-have-a-successful-idm-project/) goes into some innovative ways to solve identity. Also please check back regularly for practical posts on technology and identity best practices.

**Docs**: Customers often cite the benefit of our clear documentation and Jumpstarts. Get started [here](https://auth0.com/docs/).

**Questions?** Please reach out to an [Auth0 Resource](mailto:sales@auth0.com) if you'd like to learn how we can support your specific project or digital transformation.

The Real ROI of Auth0, Part 2: Innovation

How Auth0 can help you speed integration and encourage innovation.

Fueling innovation requires giving business units the support to solve their own challenges. But at large-scale enterprises, that often means dealing with the same problems again and again. Wasting time repeatedly solving identity — including [Single Sign On (SSO)](https://auth0.com/single-sign-on) and federation and [SAML integration](https://auth0.com/docs/protocols/saml) — from scratch is expensive, costing you innovation time while adding to the company’s bottom line.

Many companies compromise by investing in an out-of-the-box (OOTB) solution that fits most of the problems, sacrificing flexibility for key customizations teams need now — and in the future. These limited solutions not only disappoint, but also create the need for workarounds that steal development time from the core business. 

Centralizing identity, while allowing each department to customize their look and feel, and experience can eliminate these challenges. At Auth0, we have several customers successfully using this type of architecture across business units. 

## Case Study: Global Industrial Company (>350,000 employees)

One of the world’s largest industrial companies chose Auth0 for a hybrid B2B2C scenario. Operated by the company’s central IT department as a SaaS service, Auth0 allowed out-of-the-box multi-tenant capabilities via OIDC that could be customized as needed for partners and customers accessing the company’s applications accessible via the internet.

Centralized administration maintains tight administrative control, while allowing different business units and partners to configure their own apps and assets, such as custom domains, for their unique audiences. In this case, IT admins mandated an extra layer of protection through [multi-factor authentication (MFA)](https://auth0.com/multifactor-authentication), and very quickly “spin-up” sub-tenants for new business units and partners. The result has been organizational consistency across a widely diverse company, with faster time-to-market. 

For another success story of complexity, scale, and time-to-market, take a look at how our customer, Cimpress, integrated identity across multiple business units.

## Case Study: Cimpress Integrates New Unit in Five Minutes

Auth0 customer Cimpress having grown to more than 40 e-commerce sites in the last five years, considers business unit autonomy a sign of strength — except when it comes to technology. Still, they offer a choice rather than forcing all units to come over to Auth0. Being able to integrate a company like BuildASign in five minutes, though, often makes the case for them. Today, Cimpress manages seamless authentication for 1,500 applications across 500 microservices APIs and 100 UIs with the help of Auth0.

“Auth0 enables us to focus developer time on actual innovative work in the mass customization space. Every second that a developer doesn’t have to worry about how their callers are going to authenticate brings value to the organization,” [says Ryan Breen, Director, API Management, Cimpress](https://auth0.com/learn/new-business-accessed-cimpress-platform-5-minutes-auth0/).

## Deal with Complexity across Business Units with Auth0

Your customers don’t care how they log in. They just want to get to your app, but they do want to know they’re giving their credentials to the right place. Future-focused features like Auth0’s Single Sign On allow your customers to comfortably login across multiple brands and tailor their experience at the user- and unit-engagement level. Because Auth0 can handle any language or any stack, you can modernize identity for any business unit (even if they’re still dealing with legacy code). 

Centralizing identity allows you to control key aspects of identity, like multi-factor authentication, while allowing your business units to retain their own look and feel. If you’d like to learn how Auth0 can benefit your devs, business units, and your end users while solving your most complex use cases, reach out to [sales@auth0.com](mailto:sales@auth0.com).

<include src="asides/AboutAuth0" />

Identity Across Business Units

How innovation, customization can still speed time to market (and increase ROI)

The unisex t-shirt — fits everyone, right?

You know it doesn’t. Not all your employees. Not all your customers. 

But you got the bulk rate, so it’s good for the bottom line, right?

Unlike the t-shirt targeted for donation, one-size-fits-all identity can’t just be put to other uses. Your teams will be forced to come up with workarounds, delaying your time to market while driving up maintenance costs — and stealing your team away from your core business while shrinking your team’s innovation bandwidth to a trickle.

Doing identity wrong can lead to sleepless nights, poor user experiences, brand challenges, data-privacy-related fines, and security threats. [Doing it right](https://auth0.com/blog/how-to-have-a-successful-idm-project/) can enhance any digital transformation effort, [reduce development costs and maintenance overhead](https://auth0.com/blog/auth0-roi-how-are-you-calculating-your-build-formula/), and provide revenue-enhancing customer experiences. 

Ideally, your identity solution adapts to your end users’ needs (even if they don’t know what they are yet) rather than the other way around.

![An identity management solution can set you up for steady growth](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/3mYnaCAVsD5ifrgaOSp4s0/f9efa5f60b42e99bb5905687fd8533fb/roi)

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="Unlike the t-shirt targeted for donation, one-size-fits-all identity can’t just be put to other uses."/>

## Implementing at Future-Speed

During due diligence, many of our customers share that [competitor’s](https://auth0.com/auth0-vs) proofs-of-concepts can take months to execute and implementations, particularly in the B2B and B2C space can take longer even with just minimal customization. This time loss quickly negates the benefits of the one-size-fits-all solution. Auth0 believes that organizations should be entitled to the best of both from their IAM provider: value from day one out-of-the-box with the ability to easily adapt and customize over time — several key areas stand out:

### Scaling for Steady Growth and Spikes

Internal IAM solutions leveraged for external purposes often fail due to required scale.

Enterprises may manage tens, hundreds, or thousands of employee identities with an internal IAM, but customer identities can range well into the millions or even billions. The need for scale might be slow and steady, but customer use might spike during specific times of the year, say with the Super Bowl, like with Auth0 customer [fuboTV](https://auth0.com/learn/sports-centric-streaming-service-fubotv-sees-50-roi-just-auth0s-security/). A flexible IAM solution can easily accommodate dramatic shifts in need.

### Increasing Account Security

When it comes to employee identity and data created within internal applications, ownership belongs to the business. Customer identities created across sites and applications ultimately belong to consumers.

But while brands must gain permission to capture and collect consumer identity data, once a customer’s identity is on a business' property and his/her information is stored in its database, that business is responsible for protecting that customer’s data.

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="When it comes to employee identity and data created within internal applications, ownership belongs to the business."/>

Using a third-party identity expert like Auth0 makes it easier for companies to protect end user data because the company no longer needs to remain current with the cryptographic algorithms and best identity security practices — Auth0 does it for them. And we’re regularly tested by third-party assessors to maintain [certifications](https://auth0.com/security/) like ISO 27001, ISO27018, SOC 2, HIPAA, and others — all while enabling our customers to create user experiences tailored to their customer’s needs As our customer [Act.md](https://auth0.com/learn/act-md-sees-2x-dev-savings-auth0/) Chief Medical Officer Narath Carlile explains, “In creating a collaborative environment for you and your loved ones, we wanted to have the best level of security and authentication that’s available in the industry today. That’s why we partnered with Auth0.”

### Improving User Experience

[Seamless authentication experiences across multiple brands](https://auth0.com/learn/alma-media-sees-30-total-savings-seamless-brand-access/) can be easy with Auth0, as is coming up with solutions that may seem ‘impossible,’ like the Single Sign On for Microsoft products using G Suite [Auth0 helped create for Sprinklr](https://auth0.com/learn/sprinklr-achieves-impossible-sso-with-auth0/). We know that some logins need to rely on username/password, while others need social login, or end-user-specific solutions. We’ve even been recognized by Frost & Sullivan for our [innovative](https://auth0.com/blog/auth0-named-technology-innovation-award-winner-by-frost-and-sullivan/) approach to identity. We know your customer needs aren’t static, so we’ve created a solution that can give you out-of-the-box functionality within days that can be customized to your evolving needs.

## Balancing Security and User Experience Doesn’t Have to Hurt. 

Revisiting digital strategies and balancing user experiences can conjure up some painful experiences, but you can have an identity solution that suits your needs now — and the ones your future will demand. A “best-in-breed” solution doesn’t try to force your organization to fit into their identity sizing. You know best your organization’s specific challenges, goals, legacy infrastructure, culture, team skills, etc, so you should be in control, with a solution adapts to your evolving needs. If you’re ready to shift to a “best-in-breed” solution, please reach out to [sales@auth0.com](mailto:sales@auth0.com).

<include src="asides/AboutAuth0" />

One-Size Doesn’t Fit All

df6c864847fba9687d962cb80b482764?size=200 avatar

df6c864847fba9687d962cb80b482764?size=200

Martin Gontovnikas, a.k.a Gonto, is a software engineer at heart who moved to the ‘dark side’ and became VP of Marketing at Auth0. He considers himself lucky to have found a way to combine his two passions and apply his engineering thinking model to marketing. Gonto’s analytical thinking is a huge driver of his data-driven approach to marketing strategy and experimental design. He is based in the Bay area, and in his spare time, can be found eating gourmet food at the best new restaurants, visiting every local brewery he can find, or traveling the globe in search of new experiences.

Former SVP of Marketing and Growth at Auth0

Martin Gontovnikas

Understand patients at a granular level, secure PHI, and integrate with emerging technologies to gain a competitive edge.

The healthcare landscape is constantly evolving. Baker McKenzie predicts that [deals in the healthcare sector](https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/07/health-care-sector-ma-set-to-rebound-in-2019-law-firm-says.html) will increase to $331 billion in 2019. [Deloitte predicts](https://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/Deloitte/us/Documents/mergers-acqisitions/us-mergers-acquisitions-trends-2019-report.pdf) that within the industry, the average deal size will also increase — and Sapphire Ventures highlights [an influx of emerging healthcare technologies](https://sapphireventures.com/why-the-health-should-we-care/) in recent years.

For individual companies, this dynamic and competitive environment means that they must differentiate themselves to thrive. It's no longer enough to have extraordinary talent; staying on top of the latest technologies to deliver a positive patient experience and secure sensitive health records are essential to remaining in the game.

This could feel like an enormous task. In particular, if you’re relying on [legacy systems](https://auth0.com/app-modernization/) that haven’t been updated for several years, you might be struggling to figure out where to begin to make changes that deliver ROI. 

This piece will show how an identity management platform can help healthcare organizations solve several of these pain points at once. If you’re trying to stay ahead of the curve, being able to quickly and securely authenticate your users and collaborate with business partners will lay the groundwork for sustainable growth for years to come.

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="The healthcare landscape is constantly evolving. Baker McKenzie predicts that deals in the healthcare sector will increase to $331 billion in 2019."/>

## What is Identity Management?

At Auth0, we define [identity management](https://auth0.com/learn/identity-management-matters-healthcare/) as a set of tools and processes for authenticating individual users — making sure they are who they say they are and that they use the resource they’re requesting access to (an app or database, for example) correctly. Identity management is the cornerstone for a secure and successful organization in today’s complex and interconnected environment.

For healthcare teams, a cutting-edge identity management system is able to tackle several problems simultaneously — from gaining a deeper understanding of your patients in order to provide them with better care, to making your entire organization more secure and compliant with stringent industry regulations like [HIPAA](https://auth0.com/learn/why-hipaa-compliance-is-vital-your-business/).

Here, we highlight three specific ways an identity management platform will help you thrive.

### 1. Create a 360-Degree View of the Patient.

Single View is becoming the norm for connecting with end users in most industries. In [retail](https://auth0.com/blog/digital-success-through-customer-identity-and-access-management/), for example, teams are consolidating disparate bits of valuable information about their customers — from social media interests to purchase histories to geography - using integrations like [Clearbit](https://clearbit.com/marketing) that help harness the data for more personalized products and communications.

In healthcare, Single View can similarly help providers understand their patients at a more granular level. By consolidating patients’ medical records into a single source, for example, clinicians and administrators can quickly identify gaps in treatments and take preventative measures to avoid high-risk situations.

One way Auth0 is able to create this view for healthcare teams is through a centralized identity management platform. Via the [Auth0 Dashboard](https://manage.auth0.com/#/connections/database), you can easily migrate a database of user information onto our secure server.

![Auth0 Dashboard - Database Connections](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/3yaLKJLtsSh84tw9BT798I/bf2f64bbcf31851baceda757a23e79bd/auth0-database-connections)

From here, you can also create new databases and make updates to manage existing ones. Since this process doesn't require password resets, the migration is frictionless for users. They receive the benefits of your update at no extra cost.

As you gradually enrich patient profiles with more data, an identity provider like Auth0 will also secure API connections (https://auth0.com/docs/api-auth/tutorials/client-credentials) to be sure no one is calling information they shouldn't.

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="In healthcare, Single View can similarly help providers understand their patients at a more granular level."/>

### 2. Lock Down Patient Records.

[According to HIPAA](https://www.hipaajournal.com/healthcare-data-breach-statistics/), between 2009 and 2018, data breaches exposed 189,945,874 healthcare records. This represents more than 59% of the U.S. population.

![Number of Reported Data Breaches 2009-2018](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/6wRgOej6iOZJUCwr2WIZ9V/197695badaf27b236655fff10abb3202/reported-data-breaches)

[[Source](https://www.hipaajournal.com/healthcare-data-breach-statistics/)]

If your organization suffers a breach, consequences are dire. Not only will your reputation suffer, but you’ll also take a substantial financial hit. If you fail to protect patient health information under HIPAA, you could be fined $100-$50,000 per violation — up to a maximum penalty of $1.5 million per year. 

![HIPPA Violation Penalties](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/2z7XQoG88VCrHEJEXRArUw/ae901965443ffa292fefa3602dc2306b/hipaa-violation-penalties)

[[Image Source](https://www.hipaajournal.com/healthcare-data-breach-statistics/)]

While strict regulation is an important component of keeping patient data safe, it can create headaches for healthcare teams scrambling to keep up.

A robust identity management platform can help you quickly come into compliance by proving stricter access for PHI (patient health information). Measures like [step-up authentication](https://auth0.com/docs/multifactor-authentication/step-up-authentication) help ensure only authorized users are allowed access to sensitive information. In more confidential situations, step-up authentication requires users to input unique identifying criteria, such as an answer to a [security question](https://auth0.com/blog/are-your-security-questions-as-safe-as-you-think/) or a personal biometric — over and above a username and password.

If you use Auth0, you will [automatically be HIPAA compliant](https://auth0.com/security/). As part of our partnership with healthcare teams, we offer HIPAA Business Associate Agreements to those handling PHI data.

### 3. Take Advantage of Healthcare SaaS.

In a world where a [smooth customer experience](https://sapphireventures.com/the-new-science-and-art-of-customer-engagement/) is key, many healthcare teams have begun to integrate with SaaS solutions. These provide several advantages:

* SaaS vendors operate and maintain the system off-premises, eliminating the need for new installation.
* Many SaaS teams rely on cutting-edge mobile, cloud, and analytic technology — enabling them to deliver a more personalized and secure experience.
* Because SaaS companies aren’t usually working with legacy software, they can make upgrades to their products more easily; if it’s a subscription SaaS, users receive the latest versions automatically.

SaaS companies have created apps for [matching patients with doctors](https://www.zocdoc.com/); [accelerating cancer research](https://flatiron.com/); [employee health and wellness education](https://thriveglobal.com/), and facilitating the use of electronic health records (EHR). Using SaaS solutions, [93%](https://ehrintelligence.com/news/93-percent-of-hospitals-allow-online-patient-access-to-ehrs) of hospitals were able to offer patients online access to their medical records in 2018.

SaaS collaboration requires [federation](https://auth0.com/blog/why-identity-federation-matters/) — which enables user credentials to carry over from one domain to another. A robust identity management solution can save you months of effort by helping you scale federation for multiple customers simultaneously. 

![One authentication for multiple customers](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/7Gre1nvM9ydJNCnYTm24fL/8362ee9453ef21e6496948a295f7662a/accounts)

[Auth0 accommodates](https://auth0.com/docs/identityproviders#enterprise) as many users as you require with Active Directory, PingFederate, LDAP, and even custom SAML-P providers.

The ability to quickly and seamlessly configure federation gives you a competitive edge and ability to adapt to new technologies as they emerge.

## Keep Your Team Healthy

While your IT team likely has the tools and skills to build or upgrade an identity management system, to do it from scratch requires an enormous outlay of human and financial resources. The months of building infrastructure and migrating data will take them away from daily operations and core business projects. 

Outsourcing your identity needs to experts like Auth0 can cut down on the time it takes to come up to speed with industry peers. We can provide you with immediate peace of mind, knowing that you have a team dedicated solely to your identity needs, available 24/7, and that our solutions are customizable as your organization grows over time.

<include src="asides/AboutAuth0" />

How Healthcare Companies Can Use Identity Management

pamela-oldfield

Pamela Oldfield

Waiting means better quality, which is always better than quantity ...right?

Some say quality requires time — time to gather the best ideas and time to plan and execute. And quality is always better than quantity. You want to bring a strong product to market that will best your competition… right?

The thought process behind all this planning and execution can be extremely useful — unless your competition is snapping up market share while you’re still in build-mode.

But what if you didn’t have to plan and plan to execute before you started the build process? Partnering with strong experts allows you to move more rapidly through your road map and reach market before the [competition](https://auth0.com/auth0-vs).

![Some Say, Good Things Come to Those Who Wait.](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/3uT14eWjFZXZFBsWPHXsfg/62ebd462ca423153c596481bd9e4ce1c/some-say-good-things-come-to-those-who-wait)

Moving rapidly doesn’t mean you have to sacrifice customization or personalization. Auth0’s API-driven approach to identity means that we can give you a leg up on creating the identity you need. 

Forrester and others have dubbed identity as “mission critical” for any tech project. Partnering with a modern identity provider like Auth0 allows you to benefit from years of experience [planning and executing effective projects](https://auth0.com/blog/how-to-have-a-successful-idm-project/). This allows you to plan and execute effectively and rapidly, while potentially discovering (and solving) challenges in other areas of your project. [And you’ll get to market faster](https://auth0.com/overview/#time-to-market): 94% of Auth0 customers implement in one month; 33% see a reduction in time to federate enterprise partners.

<include src="asides/AboutAuth0" />

Some Say, Good Things Come to Those Who Wait

Factor in the cost of time to market, roadmap changes, accreditation, as well as security and customization ease

If you're building your own identity solution, how are you calculating your build formula? You've probably scoped labor and initial dev costs, but our customers tell us that customization and getting to market faster than the competition while eliminating ongoing maintenance, identity-related security, and accreditation costs are some of the reasons why they choose Auth0.

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="Building identity is complex. Getting a strong ROI while tailoring it to your needs doesn’t have to be — with @Auth0."/>

## Time to Market

We've had customers with complex projects tell us they've chosen Auth0 after doing a rapid proof-of-concept (POC) while waiting for months for our competitors to scope the work. Since we were built for developers, by developers, we've done the hard work to simplify the complexity of identity. That said, our customers often take on exciting customization challenges, but still manage to beat their competitors to market by taking advantage of Auth0's out-of-the-box features that can be easily customized by their team or with the help of our professional services team. We're just able to get them [to market faster](https://auth0.com/overview/#time-to-market).

"We would have had to probably delay the projects at least six months to get to a point where we are with Auth0. To implement Auth0, we are talking days, not even weeks," says [Nicolas Dormont, Vice President of Information Systems, abas USA and Corporate Product Manager, abas AG](https://auth0.com/learn/abas-sees-1100-roi-launch-market-6-months-faster-auth0/).

## Innovation Costs

Having to rip and replace because you find yourself locked into a solution that isn't flexible enough to adapt to a business-mandated change to your roadmap six months after launch can be expensive. [Auth0's flexibility and extensibility](https://auth0.com/overview/#adaptability) means you can write your own code or use one of our 100+ pre-built Rules and Extensions to provide an easy route to customization, saving both talent and time without the need to rely on an army of professional services staff &mdash; or let a vendor dictate your customization.

"There's a real fine line between building features that customers ask for and providing features that take a leap beyond that and provide an exceptional experience to the customer that they didn't know they could get. Auth0 is innovating in that space and looking at better ways to provide more convenient authentication to customers while reducing security concerns for us and them," says [Ansarada's Chief Systems and Security Officer Steven Rogers](https://auth0.com/learn/ansarada/)

## Security

Last year Ponemon reported [$3.86 million](https://www.ibm.com/security/data-breach) as the average cost of a security breach, but was pre-GDPR. [Consequences plus additional data privacy regulations](https://auth0.com/blog/data-privacy-2019-the-lowdown/) mean that breaches are just going to get more expensive &mdash; and even if you aren't breached, you need to factor in the potential cost of non-compliance (Google was [recently fined $57 million](https://techcrunch.com/2019/01/21/french-data-protection-watchdog-fines-google-57-million-under-the-gdpr/) for not following GDPR regulations).

Have you factored in the time to build active security features for your customers like anomaly detection or brute force protection as well as deal with bugs and vulnerabilities introduced by work-arounds? Auth0's ready-made platform lets you securely customize the authentication process.

You can also add on Enterprise grade Security features such as 24/7 eyes on glass security monitoring without the overhead of standing up a large internal or outsourced Security Operations Center (SOC).

Auth0 takes protecting our customers identity transactions seriously. "We invest heavily in our Security team, building out a cutting edge programme and hiring talented engineers who want to build the security of a security company" says Auth0 Senior Director of Security Duncan Godfrey.

And that adds up to an effective effort for our customers. "The cost to build the identity solution ourselves would have been significant. We're getting at least 50% ROI on the investment just for security alone," says [fuboTV Co-Founder Sung Ho Choi](https://auth0.com/learn/sports-centric-streaming-service-fubotv-sees-50-roi-just-auth0s-security/).

## The Cost of Accreditation

Certifications like SOC 2, HIPAA, and ISO 27001 require an upfront investment to achieve the accreditation plus yearly costs to maintain it. "Most Fortune 500 companies won't sign deals if you don't have the applicable certifications," says Auth0 Senior Manager of Governance Risk and Compliance Adam Nunn. "Yearly tooling costs can vary from organization to organization, ranging from $25,000 to multi-millions, depending on the size of the org."

Auth0 invests yearly on third-party auditors, salaries for the staff who make sure we're compliant, and internal compliance tools (excluding engineering tools and/or tools deployed for security purposes), and continually improving our processes &mdash; eliminating both certification worry and cost for our customers.

## ROI

Auth0's return-on-investment (ROI) numbers can seem eye-popping for companies used to lengthy proof-of-concept (POC) processes and heavy professional services engagements. We do recommend [professional services](https://auth0.com/professional-services/) to help you get to market faster and resolve complex identity challenges, but a long engagement isn't necessarily required.

"Doing what Auth0 does in-house would cost hundreds of thousands of dollars each year, and that's just to manage the service and keep it running. To roll out additional features, that cost would rise directly in proportion to the number of features we would want to add and how many developers we would need to make it happen. Anytime Auth0 releases a feature, that's something we don't have to do ourselves. Ultimately, that benefits not only us, but the hotel customers that rely on us to continue supporting them through our own enhancements and innovations," says [Mike Rogers, CTO and Co-Founder of SiteMinder](https://auth0.com/learn/siteminder-enhances-experience-security-30000-hotels-auth0/).

If you'd like to have us to factor your identity-related ROI with Auth0, please reach out to sales@auth0.com.

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="Building your own identity? Are you sure you’ve factored in all the costs that will lead to a strong ROI? Learn how @auth0 can help."/>

### Analyst Insights

[Total Economic Impact of Auth0 (Forrester)](https://auth0.com/forrester-total-economic-impact/) 
[KuppingerCole Leadership Compass: Consumer Identity Access Management](https://auth0.com/resources/whitepapers/leadership-compass-for-ciam) 
[Frost & Sullivan's 2019 Global IAM Technology Innovation Award winner](https://auth0.com/resources/whitepapers/frost-sullivan-global-iam-technology-award)

### From Selected Customers

[Servcorp Saves Months of Development Time Thanks to Auth0](https://auth0.com/learn/servcorp-saves-months-development-time-thanks-auth0/) 
[New Business Accessed the Cimpress Platform in 5 Minutes with Auth0](https://auth0.com/learn/new-business-accessed-cimpress-platform-5-minutes-auth0/) 
[Finn AI Saves 10% + 5% Ongoing in Engineering Time With Auth0](https://auth0.com/learn/finn-ai-saves-10-5-ongoing-engineering-time-auth0/) 
[Alma Media Sees 30% Total Savings for Seamless Brand Access](https://auth0.com/learn/alma-media-sees-30-total-savings-seamless-brand-access/) 
[ACT.md Sees 2x Dev Savings With Auth0](https://auth0.com/learn/act-md-sees-2x-dev-savings-auth0/) 
[Sprinklr Achieves 'Impossible' SSO for Microsoft Products without Active Directory using G Suite with Auth0](https://auth0.com/learn/sprinklr-achieves-impossible-sso-with-auth0/)

Auth0 ROI: How Are You Calculating Your Build Formula?


Some say, asking numerous questions, upfront (usually at point of sale or registration), is a great way to get the information you need from the customer, in order to best serve, well, the customer. Of course it isn’t. If anything, all you will achieve is a huge cost in conversion rates.

How often do people stop and think about how much information the customer actually wants to share straight away, or even over time? Would you answer 20 questions, upfront? In the case of a new employee, that might be acceptable, and even expected. Afterall, whether a customer, business partner, or employee, relevant and accurate data is essential to safely manage the user’s digital identity, and their experience of your organization.

And coming back to the customer angle, those organizations who are data-driven, are 23x more likely to acquire customers says [Advance2000](http://www.advance2000.com/digital-transformation-statistics-for-business/), as well as improve their retention rates and ROI. However, do you really know who, and where all your customers are - when it comes to their digital identities across your applications and services?

![Some Say - 20 Questions are a great way to start](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/7vOh7fY9tjqs4Y2nNiiGbe/1d859f7b259045b8679835deb8195c99/some-say-20-questions)

_Imagine what you could do with relevant, intelligent and centralized data about your customers, simply by using a little innovation in identity._

Using an extensible identity platform across your applications and services paves the way, not only to a single view of customer, but also to a personalized, differentiated experience while facilitating rapid development on new innovations. 

_To find out how you can modernize Identity in your department or organization, we’re offering a personalized identity assessment — [get yours here.](mailto:sales@auth0.com)._


Some say, 20 Questions are a great way to start!

Maturity and predictability is obviously the safest choice ...right?


Products, projects, profitability and people — an objective for every organization is for their people to deliver products, apps, and services that are competitive, achieve high uptake, that are delivered in a timely and efficient manner, and which bring the most profitability to the organization. **Would anyone ever disagree with that?**

_The short answer is obviously, no._

However, objectives and outcomes can often be two, very different things. Especially since technology is a cornerstone for any aspect of business today. Looking a bit deeper, a fundamental element within business technology is identity. And being the 21st century, Identity can belong to a person, a device or a machine.

_What is the point of mentioning all that?_

The point is: when it comes to technology — considering the basic organizational objective above — it has to be agile enough (read: fast) to adapt to change, to help you be innovative and to help you scale. 

![Some Say - Age Beats Beauty](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/67GrGPelAENt7pkQpkxnZ1/00efe17fac2f1bc093058239298554d2/some-say-series-age-beats-beauty)

As such, initiatives like Digital Transformation, Application Modernisation, or whatever variant of those you may have come across, are long-standing hot topics in many areas. However, let’s look at a few numbers: **45%** of executives say Digital Transformation will increase their ROI. The flipside though — is that only **19%** of North American companies and 7% of European companies consider their technology level as advanced, found a recent [Advance2000 survey](http://www.advance2000.com/digital-transformation-statistics-for-business/). 

**A Big Question**: how can more organizations modernize their technologies, in order to achieve the desired, higher ROI?

The short answer, in our view, is that there are many ways, each depending on an individual organization’s needs. 

_So let’s focus on one, universal element and try something that’s newer, faster (and better looking)?_

Earlier we mentioned that technology is a cornerstone for any organization, and within that, a fundamental element — which can be a quick win when it comes to modernization — is **identity**. How many of your legacy applications each have their own database or process to manage the identities of people and/or devices? Consolidating and streamlining the identity piece of your applications, will strengthen not only your IT security, but also your business intelligence. 

_To find out how you can modernise Identity in your department or organization, we’re offering a personalised identity assessment — [get yours here.](mailto:sales@auth0.com)._


Some Say, Age Beats Beauty

Systems may be complex, but they work ...right?



When it comes to identity, or digital identity if you prefer, complex is most definitely a word that a lot of organizations would use to describe it. Think about your organization as you read through this...

For starters, there are many use cases for, and definitions of, identity — from traditional Identity and Access Management (IAM), to Access Management (AM), to Identity as a Service (IDaaS), to Consumer Identity and Access Management (CIAM), and then there is also Identity Governance and Administration. *Are you keeping up so far?*

Also, have we mentioned yet, the different types of Identity? Human, devices, machines… Then there’s the question of: are they internally facing or external? *Are you still keeping up??*

And last but absolutely not least, where in an organization’s technology stack does, or should, this all sit? And who on earth owns it? *Is IT keeping up???*

Many feel that complexity in identity is simply the inevitable outcome of time and growth. No one intended for it to rise to the current level, but it so often does. For others the complex structure makes them feel safe in the knowledge that every possible base, when it comes to securely managing and authenticating identities for today and tomorrow, is covered. If you are one of those who believe complexity equals safety, there is no need to read further.  

![Some Say - Complexity is your friend](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/2UTtnyVfpbnwaGpyRULWsL/a9717265524ff02ed1d0cbb78ac8371c/some-say-series-complexity)

## For the rest of us, how about making a case for simplicity?

For example, here’s a simple list of items that could be ...simplified, easily:

* Effective execution of business processes
* Improved automation
* Stronger security now (and as you grow)
* Added business value
* Enhanced user experiences
* Faster time to market

To find out how you can simplify identity in your department or organization, we’re offering a personalized Identity assessment — [contact us to get yours](mailto:sales@auth0.com).


Some Say — Complexity Is Your Friend

Auth0 selected as 2019 winner for the Global Identity and Access Management industry

**BELLEVUE, Wash., February 11, 2019** --[Auth0](https://auth0.com/), a global leader in Identity-as-a-Service (IDaaS), today announced that it has been named Frost & Sullivan's 2019 Global Identity and Access Management Technology Innovation Award winner. Auth0 is the only company featured for technology innovation in the Frost & Sullivan Best Practices [report](https://auth0.com/resources/whitepapers/frost-sullivan-global-iam-technology-award) for Global Identity and Access Management (IAM).

Auth0 was recognized for its universal approach to identity management and its extensible platform that is fully customizable. As the report states, "Approaching the market by solving universal use cases helps Auth0 attract customers with many different identity needs, such as increasing end-user adoption of certain applications, increasing security, or dealing with M&A activity. Rather than requiring customers to seek additional vendors when they need authentication for additional audiences, Auth0 supports any use case and can continue to serve as the identity platform."

Frost & Sullivan Best Practices Awards recognize companies in a variety of regional and global markets for demonstrating outstanding achievement and superior performance in areas such as leadership, technological innovation, customer service, and strategic product development. Industry analysts compare market participants and measure performance through in-depth interviews, analysis, and extensive secondary research to identify best practices in the industry.

"The combination of proven technology, certified cloud delivery capabilities, and an innovative go to market strategy has established Auth0 as a leader in Identity and Access Management," said Michael Suby, VP of Research in Cybersecurity, Frost & Sullivan. "The flexibility of its platform, and the way Auth0 builds and delivers its services, is why Frost & Sullivan selected Auth0 for our Technology Innovation award."

"We are dedicated to providing a unique approach to identity for our customers and the users they are authenticating," said Eugenio Pace, CEO and Co-founder, Auth0. "Enterprises rely on Auth0 to offload identity management so they can free up resources for innovation. We are continually developing and improving our platform to ensure we are exceeding our customers' expectations. We are honored to be recognized by Frost & Sullivan."

A full copy of the report can be downloaded by clicking [here](https://auth0.com/resources/whitepapers/frost-sullivan-global-iam-technology-award).

<include src="asides/AboutAuth0" />

## **Media Contacts:**

Jeana Tahnk 
Corporate Communications 
Auth0 
[jeana.tahnk@auth0.com](mailto:jeana.tahnk@auth0.com)

Kasia Hall 
Matter for Auth0 
[khall@matternow.com](mailto:khall@matternow.com) 
971-246-7898

Auth0 Named Technology Innovation Award Winner by Frost & Sullivan

Auth0 “leads the pack” in Product, Market, and Innovation categories

**BELLEVUE, Wash., – December 20, 2018 –** [Auth0](https://auth0.com/), a global leader in Identity-as-a-Service (IDaaS), today announced that it has been selected as an Overall Leader in the KuppingerCole Leadership Compass for Consumer Identity Access Management [(CIAM)](https://auth0.com/b2c-customer-identity-management). This research report takes a thorough look at the overall CIAM industry, leading vendors, and the importance they play in managing millions of identities, and processing potentially billions of logins and other transactions per day. To download the full report, please click [here](https://auth0.com/resources/whitepapers/leadership-compass-for-ciam).

The Leadership Compass provides an overview of the industry and evaluates vendors based on the use cases, experiences, business rules, and technical capabilities required by B2C companies today, and their anticipated needs in the future. The criteria also involved evaluating overall functionality, security, partner ecosystem, licensing models, as well as specific features such as authentication options, APIs, IoT integration, and Single Sign On (SSO).

Auth0 is positioned as an Overall Leader in the industry, and is also featured in the Leadership category for the Product, Innovation/Technology, and Market categories. According to John Tolbert, lead analyst and author of the report, “Auth0 offers a full set of CIAM capabilities that can be integrated with customers’ existing IT infrastructure, including legacy applications. Auth0 has a high DIY value.”

Tolbert adds, “They identified a previously untapped segment in CIAM: developers. Auth0’s successful business model challenges traditional IAM and CIAM delivery models. Auth0 is a strong contender in the CIAM space, especially for organizations that need quick-to-deploy CIAM solutions. Those that have programming expertise alongside major consumer-facing applications should strongly consider Auth0 when doing RFPs.”

“Recognition of our unique value proposition for consumer enterprises from an analyst firm as well-regarded as KuppingerCole is incredibly gratifying,” said Eugenio Pace, CEO and Co-founder of Auth0. “We are thrilled with our placement in this report, and look forward to continuing to provide B2C customers with the product innovation and technology partnership they expect from a market leader.” 

The company’s developer-centric Universal Identity Platform and its extensibility options are why major [consumer enterprises](https://auth0.com/customers) rely on Auth0 for their identity needs. For more information about Auth0’s B2C offering, please visit: [https://auth0.com/b2c-customer-identity-management](https://auth0.com/b2c-customer-identity-management).

<include src="asides/AboutAuth0" />

## **Media Contacts:**
Jeana Tahnk 
Corporate Communications 
Auth0 
[jeana.tahnk@auth0.com](mailto:jeana.tahnk@auth0.com)

Kasia Hall 
Matter for Auth0 
[khall@matternow.com](mailto:khall@matternow.com) 
971-246-7898

Auth0 Named Market and Technology Leader in KuppingerCole Leadership Compass for Consumer Identity Access Management

diegopoza

System Engineer, geek, foodie, technology lover, speaker.

Sr Manager, Developer Advocacy

Diego Poza

Guidelines for customers, along with strategies for managers at travel companies to increase their security measures.

A recent study by Dashlane unveiled that [89%](https://blog.dashlane.com/travel-password-power-rankings-2018/) of travel sites have unsafe password practices. This includes airlines (e.g., United) as well as booking sites like Trivago and TripAdvisor. Users who recycle passwords among multiple accounts when booking a flight, hotel room or other service on one of these sites are highly vulnerable.

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="Dashlane unveils that 89% of travel sites have unsafe password practices."/>

Even if you do take precautions to create passwords you think are long and complicated, many travel companies aren't holding up their end of the bargain (and your data could still be acquired by the wrong hands). How do you know which sites to trust? Which ones should you avoid?

On the flip side, if you're a travel company re-thinking your strategy, we offer concrete approaches to improve your security measures.

## The Best and Worst Performers

Dashlane used five cybersecurity criteria to determine the safest and riskiest travel sites to book with:

1. Does the site prompt users to enter passwords with more than eight characters?
2. Does it suggest including both letters and numbers?
3. Does the site evaluate and send back to the customer the strength of the password they're using?
4. Does the company offer and facilitate a [two-factor authentication](https://auth0.com/learn/two-factor-authentication/) step?
5. Does the customer receive a confirmation of sign-up and/or activation email for a new account?

Since 2009, Dashlane has compiled data from [more than five million users](https://techcrunch.com/2016/05/25/password-and-id-startup-dashlane-now-with-5m-users-raises-22-5m-led-by-transunion/). Today it publishes those insights in several forms, including publicly on its [blog](https://blog.dashlane.com/), to help protect not only its own customers but everyone trying to figure out strategies to stay safe in an era of increased cyberthreats and [non-transparent data practices](https://auth0.com/blog/cambridge-analytica-and-facebook/).

### And now - the results:

We'll start with the bad news. The worst performers from the 2018 study were (in order):

1. Norwegian Cruise Line
2. Trivago
3. TripAdvisor
4. Air Canada
5. Allegiant Air

Additional companies in the lowest quartile of a sample of 55 travel companies were: Carnival Cruise Line, InterContinental Hotels Group, Choice Hotels, Cruise Critic, Agoda, Skiplagged, Hostelz, and Hotwire.

The best (most secure) travel companies of the year for customers were:

1. AirBnb
2. United Airlines
3. Hawaiian Airlines
4. Hilton Hotels
5. Royal Caribbean International

Other top quartile companies were Marriott, Best Western, Booking.com, Budget, Spirit Airlines, Southwest Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Enterprise, and Travelzoo. Only Airbnb received the top score of 5 (a point for fulfilling each criterion), with the next five receiving a score of 4, and the remaining top 25% of companies with scores of 3.

In contrast, all of the worst performers had a score of 0 or 1. In sum, the worst performers were far less secure than the best companies were secure. Much can be done to improve. Full data is [here](https://blog.dashlane.com/travel-password-power-rankings-2018/).

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="If you're a travel company or booking site, you can increase your score for next year's rankings using Auth0."/>

## Increase Your Score

If you're a travel company or booking site, you can increase your score for next year's rankings by focusing on two areas:

1. Password Strength
2. Two-Factor Authentication (2FA) Implementation.

While there are additional strategies for tightening your security like [hiring a managed services provider](https://auth0.com/blog/what-are-managed-service-providers/), these are steps you can take on your own or via an outsourced provider that specializes in these tasks, with no need to make a system overhaul.

### Tips for increasing password strength

Passwords are inherently risky, and most cybersecurity experts recommend using a password manager like Dashlane, Valt, or 1Password. While there are other suggested strategies, such as incorporating multifactor authentication, the following are a few important points you can communicate to your users if they do still rely on passwords.

- Length v. complexity.
- Don't "bunch up" special characters. ([Source](https://www.wired.com/2016/05/password-tips-experts/))
- Stay away from trendy words/phrases (see [Worst Passwords of 2017](https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/306499)).
- Use passwords as part of an overall plan-of-attack, including a password manager + 2FA.
- Finally, consider steering clear of passwords that have already been unveiled in a breach. (This data is publicly available [here](https://www.troyhunt.com/introducing-306-million-freely-downloadable-pwned-passwords/).)

### Implementing 2FA

2FA is your best friend for securing consumer data. In the increasingly likely event that a hacker gets your customer passwords correct, they still won't be able to access your system and obtain critical information like financials and even travel itineraries.

What is 2FA? The concept adds an additional step to the authentication process, requiring a one-time token that only the user has access to or a biometric, like a fingerprint, that is unique to the user.

![Auth0's Guardian app is a popular choice for two-factor authentication](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/6K2yUST4bUSCm0urn2iLEZ/3ba676487cd1b6c842e34147e1bfc871/auth0-guardian-is-a-popular-choice-for-2fa)

To implement 2FA in your apps, you can rely on popular choices like the [Auth0 Guardian app](https://auth0.com/learn/two-factor-authentication/), Google Authenticator, or Duo Security. By default, 2FA is requested once per month; however, with most tools you can define your own rules to trigger 2FA (e.g., weekly).

To enable 2FA with Auth0's Guardian app, simply navigate to the Multifactor Auth section in the Auth0 management dashboard.

![Easily enable Auth0 Guardian from the Guardian dashboard](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/7b8QUMPfOAWVVEkAFzZ1Aw/25362fabafdf6a8686463bcc9dd3ef0d/easily-enable-auth0-guardian-from-the-guardian-dashboard)

From there, you can choose how users will receive their 2FA codes (e.g., push notifications, SMS, or both). Once you configure which of your Auth0 applications will use 2FA, users will immediately be prompted to set up 2FA before gaining access.

An additional word of advice: in a time of murky data transparency tactics (e.g., [Facebook and Cambridge Analytica](https://auth0.com/blog/cambridge-analytica-and-facebook/)), you might consider customizing your 2FA notification prompt with a sentence describing the importance of 2FA and/or a link for more information to clearly spell out the effort your team is taking to protect its users.

## Don't Wait. Act Now.

With less than a year to go until the next rankings appear, make sure your team has moved up the list! If you're in the top quartile, aim for at least a 4 in the major categories of password length, diversity, strength evaluation, 2FA, and customer notifications. Steer clear of previously breached passwords, and communicate your new strategy to your users for better transparency. Supporting your users in avoiding a breach can save you [millions](https://www.ibm.com/security/data-breach) and help you build a stronger reputation in the years to come.

<include src="asides/AboutAuth0" />

The Best and Worst Travel Sites At Keeping Your Info Safe

The awards program recognizes entrepreneurs who are excelling in areas such as innovation, financial performance, and personal commitment to their businesses and communities.

**BELLEVUE, Wash., May 7, 2018 –** [Auth0](https://auth0.com/), a global leader in Identity-as-a-Service (IDaaS), today announced that CEO and Co-founder Eugenio Pace has been named a finalist by EY for its Entrepreneur Of The Year® 2018 Award in the Pacific Northwest. The awards program recognizes entrepreneurs who are excelling in areas such as innovation, financial performance, and personal commitment to their businesses and communities.

“I am honored to be considered for this very prestigious award, alongside such outstanding entrepreneurs from the Pacific Northwest,” said Pace. “Auth0 is experiencing tremendous growth and success, none of which would be possible without the incredible people I work with. This award is an amazing recognition of the collaboration between our team, our product, and our valued customers.”

Pace was selected as a finalist by a panel of independent judges. Award winners will be announced at a special gala event on June 15 at the Westin Seattle. Now in its 32nd year, the program has expanded to recognize business leaders in more than 145 cities and more than 60 countries throughout the world.

Regional award winners are eligible for consideration for the Entrepreneur Of The Year National competition. Award winners in several national categories, as well as the Entrepreneur Of The Year National Overall Award winner, will be announced at the Entrepreneur Of The Year National Awards gala in Palm Springs, California, on November 17, 2018. The awards are the culminating event of the Strategic Growth Forum®, the nation’s most prestigious gathering of high-growth, market-leading companies.

Sponsors
Founded and produced by EY, the Entrepreneur Of The Year Awards are nationally sponsored in the US by SAP America, the Kauffman Foundation and Merrill Corporation.
In the Pacific Northwest, sponsors also include Woodruff Sawyer.

About Entrepreneur Of The Year®
Entrepreneur Of The Year®, founded by EY, is the world’s most prestigious business awards program for entrepreneurs, chosen from an independent panel of judges including entrepreneurs and prominent leaders from business, finance, and the local community. The program makes a difference through the way it encourages entrepreneurial activity among those with potential and recognizes the contribution of people who inspire others with their vision, leadership and achievement. As the first and only truly global awards program of its kind, Entrepreneur Of The Year celebrates those who are building and leading successful, growing and dynamic businesses, recognizing them through regional, national and global awards programs in more than 145 cities and more than 60 countries. ey.com/eoy

<include src="asides/AboutAuth0" />

### Media Contact

Jeana Tahnk 
Corporate Communications 
Auth0 
[jeana.tahnk@auth0.com](mailto:jeana.tahnk@auth0.com)

Kasia Hall 
Matter for Auth0 
[khall@matternow.com](mailto:khall@matternow.com) 
971-246-7898

Auth0 CEO Eugenio Pace Named EY Entrepreneur Of The Year® 2018 Award Finalist in Pacific Northwest

story-tweedie-yates

Story is a Sr. Director of Product Marketing at Auth0, where she is passionate about the value of identity in the applications you build. With an eclectic background in psychology, professional athletics and cybersecurity, her expertise lies in working deeply with analysts, sales and customers to uncover the significance of security and identity to customers’ biggest business problems. Story is a Stanford graduate with a BS in Psychology. She also has an MBA from Thunderbird School of Global Management, speaks fluent Spanish and has done business in over 40 countries. In her time off, you will find her scooting her twins around the town or exploring underwater treasures with a scuba mask alongside her husband.

Sr. Director Product Marketing

Story Tweedie-Yates

GDPR compliance is an opportunity to improve how you do Identity—whether it's improving customer experience, time to market or increasing revenue.

<div class="alert alert-info alert-icon">
 
 GDPR is around the corner. Are you Ready? Take our GDPR Readiness Assessment to find out. <a href="https://auth0.com/gdpr-assessment/tool-1">Start the survey</a>.
</div>

---

Like the business trip that hits at an inopportune moment, [GDPR](https://auth0.com/gdpr) compliance can feel like a large inconvenience, even though it is business-critical. We believe that every security or compliance requirement has a silver lining. With GDPR, you have an opportunity to improve how you do Identity—whether it's in the context of improving customer experience, time to market, or increasing revenue.

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="We believe that every security or compliance requirement has a silver lining."/>

![GDPR - General Data Protection Regulation](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/1TWFcNwmXWjBsj2kZUcYiB/9b7cf20f83478bafa60b8a7f4cfbf73f/gdpr-flag)

Many of our customers make the most of their investment in compliance by using Auth0 to upgrade their customers' experiences and achieve their business goals at the same time. Here are a few examples of how they've done it—and how you can too.

## Increase customer conversions and upgrade user experience

Your largest customer is often both the most demanding and rewarding. If you can redirect them to a customized page after logging into your application, you will be able to treat this customer differently from the rest—as you should.

Thank them. Make it easy for them to add to their subscription. Engage them with questions. Auth0 makes it easy to take an innovative approach to this page to increase customer conversions.

An unfriendly implementation of GDPR compliance could tarnish that interaction. Instead, demonstrate your respect for their time by automatically recording the date when explicit consent or agreement to new privacy terms was granted without any disruption to service. Using Auth0 to automatically record the data without adding anything to the login form means your biggest fan won't notice the difference.

Auth0 Rules and the Management API let you accomplish [the url redirection based on identity](https://auth0.com/docs/rules/current/redirect) while [recording when explicit consent was provided](https://auth0.com/docs/compliance/gdpr/features-aiding-compliance), as well as new privacy terms and conditions agreed to at login.

## Turn leads into revenue faster

Every time a new user creates an account within your application, you can create an opportunity for your sales and marketing team. Ideally, they'll be able to convert that user from a contact into a lead and, eventually, into a customer. But success here is a numbers game. The percent of new accounts that turn into qualified leads is typically small, so automating this process can be key.

Automatically creating leads from new accounts in your CRM or marketing tools like Marketo or Eloqua frees your team to begin the customer nurturing process faster, shortening the time to potential reward.

Making lead creation contingent upon the user's explicit permission to create the account and receive marketing information at login allows you to easily automate one aspect of GDPR compliance.

Again, rules are the Auth0 innovation tool that allows our customers to [automatically create a Salesforce lead](https://github.com/auth0/rules/blob/master/rules/creates-lead-salesforce.md) or Marketo contact when a new person signs up with an account. Auth0 allows you to [provide an explicit consent option](https://auth0.com/docs/compliance/gdpr/features-aiding-compliance) within the login screen, while custom logic within Rules could be created to make sure that lead doesn't get generated in an external system without gaining (and tracking) explicit consent.

## Optimize your users' experience

Everybody wants a great user experience for their apps' login to save on costs and increase customer conversions. But this especially applies to those organizations with a very complex group of application users faced with the challenge of providing an ideal user login experience across a large number of applications. In this case, 'out of the box' identity isn't enough. Customization is critical.

One of our logistics and transport industry customers had users who might be a driver for one company, a dispatcher for another company and a manager at yet another company. Same user signing into different applications, with completely different roles. We were able to seamlessly tie the customer's complex permissions scheme to the login process to convert users based on context and give them access to the appropriate applications right from the login screen, giving our logistics and transport industry customer the precise control they needed.

GDPR specifies confidentiality of customers' personal data—so if any of these applications contain personal data, it is also critical from a compliance perspective to be able to granularly control who is accessing what application and with which permissions.

With Auth0 Rules, our customer was able to easily verify user logins and specify further permissions within the app based on information from the customer—innovating their users' experience while achieving gains in GDPR compliance.

## Compliance can help grow your bottom line through innovation

When you invest in meeting your GDPR requirements you can also innovate identity for your applications. With Auth0, compliance and innovation are not mutually exclusive.

<include src="TweetQuote" quoteText="With Auth0, compliance and innovation are not mutually exclusive."/>

See how much innovating your identity with Auth0 can grow your bottom line with the[ Forrester Total Economic Impact assessment](https://resources.auth0.com/forrester-tei-research-case-study/).

Jumpstart Identity Innovation with GDPR

eHk3ciM

I am the Group Manager, Developer Content at Okta, and a Google Developer Expert in Web Technologies and Angular. I'm passionate about identity, authentication, constant learning, and developer communities. As a developer advocate, engineer, mentor, and international speaker, I love learning from and sharing with other inhabitants of the tech space.

Group Manager, Developer Content

Kim Maida

Learn about identity innovations, and why identity matters for innovation labs.

<div class="alert alert-info alert-icon">
 
 Forrester Consulting analysis determines that using Auth0 can yield a 548% ROI and $3.7M in identity-related savings. Read the full report: <a href="https://resources.auth0.com/forrester-tei-research-case-study/">Total Economic Impact of Auth0</a>.
</div>

---

**TL;DR:** Innovation drives technology and **innovation labs** are critical for propelling the technology industry forward. Find out about innovative accomplishments with identity, and why identity matters for innovation labs.

---

## What are Innovation Labs?

**Innovation labs** are initiatives designed to promote and grow innovative thinking, services, and products. There are many ways that businesses approach the promotion of innovation, including forming strategic units or simply providing avenues for workers to network and collaborate. Some examples of corporate innovation labs include [Research at Google](https://research.google.com/), [Microsoft Research Lab](https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/), [Oracle Labs](https://labs.oracle.com/pls/apex/f?p=labs:15:0), [iLab at Harvard](https://i-lab.harvard.edu/), [and more](https://www.cbinsights.com/blog/corporate-innovation-labs/).

Innovation labs may have several aims, including but not limited to:

* **Ideation**: cultivating ideas and collaboration through hackathons, internal proposals, demos, and more.
* **Attracting talent**: companies that stay on the cusp of cutting-edge technology and foster a culture of innovation are more attractive to skilled, prospective employees.
* **Long-term revenue**: new products, services, and other offerings can have substantial long-term returns. In addition, bringing more ideation and production in-house reduces long-term costs.

## Identity Innovation

Innovations in identity technology have led us to more secure and more dynamic tools and practices. Let's examine a few examples.

### Frictionless Authentication with Passwordless

The evolution of [Passwordless authentication](https://auth0.com/passwordless) has allowed users to leave memorizing complicated passwords behind while enjoying improved security. Companies like [Slack](https://slack.com) and [Medium](https://medium.com) utilize Passwordless authentication to [increase engagement and enhance security](https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/startups/increase-engagement-and-enhance-security-with-passwordless-authentication/). Fingerprint Authentication in mobile apps is also a form of Passwordless login that greatly improves the user experience.

In fact, Passwordless biometric security is steadily gaining traction with identity innovations such as the [Biometric Wallet from Hammacher Schlemmer](http://www.hammacher.com/Product/81863) and [biometric credit card technology](http://www.sdcexec.com/news/12214482/new-biometric-credit-card-technology-is-an-important-advance-in-fraud-prevention).

### Personalization with Identity Data

Data collected from user identity is valuable for increasing ROI by providing a personalized experience to users. Retailers make use of consumer data by providing product suggestions, personalizing ads, and sending personalized emails.

For example, [Qubit](http://www.qubit.com/) leverages analytics and visitor behavior to tailor e-commerce experiences to each user. Utilizing identity information like the user's location along with data like purchase history, preferences, checkout speed, and more enables highly focused personalization and targeting. About [60% of consumers agree that "retailers who personalize their shopping experience make it easier to find the products that are most interesting"](http://www.marketingcharts.com/online/online-shoppers-prove-receptive-to-retailers-personalization-tactics-27413/).

### Using Identity Data to Improve Security

Innovations with identity _data_ have led to greatly enhanced security. [Anomaly detection](https://auth0.com/learn/anomaly-detection/) is the identification of unusual data points in a set. For example, if a user normally logs into an application from New York City, USA, a login with the same credentials from Brisbane, Australia is an outlier and could potentially indicate malicious activity. Identity data can be used to detect a multitude of different anomalies, including location, time, [repeated failed login attempts](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brute-force_attack), authentication from new devices, and much more.

When an identity data anomaly has been detected, steps can be taken to mitigate risk. The user can be notified of potentially malicious activity and asked to verify their identity, their account can be frozen in the case of a brute force attack, or their credentials can be reset such as in the case of [breached passwords](https://auth0.com/breached-passwords).

> [Breached password detection protects and notifies your users when their credentials are leaked](https://auth0.com/breached-passwords) by a data breach of a third party. You can optionally prevent access until the user has reset their password.

## Why Identity Matters for Innovation Labs

Swift development, flexibility, and focus on ideation and growth are vital for innovation labs. When producing an innovative product or application, it's important for innovators to be able to hone their craft and not have to expend hundreds of hours worrying about managing identity and securing authentication.

Auth0 is an Identity-as-a-Service (IDaaS) solution that works with any application built on any framework. Auth0 also supports a multitude of identity providers, including popular social platforms like Twitter and Facebook as well as enterprise providers such as Active Directory. Integration is swift and easy, and can be implemented in just a few minutes.

![importance of identity for innovation labs](https://images.ctfassets.net/23aumh6u8s0i/3ezOwbknxVkOvd3aBd2lqE/b7d930863795517df6fa0f7877a86ccc/innovation-labs)

> _"I'm a big proponent of letting experts do what they do best ... I didn't want to rely on building [an identity management solution] ourselves."_
>
>— _David Bernick, [Harvard Medical School](https://auth0.com/learn/harvard-medical-school-identity-secures-nih-research/)_

Innovation labs can reap numerous benefits from utilizing Auth0 as an identity management solution, including:

### Reduction in Engineering Time and Costs

Auth0 enables easy integration with any application on any framework, be it Node.js, PHP, .NET, Swift, Java, Angular, etc. [Extensive documentation](https://auth0.com/docs) and SDKs are available to jumpstart development and reduce the engineering time and effort needed to implement a robust authentication solution. Auth0 integrates with dozens of social and enterprise providers at the flip of a switch, and also supports Single Sign-On with minimal coding.

> [Auth0 offers a generous **free tier**](https://auth0.com/pricing) to get started with modern authentication.

### Flexibility and Extensibility

Auth0's login functionality and fine-grained authorization permissions are easily customized with [rules](https://auth0.com/docs/rules). Numerous extensions are also available for additional features such as logging, GitHub Deployments, and much more. Metadata can be added to users manually or via rules. Even the Auth0 login widget, called [Lock](https://auth0.com/lock), can either be used out-of-the-box, or replaced with a fully customized user interface.

### Increased Security

Auth0 supplies Multifactor authentication and Passwordless at the click of a button. The solution also provides highly customizable anomaly detection in addition to breached password and brute force protection. Auth0 is peer reviewed by international security experts and complies with standards such as SAML, OAuth, WS-Federation, and certifications like OpenID Connect, SOC2, HIPAA, etc.

> Auth0 provides the simplest and easiest to use [user interface tools to help administrators manage user identities](https://auth0.com/user-management) including password resets, creating and provisioning, blocking and deleting users.

## Innovate Without Worrying About Identity

Rapidfire development, excellent flexibility, and reduced time to market are vital for innovation to blossom in the technology industry. Auth0 provides services that enable these fundamental tenets of tech innovation. With Auth0, innovation labs can focus on producing groundbreaking offerings without worrying about authentication security and identity management.

"innovation"