ABOUT: Zerify Inc. (OTC: ZRFY), formerly StrikeForce Technologies, is an Edison, New Jersey-based company with over two decades of experience in cybersecurity solutions. The company helps to prevent cyber theft and data security breaches for consumers, corporations and government agencies through powerful multi-factor “out-of-band” authentication and keystroke encryption along with mobile solutions. Zerify offers a video conferencing solution that uses no desktop and is entirely web-based, offering a five-level meeting security control approach designed to protect valuable information.
INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPTS:
WSA: Good day from Wall Street, this is Juan Costello, Senior Analyst with the Wall Street Analyzer. Joining us today is Mark Kay, CEO and Chairman at Zerify Incorporated. The company trades OTC, Ticker Symbol is ZRFY. Thanks for joining us today there, Mark.
Mark Kay: Juan, it’s my pleasure. Thank you for having me.
WSA: Yeah, always good having you on. And so for some of our listeners that didn’t catch our interview which was about four and a half months ago, can you provide us an intro and overview?
Mark Kay: Seems like yesterday. Yeah, definitely. Well, we’re Zerify, we used to be called StrikeForce Technologies, so we changed our name. We changed our name just for our marketing reasons because we’re focusing much more now on our secure video-conferencing and the products that go with it versus before when we were just really focusing on Protect ID, which is Out-of-band authentication, which we still have and sell by the way if anybody is interested in it. We actually had a sale last week on it and we keep having more sales on it even though we’re not even marketing it. But anyway, so we have a couple different products called Zerify Meet and Zerify Defender are our two main products. Zerify Meet is our secure video-conferencing product. The reason I say secure, I hate to say this, but unlike this video it is extremely secure and nobody else can jump on it whereas some other videos, most other videos, anybody who gets the link can actually jump in onto it and that’s the biggest difference.
So there is no such thing as “Zoom Bombing” on our link, on our Zerify Meet. Every single person coming in is heavily authenticated and you could have different levels of security and it doesn’t take extra time. It doesn’t cost extra money. It’s just part of the product. And the reason our product works so well is because we run with three — two other products in there in that space at the same time where all other video-conferencing products are just the video-conferencing product. You might be able to add products on top of it but this is within the product itself. It has a Protect ID, which is authentication capability and it works with an OTP. It can work with fingerprint. It can work with facial. It works with all of them. If you choose which one you want, OTP works automatically with it. It’s simple. It’s great and we’re trying to get the word out there. Zerify Defender is our other key product. It used to be called Guard ID. We still sell Guard ID for those that like the name and are used to it and it does have some advantages.
But Zerify Defender runs with Zerify Meet. So if you buy Zerify Meet, you get Defender as well because that secures the camera, the audio, the video, many different pieces and parts of your computer from your computer. So actually if you ran Zoom, Teams, WebEx, any of the others, you would still be secure. So it works very well. If I could be more secure with Zerify Defender then you would just with the product itself so it works extremely well. We’re starting to get a lot of leverage now. We realized that we couldn’t sell it directly. We weren’t a big name, we were small fries and we just couldn’t get it going. We ended up getting resellers now and people who are distributors and we got Vation Ventures that help us greatly and with making some great strides in it.
WSA: Yeah. Great. So can you talk about some of the recent news and deals here over the last few months as you had your couple different communities and also one, Chamber of Commerce and you also had the sales partnership with SpeakSpace.
Mark Kay: Right, we gave out a bunch of PRs. They were very successful. They are new clients and those were actually getting more direct than not other than the Chamber of Commerce, which has 1.200 people coming to it, which we’re a member of, which we’re giving. And matter of fact, we’re giving Zerify Meet for free for them for six months and for any corporation that wants to buy it can get it free for six months on a trial basis. And if they don’t like it, they can get rid of it after six months. So it’s really a freebie for six months before anybody has to pay anything for it and you’re not owing anything during that time period. So that’s something we’re doing out there now in the marketplace. If anybody wants it, they can call us and get it. It really works very, very well. It now works extremely well and better than if not the same as all the other products we compete with. But we’re now actually, now that we’re making those — made those sales and they’re not that great. I mean, they’re three to five maybe 10 most, which isn’t that much money.
We charge about $15.95 a month for Zerify Meet. It’s up or down but it’s less than a competition in most cases. So we feel really good about it but we’re now getting other contracts. So we just signed recently two major contracts with two huge resellers equally about 19,000 resellers on two major distributors, excuse me, we have about 19,000 resellers that are coming on board and it’s going to keep taking us a while to train them. And one of them has its own support staff so we’re just training that one support staff. So we’re training them. We’re doing a lot with them. As I’ve told you in January when I gave my predictions and forecast, I did say $2 million to $4 million. I still believe that’s possible at these major players. Don’t forget, we’re talking about distributors with 19,000 resellers with the number of people, we got to get a bunch of sales from them and I feel we will. But we may not, I can’t guarantee it, but you never can guarantee anything except maybe waking up the next day hopefully, can’t even guarantee that.
Mark Kay: Yeah, right. Only guarantee some coming up here in a couple of weeks, right, taxes.
WSA: Oh, please don’t remind me. But anyway, yes, that’s very true. Anyway, so we’re getting a lot of these. So again, we signed two contracts. We’ll be announcing those probably next week, all the week after while we get permission from those companies because they’re huge and we’re signing on others. There are a couple other resellers we’re talking to regularly. We have a couple other companies, so we’re going to have a couple of months that are crazy here. Crazy good not crazy bad. That’s what I’m predicting based on the people we’re talking to on a regular basis that we’ll be bringing in a lot of business. And I’ll tell you, Vation Ventures was really great for us. They are one of the best companies out there. They teach you and bring you many resellers in the marketplace. And when you’re a small company like us, you need a company like that to get moving in. And we learned it the hard way but we learned it and we’re using them now and they’re coming on board and we really feel we will hit some of those markets and could potentially reach the $2 million to $4 million and maybe not but we potentially could.
WSA: So yeah. In terms of the revenue forecast and possible growth, what are the key goals and milestones that investors should keep an eye out for here over the next three to six months?
Mark Kay: Well and definitely even in the next month, you’re going to see a bunch new PRs on real revenues. Well, maybe not real revenues in the next month but shortly thereafter. We’re going to start seeing some growth in revenues as these resellers come on board and as they started getting and act together and getting it out there. Again, one of them has its own support area so that’s huge for us. And that one has I think about 13,000 resellers and they put a product out there and they teach people how to use it and then they have their own support around it, which is great for us. We have another reseller that’s coming on board that again we just signed that has very excited to get a hold of the products because they believe they are excellent products. People don’t realize you need security whether you like it or not things are stolen all the time. And on a simple video-conferencing product people can come in and steal anything and everything. They get into your computer. Your computer has much other information in it. Just think of what you have available on your computer that’s what they can get. And they can get in things to your bank and other places through your computer.
So it’s not small it’s becoming a huge idea. That’s why we’re a cyber security company. And by the way, we’re the only cyber security company with a video-conferencing product and of course it has to be secure and it is. And it’s the only conferencing product that is secure. Even with Forrester telling everybody and we put out an article on that last year that 25 companies in the world they were listed as the best secure companies. And we were one of them with security with Zerify Meet as a secure video- conferencing product. The only one as Forrester told you that and then not everybody reads Forrester, so you should look it up. It’s real. And we’re the only cyber security company with it. We’re the only security conferencing product with it. So it’s a very clear, very great and we’re doing a lot of work every day getting this out there and getting everyone involved.
WSA: Yeah. So in terms of SMBs, how will you continue to market to them and grow the business through that channel?
Mark Kay: Great question and really we’re using Vation Ventures. We haven’t done great with marketing so we’re backing off marketing a lot and we’re using Vation Ventures who market for us and bring in all the resellers. So we’re meeting with a reseller a week approximately at least a reseller a week. Our salespeople, which we haven’t increased beyond what we have now and we have a couple extras that we hired this year, they’re going to many different conferences where they meet many people. They’re starting to get some responses from people. But Vation Ventures is bringing us names, so many names a month. We are meeting with all of them where we wouldn’t have known which these companies were and we wouldn’t have been able to meet them in the past. We’re meeting with them. We’re working with them.
Vation Ventures is teaching them and letting them be aware of what we are and who we are and we’re getting a lot of progress with that. So that’s really the best thing for us to be doing. We learned that we’ve got to go through resellers. We’re not going to get it done on a one-to-one basis. It was working but we’re not getting that many and it’s good that we are. And yes, we get some, they get others, they’re bringing in others. So we think it’s the very beginning actually of getting this product out there and we’ll see what happens. But I believe we’re in a good position right now to get this thing going.
WSA: So, yeah. While you’re on the Wall Street Analyzer pretend maybe you’re talking to a Shrink or something is there anything that you want to vent about the stock or something that you wish perhaps investors better understood about you guys, which would reflect the share price and produce a higher valuation?
Mark Kay: Well, if I was talking to my Shrink, I’d probably see a lot more than I can say on this call. So I’m not going to actually do that. But what I would say is, look, right now, yes, we had a big uplift in the stock mainly because I gave another interview similar to this about a week ago. And I said a lot of these things, which is very true and we do have these new contracts. We’ll be letting you know who they are, the company names. We can’t do it right now. That’s why I’m not. I’m not being invasive. If somebody wants to take me to court, they can come in and we could show them the contract itself but I can’t tell you anybody about that. But definitely, it’s real. We don’t make anything up. We’re a real company. We really have an office in 1090, King Georges Post Road in Edison, New Jersey. We really have a sign outside our door that says Zerify. We’re 14 people we are here. We’re not fluff in any means. And we’ve been around for 22 years guys.
We’re not going to screw people for 22 years or fool people for 22 years, trust me. And we’re frustrated because these products should be out there and they should be doing very well and they’re not. And there is no two ways about it other than getting these resellers and distributors out there, which we feel if we get a big distributor with a big name on it then maybe you will buy it and that’s what we’re hoping for in doing. And they’re going for companies, we’re going for small SMBs, that’s the focus we’re having. We’re not going for the large companies who will probably ignore us because we’re too small. And then hopefully we’ll grow with that and hopefully we’ll become real big and we just need shareholders to believe in us. And if they don’t believe in us then fine, believe us alone. Don’t talk to us if you don’t want to. But if you believe in us, you got to be able to get involved, help us out, spread the word, we are going to be one of the biggest I believe, anyway. So that’s what I would say. But I appreciate that, Juan.
WSA: Yeah. So Mark, when it comes to as far as your background experience, I don’t think I asked you that the last couple times, the last couple interviews. Can you talk about your background, the management team and what’s your skin in the game?
Mark Kay: Yeah. Well, my skin in the game is pretty much my life. I’ve been doing this for 21 and a half years basically or maybe 22 years by now. I don’t keep up with it where when I got involved with this, I thought this would be a four year stint and then I’d be able to get out. Well, obviously I’m still here and I love what I do. I do it because I enjoy it. I don’t enjoy being beat up by many different stockholders, which I do all the time but at least I take it from them. I understand it. I guess I’d be pissed too if I lost money on it even though I didn’t really lose money they just didn’t cash it since they didn’t sell it yet. But anyway, I do believe that this is great and my background is I worked for EDS for seven years. I worked for [Indiscernible] [0:14:27], it was a company of 1,000 people. I worked all over this country in learning technology. It was one of the really strong technologists in Assembler and COBOL and all those different languages. Assembler is a tough language.
But if anybody could do it now, I’d give them $1000 dollars because I don’t think they can. I don’t think anybody knows as a language, but it’s really working with the code itself directly. I worked for them for seven, eight years and I worked for JP Morgan for 26 years as a Managing Director. And I retired down because JP Morgan got bought out by Chase. It was not a too friendly of a merger to be honest. But I stuck around even longer than that. I worked for Chase JP Morgan or JP Morgan Chase for another five, six years. I was there for 26 years. I retired and I felt I didn’t need to do anything else. And then I found this company and I figured this would be great. The problem was we had Protect ID, Out-of-Band authentication before it was any meaningful. Then it became meaningful then a couple of major companies bought — we beat them in a patent that we had and we were always behind. We were always ahead of the eight ball and we got there too fast and we didn’t do well at that point.
So here we are trying to really make this big splash on this big video-conferencing, which I might add is probably better than this one. But I won’t push it too hard and I appreciate all that we’ve done and all the years we’ve put in. So it’s me. It’s George Waller, Ram Pemmaraju. Ram Pemmaraju is the guy that he is our inventor. He invented the products. We came up with them all. There is no two ways, no thing about it. There are hours but we had many patents for Protect ID. We had many patents for Guard ID, keystroke encryption but you can’t do much with patents these days based on the law. So we have to rely on the products and get this thing going and I still believe it. Otherwise, I would’ve quit by now. I don’t have to be here and do this but I want to, I believe in it and I want to see it through.
WSA: So are you saying that you have a lot of the same good feature outside of just being secure, you have a lot of the other good features that some of the other platforms provide?
Mark Kay: Yes, we do. We added a lot over the past year and a half. We can do almost anything any other platforms can do related to video-conferencing. And of course we have Protect ID in the product itself. It’s not just being there. So you won’t see the words Protect ID, but you are using the authentication piece. That’s why we can call ourselves Zero Trust. We’re a Zero Trust company. We don’t trust a single person coming into our products, therefore you have to be, it’s called Zero Trust. That’s the nomenclature used in the marketplace. And we are 100% Zero Trust coming into our video-conferencing as well as because you are authenticated fully, no matter what you do.
WSA: Right.
Mark Kay: Now you do have the right. One of the changes we’ve made is you do have a right to actually click on a button that says make it public. Don’t have all the security, so it can then be a Zoombomb, I guess if you want to say that. But that’s what people wanted so we gave them that but you have to do it knowingly. It’s automatically you’re going to be authenticated.
WSA: Yeah. There was just one at the Federal Reserve, right, a Zoombomb.
Mark Kay: It’s crazy. It happens anywhere and everywhere. And then everyone says, well, we’re not going to use Zoom anymore. Fine then use us. But they don’t know about them. So we’re trying to get the word out there and become the default solution. So we’re trying, we’re hard, we’re hard at it.
WSA: And yeah, before we conclude here Mark, why do you believe investors should consider the company that this is a good investment opportunity at this point and at this price today?
Mark Kay: Well, I’m not sure about this price today and I didn’t even look at the market yet, so I don’t want to know because then I’ll start looking at it and worrying about it all the time. But with the prices actually up since it was two weeks ago or a week ago even and I think because we are talking about some great things we’re about to get done and they are getting done and we’ll be putting out PRs of the next week or two and we’re talking about it now just before I started doing this interview. We might have one of them done even sooner. We don’t know yet, but whenever we do, we do. And I think we’re about to become a large company, so I think the stock price should start going up heavily. And therefore investors should get involved when they know they can make money back or make money whichever the case may be for them. I think it’s about to take off and hopefully we’ll be correct.
I mean, we’re still finishing our 10K. We’re not really late on it. This is the timeframe we’re allowed to have. We’re trying to get that done at the same time. So that’s where we’re going crazy with that. That won’t be that great. As I’ve said before, that it was last year. Last year was not a great year as everybody knows and tells me all the time. But this year we seem to be in a great place and we’re trying to make it happen. So I believe we should get going and everybody should just watch it and get involved as best as they can.
WSA: Well, we certainly look forward to continuing to track the company’s growth and report on the upcoming progress. And we’d like to thank you for taking the time to join us today Mark and update our investor audience on Zerify Inc. It’s always good to have you on.
Mark Kay: Thank you, Juan. I appreciate the opportunity and hopefully next time we could talk about some of these great things that we’re about to get going on.
