- Support for this program was provided by Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey.

- Hello, this is John Harmon Founder President and CEO of the African American Chamber of Commerce of New Jersey.

Welcome to Pathway to Success.

Today's guest is President and CEO of Soda Technologies.

This is a distinguished gentleman.

He's done a number of inventions and products and technology.

I speak no other than Derek Peterson.

Welcome to Pathway to Success.

- Thank you John.

It's a privilege to be here again.

I really appreciate this time and opportunity for us to have this discussion.

- Yes.

Again, you're backed by popular Demand.

We're just delighted to have you here today.

But let's just start with a little bit of background on you.

- I graduated from a school, a high school in Bay Shore called Bay Shore High School.

And then from there I went off to Sternberg University to obtain my bachelor's degree in computer science, applied math.

And then from there I went off into corporate America.

I worked for a big company called Symbol Technologies.

Was there for about 16 years.

Progressed way up to VP of Engineering and then finally I decided I can do this on my own when I started creating companies.

And today I'm at my third company that called Solder Technologies.

And if you study your Greek mythology, you know that Sada comes from the Greek God of safety.

The reason why I brought up Bayshore High School that I went to is 'cause also this year I just got inducted into the Bayshore High School Hall of Fame for all of my achievements.

- So you go from a high school student that was bullied to a Hall of Fame in Duck D in in high school.

Is that correct?

- That is correct.

I grew up as an underdog.

It's kind of gone full circle.

So all the kids who, to gimme the wedgies and everything else, eat your heart out.

- Let's talk about technology.

Why is that a choice for you, career choice for you?

- Well, I, I kind of stumbled into the technology 'cause when I was coming up I thought I wanted to go to school to become a doctor.

I was gonna go to school, study biology, then eventually go off to med school.

Unfortunately, my high school counselor said, you take a computer class back in high school, which was simply punch cards.

Not knowing what that was gonna deliver for me.

I did that, fell in love with it and said, you know what?

I'm gonna change my career.

My, my plans.

I got head headlong into in technology.

- You talked about the various organizations you worked for before starting your own business.

But take us through that whole decision making process when you finally decided to go out on your own.

- Well, it wasn't an easy choice to go out on my own.

However, I kind of somewhat grew an empire at the current company I was at the time and I started to get bored.

And so getting bored just means you're gonna get into trouble and do something stupid.

I was, became really good friends with the founder of the company.

His name was Jerry Schwartz and they were talking to him, which I definitely wouldn't recommend anybody to talk to your boss about you possibly leaving 'cause they're technically they'll let you go on the spot.

I told him what I was thinking about doing and he gave me the blessing, says, Derek, go off and do your thing and if you have any trouble you can always come back home.

So with the parachute, knowing that I can come back home to if something went wrong, why I, it was an o it was an open door for me to take the chance.

I took the chance that I never looked back.

- So you mentioned, you know, the origin of the name Solder and Solder Technologies.

Now, when did you found the company?

- So we were founded in 2017, but before that we were known as a company called Digital Fly 'cause we had a social media monitoring tool called Fly Sites.

And what fly sites would do, we look at any threats to any students, teachers, or buildings, and we geocode that on a map and alert authorities about this ongoing threat.

Matter of fact, in 2014, we were able to save a young child from, from actually committing suicide, which you try to commit, set themself on fire by posting on Twitter.

You see all these threats of guns and violence in schools and, and unfortunately, again, when people go to commit some heinous crime, they typically do what they post it on social media.

So why not look on social media to, for these threats?

And that's what we did with that package.

And then from there in 2016, schools started asking us, can you help us with this ongoing bullying in schools?

And also this other thing called vaping, another product called Fly Sense, which is the world's first patented vape detector, which is now being exported into over 40 countries.

Close, well over 50,000, 60,000 devices deployed and going.

And what that device does, you take our device, you mount it on a ceiling in a bathroom typically where students will vape.

And once we detect somebody's vaping, we're looking at over air quality, we then send a text message and or a email message to the school authorities, which could be a principal student resource officer or a teacher down the hall.

And so they get this notification and they can go investigate.

And at that time we rebranded ourselves Soter technologies.

- What type of company were you seeking to create and what were some of the things you were trying to solve?

- Well, it was a certain culture.

I wanted to have a culture where we're always focused on winning, supporting the underdog, giving back to the community.

Now in terms of the product that we wanted to create and everything else, the thing when you wanna start a new company, you wanna have a company that's gonna solve a problem instead of just trying and create a company to do something.

And so if you have, if you're solving a problem, then you'll automatically be able to have customers, which then you'll be able to generate revenue, then you'll be able to give back to community.

So that's what we're out to do.

- You created another product - During the, the covid years 2020, our business pretty much shut down because we were selling to schools and therefore we had no business.

We pivoted to making medical device that we call symptom sense.

And symptom sense is the world's first medical gateway where you walk through as we walk through a body scanner and ours is built just like our airport body scanner.

And we walk through, we'll scan your vitals for the, perhaps the chance you may have covid, we look at your respiration rate, your heart rate, your blood oxidation level, your temperature, height and weight.

By putting all those together, we give you a 95% chance of us identifying if you have the virus called covid.

- So Derek, you referenced patents earlier and I'm, I'm just curious as to the number of patents you have secured today as well as the process.

- Currently today I have 80 plus patents under my name.

Wow.

The process is not as daunting as one may think, but when we think we have something that's potentially patentable, we then go talk to our patent attorneys - That because you run a smaller company, the perception is you cannot produce the level of innovation, the level of marketplace disruption with your products.

But you've done that time and time again.

So let's talk about the mindset a little bit.

- So my mindset, so I'll, I'll bring it.

I'm a very, a big sports enthusiast, so I'll bring it to one of my love.

My favorite games is that's basketball.

I stand six foot one right now, but when I'm playing basketball every Friday and Saturday, I tell everybody I'm seven foot in the paint and you can't touch me.

So that's always my mentality.

I'm seven foot and I'm gonna take you down.

And so I bring that same competitive spirit into my company.

And dealing with industry people always tend to count me out saying, how can this small company do this?

How can you deliver?

But I've been a disruptor in technology since the start.

My product Fly Sense, it's got many awards, many accolades, and people said I could not do it.

Who can make a vape detector?

How can you do that?

I did that.

I created a device called Symptom Sense, which scanning for symptoms of covid.

People didn't believe I can do that.

And I shipped that product all over the world, including to the NFL Major League Baseball.

People said, you couldn't do that.

So I can continue to have all my doubters, you know, change their mind said, wow, that guy Derek Peterson Soter technologies could actually do - It.

Let's talk a little bit about your, your conditioning and some of those things you've done, because I think that is really crazy.

- So in regards to conditioning, I'm always in the gym every morning, if you can find me.

I'm in there 5:00 AM to 7:00 AM I do a lot of cardio, I do a lot of weight lifting, a lot of calisthenics.

I'm also a multi-time Ironman finisher, and that's a race i I love to do and I I can't wait.

Wait for the next one, - The Ironman, where are some of the places that you've actually competed?

- So my favorite race of all time for Ironman Race is here in, it was in New York Lake Placid.

And what's nice about that race is you finish at the Olympic Village and so you finished and all of a sudden you hear your name being, shout out Derek Peterson, you are an Ironman.

And then I've done them in Quebec, Mont Tremblant I've done them in Texas, Ironman, Texas and and so forth.

- But this Ironman and, and, and these marathons that you participated in, can you compare them to an invention in terms of difficulty?

- Well, they, they, they kind of actually believe not, they kind of go hand in hand.

But when I'm training on the road, so if I know I gotta swim for two hours and that's on my bike and know I got a bike, I got a hundred mile ride on a Saturday, there's nobody else to talk to.

So I'm in my brain thinking and just developing ideas and concepts in my head.

So it kind helps me develop more ideas.

- We're gonna take a break now here on Pathway to Success.

And when we come back, we're gonna talk about health.

We'll be back in a moment.

- The African American Chamber of Commerce of New Jersey is your pathway to success.

We encourage you to visit our website at www.aaccnj.com.

We are your strategic partner for success.

- Welcome back to Pathway to Success.

This is your host, John Harmon.

I'm the founder, president and CEO of the African American Chamber of Commerce in New Jersey.

And just delighted to have one of our President's Club members here today.

Derek Peterson, he's the president and CEO of Soter Technologies.

And you have the developed a company that drives you to create products that help people.

Is that correct?

- That is a hundred percent correct.

So I wanna always be able to give back in this world.

I I've been blessed to, to be here.

I've been blessed to run a successful company and, and therefore, how can I also give back to the, to the underdog?

I grew up as an underdog and so now I can turn the tables and flip the script.

How can I help that other person who needs that, that hand to, to also succeed?

I believe that, you know, we, we can, we can build people up if we can help them and make a better community for ourselves.

- But you're also an author.

You have the book out called "Think You're Cuul?"

Can you elaborate on the title and and what is the book about - In, in the realm of helping schools stop kids from vaping?

So we, we have a model.

So when, when students are vaping, we, we tell the schools we wanna help them detect that's with our sensors.

Then we want to help them deter.

But now how do we defer students from vaping?

And so the, the book depicts students who are track stars, all of a sudden they started vaping and now they can't run anymore students who were football players or, or athletes.

And all of a sudden their lungs and whats impacted to them.

Students were just regular grade A students and all of a sudden they started vaping.

And then it just developed something called popcorn lung.

Wow.

And what happened to 'em.

So it goes all into depth of that.

And the students and the schools who buy the books, you know, they've given us some great reviews about it.

- You know, when I opened this segment, I said, we're gonna talk about health and, and notwithstanding your athleticism, you've had several health issues dating back for some time now.

But let's start off with one of the minor health setbacks, if you will, a broken thumb.

How did that occur?

And and what was that like?

- Well that's 'cause I was trying to be seven foot in the paint grabbing a rebound.

I got low bridged and I came down and, and broke my thumb.

- Wow.

- And then, so therefore, I guess obviously I wasn't seven foot, but then my thumb, my thumb broke.

And then we had to take the proper course to, to get that cured.

- So later, I mean, we get a little serious, I'm going from a, a broken thumb in the paint to an ascending aortic aneurysm.

- Well, yeah.

So I had the broken thumb and the thumb was looking pretty crazy.

I wanted to go see a hand surgeon.

And the hand surgeon said, we need to operate right away.

And the last thing he said, you need to get a pre-authorization to have surgery.

I says, I'd never been in the hospital, I had never had operations before.

I don't have a doctor.

He says, here, go to my guy.

So he sends me this doctor named Dr. Marian Kamath.

I go see Dr. Kamath, Dr. Kamath with the stethoscope old school technology.

He listened to my, my neck and he says, you got a problem?

I said, you mean didn't have a problem?

Said, I want you to go here.

Go to this Huntington heart center, do not pass, go, don't go home, don't go back to the office.

Go directly there.

So I get to the Huntington Heart Center and they roll out the red carpet for me.

I said, what kind of, what's going on here?

They immediately didn't echocardiogram on me and they doing.

So they came back and found, told me I had aortic aneurysm with a dilation of about 8.1 centimeters and says, I need to have surgery right away.

- He says, when do I need it?

You need it yesterday.

You are a dead man walking.

I went back to Dr. K's office and then going back to him.

And when I walked in, Dr. K greeted me with a hug and says, don't worry, I got you.

You are not dying on my watch.

I'll call my friend who's a top cardiologist surgeon in the world, Dr. Didier Loulmet.

Now the day has come my big day.

I've never been in the hospital, never been sick.

I'm waiting there patiently not knowing what to expect.

I have thoughts in my head racing around, am I actually gonna be here tomorrow?

The nurse comes in and says, it is your time.

My heart sinks.

She puts me in a wheelchair with my gown and she wheels me towards the operating doors.

As I saw the operating doors, I put my foot in the doors and I said, ah, hell no, I'm not going in.

She then proceeded to fight back and forth When you have to go in, well God dude, I'm not going in.

After she finally calmed me down, she allowed me to enter the doors.

When I entered the doors, I saw the bright lights and teams and teams of people.

I ran around that operating room like a raving lunatic, screaming, you people are gonna kill me.

The next day I woke up thanking God that I'm actually still alive with all the tubes and everything in me and with my mind still racing.

But I made it.

I am here.

I survived.

- Wow.

I mean, that's a life changing experience.

How serious is it for Blacks in, in America as it relates to the level of Blacks that have problems with their hearts?

- So in America, in our community, the, the, the Black community and the Black and Brown community, we're suffering the highest of any ethnicity of heart disease, which is unfortunate and a lot of it goes undetected, which is the biggest cause.

So like when I was growing up, you know, we only went to the doctor if you thought you were dying.

- Wow.

So this is like a solid killer, - Right?

I always thought so in regards to my conditioning, I always thought walking into any room that I was the badass dude in the room.

I'm faster than everybody.

I'm stronger than anybody.

I can handle my business, go see my doctor about my thumb, and actually my world turns completely upside down.

- So talk about your physical fitness regimen.

- So from that surgery I had to build back up And building back up wasn't the easiest thing to do.

I had, so I was just happy getting outta surgery, can I actually walk?

And so I had to learn how to walk again, learn how to run again.

Actually actually learned how to breathe.

You would not believe how important breathing is.

I mean, they literally took my heart out and had to wrap it, you know, almost like a shrink wrapper on my heart to get it fixed.

And so just learning how to breathe all over again and get myself conditioning, it took almost a little over two years get back to a point where I can actually say I'm, I'm back.

And so actually this past September and denoting that I'm back, I ran actually a a half marathon, which is 13.1 miles at a sub two hour pace, - You know?

What was that like getting the, the mindset of recovery in place and how much of what of your spiritual side connected with that?

- Well, I'll tell you right now, faith is not faith until it's the last thing you have holding onto.

So when you're getting ready to get cut open, not knowing what to expect, it's not like I had elbow surgery, knee surgery, M-C-L, A-C-L tear.

I said, they're going for the heart.

And that's like, that's everything right there.

And I'm like, you're taking out my heart.

And especially when I saw the doctor, he talked like he was doing oil change.

I said, dude, the doctor, this is a big deal.

I said, don't worry about it.

My surgery was roughly about 12 hours.

I was, I was under.

But leading up to that, if somebody does not believe in God, let them talk to me.

- Mm.

And they post step backs.

- I was having setbacks for about a year.

I, I was having they call AFib and my heart was getting these irregular heartbeats and funky heartbeats.

And then after that I developed a low hemoglobin count.

- So - This past march, my hemoglobin was down to 6.1 and a normal person just to be at 13.

When I went to see the doctor, my, my doctor who saved my life, Dr. Marian Kamath and said, you need to get to the New York Blood Center and get yourself checked out.

I said, why?

He says, 'cause your blood levels are low.

And I kept ignoring him, ignoring him, ignoring him.

So finally I took him up on it and when I got to the blood center, they said, you, your hemoglobin's at 6.1.

Again, you had, you at death's door.

Wow.

Your dangerously low.

I said, how about I drive myself to the hospital tomorrow?

And they said, okay, as long as you promise you're gonna do that.

And I did that.

The next thing I had to go through a series of infusions to get my blood counts back up.

- They're telling you you're a death's door and you're saying, you know what, I heard you, but gimme 24 hours and I'll check in.

What was that all about?

- I'm still feeling good.

I'm like, I just ran three miles.

And so I just, it's still tough.

And I believe, I know I had the major heart surgery.

They said, my heart, my heart is fine.

-Wow.

So I said, I said, why are we doing that?

So, all right.

We're, we're I You you're truly an iron man.

Okay.

Let's, let's say that for the record.

So now that you have gone through these several health scares and major operations, how are you today?

I'm a hundred percent today.

Your story is a story of triumph and perseverance and, and beating the odds time and time again.

What advice would you have to someone listening today who may be having a similar, similar challenges in life and or health challenges?

- I would tell them never give up.

Never give up.

And if you don't believe in God, I, I encourage you.

Start looking, looking to God.

I mean, to me, God saved my life.

And, and I would also encourage you to build constituents of friends and family on that can also boost you up.

'cause you can't do it alone.

You need people in your corner to continue to encourage you and cheer you on and also pray for you.

- So let's get back a little bit to business.

So while you were recovering you, you created another product.

- And so while laying in my hospital bed, one of the things I wanted to be able to do is tell people how I was feeling.

I don't post stuff, I don't, I don't have a Facebook account, I don't have an Instagram account.

And besides, why would I wanna post medical information on Facebook sitting on my pad in my hospital bed, barely able to breathe and tubes everything in my mouth.

I'm jotting down notes.

So I'm jotting down these notes.

I was able then to call some of my engineers, say, listen, this is what we're gonna do when I get here.

Developing this tool called Iasa notes and Iaso, it comes from the Greek god of of recovery.

So what this tool does is a private communication network, you actually don't even have to download any software, which is the key thing because I hate putting a new software on my cell phone.

So you go to this website and you create an account, and then you add subscribers to your account or to your page.

And then you simply add a message to your page, say, Derek is feeling better.

Derek's in recovery.

And immediately that message is text to all your constituents.

Whether it's two people, three people, four people, a hundred people, they get a text notification, Hey, Derek's doing better right now.

John's doing better right now.

And that's all you need.

There's no more back and forth.

That's too much.

I'm trying to recover.

I just wanna let you know how I'm feeling.

- What is your end goal with this product?

- The app is totally free.

So this is, again, you talked about me giving back.

There's another way of me giving back.

The app is totally free and while I'm doing is asking that those who use the app and like it donate to the application, therefore with this donation, I can keep my servers running and so forth.

And then also I can continue to do research.

I I doing right now doing research and, and the study of the heart to create new devices, lifesaving devices around the heart.

Another thing we're doing, so the doctor that helped save my life, Dr. Marion Kamath, he's asking to be a spokesperson for a hospital that I'm working with him and building in Bangalore, India.

And so some of the funds are going towards that hospital there too.

- It talked about all these things you're doing with health and technology.

You're not a doctor, not a doctor, but you're going back to school for what, - Not a doctor yet.

I'm going back to school for my doctor in biomedical engineering.

- You know what, what you've shared just now, you can do well and do good at the same time.

And this collaboration with you and the doctor in building this hospital.

Why don't you elaborate on that a little bit?

- Dr. Marian Kamath is a world renowned doctor.

He is helped so many people and bring people over here from India to pursue their medical degrees and so forth.

And him coming in contact with me and understanding my willingness to give back and have an accompany and so forth, my wherewithal, he says, ask me, Derrick, can you help me?

And can you also be a spokesperson for me on what I've done for you and come to India with me.

And so the hospital's actually complete right now, and we're gonna have an opening ceremony February 15th, 2025.

- Wow, that sounds very exciting.

And lastly, your experience with the African American Chamber of Commerce of New Jersey.

- John, there's nothing to say about you, but you've been fantastic.

I mean, there's, there's no shortcomings when dealing with Mr. John Harmon.

- Well, we're just delighted to have you and, and thank you for joining us.

- Thank you, John.

Appreciate you - Until the next time on your Pathway to success.

This is John Harmon, founder, president, and CEO of the African American Chamber of Commerce of New Jersey.

Thank you.

Today's message is will to win.

My message to those business owners today are just individuals that may be experiencing a little tmo and a little adversity and not sure that they could make it.

I will submit to you that you are designed to win.

You have the innate resources within you that you have to call upon when your back is up against the wall.

So if you're Black in the United States, we have high blood pressure, heart problems, diabetes, low net worth, limited resources to start a business.

Don't have the political support sometimes in carrying an agenda that will be equitable to, to our interests.

And so what do you do?

Do you give up or do you call upon that innate ability within you to, to win, to, to really compel yourself to the next level?

And that's what the African-American Chamber of Commerce of New Jersey is all about.

I, on behalf of the members of the Chamber on boardrooms, to really push back on the adverse perceptions that you lack the wherewithal to add value to compete and win.

It's within the Black DNA.

We've come here to these United States involuntarily drafted into slavery, if you will, to advance someone else's mission.

We came through that Jim Crow segregation, the Civil Rights Movement.

And now this recent election, folks are uncertain about what's gonna happen.

What I'm saying to you, not withstanding the hard winds, the adversity you have within you, the key to be successful.

You have resources all around you, like the African American Chamber of Commerce in New Jersey, your strategic partner for success.

Tap into it today and transform your life.

Thank you.

- Support for this program was provided by Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey.