Category Archives: Cloud Hosting
Kyndryl accelerating L&G’s cloud transformation – Technology Magazine
IT infrastructure services provider Kyndryl and Legal & General (L&G), leading financial services group and major global investor, have announced they will extend their partnership to accelerate L&Gs technology transformation.
In an announcement, L&G said it had engaged Kyndryl to transition the hosting of its IT systems to a new data centre, reducing technical debt, simplifying architecture, accelerating cloud transformation, and consuming services in a more carbon-efficient way. The new seven-year agreement will enable L&G to scale its operations to support its growth ambitions, and gain greater technical and commercial flexibility. Joining the project as suppliers are Microsoft and Dell Technologies, bringing market leading capabilities to support L&G.
We see this as a strategic opportunity for Kyndryl and L&G to build on our partnership, leveraging Kyndryls deep expertise and experience in providing secure, compliant and resilient compute, mainframe and cloud transformation services, alongside their knowledge of Legal & General, commented Mark Hall, Group Chief Technology Officer, L&G.. Kyndryl has taken a strong one-team ethos to the programme, underpinned by transparency and a great affinity to L&Gs unique culture and purpose.
In addition to L&Gs existing use of Public Cloud services, as part of the programme, Kyndryl will implement a new on-premises Microsoft Azure hybrid cloud platform from Dell powered by Azure Stack HCI, closely coupled with the zCloud mainframe, helping to mitigate any potential latency constraints and providing a building block for further public cloud migrations.
We are helping L&G accelerate the modernisation and simplification of their IT estate, generate cost efficiencies and reduce carbon emissions through a migration to Azure Stack HCI at Kyndryls new strategic data centre. The deal also includes mainframe optimisation projects, staff augmentation and the implementation of Kyndryl Bridge, commented Joe Taylor, Managing Partner, Kyndryl. Stronger together and collaborating as one team, we will bring the very best talent to restlessly innovate and accelerate L&Gs IT strategy.
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Kyndryl accelerating L&G's cloud transformation - Technology Magazine
Why Retailers Shouldn’t Worry About the OpenAI Senate Hearings – Total Retail
Its clear that artificial intelligence is here to stay. Soon, every piece of software and industry will have AI in it. But, naturally, its scary. There's so much unknown and the recent Senate hearings on regulating AI have brought up new fears across every industry. Will jobs get replaced? Why would I ever trust this to make critical decisions? And perhaps most importantly, will my data be safe?
Businesses, including high-profile companies like Apple, have even banned staff from using conversational AI tools like ChatGPT. These same fears are present in the retail industry. However, blanket bans are short-sighted and will eventually be detrimental to any business. The power of conversational AI will continue to push forward. In fact, by 2033, global AI in the retail sector is expected to achieve a $85 billion valuation. Theres no going back. Instead of facing AI with fear, retailers need to move forward and can do so safely.
Conversational AI models, if trained and applied effectively, can empower human decision makers to have a "conversation" with technology so they can make the best possible decisions without sacrificing nuance. There are many ways that this can be valuable to a retail business. For example, imagine if the individuals who have to decide where a product gets disposed of could type in a query and get the best possible answer. Or if the individuals managing your inventory could simply ask what products are running low and be fed back an answer that's tied specifically to your business and based on your internal business data. All within seconds.
At present, decision making surrounding examples like these is left to one individual or a small team. These people are tasked with understanding a vast amount of information. With the right mindset and resources, you can be using conversational AI to improve their workflows confidently and safely.
Bottom line: if you're comfortable storing your data in a database hosted on a cloud platform, then you shouldn't worry about using these AI models. Large language model (LLM) AI vendors have similar data storage and usage controls to that of database hosting. It would be no more work for Google to take data out of your cloud-hosted database than for OpenAI/MSFT to use your chatGPT sessions. Its not something to worry too much about, but its important to remember that the data privacy concerns with AI are no different than those you're likely already familiar with.
There are options out there, and each really is different. While ChatGPT is surely the most well-known, other LLMs exist. These include Google Bard, Microsoft Azure OpenAI, and various open-source LLMs. The number of options will surely grow, offering even more solutions. Its important to explore the nuances of each, choose one that works best for your business, and structure how you implement it internally in a way that's safe and makes sense for your team.
That being said, you should absolutely start by first understanding AI model data usage policies and how they differ across each. Most options have policies that offer in-depth information about their use of data and, more often than not, are enterprise friendly. However, different options have different controls and policies. MSFT Azure OpenAI service, for example, is by far the more enterprise-friendly implementation of GPT-based APIs. And OpenAI has another service called "Foundry" that provides a completely private instance of GPT. Depending on what model is used in your business and by your employees, you'll need to create internal company policies and processes to make sure your team is very clear on how to use each safely.
At the end of the day, these AI models are open source. So if all of these steps and reasons still dont have you feeling comfortable, you absolutely can spin up your own LLM. It's absolutely feasible to develop your own LLM and train it. And this is the safest way you can take advantage of the benefits of conversational AI without having to worry about data privacy.
Ultimately, conversational AI can and will be essential to your business. It won't replace your workforce (digital products dont save companies; people save companies), but it will be a powerful tool for making your teams lives easier, your decisions more accurate, and your processes more efficient. Retailers unwilling to adapt will be left behind in the wave of technological growth.
Charlie Vallely is co-founder and chief innovation officer at SmarterX, a regulatory services partner to retailers, brands and manufacturers. The company helps to accurately, and quickly, classify products for safe disposal and shipping.
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Why Retailers Shouldn't Worry About the OpenAI Senate Hearings - Total Retail
Meet the Big Tech Alumni building AI startups in Paris – Sifted
At 22 Rue Chapon, in Paris's ever-trendy third arrondissement, within a converted 18th-century mansion surrounding a cobbled, vine-covered courtyard, researchers from Meta and OpenAI are building the next generation of artificial intelligence.
These machine learning specialists cut their teeth at the perhaps less picturesque offices of Silicon Valleys most powerful Big Tech companies, and theyve now flown the nest to work on their own startups. And despite hosting a tech scene thats one seventeeth the size of the US's, they say France is the perfect place to found an AI company today.
It comes as European nations are increasingly trying to build strategic technology on home soil and reduce their reliance on American tech.
I had two AI startups before, and I moved to the US for those. If you were not in [San Francisco] you werent somebody, says Alex Lebrun, cofounder of AI healthtech company Nabla and formerly an engineer in Metas AI division. Now it's actually really changed, and Paris is a big hotbed.
Nabla which uses large language models (LLMs) to assist clinicians and reduce their admin burden shares its office building with Dust, an AI startup cofounded by former OpenAI research engineer Stanislas Polu. Not far down the road, generative AI startup Mistral founded by former staffers of Meta and Googles AI labs is working out how to spend its 105m seed round.
Despite the backgrounds of some of those founders, Polu says that Frances AI renaissance hasnt required a mass repatriation of prodigal sons and daughters from the US.
I don't think it's about people coming back [from Silicon Valley]; I think theyve always been here. Paris has a lot of traction these days because we have a very large pool of very strong talent in AI research, he says.
That includes Facebook and Google research labs in the capital city, and lots of very good engineers and scientists, according to Lebrun, who adds that it makes economic sense to build the business there: 80% of our users are in the US but we are based in Paris because AI engineers are good and cheap compared to the States.
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Nabla says that the market rate salary for a junior ML engineer in Paris is around 60k today, and 80-90k for a senior ML engineer, while Silicon Valley rates are 2.5-3x that amount (data from recruitment platform Wellfound suggests the average salary for an engineer at OpenAI is $268k).
Polu says that Frances deep talent pool is partly due to the countrys engineering degrees having a strong mathematical focus, and partly down to a government scheme called the Cifre system. The scheme encourages companies to hire PhD students by contributing to their salary payments and is funded by Frances Ministry of Higher Education, Research and Innovation.
Basically you get PhD students for free, says Polu. There's been a lot of this applied thesis research happening inside the laboratories of DeepMind [owned by Google] and Meta AI, so you get a lot of these PhD students getting access to compute and being able to do actual research during their thesis.
The fact that Paris is now home to three high-profile startups founded by alumni of Meta, OpenAI and Google represents the tip of the iceberg, Polu adds.
DeepMind and Meta, as I see it from the outside, seem to be having a harder time retaining talent these days, he argues. In the US, OpenAI is absorbing all that talent like a black hole, but they haven't quite yet figured out how to do that in Europe. And so you end up with a pool of available talent in Paris and London but in Paris in particular that is ready to explore and do stuff.
Sifted reached out to DeepMind and Meta for comment but did not receive a response before publication.
Polus Parisian bullishness should be taken with a pinch of salt. Recent research from Sequoia found that London has more than three times the share of Europes AI talent than Paris (12.29% against 3.81%), and OpenAI recently chose the UK capital as the location for its first office outside the US.
But Mistral, Nabla and Dust have now raised money from some of the worlds top VC firms, like Sequoia and Lightspeed, as well as leading business angels like Xavier Niel and former Google CEO Eric Schmidt showing the impact of having a Big Tech name on founders CVs.
While these startups share a home city and experience from the worlds top AI labs, they are taking strikingly different approaches to building companies with generative AI.
At one end of the spectrum is Mistral which raised its megaround four weeks after launching, days after hiring staff and without anything close to a product to ship. The chunky sum will largely be used to train a proprietary AI LLM, something that costs tens of millions of euros due to the huge amount of compute power needed.
Nabla, meanwhile, is building its product on top of OpenAIs GPT-4 model, though hopes that it will soon be able to transition to open-source LLMs as they improve in quality. Using third-party models means that Nabla has been able to focus on its product rather than fundamental research and doctors are already using its AI clinician companion in hospitals around the US and Europe, including a pilot programme with the British Ramsay Group.
Dust falls somewhere between these two strategies. Like Nabla, the startup is making use of third-party LLMs with Polu saying that models like GPT-4 still have a lot to offer.
It's the realisation from working at OpenAI that those models are already good enough to provide economical value, and yet theyre pretty under-deployed in the world, he says. The conclusion from that is really that it's probably as much a research problem as it is a product problem at this stage. And so the idea was to try to focus on the product problem.
Like Mistral, Dust is focused on building AI-powered products for enterprise clients, but rather than building models its trying to find new use cases for LLMs. The company is already working with six design partners to develop new applications for generative AI in the workplace.
When the smartphone came out, the App Store was flooded with to-do list apps because it was the obvious thing. We didn't realise yet that we could build Uber and Airbnb and all that stuff, he says. I think this is where we are right now with LLMs. We are in that new paradigm, we have that new abstraction, as a new platform is emerging.
Dust and Nablas product-first approach to building a generative AI company is likely to yield faster results, with third-party LLMs ready to be deployed today, but Mistral believes the bigger prize will go to those who own the underlying tech.
In a pitch memo seen by Sifted, the company argues that most of the value in the emerging generative AI market will be located in the hard-to-make technology, ie. the generative models themselves.
Lebrun takes a different view, arguing that free, open-source LLMs will be able to compete with GPT-4 within a year: I think elements are new infrastructure, like cloud [computing]. Everybody will have access to them. Your LLM is not your moat.
But Mistral is also betting on the ever-increasing attention being paid to European tech sovereignty.
Its memo points out that Europe has yet to see the appearance of a serious contender in the major geopolitical issue of building foundational models, adding that specialising in the European market will create a defensible effort in itself.
Lebrun agrees that Pariss AI renaissance is music to the ears of Frances political class, which rued the exodus of the countrys AI talent when companies like Hugging Face incorporated in the US.
Ten years ago politicians in France said, All the brains are leaving to the US! And I told them: Wait, they leave for the US, they make money, they learn and then they come back to start ambitious startups in France. It's exactly what's happening with Mistral, Nabla and Dust.
Its notable and a little ironic that these new wunderkinds of European AI are being propped up by US VC dollars. That said, more young AI companies made on the continent can only be positive if Europe is trying to avoid a Silicon Valley hegemony of the latest wave of digital disruption.
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Meet the Big Tech Alumni building AI startups in Paris - Sifted
UK Fintech News Roundup: The Latest Stories 12/07 – The Fintech Times
Every Wednesday, we delve into the latest fintech updates from across the UK. This week brings updates from Moneyhub, Innovate Finance, Veriff and Ensono.UK fintech funding falls
UK fintech funding has dropped in the first half of 2023, as the total cash raised by UK fintech firms reached $2.9billion in the first six months a 37 per cent decrease compared to the latter half of 2022, industry body Innovate Finance has revealed.
The fall in investment follows a global trend: fintech funding saw 2,500 deals worth $31.7billion in H2 2022 but only 1,714 deals worth 27.3billion in H1 2023.
Steven Mooney, CEO of FundMyPitch, commented: Funding for SMEs is absolutely vital if the nation wishes to reach economic stability and future growth, especially in sectors such as the fintech sector that drives innovation and attracts international investment.
The UK has always been seen as an international financial hub and retaining this position will only be possible if funding into the SMEs that support its developments is provided. The lack of financial backing will hold back small and medium-sized businesses that offer huge potential.
Moneyhub, the open finance data platform, has partnered with wealth management solution provider Voyant, to give advisers using Voyants platform real-time access to a more complete picture of the clients financial world.
The solution will support advisers with Consumer Duty requirements and improve their ability to help clients identify and monitor progress against their goals, demonstrating positive client outcomes one of the key challenges of Consumer Duty.
Kim Jenkins, managing director of Moneyhub, API said: A complete picture of a clients financial information is vital for advisers to give personalised and effective advice. Were excited to be working with Voyant to roll out our open banking and open finance connections to help improve efficiency, meet regulatory obligations and drive better consumer outcomes in the adviser space.
A lack of understanding of cloud computing and its benefits could put some UK-based small and medium-sized businesses in danger of falling behind the competition, according to cloud phone system provider TelephoneSystems.Cloud.
The firm also revealed that 48 per cent of UK SMEs still need to implement a technology investment strategy.
Juliet Moran, technical director at TelephoneSystems.Cloud, discussed the firms findings: Many SME Business owners remain sceptical of new technology. Although moving to the cloud offers businesses a more affordable and sustainable alternative to hosting onsite, some business leaders feel compelled to stick to what they know: on-site filing cabinets and inefficient, expensive, and energy-consuming servers.
Cloud technology can cut costs and offer flexibility and efficiency in a hybrid working world, which is vital for employers, employees, as well as customers.
Global identity verification provider Veriff has achieved certification against the UK governments Digital Identity and Attributes Trust Framework (UKDIATF). This certification enables Veriff customers to verify the identities of UK-based users more confidently while complying with UK government-approved rules.
Introduced last year, UKDIATF provides guidance and requirements for identity and authentication service providers to ensure that they meet certain technical and security standards, as well as principles for protecting users privacy and data.
Indrek Heinloo, COO of Veriff, said: This certification gives our global customers additional assurance that our internal processes meet generally accepted best practices. Even though UKDIATF is specifically designed for the UK market, certification requirements such as data privacy, risk management, and others are in line with global industry standards.
Technology adviser Ensono has revealed that human agents remain crucial to modern insurance; as 56 per cent of UK insurance consumers said they would prefer to speak to someone on the phone about insurance services over any other medium.
However, Ensono revealed it expects change to occur soon after it found that UK insurers expect to increase tech investment by 35 per cent over the next two years, on average.
The most popular methods of communication were found to be:
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UK Fintech News Roundup: The Latest Stories 12/07 - The Fintech Times
How SMEs can scale and improve with technology – The Manila Times
BEFORE the pandemic ushered in a widespread adoption of financial technology (fintech), it was the norm to dedicate time and effort to banking, payment processing and filing taxes. As recently as 2019, people were concerned about the security and reliability of e-wallets and banking apps; today, most of us can't imagine life without them.
Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) that survived the pandemic used digital methods like e-commerce, online marketing, digital payments and delivery apps to conduct business. Even when in-person transactions resumed, these methods remained for their convenience and cost efficiency. Today, with new fintech and e-commerce solutions being released worldwide, it's time for Filipino SMEs to scale and improve their businesses through further digital adoption. Here are some ways to scale your business digitally.
Cloud-based accounting
All businesses, regardless of size or structure, are required to keep their books in order. SMEs can benefit from using a cloud-based digital accounting system as it automates time-consuming financial tasks, reduces errors and provides accurate financial data for better decision-making. Additionally, cloud-based financial data can be accessed by multiple users simultaneously.
Business owners have a variety of options for cloud accounting software, depending on the features, benefits and pricing that meet their needs. With the right software, they can easily handle taxes, payroll, invoicing, expenses, and more. To find good software, get feedback from other business owners. This will help you find software with good customer support and a short learning curve for your employees.
CRM and marketing automation tools
SMEs are often forced to do more with less, especially when it comes to customer life cycle management, marketing and lead generation. Unlike larger enterprises, SMEs often handle all three of these areas through a single role or department. This is where CRM (Customer Relationship Management) and automation tools come in handy.
A CRM tool is software that helps businesses manage customer interactions. With it, SMEs can store customer data in one place making it easy to analyze and sort by demographics or behavior. CRM systems can also manage customer interactions, track leads and automate email responses. This allows for personalized marketing campaigns and better customer engagement.
SMEs can also save time by using automation tools like web forms to gather leads and add them to their CRM. AI content generators like ChatGPT can create email and social media copy, and social media planning tools let you schedule the publication of these marketing materials in advance. Lastly, data analytics from these tools will help you focus your budget on high-value clients, and lead and allow you to build consistent messaging across different touchpoints.
Cloud computing services
Cloud computing is a cost-effective way for businesses to store and share large amounts of data, including ongoing work, customer data and applications. It uses a remote online database instead of a local storage device or server, allowing organizations to access data from anywhere without physically being in the same space.
Cloud computing is not a single software or app. Rather, it's a host of web services, servers and development tools. Some you may already know, such as Google Drive, Skype, Zoom and Dropbox. More advanced tools include Salesforce for CRM; Amazon Web Services for database storage; and Drupal for content management and website hosting.
Cloud computing uses a lot of advanced technology than what your organization may be used to, but it has plenty of benefits that make it worth the transition. Services such as cybersecurity, brand intelligence and app management can give your organization an edge in your industry. Cloud computing also offers flexibility, scalability and mobility for any organization.
One way to convert to cloud computing services is through the use of a credit line. First Circle's Revolving Credit Line, for instance, can be used for any business purpose such as investing in new hardware, software and infrastructure. This can help SMEs keep up with the latest technology trends and remain competitive in their respective markets. Additionally, having access to a credit line lets you make technology investments on your own terms, rather than waiting until you have saved enough funds.
Leveraging mobile technology
Mobile technology has transformed the way SMEs operate and conduct business. With the advent of smartphones and tablets, SMEs can now access critical business information and data from anywhere and at any time. Leads and clients can also connect with your brand on the go making it essential for SMEs, especially those in retail, travel, shipping and banking sectors, to streamline their mobile touchpoints alongside desktop experiences.
SMEs can provide a seamless and personalized experience by offering mobile apps, mobile-responsive websites and mobile-only experiences. Multiple touchpoints increase the likelihood that leads will convert. Secondary mobile channels, such as SMS or app notifications, also resonate better with target audiences that are not tech-savvy or have poor access to the internet. Timed correctly, these mobile experiences enable SMEs to compete with larger organizations and expand their reach and influence even on a small budget.
Technology offers SMEs a cost-effective way to scale and improve their operations, while increasing organizational productivity and cost efficiency. By streamlining important aspects of your operations such as accounting, marketing, data storage and mobile experiences, you can stay competitive and grow your business at a budget you are comfortable with. SMEs that fail to embrace technology also risk being left behind in today's fast-paced business environment. Therefore, SMEs should take advantage of the benefits that technology offers to stay ahead of the competition.
Jess Jacutan is a content marketing consultant for First Circle, a fintech company empowering SMEs since 2016 through non-collateral, no-commitment, free-to-open business financing.
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How SMEs can scale and improve with technology - The Manila Times
BlackBerrys new cybersecurity hub to add 100 people this year – BusinessLine
BlackBerry launched a cybersecurity hub in India, with facilities dually located in Bengaluru and Noida (New Delhi). The company plans to add 100 employees specialising in Generative AI and Machine Learning (ML), threat intelligence, networks, cloud computing, and software development by the end of 2023.
The development comes after the company revealed a BlackBerry IoT Centre of Excellence in Hyderabad, dedicated to embedded software for mission-critical IoT industries.
The company is adding local expertise to its global software and services teams to help stop cyberattacks across multiple locations, including India and the Asia Pacific (APAC) region, with the help of its cybersecurity software. It is hosting a BlackBerry Careers Day in Bengaluru on July 29.
Also read: No. of cyber attacks on Indian entities far surpasses global average
We understand the critical role of AI in both closing the cyber-skills gap and staying ahead of cyber threat actors. By expanding our global software and services footprint to India, we will enhance support for our customers and partners in APAC and Japan while nurturing the next generation of cyber-defenders who want to upskill in AI and ML, said Shishir Singh, CTO, BlackBerry Cybersecurity.
The new regional expansion plan will augment the companys existing software and services teams based in Canada, the United States, and Europe. It also enhances regional access to the companys leading cybersecurity software and services, which, in addition to Cylance AI, include 24x7 cyber threat monitoring and mitigation, endpoint management to help protect and enable the digital workplace, and threat researchers providing real-time intelligence.
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BlackBerrys new cybersecurity hub to add 100 people this year - BusinessLine
Prepare for the Holiday Shopping Frenzy: Nexcess Releases The … – PR Newswire
With ecommerce sales surging,Nexcess prepares businesses to thrive during the most important time of the year for retail
ATLANTA, July 11, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- Nexcess, the fully managed, high-performance, digital commerce platform built to optimize online sites and stores, today announced the release of The 2023 Ecommerce Holiday Survival Guide, a definitive resource for ecommerce store owners preparing for the busiest and most critical time of year.
Ecommerce sales continue to trend upward and break records. Throughout 2023, U.S. ecommerce sales are expected to exceed $1 trillion. Ecommerce sales will hit 20.8% of all retail sales across the globe this year, according to Forbes. That number is expected to reach 24% by 2026.
The holiday season puts a lot of pressure on business owners. And Nexcess wants to help make sure it is profitable.
Knowing what to do and when is crucial for all ecommerce business owners. To help online store owners prepare for a successful holiday selling season, the guide provides everything needed to optimize sites, increase conversions, and prepare stores for increased traffic. The handbook, categorized by season, also outlines when to start testing sites, running ads, and how to refine selling strategies.
"As ecommerce continues to see significant growth in every sector, store owners will see increased traffic and competition this year," says Terry Trout, SVP of Marketing. "The holiday season puts a lot of pressure on ecommerce business owners. And Nexcess wants to help make sure it is profitable. For more than 23 years, we've been helping businesses build, launch, and grow online. This expert guide provides key insights and strategies that will help online stores increase customer satisfaction, generate loyalty, and take advantage of the holiday traffic surge."
To ensure success, business owners need ample time to strategize and plan for the busiest retail time of the year. By initiating ecommerce holiday preparations early, business owners will gain an edge over competitors and maximize revenue. The guide addresses every critical aspect of ecommerce success and includes a comprehensive checklist to ensure businesses don't miss a beat.
To learn more about holiday readiness, read The 2023 Ecommerce Holiday Survival Guide. For more information about Nexcess, visit nexcess.net.
About NexcessNexcess is the best place to build your business online. Optimized for your hosting and solution needs, we provide a managed hosting infrastructure, curated tools, and a team of experts that make it easy to build, manage, and grow your business online. Serving SMBs and the designers, developers, and agencies who create for them for more than 23 years, we provide a fully managed, high-performance cloud solution built to optimize WordPress, WooCommerce and Magento sites and stores. As a company within The Liquid Web Family of Brands, we collectively manage 10 global data centers, have more than 500,000+ sites under management, serve over 187,000 paying and 2.5 million freemium software customers spanning 150 countries, and provide unparalleled service from a dedicated group of experts 24/7/365. As an industry leader in customer service, the rapidly expanding brand family has been recognized as an industry leader and among INC. Magazine's 5000 Fastest-Growing Companies for twelve years.
Media ContactAndy BissonetteSr. Director of Marketing, Nexcess[emailprotected]
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Prepare for the Holiday Shopping Frenzy: Nexcess Releases The ... - PR Newswire
Competition will be kicking itself over Red Hat deal, says Nokia … – Light Reading
"It was a very, very smart move on our part. Our competition is probably privately kicking itself it didn't think of it before we did."
So said Fran Heeran, Nokia's general manager of core networks, cloud and network services, when Light Reading caught up with him to talk about the Finnish supplier's tie-up with Red Hat, announced last week.
Why the confidence? "[The partnership] is a reaction to the way the market is going," asserts Heeran. "Our CSP [communications service provider] customers have been telling us they want more choice and openness. More and more CSPs are making separate buying decisions on cloud infra and applications."
Nokia is confident partnership with Red Hat is a step in the right direction.(Source: Nokia)
Starting from the end of this year or early 2024, CSPs asking Nokia for a full stack of mobile packet core cloud-native functions running on top of a container platform will get Red Hat's "best of breed" (Heeran's words) underlying cloud infra.
Heeran concedes that Nokia Container Services (NCS) were not good at supporting apps from other vendors.
"We've been very open and very deliberate for a couple of years now that our cloud infrastructure offering was really [only] designed for our applications," he says. "We were not in the market of selling a general-purpose horizontal cloud, hosting multiple applications from multiple vendors."
The Nokia man was quick to point out, as he did on last week's call with reporters and analysts that there'd be no vendor lock-in. Nokia's apps, he stressed, will work with the big three hyperscalers: AWS, Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure. And if CSPs want NCS, that too will still be available.
"We're essentially providing extensive long-term ongoing development and support for our own portfolio with Red Hat," Heeran adds. "They'll have the development team, but it will be us driving it". As part of the deal about 350 Nokia employees will be transferred to Red Hat.
"In the next five, six and seven years this market will fundamentally change. If we don't start planning for that, we'll have a challenge further downstream," says Heeran. "We're positioning ourselves to be truly multicloud."
Contained excitement
Should Nokia's competition in the provision of mobile packet core network functions, the likes of Ericsson and Huawei, be quaking in their container boots as Heeran suggests?
Inderpreet Kaur, senior analyst and telco cloud specialist at Omdia, a Light Reading sister company, does not go that far, although she doesn't rule out similar partnerships emerging as a way to combat growing industry fragmentation. From an operator's perspective, Kaur says a consistent cloud platform that can run network functions from different vendors makes more sense.
"Nokia and Red Hat will aim to deliver a simplified horizontal cloud infrastructure for telcos," she continues, "but there are implications for Nokia as there might be customers preferring VMWare or Wind River or even public cloud providers at the CaaS [container-as-a-service] layer. From that perspective, would this be the first of a few more announcements to come?"
Predicting how the market will develop, and picking winners and losers, is far from easy though.
"A common horizontal platform from Red Hat might make it an extremely dominant provider of CaaS to the extent that it starts to charge premium pricing," speculates Kaur. "In that case, customers might find the full stack [network functions plus cloud software] from Ericsson and Huawei more appealing. However, competition from VMware, Wind River and so on means Red Hat is unlikely to raise prices too high."
Related posts:
Ken Wieland, Contributing Editor, special to Light Reading
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Competition will be kicking itself over Red Hat deal, says Nokia ... - Light Reading
Latest Study Explores the Hybrid Cloud Computing Market Witness Highest Growth in Near Future | Equinix, Googl – openPR
Hybrid Cloud Computing Market
Definition: The global Hybrid Cloud Computing market is expected to witness high demand in the forecasted period due to increasing adoption by enterprises. According to expertise, approximately 80 percent of organizations are predicted to migrate toward the cloud, hosting, and colocation services by 2025. A hybrid cloud is an integrated cloud service, which utilizes both, private and public clouds to perform distinct functions within the same organization. It provides various benefits including flexibility, security, cost-efficiency, and scalability. Also, approx. 22% of enterprise workloads will be handled by hybrid cloud platforms by 2020." The Paas and Iaas services are dominating the global market due to the rising demand for developing, testing, and managing applications. According to the Cloud Computing report on International Trade administration 2016, "the revenue for IaaS and PaaS will exceed USD55 billion and likely surpass the revenue for servers by 2020." Additionally, increasing demand for cloud services owing to the CORONA virus crises is act as the major driver of the global market. The impact of CORONA includes an increasing number of 'Work From Home' situations across the world, the increasing popularity of video gaming, growing inclination towards online video streaming will help to boost cloud computing market and similarly hybrid cloud computing market. According to AMA, the market for Hybrid Cloud Computing is expected to register a CAGR of 21.9% during the forecast period to 2027. This growth is primarily driven by High Demand in Digital Services and Their Application, Increasing Demand for Agile Computing and Rising Consumer Preferences towards Hybrid Cloud.
Major Players in This Report Include,AWS (United States), IBM (United States), Microsoft (United States), Oracle (United States), Google (United States), Cisco Systems (United States), VMware (United States), Alibaba (China), Equinix (United States), Rackspace (United States), Fujitsu (Japan)
Free Sample Report + All Related Graphs & Charts @ : https://www.advancemarketanalytics.com/sample-report/79929-global-hybrid-cloud-computing--market#utm_source=OpenPRLal
HCI to help organizations focus on innovation across any hybrid environments.
Global Hybrid Cloud Computing the manufacturing cost structure analysis of the market is based on the core chain structure, engineering process, raw materials and suppliers. The manufacturing plant has been developed for market needs and new technology development. In addition, Global Hybrid Cloud Computing Market attractiveness according to country, end-user, and other measures is also provided, permitting the reader to gauge the most useful or commercial areas for investments. The study also provides special chapter designed (qualitative) to highlights issues faced by industry players in their production cycle and supply chain.
The Global Hybrid Cloud Computing Market segments and Market Data Break Down are illuminated below: by Service Model (Software as a Service (SAAS), Infrastructure as a Service (IAAS), Platform as a Service (PAAS)), Industry Vertical (IT & Telecom, Healthcare, BFSI, Retail, Government, Media & entertainment, Transportation & Logistics, Manufacturing, Others), Component (Solution (Hardware, Software), Services (Cloud Management and Orchestration, Disaster Recovery, Hybrid Hosting)), Organisation Size (Large Enterprises, Small and Medium Enterprises), Service Type (Cloud management and orchestration, Disaster recovery, Hybrid hosting)
OpportunitiesIntroduction Of Hybrid IT Services such as cloud Consulting, Implementation, Migration, Automation, Containerization as a service, Complete Managed Services, and Others
Market DriversIncreasing Demand for Agile Computing Rising Consumer Preferences towards Hybrid CloudHigh Demand in Digital Services and Their Application
Market TrendHigh Demand for More Computational PowerGrowing Focus to Avoid Vendor Lock-In
ChallengesRising Workload Complications in Hybrid Cloud Environment
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Geographically World Global Hybrid Cloud Computing markets can be classified as North America, Europe, Asia Pacific (APAC), Middle East and Africa and Latin America. North America has gained a leading position in the global market and is expected to remain in place for years to come. The growing demand for Global Hybrid Cloud Computing markets will drive growth in the North American market over the next few years. In the last section of the report, the companies responsible for increasing the sales in the Global Hybrid Cloud Computing Market have been presented. These companies have been analyzed in terms of their manufacturing base, basic information, and competitors. In addition, the application and product type introduced by each of these companies also form a key part of this section of the report. The recent enhancements that took place in the global market and their influence on the future growth of the market have also been presented through this study.
Report Highlights:Comprehensive overview of parent market & substitute marketIn-depth market segmentation (Trends, Growth with Historical & Forecast Analysis)Recent industry trends and development activityCompetitive landscape (Heat Map Analysis for Emerging Players & Market Share Analysis for Major Players along with detailed Profiles)
Strategic Points Covered in Table of Content of Global Hybrid Cloud Computing Market:Chapter 1: Introduction, market driving force product Objective of Study and Research Scope the Hybrid Cloud Computing marketChapter 2: Exclusive Summary - the basic information of the Hybrid Cloud Computing Market. Chapter 3: Changing Impact on Market Dynamics- Drivers, Trends and Challenges & Opportunities of the Hybrid Cloud Computing; Chapter 4: Presenting the Hybrid Cloud Computing Market Factor Analysis, Porters Five Forces, Supply/Value Chain, PESTEL analysis, Market Entropy, Patent/Trademark Analysis.Chapter 5: Displaying the by Type, End User and Region/Country 2017-2022Chapter 6: Evaluating the leading manufacturers of the Hybrid Cloud Computing market which consists of its Competitive Landscape, Peer Group Analysis, BCG Matrix & Company ProfileChapter 7: To evaluate the market by segments, by countries and by Manufacturers/Company with revenue share and sales by key countries in these various regions (2023-2028).
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Key questions answeredWho are the Leading key players and what are their Key Business plans in the Global Hybrid Cloud Computing market?What are the key concerns of the five forces analysis of the Global Hybrid Cloud Computing market?What are different prospects and threats faced by the dealers in the Global Hybrid Cloud Computing market?What possible measures players are taking to overcome and stabilize the situation?
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Latest Study Explores the Hybrid Cloud Computing Market Witness Highest Growth in Near Future | Equinix, Googl - openPR
Allo Bank taps Tencent Cloud in digital banking – ComputerWeekly.com
Allo Bank, Indonesias largest digital lender, is tapping Tencent Clouds TDSQL database management system and cloud infrastructure services to power its digital banking services.
Compatible with MySQL syntax, TDSQL was built with high availability in mind, touting data reliability rates of 99.99999% and compatibility with Allo Banks existing systems and applications.
TDSQLs horizontal scaling capability has also enabled Allo Bank to expand its business, whose investors include regional tech unicorns Grab, Bukalapak and Carro. The digital bank currently serves six million customers and offers a variety of digital banking products and services including payments, loans and deposits.
Besides TDSQL, Allo Bank is using Tencent Clouds high-performance compute and storage resources to process up to 100,000 transactions a day. It is also using the Chinese cloud suppliers content delivery network and cloud hosting services to reduce its app distribution costs and run its development and testing environments.
Indra Utoyo, CEO of Allo Bank, said Tencent Cloud has helped the bank to manage vast amounts of data, handle high-frequency transactions, ensure online security and manage risks, with the aim of providing a revolutionary service to all digital banking users in Indonesia.
Tencent Cloud has been expanding its footprint in Southeast Asia by playing to its strengths in platform services, media streaming and communications. It operates datacentres in Indonesia, Singapore and Thailand.
Jimmy Chen, vice-president of Tencent Cloud International and managing director of Southeast Asia, said: Leveraging our years of global experience and expertise, Tencent Cloud is confident in providing Allo Bank with tailored solutions and services that fulfill its specific needs. We look forward to more collaborations in the future, including partnerships for additional solutions and services.
With a large population and booming digital economy, Indonesia is one of the fastest-growing public cloud markets in Southeast Asia. Besides Tencent Cloud, Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, Google Cloud and Alibaba Cloud also operate cloud regions in the country.
According to Boston Consulting Group, Indonesias public cloud market is expected to grow by a compound annual growth rate of 25% and reach $800m by 2023.
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Allo Bank taps Tencent Cloud in digital banking - ComputerWeekly.com