Summary Bullets:

• The market for edge computing solutions is becoming increasingly competitive as the hyperscale cloud providers announce new service offerings and telco partnerships.
• Going forward, solution providers will benefit from efforts to more clearly demonstrate and articulate the use cases and advantages of edge computing.

The recent launch of AWS Snowcone represents a further moment of intensification in the increasingly competitive market for edge infrastructure solutions. AWS Snowcone is a new edge computing and data transfer device from Amazon Web Services (AWS) and is the smallest member of the AWS Snow Family of devices. At just under five pounds, the solution is designed to be highly portable and able to fit in a standard mailbox or a small backpack. It is also designed to withstand harsh environmental conditions and support a range of use cases outside the traditional data center – especially those that lack consistent network connectivity. Although Snowcone customers with internet connectivity will be able to send data to the AWS cloud using Ethernet or WiFi with AWS DataSync, one interesting innovation is the option to ship the device to AWS. This makes it suitable for edge use cases without any network connectivity, including drilling platforms, military operation sites, and remote filming locations. Continue reading “Recent Investments and Team-Ups by AWS, Microsoft, and Google Demonstrate Their Intent to ‘Play It Big’ in Emerging Edge IT” →

Summary Bullets:

• A blockchain’s scalability is currently limited by the amount of power it consumes and the time lag involved when processing transactions across its distributed ledger.
• By enabling local data processing and storage, edge computing could offer a solution to blockchain’s current scalability limitations.

The disruptions to global and local supply chains which occurred as a consequence of the COVID-19 crisis have refocused attention on the ability of blockchain to enhance supply chain resilience. However, blockchain continues to face several basic challenges that prevent the technology from becoming truly scalable. These include the amount of power it consumes and the time lag that is involved when processing transactions across its distributed ledger. As a blockchain expands, both its power consumption and the amount of data processing latency increase, with inhibiting implications for platform scalability. Continue reading “Edge Computing Could Offer a Solution to Blockchain’s Limitations” →

Summary Bullets:

• A substantial portion of survey respondents revealed that IT budgets will remain relatively unchanged, and an encouraging 20% even indicated budget increases due to COVID-19.
• Communication and collaboration, cloud services, security, networking, and mobility spending will be most resilient; at least 30% of respondents expect spending increases for these technologies.

Although infectious disease experts had warned of the potential of a pandemic for years, COVID-19 took most organizations by surprise. The majority of large enterprises had extensive business continuity and resiliency plans in place, but most were still scrambling to keep employees securely connected when governments mandated that all but the most essential workers stay home. This sudden change in normal business operations, combined with the economic impact of the global lockdown, has (not surprisingly) influenced IT spending plans for the remainder of the year – and most likely into 2021. Continue reading “COVID-19: GlobalData Survey Reveals Bright Spots for IT Spending” →

Summary Bullets:

• The technology industry has a habit of making absolutist statements around big trends.

• The assumption that all use cases are knowable is the root of tech industry absolutism.

The technology industry has a strong tendency to make absolutist declarations, particularly regarding the big trends. For instance, the battle cry of “everything will be in the cloud” has been reverberating in the industry for years. There are tons of workloads in the cloud and more every day. But not all, like the cloud fanatics have been screaming for years. Continue reading “The Big Trend: One Size Does Not Fit All” →

Summary Bullets:

• Salesforce embraces Microsoft VS to bring Salesforce developers a popular tool in a web-based environment

• Salesforce downplayed AI innovations including Lightning Flow intelligent automation

During last week’s digital conference Salesforce TrailheaDX, the company released a number of developer toolkits, including a browser-based code builder, DevOps Center console, and beta serverless offering. The announcements created a lot of buzz among its own community of developers (who are itching to get their hands on the serverless capabilities). New Visual Studio integrations with Salesforce Code Builder are aimed at attracting a broader pool of web-based developers onto the Salesforce platforms in order to upsell high-value services such as Functions, Einstein AI, and SOQL Query Builder. Continue reading “Salesforce Broadens Dev Community via VS Integration” →

• TM ONE is a step ahead of competitors with the launch of ONE PASS to address COVID-19-specific business challenges.

• While the adoption is low, the outlook is expected to be positive. Digital health screening and visitor management solutions are expected to be a common service for enterprises post COVID-19.

As lockdown (a.k.a. Movement Control Order in Malaysia) eases off, businesses start to reopen and operate as before, but with stricter guidelines such as social distancing, regular sterilization, temperature screening, and personal data collection. This is expected to be the new normal post COVID-19 at least until the end of the year. It has defined a new set of business requirements, particularly in customer engagement and data collection, mainly for B2C enterprises that deal directly with end-users. Continue reading “TM ONE Leverages Its ICT Capabilities to Convert Post-Pandemic Challenges into Business Opportunities” →

Summary Bullets:

• Technology company employees need to enable reinvention, even if it will diminish their current product line.
• Buyers can and should scrutinize how a technology vendor handles reinvention due to technological or economic change.

Companies in the technology space often talk about reinvention, a renaissance in which the company will not only take a bold new stance, but also produce a new product or service that will rapidly become the majority of their business. Some companies have even done it and are held in the highest esteem. The best example of that would be Apple, which went from virtually moribund in the 1990s to a powerhouse in the early 2000s. Continue reading “Reinvention Isn’t Easy” →

This piece first appeared first on the official blog of RAD.

Summary Bullets:

• The smart city is one of the key use cases for the Internet of Things (IoT), with the connected urban environment and infrastructure providing benefits to both local government and its citizens.
• LoRaWAN is especially useful in large-scale, integrated smart city deployments because of its availability, cost, and reach.

While the public sector isn’t usually considered the most advanced technology vertical, until recently, it accounted for more Internet of Things (IoT) deployments than any other. Much of that activity has been focused on the smart city, where local governments – and their contracted agencies – have sought to use connectivity to monitor, track, or control city assets, with an overall goal of providing citizens with more efficient services. Continue reading “Powering the Integrated Smart City with LoRaWAN” →

Summary Bullets:

• Vendors with business process management (BPM) heritages and low-code expertise are well positioned to address complex workflows in high-compliance industries.
• Consolidation has accelerated in recent months, including Google’s acquisition of no-code vendor AppSheet, Microsoft’s acquisition of robotic process automation (RPA) vendor Softomotive, SAP’s acquisition of RPA provider Contextor, and Appian’s acquisition of the Jidoka RPA platform.

Automation pioneers are readying new DevOps solutions which ease the backend data integration and business processes requirements required of app modernization. GlobalData has just completed an IPA series of Advisory Reports, where Part I defined and described the emerging market segment and Part II identifies those vendors which are demonstrating thought leadership through early intelligent process automation (IPA) initiatives including consolidated solutions presented in a still-evolving market . Vendors included in this report are: Appian, Google, IBM, Microsoft, Pegasystems, Red Hat, Salesforce, SAP, and ServiceNow. Continue reading “GlobalData Identifies the Vendors Marrying AI-Based Low-Code with Robotic Software” →