The Internet of Things (IoT) is a key technology that will provide the data that will fuel the cognitive business era. Cognitive systems will ingest all the IoT data and use it to infuse intelligence into systems and processes. As a result, businesses will become more efficient, improve overall customer experience, discover new business opportunities and better anticipate risks and threats. Our research over the past year has revealed three important trends driving adoption of the Internet of Things (IoT) as we move through 2016. They are: 1) IoT systems…

Read More

Report suggests organisations, be it because of embarrassment or ignorance, aren’t seeking help from the authorities when they’re victims of cybercrime. Under a third of cyberattacks against businesses are reported to the police, suggesting that organisations are underestimating the threat posed by hackers and cybercrime, a new study has warned. According to Cyber Security: Underpinning the Digital Economy, a report by the Institute of Directors and Barclays bank, companies are keeping quiet about being the victim of a cyberattack, even if their operations were badly affected by such an incident — as figures…

Read More

When the 2016 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas filled its 2.5 million square feet of exhibit space with promising technologies, there were smart cars, smart drones and smart houses to get excited about. Missing was last year’s excitement about the Apple Watch.  Since its April 2015 introduction, Apple has remained secretive about how the smartwatch is selling.  Apple CEO Tim Cook has repeatedly stated that “we are not announcing the numbers,” but a new report by research firm Juniper estimates that Apple has claimed 52 percent of the smartwatch market.…

Read More

MANY prophets of information technology (IT) believe that the next big movement in their field will be the “internet of things”. This, they hope, will connect objects hitherto beyond the reach of IT’s tendrils so that, for example, your sofa can buzz your phone to tell you that you have left your wallet behind, or your refrigerator can order your groceries without you having to make a shopping list. That, though, will mean putting chips in your sofa, your wallet and your fridge to enable them to talk to the…

Read More

The company already has more than 50 million business pages on its network. They may not be as sexy as the celebrities Facebook is reportedly trying to woo, but small and medium businesses are still an important group of customers for the social network. On Wednesday, the Menlo Park, Calif., company unveiled a new tool that lets businesses make a short introductory video about their company. Dubbed “Your Business Story,” the video tool lets businesses create essentially a photo slide show to which they can add some music from a…

Read More

Last year was truly excellent for the mobile world especially in terms of developments made to the web browsing on smartphones and tablets. Will 2016 be similarly exciting? Here’s what we believe is likely to make news in 2016. Web fragmentation and more focus on Web Performance According to mobile experts from Applause, it is likely that ‘walled gardens’ created by companies like Google (AMP), Facebook (Instant Articles), Twitter, Netflix, Pinterest, etc. will be more visible in 2016 increasing web fragmentation. We agree that these ‘powerful regions of influence’ will…

Read More

Software-Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) have been picking up the pace as of late. A high percentage of communication service providers and large data centers have either added these technologies on their roadmaps, or are already doing small-scale Proof-of-Concepts (PoC) in their testbed environments. The one thing that has insofar received surprisingly little attention is the scalability of these technologies. On paper, the best of the SDN pack are able to scale slightly above 100,000 hosts per SDN Controller. When you compare this number against the backdrop…

Read More

Full-blown digital transformation is a relatively new phenomenon. There’s not a lot of well-documented evidence of how companies rewire their internal and external operations to generate revenue in the digital age. Yet, some companies have an uncanny ability to dominate on the digital front. They introduce innovative technologies that change the game and deliver delightful customer experiences that create unbreakable bonds with customers. How do these talked-about top performers consistently outrun the competition? And, how does your company compare to the best of the best? If I could answer the…

Read More

As Software as a Service (SaaS) ERP becomes more popular dozens of versions are now being offered by vendors. This wide choice is a good thing because, even more than conventional ERP systems, SaaS ERP has to be chosen very carefully to meet the needs of your company. SaaS systems are faster to implement than on-site ERP systems. That is one of their major advantages. But that advantage comes at the cost of greatly limited choices. SaaS isn’t as flexible as an on-premises system because many of the choices for…

Read More

Germany creates a link between privacy enforcement and antitrust. The German federal competition authority has opened an investigation into Facebook FB 0.12% , over what it suspects is “an abusive imposition of unfair conditions on users.” The Bundeskartellamt said Wednesday that Facebook’s terms and conditions, in which users agree to have their data collected for the purposes of ad-targeting, were difficult for those users to understand. “There is considerable doubt as to the admissibility of this procedure, in particular under applicable national data protection law,” the office said. “If there…

Read More