Takreem El-Tohamy, General Manager, IBM Middle East and Africa
By Takreem El-Tohamy
As companies around the world recognize that big data analytics and cloud create some of the largest opportunities for driving their business forward, the challenge of skills gaps has become increasingly urgent.
Africa faces a tremendous gap. (1) Some 87 percent of African businesses rank cloud computing, mobile, analytics, and social media as critical to their future business success, but only 53 percent are rapidly adopting these technologies, according to a new IBM report. The report, “Setting the Pace in Africa,” is based on a survey of 180 IT leaders in 29 industries across Egypt, South Africa, Kenya, Morocco and Nigeria.
That 34 percent technology adoption gap demonstrates the hurdles African businesses face as Africa takes its place as the world’s fastest growing continent. Yet at the same time, the report points the way forward, by outlining the solutions a leading group of organizations are adopting to tackle this challenge. Their ideas create a roadmap for other companies. Continue Reading »
Jon Mogford, Vice Chancellor of Research, Texas A&M University System
The Texas A&M University System and IBM have created one of the world’s largest computational sciences infrastructure. Built on a mix of high performance computing technologies that include Blue Gene/Q, Power 7 and System x servers, scientists and engineers across the system’s 11 universities and seven state agencies will work on projects dedicated to advancing agriculture, geosciences and engineering. Early tests pitted the Blue Gene/Q, installed at TAMUS’s flagship campus in College Station, on a material sciences problem that previously took weeks. The Blue Gene/Q’s 418 Teraflops solved it in less than an hour.
Jon Mogford, the Vice Chancellor of Research for TAMUS, will play a key role in the coordination and success of these diverse projects, teams and technologies. He met with IBM Smarter Planet to discuss how the university system is putting this massive new infrastructure to work. Continue Reading »
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By Steve Hamm
Back in 1999, when Mike McCue and Angus Davis left Internet pioneer Netscape Communications to start their own company, they adopted a simple motto: Only consider ideas that are big enough to make your head hurt. Ultimately, they founded TellMe Networks with the goal of making the Internet available to people everywhere via voice interactions. It was a precursor of Siri. They later sold the company to Microsoft.
A number of the suggestions we received in response to our What Should We Do With Watson? contest followed the same directive. They’re big, they’re bold, and some of them make your head hurt. For example, this comment from Hemant Shah, an M.D. and medical informatics researcher at the Henry Ford Health System in Detroit: “Watson should be deployed to answer: ‘What is the meaning of life, the universe and everything?” he wrote, quoting from the science fiction classic, A Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. “I’m being funny, but I’m also serious. You have to take on the big challenges,” he says. Continue Reading »
Glen Thomas, Vice President, Marketing and Communications, IBM Australia and New Zealand
By Glen Thomas
If you are lucky enough to attend the Australian Open in Melbourne – or simply are enjoying the tennis tournament from the comfort of your armchair – you can’t fail to be impressed by the rich, engaging experience the international Grand Slam provides for fans.
As marketers, we know that creating an engaging customer experience isn’t always easy. That’s why we’re embracing analytics, cloud computing and mobile technologies to help tap into Big Data and drive new experiences for customers. 
However, more than 80 per cent[i] of CMOs feel underprepared for Big Data – a figure that has actually increased by 11 percent in two years. Continue Reading »
Sander Dolder, Senior Project Manger, New York City Economic Development Corp.
By Sander Dolder and Devin McIntire
During a recent World Environment Center roundtable in New York City, it became clear that modern challenges including urbanization, climate change and economic woes are forcing the public and private sectors to revamp their thinking about infrastructure.
Devin McIntire, Sustainability Consultant specializing in Organizational Innovation
Opportunities abound for successful and sustainable infrastructure projects. For example, designing an enduring vision, establishing an effective communication plan, and embracing data that will measure real value, are all things that can influence behavior and drive better decision making. But to do it right, businesses of all sizes must consider three key issues: resiliency, behavior and Big Data.
Resiliency is the ability for a system to recover, adapt, and grow in the face of unforeseen changes. Companies can use the concept of resilience to help grow or transform their business, including things like where to locate, where to source materials, or what energy systems to invest in that would optimize their adaptability to climate change. Continue Reading »
Wayne Balta, Vice President, Environmental Affairs and Product Safety, IBM
By Wayne Balta
Creating a smarter planet means taking steps toward a more sustainable planet.
The EPA’s ENERGY STAR® program has been working toward this vision for years. These days, most people recognize the ENERGY STAR seal as a trusted sign of energy efficiency from seeing it on everything from light bulbs to refrigerators. But IBM’s involvement with ENERGY STAR goes all the way back to 1992 when we became a charter member of the ENERGY STAR Computer Program. Back then it was focused on personal computers. Today, however, in an era of the global internet, Big Data and analytics, ENERGY STAR is also addressing computer servers and data centers. Continue Reading »
Ocea Garriock, Technical Professionals Leader, IBM South Africa
By Ocea Garriock
Banks have become particularly good at analyzing the data for trends, patterns and insights to help boost efficiency, ensure compliance and increase revenue.
But not all of this data lives conveniently in a structured database or data warehouse. Sometimes it comes from real-time data feeds and social media. These growing sources of structured and unstructured data are potential treasure chests. But big data without analysis is just a lot of data.
Most South African / African companies are still just experimenting with big data technologies, looking to understand how big data should slot into their world views. The same is true of organisations in the rest of the world. Continue Reading »
Pramodh Narayan, Mobile Architect, IBM Global Business Services
By Pramodh Narayan
“None of us is as smart as all of us.” – Japanese proverb
Working remotely is more popular than ever. Some people even joke that IBM stands for “I’m by myself.” While there certainly are times – such as our frequent Illinois winter storms – for working from home, there’s no substitute for the power of teamwork when it comes to innovation.
The value of teamwork became clear to me growing up in India. My father (a civil engineer), my brother (a mechanical engineer) and the family always thought about ways of harnessing the power of a computer (without actually seeing one). From this early interest instilled as a youngster, I pursued a career in technology, eventually receiving my masters in Industrial Manufacturing Systems from Wayne State University in Detroit. I joined IBM in 2001 after developing knowledge-based engineering CAD/CAM systems for automotive companies. Continue Reading »
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Erich Clementi,
Senior Vice President,
IBM Global Technology Services
By Erich Clementi
When Thomas J. Watson Sr. renamed a small New York manufacturing firm International Business Machines in 1924, it was both a reflection of his outsized ambitions and a projection of his belief that business would go global in the 20th century. He was right on both counts. Since then, IBM has led the way in enabling companies to become multinational organizations even while it has emerged as a globally integrated enterprise–with more than 430,000 employees doing business in 170 countries.
Today, IBM is taking steps to lead yet another wave of change in business and technology—one that promises to transform organizations, business models and the way work is done. We’re taking cloud computing global. Continue Reading »
Lisa Seacat DeLuca, IBM Master Inventor
By Lisa Seacat DeLuca
Patents can help make our lives much richer.
Suppose you’re on the phone with your best friend from high school. The conversation might go from an upcoming wedding, to your favorite sports team, and back to some “remember when” moments. Each time the conversation changes, both people might be presented with different images or social messages relevant to those keywords, further engaging both users and enhancing the phone conversation.
One of my patents, U.S. Patent #8,494,851, issued last July, describes that scenario as “retrieval of contextually relevant social networking information during a phone conversation.”
I’m always wearing my inventor hat. Whenever I purchase a new technology, I look for ways to improve it. The USPTO has issued 115 patents to me, and I have more than 250 more pending, making me the first woman in IBM’s history to reach the 100th Plateau Achievement Award, which is a point system that rewards patent filings and publishes. Continue Reading »
