Unleashing Creative Potential

UIP has proven to be a cornerstone in nurturing and unveiling the potential of young tech enthusiasts, providing a robust platform to innovate, learn, and grow. Participants will be mentored and guided by the experienced hands of Unisys professionals, offering a unique opportunity to transform textbook knowledge into real-world innovative solutions.

This year, UIP is weaving its magic around emerging, solution-oriented technologies. Artificial Intelligence, quantum computing, and data analytics are at the forefront, presenting students with an arena to showcase their creativity and technical prowess.

“India’s digitally skilled talent pool has grown synonymous with tech innovation in recent years, making it the home of some of the world’s most talented youth in IT,” said Sumed Marwaha, managing director of Unisys in India.

The Unisys Innovation Program is a testament to this belief, aiming to equip participants with specialized technical skills for the future.

Themes Unveiled

With ten distinct themes including AI ubiquity, connected world (IoT), zero trust security, and quantum computing, participants are spoilt for choice. Each theme is intricately designed to challenge and inspire, pushing students to the zenith of their creative and technical abilities.

Driving Innovation in India

According to Sumed Marwaha, the program underscores the importance of a platform where young tech minds bring their innovative breakthroughs to the forefront of India’s technology revolution. The fusion of creative thinking, technical expertise, and hands-on learning is the crux of this unique experience.

About the Unisys Innovation Program

With over 76,500 student submissions since 2009, UIP stands as one of the country’s highly anticipated technical competitions. It’s not just a challenge but a nurturing ground for the aspiring innovators and future leaders in the tech world.

In Summary

As the curtains rise for the 15th Annual Unisys Innovation Program, the anticipation and excitement are palpable. Each year, the event morphs into a battleground of innovation, creativity, and technical expertise, and this year is no different. With the inclusion of contemporary and future-oriented technologies, participants are not just competing but are also contributing to the vast world of technology.

We invite our readers to dive deep into this narrative, witness the transformation of ideas into innovations, and be a part of this enriching journey. Do you think programs like UIP are essential in bridging the gap between academic learning and real-world application? What theme excites you the most? Share your thoughts, insights, and anticipations in the comments section below. Let’s weave a tapestry of ideas and perspectives that is as diverse and innovative as the Unisys Innovation Program itself!

The post Unisys’s 15th Innovation Program: AI, Quantum Computing Focus first appeared on Tech Insight.

IT leaders and their departments are becoming more business-focused – and not a moment too soon – realising the need to move faster and be more agile, in order to meet both strategic business goals and changing customer needs.

‘Fail fast and move on’, as the mantra goes, with the big picture being the emergence of startups and innovative thinkers who see the potential to disrupt markets with apps and sharing-economy services, but without the millstone of legacy systems – or, sometimes, any need to turn a profit before they’re snapped up by bigger platforms.

Once-core IT functions – such as the proverbial ‘keeping the lights on’ – are now outsourced commodity services, with the real value-add for the IT function being enabling the business to move at startup speed, while removing the barriers for employees to work when, where, and how they please.

Within the organisation, a flexible, agile, DevOps focus is emerging. Outside of it, cloud platforms, commercial 5G networks and services, artificial intelligence, machine learning, and other Industry 4.0 technologies, are rising and coalescing around the Internet of Things (IoT).

So far so good. But often overlooked in these megatrends is the role of communications service providers (CSPs); but it shouldn’t be, as we all become more mobile and reliant on them.

“CSPs’ ability to provide connectivity while leveraging multiple data sets gives them “a unique competitive edge to play with” in the 5G and IoT spaces, but it’s “not a foregone conclusion that they will win”. That’s the view of networking and communications provider, Ericsson, which has published a new report, Realising IoT Strategies, in the same week as Vodafone shared its own report on the IoT landscape.

According to Ericsson, digitalisation is “bringing both new friends and foes to CSPs, so they need to ensure they have the right strategic approach and pursue the opportunities that play to their considerable strengths.”

So what are those opportunities and strengths? CSPs may want to develop a cross-industry strategy such as data monetisation, says the report, while others may wish to devise a strategy targeting a vertical, such as transport and logistics, where the IoT has obvious impacts (as explored in a separate report on the Vodafone research).

However, the current momentum of digitalisation is causing the boundaries between many industries to become less defined, warns Ericsson, perhaps suggesting that a platform approach with different industry connectors may be the way ahead.

“Amidst all this change, CSPs are advancing their 5G and IoT strategies to provide greater value “both within and beyond connectivity”, explains the report. To compete, they must deploy their existing assets to defend and evolve their core businesses – such as “providing enhanced digital experiences, rolling out high-performance networks, and improving operational efficiency” – while exploring the opportunities for new growth that are enabled by 5G and the IoT.”

Ericsson says its own strategy is to help CSPs navigate through these uncertainties, by engaging strategically with their CXOs to help them define strategic intents in 5G and the IoT, how to best capture value, and whether they should focus on their existing core business or take on a larger role in the value chain.

Accordingly, Ericsson has developed a strategic 5G and IoT framework that has eight key dimensions: Strategic intent; consumer focus; enterprise focus; value chain position; go-to-market/ecosystem strategy; commercial model; portfolio and network strategy; and operating model. CSPs can use this framework to explore where their own 5G and IoT pursuits should be focused, starting with their positioning and differentiation in the market.

Taking a holistic approach across all eight dimensions is vitally important, says Ericsson, because only then can CSPs develop a unified view of their 5G and IoT priorities.

Based on its work with these companies to date, Ericsson reports that CSPs find five of the eight dimensions to be the most challenging:

• Strategic intent: CSPs tend to be too technology-focused and lack long-term strategic thinking about their 5G and IoT investments, says Ericsson. Even when they have that intent, they can be too ambitious about their execution ability. This means that their 5G and IoT strategies are often misaligned, putting their ability to capture 5G’s and the IoT’s potential at risk.
• Enterprise focus: What Ericsson calls CSPs’ “opportunistic approach” to targeting enterprises means their focus is diluted across many sectors. As a result, they face difficulty in providing meaningful 5G and IoT value to those segments. This problem is exacerbated by their miscalculation of the industry-specific expertise needed when targeting enterprises.
• Value chain position: Many leading CSPs want to assume larger roles higher up the IoT technology stack, but they often underestimate the capabilities required to reach a dominant position beyond connectivity and network provisioning. More, they may be taking competition from IT firms in the IoT stack too lightly, says Ericsson.
• Go-to-market/ecosystem strategy: CSPs are currently attempting to develop capabilities in-house and build solid partnerships for execution. They are also looking to compensate for their lack of experience and exposure to industry partners as they go to market.
• Operating model: CSPs commonly operate in silos, with isolated enterprise and network departments, causing disjointed strategic and operational approaches on 5G and the IoT. More, their IoT responsibilities tend to be scattered across the organisation.

“In short, it could be said that CSPs face the same transition challenges as many of their enterprise customers. And across all eight dimensions of Ericsson’s framework there are distinct gaps between CSPs’ current and intended positions. “These deltas must be bridged to reach strategic intents,” the report warns.”

And that’s not all. Most CSPs adopt an opportunistic approach to new revenue streams, but their desire is to follow a more well-defined strategy. Their opportunistic approach also means they tend to have a broad industry focus today while aiming to target a selected few in the future.

Given that many CSPs are part of larger conglomerates, a natural starting point for them would be to focus on the industries in which their groups are already operating. This would present some obvious advantages: easier access to the enterprise and the ability to scale and demonstrate initial use cases faster while improving the competitiveness of the parent company.

Most CSPs are also connectivity-centric, but have clear ambitions to capture the full value of 5G and move up the IoT stack to take on more profitable roles beyond connectivity, concludes Ericsson.

• In related news this week, Ericsson warned that growing media alarm about Chinese technology giant Huawei – whose activities in the UK have long been monitored by the security services – risks delaying the rollout of 5G networks and services in Europe.

Read our latest news here. A Tech About Tech Brand.

The post 5G and the IoT: Communications service provider challenge first appeared on Tech Insight.

Xively is a platform for building and managing connected products. Applications that Xively enabled use the platform to communicate with devices, manage users and access, provide service insights, and integrate an entire business with its intelligence system. From managing communication, enforcing security, and updating firmware, Xively is a powerful tool for real-time message, business logic, security, and integration.

How would Google use this technology? Xively would become a stepping stone for them. Xively would make Google a major player in the ever growing IoT marketplace by potentially connecting a projected 20 billion things together within the next two years.

Antony Passemard of Google wrote in a blog post, “This acquisition, subject to closing conditions, will complement Google Cloud’s effort to provide a fully managed IoT service that easily and securely connects, manages and ingests data from globally dispersed devices.”

Though device designers have already been building connectivity directly into the products they design through cloud-mobile connections between the app user and the connected item, Google could take this market to the next level through Xively’s technology.

What does this mean for LogMeIn? Bill Wagner, the President and CEO recently made the following announcement, “So the obvious question is, does this mean LogMeIn is exiting the IoT?  Well, if you mean the IoT connectivity platform space, yes, we’re leaving it.  We believe that Google Cloud, now armed with Xively’s team and great technology – and backed by their platform and developer heritage and reach – are a far better fit for the future of platform leadership.”

Wagner went on to add, “What we will continue to do is invest in our Support-of-Things initiatives for products like LogMeIn Rescue, Bold360, GoToAssist, Central, Rescue Lens and SeeIt – all offerings that will continue to help our customers support new types of connected products, as well as the connected consumers that use them.”

Moving forward, Google will give the cloud business a well-attested IoT platform that will enable even more growth for its already $1 billion per quarter cloud business. In competing with Microsoft, IBM, AWS, Google is making moves to compete with the top cloud market leaders.

Google’s Diane Greene recently told TechCrunch, “We are saying we crossed a billion a quarter in 2017 and according to publicly available numbers, we are the fastest growing cloud. If you step back and think about someone offering services and that’s revenue, that’s pretty darn impressive. Not too many companies can make a claim like that. It already puts you in the elite of companies.”

Expect even bigger and bolder moves for Google’s IoT plans in the future, with the decision to buy Xively as the first step of many.

The post Google’s Next Big Purchase: Xively first appeared on Tech Insight.

The IoT has begun to take up a lot of bandwidth in the news. As devices with connectivity are increasing exponentially, the need for communication and power in those devices is likewise increasing. While this massive connectivity appears promising, the reality is that it comes with a hefty price tag. Currently, devices on the IoT have battery-powered sensors that stream data back to the gateway Cloud connection via radio waves. The issue, however, has begun to arise because of the massive proliferation of devices on the IoT, and the prohibitive cost of batteries and battery replacement on such a huge scale.

The announcement by Disney Research is the first step toward finding a sustainable solution to this problem. Throughout homes and offices, there is a constant barrage of electromagnetic waves transferring information. TV waves, radio waves, and even cellular signal waves all use radio signals to transmit information. With all this ambient wave energy around us, the Disney group is seeking to take advantage. While there have been a number of different attempts to harvest and use background energy in order to communicate between devices, Disney’s model is looking the best.

All the previous models were only able to use a small range of bandwidth, making them impractical. Disney researchers have built an ultra-low power model that utilizes the existing signals across all bandwidths (ultra-wide bandwidth, UWB) system which transmits data simply by harnessing those signals and sending the data with those signals. The entire system requires so little power that it can be run with a simple photo-voltaic cell.

Markus Gross, VP at Disney Research, said, “As we move towards connecting the next billion wireless devices to the internet, however, the use of batteries to power these devices will become unworkable. UWB ambient back-scatter systems, which potentially could be deployed in any metropolitan area, hold great potential for solving this dilemma.” The additional beauty of the UWB system is that it doesn’t need to be tuned to any one frequency for workability.

It will, itself, detect the necessary band, and transmit the appropriate information. This makes them ultra-user-friendly and also allows for deployment in nearly any area with enough background energy for harvesting to take place. The sensors can even pick up on the waves being sent from mobile phones and piggyback on those signals to communicate data. Ultimately the battery usage and energy savings will be remarkable.

The next jump for Disney is to make this technology widely available. While the tech is there, the production and widespread distribution is more complex. However, given the massive cost-benefit and equally good functionality, it looks like just a matter of time before these devices are household products. Three cheers for Mickey!

Discover more insightful blogs like TechInsight.com. A brand of TalkAboutTech.

The post Ultra wide Bandwidth: IoT and Mickey Mouse? first appeared on Tech Insight.