Monthly Archives: January 2013

Belkin, Home automation, Machine to Machine (M2M)

Belkin Announces WeMo SMART, a Platform to Bring Internet Connectivity to Everyday Devices

Belkin today announced WeMo SMART, a program designed to bring its simple, Wi-Fi based WeMo home automation platform to new brands and a wider variety of household devices. Jarden Consumer Solutions (“JCS”), a leading provider of global consumer products brands, will be the first company to partner with WeMo SMART for its Sunbeam®, Crock-Pot®, Mr. Coffee® and Oster® brands.

“As smart devices become more prolific in the home, we wanted to give companies an easy way to reinvigorate traditional product categories with internet connectivity and the ability to integrate with other household devices and cloud-based services,” said Jamie Elgie, senior director of product management at Belkin. “JCS is the perfect initial partner because its brands make the exact kind of products our fans have been asking us to integrate with WeMo.”

The WeMo SMART platform allows companies such as JCS to bring smart capabilities to their products quickly and without developing a separate hub, by using Belkin’s existing WeMo technology, app development and cloud server. Mature product lines can be quickly brought into the smart home realm, giving them increased functionality and the ability to be controlled via smartphones and tablets.

“With Belkin’s focus on the tablet and smartphone market and recent successes in creating simple solutions for Internet connected devices, it is a natural partner to help some of JCS’s best-known brands create appliances that people can use to make their homes smarter, safer and more flexible,” said Alejandro Pena, senior vice president and general manager, Global Appliances.

By expanding WeMo to other known brands and appliances, Belkin gives people the ability to remotely monitor, program or interact with more devices in their homes from anywhere. The first JCS products with WeMo will launch later this year, with additional product offerings through 2014

 

Hardware, SED, Solid-state drive, Storage, Toshiba

Toshiba Announces Cryptographic-erase, Self-encryption Features for New Enterprise SSD, Mobile HDD

Toshiba Corporation today announced new enterprise SAS solid state drives (SSD), mobile SATA hard disk drives (HDD), including self-encrypting drive (SED) models in both product categories, and new enterprise-grade SATA SSD supporting cryptographic-erase. Select drives will start to ship in January with other models following later in the first quarter.

PX02SMQ and PX02SMU series enterprise SED (eSED) deliver government-grade Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) 256-bit self-encryption and offer Trusted Computing Group (TCG) Enterprise SSC protocol self-encryption and cryptographic-erase support. These high-performance, 2.5 inch enterprise models with SAS interface, target high-end servers and data center applications and provide capacities ranging up to 1.6TB[1].

The PX02AMU value line of SATA eSSD models and the PX03ANU read-intensive line of SATA eSSD models, both for enterprise applications, feature cryptographic- erase for fast and secure media sanitization.

For mobile computing, the MQ01ABU***W series provides self-encryption, cryptographic-erase and TCG-Opal SSC protocol support in a slim 7mm height with up to 500GB[1] of storage capacity. The MQ01ABU***W series also supports Toshiba’s innovative Wipe technology, which adds security features that allows system designers to automatically cryptographic-erase sensitive user data if an unexpected host attempts to access the HDDs or if a defined number of authentication failures occurs.

Toshiba is also reportedly working on FIPS 140-2 certification[2] for select SED products to meet government-class security requirements.

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SYS-CON.tv Interview: Solar Solutions for Data Centers

“Our company has been growing in the commercial industry. People want to do the right thing and are making their buildings green and it’s actually a great option for them financially,” explained Ken Ebbert, Director of Channel Sales at Trinity Solar, in this SYS-CON.tv interview with Cloud Expo Conference Chair Jeremy Geelan at the 11th International Cloud Expo, held November 5-8, 2012, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA.
Cloud Expo 2013 New York, June 10–13, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York, will feature technical sessions from a rock star conference faculty and the leading Cloud industry players in the world.

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Buyline Consumables, Consumables Spend Analytics, Medical, Spend management, Supply chain

MD Buyline Releases Tiered Solution to Tackle Healthcare PPI, Supply Chain Cost Containment

MD Buyline today released the next generation of Buyline Consumables, a comprehensive, evidence-based technology and services suite designed to help healthcare providers achieve greater predictability and data driven cost reductions across their Physician Preference Items (PPI) and supplies purchases.

With cost containment on PPI and supplies being a critical challenge facing healthcare institutions today, Buyline Consumables helps to bring clinical, finance, operational, and supply chain teams together to produce significant and measurable financial results. By utilizing data from thousands of hospital systems nationwide, MD Buyline provides rich insight and analysis to uncover financial savings opportunities. The result is a flexible, cost effective, subscription based solution that significantly improves the financial performance of a critical area of the hospital, while positively impacting both physician and patient satisfaction.

As the foundational layer of the Buyline Consumables solution suite, the Spend Analytics platform includes access to a real-time data platform that aggregates and synthesizes information from thousands of hospitals and vendors. Delivered as a cloud-based offering and accessible to anyone with a web browser, Consumables Spend Analytics enables clinical, operational, supply chain and financial departments to gain detailed line-item level visibility and drilldown views into robust national and cohort benchmarks for PPI and supply spend, resulting in greater fiscal sustainability and improved patient outcomes.

The premium service component of Buyline Consumables solution suite, aggregates Consumables Spend Analytics with a layer of diagnostic frameworks and custom research, to provide an end-to-end decision support service. Unlike open-ended PPI consulting engagements that have little or no cost predictability, Consumables Spend Management is designed to support value analysis processes “from kickoff to implementation” at a fixed cost.

In addition to all elements of Consumables Spend Analytics, the Spend Management services include:

  • Custom research for the specific supply category, complete with
    summaries of the latest clinical evidence
  • RFP reviews and insight on contract pricing, terms and conditions best
    practices
  • Custom financial impact and decision support calculators
  • Analyst insights, recommendations & negotiation support

According to Satin Mirchandani, CEO, MD Buyline, “The Buyline Consumables solution suite is designed to efficiently and effectively support cross-functional technology selection and acquisition processes, thus driving step-function improvements in PPI and supply spend reduction. The proven MD Buyline technology and services platform, in combination with our experienced analyst team, is well-equipped to deliver an integrated solution that drives improved predictability and financial performance across the healthcare supply chain.”

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Cloud Predictions for 2013

Amazon is about to experience a tidal wave of competition from the likes of VMware, Microsoft and a host of leading service providers who want a piece of the growing cloud pie.
I’ve read about a dozen different sets of predictions for cloud computing in 2013 and will coopt many I consider to be the most credible in order to create my own “hybrid” top four list. They are also influenced by a series of conversations with the team at CloudVelocity as well as a couple dozen briefings with some of the top minds in cloud computing held since October. Are you ready?

1) Hybrid cloud will enter the hype cycle as enterprises cross the process chasm between private and public clouds and data centers. New and existing multi-tier apps will be orchestrated across clouds for cloud migration, cloud cloning and cloud failover as the first generation of enterprise grade hybrid cloud solutions. These solutions will allow high performance IT teams to deliver services faster, more efficiently and reliably than other teams stuck in dedicated hardware lock-in traps. Over time these new solutions will have a powerful impact on how IT teams are organized and how the acquire new technologies, because they represent superior operating models.

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2013 Top Ten Tech Predictions

“The need to capture and manage Big Data is daunting, but not as daunting as the need to understand and analyze all you’ve captured,” says Jill T. Singer, CIO of the National Reconnaissance Office and an upcoming speaker at 12th Cloud Expo | Cloud Expo New York. “2013 will see increased emphasis on making sense of Big Data rather than just making Big Data,” she adds.

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SYS-CON.tv Interview: Cloud Computing and Sustainability

“Most people in the IT industry don’t know that it’s a dirty business. Information takes room and it takes energy to maintain and this information is growing in an exponential fashion,” explained Steven Cangiano, Solar Sales Consultant at Trinity Solar, in this SYS-CON.tv interview with Cloud Expo Conference Chair Jeremy Geelan at the 11th International Cloud Expo, held November 5-8, 2012, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA.
Cloud Expo 2013 New York, June 10–13, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York, will feature technical sessions from a rock star conference faculty and the leading Cloud industry players in the world.

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IT Metrics Drive Enterprise IT Cost Visibility

Many organizations are focusing on IT metrics and metering to generate IT cost savings. Here’s a quick summary of how one organization is using metering of IT resource consumption to improve IT cost visibility and move from being a cost center to an internal service provider.
The Company operates a 24-hour cable network that reaches about 100 million US homes and a web site that has more than 60 million users per month. The Company is divided into two primary business units, each with their own P&L.

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Customer relationship management: 7 signs your business is ready

Guest blog by Joe Manna
Senior Content Strategist at Infusionsoft

There are few words that sound like nails on the chalkboard to a small business owner such as “CRM” (customer relationship management).

At its core, a CRM tool is a database that contains customer and prospect (lead-generation) information. CRMs can range from basic contact managers, all the way up to a sophisticated tool for operating a business.

Yesterday’s CRMs were often installed and hosted “on-site,” and today’s CRM solutions are often hosted through a third-party. Salespeople are often the primary beneficiaries of a CRM, in addition to people who function in a marketing role for a company.

Though the name might be boring, I want to share several reasons why more entrepreneurs are using a CRM tool within their businesses to get organised and thrive.

1. CRM is for “closers.” Salespeople love to stay in touch with their …

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Is there a widening skills gap in the cloud industry?

A recent whitepaper from IDC sponsored by Microsoft has suggested a widening skills gap for cloud computing, and the trend will continue further through 2013.

In particular the research, of over 600 organisations, showed that as the cloud evolves, cloud-specific skills will grow at six times the rate of overall IT skills, noting that cloud-related skills “represent virtually all of the growth opportunities in IT worldwide”.

According to the paper, worldwide IT jobs will hit just under 30m by the end of 2015; however the 22.3m non-cloud jobs represent a CAGR (compound annual growth rate) of 0% from 2011, as opposed to the 7m cloud-related jobs having a 26% CAGR, going up from 2.7m in 2011.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, broken down into demographics North America is where the most cloud-oriented jobs will be in 2015 (2.7m), representing a 22% growth over four years. Asia/Pacific (2.3m, 32 …