IBM’s board of directors has elected the company’s CEO, Arvind Krishna, as its chairman, as it continues to revamp its business model.

Krishna again succeeds former CEO Ginni Rometty, who is set to completely retire from the company on 31 December 2020.

Rometty’s departure as CEO was announced back in January along with Krishna’s appointment to the helm. He officially took charge in April and the company has made seismic changes during his brief time in charge.

Krishna previously oversaw IBM’s cloud and cognitive software divisions and also played an integral role in its acquisition of Red Hat. The tech giant has prioritised hybrid cloud and artificial intelligence services and will spin off its managed infrastructure business by the end of 2021.

How long these changes have been in the works is unknown, but they have undoubtedly been pushed by the spread of the coronavirus and the resulting mass acceleration of migrations to the cloud.

In January, the firm pinned its first quarter of growth for more than a year on the uptick in its cloud division, with 2019 Q4 results showing a 21% rise in total cloud revenue, at $6.8 billion. Over the next 12 months, the company continued to invest and prioritise cloud, particularly hybrid cloud services, with a number of announcements made in October.

The month began with IBM expanding its partnership with SAP to help customers move into hybrid cloud environments. The firm also announced a new partnership with telecoms provider AT&T for 5G-based hybrid cloud architecture, and a blockchain platform with R3 that works across IBM’s Cloud Hyber Protect Service.

IBM is still a year away from its deadline to spin off its legacy business, which suggests that it will continue to invest and release more hybrid-cloud based applications. So far, its decision to focus on cloud services has been vindicated by its quarterly reports – for 2020 Q3, total cloud revenue was up 19%, year-over-year, at $24.4 billion.

If 2020 was the year to accelerate your digital transformation plans, then 2021 could be the year to explore all the wonders you might now have at your disposal. 

From containers to artificial intelligence, businesses now have a lot more power in their hands. While much of this won’t necessarily be new technology, a more varied uptake of it may lead to new use cases, greater insights and lots more experimentation. 

Pip White has been the managing director of Google Cloud’s UK and Ireland operation since June. She tells IT Pro that this year may be about exploring the benefits of all those cloud migrations. 

“Until now, cloud migration has been an infrastructure decision, promising to change the way business devices and information systems interact with each other,” White explains. “But cloud migration brings another type of transformation too – of a company’s culture – and it’s coming to the forefront of conversations.

“As we enter 2021, cloud migration will be increasingly driven by the need to establish a culture of continuous innovation to keep pace with rapid change. Untethering staff from low value, labour-intensive tasks and allowing them to focus on innovation and high-impact projects. Companies will move away from what might have been top-down corporate strategies, to fully infusing transformation and letting every person in an organisation transform.” 

White also cites a term coined by Gartner: The “anywhere operations model”, where businesses allow employees to access services from any device, any time and, as the name suggests, from anywhere. This will naturally result in greater cloud security functions, which we should see more of in 2021, though that is an area that has seen lots of attention over the last few years. 

The “Open” cloud

The ever-evolving workplace will force businesses to prioritise agile and “responsive” models, according to White. This may include a move to an “open” cloud approach, rather than using one vendor, with containerisation moving up the agenda.

“As businesses continue to stabilise themselves post-pandemic, a renewed focus will be placed on projects that enhance employee and customer experiences, reduce costs, increase operational efficiencies and boost revenue,” White says. “To enable an open cloud, build new environments and modernise old ones, the open-source community will dial-up investment in container and serverless functions, creating a spike in global demand.”

This is a fairly safe bet as containers have been steadily increasing in popularity for the last few years. Developers use them to build applications and going into 2021, demand for that skill is likely to grow. 

AI and ML shift

With the mass migration to the cloud, more and more businesses will suddenly be using artificial intelligence and or machine learning to improve customer services, boost productivity and enhance their use of data, according to White. 

“Technologies like AI and ML will be crucial to extracting meaningful insights from data sets,” White says. “For example, the banking industry has dialled up AI investment to enhance personalisation, deliver financial well-being insights and better manage risk. Even industries who are not already using AI or ML will start to experiment with technology to create tailored experiences, from anywhere.”

Again, this isn’t necessarily new, but to businesses that made the jump to the cloud in 2020, or ones that invested more into established setups, a world of automation and data analytics awaits them.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) has urged a US judge to halt the Pentagon’s $10 billion JEDI contract and assess the remaining issues with Microsoft’s winning bid. 

In a redacted court filing from October, the cloud giant said that the award must be “invalidated” as it was “the product of systematic bias” and a “flawed and politically corrupted decision”. 

AWS has again accused Donald Trump of exerting “undue influence”. The US President reportedly said “screw Amazon” when discussing the bidding process, allegedly due to an ongoing spat with the company’s founder Jeff Bezos. 

The cloud migration project was awarded to Microsoft in October 2019, but the Redmond-based tech giant hasn’t yet been able to begin its work due to legal challenges brought by AWS. Of all of the issues the cloud giant cited, a US court only found a problem with a pricing scenario quoted by Microsoft. 

In September the Department of Defence (DoD) said a court-ordered reevaluation determined that Microsoft’s proposal still represented the best value for the government, which AWS now claims is incorrect.  

“After the Court rejected the flawed initial JEDI evaluation, the DoD spent over four months attempting to revive Microsoft’s non-compliant bid and reaffirm that flawed and politically-biased decision,” an AWS spokesperson said. 

“As a result of the DoD fixing just one of many errors, the pricing differential swung substantially, with AWS now the lowest-priced bid by tens of millions of dollars.” 

The cloud giant’s argument is that the one issue the DoD did fix caused a “substantial” change, in this case making Amazon’s bid more cost-effective. As such, it is pushing for a reevaluation of the “errors that remain unaddressed”.   

“We had made clear that unless the DoD addressed all of the defects in its initial decision, we would continue to pursue a fair and objective review, and that’s exactly where we find ourselves today,” the spokesperson added.  

Microsoft did not immediately respond to CloudPro’s request for comment. 

Amazon Web Services (AWS) has announced an ambitious plan to help 29 million people around the world gain digital skills with free cloud computing training. 

The announcement came on Thursday at re:Invent 2020, the cloud giant’s annual conference. 

The training will include more than 500 free courses, interactive labs, and virtual day-long training sessions. AWS will also continue to invest in its free training courses to help participants earn certification, and will expand its AWS re:Start programme that looks to reach underrepresented communities to help them find work in the tech industry. 

What’s more, AWS will pilot new training programs, such as a two-day AWS Fibre Optic Splicing Certification and its Machine Learning University, a free course designed to teach people ML concepts for business. 

This is just a snapshot of the work Amazon is doing to help individuals around the world, according to Teresa Carlson, VP of worldwide public sector at AWS. 

“As part of our efforts to continue supporting the future workforce, we are investing hundreds of millions of dollars to provide free cloud computing skills training to people from all walks of life and all levels of knowledge, in more than 200 countries and territories,” Carlson wrote.

“We will provide training opportunities through existing AWS-designed programs, as well as develop new courses to meet a wide variety of schedules and learning goals. The training ranges from self-paced online courses – designed to help individuals update their technical skills – to intensive upskilling programs that can lead to new jobs in the technology industry.”

The announcement will be welcomed by many around the world, particularly those in industries that have been displaced by the coronavirus, which will likely have a lasting impact on many job roles. Digital or tech roles, such as those with cloud computing specialties, are thought to be of high demand for the post-coronavirus world. 

Google Cloud has acquired a London-based startup called Dataform that builds tools to manage data flows for enterprise customers.

The terms of the deal haven’t been released, but TechCrunch understands that it is an ‘acquihire’ with Google keen to take on the company’s talent.

The company is described as an “operating system” for data warehouses and some of its co-founders are ex-Google employees. Its platform aims to help data-rich businesses draw insights by mining data stored in warehouses.

This is something that usually requires a team of engineers and analysts, but the Dataform system is about making the process simpler and cheaper for organisations.

This is a growing area of data analytics with companies such as Snowflake recently undergoing a successful IPO. Dataform were close to a series A funding round, but have instead chosen to continue its growth under Google.

Under the terms of the deal, Dataform will continue to operate under its management and focus on BigQuery. The Dataform Web will also be made free for all new users from now on with customers transitioned to the free plan immediately.

“After several conversations with the Google Cloud team it became clear that we are deeply aligned on the importance of serving analysts with the right tools and technology in order to fill what we all perceive as a missed opportunity in existing solutions,” co-founder and CTO Guillaume-Henri Huon wrote on Dataform’s website.

“At the same time, as a team of just seven, in a complex, competitive and rapidly changing market, we had more ideas than we had people or resources to accomplish. There has always been so much more we wanted to do each quarter than we could achieve.

“With the support of the BigQuery and Cloud Analytics teams and our combined thought leadership and efforts, we felt that together we could achieve something bigger than we could separately”.

The pandemic has exposed a number of technology gaps in customer service, according to 88% of service professionals, as customers switched from physical to virtual locations during 2020.

This caused many customer service leaders to accelerate digital transformation strategies, according to a report from Salesforce. 

The ‘State of Service‘ report provides a “snapshot” of priorities, challenges and trajectories of global customer service teams. The findings are based on a survey of customer service agents, decision-makers, mobile workers, and dispatchers with over 7,000 respondents across 33 countries.

In response to the pandemic, 85% of service teams said they had changed their policies to provide more flexibility to customers with 60% adding that they had invested in new service technology. 

“Leaders are taking this time to rethink the value of experiences and reimagine engagement with customers and employees alike,” said Brian Solis, global innovation evangelist at Salesforce.”

“It’s not just about technology. Sometimes technology is at its best when invisible. We’re going to see significantly more agile, innovative, and relevant organisations emerge from this crisis that provides modern and sought-after experiences that change the game for everyone.”

According to the report, 88% of service professionals said the pandemic exposed technology gaps, and 86% said the same for service channel gaps as customers flocked away from physical locations and towards digital methods of engagement.

Teams also found shortcomings that went beyond the obvious, with 87% realising that their existing policies and protocols – such as cancellation fees for events that were prohibited by public health measures – were not suited for current circumstances.

In the face of these challenges, service teams were forced to make digital transformations that will endure beyond the pandemic. 78% said they had invested in new technology because of the pandemic, with 32% suggesting they had ramped up their adoption of artificial intelligence systems. 

Cisco has acquired London-based cloud communications provider IMImobile for approximately $730 million (£550m). 

The acquisition, which is the largest Cisco deal in the UK for almost three years, is expected to close in the first quarter of 2021. 

The tech giant is looking to push further into automation to reach out to its customers with IMImobile software being brought in to boost its existing customer relationship management (CRM) offerings.

IMImobile sells ‘customer interactions management’ software that automates a constant connection between businesses and clients through enhanced social media, messaging and audio channels. The firm is based in London, with offices in the US, Canada, India, South Africa and the UAE. 

With IMImobile onboard, Cisco aims to expand its customer services with an end-to-end interaction system that drives faster and smarter interactions in order to orchestrate the lifecycle journey of its customers.

Cisco’s Webex Contact Center will also be able to make use of IMImobile’s artificial intelligence technology for customer journeys. 

“We are excited to join Cisco and become part of one of the world’s leading technology companies as they seek to enable great customer experiences,” said Jay Patel, IMImobile CEO.

“We believe there will be a world of dynamic, always-on connections between global businesses and their customers and the combination of our respective technologies will enable to us make every interaction matter more for our clients.”

When the deal completes in the new year, the IMImobile team will join Cisco’s contact centre business unit, led by Cisco VP and GM Omar Tawakol.

“We look forward to working with IMImobile to help create a comprehensive CXaaS solution for the market – one that gives businesses a platform to provide delightful experiences across the entire customer lifecycle journey,” said Jeetu Patel, senior vice president and GM of Cisco’s security and applications business.

Salesforce has agreed to buy workplace messaging platform Slack in a deal worth $27.7 billion (£20.7 billion), the largest acquisition in the cloud giant’s history. 

Under the terms of the deal, Slack will now operate as a Salesforce company, but it will still be led by CEO Stewart Butterfield.  

The acquisition was first reported earlier this week but an official announcement came late on Tuesday, ahead of Salesforce’s annual conference Dreamforce. It is one of the largest deals in recent years, falling just short of IBM’s $34 billion takeover of Red Hat in 2019. 

The two companies will form a unified platform for enterprise collaboration with Slack integrated into every Salesforce cloud. The communications service will also become the new interface for Salesforce 360 customers. 

Salesforce CEO, Marc Benioff, called Slack one of the most beloved platforms in enterprise software history and said the acquisition was a “match made in heaven”. In turn, Butterfield called it the “most strategic combination in the history of software”.

Butterfield also pointed out that Salesforce “started the cloud revolution”, referencing the company’s early work selling software as a subscription service (SaaS). It is now the standard practice and a billion-dollar industry with companies like Microsoft dominating with its online Microsoft 365 suite.

Slack has endured a long rivalry with Microsoft and its competing Teams platform, which benefits from being bundled in with 365 subscriptions. There is a suggestion that joining Salesforce, a customer relationship management (CRM) software company with a large enterprise portfolio and customer base, will help push Slack further into that market and potentially level the playing field. 

“Together, Salesforce and Slack will shape the future of enterprise software and transform the way everyone works in the all-digital, work-from-anywhere world,” Benioff said in a statement. “I’m thrilled to welcome Slack to the Salesforce Ohana once the transaction closes.”

Microsoft has also wadded into competition with Salesforce by recently making CRM software a priority. Benioff previously said that his company was the world’s fastest-growing enterprise software company while announcing plans to create 12,000 new jobs over the next year.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) has announced that Apple’s macOS operating system will be available on its cloud service for developers.  

Amazon EC2 Mac instances for macOS and will run on Mac mini computers and will support developers building apps for the iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, Apple TV and Safari.

This is the first big announcement to come from AWS re: Invent, which started on Monday as a three-week virtual conference. The cloud giant previously offered EC2instances for Windows and Linux, but has now opened it up to macOS which is a popular system for many developers.

What’s more, AWS has also said that cloud support for devices with Apple’s new M1 chip is planned for 2021. 

AWS will make Apple computers available in its data centres, starting with the Mac Mini, which will help developers to create and test apps remotely rather than maintain their own devices. It’s thought this could help Apple to further pivot towards building more of its own software and services. 

“You can provision new instances in minutes, giving you the ability to quickly and cost-effectively build code for multiple targets without having to own and operate your own hardware,” said Jeff Barr, AWS chief evangelist. “You pay only for what you use, and you get to benefit from the elasticity, scalability, security, and reliability provided by EC2.”

CCS Insight senior VP Nick McQuire suggested that the growing partnership between AWS and Apple will likely be the headline trend at re: Invent 2020. 

“Not only will this move help to improve the cost, security and efficiency of building applications, what is most interesting is the potential for 5G capabilities down the line as both parties have been pioneering 5G solutions to the enterprise in 2020,” he told IT Pro.

“When you consider the direction mobile phones and applications are taking, with low latency and high throughput becoming the norm in support of technologies like VR, AR, edge computing and media streaming, for example, this AWS and Apple tie-up has formidable potential.”

Zoom has reported $777.2 million in revenue for its third quarter, roughly four times more than it reported during the same period in 2019. 

It is the second quarter in a row that the video conferencing service has recorded quadruple growth, with paid customers increasing 485% year-on-year. 

The increase rounds off a highly successful year for Zoom. This time last year it was a relatively obscure company, hardly known outside of the US, but by March the video conferencing service had become a household name.

The need for collaboration software, tied to the fact it offered a free service alongside a paid business tier, helped put the company in startups, schools and homes around the world. 

“Strong demand and execution led to revenue growth of 367% year-over-year with solid growth in non-GAAP operating income and cash flow in our third fiscal quarter,” said Zoom CEO Eric Yuan.

“We expect to strengthen our market position as we finish the fiscal year with an increased total revenue outlook of approximately $2.575 billion to $2.580 billion for the fiscal year 2021, or approximately 314% increase year-over-year.”

Zoom is expecting its growth to continue into 2021 with total revenue estimated to be between $806 million and $811 million for Q4. However, its revenue will be offset by higher cloud costs due to the sheer amount of free users.

The company said it had 433,700 customers with more than 10 employees in Q3, which is a 485% increase from 2019 but only a 17% increase from the second quarter. 

The video conferencing service does use its own data centres, but it also heavily relies on vendors like AWS and Oracle, which means it will bear some the cost for its free tier users. This pushed its gross profit margins down to 66.7%, below analyst estimates of 72.1%.

While the firm has its own high expectations for Q4, its gross margins are likely to remain lower than expected as the spike in free users continues to offset its overall business revenues. 

Zoom also announced this that it has selected AWS as its preferred cloud provider. This comes just months after the company shifted a portion of its cloud infrastructure to Oracle Cloud due to an unprecedented surge in new users following the announcement of lockdown restrictions.