Google Cloud has hired Intel engineering veteran Uri Frank to lead new server chip design efforts as part of the firm’s increasing investments in custom silicon.

Frank has spent the last two decades at Intel, advancing to Director Of Engineering in 2011 and later becoming VP of Platform and Silicon Engineering. Last year, he was appointed corporate VP of Intel’s Design Engineering Group but chose to leave the role earlier this month. 

It has now been revealed that Frank has been hired by Google and appointed VP of Engineering for the tech giant’s server chip design division which is to be based in Israel.

Announcing the move on his LinkedIn profile, Frank wrote that he “look[s] forward to growing a team here in Israel while accelerating Google Cloud’s innovations in compute infrastructure”, before adding that the tech giant is currently hiring system-on-a-chip (SOC) designers to join its growing sever chip team.

Google Cloud’s VP of Systems Infrastructure Amin Vahdat said that the company is “thrilled to welcome Uri Frank as our VP of Engineering for server chip design”, adding that Frank “brings nearly 25 years of custom CPU design and delivery experience” that will help Google “build a world-class team in Israel”. 

“We’ve long looked to Israel for novel technologies including Waze, Call Screen, flood forecasting, high-impact features in Search, and Velostrata’s cloud migration tools, and we look forward to growing our presence in this global innovation hub,” he stated.

Vahdat also elaborated on the company’s decision to focus on in-house SoC design. 

“Instead of integrating components on a motherboard where they are separated by inches of wires, we are turning to “Systems on Chip” (SoC) designs where multiple functions sit on the same chip, or on multiple chips inside one package. In other words, the SoC is the new motherboard,” he wrote.

The decision to produce custom chips in-house as opposed to outsourcing follows similar moves from companies including AWS and Apple.

This trend has been largely influenced by the difficulties in fulfilling the growing demand for chips, which has resulted in a significant global shortage of components. By manufacturing chips in-house, companies can be more self-sufficient, instead of relying on their suppliers.

Google Cloud has hired Intel engineering veteran Uri Frank to lead new server chip design efforts as part of the firm’s increasing investments in custom silicon.

Frank has spent the last two decades at Intel, advancing to Director Of Engineering in 2011 and later becoming VP of Platform and Silicon Engineering. Last year, he was appointed corporate VP of Intel’s Design Engineering Group but chose to leave the role earlier this month. 

It has now been revealed that Frank has been hired by Google and appointed VP of Engineering for the tech giant’s server chip design division which is to be based in Israel.

Announcing the move on his LinkedIn profile, Frank wrote that he “look[s] forward to growing a team here in Israel while accelerating Google Cloud’s innovations in compute infrastructure”, before adding that the tech giant is currently hiring system-on-a-chip (SOC) designers to join its growing sever chip team.

Google Cloud’s VP of Systems Infrastructure Amin Vahdat said that the company is “thrilled to welcome Uri Frank as our VP of Engineering for server chip design”, adding that Frank “brings nearly 25 years of custom CPU design and delivery experience” that will help Google “build a world-class team in Israel”. 

“We’ve long looked to Israel for novel technologies including Waze, Call Screen, flood forecasting, high-impact features in Search, and Velostrata’s cloud migration tools, and we look forward to growing our presence in this global innovation hub,” he stated.

Vahdat also elaborated on the company’s decision to focus on in-house SoC design. 

“Instead of integrating components on a motherboard where they are separated by inches of wires, we are turning to “Systems on Chip” (SoC) designs where multiple functions sit on the same chip, or on multiple chips inside one package. In other words, the SoC is the new motherboard,” he wrote.

The decision to produce custom chips in-house as opposed to outsourcing follows similar moves from companies including AWS and Apple.

This trend has been largely influenced by the difficulties in fulfilling the growing demand for chips, which has resulted in a significant global shortage of components. By manufacturing chips in-house, companies can be more self-sufficient, instead of relying on their suppliers.

Zoom has launched new tools for developers to help them build video-based applications and websites with fully customisable, native user interfaces. 

The Zoom Video SDK will now be made available via a free subscription service and will allow developers to build video-based applications and interactive features such as on-the-go live streaming with interactive chat, the company says. 

The Video SDK is part of Zoom’s Developer Platform, which features various resources such as dev tools, infrastructure support and access to a dev community. Developers can now access the SDK via a new «Buy Now» option which will come with no initial charge for up to 10,000 minutes per month, with additional minutes being charged on a per-minute basis. There will be a full paid tier, with a plan that starts at $1,000 a year and includes 30,000 session minutes per month.
 
As well as specific features for Zoom users, the firm hopes more business applications will be created. This could include functions for retail organisations with «unique» shopping experiences and tailored customer services via video. 

A good example of what developers can do with the SDK is Lingmo, a cloud-based AI translation software provider that built a feature for instant captions in meetings that let users converse in different languages. 

«Zoom’s fully customisable Video SDK was a good fit for us because it worked seamlessly with our technology and enabled us to assist enterprise customers in a new way. Zoom’s Video SDK allowed us to accelerate the development of our solution, and gave us the flexibility to enhance our product offering for our customers,» said Danny May, CEO of Lingmo International.

As well as the SDKs, developers can access APIs, chatbots, webhooks and even an analytical platform that can provide real-time data on their builds, such as customer engagement and performance figures. 
 
The announcement comes shortly after the anniversary of the UK’s first lockdown where the country switched to working remotely. Zoom was one of the biggest beneficiaries of the pandemic, seeing a 355% increase in adoption as consumers and businesses adopted its simple and cheap video conferencing. 

Zoom has launched new tools for developers to help them build video-based applications and websites with fully customisable, native user interfaces. 

The Zoom Video SDK will now be made available via a free subscription service and will allow developers to build video-based applications and interactive features such as on-the-go live streaming with interactive chat, the company says. 

The Video SDK is part of Zoom’s Developer Platform, which features various resources such as dev tools, infrastructure support and access to a dev community. Developers can now access the SDK via a new «Buy Now» option which will come with no initial charge for up to 10,000 minutes per month, with additional minutes being charged on a per-minute basis. There will be a full paid tier, with a plan that starts at $1,000 a year and includes 30,000 session minutes per month.
 
As well as specific features for Zoom users, the firm hopes more business applications will be created. This could include functions for retail organisations with «unique» shopping experiences and tailored customer services via video. 

A good example of what developers can do with the SDK is Lingmo, a cloud-based AI translation software provider that built a feature for instant captions in meetings that let users converse in different languages. 

«Zoom’s fully customisable Video SDK was a good fit for us because it worked seamlessly with our technology and enabled us to assist enterprise customers in a new way. Zoom’s Video SDK allowed us to accelerate the development of our solution, and gave us the flexibility to enhance our product offering for our customers,» said Danny May, CEO of Lingmo International.

As well as the SDKs, developers can access APIs, chatbots, webhooks and even an analytical platform that can provide real-time data on their builds, such as customer engagement and performance figures. 
 
The announcement comes shortly after the anniversary of the UK’s first lockdown where the country switched to working remotely. Zoom was one of the biggest beneficiaries of the pandemic, seeing a 355% increase in adoption as consumers and businesses adopted its simple and cheap video conferencing. 

VMware is expanding its security capabilities with the acquisition of cloud-native security company Mesh7.

The acquisition, the terms of which have not yet been disclosed, will better enable VMware to monitor cloud application traffic between virtual machines, the company said. 

Many products, such as intrusion prevention systems and firewalls, secure traffic travelling across a network, but increasingly, companies are using virtual machines or containers and sending requests between them using application programming interfaces (APIs).

Organisations need visibility into those APIs to see how the software that uses them is behaving. Mesh7 offers a product that monitors those APIs and calls, called the API Service Mesh, which includes functions including an API firewall and API gateway.

The API Service Mesh can tell when Kubernetes applications are being accessed externally and can monitor API security within applications that are distributed across lots of locations and machines. This makes it ideal for DevSecOps, which is a version of the cloud-focused DevOps development discipline that automates development and deployment.

VMware, with its heritage in virtual machines, was interested in Mesh7’s cloud-native API monitoring capabilities. Another thing that made the company an attractive acquisition target was API Service Mesh’s reliance on Envoy, which is an open source proxy system built for cloud-native applications originally created at ride-sharing company Lyft.

Envoy enables cloud-native application traffic to run over its communications bus, making it easier for DevOps pros to see what large distributed applications are doing and identify any performance issues or other operational problems. VMware uses Envoy in its own Tanzu Service Mesh that automates networking and security in distributed applications.

«VMware is seeing increased demand for a fully integrated API + service mesh product with Envoy as the foundation. The exact same Envoy architecture used in the initial service mesh use case can also control how one application can talk to another application via APIs,» said Tom Gillis, SVP and GM of VMware’s security business unit, in a blog post announcing the acquisition.

API security is becoming an increasing problem for developers and operations teams alike as companies move increasingly to API calls. Akamai has said that 83% of web traffic consists of API calls, and 40% of web applications’ attack surface is API-based. Salt Security recently revealed that 90% of businesses experienced API security vulnerabilities in 2020.

VMware is expanding its security capabilities with the acquisition of cloud-native security company Mesh7.

The acquisition, the terms of which have not yet been disclosed, will better enable VMware to monitor cloud application traffic between virtual machines, the company said. 

Many products, such as intrusion prevention systems and firewalls, secure traffic travelling across a network, but increasingly, companies are using virtual machines or containers and sending requests between them using application programming interfaces (APIs).

Organisations need visibility into those APIs to see how the software that uses them is behaving. Mesh7 offers a product that monitors those APIs and calls, called the API Service Mesh, which includes functions including an API firewall and API gateway.

The API Service Mesh can tell when Kubernetes applications are being accessed externally and can monitor API security within applications that are distributed across lots of locations and machines. This makes it ideal for DevSecOps, which is a version of the cloud-focused DevOps development discipline that automates development and deployment.

VMware, with its heritage in virtual machines, was interested in Mesh7’s cloud-native API monitoring capabilities. Another thing that made the company an attractive acquisition target was API Service Mesh’s reliance on Envoy, which is an open source proxy system built for cloud-native applications originally created at ride-sharing company Lyft.

Envoy enables cloud-native application traffic to run over its communications bus, making it easier for DevOps pros to see what large distributed applications are doing and identify any performance issues or other operational problems. VMware uses Envoy in its own Tanzu Service Mesh that automates networking and security in distributed applications.

«VMware is seeing increased demand for a fully integrated API + service mesh product with Envoy as the foundation. The exact same Envoy architecture used in the initial service mesh use case can also control how one application can talk to another application via APIs,» said Tom Gillis, SVP and GM of VMware’s security business unit, in a blog post announcing the acquisition.

API security is becoming an increasing problem for developers and operations teams alike as companies move increasingly to API calls. Akamai has said that 83% of web traffic consists of API calls, and 40% of web applications’ attack surface is API-based. Salt Security recently revealed that 90% of businesses experienced API security vulnerabilities in 2020.

Organisations might be drawn to cloud by the lure of gaining new information and insights from the data they hold. Perhaps they will learn how to retain customers more successfully, or get a better understanding of profit centres – or cost centres. The twin powers of artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI and ML), deployed in the cloud can work wonders. But they need their ‘food’, the raw data they work with, to be in tip top condition, and for many organisations preparing that food requires time, effort, and attention to detail. 

Data strategies and clear priorities 

There is no doubt that AI and ML can provide information that organisations can’t come by in any other way. Data-crunching can, if done well, help organisations boost productivity and profits. But optimal success doesn’t come overnight. As Yann Lepant, MD for Accenture Technology in the UK tells Cloud Pro: “It’s easy to get tempted by the extensive set of cloud based new data and AI technologies as it’s an exciting new playground to venture on. However, it’s also a place where it’s easy to consume wastefully and get lost in delivery.”

A key factor in avoiding the pitfalls is to have clear priorities and a solid data strategy. Lepant tells Cloud Pro that having these will mean “each initiative is done with purpose and outcome, contributing to a journey of maturation through the cloud”.

Ingrid Verschuren, head of data strategy at Dow Jones, whose global news database Factiva grows by a million articles every day, from approximately 33,000 sources, tells Cloud Pro: “It doesn’t matter how good the technology is if the data feeding it is poor quality. The first and most important step to get the most out of your data is to ensure you are using the right data – and that it is structured in a way that will answer the questions you want to ask.”  

So what do clear priorities look like? Paul Clough, professor of search and analytics at the University of Sheffield tells Cloud Pro: “Identifying the use cases is critical and needs to be based on issues and problems identified in the business by business stakeholders, rather than by data scientists or the IT department.” This approach keeps the priorities very practically focused, he says. 

Cleaning and refining

Another pair of related tasks that may need to be undertaken before AI and ML can work their magic are cleaning up old data and refining what new data is collected.

Part of the cleaning task will involve bringing data out of silos. This can be tricky, but worth the effort and organisations undertaking the task can take some comfort from the fact that they’re not alone. Often, data silos are a result of historical practice and how things have grown organically over time, and it takes a concerted effort to undo in a relatively short time what’s built up over a much longer period. But as Lepant points out, there are really no short-cuts. “From getting a 360 degree view of the customer to end-to-end supply chain management, via fraud prevention and intelligent forecasting, the list of business outcomes enabled by the removal of data silos is endless,” he says.

Cleaning data is another task that can take time, but the effort is definitely worth it in the longer term. Verschuren provides some useful advice to help keep the cleaning task focussed, telling Cloud Pro: “Before you start cleaning your data, you need to determine how that data will be used and what insights you need to generate. Ask yourself, what does perfect look like? From there, you need to define the data fields that will be part of your data set, and the input for each of those fields.” Effectively, work backwards from the outcomes you want to get, and determine what data you need to get them. 

And finally, along come analytics and insights

With clean data, a clear data strategy in place, and perhaps some new data collection streams in place too, an organisation is finally in a position to start using AI and ML to gain those valuable insights it craves.

But that’s not quite the end of the story. To continue to gain insights over time, data should take its place, unsiloed, front and centre. Or, as Lepant tells Cloud Pro when sharing key advice, organisations should “implement a programme to update the ways of working, culture and data literacy to help the business become more data driven and self-served”.

Organisations might be drawn to cloud by the lure of gaining new information and insights from the data they hold. Perhaps they will learn how to retain customers more successfully, or get a better understanding of profit centres – or cost centres. The twin powers of artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI and ML), deployed in the cloud can work wonders. But they need their ‘food’, the raw data they work with, to be in tip top condition, and for many organisations preparing that food requires time, effort, and attention to detail. 

Data strategies and clear priorities 

There is no doubt that AI and ML can provide information that organisations can’t come by in any other way. Data-crunching can, if done well, help organisations boost productivity and profits. But optimal success doesn’t come overnight. As Yann Lepant, MD for Accenture Technology in the UK tells Cloud Pro: “It’s easy to get tempted by the extensive set of cloud based new data and AI technologies as it’s an exciting new playground to venture on. However, it’s also a place where it’s easy to consume wastefully and get lost in delivery.”

A key factor in avoiding the pitfalls is to have clear priorities and a solid data strategy. Lepant tells Cloud Pro that having these will mean “each initiative is done with purpose and outcome, contributing to a journey of maturation through the cloud”.

Ingrid Verschuren, head of data strategy at Dow Jones, whose global news database Factiva grows by a million articles every day, from approximately 33,000 sources, tells Cloud Pro: “It doesn’t matter how good the technology is if the data feeding it is poor quality. The first and most important step to get the most out of your data is to ensure you are using the right data – and that it is structured in a way that will answer the questions you want to ask.”  

So what do clear priorities look like? Paul Clough, professor of search and analytics at the University of Sheffield tells Cloud Pro: “Identifying the use cases is critical and needs to be based on issues and problems identified in the business by business stakeholders, rather than by data scientists or the IT department.” This approach keeps the priorities very practically focused, he says. 

Cleaning and refining

Another pair of related tasks that may need to be undertaken before AI and ML can work their magic are cleaning up old data and refining what new data is collected.

Part of the cleaning task will involve bringing data out of silos. This can be tricky, but worth the effort and organisations undertaking the task can take some comfort from the fact that they’re not alone. Often, data silos are a result of historical practice and how things have grown organically over time, and it takes a concerted effort to undo in a relatively short time what’s built up over a much longer period. But as Lepant points out, there are really no short-cuts. “From getting a 360 degree view of the customer to end-to-end supply chain management, via fraud prevention and intelligent forecasting, the list of business outcomes enabled by the removal of data silos is endless,” he says.

Cleaning data is another task that can take time, but the effort is definitely worth it in the longer term. Verschuren provides some useful advice to help keep the cleaning task focussed, telling Cloud Pro: “Before you start cleaning your data, you need to determine how that data will be used and what insights you need to generate. Ask yourself, what does perfect look like? From there, you need to define the data fields that will be part of your data set, and the input for each of those fields.” Effectively, work backwards from the outcomes you want to get, and determine what data you need to get them. 

And finally, along come analytics and insights

With clean data, a clear data strategy in place, and perhaps some new data collection streams in place too, an organisation is finally in a position to start using AI and ML to gain those valuable insights it craves.

But that’s not quite the end of the story. To continue to gain insights over time, data should take its place, unsiloed, front and centre. Or, as Lepant tells Cloud Pro when sharing key advice, organisations should “implement a programme to update the ways of working, culture and data literacy to help the business become more data driven and self-served”.

Health secretary Matt Hancock has outlined his vision for the digital future of the NHS that operates across a «consistent data platform».

Speaking at the Digital Health Rewired virtual festival, Hancock announced he wants to explore whether a data platform can be created that separates the data layer from the application layer.

​

This would mean «providers can offer the application software, but the data will be stored separately and securely in the cloud and then we have a consistent data platform across the NHS».

He said it should be made easier to write applications or create services that interact with data from different NHS organisations.

Hancock also said that Shared Care Records will be put in place by September this year, where every local system will have at least a basic version implemented.

“This will mean patients only need to give their details once, and they’ll be captured in a local record that can be safely seen by those who are caring for them,” he said.

There was also an emphasis on the need to “connect the system so data flows appropriately and freely, and we get the intrinsic benefits that high quality data and interoperability can provide.”

He admitted that bringing together the data that usually would have only existed in silos was fundamental to the NHS’s COVID response. He also recognised the need to fill gaps in interoperability where they exist, “ especially the link to social care and responsibilities of the NHS.”

He said that in many ways every day of the last year has “been a session of digital transformation because of this shared experience of fighting the virus, and the vital role technology has played in response.”

The secretary did admit that half of the clinicians questioned in a BMA survey said they had been hampered by issues like internet speed and infrastructure when trying to access online services, and he underlined the need to “get the infrastructure in place.”

It was also revealed that thirty more NHS trusts will be joining the Digital Aspirant programme, which will help boost their digital infrastructure through funding.

“Seven trusts will get up to £6 million over the next 3 years, and the rest will get seed funding to start creating their plans,” he outlined.

Earlier this week it emerged that the digital transformation of the NHS needed “further work” and that the technological innovations implemented during the pandemic need to be improved before being “locked-in.” 

In November last year, the health department was blasted for its track record of failed NHS digital projects, with a parliamentary committee warning that there was a need for it to “move on” from its decades-long legacy of “failed attempts” at digital transformation.

​

Health secretary Matt Hancock has outlined his vision for the digital future of the NHS that operates across a «consistent data platform».

Speaking at the Digital Health Rewired virtual festival, Hancock announced he wants to explore whether a data platform can be created that separates the data layer from the application layer.

​

This would mean «providers can offer the application software, but the data will be stored separately and securely in the cloud and then we have a consistent data platform across the NHS».

He said it should be made easier to write applications or create services that interact with data from different NHS organisations.

Hancock also said that Shared Care Records will be put in place by September this year, where every local system will have at least a basic version implemented.

“This will mean patients only need to give their details once, and they’ll be captured in a local record that can be safely seen by those who are caring for them,” he said.

There was also an emphasis on the need to “connect the system so data flows appropriately and freely, and we get the intrinsic benefits that high quality data and interoperability can provide.”

He admitted that bringing together the data that usually would have only existed in silos was fundamental to the NHS’s COVID response. He also recognised the need to fill gaps in interoperability where they exist, “ especially the link to social care and responsibilities of the NHS.”

He said that in many ways every day of the last year has “been a session of digital transformation because of this shared experience of fighting the virus, and the vital role technology has played in response.”

The secretary did admit that half of the clinicians questioned in a BMA survey said they had been hampered by issues like internet speed and infrastructure when trying to access online services, and he underlined the need to “get the infrastructure in place.”

It was also revealed that thirty more NHS trusts will be joining the Digital Aspirant programme, which will help boost their digital infrastructure through funding.

“Seven trusts will get up to £6 million over the next 3 years, and the rest will get seed funding to start creating their plans,” he outlined.

Earlier this week it emerged that the digital transformation of the NHS needed “further work” and that the technological innovations implemented during the pandemic need to be improved before being “locked-in.” 

In November last year, the health department was blasted for its track record of failed NHS digital projects, with a parliamentary committee warning that there was a need for it to “move on” from its decades-long legacy of “failed attempts” at digital transformation.

​