AI, Artificial intelligence, IBM, News & Analysis

IBM launches brain-inspired supercomputer with Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

artificial intelligence, communication and futuristicIBM and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory have launched a new project to build a brain-inspired supercomputing platform for deep learning inference.

The project will be built on IBM’s TrueNorth chip, which the company claims will process the equivalent of 16 million neurons and 4 billion synapses and consume the energy equivalent of a tablet computer. The neural network design of IBM’s Neuromorphic System aims to be able to infer complex cognitive tasks such as pattern recognition and integrated sensory processing in a much more economical manner than current chips.

“The delivery of this advanced computing platform represents a major milestone as we enter the next era of cognitive computing,” said Dharmendra Modha, Chief Scientist for Brain-inspired Computing at IBM Research.   “We value our relationships with the national labs. In fact, prior to design and fabrication, we simulated the IBM TrueNorth processor using LLNL’s Sequoia supercomputer. This collaboration will push the boundaries of brain-inspired computing to enable future systems that deliver unprecedented capability and throughput, while helping to minimize the capital, operating and programming costs – keeping our nation at the leading edge of science and technology.”

The technology itself will be utilized in a number of different manners within the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), including the organizations Stockpile Stewardship Program, a program of reliability testing and maintenance of its nuclear weapons without the use of nuclear testing.

“Neuromorphic computing opens very exciting new possibilities and is consistent with what we see as the future of the high performance computing and simulation at the heart of our national security missions,” said Jim Brase, Livermore National Laboratory’s Deputy Associate Director for Data Science. “The potential capabilities neuromorphic computing represents and the machine intelligence that these will enable will change how we do science.”

While Artificial Intelligence has been one of the more prominent trends in the cloud computing world, the success of the technology and PR stunts launched has been varied.

AlphaGo is an example of the success of AI, as Google Deepmind’s AI program beat world Go champion Lee Se-dol in a five match series. As traditional machine learning techniques could not be applied in this instance, the team combined an advanced tree search with deep neural network allowing the program to readjust its behaviour through reinforcement learning. The win came as a surprise to commentators, as the game Go relies on intuition and feel.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, Microsoft has had to release an apology after its twitter inspired AI stunt backfired. The program tweeted controversial comments as it was unable to grasp the politically incorrect nature of the messages it received from users, as reported by the Independent.

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Yin and WAN? Analysing the relationship between network and cloud provider

(c)iStock.com/DundStock

More than half (56%) of businesses have expressed concern over security gaps at the point between their wide area network (WAN) and public cloud provider, according to a recent research study.

The report, conducted by IDG and commissioned by XO Communications, argues this potential pain point could compromise data used in the cloud. Less than two in five (38%) of the 55 survey respondents say they have good visibility into their WAN cloud connection points, while the biggest security nightmare for businesses is vulnerabilities being exploited by insiders (53% of respondents), data theft (47%) and the introduction of malware (35%).

“There’s definitely a vulnerability there, when you step back and take a look at the situation as a whole of connecting public cloud services to the data centre,” said John Grady, XO senior manager of solutions marketing. “That’s because you basically have two very separate environments coming together – protecting the data centre and protecting the corporate network – so IT managers have to ask themselves which approach makes the most sense.”

Of the 38% polled who say their visibility into the network is good, the unifying reason is because they have deployed a specific dedicated solution, such as a next generation firewall and managed security. Perhaps not surprisingly, XO is touting its own system to marry the network and the cloud provider, the snappily named XO MPLS IP-VPN service. Yet in turn, recent research argues the cloud is becoming more secure, but still at a high cost; 64% of enterprises polled by analyst house Clutch argue cloud infrastructure is more secure than legacy systems.

Grady argues of XO’s platform a reason this publication has heard frequently; hypervendors have great appeal, but perhaps not for specific use cases. “There are such compelling economic reasons for using services such as AWS, but because it’s a public service, enterprises don’t have enough control,” he said. “By bringing this managed offering to the table, we can offer protection that existing solutions can’t match.”

You can read the IDG whitepaper here (PDF).

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Cloud Workspace Suite 5.0 Released by @IndependenceIT | @CloudExpo #Cloud

IndependenceIT has announced Cloud Workspace® Suite 5.0. Highlights of the latest generation software include automated cross platform software defined data center deployments and management; orchestration and workflow automation for third-party Workspace-as-a-Service (WaaS) platforms; support for Azure Active Directory-as-a-Service across public/private/hybrid clouds, and hyper-scalable application services for the delivery of application workloads.
Technology buyers continue to gravitate toward WaaS solutions to increase business agility and lower costs. However, many challenges still remain with the majority of solutions on the market. Most of the available products are not built for cloud infrastructure, making it difficult or impossible to operate in cross-platform environments. As a result, large capital investments must be made by IT service providers on infrastructure to support distributed deployments. Because the majority of options are extremely complex, there is a steep learning curve that reduces time to deployment and revenue for WaaS providers. Additionally, the fragmented management of infrastructure, hypervisor, OS, application, master image, Active Directory, and end-user environments add extra layers of complexity and risk.

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API Speed and Performance By @SmartBear | @CloudExpo #Cloud

Speed. Performance. Reliability.
These are the characteristics you strive for when developing, deploying, and maintaining a truly powerful application. These are also the characteristics your customers will use to form their opinions about the performance of that application.
Through testing and monitoring to ensure that it works – and that it works well, consistently, and that any major bugs or glitches are caught early and repaired before the application (or any updates or releases) is deployed into production.

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acquisition, Dell, M&A, News & Analysis, NTT Data

NTT Data to acquire Dell Services for $3.06 billion

NTT DataJapan’s NTT Data is to acquire Dell’s IT Services business for $3.06 billion, in an effort to bolster its footprint in the North American region.

The announcement confirms speculation over recent months as to the future of the IT Services division, as Dell has been rumoured to be searching for a buyer for the business unit to aid financing of the EMC deal. Dell Services was initially formed through the acquisition of Perot Systems in 2009 for $3.9 billion. The new agreement with NTT Data will see Dell absorb an $800 million loss on the division and could indicate that financing the EMC acquisition is more difficult than initially expected.

In December, BCN reported Dell had been facing challenges in financing one of the biggest financial deals in history. For the $63 billion EMC acquisition to proceed, Dell has had to reduce its levels of debt with the Perot Systems business unit rumoured to be a favourite for sale.

The company will initially remain under the leadership of Suresh Vaswani, current President of Dell Services, who will continue to report to Dell CEO Michael Dell until the completion of the deal. It is believed that as part of the acquisition NTT Data will take on 28,000 Dell employees, though future leadership of the business has not been confirmed.

“NTT Data is pleased with the unique opportunity to acquire such high-calibre talent, and a corporate culture that shares common values with NTT Data, with emphasis on client first, foresight, teamwork and a commitment to innovation,” said Toshio Iwamoto, President and CEO of NTT Data Corporation. “Welcoming Dell Services to NTT DATA is expected to strengthen our leadership position in the IT Services market and initiates an important business relationship with Dell.”

NTT Data’s acquisition of the IT services division is the largest by the company to date and continues to bolster its North American footprint. Revenues for NTT Data in overseas markets has more than doubled since 2011 and in the same period the company has spent more than $600 million on acquisitions. The company has prioritized growth in the North America region, primarily targeting lucrative contracts in the healthcare, banking, financial services and insurance.

Since 2011 NTT Data has been proactive in bolstering its overseas business with a number of acquisitions throughout the world. In Europe it acquired companies including Everis and Value Team, in North America Optimal Solutions Integration and Carlisle & Gallagher were added, whereas iPay88 increased the company’s footprint in Malaysia.

“There are few acquisition targets in our market that provide this type of unique opportunity to increase our competitiveness and the depth of our market offerings,” said John McCain, CEO of NTT Data. “Dell Services is a very well-run business and we believe its employee base, long-standing client relationships, and the mix of long term and project-based work will enhance our portfolio.”

The deal could indicate that financing the EMC agreement has proved to be more difficult than initially expected. Dell Services as a business unit was reportedly to be valued in the region of $5 billion, which could highlight Dell’s urgency in completing the sale. If reports are correct, it would appear NTT Data has negotiated a good deal.

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What Is at the Center of Your Digital Architecture? By @TheEbizWizard | @CloudExpo #Cloud

Instead of thinking of the IT environment as being divided into apps, middleware, data, servers, or other IT-centric concepts, the entire enterprise must think about customer journeys and how the various customer interactions (‘moments’ in the vernacular) string together to provide the customer experience each customer desires.
The end result, of course, is maximizing the business key performance indicators, including profitability, revenue per customer, and the lifetime value of each customer. We just arrived at these goals by a different path than we’re used to.

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Why Financial Service Companies Should Care About Application Performance By @SmartBear | @CloudExpo #Cloud

Historically, financial services have always been the early adopters and pioneers of advanced technology.
I am talking about financial services in an all-inclusive sense – which encompasses a broad range of institutions that manage money, including credit unions, banks, credit card companies, insurance companies, accountancy companies, consumer-finance companies, stock brokerages, investment funds, and more.

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Parallels RAS, Parallels Remote Application Server, PRAS, Remote Application Server, VDI, virtual applications, Virtual apps

What is a Virtual App?

The advent of virtualization technology has brought revolutionary changes to IT procedures. Many IT components, from servers to networks, are now virtualized. With the smartphone dominating the IT world, “virtual app” and “application virtualization” are the latest industry buzzwords. So what is a virtual app? In a traditional IT environment, applications are installed on each […]

The post What is a Virtual App? appeared first on Parallels Blog.

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Cryptzone Unveils AppGate XDP 2.0 | @CloudExpo @Cryptzone #Cloud

Cryptzone has announced version 2.0 of AppGate XDP, Cryptzone’s dynamic, secure access control platform that dramatically reduces the attack surface for all users across applications and data hosted both on-premises and in the cloud.
Traditional security tools like VPNs, firewalls, and NACs are labor-intensive to manage, and provide all-or-nothing access, giving authenticated users overly broad network access and allowing wide-reaching breaches. AppGate XDP provides a simpler way – establishing secure, encrypted tunnels between users and authorized network resources. Everything else on the network is invisible and unreachable, regardless of where it is hosted, closing the door on attackers. Because AppGate XDP automatically adjusts access decisions based on policy and user context, the business obtains the agility it needs without overloading IT and Security teams.

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Akamai Opens ‘Scrubbing Center’ in Sydney | @CloudExpo @Akamai #Cloud

Akamai Technologies has opened a new, state-of-the-art data center in Sydney, Australia, as part of its global expansion strategy. Fueled by the increasing sophistication of distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, the company’s latest ‘scrubbing center’ leverages a cloud-based approach to mitigate threats without causing significant business disruption.

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