A review of last week’s headlines in the software industry finds top innovative leaders dislodged, a twist on cybersecurity risks, Silicon Valley execs criticized, cloud growth bursting, two “world’s firsts,” IBM’s Watson heading east and much more. Here’s a recap of news that caught our eye.
Innovation
- A Good&Co study of the creativity of 4,364 tech employees found that Microsoft employees are now neck-and-neck with Apple when it comes to innovation, and they’re much more adventurous than Google, Facebook or IBM employees.
- India’s prime minister established an international initiative to provide 24/7 access to electricity to every Indian citizen by 2019. Central to the initiative is an Internet of Things-based, multi-stakeholder portal with a platform to bring transparency and innovation to the system.
- Quote of the week: “I think he [Donald Trump] is a danger to innovation and they [technology executives] should care, and say something. I don’t get it. I guess they like having lots of money.” (Kara Swisher, co-executive editor and co-founder, Re/code)
- IBM and its Thai partner Digital Ventures will present the world’s first IBM Watson Business Case competition in Thailand later this year to promote financial technology or “fintech” startups. Big Blue also plans to open an innovation center in Thailand later this year, where it will combine cognitive computing technology with design thinking and customer experience. With the new center, together with its Watson Centre already opened in Singapore, IBM hopes to connect 5,000 cognitive solution tech experts in Asia Pacific.
Cybersecurity
- Software vendors need to innovate to survive, says Frost & Sullivan analyst Nancy Fabozzi, but she states they must “incorporate much better security controls into their products in order to continue doing business with the healthcare sector.” The firm predicts the healthcare cybersecurity market will increase by 13.6 percent over the next five to six years.
- Project MUMBA, funded by the UK’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, says the tendency to oversimplify business metrics results in masking important information for decision making around cybersecurity risks. The technical measures have little to do with such factors as reputation, impact on resources, response to threats, business continuity and other factors.
- The FAIR Institute and NIST published a new resource designed to help enterprises and government organizations improve cybersecurity risk analysis, reporting and decision making. The analysis helps answer fundamental questions such as: How much risk do we have? and What activities matter the most and should be prioritized? The resource goal is to manage cybersecurity risk in a cost-effective way based on business needs.
- The CIA’s chief information security officer says the agency and other intelligence community components are moving workloads from legacy to the cloud and says the cloud is “a godsend for folks trying to implement systems quickly and securely.”
Cloud
- AWS and SQLstream have teamed to provide new streaming analytics services. The solution enables architects, data analysts and developers to analyze and manage streaming data continuously in real time on and between cloud and on-premises environments.
- Cloud by the numbers: IDC says cloud software will comprise a quarter of all business software sold by 2020. Gartner predicts 85 percent of large enterprises will use a cloud access security broker solution for cloud services by 2020.
Internet of Things
- Commercial rollout of 5G wireless broadband technology won’t start until 2020. But telecom provider Ericsson is advising businesses to start thinking now about the transition to 5G so they can get the best usage of the technology. 5G tech enables massive connectivity and thus will enable more capabilities for Internet of Things applications. An Ericsson Mobility Report predicts 150 million 5G mobile subscriptions by 2021, with the U.S., China, South Korea and Japan to lead with the first and fastest subscriptions.
Kudos: TMCnet named Noble Systems Corporation, providing customer communications solutions, as a 2016 Tech Culture Award winner. Criteria for winning include a creative, collaborative workplace environment and a positive, productive and performance-driven culture.