Amazon has announced it will provide free cloud training to some 29 million people around the world by 2025.
Amazon’s AWS is the leading cloud platform, with 31% of the market. In spite of its lead, Microsoft, Google, Oracle and IBM have been making headway in an effort to close the gap. At the same time, the cloud computing market as a whole is experiencing unprecedented growth as a result of the pandemic and companies’ reliance on remote work.
To help with the latter, Amazon is investing hundreds of millions to provide free training to 29 million people around the world over the next several years. Teresa Carlson, Vice President of Worldwide Public Sector at Amazon Web Services, made the announcement at re:Invent 2020.
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. 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.
Given the free training will be through “existing AWS-designed programs,” it’s a safe bet the training will also help Amazon maintain its lead in the cloud market. While the company is spending hundreds of millions of dollars, it’s hard to put a price on millions of people having their first serious exposure to cloud computing via Amazon’s platform.
IBM and AT&T have announced they are partnering to help bring 5G and open hybrid cloud services to enterprise customers.
Edge computing has become a critical component for many enterprises, as the amount of IoT devices multiples. As IBM points out, Gartner estimates that “by 2025, 75% of enterprise-grade data will be created and processed by devices at the edge.” Processing the data on the edge saves the time that would normally be required to send it back and forth to a data processing center.
5G is an important part of that process, as well as a way of improving the privacy and security for the enterprise. The creation of private 5G networks will power devices, while at the same time keeping the data from being transmitted over public networks.
As part of the partnership, IBM is building on its previous commitment to retool its software around Red Hat OpenShift. The company has been working with telcos all over the world, citing Verizon, Vodafone, Bharti Airtel and roughly 83% of the world’s largest telcos as its clients.
It’s not just telcos that benefit, however. IBM cites healthcare, manufacturing, retail, banking and finance as some of the principles markets that will benefit from its partnership with AT&T.
“The advancements in 5G and edge are impacting every industry, bringing the promise of enhanced experiences for consumers and new revenue opportunities for businesses,” said Howard Boville, senior vice president, IBM Hybrid Cloud. “Together with AT&T, we will be helping clients securely leverage 5G and edge offerings in any environment with IBM’s open and secure hybrid cloud platform. This marks a significant step forward increasing the possibilities of 5G and edge in the enterprise.”
AMD has reached an agreement to buy Xilinx for $35 billion, as AMD continues to gain ground against Intel.
In early October, news broke that AMD was in talks to buy Xilinx. Xilinx specializes in making chips for the telecommunications industry, although it has also expanded to the datacenter market, a lucrative field where Intel has long been dominant.
In recent years, especially with its Ryzen line of chips, AMD has been chipping away at Intel’s lead in the semiconductor business. The acquisition of Xilinx should help it do so even more.
“Our acquisition of Xilinx marks the next leg in our journey to establish AMD as the industry’s high performance computing leader and partner of choice for the largest and most important technology companies in the world,” AMD President and CEO Dr. Lisa Su said. “This is truly a compelling combination that will create significant value for all stakeholders, including AMD and Xilinx shareholders who will benefit from the future growth and upside potential of the combined company. The Xilinx team is one of the strongest in the industry and we are thrilled to welcome them to the AMD family. By combining our world-class engineering teams and deep domain expertise, we will create an industry leader with the vision, talent and scale to define the future of high performance computing.”
“We are excited to join the AMD family. Our shared cultures of innovation, excellence and collaboration make this an ideal combination. Together, we will lead the new era of high performance and adaptive computing,” said Victor Peng, Xilinx president and CEO. “Our leading FPGAs, Adaptive SoCs, accelerator and SmartNIC solutions enable innovation from the cloud, to the edge and end devices. We empower our customers to deploy differentiated platforms to market faster, and with optimal efficiency and performance. Joining together with AMD will help accelerate growth in our data center business and enable us to pursue a broader customer base across more markets.”
The deal was unanimously approved by the boards of both companies and is expected to close by the end of 2021.
Microsoft is in second place in the Earth-based cloud market, but it looks to be positioning itself to be the premier cloud provider for space.
The company announced the latest version of its Azure cloud program, Azure Space, designed to be the “the platform and ecosystem of choice for the mission needs of the space community.” As companies large and small turn to space for communications, travel and colonization, cloud computing will be an important part of the transition.
Microsoft has also partnered with SpaceX to pair Azure with the Starlink satellite system. Starlink is a low-Earth orbit constellation of satellites designed to provide internet access that competes with terrestrial broadband. Unlike legacy satellite internet providers, such as HughesNet and Viasat, Starlink’s low-Earth orbit provides faster speeds and much lower latency, inline with traditional broadband options.
The combination of Starlink and Azure will help the two companies compete with Amazon and Blue Origin, as well as provide service to customers in remote regions.
“As the importance of data to society has increased, so too has the importance of reliable and diverse pathways for connectivity,” writes Tom Keane – Corporate Vice President, Azure Global. “Our global network of over 160,000 miles of subsea, terrestrial, and metro optical fiber helps billions of people connect all around the world. However, many of our customers also operate in remote, rugged environments and find it hard to keep pace with their increased need for access to data and bandwidth.”
In addition to competing with Amazon, the Microsoft and SpaceX partnership will help both companies play a pivotal role in future US space operations.
“The two companies also plan to further connect Starlink with Microsoft’s global network — including Azure edge devices — integrate SpaceX’s ground stations with Azure networking capabilities,” writes Jennifer Sokolowsky, in a company blog post.
“SpaceX recently won a contract with the Space Development Agency to build new satellites – separate from the Starlink system – in support of a Space Tracking Layer defense system capable of detecting and tracking ballistic, cruise and hypersonic missiles. Microsoft will be join the SpaceX team on this project.”
It appears that Microsoft is going all-in on the final frontier, and may quickly establish itself as the platform of choice for space operations.
T-Mobile has launched T-Mobile Ventures, a fund aimed at backing companies “developing transformative 5G products and services for the T-Mobile network.”
Carriers around the country are rushing to roll out 5G networks, while businesses and customers are eager to take advantage of the benefits it offers. T-Mobile is one of the leading 5G providers, offing the full range of 5G: low-band, mid-band and mmWave.
Because of the speeds 5G offers, it is opening up new opportunities in artificial intelligence, edge computing, cloud computing, machine learning and more. As a result, a new generation of companies are developing products and services that take advantage of 5G. T-Mobile Ventures’ goal is to help these companies succeed.
“T-Mobile Ventures is part of our mission to give customers the best 5G network in the country – one that will serve all Americans, stimulate competition and create tremendous economic value,” said Jason Young, Senior Vice President of Partnerships and T-Mobile Ventures. “With our 5G network at the foundation, we see massive opportunity across both business and consumer segments, and we’re excited to help fuel the wave of 5G applications coming to market in the years ahead.”
Microsoft announced today that it is launching Azure Space to focus on the burgeoning space industry. Microsoft says that Azure Space will bring together Azure technology and an extensive network of expert partners offering solutions for the industry. Additionally, Microsoft announced a major collaboration with SpaceX to provide satellite-powered internet connectivity on Azure.
“Today we’re launching Azure Space,” tweeted Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella. “A thriving ecosystem of satellite providers is essential to meet the world’s growing network needs, and we’re expanding our offerings to provide access to satellite data and connectivity from Azure.”
“Microsoft is taking the next giant leap in cloud computing – to space,” tweeted Azure head Tom Keene. “With the enormous challenges #space presents, there also comes great opportunity. Today, I am sharing details about our strategy for Azure Space.”
Tom Keene, Corporate Vice President of Azure Global, further discusses Azure Space:
Today, Microsoft is taking the next giant leap in cloud computing… to space. At Microsoft, our approach to space is different. This difference is evident across our platform, product, partnerships, and people.
We’re very excited about about the partnership between Microsoft and SpaceX and all of the incredible innovation that it brings for our customers and all of the possibilities that it offers to the future.
By building on new and existing partnerships within the space community, learning and leaning in to our culture of innovation and investing in people we are extending the Azure Edge capabilities with worldwide satellite connectivity.”
“If you think about Microsoft which is empowering people and organizations to achieve more and then you put that with SES which about doing the extraordinary in space to deliver amazing experiences anywhere on Earth and just look at the intersection of this,” says the CEO of SES Networks JP Hemingway. “I’ve got these fantastic cloud capabilities, this great intelligence, and we want to get to as many people as we can around the globe. Then you add that to what SES is doing. It’s providing that vehicle to get to everybody around the world whether they’re floating, flying, or in really hard to reach places.”
“What’s changing for space is that technology is propelling us forward,” says Azure Space Senior Director Steve Kitay. “Microsoft Azure Space is focusing on developing partnerships. There are many companies in the space community that have tremendous capabilities. We’re looking at bringing new and unique value along side those companies to the customers.”
Microsoft Launches Azure Space – Partners With SpaceX, SES
Verizon partners with Microsoft to create new ways for enterprises to accelerate the delivery of fast and secure 5G applications to enable state of the art low-latency IoT solutions.
Verizon’s on-site 5G Edge network integrated with Azure edge services can enable ultra-low latency, many times faster than the blink of an eye, according to Verizon, which can help businesses tap into real-time data analysis and delivery. Applications incorporating computer vision, augmented, mixed and virtual reality, digital twins or machine learning can be enhanced with 5G and MEC on the customer premise, helping transform the way industries such as retail, transportation, and logistics operations.
Think of automated high-precision asset localization, tracking and positioning in manufacturing. In healthcare, the increased speed, reduced latency and high bandwidth connectivity of 5G networks could enable real-time precision medicine leveraging mixed reality and AI capabilities as well as seamless and fast sharing of large files to improve patient care.
“We have built a network that provides real-world, 5G-enabled solutions TODAY,” said Rima Qureshi, EVP and Chief Strategy Officer at Verizon. “By bringing together Verizon’s 5G network and on-site 5G Edge platform with Microsoft’s expertise in cloud services, we will enable the development of the next-generation technologies everyone has been envisioning.”
The collaboration brings Azure cloud and edge capabilities together with Verizon’s on-site 5G Edge, a mobile edge computing platform designed to enable developers to build applications for mobile end-users and wireless edge devices with ultra-low latency. By utilizing on-site private 5G, businesses will be able to realize increased power efficiencies and reduced costs of end user devices while addressing their privacy and security needs.
Logistics and supply chain solutions company Ice Mobility is already testing on Verizon’s on-site 5G Edge platform, integrated with Microsoft Azure. The company is using 5G and MEC to help with computer vision assisted product packing. By gathering data in near real-time on product packing errors, the company has the potential to improve on-site quality assurance and save 15% to 30% in processing time.
“We are especially excited to join Verizon and Microsoft to test how 5G and MEC can improve the quality assurance process,” said Mike Mohr, CEO of Ice Mobility. “They truly have listened to our needs to provide automated real-time quality oversight and feedback, which will enable us to cost-effectively launch unique new products, while maintaining the highest execution standards, significantly increasing throughput and reducing costs. And, this is just the beginning.”
“By leveraging Verizon’s 5G network integrated with Microsoft’s cloud and edge capabilities, developers and businesses can benefit from fast, secure and reliable connections to deliver seamless digital experiences from massive industrial IoT workloads to precision medicine,” said Yousef Khalidi, corporate vice president Azure for Operators at Microsoft.
Moving forward, Verizon will explore opportunities to co-innovate with Microsoft to deliver new value to industries ranging from manufacturing to healthcare.
Verizon’s 5G Ultra Wideband network enables throughput at least 25 times faster than today’s 4G networks*; delivers ultra-low latency; and offers very high bandwidth. Verizon 5G Ultra Wideband is expected to eventually enable 100 times larger data volumes than 4G; and the ability to connect more than a million devices per kilometer. Verizon’s 5G Ultra Wideband service is available to people in 55 cities and its 5G Nationwide service is available to more than 200 million people in more than 1,800 cities around the U.S.
“Today starts a new chapter in our close collaboration with the telecommunications industry to unlock the power of 5G and bring cloud and edge closer than ever,” said Microsoft Azure Executive Vice President Jason Zander in a blog announcement. “We’re building a carrier-grade cloud and bringing more Microsoft technology to the operator’s edge. This, in combination with our developer ecosystem, will help operators to future proof their networks, drive down costs, and create new services and business models.”
Jason Zander, Executive Vice President, Microsoft Azure, announces new collaborations with the telecommunications industry that will unlock the power of 5G and bring cloud and edge closer than ever:
The increasing demand for always-on connectivity, immersive experiences, secure collaboration, and remote human relationships is pushing networks to their limits, while the market is driving down price. The network infrastructure must ensure operators are able to optimize costs and gain efficiencies, while enabling the development of personalized and differentiated services. To address the requirements of rolling out 5G, operators will face strong challenges, including high capital expenditure (CapEx) investments, an increased need for scale, automation, and secure management of the massive volume of data it will generate.
Today starts a new chapter in our close collaboration with the telecommunications industry to unlock the power of 5G and bring cloud and edge closer than ever. We’re building a carrier-grade cloud and bringing more Microsoft technology to the operator’s edge. This, in combination with our developer ecosystem, will help operators to future proof their networks, drive down costs, and create new services and business models.
In Microsoft, operators get a trusted partner who will empower them to unlock the potential of 5G. Enabling them to offer a range of new services such as ultra-reliable low-latency connectivity, mixed reality communications services, network slicing, and highly scalable IoT applications to transform entire industries and communities.
By harnessing the power of Microsoft Azure, on their edge, or in the cloud, operators can transition to a more flexible and scalable model, drive down infrastructure cost, use AI and machine learning (ML) to automate operations and create service differentiation. Furthermore, a hybrid and hyper-scale infrastructure will provide operators with the agility they need to rapidly innovate and experiment with new 5G services on a programmable network.
More specifically, we will further support operators as they evolve their infrastructure and operations using technologies such as software-defined networking, network function virtualization, and service-based architectures. We are bringing to market a carrier-grade platform for edge and cloud to support the operator’s goals to future proof their infrastructure with disaggregated, and containerized network architectures. Recognizing that not everything will move to the public cloud, we will meet operators where they are—whether at the enterprise edge, the network edge, or in the cloud.
Our approach is built on the acquisitions of industry leaders in cloud-native network functions—Affirmed Networks and Metaswitch and on the development of Azure Edge Zones. By bringing together hundreds of engineers with deep experience in the telecommunications space, we are ensuring that our product development process is catering to the most relevant networking needs of the operators. We will leverage the strengths of Microsoft to extend and enhance the current capabilities of industry-leading products such as Affirmed’s 5G core and Metaswitch’s UC portfolio. These capabilities, combined with Microsoft’s broad developer ecosystem and deep business to business partnership programs, provide Microsoft with a unique ability to support the operators as they seek to monetize the capabilities of their networks.
Your customer, your service, powered by our technology
As we build out our partnerships with different operators, it is clear to us that there will be different approaches to technology adoption based on business needs. Some operators may choose to adopt the Azure platform and select a varied mix of virtualized or containerized network function providers. We also have operators that have requested complete end-to-end services as components for their offers. As a part of these discussions, many operators have identified points of control that are important to them, for example:
Control over where a slice, network API, or function is presented to the customer.
Definition of where and how traffic enters and exits their network.
Visibility and control over where key functions are executed for a given customer scenario.
Configuration and performance parameters of core network functions.
As we build out Azure for Operators, we recognize the importance of ensuring operators have the control and visibility they require to manage their unique industry requirements. To that end, here is how our assets come together to provide operators with the platform they need.
Communication Service Providers
Interconnect
It starts with the ability to interconnect deeply with the operator’s network around the globe. We have one of the largest networks that connect with operators at more than 170 points of presence and over 20,000 peering connections around the globe, putting direct connectivity within 25 miles of 85 percent of the world’s GDP. More than 200 operators have already chosen to integrate with the Azure network through our ExpressRoute service, enabling enterprises and partners to link their corporate networks privately and securely to Azure services. We also provide additional routes to connect to the service through options as varied as satellite connectivity and TV White Space spectrum.
Edge platform
This reach helps us to supply operators with cloud computing options that meet the customer wherever those capabilities are needed: at the enterprise edge, the network edge, the network core, or in the cloud. The various form factors, optimized to support the location in which they are deployed, are supported by the Azure platform—providing virtual machine and container services with a common management framework, DevOps support, and security control.
Network functions
We believe in an open platform that leverages the strengths of our partners. Our solutions are a combination of virtualized and containerized services as composable functions, developed by us and by our Network Equipment Provider partners, to support operators’ services such as the Radio Access Network, Mobile Packet Core, Voice and Interconnect services, and other network functions.
Technology from Affirmed and Metaswitch Networks will provide services for Mobile Packet Core, Voice, and Interconnect services.
Cloud solutions and Azure IoT for operators
By exposing these services through the Azure platform, we can combine them with other Azure capabilities such as Azure Cognitive Services (used by more than 1 million developers processing more than 10 billion transaction per day), Azure Machine Learning, and Azure IoT, to bring the power of AI and automation to the delivery of network services. These capabilities, in concert with our partnerships with OSS and BSS providers, enables us to help operators streamline and simplify operations, create new services to monetize the network, and gain greater insights into customer behavior.
In IoT our primary focus is simplifying our solutions to accelerate what we can do together from the edge to the cloud. We’ve done so by creating a platform that provides simple and secure provisioning of applications and devices to Azure cloud solutions through Azure IoT Central, which is the fastest and easiest way to build IoT solutions at scale. IoT Central enables customers to provision an IoT app in seconds, customize it in hours, and go to production the same day. IoT Plug and Play dramatically simplifies all aspects of IoT device support and provides devices that “just work” with any solution and is the perfect complement to achieve speed and simplicity through IoT Central. Azure IoT Central also gives the Mobile Operator the opportunity to monetize more of the IoT solution and puts them in a position to be a re-seller of the IoT Central application platform through their own solutions. Learn more about using Azure IoT for operators here.
Cellular connectivity is increasingly important for IoT solutions and represents a vast and generational shift for mobile operators as the share of devices in market shifts towards the enterprise. We will continue our deep partnership with operators to enable fast and efficient app development and deployment, which is critical to success at the edge. This will help support scenarios such as asset tracking across industries, manufacturing and distribution of smart products, and responsive supply chains. It will also help support scenarios where things are geographically dispersed, such as smart city automation, utility monitoring, and precision agriculture.
Where we go next
Our early engagement with partners such as Telstra and Etisalat helped us shape this path. We joined the 5G Open Innovation Lab as the founding public cloud partner to accelerate enterprise startups and launch new innovations to foster new 5G use cases with even greater access to leading-edge networks. The Lab will create long-term, sustainable developer and commercial ecosystems that will accelerate the delivery of exciting new capabilities at the edge, including pervasive IoT intelligence and immersive mixed reality. And this is just the beginning. I invite you to learn more about our solutions and watch the series of videos we have curated for you.
Microsoft is partnering with the telecom industry to power 5G, cloud and edge technologies.
Microsoft Azure is currently the second most popular cloud platform. Despite this, Microsoft has been making inroads into a number of industries, and has set its sights on the telecom industry.
The telecom industry promises to be a lucrative market for cloud providers, especially with the rollout of 5G. The new wireless technology promises to revolutionize cloud computing, as well as edge computing.
Today starts a new chapter in our close collaboration with the telecommunications industry to unlock the power of 5G and bring cloud and edge closer than ever,” writes Jason Zander Executive Vice President, Microsoft Azure. “We’re building a carrier-grade cloud and bringing more Microsoft technology to the operator’s edge. This, in combination with our developer ecosystem, will help operators to future proof their networks, drive down costs, and create new services and business models.
In Microsoft, operators get a trusted partner who will empower them to unlock the potential of 5G. Enabling them to offer a range of new services such as ultra-reliable low-latency connectivity, mixed reality communications services, network slicing, and highly scalable IoT applications to transform entire industries and communities.
Should Microsoft gain significant traction in this market, it will be another arena where it will be able to substantially challenge market-leader AWS.
Accenture announced the formation of Accenture Cloud First with a $3 billion investment over three years. Accenture’s $3 billion investment will be used to continue advancing — often together with its cloud and broader technology ecosystem partners — industry roadmaps, data models, and solutions; cloud AI data and AI architectures; integrated full-stack infrastructure and applications capabilities; cloud tools, assets, and automation to drive lower unit cost and innovation; and research and development in edge computing and related cloud technologies.
Accenture Cloud First is a new multi-service group of 70,000 cloud professionals that brings together the full power and breadth of Accenture’s industry and technology capabilities, ecosystem partnerships, and deep commitment to learning and upskilling clients’ employees and to responsible business, with the singular focus of enabling organizations to move to the cloud with greater speed and achieve greater value for all their stakeholders at this critical time.
“COVID-19 has created a new inflection point that requires every company to dramatically accelerate the move to the cloud as a foundation for digital transformation to build the resilience, new experiences and products, trust, speed, and structural cost reduction that the ongoing health, economic and societal crisis demands — and that a better future for all requires,” said Accenture CEO Julie Sweet. “Accenture Cloud First and our substantial investment demonstrate our commitment to delivering greater value to our clients when they need it most. Digital transformation requires cloud at scale, and post-COVID leadership requires that every business become a ‘cloud-first’ business.”
The idea is to help clients across all industries rapidly become “cloud-first” businesses and accelerate their digital transformation to realize greater value at speed and scale. Karthik Narain will lead Accenture Cloud First and join the Global Management Committee, effective October 1.
Julie Sweet, CEO of Accenture, discusses how the company is investing in helping businesses “replatform” in the cloud:
Once In An Era Replatforming Of Global Business
There has been this massive acceleration in the cloud. Really what’s happening is a once in an era replatforming of global business. We are 20 percent in the cloud today. We believe we will move to around 80 percent in just five years. What Accenture Cloud First is about is helping companies get there faster by bringing together all of the capabilities with a singular focus of how are we going to replatform at speed.
Pre-COVID we worked with a ton of the digital leaders who have been out front. What we see is that there are three important components. First of all, with our cloud partners across the spectrum it’s really critical to not just move companies but to move entire industries. That takes the road map, the learning, and the data integration about what problems are specific to the industry. We are going to be investing in those solutions often along with our partners.
The second area is the speed, investing in better automation and technology that is going to help not just move these companies faster but actually also be able to operate in the cloud with increasingly more productivity. Think about the cloud becoming a platform for their productivity.
Investing In Making Replatforming Sustainable
The third place is around talent and sustainability. If you are replatforming entire global businesses in the cloud we have to do so in a sustainable way. This means getting out of the datacenter to the cloud and what it does for climate change. It’s around things like supply chain and making sure that you are building in the ability to have the integrity of the supply chain and that you are reskilling.
We will be investing in making this replatforming sustainable. This is core as we think about post-COVID our belief as companies across the globe and government that we need to make a better future for all by building in this view of all stakeholders from the planet to our people.
Accenture CEO Julie Sweet: Once In An Era Replatforming Of Global Business
This may or may not worry you depending on your point of view. IBM has deployed a super intelligent face mask surveillance system for businesses (or government) to discreetly track face mask usage by employees, customers, and anyone who enters a building where their system is installed. The platform will send alerts to the powers that be if anyone is either not wearing a face mask properly or not wearing one at all.
Presumably, if the tech savvy eye in the sky notices an infraction it will quickly enable management and their enforcement teams to confront the individuals to rectify their face mask violation. How dare they! It will also monitor in real-time crowd density, social distancing, and elevated body temps of those who are entering an establishment.
IBM Cloud released a video narrated by Ian Smalley (below) that explains how their technology works to enable any business or government to surveil and enforce mask usage:
Here is a really cool way that Edge Computing is being used to help businesses reopen and operate safely. We know face masks can substantially reduce the transmission of aerosol borne viruses. But sometimes people forget to wear them properly or at all. IBM Edge Application Manager places analytical workloads with Edge enabled cameras that can recognize face masks and determine if they are being worn effectively.
Since analysis is being performed at the camera the video data and individual privacy are protected. You also avoid the expense of transmitting, storing, or analyzing that image data any further. Alerts are sent every time the camera detects improperly worn or non-existent face masks. Then it sends the aggregated data back to the IBM Maximo Worker Insights platform allowing you to highlight face mask activity in your facilities.
It’s pretty amazing stuff and that’s only scratching the surface. IBM Application Manager is also using Edge Computing to monitor crowd density, social distancing, and elevated body temps of those who are entering an establishment.
IBM and AT&T are deepening their 5G and edge computing partnership, with the goal of accelerating the business world’s digital transformation.
The two companies are working at IBM’s Thomas J. Watson Research Center, where they are “deploying AT&T’s 5G and multi-access edge computing (MEC)—a private cellular, low latency solution that can process data on a business site’s premise, instead of routing traffic over public networks.”
The two companies have a years-long history of working together, a partnership that helped them both respond to the coronavirus pandemic by helping customers with their work from home needs. Now the two companies are building on that track record, working on new ways to enable remote work, especially in those industries where it has not yet been possible.
“Combining 5G with edge computing, for example, could open the door to breakthroughs in robotics and the ability to perform intricate machine work from remote locations,” write Mo Katibeh, AT&T Chief Product and Platform Officer and Steve Canepa, IBM General Manager of the Global Communications Sector. “One of the tasks we are exploring at Yorktown Heights envisions enabling a researcher to remotely adjust locations of IoT network devices in a laboratory. Another envisions allowing a systems administrator to remotely rewire machines in a data center to provide a more agile environment.”
At the same time, the two companies are working to help employees be able to safely return to work.
“We are addressing workplace safety in a system driven by IBM AI and made feasible at scale by AT&T LTE and 5G mobile network technologies,” continue Katibeh and Canepa. “That includes AT&T MEC. This solution from AT&T enables the development and deployment of new capabilities that rely on ultra-low latency, higher security and privacy, improved bandwidth conservation and greater control of data.
“The low latency of 5G allows for remote operations in industrial settings, helping to keep workers from harmful situations. And if any dangerous situations do arise, edge computing is designed to let businesses capture and analyze data quickly without extra storage or processing on a central cloud.
“That same processing ability can help employees look after their health with devices to monitor their temperature, oxygen levels and blood pressure with instantaneous feedback. Hospitals can even take advantage of similar advances to make their current infrastructures more reliable, while implementing advances like wireless surgery, robotics, virtual reality simulations.”
IBM and AT&T’s partnership is poised to leverage emerging technologies to help companies now and in the future.
Verizon Business has announced a definitive agreement to buy up Zoom competitor BlueJeans, as the videoconferencing market heats up.
Amid the coronavirus pandemic, videoconferencing has become one of the most critical components that has allowed businesses, schools, religious organizations and more to keep functioning. Zoom’s stock has reflected its newfound status as a nearly indispensable tool.
In spite of that success, Zoom has also come under heavy criticism for privacy and security missteps, prompting many organizations and government agencies around the world to ban the app. The company has responded by putting a moratorium on new features for 90 days, while their entire engineering staff focuses on improving security and privacy.
In such an environment, rivals are moving to take advantage of the company’s missteps. Microsoft has made improvements to both Skype and Teams in an effort to make headway, and now Verizon is acquiring BlueJeans in an effort to move squarely into the space. Verizon specifically touts their intention to deeply integrate BlueJeans videoconferencing with the company’s 5G network, making things like telemedicine and distance learning more mainstream.
“As the way we work continues to change, it is absolutely critical for businesses and public sector customers to have access to a comprehensive suite of offerings that are enterprise ready, secure, frictionless and that integrate with existing tools,” said Tami Erwin, CEO of Verizon Business. “Collaboration and communications have become top of the agenda for businesses of all sizes and in all sectors in recent months. We are excited to combine the power of BlueJeans’ video platform with Verizon Business’ connectivity networks, platforms and solutions to meet our customers’ needs.”
“The combination of BlueJeans’ world class enterprise video collaboration platform and trusted brand with Verizon Business’ next generation edge computing innovation will deliver highly differentiated and compelling solutions to our joint customers,” said Quentin Gallivan, CEO of BlueJeans Network. “We are very excited about joining the Verizon team and we truly believe the future of business communications starts today!”
Combining BlueJeans’ platform with Verizon’s network is likely to be a win for customers of both companies, while the added competition should be good for everyone.
Microsoft has announced an agreement to acquire Affirmed Networks, the “virtualized, cloud-native mobile network” startup.
The acquisition will help Microsoft as networks transition to 5G. In the past, “wireless networks have been based on purpose-built hardware,” writes Yousef Khalidi, Corporate Vice President, Azure Networking. “We believe that with innovation in software and by making use of broadly available cloud computing platforms like Microsoft Azure, operators can deploy and maintain 5G networks and services more efficiently, more cost effectively, more rapidly and more securely.”
That’s where Affirmed Networks comes in. The company offers “Affirmed UnityCloud™ 5g core (5gc) is a cloud-native solution built on an open, webscale architecture that enables mobile operators to build the most innovative 5GC network, and dramatically reduce the costs of operating the network up to 90% by simplifying and automating network functions. UnityCloud converges ‘Any G’, including 2G, 3G, 4G, 5G core networks, and wireline core, onto one unified platform, greatly simplifying the overall network architecture.”
Combined with Azure, Affirmed Networks’ platforms will give Microsoft an edge in the competitive 5G landscape.
China may have finally turned a corner in its fight against the coronavirus, and it has robots to thank for helping it do so.
Throughout the coronavirus pandemic China has issued cutting edge technology in an effort to combat the virus. Early on Chinese authorities used AI-driven robots to scold people for being in public without wearing masks, while companies worked on using drones to deliver medicine and supplies to patients without endangering healthy people.
As China has continued to fight the pandemic, robots continue to play a significant role in the ongoing efforts to contain the spread of the virus. According to All About Circuits, in addition to the robots scolding people for not wearing masks, authorities are also relying on robots that scan crowds for raised temperatures, one of the earliest symptoms of infection. The robots “include high-resolution cameras and infrared thermometers that are capable of scanning the temperatures of up to 10 people at once who are in a radius of 5 meters. If one of these robots discovers somebody who is not wearing a mask or who has a high temperature, an alert is sent to the authorities.”
China’s success with robots is only possible due to a combination of 5G, AI, edge computing, cloud computing and IoT. The end result are robots capable of interacting with people in a way never before seen. As All About Circuits highlights, that interaction can be eerily lifelike:
“You there! The gentleman wearing a red coat holding an umbrella in your left hand—yes, you. You are not wearing a face mask, please put one on immediately. If you do not have one, come to the police car and we will provide you with one.”
With robots finally beginning to deliver on the promise proponents have long held out, it’s little wonder Microsoft, AT&T, Google Cloud and Verizon are all working hard to capitalize on the emerging technologies.
Apple has announced a new iPad Pro that is clearly aimed at the laptop market, with a slew of powerful new features.
The new iPad Pro is powered by the A12Z Bionic chip and an eight-core GPU, allowing the tablet to outperform most PC laptops on the market today, according to Apple. Given that the 2018 iPad Pro was touted as being faster than 92% of notebooks on the market at that time, Apple’s claim about the new model is probably pretty accurate.
iPad Pro Cameras – Image Credit: Apple
The camera on the new model is equally impressive. The iPad Pro includes a 12MP Wide camera, as well as a 10MP Ultra Wide camera. There are also “studio-quality mics and a breakthrough LiDAR Scanner that delivers cutting-edge depth-sensing capabilities, opening up more pro workflows and supporting pro photo and video apps. The LiDAR Scanner, along with pro cameras, motion sensors, pro performance, pro audio, the stunning Liquid Retina display and powerful apps, extends the lead of iPad Pro as the world’s best device for augmented reality (AR).”
iPad Trackpad Support – Image Credit: Apple
The feature that will catch most users’ attention is full trackpad support. iPadOS 13.4 brings trackpad support to the iPad, and the feature particularly shines when paired with the upcoming Magic Keyboard. The new keyboard is designed to offer a laptop-style experience, suspending the iPad magnetically and giving 130 degrees of viewing angle—far better than the older Smart Keyboard. The Magic Keyboard also features pass-through USB-C charging, leaving the USB-C port on the iPad free for peripherals.
“The new iPad Pro introduces advanced technologies never before available in mobile computing,” said Phil Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing. “Combining the most advanced mobile display with powerful performance, pro cameras, pro audio, the breakthrough LiDAR Scanner and new Magic Keyboard with Trackpad, this is another huge leap forward for iPad. There’s no other device in the world like the new iPad Pro and we think our customers are going to love it.”
“We’re making iPad even more capable and versatile by bringing trackpad support to iPadOS,” said Craig Federighi, Apple’s senior vice president of Software Engineering. “We carefully considered the best way to integrate trackpad use into a touch-first environment while retaining everything our customers know and love about iPad. We’re thrilled to bring this new way of interacting with iPad to the millions of people using iPadOS today.”
iPad Pro and Magic Keyboard – Image Credit: Apple
For years, the iPad has been a beautiful and powerful piece of hardware held back by the OS. Similarly, users have been clamoring for trackpad support to help with more tedious tasks. With today’s announcement, Apple goes a long way toward addressing those issues, making the iPad a much stronger laptop replacement than it has ever been.
The Department of Defense is reconsidering its decision to award Microsoft the JEDI contract, following legal challenges by Amazon.
Microsoft stunned Amazon and industry insiders when it won the Pentagon’s coveted JEDI contract, worth some $10 billion. The win lent a tremendous amount of credibility to Microsoft’s cloud business, proving it could compete with the biggest, for the best contracts. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella predicted the contract could lead to a “halo effect” for the company, bringing in even more business.
Amazon, however, has not taken the loss lying down. The company almost immediately mounted a legal challenge and succeeded in getting a temporary injunction, preventing Microsoft from beginning on the contract. A judge agreed that Amazon stood a good chance of winning its case.
Now, according to Business Insider, “the Department of Defense on Thursday in a court filing said it ‘wishes to reconsider’ its decision to award the $US10 billion JEDI cloud computing contract to Microsoft.” The Department of Defense said its decision was “in response to the other technical challenges presented by AWS.”
An Amazon spokesperson told WebProNews: “We are pleased that the DoD has acknowledged ‘substantial and legitimate’ issues that affected the JEDI award decision, and that corrective action is necessary. We look forward to complete, fair, and effective corrective action that fully insulates the re-evaluation from political influence and corrects the many issues affecting the initial flawed award.”
A reversal by the Pentagon would be a big loss for Microsoft, and likely have a major impact on how the Pentagon awards contracts going forward.
Schneider Electric has announced the release of the Uniflair Rack Mounted Cooling Solution, specifically aimed at edge computing and micro data centers.
The solution is aimed at freeing up floor space by using the bottom of an IT rack. This makes it ideal for applications, such as on-premise processing, where space is at a premium.
“Simply put, our new vendor-neutral, rack mounted cooling solution is right-sized for edge micro data centers and provides the right answer for cooling today’s critical edge technology,” said Maurizio Frizziero, Director of Cooling, Schneider Electric. “It offers more cooling in less space and simplifies management and maintenance, making it ideal for industries like retail, finance, health care, light manufacturing, and education.”
As 5G technology boosts edge computing, on or near-premise data processing will become far more important for a variety of technologies, such as artificial intelligence, augmented reality, virtual reality, self-driving cars and more. Solutions such as Uniflair will become an increasingly critical component, helping ensure the success of those technologies.
Hewlett Packer Enterprise (HPE) has announced the availability of an as-a-service 5G portfolio to help telecom companies roll out 5G networks.
According to the company, by making its portfolio of hardware and software solutions available as-a-service, it will help telcos rapidly deploy 5G networks and start turning a profit, by reducing the initial cost. The “edge-to-cloud, platform as-a-service strategy is uniquely positioned to help telcos capitalize on the 5G opportunity, by leveraging a cloud-native software stack for 5G core, optimized telco core and edge infrastructure blueprints, and Wi-Fi 6 enabled services. Built on open and interoperable platforms combined with carrier grade infrastructure and modular software components, the portfolio of offerings allows telcos to incorporate more automation, become more agile, and deploy new 5G services faster across the telco core, the telco edge and into the enterprise.”
With the increased emphasis on edge computing and the potential of 5G networks, HPE’s solution is designed to overcome some of the problems with previous generations of network equipment, especially those posed by proprietary equipment. By basing its solution on open source technology, HPE’s 5G portfolio will help telcos more fully realize the potential of the next generation network.
“Openness is essential to the evolutionary nature of 5G and with HPE 5G Core Stack telcos can reduce operational costs, deploy features faster and keep themselves open to multiple networks and technologies while avoiding being locked-in to a single vendor approach,” said Phil Mottram, vice president and general manager of the Communications and Media Solutions business unit at HPE. “HPE has one of the broadest 5G portfolios in the market and is uniquely positioned to help telcos build an open multi-vendor 5G core, optimize the edge with vRAN, and deliver connectivity and new compute services to the enterprise using MEC and Wi-Fi 6.”
Google Cloud and AT&T have announced a partnership between the two companies to help enterprises take advantage of 5G and edge computing.
Edge computing moves processes closer to where data is being collected and used, rather than sending it to a data center for processing. Thanks to 5G, edge computing stands to usher in a whole new era of on or near-premise computing, significantly speeding up the speed and latency of critical and intensive operations.
The partnership will allow Google Cloud to deliver technologies and capabilities to companies using AT&T’s 5G network. These technologies include artificial intelligence, machine learning, data and analytics, Kubernetes and more.
“We are delighted to work with AT&T, a 5G leader, to help enterprises and the industry harness the potential of 5G,” said Thomas Kurian, CEO, Google Cloud. “Our co-innovation with AT&T aims to bring a multitude of 5G and Edge Computing solutions to address a diversity of use cases, driving real business value in industries like retail, manufacturing, gaming and more. We are deeply committed to helping drive positive business outcomes for enterprises by working with AT&T on 5G.”
“We’re working with Google Cloud to deliver the next generation of cloud services,” said Mo Katibeh, EVP and CMO, AT&T Business. “Combining AT&T’s network edge, including 5G, with Google Cloud’s edge compute technologies can unlock the cloud’s true potential. This work is bringing us closer to a reality where cloud and edge technologies give businesses the tools to create a whole new world of experiences for their customers.”
The announcement is another in a string of wins for Google Cloud as it works to take on AWS and Microsoft.
In an interview with Bloomberg Businessweek, Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg talked about Verizon’s recent cloud partnership with Amazon, as well as the transformative effects 5G will bring, especially when paired with cloud computing.
On Cloud Computer Partnership With Amazon
“It is extremely exciting…we spent almost one and a half years with Amazon to do this. So—just to understand what we’re doing with Amazon—we’re bringing the cloud service out to the edge, together with 5G, in order to give super low latency, enormous throughput for applications being developed by developers.”
“This cannot be done. This is the first time in the world where actually we have seen that partnership. Amazon couldn’t have done it by themselves, because they don’t have wireless 5G. Verizon couldn’t have done it by itself, because we are not in cloud service, we don’t have cloud software. The combination of us can create something that is so transformative that, today you basically as a developer you can click on our first 5G edge site in Chicago and start developing an application for 5G with low latency, enormous throughput.”
“Of course…we’re one site right now. Think of us when we have hundreds of them, maybe thousands of them, over time….We can then give 5G experiences of low latency….Autonomous cars, real-time AR/VR, artificial intelligence, all of that can be at the edge.”
“And we’re just seeing the start of it, so that’s why we’re so excited about this partnership and what we launched 3rd of December last year.”
On How 5G Differs From Previous Generations
“Remember, when the design of 5G was done, the idea was this is wireless technology for industries and society….It was of course thought that consumers would get the benefit, but from the beginning was: How can you take away all the cables in the world and have the same performance as you had with cable, being much more agile, having new ways of doing it? That was the idea.
“When I think about 5G, 4G has basically two capabilities: speed and throughput. The phone is better every time you get a new generation. In 5G, eight currencies: battery optimizations, low latency. I mean, just one of the currencies, today I can connect 100,000 devices per square kilometer, tomorrow I can do 1,000,000. There’s never going to be 1,000,000 people on a square kilometer, so it’s done for devices talking to devices, optimizing flows for industries.
“So where are we? I mean, the plan was actually to come out 2020. We came out 2018. I think we’re ahead of the game, but still, from a consumer market, we’re just now starting to massively come into it. As we have said, this year we’re going to launch 20 5G phones….We think that our 5G is so different from others, because the performance on our millimeter wave 5G is just extraordinary. Today I get 2 gigabit per second in my phone! If you have a 4G phone, which you probably have over there, you probably have 40 to 50 megabits per second on Verizon, which is the best network in the country. And here we’re getting 2 gig. You cannot even imagine how much faster that is.”
