Futurum Tech Webcast

In this special episode of the Futurum Tech Webcast — Interview Series, host Shelly Kramer interviews Rob Walker, Pega's VP of decisioning and analytics to discuss the role AI is playing in the pandemic, the launch of Pega's Responsible AI ethical bias check, how empathy and ethics come into play and impact the bottom line, and also how organizations can benefit from leveraging AI moving forward. This conversation is intended as a preview to Pega's upcoming Pegaworld iNspire virtual event being held on June 2, 2020, from 9 to 11:30am EDT. This high impact, low time commitment, interactive virtual event is free, sure to be packed with great information, and also available on demand for all registrants. Register for Pegaworld iNsprire here. Shelly and Rob covered a wide range of topics, all related to AI, ethics, empathy, and how all of them are playing a role in business operations (and customer experience), during these pandemic times and beyond. They discussed: Companies who are successfully leveraging AI in pandemic times and how they and their customers are benefitting; How taking the long-term view of your customer relationships can actually be the most profitable view, and also lead to longer term loyalty. How speeding up interactions and adding in empathy is something AI can do at scale, which organizations need most right now. Responsible AI, a new offering from the team at Pega, and how an ethical bias check built in beyond the data science level can help businesses practice responsible AI in their engagement strategies. Rob shared some interesting customer use case examples and some innovative approaches that Pega customers are taking in these pandemic times — and what that might mean for the future. Please also check out my other interviews with Pega SMES, including: The Pandemic is a Catalyst a Lot of Businesses Needed — It's Time for a Massive Rethink (Don Schuerman, Pega CTO) How Banks Are Capitalizing on Pandemic-Fueled Digital Transformation to Serve Customers (Marc Andrews, VP of Financial Services and Insurance) How Businesses are Adapting Customer Service Strategies in Times of Disruption (Jeff Nicholson, global head of CRM)

On this episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast - Interview Series, host Daniel Newman welcomes Amanda Mountain, the Global Vice President of Marketing for Digital Commerce at SAP to discuss digital software buying, COVID-19 and some key findings from the 2019 B2B Digital Buyers' Journey: Trends, Challenges, and Predictions report. B2B Digital Buyers' Journey In late 2019, Futurum Research, in partnership with SAP published a research report on the digital buyers' journey. Prior to the study, there was existing research that identified the consumerization of the B2B experience. Amanda shared that SAP was changing the way they were selling their products to an organization, but what she didn't know was if that change was a result of the way buyers were changing or if SAP's change made buyers change. In essence, we wanted to know which came first. The Need for Immediate Solutions Daniel shared that four out of five people surveyed said that the traditional annual software buying cycle in the enterprise was over. It makes sense with the move to the cloud that companies are looking to get what they want when they need it. People want immediate solutions. And that has never been more apparent than right now with COVID-19. Another interesting area the research uncovered is that not all software is created equal. Different categories were more commonly purchased digitally than others like analytics, business intelligence, and CRM software. But these categories and some of the findings might be different now that companies are forced to go digital due to the current pandemic. Amanda shared that developer tools were not a high digitally purchased priority in the research, but in Q1 of 2020, Web IDE, a developer tool from SAP was the top seller for the digital channel. COVID-19 has forced companies to reimagine development and really solidified the notion that every company is a software company. COVID-19 has also shown that software developers need to be more agile, productive, and efficient pushing developer tools to the top of digital buying categories. Drivers of Digital Buying Daniel and Amanda discussed that it's not surprising that the shift from traditional buying to digital buying is almost entirely aligned with the digitization of the organization and the promise of streamlined frictionless operational efficiency. What was surprising to Amanda though, is operational efficiency ranks higher than cost savings. Organizations are clearly looking to save their employees time and effort during the procurement process which is critical for B2B software companies to understand. The Digital Buying Ecosystem In recent years, companies like SAP, as Amanda said, have focused more on digital selling. Early research showed that B2B buyers wanted the experience to match B2C experiences. They wanted speed, transparency, flexibility, simplicity and personalization. Companies like SAP have worked to improve digital buying experiences with a better ecosystem that can deliver what B2B buyers want. The ecosystem that is built for digital buying is just as important as the software solutions. Partner extensions, add-ons, and enhancements need to be as easy to get as the software itself if you want digital buyers to continue to work with you. If you'd like to learn more about the digital buying experience check out the findings in the research report or listen to the entire conversation with Amanda and Daniel. This is one you don't want to miss. While you're at it, be sure to subscribe to the Futurum Tech Podcast so you never miss an episode.

In this episode of the Futurum Tech Webcast — Interview Series, host Shelly Kramer is joined by Jeff Nicholson, global head of CRM at Pega to discuss how businesses are adapting customer service strategies in times of disruption. This conversation is intended as a preview to Pega's upcoming Pegaworld iNspire virtual event being held on June 2, 2020, from 9 to 11:30am EDT. This high impact, low time commitment, interactive virtual event is free, sure to be packed with great information, and also available on demand for all registrants — you'll find a registration link at the bottom of these show notes. Shelly and Jeff covered a wide range of topics related to customer relationship management (CRM) and how businesses are adapting their customer service strategies in times of disruption including: The challenges the Pega team is seeing from their customers and what they are specifically asking for; Examples of what organizations can do to help meet their customer service challenges; The role that building empathy for customers into customer service operations can play, in times of pandemic and beyond; How organizations and using technology to help develop strategies for providing exceptional customer service in times of disruption; How NPL-powered email bots can help speed up email response times; and How establishing microjourneys and smart case management systems can help reduce the time front line workers are spending tracking and managing all interactions. Jeff shared a variety of fascinating real world use case examples that we can all learn from, and also talked a little about Pega's Crisis Response Solutions Portfolio and how organizations are using and deriving value from that. He also shared some customer use case examples showcasing the innovative ways that Pega customers are embracing digital transformation, adapting their customer service strategies in times of disruption, and the technology solutions they're using to make that happen. This is digital transformation personified and it was exciting to get an inside look at how organizations are pivoting, embracing technology, and developing customer service strategies that allow them to not only function, but hopefully to set themselves up to future-proof their operations moving forward. Here's your reminder to make it a point to register for Pega's upcoming Pegaworld iNspire virtual event being held on June 2, 2020, from 9 to 11:30am EDT. This high impact, low time commitment, interactive virtual event is free, sure to be packed with great information, and also available on demand for all registrants. Be sure and note that even if you can't attend the virtual event in person on June 2nd, if you'll register, you'll be able to access the entire event on demand. Register for Pegaworld iNsprire here. Please also check out my other interviews with Pega SMES, including: The Pandemic is a Catalyst a Lot of Businesses Needed — It's Time for a Massive Rethink (Don Schuerman, Pega CTO) How Banks Are Capitalizing on Pandemic-Fueled Digital Transformation to Serve Customers (Marc Andrews, VP of Financial Services and Insurance)

In this episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast, Interview Series, host Shelly Kramer speaks with Marc Andrews, VP of Financial Services and Insurance at Pega, to discuss how banks are capitalizing on pandemic-fueled digital transformation to serve their customers. This conversation is intended as a preview to Pega's upcoming Pegaworld iNspire virtual event being held on June 2, 2020, from 9 to 11:30am EDT. This high impact, low time commitment, interactive virtual event is free, sure to be packed with great information, and also available on demand for all registrants. Register for Pegaworld iNsprire here. Shelly and Mark covered a wide range of topics, including: The challenges banks face in servicing their customers as a result of the global pandemic, and how banks and financial institutions are capitalizing on digital transformation to improve almost every part of their operations; The impact working remotely presents for banks and financial institutions when handling an increased volume of requests and a different kind of customer requests than what they are accustomed to and a myriad of other challenges; The gaps or full on deficiencies in some organizations' digital capabilities and how the Band-Aid approach is out, and auditability, compliance, scalability, combined with the ability to shift resources as needed, is more important now than ever before. The fact that despite the rise of FinTechs — who often offer slicker, more seamless digital experiences — this crisis might actually give banks the chance to recover and thrive and the factors that influence that; What customers are looking for from their technology partners and what they seem to need the most; The role intelligent automation can play in helping banks and financial institutions manage processes and cases from front to back and to be able to deliver those quickly. Marc shared some interesting customer use case examples and some innovative approaches that Pega customers are taking spurred by the pandemic. There is a new way forward in financial services, and banks can use technology to increase their level of service, create and deepen customer loyalty, streamline processes, increase efficiencies, meet compliance objectives, and more effectively compete in what is an increasingly crowded marketplace. Check out the show recap of the interview I did with Pega's Don Schuerman discussing how the pandemic might well be a catalyst a lot of businesses needed. You'll find that here: The Pandemic is a Catalyst a Lot of Businesses Needed – It's Time for a Massive Rethink.

On this episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast - Interview Series, host Daniel Newman welcomes Jeni Panhorst, Vice President and General Manager of Network and Edge Platforms Division at Intel for a conversation about the future of 5G and edge innovation. Technology Companies are Essential Intel, like most companies in the last few months, has had to pivot to figure out how to deliver what other companies and the world needs right now to fight this pandemic. Whether it's just dealing with the changes in the way that we work, being able to support the enterprise capacity, or the communications capacity that's required for people as they pivot their work from offices to homes, Intel has been a backbone for technology solutions in infrastructure worldwide. And that's likely going to continue with the proliferation of 5G networks and edge technology. The Future of 5G and Edge Innovation 10 years ago, the smartphone revolution created an entirely new ecosystem for innovation of apps and services that now, we couldn't imagine living without. Intel has been involved in that transformation from the beginning, working network operators, telecom equipment manufacturers, hardware manufacturers, software innovators, system integrators, and other partners to build network infrastructure with greater capacity and great flexibility that supported and connected all these devices. This has formed the foundation for the future of 5G and edge innovation. Today networks have more flexibility and agility to bring computing capacity closer to where data is generated which in turn enables innovation. We have the ability to process data much closer to where it's brought into the overall system which drives down decision latency and drives up a value of insights that are generated. Jeni shared that Intel has built a huge foundation through virtualization of the network, cloudification of the network, which is going to form the bedrock for the next wave of 5G and edge innovation as well. Improving the Ability to Innovate Dan referenced a recent report Futurum conducted in partnership with Intel on hardware to software transformation that determined with software defined virtualization, a lot more can be done in less time — workloads can be scaled, data can move more seamlessly, and we can have real-time applications for things like edge and IoT, in retail, smart cities and government. But this high degree of virtualization has also given companies the ability to do more and more computing closer to the data. They have the ability to add AI and machine learning enabled services much closer to where those devices exist. More companies are able to innovate new use cases for these technologies. Jeni and Dan discussed a few different examples of new use cases like factory reconfiguration. There's an aggregation of insights coming from multiple different factory locations, so companies have the ability now to reconfigure the equipment to deal with changing demand or the need to produce different types of goods like we saw with the PPE shortage. And since companies have found success with this, it will likely accelerate more in the future. The Next Generation of 5G Edge Jeni shared some of the exciting announcements that Intel has made recently like the Intel Xeon processors and the Intel Atom P5900 product — a system on a chip specifically focused on the radio access network. It is the first Intel architecture processor focused on base stations. Intel is focused on building next generation 5G base stations based on this product, as well as a set of products across the portfolio, including the FPGA products, the ASIC products and the Intel Ethernet controllers, in order to have a complete solution that delivers on the needs of 5G processing. Intel's Commitment to Partnerships There's an opportunity now to partner across the industry to ensure that the needs of the next generation of networks are met. Non-real time is not valuable anymore. The closer the data is to the actual moment is when companies will see the biggest return — and that is what intel is committed to providing. Jeni shared that Intel is heavily dependent upon those partnerships that exist across the entire value chain, whether it's the equipment manufacturers, the software vendors, the system integrators, and the operators and end users who are deploying and using the technology. But not every network developer will have the right expertise that is needed for the new use cases. In order to foster innovation Intel created an open source software toolkit called OpenNESS. The purpose is to abstract the complexity out of the network to developers of edge applications while providing a place for those next generation cloud-native edge applications to land. There are a lot of challenges that still need to be addressed in order to ensure the orchestration and automation of the necessary infrastructure in order to deliver all of the promises of next-generation edge computing. But it'

In this new episode of the Futurum Tech Webcast, senior analyst Sarah Wallace joined host Shelly Kramer to discuss the COVID-19 driven evolution of the financial services sector as a precursor to the release of their upcoming Financial Services Market Insight report. Their coverage in this episode included what's now, what's next, and what's important to know about if you're operating in this space. Topics discussed ranged from: Technology powering the evolution of financial services Financial services cloud vendors in general, as well as the latest offerings from IBM and AWS What's happening with digital payments (and why) Ecommerce growth spurred by COVID-19 and growth predictions The importance of SOCs and use of SIEMs to detect, isolate, and mitigate security risks The role RPA is playing in the digital transformation of financial services COVID-19 has shifted financial services more rapidly into digital transformation, which is a good thing for pretty much organizations and consumers alike. For the most up-to-date information on what's now, what's next, and what's important to know about if you're operating in this space, this is a don't miss episode. Be sure to hit the "subscribe" button while you're here. Find and Connect with Shelly Kramer and Sarah Wallace on the web as follows: Shelly Kramer on Twitter - @ShellyKramer Shelly Kramer on LinkedIn Sarah Wallace on Twitter - @Sarah_Wallace Sarah Wallace on LinkedIn For more on Futurum Research, check us out here: Futurum Research Find Futurum Research on LinkedIn and on Twitter @Futurum Research Other insights from Futurum Research: Exploring AWS' Recent Announcements with Jeff Bar, AWS VP and Chief Evangelist Think 2020: IBM Goes Vertical With the Financial Services Ready Cloud Think 2020: IBM Extends Hybrid Cloud Offering with IBM Cloud Satellite AWS Results Still a Bright Spot Within Amazon's Q1 Earnings

Leading tech analysts from Futurum Research offer weekly deep dives on the latest in tech news, new products and services, mergers, earnings, regulations, and more, from startups to industry leaders, emerging tech and what's ahead for industries across the globe, along with interviews with tech industry leaders and experts. In this episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast, Interview Series, I'm joined by Don Schuerman, the CTO of Pega, a leader in software for customer engagement and intelligent automation, for a conversation about how the COVID-19 pandemic is perhaps a catalyst that a lot of businesses needed right now. We explore how engaging in a massive rethink is likely the best path forward for companies of all sizes as we navigate pandemic times, and also take a quick preview of Pega's upcoming Pegaworld iNspire virtual event being held from 9am to 11:30am EDT on June 2, 2020. Our conversation included insights into the following: The fact that digital transformation in the COVID-19 age is truly an opportunity for organizations to not just survive, but also to thrive. In fact, some might say that this is a once in a lifetime opportunity. The role a smart digital transformation strategy plays in pandemic times and beyond, helping lay the foundation for the future, including building resiliency into organizations in ways it might not have existed before Business architecture and what to consider when setting out to future-proof your business model, and the role that technology plays there, as well as why designing with a "digital first" mindset is more important now than ever before How solutions that serve short term needs — things like automation, case management, and low code app development — can ultimately serve as building blocks for more bigger, more comprehensive solutions down the line. Real world use cases of some exciting technology solutions that are happening right now, as well as a look at how those can be extended in the future. The role that automation plays in building and facilitating resilient, business operations. Take a moment and go register (it's free!) for Pega's upcoming Pegaworld iNspire virtual event on June 2nd, from 9am to 11:30am EDT. You'll get a chance to hear keynotes from Anna Gleiss, Siemens' Global IT Head (Don't Just Talk, Transform: Survive and Thrive in a Disrupted World), Rich Gilbert, Aflac's Chief Digital Information Officer (One Digital Aflac: A Digital Transformation Journey), and Pega's Founder and CEO, Alan Trefler (The Platform for your Platforms). You'll hear use cases and insights from Vodafone, Anthem, Blue Shield of California, Unilever, Google, Lloyds Banking Group, HSBC and others, and walk away with a myriad of valuable information that will undoubtedly help on your organization's digital transformation journey, in pandemic times and beyond. Note that even if you can't attend the Pegaworld iNspire event live on June 2nd, if you register, you'll have access to all the content on demand. Now go do that, right now! Register here.

On this episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast - Interview Series, host Daniel Newman welcomes Alexey Gerasimov, Vice President of Global Cloud Delivery for HPE to discuss cloud consumption, the benefits of the cloud, and how to find the right mix of cloud for your business. The Value of the Cloud in the Face of COVID-19 We have built a culture of face to face collaboration, but how we approach business and collaboration has changed in the last few months. Cloud has enabled us to be able to work from home. It has powered companies to keep going. We are coming to a point now where the real, true value of cloud can be realized especially those companies still looking to transform to be able to conduct business as effectively as possible. Public Cloud Works… Most of the Time Public cloud usage is through the roof right now. Originally, the whole concept of public cloud was centered on speed, agility, cost effectiveness and faster time to market — all of which was not available in on-prem environments. But that has started to change in recent years as on-prem, private cloud, and hybrid options have started to flood the market. Many companies now employ some sort of cloud mix to handle all of their needs. But the question remains, how do companies figure out the right mix of cloud options? Where should workloads go? This is what HPE strives to help companies figure out. Enterprise Cloud Adoption Needs Strategy Like any technology, just because you can migrate to the cloud doesn't mean you should. Your enterprise cloud adoption needs a strategy. Shadow IT won't work for the cloud. HPE works with companies to figure out what exactly their needs are in order to recommend the right mix. It's a multi-phase journey that allows companies to build in increments similar to a devops approach. Alexey broke down the basic steps of the process into strategic workshop, assessment, minimum viable cloud, final cloud solution. The strategic workshop is the most important step. It lays the groundwork for the entire cloud strategy. Companies first need to answer a few basic questions to get to the strategy behind a cloud migration. Questions include why are we doing this? What problems are we trying to solve? And where can we gain the most business value? Objective Recommendations Once the strategic workshop and assessment are complete, HPE can pitch recommendations that are part of the Right Mix Advisor. The best thing about HPE is they don't pitch one cloud over another for their own gain. HPE partners with several cloud providers and pick the best cloud for whatever their customers requirements are. HPE determines what applications and workloads can go to the right cloud infrastructure based on decisions from tech components like security, governance, and finances among other things. They help customers find what they need and then can help the strategy shift as needed as well. Process of Ongoing Engagement What works today for a cloud strategy might not work next year or even in six months. Companies can spend unnecessarily more if they don't pay attention when adding on or dealing with scale. Cloud is a living, breathing entity that HPE can help manage in a few different ways like cost control and managed compliance. Having the right structure in place from a cost approach is critical especially in situations like this where everyone is tightening their belts so to speak. Alexey noted that HPE understands this and helps companies get it right from the start. COVID-19 and Cloud Transformations With the outbreak of COVID-19 every company had to step up their game. If they had already started to transform, the process went faster. If they were already in the cloud, they likely needed more bandwidth or compute power. If companies hadn't transformed at all, it became even more clear that they needed to. The spending must go on to keep business moving forward no matter what the situation is. HPE stepped in to help even more. First, companies can defer payments for 90 days to get the technology and IT infrastructure set up to continue working efficiently. Second, if companies need cash upfront, HPE is offering a buy back program where they will buy back old outdated technology assets to help with the new IT infrastructure investment. Furthermore, once IT leaders and companies realize what their cloud strategy looks like, HPE can work with them to figure out how that adoption happens. Whether it's buying the technology back and managing it for them or moving technology to consumption models, HPE has a lot of different options available to help companies in whatever stage they are in. If you'd like to learn more about how HPE can help you with your cloud strategy, please visit their website and be sure to listen to the full episode to hear more insights. While you're at it make sure to hit subscribe so you never miss an episode.

On this special edition of the Futurum Tech Podcast - Interview Series, host Daniel Newman welcomes Mark Hughes, Senior Vice President of Security at DXC Technology to discuss the CISO's playbook for leading security during COVID-19. The Current Cybersecurity Landscape Cybersecurity challenges and threats are not getting any better or easier to manage. CISOs confront new threats, new threat actors, and new strains of malware and ransomware constantly. We used to be concerned with confidentiality attacks where information was being stolen, but now there is an increasing escalation in targeted attacks like ransomware. To deal with these threats, most companies are spending just enough money to have the framework to stop the most critical attacks. But many companies aren't overspending on security to be safe. There are trade-offs between the risk-based decisions, but there are two things that are definitely true in the cybersecurity landscape right now. A lot of risks come from malicious intent, but not all so organizations need to be prepared on all fronts. Threats and risks appear very quickly. Many organizations can be secure one day and under attack the next. CISOs are in a balancing act. They need to mitigate risks as quickly as possible while making sure that the organization is as secure as it can be with a limited budget. It can definitely be tricky. New Challenges with Remote Work Almost overnight, CISOs faced a whole host of new challenges as entire companies moved to remote work as a result of the pandemic. Until now, many companies had a few groups working remotely or were prepared for people to work from their own devices while traveling. They only had a small scale set up to manage little pockets of people, but now companies and CISOs have to do this with the whole organization. The job of a CISO got extremely complicated in the matter of a few days. Every CISO was now asked if the company had the scale and infrastructure to handle this new situation. And if they didn't have the scale, CISOs needed to come up with a solution — and fast. The second question many CISOs faced was can the security tools operate effectively in the new network environments we are now operating in. Are there particular groups that pose the highest level or risk that need access to critical tools? How do you layer security in a work from home environment so you can manage risk proportionately without hindering productivity? Managing Security Risks Companies have SaaS solutions, open source solutions, open stack, public clouds, private clouds, and a host of other initiatives and programs in use to help employees be productive. But each new program or solution adds a layer of complexity to security. And as much as a CISO might want to, putting stringent security protocols in place isn't always the answer. It's a balance between four things: people, process, physical control, and technical control. CISOs need to educate people on the role they play in security. They need to help people understand the process of security. Then there needs to be physical and technical security controls in place that are manageable. If you try to skew your strategy to only one bucket, like the technical aspect, users will figure out workarounds. But if you make sure that people know that security is the thing that needs to be done everywhere, by everyone, at all times, you'll find more success. Education, however trite it may sound, is key. If you do this well and do it consistently, you can massively improve your risk posture making a big difference very quickly. If you'd like to learn more about managing your security risk and ways DXC Technology can help, check out their website. Be sure to listen to the full episode below and while you're at it, make sure to hit subscribe.

On this special episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast - Interview Series, host Daniel Newman welcomes Dan Rodriguez, Vice President Network Platforms Group and GM Communication Infrastructure Division at Intel to discuss the proliferation of 5G, network platforms, and the impact COVID-19 is having on technology. Intel's Response to COVID-19 The COVID-19 pandemic has made it clear that technology is an essential part of our lives and how we conduct business. Intel has pledged an additional $50 billion to help support the use of technology for patient care, online education, and scientists who are searching for a cure. Intel employees are essential workers who are keeping the networks and technology up and running so we can continue to function on a personal level, business level and global level. COVID-19's Impact on 5G Networks Prior to the pandemic, the big topic in networking for 2020 was 5G. Despite the current macroeconomic uncertainty, Dan shared that most of Intel's customers and partners are continuing with their planned pace of 5G deployment. Networking and the infrastructure needed to support the advancements of the technology are critical. We are seeing a lot of governments worldwide recognize the need for this critical infrastructure and many are including the support for infrastructure in stimulus packages. Our current infrastructure has been essential for how economies are able to sustain during this crisis. The work that intel has done has been paramount to keeping our economy running, business operating, and students learning. Industry Response to COVID-19 Intel works with a lot of cloud and communication service providers. These customers have made small adjustments in their networks and will likely make more adjustments as demand and traffic on the networks continues to increase. Besides the immediate changes, many customers are focused on building out infrastructure to support what's coming in the future. CoSPs are preparing for 5G. Businesses are preparing to utilize the next wave of compute infrastructure — edge technology. Dan shared that companies are ramping up their investments in 5G and edge computing in a big way — and it shows. Intel's Investments to Unlock the Full Potential of 5G In February, Intel announced new products and investments that have showcased their broad portfolio from both a silicon and software perspective. Unlocking the full potential of 5G requires network transformation and Intel is ready to drive this forward. The first announcement was additional investments to the Xeon Scalable platform which is the foundation of many networks worldwide with over 30 million units sold. Dan shared that in addition to enhancing the architecture and CPU, the company has also made adjustments to other platform ingredients that go around it like ethernet controllers. Intel has also made significant investments in many open source communities like Linux Foundation DPDK and CNCF. These investments and contributions really enable the core networks today, as well as the future. The company has made continued progress on the journey of network transformation with virtualization. Last year 40 percent of all core network deployments beame virtualized. By 2024, Intel expected that number to be 80 percent which will be fueled by 5G investments. Intel also announced the Atom P5900 platform, the first SoC built from the ground up to meet the needs of a Radio Access Network including low-latency and high-bandwidth. This platform will deliver what's required for 5G base stations today and in the future. The final significant announcement, the Intel Ethernet 700 Series Network Adapter, will give radio access networks the additional functionality needed to handle the latency requirements across 5G network implementations. Customers need to invest in networks that have the end-to-end architecture that can support the increased demand from 5G and other emerging technologies. With these new announcements, Intel is a leading provider in base stations going forward working with customers to meet the new demands. If you'd like to learn more about Intel's announcements, products, investments or their response to COVID-19, visit their website. Be sure to listen to the full episode below and while you're at it make sure you hit subscribe so you never miss an episode.

On this episode of Navigate, a special six-part podcast series with Pexip and Futurum Research, host Daniel Newman talks with Jordan Owens, VP of Architecture at Pexip, about how video fits into your long term digital workplace strategy. Video Complements In-Person Meetings COVID-19 forced companies to turn to video to work effectively and to connect with teams and employees now spread out across the country. While video is great for maintaining face-to-face interactions when remote, there will always be value in meeting in person. When we come out of this pandemic and return to business as normal, people will crave the human-to-human interaction. But video will augment those meetings and help fill in the gaps. If someone is working from home or travelling, video conferencing will be more normal to ensure that person is connected to the workplace. Businesses will realize that they used video to fill the void during this pandemic, why can't it continue once we emerge and return to normal? Realizing the Benefits of Video Video conferencing will also be part of the digital workplace strategy because companies will finally see its worth. Companies will realize that this technology will help accelerate transformation and improve efficiency ultimately improving the bottom line. It will also likely eliminate unnecessary travel, saving companies money. A lot can get done in a well-assembled, secure, high definition, quick, easy to enter, frictionless video meeting. No need to travel across the country or across the globe for meetings. For employees, video will be empowering. Employees will have a better work life balance once video is part of the digital workplace strategy. The current work environment is illustrating that employees can be effective working from home with video. Jordan predicts that managers and leaders will empower employees to make the decisions that are right for themselves. That could be creating a flexible work schedule, eliminating travel, or working from home full time. Employees are going to figure out how to use the tools they're given, including video, to be more effective in their role in the workplace. How to Deploy Video as a Long-Term Strategy It's clear that video is now mission-critical. Once we return to our normal work environments, IT leaders will be tasked with determining if they have the right tools in place to support video in the digital workplace strategy. This will likely require an audit and internal reflection on processes that are currently in place to determine where video fits. Video isn't going anywhere. It will soon be built into the fabric of how we work. If you'd like to learn more about Pexip, their products, offerings, and how they can help you add video to your digital workplace strategy, be sure to check out their website or listen to the full episode of Navigate below.

In this episode of the Futurum Tech Webcast, Daniel Newman is joined by partner and fellow analyst Shelly Kramer to explore what pandemic marketing looks like for Big Tech. Their conversation revolved around things to keep in mind as we transition to digital events and other marketing tactics — and the important pivot needed by Big Tech in order to stay connected with customers and prospects in the year ahead. Their conversation explored how companies are dealing with the events that they've been relying on for decades are cancelled, and what a "new normal" in terms of tech brands connecting with customers and prospects might look like — or at least a temporary normal as we move from in person events to digital events. The conversation also included insights on: Big tech is experiencing two years' worth of digital transformation happening at the speed of light Why (and how) social habits need to be revisited How to replace face-to-face interactions that happen at live events and how brands can pivot to create and/or participate in digital events that look and feel like the next best thing to in person interactions. Being raw, being vulnerable, offering up the human side of the brand is not only possible, it's incredibly impactful. How things like podcasts, webcasts, fireside chats video discussions, online media events, and well-executed digital events can all play an outsized role in how big tech is able to pivot — in pandemic times and beyond. They examined some of the digital events they have sat through these last few weeks and touched on the good (and there wasn't much) and the not-so-good that they saw along the way — and what brands can learn from those early experiences. The explored how brands need to pivot and what marketing messaging should look and feel like. Want more on that (of course you do!) you can watch the video here — be sure to subscribe to the Futurum YouTube channel while you're here. You can find more insights from the Futurum Research team on the Futurum Website and connect with Shelly Kramer and Daniel Newman in social as follows: Shelly Kramer Twitter Shelly Kramer LinkedIn Daniel Newman Twitter Daniel Newman LinkedIn

On this episode of Navigate, a special six-part podcast series with Pexip and Futurum Research, host Daniel Newman talks with Giles Chamberlain about how to approach privacy and security for your video conferencing solutions. Video Conferencing Popularity Bringing Privacy and Security to the Forefront In the last month, video conferencing has seen an explosion in popularity due to shelter-in-place orders. More people are on video than ever before, but this huge increase has also brought increased security concerns. Zoombombing and other video conferencing breaches have made headlines for weeks. Enterprises are realizing that it is not as easy as just clicking a link and joining a video. There has been a greater call to ensure privacy and security for all users. Giles noted that when looking at a video conferencing solution, you need to consider privacy and security individually. Let's break it down. Breaking Down Privacy and Security Every video conference call creates data. If you're recording audio, video and chat sessions that is all data that is in the hands of the provider. But even if you're not recording, you're still creating metadata. That could be IP addresses, email addresses, or company information. Protecting this information is crucial. Laws and regulations like the GDPR, CCPA, HIPAA and others set the standard of how this information is protected. When considering a solution, it's important to perform a risk assessment or research the standards that companies guarantee. It is the responsibility of the ITDM in the enterprise to ensure privacy by understanding the security protocols that are in place. An enterprise should also have their own set of security protocols in place for video conferencing. Giles recommended that companies start with strict security and loosen restrictions as you operate. No employee will ever start with lax security and then voluntarily move to a more secure environment. Retrofitting is hard. For example, end-to-end encryption should be standard from day one. Meeting ID numbers and passwords to enter meeting rooms should be standard. User experience might be sacrificed in the name of security, but it's table stakes. Hosting Options Privacy and security standards come down to where a video conferencing solution is hosted. The great advantage of the cloud service is somebody else does all the work for you. But you still have the legal obligation to know what data you're giving them, where it's going, and what's happening with it. You can't just abdicate the responsibility altogether. If a company decides that the risk of losing important data is too high then they can bring it all in-house and host in their own data center. This is where Pexip started. Self-hosted solutions were sold to providers to host on-prem. The second option available is shared hosting. Companies that trust a cloud provider like Google, Azure, or AWS can move the compute capacity to the cloud while still having employees manage the service. The data is still under the control of the organization, but the hosting is elsewhere to take the strain off the company's data center. The final option is managed hosting. Companies can turn the whole service over to someone else. Another company provides the compute power and ensures the data protection. Some off-the-shelf video conferencing solutions only offer one hosting option. Pexip on the other hand offers all three, giving customers better options for what fits their needs. At the end of the day, enterprise leaders know what they need and what they need to protect. For more information about Pexip, their products and offerings be sure to check out their website or listen to the full episode of Navigate below.

On this special edition of the Futurum Tech Podcast - Interview Series, host Daniel Newman welcomed Richard Davies, Vice President at DXC Technology and Managing Director of Leading Edge Forum and Caitlin McDonald, Digital Anthropologist at Leading Edge Forum. Richard and Caitlin discussed findings from a recent report from LEF and the accelerated digital transformation that's happening due to COVID-19. Reconfiguring the Collaborative Workspace Even before the pandemic we were seeing a massive shift in the way that people are working. Caitlin and Richard shared insights from The Leading Edge Forum's latest research "Reconfiguring the Collaborative Workspace," a study that was done over the last few years with insights from a variety of companies in a variety of industries. It's clear that there is an increasing ubiquity and reliability of collaborative technologies like Slack, Zoom, and shared cloud etc. All of these things were coming together to enable businesses of any size and in any field to think about how they could change the way that people work whether that's flexible hours or a distributed team across the globe. The office has become less of a hub. Now, 30 percent of the earth's population is under some sort of shelter-in-place order so this shift in how we work is massively accelerated. We are looking at a new collaborative workspace. The Technology Matters Beyond the way that people were working, where they worked, the kinds of work they were doing one key finding from the report is all about how important the right equipment is. If there's a barrier to communication because of the technology, you as a person perceive it as a barrier to your interpersonal communication which can be difficult to overcome in this new work environment. Caitlin shared that employees don't complain about wanting the new hot technology. They complain about coworkers not being able to hear them or not being able to understand them. You can't expect effective collaboration if the tools that are in place hinder it. Companies need to invest in technology solutions that facilitate collaboration. Rethinking How We Interact Working from home also requires us to rethink our interactions with coworkers and clients. We are missing spontaneous interactions and team building moments. Richard shared that leaders especially have to think a little more about how to keep people engaged and connected. How do you build the community? How do you deliver what you're trying to say? You have to consider what you're trying to create and the desired outcome. If it's team building, perhaps a quick informal check in call would work. If it's something more important, then an interactive presentation might do the trick, But there's more to think about than just the information that's being delivered. The Changing Physical Environment We talk a lot about the virtual environment, but realistically when you're working in a virtual environment you also are still sitting somewhere physically. In the current situation, it's not just that people are working from home, you have to consider that their kids are there or roommates are there. Multiple people in one household trying to work and collaborate with their own companies and schools. Companies need to consider this when thinking about the virtual environment too. As individuals, we need to get in the right mental headspace. We need to create the right working zone in our minds to get things done. There is no "one size fits all" response that will work. We each have to figure out what works. Biggest Surprises and Takeaways There were many surprises and big takeaways from the study but a few stood out. Caitlin shared that she was surprised how adaptable people are to different situations, but that there are still barriers to success if you don't handle collaborative workspace in the right way. Right now many companies are thinking about how to get the workforce on board to deal with new ways of work and to adjust to this environment, but yet have a balance in their lives? Richard proposed that companies and leaders need to create a shared sense of purpose. Get employees invested by helping them understand the value proposition and the role they play. At the same time, communication is hugely important. Slow everything down and make slear points so people have the opportunity to absorb, understand, and then respond. Caitlin's final takeaway is mostly aimed at leaders. As you're thinking about your teams and a virtual only way of interacting, it is important to create those micro-moments of trust that normally you depend on happening by accident physically in the office. This cannot be overlooked or forgotten if you want your team to be successful. If you'd like to learn more about the study or other pieces of research that the Leading Edge Forum is working on, visit their website. Also be sure to listen to the full episode below and hit subscribe while you're at it so you never miss an insightful epi

In this episode of the Futurum Tech Webcast, I'm joined by my colleague Olivier Blanchard and our focus today is on a discussion around contact tracing apps — and what these apps mean for privacy in the era of COVID-19. With the development and deployment of contract tracing apps, are privacy and security concerns taking a back seat when it comes to combating the COVID-19 pandemic? Olivier has written a lot on the topic of privacy and security concerns the world over in recent months. He has also covered the Google Apple partnership in a recent analyst insight article: Google, Apple COVID-19 Contact-Tracing Partnership: The Good and the Bad, in case you'd like the latest on what Google and Apple are partnering to do in terms of a contract tracing offering, which is due to launch mid-May Our conversation touched on what's going on elsewhere in the world as it relates to the use of contact-tracing apps to combat the spread of COVID-19, including updates in global markets ranging from South Korea, Singapore, China, and Taiwan, to Australian and Germany, and even what's happening in some individual states in the United States as it relates to contract tracing apps. We also talked about what's happening in the private sector with the development and deployment of apps designed to provide contract tracing capabilities to enterprises and what's likely ahead there. This might present an interesting challenge for employees who aren't comfortable opting in to contact tracing apps, but whose options might well be to either have a job and participate in contact tracing apps, or, well, to not have that job. This was an interesting discussion about contract tracing apps, who are sure to be in our not-too-distant future in some way or another, and what they mean for privacy in the era of COVID-19.

On this episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast - Interview Series host Daniel Newman welcomes Chadd Kenney, Vice President and Chief Technologist at Clumio to discuss cloud and data storage, Backup as a Service, and the latest happenings in the company. Making Backup as a Service Simple Cloud solutions are mission-critical for the enterprise these days, but nobody really likes to manage these complex systems. Most enterprises have data spread across public and private clouds and SaaS solutions. Ensuring that all data — everywhere — is backed up properly can be a headache. When we think of backups we probably think of the simple solutions for a single user like an automatic iCloud backup where you don't have to think about it. That's not the case for the enterprise. It's not friendly. It's not a modern architecture. It's tapes and storage arrays. It's on-prem. Adding in more SaaS applications only makes the data dispersion more and more complicated. Companies need a quick easy way to have consistent data protection. The old storage solutions need to be more agile which is what Clumio set out to do. Their Backup as a Service offering has a low barrier to entry meaning companies can start backing up almost immediately Building For Cloud, In Cloud Old storage models are the antithesis of agile IT. Companies have legacy storage solutions and giant data centers with racks and racks of servers that took weeks and months to get up and running. Clumio makes it easier for the end consumer by allowing them to really leverage the agility and scalability of the cloud. In order to get true leverage from the public cloud, you actually have to build it on a lot of the native componentry because it's built for agility, scalability and it enables you to build platforms that take the efficiencies of the cloud into the platform. Clumio is integrating this agility early on in the platform so when it moves operations, enterprises have a consistent way of applying data protection — no matter where the data is. Clumio's Key Differentiators You used to be able to copy data from one rack to another rack, or from one site to another site, and it didn't matter. There was no additional cost, it was all one big capital purchase. But if you try to do that now, you get hit with hidden charges and fees that make it difficult to operate. Clumio's architecture allows data to be backed up in the cloud that it was created in. They've increased parallelism, decreased overall aggregate costs, enabled user experiences that were much more scalable without having to do any thinking whatsoever which is especially helpful as data gets more dispersed across SaaS and even PaaS solutions. Clumio's Exciting Future Clumio started with backing up private cloud with virtualization. They also do VMware cloud running in AWS and a few months ago added the ability to do elastic block storage which is in AWS as well. This covers most of public and private cloud storage. To continue the momentum, Clumio is building its first SaaS service with Office 365 enabling customers to be able to provide consistency across all these use cases. Now customers can have uniform policies that can be applied across your private cloud, your public cloud assets, and even SaaS based solutions with Office 365. The best thing is zero customers will have to do a software upgrade to add this new innovation to their platform. If you'd like to learn more about Clumio, its offerings, or the exciting new announcements check out the website and make sure you listen to the full episode below. While you're at it, be sure to hit subscribe so you never miss a great conversation on the Futurum Tech Podcast.

On this special edition of the Futurum Tech Podcast Interview Series, host Daniel Newman welcomed Faisal Siddiqi, Chief Technologist, Innovation and Ecosystems at DXC Technology and Chris Swan, CTO of Global Delivery at DXC Technology. In this episode, the two talked to Daniel about the current state of upskilling and technology in the workforce especially in the wake of COVID-19. COVID-19 Pushing Digital Transformation Forward Almost overnight, companies around the world have been forced to change how they work, bringing in a lot of new technologies to help the business run efficiently. We are seeing a rapid digital transformation. What used to take years is taking weeks and months now because companies have no choice. But this is also leading to another revolution in the workplace. At the World Economic Forum this year, it was predicted that we are on the cusp or a reskilling revolution. An estimated 1 billion people will need to be reskilled by 2030 for emerging technologies. The shifts are already starting to happen in the workplace. From a service provider perspective, we are moving away from sending work to low-cost labor to sending it to software engineering while at the same time shifting from software engineering to machine learning and AI where we are training systems instead of programming systems. The demand for machine assisted technology is on the rise. It's augmenting how we work and we need people to understand how this technology works in order to make it work in the enterprise. This technology is not replacing humans, it's requiring a new skillset. Building the Foundation Today to Upskill Tomorrow In most businesses, employees are required to have certain certifications or degrees to be able to work on certain technologies. Some businesses might require a certification to work with their cloud partner while others might require a certification to work on any cloud system in general. But emerging technologies are starting to require a certain type of individual rather than a certification. It doesn't matter if their education comes from a certification or degree program or if they're self-taught from an open source community. In the future, we will likely need both employees in the workplace. The employees who have degrees in the tech fields, but also the employees that seek new education. The ones who are constantly learning how to solve new problems. New Kind of Training Program With upskilling in mind, DXC Technology turned to a DevOps Dojo to train anybody. These problem-solving programs aren't focused on if employees know the material. It's about how they solve the problem. They can use whatever program they want to help them — Google, GitHub etc. It's an authentic, on-demand experience designed to help people understand the new material in whatever way works for them. Great examples of this style training program are Katacoda and Microsoft Learn. These two are designed to help people not just learn the technology, but master it as well. Open Source Upskilling Open source communities are a great place to better oneself. The right community can offer the right kind of support no matter what level of education you have. It's open to everybody meaning it's a great way to seek collaborative input from a number of people and it's a game changer for so many businesses. Open source is likely going to be the onramp to help people and companies move from legacy applications to the multi-cloud world. It's going to provide the support and training that employees need in order to be prepared for new technology. The Future for DXC Technology Chris shared that DXC is on the cusp of opening several modules from DevOps Dojo similar to the Katacoda training. Faisal shared that DXC has a few open source projects now available on the DXC GitHub like the newly released AI starter kit. Beyond that, Faisal discussed the importance of taking the foundation of open source software technology development and applying it to the culture of the enterprise to become better collaborative citizens. It's clear that work is changing and building a better collaborative environment will prepare us for the future. If you'd like to learn more about what DXC Technology is doing visit their website and be sure to listen to the full episode. Don't forget to subscribe so you never miss an episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast.

On this special edition of the Futurum Tech Podcast - Interview Series host Daniel Newman welcomes Rafael Sweary, President and Co-founder of WalkMe to discuss COVID-19, successful business pivots in the wake of a crisis and what the future now looks like for the company. How WalkMe Addressed COVID-19 WalkMe was built around digital transformation. The ultimate goal of the company is to help other companies adopt technology faster. The Digital Adoption Platform was designed as a guidance system to simplify the user experience. Digital transformation is the name of the game for WalkMe, so when COVID-19 first started and the shelter-in-place orders happened across the globe, the company was ready to react. Initially there were some difficulties with getting all employees connected, but the company quickly adapted their own technology to solve the problems. Leadership also implemented a three-touch system meaning all employees needed to be touched three times a day by the company to make sure employees still felt connected. Touches could be anything — webinars, team meetings, calls from managers or coworkers, etc. This communication effort has made a difference. Culture and Leadership Make a Difference The transition success for many companies has ultimately come down to culture and leadership. WalkMe was built embracing technology. They had the technology in place to support people working from home. But they also made small changes like giving Zoom free to every employee to help not only the company stay connected but families stay connected too. The Leaders at WalkMe embrace change — and it shows. WalkMe's Realize 2020 event was scheduled for March 19 in San Francisco, but it had to be cancelled. Instead of cancelling completely, the company pivoted and in four days held a very successful digital event. These small pivots have helped with business continuity and ultimately productivity of the employees. Rafael made a good point that you can't predict the future. You can't plan for disasters like COVID-19. But you can flex the leadership muscle. You can train employees to be better prepared for pivots. You can ensure the tools are in place to support the pivots. Helping Employees See Value in Technology Like I mentioned previously, WalkMe is a digital adoption platform. The ultimate goal is to help employees of any company adopt technology faster. The last mile of digital transformation comes down to human effort. If employees don't see value in technology the transformation won't work. No matter how much you train or teach an employee to use a new CRM platform, if he doesn't see value, he won't use it. Sticking with that same analogy, Rafael explained that you have to take the time to show that a CRM will enable him to sell more, to make more profit, that it's in his best interest. This is ultimately what WalkMe strives to do. If you'd like to learn more about WalkMe's products and solutions, check out their website and be sure to listen to the full episode. Don't forget to hit subscribe so you never miss an episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast.

In this special edition of the Futurum Tech Podcast - Interview Series, host Daniel Newman welcomes Jason Mann, Vice President of IoT at SAS. Daniel and Jason discussed SAS's response to COVID-19 and the impact IoT and AIoThave had on businesses all over the world. Analytics to Fight COVID-19 It's almost cliche to say that we are living in an unprecedented time, but it's still the case. SAS, like all companies, had to quickly reprioritize and pivot within the last month. The first priority obviously was the health and safety of employees and families. SAS quickly moved to equip employees with what they needed to work from home. The second priority for SAS was community-based. On the company homepage, you can find dashboards available for free that help track the spread and trends of the virus. They also created specific resources that are focused more on the healthcare sector. SAS is working with several hospitals to help with the SIR epidemic models which help with the projections of the advancement of disease within populations. The output for these models is critical in order to project staffing and equipment needs. The final priority is helping partners and customers with business continuity. What can SAS do to help other companies continue their business as close to usual as possible. Jason shared a great example of this effort has been seen in supply chains and food chains. SAS is working with companies to help maintain a level of consistency of delivery from the farm to the grocery store. SAS has moved quickly to use their analytic software to make decisions or help other customers and companies make decisions. They're able to take information and create an action item. The companies that do this successfully during this time will inevitably come out stronger in the end. Breaking Down the AIoT In the last few years SAS has spent a lot of time and money focusing on the Artificial Intelligence of Things or AIoT. Jason described it as a convergence of AI around IoT principles, many of which have been around but are seeing renewed value in the expansion of compute. It's an expansion of the power of analytics and a convergence of data that customers can use to make decisions in real time to solve issues faster. Companies and Industries Benefiting from AIoT Industries like healthcare, manufacturing and transportation are already seeing the benefits of AIoT. Jason shared a particular example of a rail company that has been able to track not just the locomotive performance and maintenance initiatives but also the operator performance and how all of those things interact and impact each other. The company is also able to use data and evaluate in real time the safety of the track, overall station performance, and potential maintenance issues. Using AIoT the company has expanded their compute capability and has improved performance and the bottom line. AI provides the opportunity to streamline, to determine correlations, to get more intelligent as neural networks or deep learning is able to identify patterns, trends, and then create automation and activities. It's about removing the human from the equation to make decisions faster. SAS has also partnered with Honeywell to pair this AIoT technology with drone video surveillance to help farmers track vegetation. Farmers can take this data and then make decisions about their crops optimizing fertilizing, watering, or eradicating efforts. AIoT and Future Technologies There are a lot of potential use cases for AIoT and other technologies. We could easily take the surveillance and data technology and use it to determine if social distancing is happening in some areas. Jason also discussed the potential around virtual and digital twins and virtual reality. Companies are realizing that we don't necessarily need to be in person or in a physical location to conduct business. So as more digital or virtual twins are created for existing technologies, how will the AIoT help them operate more efficiently? More than 220 US public companies are seeing their supply chain impacted by a virtual version of product, process, or system. When you can manufacture a product in a digital or virtual environment you're keeping costs low. We are seeing this with automobiles. We're seeing it with windmills. We're seeing it being done in a lot of heavy industrial manufacturing as well as consumer products and health care. We're seeing all kinds of applications. This is really powerful and this is IoT data. This is AI and this is analytics at their finest. It's likely that moving forward, many businesses will have continuity plans that include digital twins or virtual environments in case something catastrophic like this ever happens again. This will clearly be our new normal. If you'd like to learn more about SAS, AIoT, or the future of this technology be sure to check out their website and listen to the full episode. Don't forget to subscribe to the podcast so you never miss an episode.

3D printing technology has the potential to impact almost every industry in the world — whether it's creating replacement parts for machines to quickly developing prototypes from scratch. Today, the impact 3D printing is having on the global fight against the coronavirus COVID-19 is significant. In this episode of our show, my colleague and fellow analyst Sarah Wallace and I take a look at the role 3D printing is playing — from rapidly creating protective face shields, respirator masks, nasal swabs and ventilator parts for use by front line workers and hospitals — to the challenges the industry faces, to spotlighting companies doing innovative things with 3D printing — and what's ahead. What makes 3D printing such a great solution? What makes 3D printing such a great solution? In a word: It's fast. With 3D printing, in the space of a short period of time (think hours not days or weeks) it's possible to design, prototype and produce an idea. And that? That incredibly rapid turnaround time is something that manufacturers can't (yet) do. Right now, supply chain issues and overwhelming demand are what is driving the need for 3D printing solutions. As a result, 3D printing is, and can continue to, have a big impact on the supply chain by filling short-term supply gaps that every industry is facing as we navigate the COVID-19 outbreak. Here's but one example of how 3D printing can provide important solutions to the coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic and our supply chain problems — Manufacturers of nasal swabs have been struggling to keep up with demand. These swabs are used for coronavirus tests and are very different from standard swabs, as they need to be long and skinny, made of synthetic fiber, and can't have a wooden shaft. While hospitals and communities want and desperately need to ramp up testing, this weak link in the supply chain is a big factor. That's where 3D printing can help. In a recent interview with CNN, HP's Raymond Pastor, acting president of 3D printing and digital manufacturing for HP indicated the company has the capacity to print 1 million swabs a week in the U.S. alone. What are the limitations of 3D printing? Sarah walked us through some challenges as it relates to 3D printing. For starters, not all 3D printed equipment is the same, and some is easier to produce than others. Equally as important, some 3D-printed equipment might be better than others, while some might not quite afford the level of protection that's needed. Some things require FDA approval to produce, and of course there's always the risk factor for companies producing these things that is inevitably important to consider. Sarah also mentioned there's a skills gap that plays a role in the limitations and challenges of 3D printing, as well as some other things worth considering. What companies in the 3D Printing Space Are Doing Some Really Innovative Things? Our conversation in the webcast turned to the companies in the 3D printing space that are doing some really innovative things. Sarah is currently immersed in developing a 3D market insight report, so it wasn't hard to come up with examples of companies doing innovative things with 3D printing. This includes: Siemens' Additive Manufacturing (AM) Network is an online order-to-delivery collaboration platform for the industrial additive manufacturing community and connects users, designers, and 3D print service providers to enable faster and simpler production of spare parts for machines like ventilators. Siemens is also making 3D printers available to the global medical community to speed design and production during the COVID-19 pandemic. Doctors, hospitals, and organizations in need of medical devices and designers and service providers can register for free access to the Siemens AM Network. HP has developed a 3D printed hands-free door opener, a mask adjustor clasp that helps make masks more comfortable during long time wear, face shields, hospital grade FFP3 face masks that are reported to be available soon, and 3D printed parts for field ventilators are in development. HP and the company's partners are making validated design files for many parts that don't require complex assembly available for free. If you're a 3D designer or innovator (or know one) who wants to join the battle against COVID-19, you can contribute new applications and ideas to the collaborative effort directly from HP's website dedicated to 3D printing in support of COVID-19 containment efforts. Dassault Systèms is using scientific simulation of the human sneeze to support the development of personal protective equipment (PPE) projects in the 3DEXPERIENCE Lab OPEN COVID-19 online community, as part of collaborative efforts to quickly answer unmet urgent needs during the COVID-19 pandemic. The simulations are used to demonstrate what happens when a person sneezes, to better understand the effectiveness of different PPE being developed and deployed, and to aid in improving their design. Dassault's simulato

On this special episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast — Interview Series, host Daniel Newman welcomes Bill Boswell, Vice President of Marketing at the Siemens Digital Industries Software, to discuss digital transformation in the age of COVID-19 and what companies across all industries are facing. It's Not Time to Slow Down We are in an unprecedented time right now. Companies have the opportunity to pause and look at what they're doing across the board. How they're operating, what technologies are being used, how employees function. This is not the time to slow down. This is the time to embrace digital transformation. Some companies understand that and are innovating and collaborating faster than ever before. Today's products are smarter and more personalized. More data is being collected than ever before. And many companies are blurring the lines between the digital and physical worlds. Siemens helps customers use technologies to find opportunities in their industries. Customers are using automation in their supply chain. They are making decisions with technologies like digital twins. They are using software applications that run in the cloud to manage business more efficiently. Siemens is not just a software development company. They also have factories and manufacturing plants across the globe which gives them a unique opportunity to use the technology that their customers use. Bill pointed out that Siemens has the opportunity to be working right alongside customers, understanding their pain points, knowing what they need in order to speed up the technology of innovation. Digital Twins Improve Production One of the great things that Siemens offers to customers is a comprehensive digital twin. There are a lot of definitions of 'digit twin' out there, but the way Siemens looks at it depends on your use case and industry. There's a digital twin of the product that is the design of the product. Everything from your customer requirements to the physical simulation, design, electrical, and mechanical. Then there's the digital twin of production, which covers manufacturing, planning, and simulating the workstations of the entire factory as you move through the process. The next digital twin covers performance that allows you to see how it is operating, and then you can close the loop back into your digital twin of the design or your digital twin in the production to make the whole product or the whole production better. Industrial IoT Isn't Your Mama's IoT Most of the time when we think about IoT, we think about the smart speaker in our house or maybe the wearable on our wrist. But industrial IoT covers so much more than that. It could be a smart machine. It could be a smart manufacturing line, smart robots. It could be smart trains. It could be wind turbines. It can be energy grids. It can be entire infrastructures for cities. The consumer IoT products have to be manufactured somewhere. Industrial IoT goes behind the scenes. What kind of sensors do you need during the manufacturing process. What kind of smart machines do you need? And then ultimately, what do you do with the data you're collecting. Edge Computing or the Cloud? These devices, whether it's consumer IoT or industrial IoT, create a lot of data and we have a lot of choices of where we are going to store and interact with that data. There are some analytics that you want to do as close to where the sensors are as possible, and that may be because you want to have reduced latency or no delay for health and safety kinds of things. You may also want to do some edge computing because you can only transfer data around so fast. You need to be able to do the stream process close to where the device is to possibly optimize how much data is being sent to the cloud. Companies today are learning to put their compute resources in the right spot and it's usually a hybrid combination. Companies, especially manufacturers are using the edge and computing closer to the device in order to make decisions almost instantly. They are able to realize the power of real-time analytics. But then going a step further, Bill noted that companies are able to take this data and analytics and connect it with their other systems like CRM or ERP systems that help the company operate. IoT as a Service Working with the Cloud Customers today face the dilemma of being an IoT company and building the sensors and services they need themselves or buying an off the shelf solution that might not fit all of their needs. Siemens realized there was a middle ground. Companies could buy IoT as a Service on top of their cloud to get the best of both worlds. Siemens isn't reinventing the wheel, they're enhancing it to fit what customers need. If you'd like to learn more about Siemens, their offerings and partnerships check out their website and be sure to listen to the whole episode, too. While you're at it, hit the subscribe button so you never miss an episode.

On this special edition of The Futurum Tech Podcast - Interview Series host Daniel Newman welcomed Masum Mir, Vice President of Product for 5G Automation and Software for Cisco. Daniel and Masum discussed what Cisco has been doing to help the community during the COVID-19 pandemic, the transformation to software-defined infrastructure and what our new normal will look like after the pandemic is over. How Cisco is Helping the Community Cisco has made a big commitment to employees, partners, clients and the public during this pandemic. The company has pledged $225 million to the COVID-19 response in cash, products and services. The main priority is to provide a robust infrastructure that won't go down. It has to be up and running 24/7 for customers and partners and that requires 24/7 support services. People are using Cisco's collaboration platforms and video communications tools for work, education, and staying connected. We are seeing an unprecedented demand on the video infrastructure so Cisco is doing all that it can to provide additional software capabilities to existing infrastructure to keep the video experience from fading. Moving to Software Defined Infrastructure Prepared for 5G Over the last few years, Cisco has transformed from hardware to a software-defined business. They have worked to simplify the infrastructure and moved to a software model where remote upgrades are possible. The situation brought about by COVID-19 has shown the critical nature of transformations. It's clear that the companies that have already transformed, like Cisco, are reaping a huge benefit. This transformation to a software-defined infrastructure has also opened the doors for automation and scalable changes. As we move into the 5G era, Cisco expects to see more demand on the network. Masum said the network will be massive. Having automatable, scalable infrastructure will allow people and companies, whether it's 5 people or 5000, to have the same connection experience and at the end of the day, customer experience is what matters. Cisco is also constantly working to simplify the network connection strategy and automation strategy for service providers. Masum shared that they've put a lot of emphasis on digitizing and automating processes. They're pushing traditional service providers to disrupt and change because the current network model is outdated. Service providers need to be able to deliver faster services while reducing overhead and capital expenses. Moving to a software-defined architecture that enables automation will help these companies meet the operation demands from customers around the world. Is This 'New Normal' Permanent? This crisis has pushed the world into a new normal. We work from home. We have to be able to respond from home. We have to be able to manage issues from home. What will all of this mean for the future? Masum surmised that this will change the way infrastructure is built. Companies will need to be proactive, not reactive. Infrastructure will need to be more nimble. It will need to be scalable, up or down, and allow for automation. Cisco has already embraced this school of thought and is ready to help partners transform. If you'd like to learn more about what Cisco is doing during the COVID-19 pandemic or learn more about their 5G initiatives check out their website. Be sure to listen to the full episode for more insights and while you're at it, make sure to hit subscribe so you never miss an episode.

This episode of the Futurum Tech Video Podcast focuses on the post-pandemic business model and why rethinking and reworking should come before rebuilding and recovering. We decided to highlight just a few business categories with a view toward how they might rethink and rework their post-pandemic business models. Our focus in this discussion was on five categories: Education, Retail, Manufacturing, B2B Marketing and Sales, and Entertainment (Travel, Destinations, Sports). Here's a look at what our analysts think is important to consider when rethinking the post-pandemic business model — and where we go from here.

On this special edition of the Futurum Tech Podcast Interview Series host Daniel Newman welcomes Eric Vogel, Global Vice President of Customer Experience with HPE Greenlake. Daniel and Eric discussed data storage solutions, consumption-based business models as well as how HPE is helping in the fight against COVID-19. HPE is Helping in the Fight Against COVID-19 Currently, HPE is working on giving back to the global community to help in the fight against COVID-19 in a few ways. First, the company has set up a global matching relief fund where they plan to match every dollar employees donate to the COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund. Second, they've set up a dollar for dollar matching campaign to support the Bay Area in California, one of the hardest hit regions in the country. The company is also looking at what can be done from a high-performance computing standpoint. They have partnered with the White House on their high-performance computing consortium to provide capabilities with respect to high performance computing to really understand the science and mysteries of this COVID-19 virus. On-Prem and Consumption Based Business Models As businesses have had to shift operations in the last few weeks, it's clear that those who have not transformed in some way will be left behind. One of the biggest transformation efforts in the last few years has been a shift to the cloud, but with that comes data gravity issues, security issues, compliance issues, connectivity issues and even the application interdependency issues. Eric shared how HPE Greenlake has been working with customers to deliver on-prem storage solutions with the benefits of the public cloud without the drawbacks. Companies that use Greenlake have the flexibility to scale up or down and pay for what they're using while also knowing that their data is securely stored and protected. Understanding the Right Mix Advisor There's a lot to consider when moving to an on-prem consumption-based IT or business model. CIOs and IT decision makers have a lot to evaluate and it can be difficult to know where to begin. HPE has a logic-based program that helps companies evaluate their needs. Right Mix Advisor looks at 60 different variables and scores each based on the needs of the company. Some of these variables include looking at their application portfolio. Where does it run? What does it do? What do you need it to do? Do you value cost over performance? Other variables include culture, team structure, and employee expertise. It would be a waste to move to a fully public cloud if there was no one on the team equipped to manage it. And of course, each company is different, so HPE really sets out to help companies answer these questions in order to propose the right software mix. These software solutions are also constantly evolving and changing as business needs are constantly evolving too. Right Mix Advisor continues to make adjustments as the company makes adjustments. It's not a set it and forget it situation. Partner-Centric Model HPE also works to give customers lists of things to do to help with their transformation based on the goals and information fed to the Right Mix Advisor. They look at what can make the most impact for the client right now and then work with partners to deliver on their promises. They recognize that no one firm or company can do it all so HPE maintains a partner-centric approach. They work with other companies like Microsoft, AWS, SAP, and Google — to name a few — to deliver what the customers want and need. Centralized Monitoring and Data Visualization The future for storage solutions is hybrid. Public and private clouds with on-prem and off-prem options are everywhere for customers. But the issue with the hybrid model is that it's not always easy to see where all the storage is, what's being used, and how much is being spent. Plus, many companies also have to deal with compliance like PCI or HIPAA. HPE Greenlake works to eliminate this issue by creating a place for clients to see all their solutions at once. The ability to have easy data visualization can help streamline operations especially in an enterprise that likely has thousands of applications. As more technologies like edge computing and expanding storage solutions complicate the data picture, having one simple way to view this complex environment can help businesses operate more efficiently. If you're interested in learning more about HPE Greenlake and their offerings, be sure to check out their website. You can also listen to this podcast below. While you're at it, be sure to hit subscribe so you never miss an episode.

On this special edition of The Futurum Tech Podcast - Interview Series host Daniel Newman welcomes Satish Thomas, Director of Product Management for Microsoft Dynamics 365 to discuss data, marketing technology, and customer insights in our current situation. Data Is Everything Our world is undergoing a fundamental change. Data is coming out of everything and everywhere. When customers call your company, use your product, interact with your social media posts, visit your website, they are creating a data profile about themselves. A customer Data Platform (CDP) takes all this previously siloed data and combines it to create a 360-degree view of the customer. When done well, it can be used to fuel personalized experiences across sales and marketing departments. Four Key Pillars of a Customer Data Platform CDPs are gaining popularity as companies realize the value that they bring. Satish and the team at Microsoft have identified four key pillars of a CDP that make it effective. First, it is critical to have a vendor-agnostic view. You should be able to bring in data from every source regardless of vendor and schematize it. Then once you have all of the data collected and you've created this unified view of the customer, the second pillar is to be able to enrich the data from other sources. This involves giving the data context which is crucial for the third and fourth pillars. The third pillar brings in AI. It's one thing to bring all the data together, it's another thing to be able to identify the next best step. AI allows you to make decisions based on the data. The final pillar is how can you drive actions with these decisions. How can you power your business processes with this data. The Myths and Misconceptions Surrounding CDP As CDPs grow in popularity, Microsoft has found several myths and misconceptions that customers have regarding the technology. These range from the simple to the more complex. It's Satish's goal to eliminate these misconceptions and educate business decision-makers on how a CDP can impact their business. These are a few that he sees regularly: Vendor Lock-in. Many people assume that having a CDP from one vendor means you can only collect data from that vendor's sources. Microsoft Dynamics 365 runs on a vendor-agnostic view meaning data from any source and any vendor can be collected. Just for Marketing. While CDPs started out as a piece of marketing technology, today Microsoft sees use cases across the enterprise in sales, marketing, and service. It Takes a Long Time. Microsoft has worked to eliminate the misconception that it takes a long time to get a CDP up and running. The Microsoft Dynamics 365 is a SaaS application that can launch within a few months if they have a refined process or plan in place. Have to Rip and Replace. Most customers assume that when you start working with a CDP that you have to rip out and replace existing processes and other applications. That is not the case with Microsoft. Dynamics 365 works with other applications and can be built on existing processes. Vision for the Future If you look at CDPs today, getting that 360-degree of the customer is great, but there's more that can be done. The fact that you have a unified data view of the customer makes it easier to leverage AI. Satish believes that AI and ML will be the next frontier with CDPs. There's power in putting your data to work. There's power in having your data take shape in a system and then being able to make decisions and create actions from that data. This is an interesting time in the world and companies have an unprecedented opportunity to hit the pause button and refocus their efforts on digitally transforming. If you're interested in learning more about the Microsoft Dynamics 365 customer insights platform be sure to check out their website and listen to the full podcast here. While you're at it be sure to hit subscribe to make sure you never miss an episode. This podcast is part of a special series focused around what leaders and companies are doing to help employees and customers deal with COVID-19. Be sure to subscribe so that you don't miss out on amazing insights.

In this special edition of the Futurum Tech Podcast – Interview Series host Daniel Newman welcomed Doug Merritt, CEO of Splunk to discuss how data applies to everything — even in the fight against COVID-19, business continuity, and what Splunk is doing outside of the COVID-19 realm. Looking at Data Differently At the foundation of digital transformation is data. About five weeks ago, Splunk created a series of free dashboards hosted in the cloud that showed data about the spread of the virus and a myriad of characteristics around it. Companies can easily download these free dashboards and apply the data amassed by Splunk directly to their own data sets in order to help them make better sense of what is happening and plan accordingly. Splunk is also working on a set of healthcare applications designed to offer better visibility to the healthcare supply chain ecosystem. Using these applications, healthcare organizations will have a better idea of bed availability, necessary PPE stock, and critical care staff and their availability. Splunk is also working with companies in a variety of industries to fight fraud, as instances of hacking have really ramped up amid the massive distraction caused by coronavirus COVID-19. Companies have been collecting data on their networks, at endpoints, and back at data centers for other uses, but now Splunk has been able to come in and help these companies retool the data to work through these new issues. Most companies aren't collecting new data, but by adding Splunk they are able to look at the data through a different lens to solve a different problem. Business Continuity in the Age of COVID-19 One difficult thing many businesses are facing right now is the business of remote work, and companies very quickly moving to a completely virtual workforce — including the team at Splunk! Doug praised his team for being incredibly agile and fast tracking everything needed to get themselves, and their clients, set up so the company could continue to support their clients without much disruption. If there's one thing that we all will learn from this pandemic, it's the importance of agility and having the right technology in place to handle a massive, unpredictable shift in how we operate. Doug also shared a little about his own message to his employees during this time, which focused on being calm and trying to just roll with things as they come. He has counseled his employees on the importance of taking breaks, allowing for distractions, not getting stressed by a dog barking or needing to help a child with homework. He reminds his team, and our listeners, that this is a marathon and a team sport. We all need to come together to help each other be effective and still find a balance between work and home life. If we do it right, we will all come out stronger in the end — a bold and helpful leadership message. Data to Everything Beyond the fight against COVID-19, Splunk is helping companies bring data to everything. The Splunk platform allows companies to take non-structured data and put it into storage format allowing the structure to emerge as you ask questions and interact with it. The problem with most data tools is you take one point of view on the data before you've ever interacted with it and you don't get the full picture. Splunk allows the data to speak for itself through whatever questions or problems are thrown at it. In the last three years, Splunk has pivoted to bring streaming data into the analysis mix. Data is flying around now rapidly, and companies are needing to analyze that data, in real-time, to make fast decisions. Splunk evolved and delivered, providing real-time streaming, real-time interrogation, and real-time contextual capabilities. Data to everything, while maybe grammatically confusing, makes perfect sense in the business world and has helped many of Splunk's customers be successful. Want to learn more about Splunk's Data to Everything platform or check out the free dashboards that Splunk developed to help companies help in the fight against COVID-19? There's also probably not a better time to learn more about why customers chose Splunk, and how they can help your company act faster and accelerate innovation, amplify the impact of your data, and scale without the stress. Listen to the full podcast here, and while you're at it, be sure to subscribe to the Futurum Tech Podcast so that you never miss an episode. This podcast is part of a special series focused around what leaders and companies are doing to help employees and customers deal with COVID-19. Be sure to subscribe so that you don't miss out on amazing insights.

In this episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast, I'm joined by my colleague and fellow analyst, Olivier Blanchard, in a discussion about the COVID-19 related rapid deployment of tech that we are experiencing as a result of the coronavirus outbreak and the new security risks posed as a result. Our goal is to highlight some of those security risks, offer suggestions on how to mitigate those risks, and also explore some other goings on in the world of cybersecurity along the way, largely driven as well by the COVID-19 pandemic we are slogging through the world over. Main Dive At a time when many, or perhaps most, of us are stuck at home, Zoom, Slack, Google, Microsoft Teams and other and other online collaboration tools have become our collective lifelines. While that's great — and it's wonderful that kids can learn online using collaboration tools, we can work online using these tools, and we can host family gatherings and happy hours using these platforms, there's an inherent security risk that you can be sure hackers are paying attention to, and exploiting whenever possible. THIS WEEK's FAST FIVE Tech Tools are Assisting With Tracking the Mapping and Spreading of COVID-19. Zoombombing attacks are disrupting classes, interviews, meetings, and even social gatherings. China-based threat group launches widespread malicious campaign. Department of Homeland Security warns terrorists may exploit COVID-19 pandemic. The Justice League to the rescue. This Week's Tech Bites Winner: Ecommerce: Blessing For Consumers, Curse for Amazon Workers. While the technology that powers ecommerce giant Amazon is, for most of us, a beautiful thing, Amazon workers might feel slightly less enthusiastic. Warehouse workers and other Amazon employees (and likely drivers as well), question whether Amazon is doing enough to keep them safe. While they are likely happy to have jobs as the jobless claims are at nearly 3.3 million, economic security and personal health and safety, and that of their families, is understandably on the minds of these front-line workers. It is great for consumers to be able to sit safely at home and shop online, but that privilege comes at great cost to a whole lot of people who are reportedly both scared and frustrated. And not to pin all this on Amazon, we also discuss the fact that front line workers in grocery stores, Costco, Walmart, Target, along with millions of healthcare workers are equally as concerned about their safety as they make their way to work every day. Companies need to do everything they can to step up their efforts and keep these superheroes of a different kind healthy and well. Our Crystal Ball: In the Crystal Ball section of our podcast we always circle back to the main dive and try to make some kind of prediction. We are sorry to say that this week's Crystal Ball prediction as it relates to the rapid deployment of tech and security concerns that presents is not a rosy one. We are pretty confident that things are going to get a lot worse on the cybersecurity front before they get better. INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Shelly Kramer (@ShellylKramer) and Olivier Blanchard (@OABlanchard). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast.

For this week's episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast, host Shelly Kramer is joined by Sarah Wallace and Ron Westfall. In our Main Dive discussion, they talked about Zoho, Zoom, Cisco, Intel, Amazon, Microsoft, Google, and other tech brands who are doing good in tough times. From Cisco offering free Webex licenses to employees working from home to Zoom offering K-12 schools the use of its video conference platform for free, tech companies are stepping up and doing what they can to help businesses, schools, workers, teachers, students, and communities stay connected and try to keep moving forward in uncertain times brought on by the coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic. Some other notable moves from tech companies include: Zoho has made its comprehensive suite of business software applications available by way of its Small Business Emergency Subscription Assistance Program (ESAP) to help existing customers with 25 employees or less by waiting the cost of the applications these companies are currently using for up to three months. Intel's CEO Bob Swan has made it crystal clear the company intends to be a part of the solution for COVID-19, and that they are working in myriad ways across the country to do just that. As just two examples, Intel teamed with Lenovo and BGI Genomics in China to accelerate research and diagnostics and is also working with customers and partners to facilitate and expedite virtual learning among communities with the greatest needs. Amazon created a $5 million relief fund to aid small businesses in the Seattle area, which has since been extended nationwide, and the company is hiring thousands of drivers to help meet the needs of its ecommerce site at a time when home deliveries have never been more popular. Apple has created a $15 million fund to help investigate and find other ways to counter coronavirus, testing, and supplies, and Dell's CEO Michael Dell has warned that if you were spending time in the last few weeks partying on beaches or gathering in other ways rather than practicing social distancing as advised, that you had best not apply for a job at Dell. Broadband companies (AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile and others) are waiving late fees, not charging overage fees, removing data caps and throttling, and opening up Wi-Fi spots to help spur connectivity. Microsoft Research (in partnership with the Allen Institute, the White House, and others) has made the COVID-19 Open Research Dataset (CORD-19) a repository of more than 29,000 scholarly articles on the coronavirus family from around the world available, including machine-readable research from more than 13,000 articles, and Google.org has made a $1 million contribution to facilitate online learning. These are just a handful of the tech companies stepping up to do good in very difficult times, and it's encouraging to see those who can, do. Keep it up, friends in tech. THIS WEEK's FAST FIVE Intel CEO Letter. To kick off the Fast Five segment of our show, Ron covered Intel Chief Bob Swan's letter to customers and partners outlining the company's commitment to doing everything in its power to help be a part of the solution for COVID-19. Internet Usage Surges — With No End in Sight. Industry Giants Reduce Streaming Quality in Effort to Reduce Strain on Networks in the EU. Security and Privacy in a Pandemic. Ron took us on a quick dive into the importance of certification in assuring secure networks during a worldwide public safety and health crisis. This Week's Tech Bites Winner: For the Tech Bites portion of our show, we covered the irony of Facebook establishing a Coronavirus Information Center and how difficult it is, at least for us, to trust Facebook in any way to curate and disseminate the "best" information on the net about COVID-19. Trust is earned, and Facebook? Hasn't earned a bit. We also touched on Facebook being overwhelmed by a lack of staff and using AI to moderate content and stretching the company to its limits, as personified by thousands of users receiving notifications this past week that content they shared was disallowed. Interesting, and ironic, how Facebook is in some ways an integral part of how we communicate on a daily or weekly basis, yet so largely not trusted by the majority. And deservedly so. Our Crystal Ball: For the Crystal Ball portion of our show we circle back to the coronavirus COVID-19 outbreak, and talk about what we think is next and/or ahead. INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Shelly Kramer (@ShellylKramer), Sarah Wallace (@sarah_wallace) and Ron Westfall (@SirRonSolicon). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes

In the latest episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast, The Interview Series, Daniel Newman welcomes Dr. George Mathew, who is an internal medicine physician and Chief Medical Officer for the Americas for DXC Technology. He also welcomes Paul Thompson, Vice President of Global Healthcare Strategy and Product Development for DXC Technology. In this podcast episode, the two talked to Dan about the current state of price transparency in the medical field—and how technology can improve this issue. First, they agreed on the fact that most patients don't think about what the real cost of a procedure or office visit is. They think about their copay, not what insurers are charged, meaning they're insulated from the true cost of healthcare. Dan mentioned that people want to know more, kind of, but mostly they want to pay less! Currently, healthcare is about people paying insurance premiums and copays and then not worrying about it. But lately, large employers are pushing larger insurance costs onto their employees, and it's becoming a problem that people are more worried about. They're starting to demand price transparency, which starts with better communication of what services are being rendered, and what people are paying for. When Dan asked how providers are addressing transparency in healthcare today, and how technology can help this, George replied with his experience working with commercial health plans. At that time, the work was focused on increasing the efficiency of providers, information that was delivered through an online provider directory that allowed them to share a lot of information. They tried to offer the ability to search for the cost of procedures in a certain area but found the price could range a lot. Though they were able to find doctors with better efficiency and lower mortality rates than others this way, the data they had was raw and analytics capabilities were not as good as they are now. George went on to explain how technology investments could enable better realization of efficiency. After all, hospitals have made huge investments in electronic health records due to government incentives in recent years. Providers (which are defined here as hospital systems and healthcare systems, which have been acquiring doctors and using them) found their systems needed to be connected together for better value. They needed an outside integrator to do this. Aetna even said 5-10% of healthcare happens in the doctor's office or hospital, and the rest happens in the home. So, it's good to find ways to get data from smart homes and apps on your phone, creating a 360 view for a better patient experience. But part of the patient experience is price. You don't want to be shocked by the price after the procedure! At the same time, not all procedures are the same, and this complexity makes it hard to say the price of each one. Of course, technology will help with this ability to let patients know prices upfront. Healthcare technology can streamline systems and merge databases. But regulation and compliance are big hurdles. George explained that the most immediate driver is President Trump's executive order around price transparency, which dictates that there will have to be price transparency given by providers and health plans so procedures can be shoppable. There's not been a huge amount of work done at the state level yet compared to the federal level, but it will have to begin soon since consumers are starting to need it. Overall, the gist of this podcast was that patients don't care about overall price, but the cost to them and the outcome, such as whether they got better. They want value, which means they're paying an affordable price for a good outcome. And the experts are starting to figure out what people are willing to pay for. With healthcare, they haven't had enough data, especially providers, but now there is more in the last five years that can help put forth some good estimates. With better technology, we can help people see what they're paying for, improve value, and enhance the patient experience. Dan concluded that lots of work needs to be done, and systems need to go through more transformation before we can realize a digitally transformed healthcare system with price transparency. But that's the goal! If you're interested in learning more on price transparency in healthcare, listen to the full podcast today.

As the coronavirus COVID-19 sweeps into our lives, remote work (and remote learning) are rapidly becoming the "new normal" for many of us, ushering in a new means of communication and collaboration. We thought it would be an interesting topic to dive into for our Futurum Tech podcast. In this episode, I'm joined by my fellow analysts and colleagues at Futurum Research, Sarah Wallace and Fred McClimans, and all three of us have decades of experience working remotely. While using video communication platforms and various other collaboration platforms is as common as checking email for the three of us, we know that's not necessarily the case for a whole lot of folks who might be finding themselves working remotely. We thought it might be helpful to kick off this week's show by sharing some of our thoughts and best practices, along with tips on how to make it through these next weeks of remote work so that you can not only experience maximum effectiveness, but perhaps also learn to enjoy the many benefits of some pretty awesome collaboration and communication platforms and tools. In the podcast, we offer a bunch of advice and share some of our best tips. Here are just a few: Probably the most important piece of advice is to try and make sure you're working on a hard-wired connection—plugged into your router, not operating on wifi. That way, you can be assured of maximum quality in your video collaboration efforts. Schedule calls with your team with defined, predictable windows so that you can begin to establish a routine. Find/create a dedicated workspace during the time you're working remotely Make sure the lighting in your workspace is good (poor lighting on video is no bueno) and keep your laptop (or phone) at eye level when engaging in video collaboration. When you're looking down into your laptop or phone it provides a super nice look up your nostrils — and that's not a good look for anyone. Get a good microphone and when you're working via video collaboration, plug into your device with earbuds, headphones, or get a pair of wireless headphones. You might not notice the difference in the quality of your communications, but your team will definitely notice. We've got more advice, but for that, you're going to need to tune into the podcast. THIS WEEK's FAST FIVE Chinese auto giant Geely and its low Earth orbit satellites. Cisco rewires itself for the cloud era. The DoD puts the brakes on the JEDI contract, previously awarded to Microsoft. Hackers are taking advantage of the panic around COVID-19 to do what they do best: Hack, hack, hack. Popular video game becomes a virtual library and provides a major assist when it comes to freedom of information This Week's Tech Bites Winner: There is a giant asteroid racing toward Earth, suggesting tsunamis could crash into the ocean and trigger waves hundreds of feet high. Scary? Sure. Well, the asteroid, known as 1950 DA is has something like a 0.3 percent chance of slamming into the Earth — in 2880. So yes, technology definitely bites sometimes. Especially when publications publish articles like this, designed to inspire fear, and people read and share, without really grasping the realities of the timeline. 2880. That's a heck of a long time away! Our Crystal Ball: We agree that the current situation where many are experiencing remote work for the first time, will likely change how both employers and employees feel about remote work, video conferencing, and the use of collaboration platforms to do their jobs. INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Shelly Kramer (@ShellylKramer), (Fred McClimans (@fredmcclimans) and Sarah Wallace (@sarah_wallace). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast.

In the latest episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast, The Interview Series, Daniel Newman welcomes three experts to talk about robotic process automation (RPA) and intelligent automation (IA). Francis Carden is one of the founders of OpenSpan and is currently VP of Digital Automation and Robotics at Pegasystems. Lee Coulter is CEO of transformAI, and Jon Gilman is CEO of Clear Software. Together, they gave Dan some great insight on the future of RPA and IA. To start off, they defined RPA as a method of automating existing work, such as rote work people have been doing on their own for years. Think of all the tasks Amazon's Alexa does now for people, chores that we once had to do ourselves, manually navigating across systems without her help. That's an example of RPA now. And while you can use AI to help RPA, you really don't need to for most tasks, as actual RPA is rules-based task automation. For example, reconciling bank statements in a finance department is a perfect job for RPA, as it's a rules-based process that can be automated without human involvement. This is where RPA excels. On the other hand, IA takes different tools in the RPA toolbelt and creates an exoskeleton to help humans get things done faster. IA is necessary when there are lots of paths to go down, requiring some input from humans. For instance, at a call center, there are lots of triggers that could change how a customer service rep helps people. In this situation, a chatbot integration that can take a customer's phone number and look up information would help get the job done faster. The three guests went on to explain how they want to get people to stop using RPA as a catch-all term. After all, RPA is essentially a tool inside the toolbelt of intelligent automation. It's a tactical way to automate tasks, while IA is orchestration of work. And that's important, since it doesn't matter if a human or robot does the work, as long as it's orchestrated from end to end. During the interview, Francis, Lee, and Jon mentioned that some of the issues with RPA vendors is that they're saying their products are low code, but they're not actually replacing the underlying systems. So the best thing to come out of RPA is bringing to life the recognition of how poor some of these systems are, which means maybe we can finally upgrade them and get on the IA journey! After all, RPA can only get you so far, which many organizations are now realizing. They used it for simple tasks like resetting passwords. Now they want to do bigger things, like using it for a call center. They need orchestration, which should be a single digital experience to be true intelligent automation. So, what's next for IA? Well, according to Jon, getting customers into IA is going to be a big effort. It will take a while to have all processes automated, as a huge amount of business process reengineering needs to happen. So, we can't really claim that in 10 years we'll have automated 90% of processes. But in the next 20 to 25 years, a huge amount of front office jobs will have disappeared due to automation, leaving people to forget about the mundane tasks that can be automated and focus more on the tasks that require human involvement. If you want to learn more about what Jon, Francis, and Lee discussed with Dan concerning RPA and IA, be sure to listen to the podcast today!

This week's episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast, included analysts Daniel Newman, Fred McClimans and Sarah Wallace. We discussed the collaboration and e-learning opportunities that may arise from the coronavirus outbreak. We also covered financial cloud startup Thought Machine receiving next round of funding, Cisco Webex's global support of customers during this time, Elliott Management buying stake in Twitter, AT&T launching its AT&T TV service nationwide and Microsoft entering the RPA space. Let's dive in. The Main Dive: A discussion of what it means for collaboration and e-learning as a result of the coronavirus. THIS WEEK's FAST FIVE Cloud-based fintech startup Thought Machine receives $85 million in Series B funding Cisco offers free Webex around the globe The Elliott Management group, spear headed by Paul Singer has made an investment in Twitter AT&T launches its AT&T TV offering nationwide Microsoft announces its launch into the RPA space This Week's Tech Bites Winner: LinkedIn adds snapchat-style stories. LinkedIn will be adding a stories feature that will be much like Snapchat stories in that they will be brief videos that can be sent, then disappear. Our Crystal Ball: Fred asked Daniel and Sarah what lessons tech will learn from this experience with the coronavirus. As companies have had to cancel trade shows, limit company travel and adjust budgets, overall, what will be the lessons learned here? INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Fred McClimans (@fredmcclimans), Sarah Wallace (@sarah_wallace) and Daniel Newman (@danielnewmanUV) If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast.

On this episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast, host Olivier Blanchard was joined by colleague and fellow analyst, Ron Westfall. They discuss what organizations need to know about the EU's newly proposed guidelines for artificial intelligence and Apple's hit to the bottom line as a result of the coronavirus outbreak. They also cover the T-Mobile Sprint merger and what they think is ahead in the telecoms market and explored thoughts about the role automation will play in 5G operations. Lastly, they cover news that Google is cracking down on Google Play apps that track location in the background, along with the FTC's probe into high tech acquisitions over the course of the last decade. Let's dive in. THIS WEEK's FAST FIVE Apple warns revenue will be lower than expected because of coronavirus impact. The T-Mobile Sprint merger is a go — here's a look ahead at what's next. Google cracks down on Android apps tracking location in the background. Automation is the key to successful 5G operations. Big Tech braces for sprawling FTC acquisitions review. This Week's Tech Bites Winner: Facebook. Political Advertising. Continues to be best described as "nightmarish." Our Crystal Ball: We explore when and how the U.S. will develop or adopt guardrail guidelines for artificial intelligence. What do you think? Want to know what we think, well, you'll need to listen to the podcast. And if you've not yet taken a moment to subscribe, do it — you won't be sorry. INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Olivier Blanchard (@OABlanchard) and Ron Westfall (@SirRonSolicon). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast.

On this week's episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast, Shelly Kramer is joined by her colleague and fellow analyst, Olivier Blanchard. In our Main Dive, we tackled this week's news of the injunction issued by a judge in the case filed by Amazon protesting the award of the Pentagon's $10Bn 10-year Department of Defense contract (referred to as the JEDI contract) to Microsoft. THIS WEEK's FAST FIVE Update on the FTC vs. Qualcomm case that's going before the 9th Circuit Court FBI warns software providers about hacking Ohio man arrest for running Bitcoin mixing service that laundered $300 million Bugs in Bluetooth low energy chips might just be somewhere near you Big Tech braces for sprawling FTC acquisitions review This Week's Tech Bites Winner: Plastic surgery images and invoices leak from unsecured database. Our Crystal Ball: We circle back and talk about the situation between Amazon, the US Government and how it relates to the award of the DoD JEDI contract. What should we expect from it? INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Shelly Kramer (@ShellyKramer) and Olivier Blanchard (@OABlanchard). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast.

This episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast, The Interview Series, is sponsored by SAP and Vistex. Daniel Newman is joined by Richard Whittington, Senior Vice President of Media and Entertainment for SAP and Amos Biegun, Global Head of Rights and Royalties for Vistex. Today they are talking about media entertainment. For everybody out there that wants to think about this even at a simpler level, they're going to talk about what's going on with content and streaming and what you're listening to in those little earbuds every day. INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features host Daniel Newman (@danielnewmanUV). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast.

In the latest episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast, The Interview Series, Daniel Newman welcomes Chris James, CEO of Scaled Agile. Chris and his company focus on building frameworks to help organizations move digital transformation forward as seamlessly as possible. After all, digital transformation is no longer just about technology. It's the blending of technology and humans as the industry evolves, which means businesses of all kinds are affected and could use some guidance dealing with constant change. INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Daniel Newman (@danielnewmanUV) and Scaled Agile's Chris James (@ChrisJamesSAI). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast. ###

On this week's edition of the Futurum Tech Podcast, how the coronavirus may change tech trade shows in the future. Apple gets fined by the EU, Google earnings analysis, the space race heats up again and Britain points the way to Huawei 5G network compromise. THIS WEEK's FAST FIVE > Alphabet's 4th quarter 2019 results show promising growth > Nvidia's GE Force NOW eliminates wait lists and opens memberships to all > Apple is being fined by France's DGCCRF for slowing down old iPhones > NASA is now questioning Boeing about potential glitches with the CST-100 Starliner > Britain's plan to contain Huawei's involvement with 5G networks This week's Tech Bites Winner: The US government purchases location data for millions of cell phones, allegedly to track and locate undocumented immigrants. The ethical issue here is not the legitimacy of these agencies' mission - from immigration enforcement and border protection to fighting human trafficking - but rather the potential slippery slope of warrantless mass surveillance being enabled by the private sector, and remaining unchecked by a not-always-tech-savvy US courts system. Our Crystal Ball: How will new technologies help event organizers get around the threat of epidemics? You'll have to tune into the podcast to hear our predictions INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Olivier Blanchard (@OABlanchard), Sarah Wallace (@sarah_wallace) and James Kobielus (@jameskobielus). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast. ###

In this week's episode of Futurum Tech Podcast we cover news of IBM's CEO Rometty stepping down and the rise of the technologist in enterprise leadership roles. THIS WEEK's FAST FIVE > Cyberattacks and e-skimming on the rise > EU lawmakers snub Apple's pleas, voting to push for charging cable standard > Huawei surpasses Apple to become the second largest smartphone vendor globally > UPS investment in EVs and what's ahead > British telcos must rethink planned 5G investments This week's Tech Bites Winner: U.S. Colleges are quietly trying to install location tracking apps on students' phones. Privacy invasion or a great way to track attendance? Our Crystal Ball: What do you think we will be talking about when we mention IBM a year from now? What will be the main topic or what will be the biggest change between IBM in 2020 and IBM in 2021? INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Shelly Kramer (@ShellyKramer,) Fred McClimans (@fredmcclimans), and Olivier Blanchard (@OABlanchard). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast. ###

In this special episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast, The Interview Series, Daniel Newman welcomes Zendesk's Shawna Wolverton, SVP of Product, and Sarah Reed, CX Leader/Event Creator. Together, they discussed the latest trends in customer experience, what customer experience leaders should think about for years ahead, and more. INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Daniel Newman (@danielnewmanUV, Shawna Wolverton (@shawnawol)and Sarah Reed (@stealeyreed). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast. ###

This week we take a look at Atlassian and the collaboration space. Can this company upend the way we collaborate and the market? Plus, we take a look at how CIOs are aging up in the industry. We'll talk about cloud, we'll talk about Tencent, gaming, and 2020, is it the year of the chip? THIS WEEK's FAST FIVE > The Average Age of CIOs Nudges Higher > Cloud Native Computing Foundation Annual Report > YouTube Content Moderators Must Acknowledge that a Side of PTSD Might Well Come With the Job > China-based Tencent Offers $148M to Acquire Funcom Games > Intel's Q4 earnings This week's Tech Bites Winner: Tinder's new panic button is kind of a loser. Designed supposedly for safety, is only available if you download the Noonlite app, a free app that will enable those safety features in the Tinder app. Our Crystal Ball: What's next in the collaboration space? You'll have to tune into the podcast to hear our predictions. Oh, and if you've not yet hit the "subscribe" button, do that. We promise to only bring the good stuff. INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Fred McClimans (@fredmcclimans), Shelly Kramer (@ShellyKramer) andRon Westfall (@SirRonSilicon). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast. ###

Elon Musk, Space Travel, and its impact on the tech industry. In this episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast we explore the giant impact this will have across multiple industries and more. THIS WEEK's FAST FIVE > Microsoft and Samsung team up > Smaller rivals are now joining the growing chorus singing "Break up Big Tech's Monopoly" > Google launches online coding course in Python to train workers for tech jobs > Mojo Vision puts augmented reality screen on contact lens > Visa's acquisition of Plaid This week's Tech Bites Winner: Intrepid analyst Olivier Blanchard presented a story about activist group Avaaz, who discovered that some of the biggest companies in the world are unknowingly funding climate misinformation by advertising on YouTube. Our Crystal Ball: In the Crystal Ball segment of the show, we always circle back to discuss the main dive topic. In this case, we predict what's going to happen with space travel. When will we see the first people on Mars? Our answers might surprise you. INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Olivier Blanchard (@OABlanchard), Shelly Kramer (@ShellyKramer) and Sarah Wallace (@sarah_wallace). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast. ###

Is CES better called 'The Connected Ecosystem'? Our thoughts on that, the good and the bad about AI dominating this year's show, highlights from Intel, and Deeplite and more. THIS WEEK's FAST FIVE > CPU-based edge AI > State of the Fitness Tracker Market > What Deeplite's up to > Andes Technology > The exciting things to expect from Android in 2020 This week's Tech Bites Winner: For the Tech Bites portion of our show, we cover weirdness from Teen Vogue. Business insider reported that Teen Vogue posted a well-polished and positive piece on how Facebook is "securing" the 2020 elections. It looks like sponsored content. It smells like sponsored content. It is sponsored content. At least Teen Vogue says it was sponsored content by posting a note at the top of the article. Facebook then denies it, saying the article is not sponsored content. Then it changes course and says, oh wait, we guess it was sponsored content. And then, Teen Vogue deletes the entire story. Get it together, Teen Vogue. We expect more from you. Our Crystal Ball: We circle back to CES and our predictions on what the main technology or technology category will be for the 2021 show. Without hesitation, all three of us have an answer … you'll have to listen to the show to find out what it is! INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Olivier Blanchard (@OABlanchard), Shelly Kramer (@ShellyKramer) and James Kobielus (@jameskobielus). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast. ###

CES 2020, the Consumer Electronics Show happening this week in Las Vegas, will offer up some winners and some losers – we let you know what to expect. Plus the latest on deep fake technologies, Intel's quantum computing chips, VMware's shift to the cloud, and how Russia is edging closer to shutting off the global Internet – all this and more on this week's edition of the Futurum Tech Podcast. THIS WEEK's FAST FIVE > Deep Fakes go TikTok > Intel's new Cryogenic Horse Ridge Chip for Quantum Computing > Artificial Intelligence Boosts Cancer Detection > Apple Rethinks its Imagination Play > VMware Buys Back Pivotal Software, Sort Of This week's Tech Bites Winner: Russia's Success is the Internet's Failure Our Crystal Ball: Returning to our main dive topic, Olivier Blanchard tasked Dan and Fred to predict our Winner and Loser of this year's CES show. INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features , Daniel Newman (@danielnewmanUV), Fred McClimans (@fredmcclimans) and Olivier Blanchard (@OABlanchard). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast. ###

In this special episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast — The Interview Series, Daniel Newman welcomes Bill Lobig, Vice President of IBM's Content Services, to discuss how the way we manage content has evolved. After all, content is the cornerstone of the internet, and the way we treat it is changing—thanks to developing technology. More specifically, in this podcast, Bill noted that there are two types of content: structured data and unstructured data—and we treat them differently. The unstructured data in particular has been more difficult to deal with, as it's made up of documents, text, and videos. It takes a lot of time to read or view, so it's hard to get information out of it. But that's been slowly changing due to the digital transformation, which happens to be the backdrop for everything that's going on right now. INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Daniel Newman (@danielnewmanUV). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast. ###

In this episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast — Interview Series, Daniel Newman sat down with Des Cahill, Chief Marketing Officer of Oracle CX. Together, they went over what makes Oracle's customer data platform (CDP) stand out from the competition, as well as what's in store for the future of this type of platform. Thank you to Oracle for sponsoring this edition of Futurum Tech Podcast. INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Daniel Newman (@danielnewmanUV). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast. ###

Always on surveillance by way of that phone in your pocket (and some creepy data visualizations that'll give you pause), the bias that's inherent in facial recognition systems, and a discussion around the Apple, Amazon, Google partnership on smart-home protocols are just a few of the topics covered in this week's Futurum Tech Podcast. Check it out — it might be the most interesting thing you've listened to all week. THIS WEEK's FAST FIVE > Another Facebook data leak > Amazon, Google and Apple partner up > China's ongoing surveillance trends > Facial recognition algorithms > Apple's satellite technology project This week's Tech Bites Winner: How easy is it to fool facial recognition software? Easier than you might think. Our Crystal Ball: What's ahead for consumers as devices and location tracking technology becomes more sophisticated and more widely used? INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features , Shelly Kramer (@ShellyKramer), Fred McClimans (@fredmcclimans) and Olivier Blanchard (@OABlanchard). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast. ###

In this special episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast — Interview Series, Daniel Newman welcomes Automation Anywhere's Chief Strategy Officer, Stephen DeWitt, to discuss RPA and its emerging evolution to intelligence. Automation Anywhere develops robotic process automation (RPA) software, which uses bots to complete important processes. And as CSO, Stephen's role is to look further ahead than the here and now. This is especially important because the RPA space is going through a period of growth, as automation drastically changes how companies do things. Thank you to Automation Anywhere for sponsoring this edition of Futurum Tech Podcast. INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Daniel Newman (@danielnewmanUV). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast. ###

The era of simultaneous translation is upon us. In our podcast today, host Olivier Blanchard is joined by fellow analysts Shelly Kramer and Fred McClimans for a discussion about simultaneous translation, exciting new functionality that mobile devices are going to be affording, and what the future of conversations is going to look like — especially on Android devices. THIS WEEK's FAST FIVE > New Features Coming to Android Phones in 2020 are Pretty Cool > Pandora Launches Interactive Voice Ads > Amazon Kicked off Its Celebrity Voice Program for Alexa > Killer Robots Aren't Regulated, Yet > Huawei Sales Soar, Company Now Owns 42% of Chinese Smartphone Market This week's Tech Bites Winner: We explored the news that a thief stole payroll data from someone's car that contained personal information on thousands of Facebook employees. Our Crystal Ball: We circled back to simultaneous translation and talked about when we think we'll see this technology in action. Hint: Not long! INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Olivier Blanchard (@OABlanchard), Shelly Kramer (@ShellyKramer), and Fred McClimans (@fredmcclimans). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast. ###

We did a massive global research study in partnership with SAS, surveying over 4,000 consumers and brands to explore the state of Customer Experience: Where we are now, and where consumers and brands expect to be over the course of the next decade. Our research showed that there are five key things driving the evolution of customer experience and Fred and I discussed those key drivers and shared some data points from our study. THIS WEEK's FAST FOUR > Russian nationals in a massive hiking and bank fraud scheme > Employees just want to get away from Away > TikTok settle children's data lawsuit > China makes it a criminal offense to publish deepfakes This week's Tech Bites Winner: First new Toys 'R' Us store opens but it isn't exactly a 'store'. Our Crystal Ball: What's on tap for customer experience in the coming decade? We'll tell you what we think, based on what consumers and brands shared in our research report. INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Shelly Kramer (@ShellyKramer)and Fred McClimans (@fredmcclimans). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast. ###

In this special episode of the Futurum Tech Podcast Interview Series, Daniel Newman welcomes back Intel's Kristie Mann, Sr. Director of Product Management for Intel's Optane DC Persistent Memory products. In the first part of the interview, Daniel and Kristie explored the impact memory has had on businesses. In this episode, the two dig a bit deeper into Optane technology to understand how it works in the real world technological ecosystem. Thank you to Intel for sponsoring this edition of Futurum Tech Podcast. INFORMATION: This Futurum Podcast features Daniel Newman (@danielnewmanUV). If you haven't already, please subscribe to our show on iTunes or SoundCloud. For inquiries or more information on the show, email the team at [email protected] or follow @FuturumPodcast on Twitter. To learn more about Futurum Research please visit www.futurumresearch.com. DISCLOSURE: Futurum Research is a research and analysis provider, not an investment advisor. The Futurum Tech Podcast (and all related written notes and materials) is a newsletter/podcast intended for entertainment and informational purposes only. Futurum Research does not provide personalized investment advice and no investment advice is offered or implied by this podcast. ###