SIBOS: IBM today announced a new blockchain banking solution that will help financial institutions address the processes of universal cross-border payments, reducing the settlement time and lowering the cost of completing global payments for businesses and consumers. Using IBM Blockchain, and in collaboration with technology partners Stellar.org and KlickEx Group, the solution is intended to improve the speed in which banks both clear and settle payment transactions on a single network in near real time.

IBM today announced it is teaming up with Toronto-based FinTech company Dream Payments to bring new revenue generating mobile payment offerings to financial institutions and merchants in the United States via the IBM Cloud.

[Image: Der Wanderer über dem Nebelmeer by Caspar David Friedrich (c. 1818).] It would be interesting to look at locations of the American popular imagination, as seen in movies and TV, mapped against regional tax breaks for the film industry. There was a brief span of time, for example, when rural Pennsylvania stood in for … Continue reading "Tax Incentives and the Human Imagination"

[Image: An example of gravitational lens effects, via Wikipedia.] Over at WIRED, Daniel Oberhaus, author of the recent book Extraterrestrial Languages, takes a look at some proposals from NASA’s Innovative Advanced Concept (NIAC) program. “Among this year’s NIAC grants,” Oberhaus writes, “are proposals to turn a lunar crater into a giant radio dish, to develop … Continue reading "Gravitational Lensing, Interstellar Cinematography, and the Future of Magical Warfare in Space"

[Image: An otherwise unrelated photo of fire-fighting foam, via Wikipedia.] There are at least two classes of materials that have always interested me: synthetic materials designed to be so resistant and indestructible that they verge on a kind of supernatural longevity, and engineered biomaterials, such as enzymes or microbes, designed to consume exactly these sorts … Continue reading "Fables of the Permanent and Insatiable"

[Image: From a project called “Slice” by HANNAH, as featured in FABRICATE 2020.] The Bartlett School of Architecture recently put out two new books, freely available for download, FABRICATE 2020 and Design Transactions. Check them both out, as each is filled with incredibly interesting and innovative work. Purely in the interests of time—by all means, … Continue reading "Building Digital with Timber, Mud, and Ice"

IBM today announced that M-Industry, one of the world’s largest private label consumer goods company and subsidiary of Switzerland’s largest retailer and supermarket chain, Migros Group, has launched a new IBM designed mobile offering to transform how product promoters work.

Digital video consumption is viral and, according to a new study released today by IBM and International Broadcasting Convention (IBC), more than half of the 21,000 consumers surveyed are using mobiles every day to watch streaming videos, and that number is expected to grow 45 percent in the next three years.

IBM is bringing its expertise in sports venue infrastructure design and implementation to the practice field for newly formed Major League Soccer Club, Atlanta United, providing a year-round, state-of-the art technological experience for the players and staff.

IBM today announced a new agreement with Walgreens, one of the country’s largest drugstore chains, to deploy IBM retail analytics at more than 8,100 locations nationwide to help improve the efficiency of field service support for these locations.

IBM today announced its intention to acquire Vivant Digital business (Vivant), a boutique digital and innovation agency based here. This acquisition extends the strategy and design expertise of IBM iX, one of the world’s largest digital agencies and global business design partners, with Vivant talent and expertise to accelerate clients’ digital transformations.

As businesses increasingly recognize the opportunity to increase productivity, improve customer experiences and deliver new products and services through intelligent automation, Blue Prism and IBM have joined forces to deliver a secure, scalable and easy-to-use Digital Workforce for enterprises worldwide, such as Walgreens.

A.P. Moller –Maersk and IBM today announced their intent to establish a joint venture to provide more efficient and secure methods for conducting global trade using blockchain technology.

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IBM Security today released a global study examining consumer perspectives around digital identity and authentication, which found that people now prioritize security over convenience when logging into applications and devices. Generational differences also emerged showing that younger adults are putting less care into traditional password hygiene, yet are more likely to use biometrics, multifactor authentication and password managers to improve their personal security.

China Construction Bank (Asia) Corporation Limited (“CCB (Asia)”) and IBM today announced the development of the first blockchain-enabled bancassurance project in Hong Kong. Built on the IBM Blockchain Platform, the solution is designed to streamline CCB (Asia)’s bancassurance process and greatly enhance customer experience and the quality of services delivered through faster transaction processing time and increased transparency.

NASCAR and The Weather Company, an IBM Busines, announced today a multi-year agreement that will optimize the weather-related decision process for NASCAR as it incorporates hyper-local weather data and forecasts into their races to improve race-day operations and fan engagement. As part of the agreement, The Weather Company, via The Weather Channel brand, becomes the Official Weather Partner of NASCAR.

IBM announced today two significant quantum processor upgrades for its IBM Q early-access commercial systems. These upgrades represent rapid advances in quantum hardware as IBM continues to drive progress across the entire quantum computing technology stack, with focus on systems, software, applications and enablement.

IBM Watson Health™ today published its 100 Top Hospitals® annual study identifying top–performing hospitals in the U.S. based on overall organizational performance. Formerly known as the Truven Health Analytics® 100 Top Hospitals, this study spotlights the best–performing hospitals in the U.S. based on a balanced scorecard of publicly available clinical, operational, and patient satisfaction metrics and data. It has been conducted annually since 1993.

Mayo Clinic and IBM Watson Health today unveiled results from early use of the Watson for Clinical Trial Matching, an IBM cognitive computing system. Use of this system in the Mayo Clinic oncology practice has been associated with more patients enrolled in Mayo’s breast cancer clinical trials.

IBM today announced a new all-flash, high-performance data and file management solution for enterprise clients running exabyte-scale big data analytics, cognitive and AI applications. The combined flash and storage software solution has been certified with the Hortonworks Data Platform (HDP) to provide clients with more choice in selecting the right platform for their big data analytics on data processing engines like Hadoop and Spark.

While marketing and sales professionals increasingly find themselves drowning in data, a new IBM study finds that nearly two thirds—64 percent--of surveyed CMOs and sales leaders believe their industries will be ready to adopt cognitive technologies in the next three years. However despite this stated readiness, the study finds that only 24 percent of those surveyed believe they have strategy in place to implement these technologies today.

IBM Japan today announced that Sony Corporation and Sony Global Education, a subsidiary of Sony that works to provide global educational services, have developed a new blockchain-based student education records platform. With the solution, school administrators can consolidate and manage students' educational data from several schools, as well as record and refer their learning history and digital academic transcripts with more certainty. The new platform, developed using IBM Blockchain, uses blockchain technology running on the IBM Cloud to track students’ learning progress, as well as establish transparency and accountability of scholastic achievements between students and schools.

IBM today announced the Integrated Analytics System, a new unified data system designed to give users fast, easy access to advanced data science capabilities and the ability to work with their data across private, public or hybrid cloud environments.

IBM today announced sweeping advances in its all-flash storage solutions and software to significantly drive down the costs of data and extend its solutions for hybrid and private cloud environments.

IBM today unveiled its next-generation Power Systems Servers incorporating its newly designed POWER9 processor. Built specifically for compute-intensive AI workloads, the new POWER9 systems are capable of improving the training times of deep learning frameworks by nearly 4x allowing enterprises to build more accurate AI applications, faster.

IBM today announced it has completed the acquisition of Vivant Digital business (Vivant), a boutique digital and innovation agency based in Australia, to join IBM iX. Financial details were not disclosed.

IBM today announced it has reached agreement to resolve the patent lawsuit between IBM and The Priceline Group pending in the United States District Court for Delaware. As part of the confidential settlement, the parties will obtain patent cross-licenses to each company’s worldwide patent portfolio.

IBM today announced fourth-quarter and full-year 2017 earnings results.

IBM today announced a research collaboratory in Singapore, where researchers from IBM intend to collaborate with scientists and engineers from public agencies in Singapore to improve the quality of its urban services. The focus of this research effort will be to use sensor networks to more effectively model, predict and manage the use of natural and physical infrastructure resources – water, transport and energy.  

Twitter and IBM today announced a landmark partnership that will help transform how businesses and institutions understand their customers, markets and trends – and inform every business decision. The alliance brings together Twitter data that distinctively represents the public pulse of the planet with IBM’s industry-leading cloud-based analytics, customer engagement platforms, and consulting services.

• Con vigencia de 10 años, Banorte e IBM firman alianza estratégica que permitirá establecer las bases de un nuevo modelo de banca enfocado al cliente, y mejorar sustancialmente sus índices de eficiencia para alcanzar niveles cercanos al 40%, así como retornos sobre capital superiores al 20%. El acuerdo incluye servicios de consultoría y de tecnología, investigación y desarrollo. • “Estamos plenamente satisfechos con el acuerdo logrado, pues este suma el mejor talento humano, tanto de IBM, como de Banorte Ixe, y está en línea con nuestra búsqueda de herramientas tecnológicas para servir a nuestros clientes de manera individualizada”: Alejandro Valenzuela.

IBM anunció hoy que un 40% de los principales bancos e instituciones financieras en el país cuentan con protección de fraudes en línea que se sustentan en la solución Trusteer de IBM, con la cual la seguridad de los clientes está respaldada al realizar transacciones electrónicas.

IBM (NYSE: IBM) announced today that Workshop FX, a Wellington 3D Computer Animation and Visual FX company, is the first New Zealand customer to implement IBM SONAS, its scalable enterprise-class network attached storage array. SONAS (Scale Out Network Attached Storage) has enabled Workshop FX to significantly increase rendering productivity while preparing the studio for future business growth and emerging industry standards including 3D film production.

El actual entorno tecnológico impulsa a las empresas a transformar sus modelos de negocio en un escenario en donde, según la Organización para la Cooperación y el Desarrollo Económicos (OCDE), el 25% de la economía mundial será digital en los próximos cinco años. De esta forma, el uso de nuevas tecnologías se vuelve la pieza clave para asegurar tanto competitividad, como su alto desempeño.

IBM anunció hoy la primera plataforma de servicios basada en IBM Watson y construida en IBM Cloud para aumentar la inteligencia humana y ayudar a mejorar las operaciones de los proveedores de servicios a través de tecnologías cognitivas.

El Grupo BBVA acaba de formalizar un acuerdo con IBM para que esta firma asuma la operación y transformación de la infraestructura tecnológica actual de BBVA y el procesamiento de datos en América Latina y EE.UU., actualmente gestionada por su filial ATA en México.

IBM anunció dos nuevas soluciones de almacenamiento empresarial completamente basadas en tecnología flash, las cuales ofrecen avanzada eficiencia e incremento en desempeño, así como una sobresaliente confiabilidad para ayudar a reducir costos, y acelerar infraestructuras y aplicaciones con manejo intensivo de datos.

IBM fue reconocido como líder de software de almacenamiento en el Cuadrante Mágico de Gartner para Software de Recuperación y Respaldo en Centro de Datos1. En sus “cuadrantes mágicos”, los analistas de Gartner evalúan tecnología y soluciones con la “capacidad de ejecución” y una “visión completa”.

Como parte de su compromiso por contribuir con la tecnología más innovadora a la resolución de los desafíos y retos que enfrenta el mundo, IBM dio a conocer que seleccionó a CUCEA (Centro Universitario de Ciencias Económico y Administrativas) de la Universidad de Guadalajara (UdeG); a fin de poner en marcha en México la implementación del Programa IBM Skills Academy, con foco en competencias de tecnología de Nube.

IBM es y ha sido un jugador clave en el progreso de México, liderando en el transcurso de 90 años a diferentes generaciones a través de la transformación de industrias y profesiones, e impactando el panorama económico, académico y social del país gracias a la estrecha colaboración con todos los actores de la sociedad.

Como parte de las celebraciones del 90 aniversario de IBM en México, la empresa realizó por primera vez en el país, los días 7 y 8 de octubre en el Campus Tecnológico de IBM en Guadalajara, el festival de hackeo para desarrolladores cognitivos: HackaPalooza.

IBM anuncia el lanzamiento de IBM Cloud Private, una plataforma de software creada para los clientes que requieren la flexibilidad y capacidad de una nube pública en un ambiente privado. IBM Cloud Private transforma los sistemas de TI (Tecnologías de la Información) en un ambiente de nube flexible para crear un puente hasta las nubes públicas y acelerar el desarrollo de aplicativos.

IBM y PAPALOTE MUSEO DEL NIÑO, anunciaron hoy su alianza para desarrollar y ofrecer dos cursos de formación para profesores de la Ciudad de México. El taller estará basado en el portal web teacherstryscience.org de IBM y representa el compromiso de ambas instituciones por contribuir a la enseñanza de la ciencia y en particular de la astronomía, a través de dispositivos en línea.

IBM (NYSE: IBM) reinventa hoy el correo electrónico empresarial con una nueva oferta de colaboración social freemium que utiliza la tecnología de analítica integrada para dar a los empleados una nueva forma de conversar, encontrar a las personas y la información correcta rápidamente, y hacer su trabajo de manera eficiente. IBM Verse es el resultado de una inversión de US$100 millones en diseño e innovación, y reúne las plataformas líderes cloud, analytics, social y de seguridad de la compañía para transformar el futuro del trabajo.

Seguridad, aplicaciones estratégicas y analítica móvil son clave para que las organizaciones inteligentes mejoren sus resultados

Apple e IBM lanzaron hoy la primera ola de soluciones IBM MobileFirst para iOS, una nueva clase de apps creadas para los negocios y con soporte para servicios de Cloud, que llevan las capacidades Big Data y Analítica de IBM a los usuarios de iPhone e iPad en las empresas.

Hace posible el cifrado en tiempo real sobre todas las transacciones móviles a escala. Primer sistema mainframe con análisis integrado que proporciona conocimientos de transacciones en tiempo real, 17 veces más rápido en comparación a sistemas competidores en una fracción del costo.

Empresas y organizaciones como bancos, agencias de viajes, restaurantes, proveedores de salud y gobiernos municipales en toda América Latina están adoptando nuevas tecnologías de nube, movilidad y analítica que llevan a una mayor eficiencia, menores costos y un mejor servicio a sus clientes y ciudadanos.

IBM today announced that Westpac New Zealand, part of one of the world’s largest financial services institutions, has selected IBM’s private cloud technology to support its goal to be New Zealand’s leading digital bank. The new five year agreement is part of an extensive services and technology contract which includes Westpac migrating some of its business critical IT systems into IBM’s state-of-the-art Auckland data centre, enabling enhanced customer service.