Menu

Blog

Archive for the ‘internet’ category: Page 194

Jun 25, 2019

Opportunity at the Edge: Change, Challenge, and Transformation on the Path to 2025

Posted by in categories: computing, internet

The next five years will mark a dramatic enterprise shift toward the edge of networks, where emerging technologies can be harnessed to radically improve user experiences, transform business models, and generate vast revenue opportunities, according to a new book by Fast Future in collaboration with Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company.

Opportunity at the Edge: Change, Challenge, and Transformation on the Path to 2025, developed by Fast Future in collaboration with Aruba, reports that edge technologies – those which process and analyze user data where people connect to a network – will revolutionize corporate strategies, create more dynamic, responsive, and personalized customer and employee experiences, enable powerful business and revenue models, and even catalyze the growth of entirely new industries. To unlock these opportunities, the book argues that enterprises must embrace fundamental change, engaging in widespread strategic, structural, and leadership transformation.

Morten Illum, VP EMEA at Aruba, comments: “The findings in this book highlight the vast commercial potential for enterprises utilizing edge technologies, if companies are willing and able to enact the considerable organizational changes needed. The edge represents a dramatic overhaul in how companies understand, service, and meet the needs of their customers and employees. It will be a world defined by dynamic, immediate, and personalized services.”

Key Themes and Findings

Commissioned to explore the scale of possibilities presented by edge technologies in the next 3–5 years, the book features insights from 19 leading global CIOs, technology leaders, industry experts and futurists, and a perspectives survey of 200 future thinkers from across the globe. It explores the edge technologies that are driving change, the use cases and businesses opportunities these are creating, and the ways in which organizations can adapt to take advantage. Key trends that emerged include:

  • The edge of the network holds the key to industry transformation: The edge is designed to enable and capitalize on modern digital experiences at the convergence of people, apps, and things – allowing customer and ecosystem partners to take these actionable insights to then create “experiences” for employees and customers. This is making it possible for businesses and organizations in various industries to leverage data and insights from the edge to deliver new and immersive experiences to consumers and end customers. It is driving sectors from education and retail to healthcare and hospitality to rethink how they act today. New types of experiences such as location-aware mobile engagement, digitally assisted patient care, and user-aware meeting rooms can give organizations a competitive advantage.
  • At least one-third of businesses will create edge-enabled mainstream personalization by 2025: The study shows that a clear majority (67%) of respondents believe at least 30% of businesses will be using the edge to create “mainstream personalization” in the next five years. From the classroom to the office, retail stores, and major event venues, edge technologies will enable personalized service delivery that meets growing user expectations of an immediate, customized experience.
  • New benefits from the edge will be realized: Other benefits arising include localized products, services, and pricing (52% of respondents), enhanced real-time market insight (50%), improved customer and user satisfaction (48%), and faster product and service innovation (47%).

Opportunities at the Edge

The edge will create transformative business opportunities for industries across the economy, using data to understand customers and tailor services to their needs, such as:

  • A retailer that can provide custom-made clothing, fitted to your 3D hologram, as the industry evolves to provide an anywhere and everywhere experience;
  • A classroom environment that automatically adapts to each student’s comprehension and comfort level, as schools and colleges harness edge technologies to enhance student performance, confidence, and mental wellbeing;
  • A hospital that uses IoT monitoring sensors to provide continuous patient reporting at the point of care and real-time diagnosis, enhancing the ability of healthcare professionals to deliver efficient and effective care;
  • A workplace with always-on tools, enabling collaboration from any device around the world, as offices evolve to facilitate the same level of access and functionality for employees anywhere in the world.

These shifts will be underpinned by emerging business and revenue models, such as payment by facial recognition or biometrics (highlighted by 70% of survey respondents), commercial application of customer data accumulated via the IoT (67%), hyper-personalized instant offers (63%), demand-driven and location-specific pricing (55%), and subscription models for everyday purchases such as food and clothing (52%).

How Enterprises Must Adapt to Take Advantage

While the opportunities of the edge are considerable, relatively few companies have moved quickly to embrace them. Simply implementing the technologies will not be enough; companies must rethink their entire business strategy to take advantage of edge opportunities. The book outlines several key changes for enterprises to consider, including:

  • Embrace a more progressive, experimental approach: A majority of survey respondents said that a change in business mindset was needed to embrace the concept of edge strategies (64%). This could include accepting autonomous decision-making by edge devices (60%), greater top-level support and leadership for the pursuit of driving smarter experiences (53%), and a willingness to experiment with solution design and business models for edge applications (53%).
  • Focus on investment, training, and customer need: There were also calls to more clearly define the customer benefits of edge applications (50%), allocate appropriate investment funds (42%), and provide training in how to spot and specify potential edge applications (45%).
  • Address emerging security concerns: Enterprises must address the security challenges of a network hosting many more connected devices. These include the creation of potentially thousands of points of risk exposure across the network (82%), uncertainty over whether a device has been compromised (67%), hacking of voice or biometric security (62%), and concerns that IoT devices and sensors are not being built with security in mind (62%).

Rohit Talwar, CEO at Fast Future, comments: “To access the opportunities of the edge, companies need a mindset shift to drive both structural and strategic change. Leaders must take responsibility for navigating the journey to the edge, working hand in hand with IT to pursue open technology options, and maintaining a consistent dialogue with employees, customers, and other key stakeholders. Focused experiments, with clearly defined goals, proactive project owners, and dedicated resources, are likely to be the best way forward.”

Morten Illum, VP EMEA at Aruba, concludes: “Enterprises should be excited about the edge opportunity, but they should not underestimate the degree of change needed to unlock it – including the implementation of a network infrastructure that is strong and flexible enough to withstand the greater demands edge technologies impose, and the security threats they create. Given the pace and uncertainty of the change ahead, it is also essential to base any edge strategy on an open technology ecosystem that leaves flexibility to adapt and evolve over time.”

To read the full book, visit www.arubanetworks.com/ebook/opportunity-at-the-edge/


Research methodology
The research was commissioned by Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company, and conducted in 2019 by Fast Future. The study used a blended approach drawing on Fast Future’s foresight expertise, targeted secondary research, and in-depth qualitative interviews with 19 global CIOs, technology leaders, industry experts, and futurist thought leaders. The project also undertook a broad survey to test emerging ideas and incorporate additional perspectives from 200 business and technology future thinkers across Fast Future’s global networks.

About Fast Future
Fast Future is a professional foresight and publishing firm, specializing in delivering research, keynote speeches, executive education, and consulting on the emerging future and the impacts of technology-driven change for global clients. Fast Future publishes books from leading future thinkers around the world, exploring how developments such as the Internet of Things, edge technologies, AI, robotics, and other exponential technologies and disruptive thinking could impact individuals, societies, businesses, and governments and create the trillion-dollar sectors of the future. Fast Future has a particular focus on ensuring these advances are harnessed to unleash individual potential and enable a very human future.
To learn more, visit Fast Future at www.fastfuture.com, or follow on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.

Jun 25, 2019

SpaceX Will Put Internet Connection On Mars, Elon Musk Confirms

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, internet, space travel

Mars has to have its own internet because no one’s going to wait 20 minutes for a download.

Jun 23, 2019

SpaceX Is on a Hiring Spree for Its Starlink Global Internet Project

Posted by in categories: internet, satellites

After a string of delays, SpaceX’s Starlink project was finally launched last month. The ambitious aim of the project is to create a “global broadband” system by launching a network of satellites which will eventually be able to give fast internet access from anywhere, even remote locations which currently can’t get broadband internet access.

The project is moving ahead at a considerable pace, with aims to have the first internet access provided by 2021. It may take until November 2027 to get all of the satellites required for the global network launched and into place, but a basic version of the service may be possible with around 1,000 satellites. Within the U.S., some version of the service could be available with just 400 satellites in place.

Naturally, a project of this magnitude requires a huge logistical undertaking and a lot of knowledge from a lot of different sectors. And you can see the takeoff of interest in the Starlink project within SpaceX by analyzing the company’s hiring practices.

Jun 23, 2019

How smart technology is transforming the industrial world

Posted by in category: internet

Whether you call it Industry 4.0, the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), or Smart Manufacturing, the power of technology is being felt throughout the industrial world and fundamentally changing value chains and production methods. Indeed, so great is the change that Capgemini’s Digital Transformation Institute predicts that smart factories could add as much as $1.5 trillion to the overall output of the industrial sector in the next five years. This is because of the turbo-charge effect of smart technology, which is enabling factories to produce more while lowering costs. According to Capgemini, some industries may almost double their operating profit and margin.

Jun 22, 2019

Conscious Brain-to-Brain Communication in Humans Using Non-Invasive Technologies

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, computing, internet, neuroscience

Human sensory and motor systems provide the natural means for the exchange of information between individuals, and, hence, the basis for human civilization. The recent development of brain-computer interfaces (BCI) has provided an important element for the creation of brain-to-brain communication systems, and precise brain stimulation techniques are now available for the realization of non-invasive computer-brain interfaces (CBI). These technologies, BCI and CBI, can be combined to realize the vision of non-invasive, computer-mediated brain-to-brain (B2B) communication between subjects (hyperinteraction). Here we demonstrate the conscious transmission of information between human brains through the intact scalp and without intervention of motor or peripheral sensory systems. Pseudo-random binary streams encoding words were transmitted between the minds of emitter and receiver subjects separated by great distances, representing the realization of the first human brain-to-brain interface. In a series of experiments, we established internet-mediated B2B communication by combining a BCI based on voluntary motor imagery-controlled electroencephalographic (EEG) changes with a CBI inducing the conscious perception of phosphenes (light flashes) through neuronavigated, robotized transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), with special care taken to block sensory (tactile, visual or auditory) cues. Our results provide a critical proof-of-principle demonstration for the development of conscious B2B communication technologies. More fully developed, related implementations will open new research venues in cognitive, social and clinical neuroscience and the scientific study of consciousness. We envision that hyperinteraction technologies will eventually have a profound impact on the social structure of our civilization and raise important ethical issues.

Citation: Grau C, Ginhoux R, Riera A, Nguyen TL, Chauvat H, Berg M, et al. (2014) Conscious Brain-to-Brain Communication in Humans Using Non-Invasive Technologies. PLoS ONE 9: e105225. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.

Editor: Mikhail A. Lebedev, Duke University, United States of America.

Jun 19, 2019

The Quantum Internet Is Emerging, One Experiment at a Time

Posted by in categories: drones, internet, quantum physics

Breakthrough demonstrations using defective diamonds, high-flying drones, laser-bathed crystals and other exotica suggest practical, unhackable quantum networks are within reach.

  • By Anil Ananthaswamy on June 19, 2019

Jun 19, 2019

The fourth Industrial revolution emerges from AI and the Internet of Things

Posted by in categories: internet, robotics/AI

IoT has arrived on the factory floor with the force of Kool-Aid Man exploding through walls.

Jun 15, 2019

Biometric Identifiers

Posted by in categories: internet, privacy

Spotlight: FBI Pushes Forward with Massive Biometric Database Despite Privacy Risks.


The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) focuses public attention on emerging civil liberties, privacy, First Amendment issues and works to promote the Public Voice in decisions concerning the future of the Internet.

Jun 12, 2019

Wireless devices go battery-free with new communication technique

Posted by in categories: energy, internet, surveillance

This technology is also used for surveillance.


We might be one step closer to an Internet-of-things reality.

Continue reading “Wireless devices go battery-free with new communication technique” »

Jun 9, 2019

Catalyst: A review of 7 predictions from 2013

Posted by in categories: economics, futurism, governance, government, human trajectories, internet, journalism, transparency

My own 2013 book Catalyst: A Techno-Liberation Thesis offered a prediction of the political future, viewing the near-term future as a time of crisis shaped by the nature of technology and the slowness of states to adjust to it. As this struggle becomes more acute, guarded new technologies will also get stolen and overflow across borders, going global and penetrating every country before they were intended to. States and large companies will react with bans and lies as they try to save their monopolies. Ultimately, over a longer time-frame, the nation-state system will collapse because of this pressure and an uncertain successor system of governance will emerge. It will look like “hell on earth” for a time, but it will stabilize in the end. We will become new political animals with new allegiances, shaped by the crisis, much as the Thirty Years’ War brought about our Westphalian nation-state model. Six years on from my book, are we any closer to what I predicted?

  1. The internet is “liberating” and “empowering” in a political sense (pp. 2, 3)
    • Uncertain outcome. Will current habits of censorship, de-platforming and other techno-enslavement as a result of controversies like “Russiagate” persist or are they temporary? If the economically or commercially favorable course is one of freedom and the removal of all filters and bans, will we see a reversal in the next few years? As younger politicians replace the old, will the internet become a sacred anarchy again?
  2. “Duplicitous policies” preserve the status of rich countries as exploiters and bullies (p. 11)
    • Yes, and it is increasingly obvious. Such policies became exposed and visible under the Trump administration, which openly declares its national interest to lie in the economic deprivation of others and sabotage of their tech. This has been criticized as harmful to free trade, and has been described as “de-globalization”. Even
      ">Russian President Vladimir Putin remarked that the tech war complicates the issue of global inequality
      (a rare observation seemingly asserted only in the Catalyst Thesis before recently).
  3. “Nano” and “bio” appliances will be in the household and will “shrink” production processes, abridging these processes so they are not corporate or state controlled and are in the “hands of the people” (p. 15)
    • This is uncertain. If there has been progress towards this outcome, it is not visible and has not had a major impact on world events. The possibility of it has started to cause concern for states and monopolistic schemes, but this is more in the ‘alarm’ stage rather than the ‘ban’ stage. More time may be needed, before this trend has a deeper impact on society.
  4. The nation-state system is being weakened by technology, media and globalization (p. 16), anti-state forces are “winning”
    • Well, not really. As of 2019, unless everything we just saw was a hiccup in the grand plan of history, the “ideological mask” of exploitation and division — the nation-state system — has reasserted itself. In almost every policy area in every country, the clock is running backward towards nationalism, censorship, borders, walls, and deep paranoia. Almost everyone on the political left and right is part of the problem, wittingly or unwittingly. Whether you support Trump or think he’s a Russian asset, or even care, your views and values are right out of the Nineteenth Century. We have seen the defeat of net neutrality, along with the passive acceptance of censorship on social media in the foolish assumption it will only be used on targets we dislike or who went too far. There seems to have been a lack of any major follow-up disclosures of government abuses on the scale of Edward Snowden’s, and whether it will ever happen again is questionable. With all these things considered, “losing” might be a better description of the situation for anti-government techno-politics as of 2019. If what is happening is not a minor disruption in the flow of history, it is consequential for the Catalyst Thesis and severely undermines its value. If the “soft” battle is lost as described above, and we revert to a society dominated entirely by strong states and corporations, the “hard” battle of techno-liberation may never start in our lifetimes.
  5. Historical transitions are “dark and filled with reaction” (p.23)
    • Yes. This appears to still be the case. The reaction may be what we are already facing, as all elites invested in the old system desperately try to suppress the global political will, motivated by fear of a new world order in which they are demoted.
  6. “Open-borders global political will” will form as a result of the internet, translation software, and the difficulty of statists in managing the overflow of popular technologies and their users (pp. 24, 25)
    • Yes. Almost every attempt by the media conglomerates and/or state to create a uniform public opinion about an election, a global issue, a scandal, etc. is failing because of alleged foreign “trolls”. They cannot be stopped because the internet’s circulatory system is not for one nation, but completely open to the world. That is the whole point of it, the reason it is the internet. The US 2016 election was the most visible example of the loss of control. Repressive and paranoid statements ensued. But, as of 2019, governments and media still gasp at the results they are getting.
  7. We will see new or experimental technologies shared illegally, the way information is leaked (p. 37)
    • Uncertain. Edward Snowden and Wikileaks do not seem to have captured as many imaginations as they should have, given how central they have been in the story of the internet. It is difficult to argue that the next generation will be even more rebellious, if they are to grow up in a much more monitored and conformist society. If the anarchy of the internet is going to be stopped and the smallest infractions punished as treason, this will damage the thinking of younger people who should have grown up noticing the contradictions in society. If, on the other hand, younger people are increasingly trained to be highly capable in the cyber-world (e.g. coding classes), we may see an even bigger generation of cypherpunk rebels accidentally raised by the state.

Catalyst is read in less than a day, and can be found on Kindle as well as in print. It was written to bring together a number of ideas and predictions I presented in https://twitter.com/i/moments/879083385590870018″>articles at the IEET website, h+ Magazine, and other websites and includes full lists of sources. If you prefer to see more first, follow @CatalystThesis on Twitter or sign up to the email newsletter.