Lots happened the past week in the social media, social business, big data and business intelligence world. Read below a review of the most interesting happenings and developments that caught my particular attention. What news did you find the most interesting?
Social media and social business
IBM opens social business data center in Germany
IBM announced that its newest SmartCloud data center in Europe will be located in Ehningen, Germany. A major push with this project is social networking for business.
Alistair Rennie, general manager of social business at IBM, said adoption of cloud-based “social business” was soaring. “With the new European data center we expand our industry-leading social business footprint, strengthening our ability to meet the needs for businesses seeking security-rich, flexible cloud environments that let them unleash innovation and drive a smarter enterprise,” he said.
The company’s other data centers supporting its cloud-basd social-business services are located in North America and Asia Pacific.
Top 20 female social media influencers
Great list by Haydn Shaughnessy on Forbes. How did Shaughnessy researched it?
He took nominations from ReThinking Innovation and did their own research to be sure they did their best to identify potential candidates. In total over 850 social media influencers were assessed.
Without further ado, the list:
#1. Ann Tran. Twitter: @AnnTran_
#2. Jessica Northey. Twitter: @jessicanorthey.
#3. Mari Smith. Twitter: @marismith.
#4. Liz Strauss. Twitter: @lizstrauss.
#5. Pam Moore. Twitter: @pammktgnut
#6. Renee Blodgett. Twitter: @magicsaucemedia
#7. Eve Mayer. Twitter: @linkedinqueen.
#8. Kim Garst. Twitter: @kimgarst
#9. Lori Ruff. Twitter: @loriruff
#10. Ann Handley. Twitter: @marketingprofs
#11. Pam Dyer. Twitter: @pamdyer
# 12. Laura Fitton. Twitter: @pistachio
#13. Bonnie Sainsbury Twitter: @bsainsbury
#14. Lilach Bullock, Twitter: @Lilachbullock
#15. Deborah Lee. Twitter: @debsylee
#16. Marsha Collier. Twitter: @Marshcollier
#17. Lori Taylor. Twitter: @lorirtaylor
#18. Viveka vonRosen. Twitter: @LinkedInExpert
#19. Sandi Krakowski. Twitter: @sandikrakowski
#20. Susan Cooper. Twitter: @buzzedition
Big data
Big data critical to customer-centric cultures
Both marketing and IT executives believe that big data is a key competitive differentiator and will be core to implementing a more customer-centric business culture, according to a new study conducted by the CMO Council in partnership with SAS.
The study found that 61% of marketing executives and 60% of IT executives believe that big data presents both an opportunity and an obstacle, since many companies are struggling to manage the complexity, flow, aggregation and analysis of massive amounts of structured and unstructured data flowing in to their organizations.
In addition, 46% of marketing executives and 50% of IT executives agree that big data has added complexity to developing actionable customer profiles.
Marketing and IT executives, however, disagreed about the focus of big data. While 39% of IT executives believe that big data has primarily focused importance on IT systems and data availability, 52% of marketers believe that big data has identified business opportunities. This disagreement shows where both marketing and IT professionals believe their departments fit on the continuum of customer data and big data for the organization.
The study concludes that regardless of their differences, both marketing and IT leaders agree that big data is a huge opportunity and a component to creating a customer-centric business culture.
GigaOM’s Structure Data event reveals 10 big data trends
Eric Lundquist attented the GigaOM Structure Data conference for eWeek and reports back 10 big data trends:
- Start with the applications
- Think physical
- Go simple, but big
- The Internet of Lots of Things
- The emerging platform
- Making the Big Shift
- Discerning the signal versus noise
- Dealing with a new model of application development
- Applying new rules
- What’s on the Fringe?
There are very interesting ones amongst them, read the full elaborations on the 10 big data trends here.
Business intelligence
MICROS launches next-gen mobile business intelligence solution
MICROS Systems, Inc., a provider of information technology solutions for the hospitality and retail industries, has redefined how restaurant operations data is delivered to mobile devices with its release of MICROS inMotion, MICROS’ next generation mobile business intelligence tool for restaurants of every size.
Designed specifically for restaurant management, MICROS inMotion allows restaurant operators and management to understand both high-level trends and front-line operations using their smartphone.
Don Schaefer, Director of Operations for sweetgreen, inc. stated:
“We have been very impressed with the intuitive nature of MICROS inMotion. It provides us real-time information in the palm of our hand that we can act on immediately.”
Mike L. Russo, Chief Technology Officer, Restaurants at MICROS Systems said:
“MICROS has been delivering mobile business intelligence tools for many years now, and with MICROS inMotion we elevate to a new dimension with a stunningly beautiful native mobile app.”
Actian and OpenBI collaborate to bring Business Intelligence capabilities to customers
The relationship with Actian will allow OpenBI’s customers to capitalize on Vectorwise’s disruptive combination of high-performance and affordability to drive unprecedented new business value at a fraction of the cost of other leading solutions.
With its ability to analyze and report on large and complex data, Vectorwise is a perfect complement to OpenBI’s big data and analytics service offerings. “Adding Actian Vectorwise to our portfolio of technologies provides strategic benefits to both OpenBI and our customers,” said Steve Miller, co-founder and President of OpenBI.
OpenBI sought a high-performance analytical database capable of serving business users with rapid-fire analytic queries. Additionally, OpenBI has been able to deploy Vectorwise behind a number of analytical applications with little configuration or preparation.
“OpenBI knew the market and was able to advise us on the best tools for our problem, which included Actian Vectorwise,” said Tim Garnto, vice president of product engineering at edo Interactive.
“OpenBI continues to expand its expertise in the big data ecosystem and is ready to meet the needs of businesses for both the innovative tools to analyze growing volumes of data and the expert insights to help businesses prosper,” says Fred Gallagher general manager, Vectorwise at Actian Corporation.
Cloud computing
Accenture launches Accenture Cloud Platform
Accenture is going to invest more than 400 million USD in cloud capabilities. The Accenture Cloud Platform represents an important next step in Accenture’s cloud strategy and reaffirms the company’s intent to providing cloud brokering and orchestration services that are growing in importance to clients.
Supported by the cloud, technology trends like mobile, social collaboration and big data are changing the landscape as an increasing number of businesses go digital. The Accenture Cloud Platform provides a secure, scalable, and enterprise-ready cloud integration system to support these critical changes.
As part of its overall investment, Accenture has created expanded services on the Accenture Cloud Platform, including public and virtual private cloud infrastructure, data decommissioning, software systems testing and big data analytics solutions in the cloud.
Accenture has already worked on more than 4,000 cloud projects for clients, including over half of the Fortune Global 100, and has more than 6,700 professionals trained in cloud.
IBM announced cloud computing deal with Government of Thailand
IBM announced that CAT Telecom Plc. (CAT) has signed a strategic engagement with IBM to help the government owned telecom company provide cloud computing services in Thailand. IBM will be the preferred technology service provider to help manage cloud systems, delivering innovative cloud computing services for CAT.
CAT, run by the government of Thailand, provides a complete range of telecom services including:
- voice,
- data,
- e-business and
- IT security operation and delivery
to customers both locally and internationally.
Through IBM SmartCloud Managed Service, CAT will be able to offer unique cloud services superior to other providers.
Gianluigi Cuccureddu is co-founder of Damarque, helping you to improve your commercial performance through better engagement with your employees, customers and strategic business partners.
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