Member of Awards Judging Panel – Datacloud Global Congress & Exhibition

I was delighted to have been asked and accept the opportunity to become a Member of the Awards Judging Panel for the prestigious annual Datacloud Global Congress & Exhibition.

Datacloud creates the leading platform for datacentre and cloud IT infrastructure end users, software, solutions providers, experts, investors and all companies engaged in this expanding sector. The conferences explore the very latest in technologies and markets, to inspire through rich content and uniquely host senior executives to meet, connect, collaborate and do deals. Events include Europe (Global Congress), Nordic and South East Asia.

Datacloud Global Congress & Exhibition (DCG) returns for a third year to the Grimaldi Forum with an even better format, in Monaco, June 8-9 2016.

More detail about the Datacloud Global Congress and Exhibition can be found here. DatacloudEuropeLogo

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Open Data – how far do we go?

Technology has now woven itself in to our daily lives to such an extent that we cannot imagine how we ever lived without its features and relevant products as we do today.
At the heart of this huge technological transition is data: commercial and personal data which we all have nightmares about people trying to access or gaining control of.
Conversely, we are all rightly concerned about what data is captured about us but we are very open to reward for sharing it with organisations we trust such as supermarkets and other loyalty purchasing schemes.

Open data is the idea that certain data should be freely available to everyone to use and republish as they wish, without restrictions from copyright, patents or other mechanisms of control.
The goals of the open data movement are similar to those of other “Open” movements such as open sourceopen hardwareopen content, and open access.
Why then does the very topic of open data cause such consternation and alarm? Open data is seemingly all about enabling everyone to access information to use for the greater good, but unfortunately the definition of its use will always appease and infuriate the populous in equal measures.

No area is this ‘sharing’ of open data more prevalent than in the medical world. You share your data with your doctor so that they can have a record of your medical history and thus better diagnose and/or treat you as a patient but would you go a step further and share your personal medical data with academic or professional institutions for research purposes to help society combat disease?

The power of open data is clear with Wikipedia one of the largest and most used proponents of it.
Its well known that they don’t pay their editors but still people have built the most amazing repository of human knowledge. I use it so often without ever thinking of how else I would so easily find access to the rich seams of data that it serves up and briefly thinking about it not being available is daunting but it does make you ponder further about the merits of open data.

With the next transition of technology opening up the so-called ‘internet of things’ the amount of captured data is only going to increase exponentially and if its going to fulfil its world-changing potential the need to aggregate and share that data is clear.
Will the lure of what we gain through its various services and features loosen our ties to the data we share to achieve them?

I think we all agree that there should be a degree of open data and we are happy to add elements of our ‘personal’ data into the pool but there needs to be controls in place where we can view exactly what is available and legal recourse to remedy any subsequent issues.
Getting these standards and processes in place and adhered to globally is the most difficult part of this whole issue, and crucially the knitting that binds it all together.
It won’t happen overnight and how far we go with open data is up for debate but the most critical point is that it must not be at the expense of social freedom.

This post has also been featured on the HP Business Value Exchange here 

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BCS Digital Leaders 2015 E-Book

I was delighted to be asked to submit a piece to the 2015 BCS Digital Leaders e-book, which you can read on page 130 here.
As a fellow and chartered IT professional of the BCS, I think its important to contribute and add value when I can to the societies publications.

Digital Leaders is a publication written by IT professionals for IT professionals to help them influence their organisations away from using outdated practices, governance models and structures to a more cutting edge world, but without depriving people or communities.
Aimed primarily at C-level managers and senior decision makers, Digital Leaders can enhance any organisation’s IT strategy – visit bcs.org/digitalleaders for related articles and blogs.

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EMC #HybridCloud Twitter Chat – ‘What are the catalysts for the Hybrid Cloud?’

I was delighted to work with EMC again as a featured panelist on their second #HybridCloud Twitter chat entitled, “What are the catalysts for the Hybrid Cloud?”
Following hot on the heels of the first very successful Hybrid Cloud Chat in March, we were delighted to double our reach on this chat to 2.1 million, which is a great achievement. hybridcloudchat190115

You can read a Storify write-up of the event including some fantastic illustrations here and read the entire chat via Crowdchat here.

EMC pre-event info: In our upcoming #HybridCloudChat Twitter chat, an expert panel from EMC of Suhela Dighe, Hans Timmerman and Dinko Eror with industry expert Christian McMahon (@ChristianMcM) will discuss Hybrid Cloud. Join the conversation on May 19 at 12 p.m. GMT on Twitter using the hashtag #HybridCloudChat

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EMC #HybridCloud Twitter Chat – ‘How ready are you for the Hybrid Cloud?’

EMCHybCLoudI was delighted to work with EMC recently as a featured panelist on their #HybridCloud Twitter chat entitled, “How ready are you for the Hybrid Cloud?”
It was their first chat of this type in EMEA and it achieved a social reach of 1.1 million, which they were rightly delighted with.

More information about the event and a log of the chat can be found here and you can also follow the chat on Twitter using the hashtag #HybridCloudChat.

EMC pre-event info: In our upcoming #HybridCloudChat Twitter chat, an expert panel from EMC of Suhela Dighe and Dinko Eror with industry expert Christian McMahon (@ChristianMcM) will discuss Hybrid Cloud. Join the conversation on March 25 at 12 p.m. GMT on Twitter using the hashtag #HybridCloudChat.

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What are the top cloud trends that will shape 2015?

I was asked by Atheneum Partners to write a piece for their global newsletter which goes out to over 75k registered users. The question I was posed was for my take on what are the top cloud trends that will shape 2015? The piece can be found on their site by clicking here but I have also copied in the text below:

The usage of cloud-based services continues to penetrate deeper in to the enterprise than ever before. The fear factors of security, data control, privacy and contractual exit strategies continue to be tempered by the virtues of cost savings, availability, speed to market and innovation.

If you are evaluating technology upgrades, replacements or acquisitions, 2015 is the year that cements cloud on the list of considerations.

I have detailed below in no order of importance what I think will be the main cloud focused trends in 2015 but I would love to hear what else you would add to the list?

Cost

Thanks to the price and feature wars between the biggest providers including AWS, Microsoft and Google the market is now more available than ever as organisations now look beyond raw infrastructure for value.

Hybrid Clouds

Gartner broadly defines hybrid clouds as the combination of two or more cloud services coming together to create a unified cloud experience. It can be a mix of private and public cloud services, but can also include combinations that are all public or all private.
In 2015 a blend of on-premise and cloud services is pretty normal but enterprises should adopt cloud services in a tactical way that ensure they’re getting the right match and secure model to suit the needs of their organisations. Hybrid cloud is the much-discussed direction that many organisations will ultimately follow.

Hybrid cloud management tools will improve and allow IT organisations to seamlessly administer and operate them securely.

Cloud Operating Models

As cloud services converge with social, mobile and information in what Gartner calls the. “Nexus of Forces”, organisations will need to start incorporating cloud operating behaviours in a platform for digital business.

Maturing and well-defined Cloud Market

The cloud marketplace has matured significantly and moved away from the free for all approach of the past couple of years. The global scale cloud providers such as AWS and Microsoft’s Azure will continue to operate at the high-end but there will be lots of smaller, more regional, industry focused custom providers to fill in the gaps around them.

Cloud Brokerages

There will be a rise of intermediation services that will seek to help organisations manage and integrate their cloud services. Organisations new to the cloud and those delving in to the hybrid approach will welcome such third-party providers and the niche skills they bring but will need to decide how much they cede control.

Enterprise Workloads Moving in to the Cloud

Amazon’s AWS has long been a go to choice for those offering online services but 2015 will see a greater enterprise adoption for not just AWS but Microsoft’s Azure and Google’s Compute Engine amongst others.

Cloud is the new style of elastically scalable, self-service computing and many enterprises will look to embrace all that it can offer.

Containers will gain momentum

Containers have helped solve many of the problems that the cloud poses for IT operations. Developers love containers but IT operations now need to be able to containerise different parts of an application, locate them in different types of cloud infrastructure, and manage them as discrete units whilst keeping the part acting as a whole.

Compliance and Regulations

As cloud platforms continue to mature, cloud is spurring interest from even those industries that have previously been hesitant. Think of those most beset with regulation, compliance and privacy: public sector, life sciences, financial and health care. Lots of cloud providers will take the necessary steps to receive appropriate industry certifications, creating more platforms designed to align to Sarbanes–Oxley and others.

Internet of Things

Interest in the Internet of Things will build throughout 2015. Positioning clouds and applications for it right now is difficult but if your organisation is moving in to this space you need to be prepared for how to capture and store the potentially large amounts of resulting data. Everything from orchestration to database management tools will need to evolve to better support this area.

Disaster Recovery

Traditionally this has been a problem area for IT but DRaaS enables you to address many previous problems such as testing, the high cost of installing a backup system and accurately mimicking potential issues. I think this will be a growth area in 2015.

With CIO’s under constant pressure to deliver innovation and business value whilst continuing to provide BAU services, they are always looking for new ways in which to achieve their goals. Cloud services have often provoked fear in many enterprises due to security, data and privacy issues but with the market rapidly maturing, costs falling, security and services improving could this be the year that cloud thrives?

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