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By Martin Kelly
Partner, IBM Venture Capital Group
Editor’s note: Startup entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and business leaders will gather in San Francisco for the IBM SmartCamp competition world finals next week (Jan. 31, Feb. 1 and 2.) To follow the event virtually, return to A Smarter Planet for liveblogging, view livestreaming video and follow the Twitter hashtags #IBM SmartCamp and #startups.
How do you create something from nothing? It seems like magic to take an idea and turn it into a growing enterprise. Yet this is what entrepreneurs do every day. And that’s also what we did when we created IBM SmartCamp.
Our journey started almost 3 years ago. I was traveling to conferences and events around Europe. As I met entrepreneurs, it became clear that very few had heard about what we think is the biggest technology opportunity over the next decade: making the planet smarter by putting intelligence into things no one would recognize as computers, including cars, appliances, roadways, power grids, buildings, farms, waterways and clothing.
It became clear: We needed to do something to get the startup community focused on making a smarter planet- and help the ones who do so become successful.
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Steve Hamm in
By Lauren States
CTO, IBM Cloud Computing and Growth Initiatives
Increasingly, companies will access innovations over the Internet– from the cloud. The power of the cloud model comes from the fact that IT complexity is masked from the people who use it. Plug into the cloud and you can get the resources you need on demand. Sounds easy, right?
Not so fast. A recent GigaOm article starts with the premise “Cloud is complex – deal with it.” Author James Urquhart (@jamesurquhart) goes on to describe while cloud is a great way to worry less about your infrastructure, the problems you are eliminating may create new challenges (and opportunities). Urquhart explains the cloud as a complex system, one made of piece parts that are all interdependent and adaptive. He used three lines that stood out for me in his explanation. “Think biology. Think economics. Think ecosystems.”
At IBM, if there’s one thing we do, it is think deeply about complex systems. And we have thought for a long time about adaptive, almost biological IT systems interconnected with our businesses needs. And that’s how we think about the cloud.
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by Mark Cleverley, IBM director of public safety
As we enter the New Year, happily, some things stay the same. Namely, IBM’s focus on helping cities become smarter and safer. IBM just announced how it is working with the Rochester and Las Vegas police departments to better forecast crime “hot spots” and proactively allocate resources accordingly. Continue Reading »
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by Swami Chandrasekaran, Chief Architect – Business Solution Services, Communications Sector at IBM
There have been some key shifts in the Energy & Utility arena over the last few years, which have resulted in a new “reality” for companies today. Changing regulatory requirements, the high cost of energy, increasing consumer demands, and grid security are just some of the challenges these organizations face. Continue Reading »
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Kevin Winterfield in
IBM SmartCamp Finals Silicon Valley
IBM SmartCamp World Finals in Silicon Valley has just announced the 9 startups in this year’s competition.
Watch their pitch video and vote for the startup you like best.
BitCarrier - Click Here To Watch Their Pitch Video And Vote
BitCarrier’s traffic management solutions analyze real-time traffic information providing current travel times, estimations on congestion rates and accident alerts. (winner, SmartCamp Barcelona). Watch and Vote
C-B4 - Click Here To Watch Their Pitch Video And Vote
CB4 has created a context-based system for identifying and analyzing hidden data patterns in large scale data warehouses. The system is particularly suited to the retail trade and customer relations management (winner, SmartCamp Tel Aviv). Watch and Vote
ConnectM - Click Here to Watch Their Video and Vote
ConnectM’s machine to machine technology uses advanced analytics to collect information from disparate systems to provide business intelligence. The solutions are developed specifically for the telecommunications, utilities, and transportation industries (winner, SmartCamp Bangalore). Watch and Vote
IDXP - Click Here To Watch Their Pitch Video And Vote
IDXP’s consumer behavior solution installs sensors in stores and shopping carts to help retailers understand consumer behavior in real time (winner, SmartCamp Rio de Janeiro). Watch and Vote
Localytics - Click Here To Watch Their Pitch Video And Vote
Localytics provides a real-time analytics service that provides makers of mobile phone and tablet applications with a better understand user preferences and tendencies (winner, SmartCamp New York City). Watch and Vote
Palmap - Click Here To Watch Their Pitch Video And Vote
Palmap’s mapping solution provides mobile users with real-time information for indoor activities such as navigating airports and shopping malls (winner, SmartCamp Shanghai). Watch and Vote
Profitero - Click Here To Watch Their Pitch Video And Vote
Profitero helps on-line retailers maximize profits via actionable competitor analytics (Winner, SmartCamp London). Watch and Vote
SecureWaters - Click Here To Watch Their Pitch Video And Vote
Secure Waters’ patented technology continuously monitors. detects and identifies toxins in surface water. An early warning alarm system alerts clients to potential issues (winner, SmartCamp Austin). Watch and Vote
SkinScan - Click Here To Watch Their Pitch Video And Vote
SkinScan’s mobile application enables users to scan the moles in their bodies and measure the skin cancer threat levels. They also offer a cloud infrastructure for medical histories of the patients and the doctors (winner SmartCamp Istanbul). Watch and Vote
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Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, foursquare – we no longer just communicate; we interact. In the process, how can the wealth of information being generated by social media help us better understand how our cities function and create smarter cities in the process?
Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter all report membership in the hundreds of millions. Google+, the social media network launched by the search engine giant early in 2011, saw 25 million people sign up in its first four weeks. Foursquare popularised geolocation in social media, and now photographs, tweets and status updates can be tagged with your location. Our appetite for social media is changing the way we communicate and offers new ways to interact with our cities.
Over a billion people worldwide log on to social networking sites. British internet users on PCs clocked up a total of 169 million hours on Facebook alone in April 2011, according to research by Ofcom, the UK’s communications regulator. Mobile users of Facebook, meanwhile, spend more than five and a half hours on the site each month. Clearly, social media is not a fad. Instant communication over social networks – and the presumption of instant feedback – now underpins just about every aspect of our lives. This includes our relationships with local and city governments. The spectacular growth of social media has also increased expectations about transparency and the right to participate in the policy-making process. Used properly, social media represents new value for local authorities, especially when coupled with the right technology, such as a secure private cloud. Leading cities in the UK, US and beyond are already tapping into this hunger for public engagement, with social media playing a part in everything from town planning to combating traffic jams.
Download the Social media and the city new paper
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By Michell Zappa
Technology Strategist
Envisioning Technology
We are on the brink of unimaginable technological change. The predictable acceleration of hardware, connectivity and sensors coupled with an unforeseen plethora of new business models and the need to tackle problems on a global scale leaves me optimistic about the coming decades.
It was with that in mind that I started developing Envisioning Technology– as a framework for speculating about currently emerging technologies that are bound to grow in the foreseeable future, and how they might do so. From Bio-enhanced Fuels to Telepresence. From an Interplanetary Internet to Artificial Retinas. All areas were of interest.
The exercise of researching these distinct technologies then led me to designing a framework in the form of a visualization. This incorporates key observations, such as inter-related areas of research in addition to pure speculation, such as when they might reach mainstream, or the impact they might have for consumers.
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Kevin Winterfield in
SecureWaters
Secure Waters’ patented technology continuously monitors. detects and identifies toxins in surface water. An early warning alarm system alerts clients to potential issues (winner, SmartCamp Austin).
Watch their pitch, then VOTE for them by clicking “LIKE” below:
VOTE by clicking ‘Like’ below:
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Kevin Winterfield in
Profitero
Profitero helps on-line retailers maximize profits via actionable competitor analytics (Winner, SmartCamp London).
Watch their pitch, then VOTE for them by clicking “LIKE” below:
VOTE by clicking ‘Like’ below:
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Kevin Winterfield in
Palmap
Palmap’s mapping solution provides mobile users with real-time information for indoor activities such as navigating airports and shopping malls (winner, SmartCamp Shanghai).
Watch their pitch, then VOTE for them by clicking “LIKE” below:
VOTE by clicking ‘Like’ below:
