The 10 Most Disruptive AI Solution Providers 2019

Volume-5 Issue-5

www.insightssuccess.com May 2019

Gary A. Fowler CEO, President & Co-Founder

Yva.ai Aiding Businesses to Retain the Best Talent, Build Engaged Teams and Achieve More

The 10 Most

Disruptive AI Solution Providers 2019

Editor’s Desk AI! In the Process of Disrupting Daily Work Environment

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t comes as no surprise how Artificial Intelligence has driven digital transformations in almost every sector. The way we work has fundamentally switched with AI. Be it finance, healthcare, marketing, logistics, defense, education, technical support or customer service, AI has been redefining every aspect of the business areas. The only change that has occurred in AI is the pace at which it is evolving.

When we talk about the advancements of AI, we usually become skeptical regarding its nature. Will it create more opportunities for people or put them out of employment? However, AI has endless possibilities accompanied with the wealth of opportunities across all sectors.

The existence of AI has been seen in every aspect of human life. The beginning of electric cars, robotization, virtual assistants, and the emergence of many such occurrences have been possible due to Artificial Intelligence. After witnessing some revolutionary transformations of our daily tasks, we can say that AI has been established as one of the prominent disruptive technologies. Days seem to be near, when there will be an exponential increase in the number of commercial AIbased applications.

Taking into consideration the importance of AI, many companies have started scrutinizing how AI can be applied into their respective sectors. Some of them are already delivering AI based disruptive solutions that are definitely adding value to the processes of various businesses. In order to acknowledge the significant contributions in the AI industry, Insights Success has curated a list of “The 10 Most Disruptive AI Solution Providers 2019”, who are propelling artificial intelligence into business mainstream.

Any solution when integrated with AI could turn into a disruption.

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Hitesh Dhamani

Our cover story features a Menlo Park, CA based company, Yva. In order to ensure steady and successful corporate growth and high productivity, every company needs to listen to its employees and provide continuous actionable feedback to employees. Based on this consideration, Yva developed Yva.ai, the AI-driven People Analytics and performance management system. Yva allows businesses to increase their performance and sell more. Its system uses the power of neural networks to boost corporate health and performance while ensuring the individual happiness of employees. Yva.ai is an intelligent “corporate health tracker” that maintains and bolsters the good health of an organization by providing real-time insights and recommendations to the company managers, employees, and HR. Further, this edition also includes Solvera Lynx, a company that combines interdisciplinary knowledge in energy, information, and economy and introduces modern information technology and advanced energy services to the demanding technical fields of energy, industry, and transport; Guavus, a company that offers cutting-edge AI and analytics solutions for digital transformation; NGD Systems, a computational storage solution provider that builds an innovative intelligent platform that allows users to create, manage, and execute applications within the SSD storage solutions via the company’s InSitu Processing.

Also, make sure to scroll through the articles written by our editorial team and CXO standpoints of some of the leading industry experts to have a brief taste of the sector.

Let’s start reading!

Cover Story

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Yva.ai Aiding Businesses to Retain the Best Talent, Build Engaged Teams and Achieve More

Articles Virtual Future

Infrastructure Transformation

Virtual Assistants: Aiding Businesses to Retain the Best Talent, Build Engaged Teams and Achieve More

AI: Moving Towards Transformation of Industries

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CONTENTS Guavus Offering Cutting-Edge AI and Analytics Solutions for Digital Transformation

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NGD Systems Ensuring AI Advancement with Intelligent Storage

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Solvera Lynx Delivering Comprehensive Solutions for Energy Management

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24 Tech Insider Blockchain: The Next Opportunity for Better, Safer, Smarter Cities

30 40 Expert’s Column Maintaining a personal and professional life balance: How To Do Your Best Work When You're Not Actually Working!

Expert’s Insights Fostering a Risk-based Company Culture

Editor-in-Chief Pooja M. Bansal Managing Editor Anish Miller

Executive Editor

Assistant Editors

Bhushan Kadam

Jenny Fernandes Hitesh Dhamani

Visualizer

Art & Design Director

Associate Designer

David King

Amol Kamble

Sanket Zirpe

Senior Sales Manager Co-designer

Co-designer Karan Gaikwad

Business Development Manager

Passi D.

Peter Collins

Marketing Manager

Sales Executives

John Matthew

David, Kevin, Mark, Vishnu

Technical Head

Business Development Executives

Jacob Smile

Steve, Joe, Alan, Anup

Technical Specialist Aditya

Digital Marketing Manager Marry D'Souza

SME-SMO Executive Prashant Chevale

Research Analyst Patrick James

Circulation Manager Robert Brown

Database Management Stella Andrew

Technology Consultant David Stokes

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Gary A. Fowler CEO, President & Co-Founder Yva.ai

Yva.ai Aiding Businesses to Retain the Best Talent, Build Engaged Teams and Achieve More

Our team consists of PhD's from around the world and professionals with more than 10 years of experience working in AI, NLP, semantic and search engine technologies.

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rtificial Intelligence (AI) is shaping the future of almost every sector.

Be it finance, marketing, technical support or customer service, AI is redefining every aspect of the business areas. Similarly, employee satisfaction is another vital aspect of every business as employees are the most valuable asset any company has. And in order to ensure steady and successful corporate growth and high productivity, any company needs to listen to its employees and provide continuous actionable feedback to employees. Based on this consideration a Menlo Park, CA based company, Yva developed Yva.ai, the AI-driven People Analytics and performance management system.

Yva allows businesses to increase their performance and sell more. It helps them understand, motivate, and develop their employees. The company identifies the successful behaviors and skills, using communication and survey data. It predicts resignations and offers tools to lower unwanted attrition.

Intelligent Corporate Health Tracker Yva.ai uses the power of neural networks to boost corporate health and performance while ensuring the individual happiness of employees. It is an intelligent “corporate health tracker” that maintains and bolsters the good health of an organization by providing real-time insights and recommendations to the company managers, employees, and HR. Yva is unique in how it combines communication data analytics with short weekly employee surveys, ensuring constant feedback directly from company employees while also generating objective and reliable insights from the digital footprint of these employees. This one-of-a-kind combination of hard and soft data allows the continuously monitoring the happiness and productivity of the employees with the unbiased support of artificial intelligence while enriching the AI-generated results with the personal voices of the employees.

Proven Leadership An elite team of Yva.ai is led by its CEO, President and Co-Founder, Gary A. Fowler. Gary is an award winning marketing guru, serial entrepreneur, business coach, mentor, TEDX presenter and has a long history globally with 10 startups under his belt as well as a successful IPO (CKSW). His background has centered on leadership in high tech, services and consulting companies as well as his own companies in technology, development and consulting. He is also the Founder of Fowler International, GVA LaunchGurus, DY Investments, Broadiant, etc. In addition, he has also held different executive level positions in top tier companies like Hewlett Packard, Modcomp, and Siemens attaining numerous sales and marketing awards.

Filling the Gap According to Yva.AI, the annual survey has been the traditional method of measuring employee engagement and corporate health for years. In times, when the pace of changes and growth in businesses across industries is increasing, the annual surveys have become extremely insufficient. Imagine a scenario where once a year, businesses would encourage the employees of their company to take long surveys with questions recapping the prior year.

Businesses intend to use this information to plan their business strategy and the subsequent changes in the organization for the following year.

the very core, Yva’s core functions can be broken down into three main categories: the Resignation Predictor, Organizational Network Analysis, and Continuous Engagement and Performance.

Where a Human Eye Fails, AI thrives

But for one, these annual surveys are incapable of offering real-time information that reflects the real and true state of their organization. A lot of things can change over a year. And, while the survey allows gaining insights into what the employees think, they are retrospective and cannot offer in-depth information about past issues from the previous year, and let alone the on-going issues the company might be experiencing at the given moment. To be realistic, employees can hardly recall the details from an entire year that has passed. While they can get lengthy and tedious, annual employee surveys also leave room for bias and survey fatigue for the employees who are caught up in their daily workflow and are unwilling to spend extra time answering questions that seem unimportant and ineffectual. According to Harvard Business Review, a few ways employees can distort the survey results include the social desirability bias, when they tend to give answers that they believe would make them look more desirable in the eyes of the management. And, when the acquiescence bias tends to state agreement as a default response to questions, they don’t have enough information to answer.

So, today of all times when actionable information is valued highly in the fast-paced business environment; and this is exactly where the traditional survey method fails to deliver the value companies demand.

Yva.AI developed Yva to fill in this gap between the expectations, which companies expect and the lack of actionable insights that annual surveys don’t provide by calibrating personalized employee surveys with the AI analysis of communication data. Yva generates real-time dashboards, predictions, and recommendations that allow managers to make evidence-based decisions on one hand, and ensure employees receive continuous and actionable feedback on the other. Businesses can achieve a lot with such powerful information at their disposal. At

Yva believes in a saying that states ‘employees do not leave their companies; they leave their bosses’. And in the opinion of the company, yet, lot of organizations don’t do a good job at retaining their top performers. Losing a key employee who is highly integrated within the company can cost up to twice their annual salary, as replacing a valuable employee takes extra months of recruiting, interviewing, and training of new candidates. Losing employees isn’t just costly; it’s time- and resourceconsuming, with the potential of hindering overall company growth and the integrity of the corporate culture.

When employees make the decision to leave the company, their communication patterns undergo slight changes that are undetectable to a human eye. But where a human eye fails, artificial intelligence thrives. Yva’s neural network can catch these minute changes and predict resignations 12 months in advance with 86% accuracy, allowing managers and executives to take action before the employees take the step to leave the company. The system is trained on “blind tests” using the historical data of employees who have previously resigned. By avoiding unwanted attrition, companies can save significant resources, continue steady corporate growth, and ensure uninterrupted workflow.

Taking it a step further, Yva.ai can also identify the Toxic Managers and the Opinion Leaders within the company, revealing the “silent killers” and the true leaders of the company.

Toxic managers constantly demotivate and disengage other employees; very often, toxic managers can become a major contributing factor to the employees’ decision to leave.

Through objective Organizational Network Analytics (ONA) based on communication data, Yva’s AI brain identifies these sources of toxicity within organizations and allows the

leadership to take measures before major conflicts arise. Following the same logic, the system recognizes the most integrated, well-connected and highly communicable employees who act like communication hubs, bringing all other employees together, motivating and engaging them.

They are the real agents of change who have the potential to successfully lead corporate transformation.

The system doesn’t just provide actionable insights to managers and executives; it also ensures constant feedback for all employees through real-time dynamic scanning and 360-degree surveys. A few times a week, employees in the company receive an invitation to participate in a survey and share their feedback about their co-workers. Based on the anonymized feedback provided by co-workers, each employee receives a report that highlights their strengths and points out the skills that need further improvement. Through such evaluations, the employees constantly get motivating updates and recommendations on self-growth and self-improvement.

Envisions Becoming Personal Virtual Assistant

Yva is not a human; it’s articial intelligence.

As artificial intelligence solutions get more integrated into the process of boosting company growth and health, the future of successful employee engagement and corporate success is “continuous sensing.”

Yva.ai is one such AI technology of and from the future that constantly listens to the employees, monitors small changes, and provides real-time insights for managers and employees to make evidence-based decisions. The company aims to become a personal virtual assistant to each employee or manager in the company, helping them understand their performance, measure their impact on the overall company environment, and make informed decisions day-to-day to work on areas that need more improvement.

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Assistants Professional Assistance, Virtual Guidance

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May 2019|

Virtual Future

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owadays, we all are becoming more engage and busy in our day-to-day life due to professional commitments or personal life. In such a situation, we always find ways to make our life simple and easy. Every human on this planet feels lazy at certain situations where he/she wants to make his/her work or task easier.

Thus, there are various innovations which are carried out with these technologies. Those are intensively working upon such tools which can execute to minimize human efficiency and saves time.

According to the well-known French author Jules Renard, “Laziness is nothing more than the habit of resting before you get tired.”

To reduce this, there are some virtual inventions that create an easy way to implement our work. One such major device which is widely used is known as Virtual Assistant generally abbreviated as VA or Virtual Office Assistant. It is a unique self-employed device which provides assistance to clients remotely. It is a highly skilled device that recreates overall verbal communication stronger. VA helps its users to access data and information through voice assistance with its unique approach to signify various fundamental activities.

Hence, VA exclusively synchronizes human voice instructions to manage various human actions such as music playback via voice, emails, to-do lists, and calendars with verbal commands. Its invention has created a reforming approach for doing our day to day task easier. The qualities |May 2019

that make virtual assistant a power tool is its exceptional programming and strong process execution.

Various Forms of Virtual Assistants In the global market, there are many technology giants that have introduced their own virtual assistant (VA) devices are as follows, Amazon Alexa majorly known as Alexa is a virtual assistant device developed by Amazon. It has two devices which reflect its VA properties such as Amazon Echo and Amazon Echo Dot Smart Speakers.

Alexa helps you to check the weather, latest news, connect to music and listen to your favorite song on command as its special features. Siri by Apple is one of the unique virtual assistant devices introduced in 2011. Siri answers all the questions and updates you with sports news as well. Siri also uses to set alarm, timer, and scheduling daily task manually. With voice request, Siri can help you to send text or place call just by voice. Siri is exclusively available on Apple devices like iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple watches etc.

Cortana is a Microsoft device, known as its digital assistant who is designed to learn from your command and respond to the queries.

It is very similar to Apple and other VA device which can track tasks, manage your calendar or follow your commands etc. Cortana works on following Microsoft devices, including Windows phones and operating systems. Google Assistant a product by Google which is highly

known for its accessibility. It is easily available on various devices like your phone, speaker, watch, TV, or in your car. It connects smoothly with any device and gives an active response. Google Assistant is available on Google Play Store and iTunes App store.

Last but not the least; we have Bixby a smart virtual assistant by Samsung.

It is one of the most featured and unique virtual assistant device used globally. It has a unique feature that represents your music choices and voice commands to identify landmarks and other visuals by taking a photo. Bixby can translate many foreign languages and transform them in an easy manner. It also recommends you about businesses, restaurants to create reminders and manage your schedule. Bixby is exclusively available on Samsung devices like Galaxy S series and Note 9.

Role of Virtual Assistants Followed with its overall introduction and functionalities, the core part that highly approachable about virtual assistant is its features and roles like, 1. Responsiveness: A virtual assistant is mainly known for its extreme responsive nature and fundamental structure. The ultimate role of any virtual assistant is to follow the commands and execute the process accordingly. In any organization, the basic role is to follow the commands and provide suitable information at the earliest like, quick response to the e-mails, requests, and voice commands.

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2. Discretion: Discretion is nothing but the quality of behaving or speaking in such a way as to avoid causing offense or revealing confidential information. Hence, the virtual assistant helps individuals and organization to avoid conflict between confidential information and relieving information.

Planning and Organizing: Finally, planning and organizing is another topmost virtual assistant feature. It prominently works to track and analysis top-level view of daily tasks and helps to create effective plans and methods to meet business goals.

Promising Future

3.Accuracy: Accuracy is very important and essential.

Human make mistakes and it will happen but to avoid mistakes and false we need perfect and accurate work.

Hence, virtual assistant provides accuracy that plays a crucial role when commands are given to it for execution.

4. Multi-tasking: Probably one of the important feature of virtual assistant it its capability to do multiple jobs at the same time. A virtual assistant can hold many commands and actions with respect to multiple users and keep them moving correctly. It benefits organization with efficiency, good scheduling, and perfect duty.

As we mentioned earlier, how virtual assistant is important in our day-to-day life or in an organization process. In businesses, the virtual assistant helps organizations to grow fast and efficiently. Virtual Assistants are independent experts, who work for its users from a remote location. With specific skills, a virtual assistant can perform multiple tasks at the same time and work on various projects simultaneously.

Hence, a virtual assistant is becoming one of the major parts of organizations overall process and structure for opting better growth and their future endeavors. In addition, it signifies importance it in our day-to-day lives and helps us to make our daily task easier.

How Virtual Assistant aids Organizations Today, almost every organization is working on its core competencies to grow rapidly in the market with effective speed and market response. Hence, they are building its capabilities with the help of a virtual assistant which are as follows, Email Management: A good virtual assistant will always offer email or inbox management services.

Virtual assistant organizes various email skills such as managing emails into manageable folders, incoming emails notifications, prioritizing a list of senders etc.

Better virtual assistant supports organization for superior productivity.

Marketing Responsibilities: One of the top feature of virtual assistant, in which it handles various marketing tasks easily, timely and precisely. There are some of the respective tasks on which virtual assistant works such as, website landing page, blog posts, graphic design, and social media marketing etc. It also helps the organization more effectively and precisely.

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May 2019|

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n an interview with Insights Success, Faizel Lakhani, the CEO of Guavus, provides an update on the company, discusses how communications service providers (CSPs) are using Guavus’ AI and analytics solutions, and shares his views on where the AI industry is headed and specifics on how CSPs can take advantage to expand their business and provide an improved customer experience. Below are highlights of the interview we conducted with Faizel: Give a brief overview of Guavus, its uniqueness, and its vision.

Guavus is at the forefront of artificial intelligence (AI)based, real-time analytics and machine learning (ML) innovation – we’re driving digital transformation at all of the Tier 1 mobile service operators and at 6 of the 7 world’s largest telecommunications providers. Using our Reflex solution, customers are able to analyze big data in real-time and take decisive actions to lower costs, increase efficiencies and dramatically improve their end-to-end customer experience – all with the scale and security required for next-gen 5G and IoT networks.

We were founded on two key values, which still guide us today. First, we understand that our value lies not simply in analyzing data to offer a superior interpretation of the world, but in fact using data to change the world – that is, to drive decisions which save money, make money or otherwise help our customers transform how they run their businesses. Second, our perspective has always been that service providers’ and Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) providers’ major product is the customer experience they deliver. Therefore, the machine learning and data analytics lens should always be with the subscriber at the center. As simple as this sounds, the implications of this perspective are transformative for our customers who today deal in a world focused on network elements and aggregate traffic flows.

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Most

AI Solution Providers 2019

Our customers’ success is our success. Deploying our solutions is only the first step in the process towards operational efficiencies, OPEX savings, and an improved Net Promoter Score (NPS). We work hand-in-hand with all key stakeholders within a customer’s business to best understand their success criteria, what’s needed to guide their teams in order to realize the maximum benefit, and constantly strive to improve the user experience for advanced analytics. We combine data and computer science with vast domain expertise to provide a robust yet open solution that will evolve with our customers’ business needs, now and in the future.

Describe your company’s AI and analytics solutions and how they’re addressing the needs of your customers today.

We offer an AI/ML-based platform called the Guavus Reflex Analytics Fabric that makes the development, deployment and operation of AI/ML-based applications simple and fast. The struggles with using analytics for transformation are: injesting the data, wrangling the data into a useful form, applying the analytics on the data to result in outcomes, and operationalizing the outcomes into the business. We’ve built a solution that simplifies the first three and aids in the fourth. We also offer specific CSP analytics applications for network operations, customer care, marketing, data monetization, IoT, and security, including: Ÿ Live Ops: adaptive analytics to correlate, identify, and understand subscriber-impacting events in real time and then recommend steps to repair. Ÿ Proactive Ops: proactively anticipate events that may cause network problems, identify which ones will have the biggest customer impact and take automated actions as needed. Ÿ Smart Care: integrates with existing customer care systems and recommends resolutions through advanced predictive algorithms and AI. Ÿ Marketing Insight: dynamic customer segments can be May 2019|

‘‘ created based on particular campaigns and targeted offers presented in real time to increase acceptance rates. Ÿ Smart Industry & IoT: an out-of-the-box solution that can run at the edge or in a central location to automatically pinpoint customer behaviors and preferences, classify asset usage, identify performance issues and root causes, and take closed-loop actions. Ÿ Alarm IQ: harnesses the power of AI to eliminate alarm noise without requiring changes to NOC operator workflows. Ÿ

Where do you think AI in telecom is headed and how can CSPs take advantage of AI and analytics in the future?

We believe that our CSP customers are at an inflection point with the adoption of 5G, increasing reliance on network virtualization and introduction of AI in their operations. The use of advanced analytics, AI and automation become critically important as networks densify, network services diversify, and customer experience becomes one of the primary metrics tracked by CSPs. In order to be successful in their digital transformation, CSPs will require: Ÿ Turnkey use cases: solutions that address specific needs and can be integrated quickly; most will run on a broader company platform, but the specific use case is paramount. Ÿ Analytics that are real-time and predictive Ÿ Scale and seamless integration, and must have the ability to interactively explore their data to increase a network analytics solution’s usefulness, as well as APIs and other capability exposures that enable the solution to feed into automated operations. Ÿ Future-proofed analytics investments: analytics solutions that demonstrate they can handle network |May 2019

slicing, virtualized networks, and new service types.

About the Leader Faizel joined the company in 2017 after decades of senior leadership roles in telecommunications as well as enterprise security and networking companies. Under Faizel’s leadership, Guavus has achieved double-digit year-on-year revenue growth, winning new business from leading CSPs worldwide, and the company has been recognized in the industry as a leader in the CSP segment for AI and analytics.

Faizel has played a critical role in the integration and partnership of Guavus and Thales – a €19 billion aerospace, defense, transportation and digital identity and security technology supplier that acquired Guavus in 2017 and is integrating Guavus analytics into its solutions. He has fostered partnerships as well with Cisco and Gemalto, and in 2018 led Guavus’ acquisition of SQLstream, a leading provider of streaming edge analytics – enabling Guavus to uniquely offer CSPs and IoT customers full network edge-to-core access to real-time, cloud-enabled streaming analytics to address their growing big data needs.

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Blockchain: The Next Opportunity for Better, Safer, Smarter Cities About the Author: Gianni Minati Passionate and eclectic technology expert, Gianni Minetti is the President and CEO, Paradox Engineering SA has about 25 years of business experience in information and telecommunication systems, with peculiar interests in Internet of Things, smart technologies, blockchain and cryptography. In 2005 he founded Paradox Engineering as the vehicle for bringing his unique technology vision to the market through pioneer IoT platforms for Smart Cities and Smart Factories. He is currently President and CEO of the Company, which has been part of MinebeaMitsumi Group since July 2015. Gianni is also chair of the Southern Alps Chapter of the Crypto Valley Association, active investor and advisor to several blockchain venture projects. He is based in Ticino, Switzerland.

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oday, about 55% of the world’s population lives in urban areas, but this share is expected to increase to 68% by 2050.

Combined with the overall growth of global population, this could add another 2.5 billion people to urban areas by 2050, with close to 90% of this increase taking place in Asia and Africa, as reported by the United Nations’ 2018 Revision of World Urbanization Prospects.

Since the world continues to urbanize, a wiser and far-sighted management of urban resources is more and more needed, especially in low-income and lower-middleincome countries where the pace of urbanization is projected to be the fastest. Smart technologies and smart

May 2019|

Tech Insider

urban platforms can support City managers in tackling the increasing demand for energy, infrastructures, affordable housing, well-connected mobility systems, healthcare and education, as well as quality of life and jobs.

consumption, optimize costs and simplify processes for City operators and managers. Even more, it provides actionable information to feed strategic decisions about services efficiency and improvements, and take evidence-based actions where and when needed.

To understand how smart technologies work, we should picture Cities as distributed communication systems, where urban objects – think of streetlights, meters, parking lots, waste bins, Wi-Fi hotspots, video surveillance cameras, etc. – are not dumb, isolated devices, but smart nodes of a citywide network. With the Internet of Things (IoT), all these objects are injected with intelligence and acquire the capability to receive and transmit data and execute commands, thus enabling remote monitoring and dynamic, adaptive control functions.

Let’s apply what we’ve just described to a basic service such as street lighting. By connecting street lamps to a wireless IoT network, it becomes possible to turn them on/off and adjust brightness according to daily solar times and ambient light levels, defining variable patterns for working and festive days, residential and industrial districts. Sensors can be integrated to bring lights up when human or vehicle presence is detected, and on demand actions can be triggered in real time for single or grouped lamps – for instance when a car accident or an emergency requires intense lighting in a specific area.

Acquiring and correlating data from urban assets is a significant step forward to improve quality of public services and citizen satisfaction, reduce energy

It is proven that implementing LED lighting and an IoT remote management and control platform can cut energy consumption and greenhouse emissions up to 70%.

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Moreover, connected lamps can monitor key operating parameters and automatically report failures, generating extra savings on maintenance costs. Considering LED technologies last about 50% longer than traditional light sources, the US Federal Department of Energy estimated that if the entire country converted to LED lighting over the next 20 years, it would save a total of USD 120 billion.

Even more interesting developments are possible with blockchain technology, which can make Smart Cities far more secure, transparent, efficient and resilient. As an original combination of mature technological concepts, including peer-to-peer networks, distributed consensus algorithms, validity rules, ledger technologies and cryptography, blockchain can be successfully applied in any domain where stakeholders’ relations are based on

trust and may be entirely disintermediated. This is particularly true in Cities, as they rely on accurate, secure, authentic and trustworthy information exchanges to deliver services to people and businesses.

About energy distribution, for instance, blockchain-based metering solutions can accelerate the adoption of real-time differential pricing models and encourage users to participate to power generation by connecting their renewable energy microgrids to the main grid. In water networks, blockchain technologies enable smart contracts and validated rules to automate water supply in the most possible efficient manner, minimizing leakages and tampering.

Blockchain technology can be combined with IoT solutions to provide better waste collection services: it allows to accurately track

waste input and optimize waste truck routes upon parameters like bin status, filling levels, etc. This increases service quality and efficiency, and generates further savings on fuel expenses and overall maintenance costs. Garbage-related data could also support the introduction of customized fees for household and commercial users, thus rewarding recycling and correct waste separation.

Coming to public government and administration, blockchain can be used to automate and digitalize civil registries, as well as property, real estate and business registries, generating notable cost savings and increasing quality of service.

Considering citizen participation, blockchain-based voting platforms can improve present, analogue electoral systems by achieving secure, anonymous and unique voting in a decentralized manner.

Same platforms can be used to poll citizens on specific urban initiatives, making sure contributions from civil society are recognized in Smart City planning and development.

Blockchain technology is still in its early days, but most experts agree it has a potential for disruption. And some pioneer experiences – from Dubai to Tokyo, from New York to Tallinn – demonstrate that benefits for Smart Cities can really be worthwhile.

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May 2019|

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The

Most Solution Providers 2019

NGD Systems Ensuring AI Advancement with Intelligent Storage

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fter the emergence of Artificial Intelligence (AI), the rapid change it has brought in every industry sector is incomparable. The evolution of data analytics is in every leading technology much like deep learning, machine learning and blockchain. This has developed a gap where current hardware, like SSDs, are not equipped for performing massively parallel computation.

This computation process requires a massive level of data management which is a mismatch between storage capacity and the amount of memory that the central processing unit (CPU) uses to analyze data. NGD Systems, a Computational Storage Solution provider, has developed the solution to this problem with the ability to add AI execution to within their storage products.

NGD Systems build an innovative intelligent platform that allows users to create, manage, and execute applications within the SSD storage solutions via the company’s In-Situ Processing. It delivers Computational Storage products unify compute and storage in the industry’s highest available capacity NVMe SSD with the most power efficient product. These products are also available in the industry’s smallest form factors for the emerging Edge markets. This allows users to utilize core platforms in Storage, HPC, Server, Rack and Power solutions that are optimal for their SW and HW ecosystem. The creation of a Computational Storage platform furthers the storage architect’s ability to scale their Storage and Compute needs like never before.

Advance Storage Solution The Computational Storage platform provided by NGD Systems allows its customers to remove the traditional storage bottlenecks in modern AI application. The SSDs from NGD Systems solves the customer’s needs by running these AI applications at the storage device level. This unique, patented, and industry-leading solution allows

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augmented edge AI with limited architecture or platform changes while still realizing significant performance and power gains. The company’s 16TB drives provide 45% more capacity and 45% power reduction compared to alternative NVMe drives which means more efficient resource use! This patented technology is ideal for hyperscale environments, edge computing, and AI/data analytic applications.

The NGD Systems’ Patented portfolio provides NAND Flash Agnostic capabilities, and industry-leading capacity scale customers need in today’s data deluge. This also allows for the world’s highest capacity, coupled with low power consumption in an NVMe Storage device. NGD Systems’ proprietary QoS technology incorporates patented algorithms to manage data and performance that maintains 5 9s latency characteristics without complicated system changes. The Innovative architecture works with any 3D TLC and is QLC flash ready, even when new Non-Volatile Memories (NVM) come to market. This is enabled by a proprietary FW and LDPC error correction engines that allows for multiple media generations as well as new memory.

Agile Leadership Through countless hours of discussions with customers, Nader Salessi, CEO and Founder of NGD Systems, determined there was a gap in the storage market. This gap is not addressed by ’turn-key’ SSD players and was being grossly ignored. He gathered industry veterans and colleagues to form NGD Systems to deliver the solution customers were truly asking for, not what the other players provided as their idea of what customers wanted. By listening and delivering on this premise, the Computational Storage market, driven by NGD Systems, is ready for significant growth in 2019.

May 2019|

‘‘

NGD Systems unites compute and storage for Edge AI in the highest capacity and most power efficient NVMe storage solution available.

— Nader Salessi, CEO & Founder NGD Systems

Unique and Upgraded NGD Systems built their Newport Platform to ensure customers did not have to re-invent their platforms, add additional products to an already crowded market or even force net new rack level hardware buys. By selling an ‘off the shelf’ compatible NVMe SSD that offers compute acceleration at the device, the barrier to entry and ease of deployment are unmatched by other AI point solutions in the space.

Modern Approach is the Solution The company believes “Because the market ingests more data than it really needs, and we cannot get access to the results of the data mining activities fast enough with current AI solutions, there is a need to remove data movement bottlenecks.” By executing compute related applications inside the storage device (In-Situ Processing), NGD offers customers a way to remove that bottleneck and achieve near real-time results in ways never before seen.

Evolving with Time As technology advancement and equipment needs grow, the world will continue to drive for more and more data generation. The need for the tools to manage that data |May 2019

continues to evolve. With a platform that offers an unlimited and scalable model to support real-time change in SW and HW needs, the NGD Systems solution is positioned to ensure today and tomorrow’s success in managing that data at scale. The ability to ‘re-purpose’ and turn the compute resources on and off at the end customer provide the flexibility that ensure growth and adaptability.

Testimonials “NGD Systems solution has been able to solve a problem we identified over 5 years ago in a way that could never before be accomplished.” Researcher at Microsoft “This solution provided the exact right path to close our issue without significant re-design or deployment costs”.

“The ability to realize the need for compute at the Edge, related to AI or not, cannot be found in another solution.”

Sr. Dir, Server OEM “Their products offered the perfect balance of capacity, form factor, and power, along with compute offload, that makes our Edge deployment truly innovative and leading edge for our customers”.

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HOW TO DO YOUR BEST WORK WHEN YOU'RE NOT ACTUALLY WORKING! Maintaining a personal and professional life balance

I Tessa Clarke Co-Founder & CEO

OLIO

n my role as chief evangeliser for OLIO – the world’s only neighbour-to-neighbour food sharing app – I speak about our work and journey at a lot of events. And without fail I’m almost always asked something along the lines of “How do you juggle having a family with a start-up?” Whilst this is an extremely valid question – and it touches on a topic that’s very close to my heart, it really frustrates me because I never hear the same question levelled at male peers. As a result, this seemingly innocuous question is laden with an enormous amount of gender bias, generally to the exclusion of men. I would suggest that if we want to achieve a fulfilled balanced life for all – male and female – we have to ensure that we’re all participating in this debate about work/life balance, and that inclusivity needs to be the starting point.

Another challenge in this area is, funnily enough, the gender bias experienced by men who choose to be the “stay at home Dad”! Several years ago my husband and I decided that given our respective career paths and motivations in life, it made sense for me to be the “bread winner” and for him to look after our two kids and home, whilst developing property in his remaining time. This has given me the flexibility to pursue the opportunities for OLIO with full vigour, and has been absolutely invaluable in terms of helping me to achieve a balanced life. However, sadly, my husband experiences more than the occasional disparaging passing comment and has even been asked “When are you going to get a proper job?” Thankfully he has no self-

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Expert’s Column

esteem issues, and thinks he has the best job in the world!

But I highly doubt that in this day and age anyone would ever dare say this to a woman; and so why to a man? If women are to be truly equal in the workplace – and to achieve a balanced life, then we need to adjust our perceptions of what it means to be a male in a modern society, and accept that this will require men to taking on an increasingly prominent role in the delivery of childcare – which is to the benefit of all involved, not least the children!

Gender issues aside, I spend a considerable amount of mental energy working towards achieving a ‘balanced life’.

I prefer the terminology of a ‘balanced life’ rather than ‘work/life balance’, because when you’re an entrepreneur (and especially an entrepreneur working from home), the two can become very mixed! And to suggest that ‘work’ and ‘life’ are the antithesis of one another surely isn’t what we should aspire to. In the very early days of setting up OLIO, it was pretty much impossible to lead a balanced life because we had to achieve so much, in so little time, and with virtually no resources. As we’ve grown the business and the team however, both Saasha my Co-Founder and I have achieved a much more balanced life – which is important, because the start-up journey is a series of marathons, not a sprint, and so it’s essential to avoid burnout. We find that working predominantly from home is extremely helpful in achieving balance (5-10 hours per week gained back through not having to commute!), and we both carve out time during our working days to exercise. In the early days we used to feel quite guilty about exercising when we ‘should’ be working, but now we recognise that if we’re to perform at our best then we need to be mentally and physically fit and exercise is absolutely critical for this.

Plus, I find that I have many of my best insights and inspirations for OLIO when working out, so it really is killing two birds with one stone!

As well as working towards a balanced life for ourselves, we’ve really baked this into the DNA of the company too.

And this has manifested itself in a couple of important company policies. The first is our holiday policy – we have no cap on the number of day’s holiday an employee can take; however we do have a minimum and insist that everybody has at least 20 days off. This is because we saw research from other companies who had adopted a limitless holidays policy, and it actually showed that the number of days worked by employees increased, not decreased! We also think it’s really important for the team to have a collective break over the Christmas holidays so everyone can really relax, confident in the knowledge that their email inbox isn’t rapidly filling up! We also ensure that in every |May 2019

employee’s induction, we talk about the importance of a balanced life, and in our line manager training, we stress that the line manager is responsible for working with their direct reports to ensure that they are achieving a balanced life. What this means is that on a day to day basis our team chat will often show someone walking the dog at mid-day, someone else with their kids at 3pm and others heading off to swim or yoga. Each team member is responsible for ensuring that their work is done, according to whatever schedule best suits them, and as a result, we have an incredibly motivated and productive team, the majority of who say that working for OLIO is the best job they’ve ever had! If you aren’t already talking about how you can achieve a balanced life as individuals and as a company, then I can highly recommend spending some time on it, as the rewards will be enormous!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Tessa Clarke is the Co-Founder and CEO of OLIO, a free app tackling the problem of food waste by connecting neighbours with each other, and volunteers with local businesses, so that surplus food can be shared, not thrown away. Since its inception in 2016, 850,000 people have joined OLIO and have together shared over 1.2 million portions of food.

OLIO also publishes ZeroWasteWeekly.com, a website and newsletter that aggregates all the best zero waste news from around the world.

Prior to founding OLIO, Tessa spent 10 years as a digital Managing Director in the media, retail and nancial services sectors, and gained her MBA from Stanford. Tessa is passionate about the sharing economy as a solution for a sustainable world, and is equally passionate about the importance of leading a ‘balanced life’.

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AI

Moving Towards Transformation of Industries

I

n the recent years, Artificial Intelligence (AI) has transformed various industries and helped to perform better and achieve success in their respective arena. An ideal amalgamation of human intelligence and machines has proven that it can create wonders in the businesses. This attachment of human intellect with the machine assists businesses, to automate their day-to-day activities, to understand customer behaviors, to decrease work expenditures and to create occurrences on an individual level.

Therefore, business individuals need to keep a close eye on the latest developments occurring in AI industry. This information can be vital as they can utilize AI in areas where it can create profit for them.

There are various industries that are already utilizing AI in their respective business functions and are getting benefited.

Following are some of the leading industries that have utilized AI as an instrument to optimize their operations: 1. Healthcare Healthcare sector has shown a positive response to assimilate AI in its field. That is the reason; Healthcare has received enormous funding to develop and execute AI. The modern day machine intelligence is assisting healthcare sector to examine medical data extracted from X-rays, CT scans and various other tests.

Segregation of this information is important as doctors go through the patient's history to check and diagnose illness.

Healthcare experts are dependent on their years of experience and prefabricated algorithms to acknowledge the symptoms of an illness. However, sometimes they overlook and make mistakes unconsciously. A BBC report titled 'AI Early Diagnosis Could Save Heart and Cancer Patient' stated that

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Infrastructure Transformation nearly 20% of experienced doctors make mistakes while diagnosing patient's illness. Therefore, this arduous as well as daunting task is certainly made easier by AI. There are famous examples of utilization of AI in healthcare sector. The Babylon AI doctor app avails speech recognition to interact with patients cross-examines carefully against its database and provides necessary treatment. Another interesting healthcare AI, Molly by Sense.ly -virtual nurse app- links patients to scientific recommendations and help, with the assistance of proprietary categorization engine pays attention to the patients and replies appropriate response to them. Microsoft's Hanover project utilizes machine comprehension with natural language processing to forecast productive cancer drug compatible to the patient.

2. Automobile and Logistics Automobile industry is witnessing crucial shifts such as autonomous driving, connectivity, electrification and divided mobility. It is anticipated that the automobile industry will experience rise in economic growth by shifting from conventional to disruptive technologies and unconventional business models.

On October 14 2015, Tesla announced that it is going to launch an autopilot car i.e. a car with self-driving capability.

The car is expected to drive itself from coast-to-coast with the help of autonomous navigation. Other car makers are aiming to implant AI services like Amazon's Alexa. This will authorize passengers to self-command car technologies with the help of natural language voice orders.

German premium car maker Mercedes-Benz has deployed voice command personal assistant in CES show 2018 held in Las Vegas. Its arch business rival BMW followed the footsteps and decided to adopt Alexa and its assimilation into its handpicked BMW and mini automobiles. KIA Motors has also proclaimed that it is thinking about assimilating Google assistant in its cars.

It is the need of the hour for any business to perform better in its services and increase profit as much as possible. It is expected that machine learning (ML) will empower systems to an extent that they will comprehend the data and utilize it to increase their performance. This is where AI comes into the picture. The association between AI and ML can create wonders in logistics, where time is a paramount entity.

The logistics sector gathers extensive data from diverse sources such as websites, smartphones and various telematics tools. Predictive analytics not only rearranges delivery schedule but also predicts subsequent orders which gives logistics sector an advantage to utilize its resources effectively.

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Interestingly, AI does not stop there. It assists in semiautonomous driver assistance, autonomous fleets for ride sharing, engine overseer and forecasting maintenance for automobiles.

Also, AI has been assisting logistics sector to construct supply chains beforehand with the help of advanced systems. This computer assistance in automobiles delivers goods in the efficient manner which is essential for the success of a logistics company. The forecasting helps logistics to avoid disastrous calamities such as difficult weather situations, traffic delays and many unexpected occurrences.

3. Marketing and Advertising Marketing sector has changed drastically over the years.

Customers anticipate for a personal experience and it is the need of the hour for marketing sector to change itself and adjust accordingly. They are required to leave the conventional methods of marketing and concentrate on enhancing their communication, execute demands as well as aspiration. This adaptation of AI is vital for marketing sector as reluctance to implement this new technology can lead to loss of business for the company.

Virtual Assistants such as Amazon Echo as well as Google Home incorporates 'Routines' attributes which allow these Virtual Assistants to carry out many tasks on a single command given by the user. This means a user can create a 'Routine' command which will instruct the Virtual Assistant to start multiple tasks it supposed to execute.

Industries are constantly trying to update themselves by adapting new technologies. AI is transforming industries and helping them to grow their businesses. It is going to advance into more sectors. It will help human beings to operate risky tasks, decode universal issues and take care of various human tasks. We can definitely anticipate a future where AI will be the new normal.

AI assists marketers to find and forecast customer attitudes.

This precious information allows marketers to carry out impactful keywords and communicate with consumers on a more personal level. Moreover, chatbots also help to execute this communication in a less expensive, effective and in a persistent way.

On top of it, AI generates ideas which are subdivided into many sub ideas. This way the risk of catering a sole idea is eliminated and various ideas can be catered according to customers and their preferences. Brands have started to acclimatize on this useful technology and are focusing on selected customers. Startups have also begun to apply AI with the help of AI automated personalization and compelling video content.

4. Virtual Assistant A Virtual Assistant can help you to handle smart home devices. This feature will allow you to administer door locks, lights, appliances and many smart home devices. There are Virtual Assistants available in the market, which show the capacity to function as an intercom. A user needs to place Virtual Assistants in every room to communicate with others.

Amazon Echo's 'Drop In' feature enables users to interact with each other from different rooms.

Users can also utilize Virtual Assistants to shut down and start TV sets on compatible television models. In addition, a Virtual Assistant in the kitchen can also be utilized to handle kitchen machines.

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May 2019|

10

The

Most Solution Providers 2019

Solvera Lynx Delivering Comprehensive Solutions for Energy Management

E

nergy management is no longer an engineering issue, but a question of infrastructure which is based on information and communications technologies.

In order to improve operational processes and energy efficiency, companies need to invest in energy management.

The ultimate success depends on the ability of system and devices to securely and reliably interconnect via a network, believes Solvera Lynx and thus, provides innovative and comprehensive solutions for smart energy management (EM).

Solvera Lynx combines interdisciplinary knowledge in energy, information, and economy and introduces modern information technology and advanced energy services to the demanding technical fields of energy, industry, and transport.

Holistic Approach Solvera Lynx provides a cost-effective package of integrated software and hardware that guarantees a complete overview of its customers’ energy consumption.

Implementation of its solutions allows companies to accomplish primary EM goals including holistic monitoring of energy efficiency performance and reduction of energy consumption.

A wide range of business applications can benefit from Solvera Lynx’s solutions which include Energy & Utilities,

Telecom, Oil and Gas, Factories, Building and Facilities, Industry, Agriculture, Smart City, Transport, and Logistics.

The company has already provided tailor-made solutions for the projects including smart metering (electricity, gas, water, air renewable energy), volume monitoring (fuel tanks/containers), different types of analyses (air quality, temperature, humidity), tracking/localization, and machine status monitoring.

Comprehensive Solutions with Multi Benefits Introduction of new energy management system and usage of Solvera Lynx’s innovative software (GemaLogic®) and hardware (ComBox.L®) solutions brings the following benefits to its customers:Holistic control over energy useØ Digitalization of energy data Ø Consolidation of all energy data in one place, no switching between systems Ø Establishment of a benchmarking process & insights into energy consumption (energy efficiency KPIs) Ø Quick identification of areas for improvement Lower energy consumption by up to 7%Ø Reduction of energy consumption through monitoring and analysis detecting problematic areas that can be improved with minimal or no capital investment Ø Transparency of energy saving actions Ø Detecting leakages Lower energy costsØ Reduced energy use = reduced energy bill Ø A tax refund / financial aid in the form EBRD credit or development schemes Ø Cutting down on maintenance costs due to reduced stress on systems Ø Introduction of energy alerts and shortened reaction time in the event of a malfunction Ecology Ø Reduced energy consumption Ø Reduced carbon footprint Compliance with the latest energy management standardsØ Obtaining the ISO50001 certificate - a recognized

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‘‘

By controlling energy use, we help some of the most important companies in the fields of energy, manufacturing, infrastructure and transport.

— Klemen Logar Sales Director Solvera Lynx

international standard that helps companies to improve corporate image and credibility among their customers, clients, and stakeholders An Ardent Marketer Solvera Lynx has interdisciplinary team of experts from various streams. Among that team, one of its core members is its Sales Director, Klemen Logar. Klemen is an ardent marketer and passionate about sales and marketing, as it brings new challenges to him on daily basis. He believes that every account is different and therefore, thinking out of the box is crucial for success. This drives him forward to go an extra mile to help customers grow their business and profitability. Ø

Klemen carries ability to establish credibility with decision makers through his consulting approach. This in turn enables him to assist companies from various fields to accomplish primary energy management goals.

Staying ahead in the Competition Solvera Lynx delivers end-to- end solutions for holistic energy management with advanced software & hardware.

The company develops its software and hardware solution in-house, and thus, it is ready for almost any EM challenge, which requires custom-made, unique, future-oriented solutions. It has an interdisciplinary Energy Management team of experts (IT, ICT, energy management) with 17 year+ experience and professional energy management certification.

In addition, Solvera Lynx also holds the certifications of TÜV SÜD, ISO, LoRaWAN, which exemplifies its qualitative approach. Besides these, the company has the

|May 2019

real experience of working in the hardest industrial environments which include inhospitable, with high moisture rate, extreme temperature conditions and farspread production areas where LoRaWAN communication is the only suitable alternative to the classical wired system or 3G/4G networks.

Satisfied Clienteles “Solvera Lynx has helped us to join the top 10 % most energy-efficient cement factories in Europe. Our company wanted to understand into details the energy flow through the company and we were looking for a system to handle energy consumption data automatically. After 16 months of good operations, we are highly satisfied with our choice”, Salonit is now able to monitor its energy efficiency performance. The good thing is that we now have a reliable picture of energy consumption which is shared throughout the organization. We plan to reduce our energy consumption in the long run.”- Magda Gabrijelcic, Energy Manager in Salonit Anhovo Company “By using the GemaLogic energy management system here at BTC d.d., we are able to track the consumption of different energy sources in all our objects from a single reading point in a simple and easy-to-use way. The system is an excellent tool for monitoring the data, setting alarms and enables us to use energy effectively and cut energy costs.”- Tomaž Damjan, BTC Company

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Fostering a Risk-based

Company Culture connected approach, information lacks operational context and is inevitably segmented and looked at in silos, rather than holistically.

I

For example, almost every department has some type of incident management capability, but most incidents are cross-functional in nature. This makes it difficult to resolve incidents where one department’s or group’s activities have upstream or downstream impacts, which are often unknown. This collateral damage is avoidable through enterprise risk management and is the way 100% of scandals waiting to happen are prevented.

It’s essential that everyone, not just risk managers, assimilate risk awareness into their job descriptions. That said, there are many factors that contribute to a healthy, risk-managing culture.

Any effective risk-based company culture is set by the “tone from the top.” Support from leadership teams makes it easier to engage front-line managers by providing context on how risks connect to strategic goals, as information moves across the organization. When information is pushed back up the chain, new insights from individuals in governance and operational roles are included. Providing this context ensures information is actionable, useful and understandable to everyone, including senior management.

n the see-through economy, the impact that new technologies like social media can have on a company’s reputation has empowered customers to demand transparency and accountability from businesses and other organizations. A recent study showed 81% of consumers would switch brands for ethical, social, or environmental reasons. This shift means PR departments can no longer control an organization’s image.

One of those factors is support from below; be it front-line employees or operational managers. I often stress that “front-line” employees (who are responsible for everyday activities) are a vital yet often overlooked resource for risk identification. A healthy company culture benefits from bottom-up involvement as well as top-down support.

A risk-based company culture builds value through its ability to achieve both top-down and bottom-up objectives.

This eliminates any misalignments between leadership’s goals and the knowledge of front-line employees, which is the primary cause of wasted resources, missed opportunities, and compliance problems. Without a

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To develop a risk-based company culture, companies should implement connected information collection and reporting systems. If you do not have ways to initiate a task that can be reassigned to the right individuals through predetermined workflows,you’re not able to ensure it gets addressed in the appropriate manner, or measure your progress against. The goal is to make it easier for different levels and silos in an organization to also escalate information appropriately, which encourages collaboration with fewer meetings.

May 2019|

Expert’s Insights

Steven Minsky CEO LogicManager

|May 2019

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Efficiency is created when these tasks are “risk-rated;” meaning prioritized on a common scale across levels and silos to determine which risks should get attention and follow-up first.

About the Author Steven Minsky is the CEO of LogicManager and author of the RIMS Risk Maturity Model. Steven is a patent author of risk and process management technology. He has 30 years of business and technology experience. Prior to LogicManager, he co-founded RulesPower. He holds MBA and MA degrees from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business and The Joseph H. Lauder Institute of International Management.

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These connections make it possible for leadership groups to pull the information they need directly from front-line employees, and avoid blame for mistakes, negligence, and missed opportunities call these types of results surprises, and in business, all surprises are bad. A company’s best bet is to ensure quality information is delivered to the right people, at the right time, and with the proper context.

A Risk-Based Approach Adds Value Many CEOs and board members have expressed concern that placing so much emphasis on implementing and sustaining a risk-based culture may increase costs or existing staff burdens.

In reality, organizations with sustainable, risk-based cultures (and effective risk management programs) have been proven to experience a 25% increase in market value on average, when compared to businesses competitors without mature ERM programs.

A risk-based company culture shouldn’t stifle anything.

Rather, risk-based concepts like regular risk assessments should enable innovation as they can better align a company’s goals to its risk management processes and overall culture. Regular risk assessments enable innovation because key risks are identified proactively, allowing them to be properly mitigated. This results in more streamlined processes and better use of resources.

There is a simple way to measure a company’s focus on its risk-based culture. Look up the customer complaints, budget variances, revenue goal achievement, stock price fluctuations, customer satisfaction reports, health and safety records, qualified audit reports, and regulatory inquiries.

Customer satisfaction and investor returns are higher when a company performs well across these categories and emphasizes the measurement of its risk culture.

May 2019|