Dublin, Ireland Adopts Smarter Approach on Its Road to Recovery

Ireland’s capital, Dublin, is one of the oldest in Europe. Because its city council wants to maintain the city’s historic fabric, city policy today prevents new roads from being built in some of the most historic areas. But with traffic congestion worsening, the city sought an efficient solution to its traffic woes. To that end, it’s partnered with IBM to collect and analyze data to help tackle its congestion, all part of a push towards making Dublin a Smarter City.

Ireland’s capital: an IBM Smarter City testbed

Today, journey information is released and updated by Dublin city council every minute, enabling residents to go online and find the quickest route to their destination. In addition, research is being conducted in Ireland on similar problems that might be tackled by joining up existing databases. The work is part of IBM’s Smarter Planet initiative, part of which emphasizes applying analytics to solve pressing problems. Read more in The Guardian.

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- Posted by Regan Kelly. Part of our June 2013 theme on the environment and sustainability.

It’s Simple: Predictive Analytics = Higher Profitability

George Makovic

Need a statistical sherpa to help you navigate the mountains of Big Data? Though predictive analytics can be a daunting discipline, companies who have adopted Predictive Analytics can see higher profitability than their competitors, says George Makovic, Senior Development Manager, IBM Business Analytics.

In his guest post at Business Analytics Blog, learn what you need to know about useful statistical analysis and data mining. Read more.

And coming up: don’t miss the IBM Business Analytics Virtual Launch event June 11 and see how IBM’s new analytics solution will make big data more accessible and serve as a catalyst to propagate the use of advanced analytics throughout the enterprise.

Details here.

Register for the event.:

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How has the rise of Big Data affected your business? Let us know in the Leave a Reply field – share your story!

 

 

- Posted by Regan Kelly. Part of our May 2013 theme of emerging trends.

Mobile Business Isn’t Your Devices, It’s What’s BETWEEN Them

Mobile business is more than devices; it’s what you can do with the data between them.

In other words, the mobile world is open for business. Learn more.

Related:

IBM Mobile First

See it in action

IBM Offerings

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- Posted by Regan Kelly

1st Quarter 2013 Earnings: How Did IBM Do?

- from IBM.com

IBM today announced first-quarter 2013 diluted earnings of $2.70 per share, a year-to-year increase of 3 percent.  Operating (non-GAAP) diluted earnings were $3.00 per share, compared with operating diluted earnings of $2.78 per share in the first quarter of 2012, an increase of 8 percent.

First-quarter net income was $3.0 billion, down 1 percent year-to-year. Operating (non-GAAP) net income was $3.4 billion compared with $3.3 billion in the first quarter of 2012, an increase of 3 percent.

Total revenues for the first quarter of 2013 of $23.4 billion were down 5 percent (down 3 percent, adjusting for currency) from the first quarter of 2012.

“In the first quarter, we grew operating net income, earnings per share and expanded operating margins but we did not achieve all of our goals in the period. Despite a solid start and good client demand we did not close a number of software and mainframe transactions that have moved into the second quarter.  The services business performed as expected with strong profit growth and significant new business in the quarter,” said Ginni Rometty, IBM chairman, president and chief executive officer.

Virginia Rometty, IBM President & CEO

“Looking ahead, in addition to closing those transactions, we expect to benefit from investments we are making in our growth initiatives and from the actions we are taking to improve under-performing parts of the business.  We remain confident in this model of continuous transformation and in our ability to deliver our full-year 2013 operating earnings per share expectation of at least $16.70.”

Read more in the official press release.

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- Posted by Regan Kelly

The Replay: Watch Ginni Rometty’s Historic Speech to the Council on Foreign Relations

In case you missed IBM CEO Ginni Rometty‘s historic speech last week before the Council on Foreign Relations, there’s good news: the replay is now available for you to watch anytime.

Ginni Rometty

In these early days of the 21^st century, Big Data, analytics, cloud, mobile and social technologies are transforming our world.  This new era of computing provides the instrumentation, interconnection and intelligence that make it possible to build a smarter planet.

But, in order to do so, countries, cities, corporations and individuals need to rethink how they go about achieving their goals. Watch the speech, followed by a Q&A session with the audience.

Join the conversation by using the hashtags #IBM and #CFRlive.

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Greater IBMers, let us know your thoughts in the Leave a Reply field below.

– Posted by Regan Kelly, Editor/Community Manager, The Greater IBM Connection

Wrapping Up Feb: Big Data and Smarter Analytics

Our theme for February was ‘Analytics’, and what better way to wrap up the month than with the IBM Smarter Analytics Leadership Summit held in New York City on February 21.  Here’s a replay of one of the two keynote addresses:

To learn more about how leaders are using big data and analytics to improve their business and download presentation materials from each of the five leadership tracks, check out IBM Analytics.

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–Posted by Julie Yamamoto, Program Manager, The Greater IBM Connection

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The February 2013 theme for The Greater IBM Connection was ”analytics”.

IBM to Acquire Star Analytics, Inc

IBM has announced a definitive agreement to acquire the software portfolio of Star Analytics Inc., a privately held business analytics company headquartered in Redwood City, California. The combination of IBM and Star Analytics software will further advance IBM’s business analytics initiatives, allowing organizations to gain faster access and real-time insight into specialized data sources.

With growing challenges in gaining a more complete view into varying types of data, companies are increasingly looking for ways to automate and provide business users with self-service access to critical information. Star Analytics software addresses a rising challenge for organizations: helping to automatically integrate essential information, reporting applications and business intelligence tools across their enterprises, on premise or from cloud computing environments. The software removes typical custom coding for specialized sources that is hard to maintain, and eliminates cumbersome manual processes.

“IBM sees an enormous opportunity for our clients to apply Star Analytics to the information they have stored in their financial applications,” said Leslie J Rechan, General Manager, IBM Business Analytics.  “And to then easily access it within their IBM performance management and business intelligence solutions.”  Read the rest.

Analytics: New Power Systems from IBM Challenge HP, Oracle and Dell For SMB Apps

- Forbes.com, Tom Groenfeldt

As Dell and HP struggle to figure out their businesses, IBM is moving into their territory with Power Systems starting at $5,947 at the low end of its newly launched Power line of computers. “With these new systems, IBM is forging an aggressive expanding of its Power and Storage Systems business into SMB and growth markets,” said Rod Atkins, senior vice president of IBM Systems and Technology Group.

“Big data and cloud systems that were once only affordable to large enterprises are now available to the masses.”

Colin Parris, VP, IBM Power Systems (photo, IBM Systems Magazine)

The systems have more power, greater stability and manageability because they’re are integrated from design through production, said Colin Parris, general manager, IBM Power Systems. Read the rest of the story.

 

IBM’s Watson Is Off to College: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

IBM will donate a powerful version of its Watson computing system, a repeat winner on long-running quiz show Jeopardy! in 2011, to the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) for research and development in big data, analytics and cognitive computing. The supercomputer already has been used in health care, analyzing thousands of pages of the latest medical research, suggesting diagnoses and treatments, etc.; and in financial services.

 

 

IBM says that Watson has a unique ability to understand the subtle nuances of human language, sift through vast amounts of data to provide answers.

“Access to the Watson system will enable new research in cognitive computing as it relates to a diverse range of scientific and engineering fields,” said Shirley Ann Jackson, president of RPI. “The experience of working on Watson will give our students an advantage as they compete for the best jobs in Big Data, analytics, and cognitive computing.”

Gartner estimates that the U.S. will create 1.9 million big data jobs by 2015 – which means that experience with a cutting-edge system like Watson may well become a valuable skill in the marketplace. Get the rest of the story (Forbes.com).

4th Quarter 2012 Earnings: How Did IBM Do?

- from IBM.com

IBM has announced its fourth-quarter 2012 diluted earnings of $5.13 per share, compared with diluted earnings of $4.62 per share in the fourth quarter of 2011, an increase of 11 percent. Operating (non-GAAP) diluted earnings were $5.39 per share, compared with operating diluted earnings of $4.71 per share in the fourth quarter of 2011, an increase of 14 percent.

Fourth-quarter net income was $5.8 billion compared with $5.5 billion in the fourth quarter of 2011, an increase of 6 percent. Operating (non-GAAP) net income was $6.1 billion compared with $5.6 billion in the fourth quarter of 2011, an increase of 10 percent.

Virginia Rometty

Total revenues for the fourth quarter of 2012 of $29.3 billion decreased 1 percent (flat adjusting for currency) from the fourth quarter of 2011. Without the impact of the divested Retail Store Solutions (RSS) business, revenue increased 1 percent, adjusting for currency.

“We achieved record profit, earnings per share and free cash flow in 2012. Our performance in the fourth quarter and for the full year was driven by our strategic growth initiatives — growth markets, analytics, cloud computing, Smarter Planet solutions — which support our continued shift to higher-value businesses,” said Ginni Rometty, IBM chairman, president and chief executive officer.

“Looking ahead, we continue to invest to deliver innovations for the enterprise in key areas such as big data, mobile solutions, social business and security, while expanding into new markets and reaching new clients. We are well on track toward our long-term roadmap for operating EPS of at least $20 in 2015.”

Read the rest of the story here.

Tune in anytime to watch the replay of Mark Loughridge, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, Finance and Enterprise Transformation, discussing IBM’s fourth quarter earnings.

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