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IBM Think goes virtual - again
This year's version of IBM Think, like most other conferences, was virtual for the second year running. This time it was broken into three segments, with general content shown everywhere and regional-specific content dropped in for each of the Americas, APAC and Japan, and EMEA and India editions.For the second year running, it was powered by IBM's own Watson Media, an AI-driven streaming solution. That's somehow appropriate since the overarching themes were AI and hybrid cloud. The event also included networking opportunities, a virtual lounge where customers could interact with subject matter experts, and an expo. Here are some of the highlights.
IBM's chairman and chief executive officer Arvind Krishna kicked off the conference by charting the company's course for the future. It's centred around hybrid cloud and artificial intelligence (AI), which product-wise means heavy reliance on Red Hat OpenShift and IBM Watson."IBM is all-in on hybrid cloud," he said. "A hybrid cloud strategy is about meeting you where you are in your journey. It's about giving you the ability to leverage the capabilities and benefits of the cloud across a whole spectrum of environments, including the edge. With hybrid cloud, you extend your data center to the cloud, you consistently and securely deploy any app to any location."He noted that despite the excitement, only 25 per cent of workloads have so far moved to the cloud."A hybrid cloud approach helps overcome the challenges that prevent companies from moving to the cloud," he said. "That's why I believe hybrid cloud will define the technology strategy of businesses over the next decade."
Krishna said that, according to IDC, data will grow to about 175 zettabytes by 2025 – the equivalent capacity of a stack of Blu-ray disks tall enough to go to the moon and back 23 times."What we are seeing today is that it is data, not just software, that is eating the world," he said. "The only way we know how to make sense of the phenomenal amount of data is artificial intelligence. At a global level, AI is slated to unlock almost $16 trillion in productivity by 2030, according to a study by PwC. In the same way that we have electrified every factory and machine in the past century, we will infuse AI into every software and system in the 21st century. So we are really thrilled about this potential for AI to transform business everywhere."IBM's 
During a pre-event press conference, IBM president Jim Whitehurst reported on the progress that's been made in fulfilling the vision presented at last year's conference.Despite significant progress, there are still issues to address. Whitehurst pointed out that it's easy to pick a cloud, but it's very hard to move applications to it. That led to the development of two products announced at the conference: Mono2Micro (using technology developed for 
Over the course of the conference, IBM made a series of product announcements, mainly (surprise) around cloud and AI. In addition to Watson Orchestrate, we saw:
In the tech world, there's something about garages that says "innovation". Sometimes the garage is a physical location, but not in IBM's case. 
Customers want things fast and easy, and they want engagement, said Brian Loveys, director of offering management focusing on the use of Watson AI in customer experience at IBM, and that's where AI and automation come in. Not only do they improve customer experience, but the technologies can also save companies money by dealing with routine calls, allowing humans to handle what they do best. He spoke with customers who have successfully done just that.The first was Melanie Cheng-Kai-On, director of digital channels at courier company 
Collette Smith, vice-president of clinical services and human resources, chief nursing officer at 
Bestselling author and co-founder of Pushkin Industries Malcolm Gladwell sat down with organizational psychologist and professor at Wharton School Adam Grant for a lively discussion about whether the pandemic would radically change the way we live and work in the future.Grant said that when he went to CEOs in 2018 and suggested that the future of work might be hybrid, so perhaps they could experiment with allowing people to work from anywhere one day a week, they turned him down."They said, 'We don't want to open Pandora's box, we think people will procrastinate constantly and our culture is going to fall apart,' and a lot of those CEOs have started rethinking it. Some of them announced they're going to be permanently remote, many others are at least rolling out hybrid plans, and so I don't think that flexibility is going away," he said.Gladwell argued that when he was young, going to the office was exciting, and he learned a lot."If you're a company that employs young people, can you really hire the best and brightest young people by saying, 'we're gonna have you work out of your apartment or a Starbucks' is nuts to me."Grant agreed to a point but said he doesn't think requiring people to be in the office every day will work either. He cited the example of Brazilian company Semco Partners, who offered employees the option to buy back one day a week for ten per cent of their salary. Semco thought the notion would appeal to older workers, but it is most popular with employees in their 20s and 30s."I think this is going to be a competitive advantage for companies moving forward," he said. "The organizations that are willing to give you that little bit of flexibility are going to do a much better job attracting motivating and retaining people than the ones that say you have to be here all the time."
IBM president Jim Whitehurst closed out the conference by first echoing Krishna's comments about the power of technology to not only change IT systems that support the business, but to change business models, the way people work, and even corporate culture."That's why technology decisions that we make today are so important, because we know they'll have the potential to shape your business for decades to come," he said. "So the question is, what kind of shape do you want your business to take?"He went on, "I have a passion for all things open: open standards, open organizations, open cultures. These aren't moral choices; these are strategic business decisions based on market realities. In the digital economy, companies compete on the basis of innovation - those that produce innovation more quickly, efficiently, and effectively when. It's that simple." For those reasons, he believes Red Hat OpenShift is a transformative technology. Its open approach to innovation has a ripple effect that goes beyond technology to corporate culture, even at IBM.He concluded with a discussion with Scott Kirby, CEO of United Airlines, on how United's investments in technology are helping it weather the storm of COVID disruption and address organizational problems.Kirby said, "Our goal, frankly, is to be more than just 'make a difference at United', but to show the path for others to do the same kind of thing so that when we look back 20 years from now, the world feels different than it feels today."
