IBM’s famous Watson supercomputer is the dominant force in machine learning across the entire IT world, and the IoT. The company is also establishing its bona fides in the blockchain world at a rapid pace. At IBM Interconnect and other recent events, the company dropped a series of announcements to cement those reputations.
First up, the availability of a new cognitive assistant that leverages IBM Watson to help IT professionals more effectively manage and protect networks of smartphones, tablets, laptops, IoT devices and other endpoints. The MaaS360 Advisor is designed to use machine learning to analyze devices on the network and recommend policies, patches and customized best practices to better manage and protect them. IBM said its MaaS360 unified endpoint management (UEM) platform is delivered via the IBM Cloud and it will address the challenge of managing device sprawl across businesses.
“There is enormous potential in unified endpoint management when you incorporate cognitive technology like Watson into MaaS360,” said Brian Jacome, Senior Product Manager, Enterprise Mobility, Royal Bank of Canada. “With this capability, we are able to get an in-depth feel of our device landscape instantly helping us make decisions faster as to where we need to evolve the platform.”
The company is meanwhile expanding its IBM Cloud to China through a new agreement announced with Wanda Internet Technology Group through the formation of a new company built on IBM's Cloud Platform. Chinese businesses will have access to select IBM cloud infrastructure and Platform as a Service technologies, according to the announcement. IBM will introduce Watson services to China through this new partnership, starting with Watson Conversation services, which allow developers to add natural language interactions between apps and customers.
The other piece of the puzzle is thanks to blockchain technology.
IBM and SecureKey Technologies have announced that they will work together to enable a new digital identity and attribute sharing network based on IBM Blockchain. The network will be designed to make it easier for consumers to verify they are who they say they are, in a privacy-enhanced, security-rich and efficient way. When launched later this year, consumers can use the network to instantly verify their identity for services such as new bank accounts, driver's licenses or utilities. The network is currently in the testing phase in Canada, and once it goes live later in 2017 Canadian consumers will be able to opt-in to the new blockchain-based service using a mobile app.
“Collaborating with partners like SecureKey and IBM in the development and implementation of solutions that make our clients’ interactions secure and seamless is essential to meeting evolving expectations in a digital world,” said Eddy Ortiz, VP, Solution Acceleration and Innovation, RBC. “Canada has an important opportunity to innovate with emerging technologies like blockchain to advance digital identity in Canada.”
The company has created what it calls the world’s first blockchain-based green asset management platform based on the open source, openly governed Hyperledger Fabric. In use by the carbon asset market in China, it is designed to allow enterprises to generate carbon assets more efficiently, helping to build a green, low-carbon and environmentally-friendly future in China. Carbon asset development, also known as CER (Carbon Emission Reduction) quota issuing, is one popular way of encouraging enterprises to decrease emissions and use low carbon emission technology.
“It is estimated that the platform will significantly shorten the carbon assets development cycle and reduce the cost of carbon assets development by 20 to 30 percent, enabling cost-effective development of a large number of carbon assets,” said Cao Yin, Chief Strategy Officer of Energy-Blockchain Labs. “Blockchain technology is expected to become an important means for effective control of carbon emissions, which is of great significance to China, the world's largest source of carbon emissions.”
The two companies completed a proof of concept in late 2016 and a beta version of the carbon asset management platform on blockchain will be released in May. Energy-Blockchain Labs and IBM intend to commercially offer this platform later this year, keeping pace with China's unified national carbon market opening.
“As an important signatory of the Paris Agreement, China must assume its responsibility for global climate governance and continue to fulfil its pre-2020 climate change action targets and build a standard nationwide carbon market,” said Li Junfeng, Director of China's National Climate Change Strategy Research and International Cooperation Center (NCSC). “We must work to limit high energy consumption and high emission industries, encourage clean energy development and further promote energy saving and emission reduction. These tasks are not only necessary for China's own sustainable development, but for the welfare of the entire human family.”
Edited by
Alicia Young
