CXO DX July 2023

RAMAN NARAYAN

Co-Founder & Editor in Chief

narayan@leapmediallc.com

Mob: +971-55-7802403

DRIVING SUSTAINABILITY

Several important trends have manifested in recent years and the disruption caused by emergence of new technologies and innovations is indeed resetting goals for mankind. Along the way, we have tremendous existential challenges to surmount because of the alarming rate at which climate change is happening. As organizations get serious about ESG goals, IT has a key role to plan in helping them with solutions to achieve those goals by helping with necessary quality data collection from different systems, automating those processes and with reporting on a consistent basis in real time as well. In addition, sustainability and ESG objectives driven IT strategies need to come to the forefront as well.

Enterprises need better understanding of their data to help understand where they can possibly advance their defined ESG objectives such as for instance looking to reduce wastage in raw materials procured in a manufacturing vertical for instance or from leakage of water in a hospitality facility for instance or around any other similar metric. All of this will need better data collection for decision making on a dashboard and IT can look at making this possible to help advance sustainability goals where possible. IT leaders can ensure IT itself is following the sustainability path by looking to reduce carbon emissions such as moving to public cloud as much as possible rather than running a local data centre, ensuring better server utilizations and energy efficiencies. Enabling hybrid work as well could go a long way in reducing collective reduction in carbon footprint with lesser people commuting every day for instance to their workplaces even as work itself gets done by employees working on remote basis.

For Organizations and IT leaders, the onus is to embrace sustainability sooner than later as an urgent priority, especially in the background of COP 28 being held in the UAE from 30 November to 12 December this year.

SAUMYADEEP HALDER

Co-Founder & MD

saumyadeep@leapmediallc.com

Mob: +971-54-4458401

Sunil Kumar Designer Nihal Shetty Webmaster

MALLIKA REGO

Co-Founder & Director Client Solutions

mallika@leapmediallc.com

Mob: +971-50-2489676

20 » REIMAGINING NETOPS AND SECOPS

Mohammed Al-Moneer, Sr. Regional Director, META Region, Infoblox discusses the recent rebranding of the company as well as the company’s initiatives in the region

22 » ENHANCING THE SECURITY EDGE

Jamil Abu Aqel head of Mandiant systems engineering for MEA and Emerging region, Google Cloud discusses the focus of solutions from Mandiant, now part of Google Cloud.

14 » RESETTING TRANSFORMATION GOALS

As organizations review their digital transformation goals, they will need to look at, consolidating cloud strategies, incorporating generative AI tools, shoring up cybersecurity along with including a proactive approach toward achieving ESG objectives.

18 » AHEAD OF THE CURVE

The demand for flexible and reliable connectivity solutions has soared says Sakkeer Hussain, Director - Sales & Marketing, D-Link MEA

24 » HOW SASE CAN SOLVE A LOT OF PROBLEMS AT ONCE

Across the GCC, as businesses continue to digitize, the performance-vs-security issue can be largely resolved through SASE says Toni El Inati - RVP Sales, META & CEE, Barracuda Networks.

26 » 5 BENEFITS EVERY DATA-FIRST MANUFACTURER ENJOYS

Vibhu Kapoor, Regional VP - MEA & India, Epicor explains why Data-first, technology-forward manufacturing companies are trailblazers in today’s digital economy.

28 » ENSURING A HOLISTIC APPROACH TO CYBERSECURITY

Hadi Jaafarawi, MD for Middle East, Qualys discusses 3 areas of focus that can prevent the MEA region’s cybersecurity investments going to waste.

30 » WHAT IS QUIET QUITTING? AND HOW CAN TECHNOLOGY HELP?

Ekta Puthran, Head of Sales APAC & MEA - Collaboration, Barco Shares insights from Barco Research into the challenges of quiet quitting across the hybrid environment.

31 » WHY ADAPTIVE AI SHOULD MATTER TO YOUR BUSINESS

Erick Brethenoux, Distinguished VP Analyst, Gartner says Adaptive AI brings adaptability and resilience into design into organizations.

32 » HOW DOES YOUR BOARD MEASURE CYBER RESILIENCE?

Deryck Mitchelson, Field CISO at Check Point Software writes that adopting a prevention-first approach is crucial when it comes to shoring up resilience.

34 » SIGNIFICANCE OF ECM & BPM

Rahul Bhatia - VP - Sales & Practice Head - ECM And Conversational AI at Finesse talks about the growing significance of ECM and BPM

OOREDOO AND DELL TECHNOLOGIES SIGN MOU

Ooredoo will explore the Dell APEX offerings to simplify its cloud experiences and gain more control over its applications and data

Ooredoo will be able to eliminate unnecessary complexity and inefficiency, thereby freeing up its teams to focus on innovation. The collaboration complements Ooredoo’s current IT environment and builds on the existing technology centered around Dell’s infrastructure, storage and cyber recovery services.

Ooredoo and Dell Technologies have signed a memorandum of understanding to strengthen existing collaboration, simplify digital transformation initiatives and explore new growth opportunities through Dell’s APEX multicloud portfolio.

The memorandum was signed by Adrian McDonald, EMEA President, Dell Technologies and Sheikh Ali Bin Jabor Al Thani, CEO, Ooredoo Qatar, during the

annual Dell Technologies World 2023.

Through the agreement, Ooredoo will explore the Dell APEX offerings to simplify its cloud experiences and gain more control over its applications and data. Dell APEX will allow Qatar’s leading communications service provider to seamlessly manage and orchestrate its workloads while optimizing performance, minimizing risk and ensuring high network availability.

Adrian McDonald, EMEA President, Dell Technologies said, “In a competitive telecoms sector, consistent performance, improved efficiency and scalability are key differentiators that enable service providers to stand out and take advantage of new opportunities. We look forward to supporting Ooredoo with tailored technologies that align with its diversification and growth efforts. The Dell APEX solutions will help Ooredoo to remain agile and offer enhanced services to its corporate customers.”

QUALYS ANNOUNCES DEPLOYMENT OF NEW CLOUD PLATFORM IN SAUDI ARABIA

Makes its entire portfolio available in the cloud, allowing security teams to eliminate data silos and gain comprehensive visibility of assets from a single interface

Qualys, a pioneer and leading provider of cloud-based IT, security, and compliance solutions, launched Qualys Cloud Platform (CP) in Saudi Arabia to help organizations across the Kingdom to localize their cybersecurity and comply with an array of regulatory requirements, including those related to data residency.

“Qualys’ cloud service is built for visibility in a cloud-first world, helping public and private enterprises to take back control of their environments while ensuring that data remains within their domestic borders,” said Hadi Jaafarawi, Managing Director, Middle East, at Qualys.

“Saudi Arabia’s public and private sectors are transforming rapidly to align with

the principles set out in Vision 2030, but recent expansions in the attack surface, brought about by cloud migration and remote work, make these innovators prime targets for threat actors. Entities like NCA and SAMA, the Kingdom’s central bank] are implementing cybersecurity regulations that protect citizens and residents, such as mandating hosting of data in-country. The Saudi Qualys Cloud Platform is the ideal solution for companies and government entities looking for flexible visibility and control while ensuring they remain compliant with these new regulations.”

According to IDC, cybersecurity spending in the Kingdom stands at 2.77B SAR (approx. US$720M) in 2023, growing at a

CAGR of 12.7% from 2021 – 2026. As the Kingdom’s technology investment moves from an infrastructure- and product-centric model towards value-added professional services, government authorities have recognized the need to secure disparate architectures. Recent regulatory additions have concentrated on vulnerability, patch management and data residency.

These regulations were the driving force in Qualys’ decision to launch its cloud offering in the country. The service offers vendor consolidation and out-of-the-box local compliance while empowering security teams with a scalable solution that offers comprehensive visibility across global IT, OT, cloud, mobile and SaaS setups through a single interface.

MINDWARE ANNOUNCES PARTNERSHIP WITH GOOGLE CLOUD IN MENA

The distributor will deploy a strategy and methodology of addressing Google Cloud’s requirements to expand its business in the regional markets.

Mindware has announced the signing of a distribution agreement with Google Cloud to develop the channel and grow the business across the Middle East & North Africa (MENA) region. The agreement will see Mindware promote the Google Cloud portfolio and Workspace across the countries of United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman, Bahrain, Yemen, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine and Iraq. With the support of Google Cloud, the distributor will extend its portfolio with specialized solutions around Data & Analytics, API Management, industry-leading AI and ML services for improved business outcomes, application development and delivery acceleration.

Mindware will deploy a strategy and methodology of addressing Google Cloud’s requirements to expand its business in the regional markets. The company will deliver increased sales of Google

Cloud solutions through a new ecosystem including MSPs, ISPs, and leveraging the Mindware Cloud Marketplace and professional and support services.

With the Google Cloud portfolio, Mind-

ware partners will be able to offer their customers the flexibility to migrate, build, and optimize applications across hybrid and multi-cloud environments, while minimizing vendor lock-in, leveraging bestin-breed solutions, and meeting regulatory requirements. The collaboration will allow Mindware to strengthen its reach in the market, based on vertical solutions especially in the education sector, and the access to the open source ecosystem.

Philippe Jarre, Mindware Group President comments: “We strongly believe that the Google Cloud-Mindware partnership offers a unique opportunity for both organizations to succeed and grow in the market, particularly in the domains of data and AI. Collaborating with Google Cloud will add value to both companies, as we are going to leverage our capabilities to develop an expansive Google Cloud channel ecosystem and access hundreds of clients from different industries and market segments.”

CISCO ACCELERATES APPLICATION SECURITY STRATEGY WITH PANOPTICA

New solution helps customers secure cloud native applications, prioritize risks with precision, and accelerate development, deployment, and production

Cisco is advancing customers’ modern application security needs along their cloud journey with the introduction of a new solution.

Announced at Cisco LIVE 2023, Cisco’s Cloud Native Application Security solution, Panoptica, will now provide end-toend lifecycle protection for cloud native application environments, from development to deployment to production.

This will secure modern applications from the start and help teams identify risks easily, address alerts that matter most first, and ultimately remediate the most important vulnerabilities with powerful attack path analysis.

The capability addresses challenges that organizations worldwide are grappling

with amid surging demand for applications to drive core business processes alongside the complexity of securing application development and deployment, across hybrid and multicloud environments.

“Our customers deserve a true partner and total confidence in the protection of their critical applications, data and workloads,” said Liz Centoni, Executive Vice President, Chief Strategy Officer and General Manager of Applications at Cisco. “Panoptica offers a differentiated experience by bringing these powerful capabilities together for complete code to cloud security coverage. Backed by Cisco’s unrivaled portfolio of end-to-end security solutions, we’re here to help our customers supercharge their application security at scale.”

The innovation in Cloud Native Application Security represents an important step in Cisco’s accelerating end-to-end Security strategy. Cisco is uniquely positioned to be able to secure organizations’ networks, devices, users and now applications.

CLOUDFLARE PARTNERS WITH DATABRICKS TO SIMPLIFY DATA SHARING ACROSS CLOUDS

Cloudflare R2 is now a native integration and cost efficient partner for Databricks’ Delta Sharing, the first open data sharing standard

way of the full potential of multi-cloud analytics and AI initiatives.

Many organizations still struggle to share data across clouds, customers, teams, and with partners — they often use restrictive platforms and face maintenance burdens, exorbitant egress costs, and a lack of security. Databricks’ Delta Sharing, the industry’s first open protocol for secure data sharing, makes it simple to share data across teams, and with other organizations, regardless of which computing platforms they use.

of data sets, and with zero egress fees. This will enable joint customers to ensure they’re sharing the most up to date data sets with their partners, suppliers, and lines of businesses, without compromising security and privacy, and without unpredictable, surprise egress fees.

Cloudflare announced a partnership with Databricks, the data and AI company, to enable organizations to safely, simply, and affordably share and collaborate on live data. With Cloudflare and Databricks, joint customers can eliminate the complexity and dynamic costs that stand in the

Databricks will now support Delta Sharing from Cloudflare R2, Cloudflare’s zero egress, distributed object storage offering. This seamless integration enables data teams to share live data sets in R2 easily and efficiently, eliminating the need for complex data transfers or duplications

“We are in the midst of an AI revolution rooted in data,” said Matthew Prince, co-founder and CEO, Cloudflare. “R2 provides an amazing value proposition for companies that suffer from vendor lockin, and instead ensures developers retain the power to choose where to move and use their data. The combination of Cloudflare's massive global network and zero egress storage, along with Databricks' powerful sharing and processing capabilities, will give our joint customers the fastest, most secure, and most affordable data sharing capabilities across the globe.”

FRESHWORKS UNVEILS GENERATIVE AI ENHANCEMENTS ACROSS PRODUCT LINES

Freddy, Freshworks’ AI assistant, continues to advance to make generative AI more accessible to employees

Freshworks announced Freddy Self Service, Freddy Copilot and Freddy Insights to make artificial intelligence more accessible to every workplace. The new predictive and assistive generative AI capabilities embedded within Freshworks solutions and platform go beyond content generation and help support agents, sellers, marketers, IT teams and leaders become more efficient with a revolutionary new way to interact with their business software.

"Our goal at Freshworks is to put the power of generative AI in the hands of the Fortune five million, not just the Fortune 500 enterprise,” Girish Mathrubootham, Founder and CEO. “We’ve been helping customers run more efficient businesses with AI for half a decade and know they don't need a billion apps to do so. Every department could benefit from a workplace assistant that maximizes productivity, and that's what Freddy AI can do – for the support agent, sales person, mar-

keter, IT manager, HR professional, developer and more."

The new Freddy AI capabilities leverage Freshworks’ domain expertise in sales, marketing, customer support and IT to deliver artificial intelligence that helps eliminate busy work and makes doing work easier and more delightful. Freddy Copilot offers contextual assistance, offloads repetitive tasks, and maximizes team productivity by enabling developers and employees in support, sales, and marketing to use conversations to get their work done; Freddy Self Service offloads monotonous work to bots to scale support and deliver excellent customer experiences; and Freddy Insights automates the analysis of their daily productivity and provides recommendations to drive greater business impact. Together, Freddy generative AI capabilities help businesses automate, scale, and derive actionable insights from their work.

QNB GROUP SELECTS IBM TO TRANSFORM THEIR DIGITAL BANKING EXPERIENCE

IBM implemented a microservices architecture using IBM’s Cloud Pak for Integration, deployed on Red Hat OpenShift

QNB Group, in collaboration with IBM and its ecosystem partner, Mannai InfoTech, an ICT Division under Mannai Trading Company WLL have delivered an innovative, pioneering and engaging Digital Banking experience to its customers. IBM Consulting’s Business Transformation expertise, the IBM Garage methodology and innovative technology solutions played a key role in this success story.

The project aimed to deliver a seamless Digital Banking experience for QNB’s customers by implementing a futuristic Omni Channel solution. Every layer of the technology stack was re-designed and modernized to support this vision.

To revolutionize QNB's digital banking with a hybrid cloud approach, IBM implemented a microservices architecture using IBM’s Cloud Pak for Integration, deployed on Red Hat OpenShift; a platform that provides a single, unified experience that connect applications and data across any cloud. The implementation of this architecture has resulted in unprecedented simplicity in version maintenance, dynamic scaling, service governance and service discovery. These advancements from IBM, together with the support of the ecosystem partner Mannai InfoTech, has allowed QNB to offer a more sophisticated banking environment, which has increased efficiency, enriched resiliency, streamlined operations, and improved productivity, ultimately benefiting the end-user experience.

In addition, integration architects from IBM Consulting guided the installation and configuration of IBM App Connect Enterprise, assisting with the deployment and testing of the infrastructure and supporting QNB to easily govern their integrations to ensure the security and integrity of their data, applications and services.

“Major financial institutions need to adopt an unparalleled mindset to expand their digital footprint, to align with the challenges and changes in the marketplace. At QNB, we engage with our trusted partners, such as IBM to leverage innovation and build smarter industry solutions. Having a cloud-native solution will significantly enhance our infrastructure and improve business productivity.”

SERVICENOW INTRODUCES NEW GENERATIVE AI SOLUTION, NOW ASSIST FOR VIRTUAL AGENT

Solution builds on strategy to embed generative AI across the Now Platform, following recent partnership with NVIDIA

ow Chairman and CEO Bill McDermott. “We’re building generative AI into our platform so customers can maximize their ROI: ‘return on intelligence.’ This is all about thoughtful, high-trust co-innovation as we find the balance between machine speed and human judgment. Enhanced by our strategic partnerships with NVIDIA and Microsoft, we are engineering smarter, fully automated workflows. We help our customers innovate completely new business models on ServiceNow as the intelligent platform for end-to-end digital transformation.”

ServiceNow announced its newest generative AI solution, Now Assist for Virtual Agent, designed to create truly conversational experiences for more intelligent self-service. Now Assist for Virtual Agent builds on ServiceNow’s strategy to embed generative AI across the Now Platform so customers can easily harness intelligence at scale and simplify and optimize digital workflows, as announced recently at ServiceNow’s signature Knowledge event.

“ServiceNow is leading the intelligence era. Years of AI investment have put us at the center of an undeniable movement,” said ServiceN-

Now Assist for Virtual Agent uses generative AI to deliver more direct, relevant, and conversational responses to questions—and to connect exchanges to digital workflows across the Now Platform. For example, if a user asks Now Assist for Virtual Agent a question, the solution will use generative AI to provide a straightforward answer within the conversation that helps users immediately get the information they need—such as internal pieces of code for product and engineering teams, product images or videos, links to documents, or summaries of relevant knowledge base articles. Now Assist for Virtual Agent converses accurately even if the user doesn’t know who to ask or where to start, which helps increase productivity, creates higher self-solve rates, and drives faster issue resolution.

KYNDRYL ANNOUNCES CYBERSECURITY INCIDENT RESPONSE AND FORENSICS SERVICE

CSIRF service provides integrated and seamless incident response (IR) support, forensics, and recovery capability

Kyndryl unveiled a Cybersecurity Incident Response and Forensics (CSIRF) service to help customers proactively prepare for and respond to threats by applying the latest threat intelligence and experience from Kyndryl’s deep domain security experts. The new service helps customers investigate and respond to a detected security incident by leveraging capabilities such as incident triage, incident response, threat intelligence, compliance monitoring and management. Customers may also select proactive services that may significantly reduce the time to respond to an incident.

Kyndryl’s CSIRF service provides integrated and seamless incident response (IR) support, forensics, and recovery capability to help customers analyze, identify, compare, and understand the evidence and causes of a cyber incident. In the event of

an occurrence, such as ransomware, Kyndryl’s CSIRF experts provide on-demand, hands-on support to assist in resolving threats to a customer’s business.

“Cyber resilience is the ability to anticipate, protect against, withstand, and recover from adverse conditions, stresses, attacks, and compromises of cyber-enabled business. CSIRF discovers and responds to detected security incidents and provides advanced threat detection response and forensics,” said Kris Lovejoy, Kyndryl Security and Resiliency Global Practice Leader. “Kyndryl’s CSIRF is intended to shift the cybersecurity field, from simply security to one of cyber resilience.”

The new CSIRF service complements Kyndryl’s Recovery Retainer Service, which is designed to help customers recover and rebuild their environments after

catastrophic events. When coupled with the Recovery Retainer Service, CSIRF provides on-demand availability of qualified experts that can effectively help customers recover from and mitigate the impact of cyberattacks.

SALESFORCE ANNOUNCES AI CLOUD

AI Cloud is built for CRM – enhancing customer experiences and company productivity by bringing together AI, data, analytics, and automation to provide trusted, open, real-time generative AI that is enterprise ready

Salesforce announced AI Cloud, to enhance their customer experiences and company productivity with generative AI for the enterprise. AI Cloud is a suite of capabilities optimized for delivering trusted, open, and real-time generative experiences across all applications and workflows.

AI Cloud’s new Einstein GPT Trust Layer resolves concerns of risks associated with adopting generative AI by enabling customers to meet their enterprise data security and compliance demands, while offering customers the benefits of generative AI.

With generative AI, Einstein helps make every company and employee more productive and efficient across sales, service, marketing, and commerce.

AI Cloud will enable sales reps to quickly auto-generate personalized emails tailored to their customer’s needs, and service teams to auto-generate personalized agent chat replies and case summaries. Market-

ers can auto-generate personalized content to engage customers and prospects across email, mobile, web, and advertising. Commerce teams can auto-generate insights and recommendations to deliver customized

commerce experiences at every step of the buyer’s journey. And, developers can auto-generate code, predict potential bugs in code, and suggest fixes.

The Einstein GPT Trust Layer will help prevent large-language models (LLMs) from retaining sensitive customer data. This separation of sensitive data from the LLM will help customers maintain data governance controls while still leveraging the immense potential of generative AI.

“AI is reshaping our world and transforming business in ways we never imagined, and every company needs to become AIfirst,” said Marc Benioff, Chair and CEO, Salesforce. “AI Cloud, built on the #1 CRM, is the fastest and easiest way for our customers to unleash the incredible power of AI, with trust at the center driven by our new Einstein GPT Trust Layer. AI Cloud will unlock incredible innovation, productivity, and efficiency for every company.”

BULWARK & HOLM SECURITY PARTNER

The partnership will enable customers with enhanced vulnerability and policy scanning across their networks

Bulwark Distribution FZCO and Holm Security have entered into a distribution agreement to offer enhanced system & network vulnerability scanning to customers across Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Iraq, Jordan, Egypt and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

As a result of this new partnership, businesses in the region will be given the ability to uncover, monitor and control vulnerabilities across their entire business infrastructure which will help them prevent against the sort of high profile attacks that saw high profile oil giants held to ransom for tens of millions of dollars in exchange for data.

Holm Security’s Next-Gen Vulnerability Management Platform automatically scans for an ever-increasing number of vulnerabilities, with continuous vulnerability and policy scans across local and public networks that can be customized

based on user requirements.

Assets can then be effectively organized, tracked, and analyzed based on which reflect the most significant risks to operations. With this threat intelligence, orga-

nizations understand where to prioritize their efforts in cyber security.

As a value-added distributor, Bulwark will provide Holm Security’s Next- Gen Vulnerability Management Platform to Managed Security Service Providers (MSSPs) and other organizations to identify and mitigate vulnerabilities within their networks.

“We are delighted to offer Holm Security’s innovative platform to our customers across the Middle East”, said Jose Menacherry, Managing Director, Bulwark. “This will play a crucial role in ensuring stronger lines of defence against malicious attacks, giving businesses the means to identify and mitigate system and network vulnerabilities before they can be exploited. Our customers can now rest assured they can go about their business knowing that the most critical vulnerabilities are being found, prioritized and actioned”.

CIRRUSLABS ESTABLISHES NEW CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE CENTER FOR THE MIDDLE EAST

The company unveils its new experience center in Dubai to serve the region. CirrusLabs unveiled their new office and Customer Experience Center at Dubai Digital Park, Dubai Silicon Oasis, UAE. This strategic location places us at the heart of technological innovation in the region, making it an ideal spot to serve customers better and cater to their digital transformation needs.

The launch ceremony was presided over by Dr. Juma Al Matrooshi, the Director General of Dubai Silicon Oasis as the chief guest of honor and the ribbon-cutting ceremony was attended by a team of senior officials from Dubai Silicon Oasis. The Commercial Attaché/Digital Attaché of the Commercial Section, United States Consulate General in Dubai, Bruce J. Ellsworth also graced the occasion. Several key customers and partners of CirrusLabs along with senior members of the CirrusLabs team were present at the ceremony.

Naeem Hussain, Chief Operating Officer at CirrusLabs welcomed all the esteemed guests and expressed his happiness on the launch of new premises in Dubai.

The facility will also serve as a launchpad for new product offerings, helping the company to stay ahead of the curve in the rapidly evolving digital landscape. With a dedicated team of ex-

perts, CirrusLabs will continue to drive innovation and provide customized solutions to meet the unique needs of its customers.

"We are committed to delivering exceptional value to our customers and partners, and this new facility will allow us to do just that. We look forward to leveraging this new space to continue growing our business, building strong customer relationships, developing a robust talent pipeline, forging fruitful partnerships, and delivering best-in-class transformative digital solutions in the UAE and beyond," said Shahnawaz Sheikh, VP Sales – META at Cirruslabs Middle East.

SAP LAUNCHES OMAN’S FIRST DATA CENTER FOR PRIVATE CLOUD

Global integrated energy company OQ leads the market to become SAP’s first private cloud customer in Oman

ing the goals of Oman Vision 2040 in the field of digital transformation.

In addition: “Continuing to drive OQ's growth and diversification of operations has motivated OQ to have an integrated, flexible and scalable system that suits future needs and is in line with specialized best practices.

Oman has reached a major milestone in its digital transformation with today’s announcement of the Sultanate’s first private cloud data center, launched by global technology company SAP SE (NYSE: SAP) in alignment with Oman’s Ministry of Transport, Communications, and Information Technology (MTCIT).

At the same time, Oman-based global integrated energy company OQ signed an agreement with the global technology company to adopt RISE with SAP and to run its SAP solutions, including integrated enterprise resource planning (ERP) across all of its business assets, on the new in-country data center, making it the first SAP Oman private cloud customer.

In the presence of H.E. Dr. Ali Al Shidhani, Undersecretary for Communications and Information Technology at the MTCIT, the agreement was signed by Eng. Mariam Al Shaibani, Vice President of Integrated Digital Solutions at OQ, and Waheed Murtadha Al Hamaid, Country Manager, SAP Oman.

SAP’s data center will help to empower the Omani Vision 2040 strategy by accelerating innovation and cloud adoption and enabling companies across more than 25 industries to leverage the benefits of SAP’s cloud solutions with secure in-country data storage.

H.E. Dr. Ali Al Shidhani, Undersecretary for Communications and Information Tech-

nology at the MTCIT, said, "The launch of a local SAP cloud service that enables companies to securely store their information within Oman’s borders is aligned with the MTCIT’s commitment to creating efficient digital systems and solutions as set out in the four-track digital transformation program we announced last year. We believe the move will inspire new public and private sector digital transformation agendas as well as innovation as Omani entities start to leverage the benefits of cloud computing, including advanced technologies such as AI and machine learning."

By moving to the cloud, OQ will be able to leverage the benefits of SAP S/4HANA ERP, which include increased efficiencies, 360-degree visibility, and greater control over all operations. The solution streamlines and automates business processes and delivers real-time analytics, enabling data-driven decision-making to respond with agility to new opportunities and changes in the market.

Maryam Al Shaibani, VP Information & Digital Solutions at OQ, said, "As OQ becomes the first partner in Oman with SAP International under this agreement will enhance confidence for the transition of Omani companies to cloud systems, which will improve the quality of data retention and accelerate the digital transformation process in the Sultanate of Oman, and develop national competencies in various fields of technology, this comes in line with achiev-

To support the country’s digital transformation, OQ and SAP are also exploring collaborating with the MTCIT to develop emerging talent by training Omani nationals through in-country, global, and virtual programs covering technology, business, and behavioral skills. This effort includes participation in SAP’s Young Professionals Program in Oman, which has already trained 140 university graduates in core and emerging technologies. In addition, job seekers and freelancers will be supported through a new SAP-designed platform that will bridge the gap between supply and demand for fulltime and freelance opportunities.

Commenting on SAP’s investment in cloud and skills development in Oman, Alaa Jaber, Managing Director for SAP Fast Growth Markets, said, "Oman is a significant market for SAP as it is widely recognized for its commitment to digitalization. The new data center will enable forward-thinking businesses, such as OQ, to develop and enhance their operations with the latest SAP solutions and improve efficiencies while lowering total cost of ownership."

The Omani data center is ready for immediate use by businesses who wish to adopt SAP cloud solutions or existing cloud computing clients who wish to transfer their information to be hosted within Oman. The data center can support companies across all industries, including the oil and energy sector, education, higher education, health facilities, local companies, and other sensitive entities with confidential information that remains securely stored within the sultanate.

Dataiku announces breakthroughs in Generative AI Enterprise Applications

New Generative AI Use Case Collection, Responsibility Framework and Platform Capabilities build on Enterprise AI Leadership to accelerate real Applications with real safety

Dataiku, the platform for Everyday AI, announced breakthroughs in Generative AI enterprise applications, safety, and tooling. Developed from the invaluable experience gained from working with over 500 customers, these innovations push beyond the boundaries of traditional chatbot functions and unlock the potential for meaningful, real-world enterprise applications. Given that Gartner® indicates “70% of organizations (are) currently in exploration mode with Generative AI” and with 90% of enterprise executives harboring concerns (according to KPMG), Dataiku’s announcement arrives at a pivotal moment.

“We’ve seen hundreds of our customers exploring how to better leverage Generative AI. Most have started to compile a list of potential use cases and evaluate them through the prism of feasibility, business impact, and risks. We’ve distilled the top use cases which are real, actionable, and repeatable today, on our platform. The companies that succeed at this today are going to be out of reach of their competitors a year from now. This is the moment when the future winners are decided. It’s exciting for Dataiku to be part of it,” said Florian Douetteau, co-founder and CEO of Dataiku.

Dataiku’s newly released Generative AI Use Case Collection is a leap forward in applying Generative AI in the enterprise. Having identified common design patterns for the application of Generative AI, Dataiku has built an initial batch of 16 Generative AI Use Cases that apply this revolutionary technology to real business needs. This new approach will allow enterprises to move out of an artisanal approach of building custom Generative AI projects and into the industrial-scale development and deployment of these use cases, moving out of the research lab and into the corporate office.

Examples in the Generative AI Use Case Collection include:

• Predictive Maintenance Data Explorer: Privacy-preserving, automated generation of insights into the performance of factory machines

• LLM-Enhanced Next Best Offer: Legal-approved, automated generation of promotional emails, including highly accurate product recommendations

• IT Support Advisor: Always-accurate assistants that query complex policy documents and contracts, accelerating the work of support agents

With the arrival of a wave of policy proposals seeking to protect both workers and consumers from potential harms of AI such as the U.S. Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights and the EU AI Act, Dataiku is announcing its RAFT Framework for Generative AI use cases (Reliable, Accountable, Fair, and Transparent). Based on years of pioneering work on Responsible AI with the compli-

ance, risk, and ethics teams at some of the world’s largest companies, the framework provides actionable steps that enterprises can take now to be ready for future regulation. Taking into account enterprise realities and the input of experts in public policy, digital ethics, and AI bias, the framework balances the need to move quickly on AI while doing so safely and responsibly.

Travers Nicholas Country General Manager for Qatar, Dell Technologies

“Popular imagination is hung up on a naive and limited vision of Generative AI’s potential. Simply put, you are not going to transform the way that an enterprise performs through one-off questions and answers to a chatbot. Real applications will see Generative AI being woven into a company’s data and machine learning workflows,” said Clément Stenac, co-founder and CTO of Dataiku.

Dataiku is building on top of its latest product update, Dataiku 12, adding capabilities that will make that vision a reality. Dataiku’s Prompt Studios allows many more people to become highly-proficient prompt engineers, building reusable, enterprise-grade prompts that can be part of production data workflows. Prompt Studios is now available in limited preview.

Today, a business person needs to translate their business ideas into the data vocabulary of tables and columns. With Generative AI, we can automate this translation in Dataiku, enabling an even wider population of users to play with data by talking to it.

Dataiku’s AI Prepare allows people with the widest possible range of skills to build production-ready data transformations, simply by typing what they want done to their data. This breaks down the last barriers between knowing what needs to be done and making it happen in enterprise databases and cloud environments. AI Prepare is now available in limited preview.

RESETTING TRANSFORMATION GOALS

As organizations review their digital transformation goals, they will need to look at consolidating cloud strategies, incorporating generative AI tools, shoring up cybersecurity along with including a proactive approach toward achieving ESG objectives

Organizations that have undertaken digital transformation initiatives over the recent years, are now looking to step up the transformation initiatives. This will include consolidation of their cloud strategies, adopting generative AI as is relevant to their line of Business, shoring up cybersecurity, drawing up sustainable IT strategies and more.

Jacob Mathew, head of IT at an Abu Dhabi Government entity says, “Digital transformation is an ongoing exercise where we look at continuously improving the experience of our client and our employees. There is always scope for improvement and this can be ascertained from meetings, surveys, data analysis and actual observations. Companies should also look at what the peers in other countries and the industry is doing and ascertain if this would be applicable to them and make the change if appropriate.”

He adds that while specific priorities vary depending on the industry and corporate strategy, some of the essential technology considerations would be cloud migration, data governance, AI, IoT and edge computing, RPA, chatbots as well as ECG initiatives including sustainability.

Jacob adds that work from anywhere is already a reality in most organizations - thanks to the pandemic. “I think nowadays IT leaders are ensuing that remote workers are adequately protected - not just with technical tools that are important but also are trained how to use the systems online without falling prey to online phishing mails etc. Most companies now conduct regular phising mail exercises and those employees that fail the test undergo mandatory training.”

Jayaraj Perumalsamy, Group Head of IT at Barakat Group mentions priorities from the perspective of the food and beverage industry and while they may be specific, they are in general shared objectives across verticals where businesses would be looking to enhance their business processes.

He lists the need to improve supply chain visibility to ensure products are delivered on time and in good condition as well as Implementing traceability systems to ensure food products are safe and traceable. Further, using data analytics to improve decision-making in areas such as demand forecasting, pricing, and product development is a crucial objective as is cybersecurity and compliance to protect sensitive data and transactions. Enabling work from anywhere to improve productivity, reduce costs, and attract and retain top talent are key priorities as well to help accelerate the digital transformation journey.

Elaborating on further objectives that can position businesses for success, he says, “In addition to these priorities, businesses should also focus on sustainability goals by reducing their environmental impact and using more sustainable practices. They should look to enhance customer experience by providing

a seamless and personalized customer experience. Further, they step up innovation by developing new products and services that meet the needs of their customers.”

By focusing on these areas, businesses in the food and beverage industry can position themselves for success in the years to come.

Role of AI

Generative AI in a short span of time has become a key area of focus for companies. Generative AI has the potential to considerably enhance processes as well as market offerings.

Jayaraj says, “I believe that AI and generative AI are key areas of investment for the food and beverage industry. These technologies can be used to improve product development, personalize customer experiences, optimize supply chains, ensure food safety, and reduce environmental impact.”

He believes early adopters of AI and generative AI will have a massive advantage. “These technologies are still in their early stages of development, but they have the potential to revolutionize the food and beverage industry. The benefits of early adoption outweigh the risks. The risks associated with these technologies are still being evaluated, but they are not insurmountable.

I believe that the potential benefits of these technologies are significant, and I encourage companies to consider early adoption.”

He believes that some of the benefits of early adoption of AI and generative AI in the food and beverage industry will include improved customer experience, reduced costs, improved food safety, increased innovation and reduced environmental impact.

According to Jacob, AI in general, and generative AI, in particular, will remain key areas of investment for corporates in the foreseeable future. The current digital transformation in companies are driven by AI that is dependant on good-quality data.

“Generative AI deployments are rapidly growing as this AI technology quickly gains adoption. Generative AI deployment are found in industries ranging from healthcare to manufacturing to finance to marketing. Tools such as ChatGPT and Google Bard are being widely used across the world. Hence I do not think it is too early to look into generative AI - companies that do not adopt generative AI may risk of being left behind and hence all companies need to look at adopting generative AI at the earliest.”

Cloud migration and consolidation

Organizations are at point where they are looking to consolidate their cloud strategies dividing between multi cloud where they utilise servicers from more than one public cloud provider and hybrid cloud, where they have a combination of a private cloud and public cloud. This entails strategic decision making.

“Hybrid cloud and multi-cloud architectures offer flexibility, cost savings, and performance. However, they can be complex to manage and secure. Organizations should consider their business needs, size, and IT infrastructure when deciding which type of cloud architecture is right for them. They should also choose cloud providers that have a good track record and offer the features they need,” says Jayaraj.

He adds, “Some of the challenges of managing hybrid cloud and multi-cloud architectures include data migration, security, compliance, and cost. Organizations need to carefully consider these challenges before migrating to the cloud. Ultimately, the best cloud architecture for a particular organization will depend on their specific needs and requirements. However, hybrid cloud and multi-cloud architectures can offer several benefits that can help organizations achieve their business goals.”

According to Jacob, “cloud migration is not a silver bulletcompanies and their IT department need to assess cloud migration very carefully. In many cases, it is best to run IT services and applications from the on-prem or hosted solution. There has been a number of cases where companies migrated to the cloud and then brought the workload back to on-premises solution. By planning and considering all aspects the risk of this happening can be reduced. I would recommend that a cloud strategy be first developed in each company or entity - even if some applications and systems are already hosted in the cloud. It should look at criteria for adopting the cloud and how risks and costs associated with this migration be managed. A robust cloud strat-

egy document should address the full impact of costs and risks associated with cloud migration like vendor lock-in, compliance to local laws and industry regulations.”

He adds that the cloud strategy of a company should also incorporate a stance on the hybrid vs multi-cloud options.

“Most organisations are adopting multi-cloud strategy, and this is best done when the internal IT teams are well manned and train each other in other cloud technology platforms (e.g. Azure resource train AWS resource and vice versa). This improves the motivation and skillset of the team and also help companies to reduce costs and risks associated with having all the workloads on one platform. Additionally, adopting a phased approach to migration and performing thorough testing can help mitigate potential issues during the transition to the cloud.”

Addressing cybersecurity challenges

The disruptive nature of digital transformation needs to be balanced with a comprehensive cybersecurity approach.

Jacob says, “I think the approach to managing cybersecurity challenges is getting CEO sponsorship. I have been in cybersecurity for more than 15 years now and I have seen that the success of cybersecurity initiatives works best if actively supported by the CEO. Once this happens business leaders and stakeholders will also support these initiatives. It must be understood by all concerned that cybersecurity risks are no longer just technical risks but also Enterprise risks that may affect the reputation, and profitability of the company besides compliance with laws and regulations in the country and associated industries.”

He recommends that most companies and government entities must consider using managed security services providers (MSSPs) as there are a number of good ones working in the region.

"Generative AI deployments are rapidly growing as this AI technology quickly gains traction. Generative AI deployment are found in industries ranging from healthcare to manufacturing to finance to marketing. Tools such as ChatGPT and Google Bard are being widely used across the world."

“Accountability still lies with the company board and directors but using good MSSPs can reduce the risk exposure. Cybersecurity is quite vast and requires active management, monitoring, and remediation 24 x 7 and this would be beyond the budget and capability of most companies. All companies should have a risk committee where risks are discussed and addressed and this would be a good forum for the CISOs to approach funding for cybersecurity investments and this would ensure that investments are based on strategy, risk importance, and impact,” he adds.

Jayaraj mentions best practices for approaching cybersecurity investments. This includes starting with a risk assessment which will help you identify your most critical assets and the threats that these assets face. He says it is critical to invest in the right security controls as not all security controls are created equal. Further, cybersecurity investments should be based on your organization's risk appetite.

“Cybersecurity is critical for the food and beverage industry. These companies handle sensitive data and are often targeted by cyberattacks. Best practices for ensuring cybersecurity includes fostering a strong security culture that starts with top management. Implement a layered security approach that includes things like firewalls, intrusion detection systems, and data encryption. Keep systems up to date. Software updates often include security patches. Educate employees as they are often the weakest link in an organization's security defences. Have a plan for responding to cyberattacks that should include things like how to identify and contain a cyberattack, how to restore systems, and how to communicate with customers and partners,” he elaborates.

Driving sustainable IT strategies

With spotlight on climate change, the need for having a sustainable IT strategy is an urgent priority. Companies can benefit from having a strategy that is responsible towards the environment as well as delivers cost benefits and resilience.

Jayaraj says, “Building a sustainable IT infrastructure is important. This can help to reduce costs, improve efficiency, increase resilience, and improve reputation. The building blocks of a sustainable IT strategy including using energy-efficient hardware, optimizing energy usage, using renewable energy and so on. By following such guidelines, companies can build a sustainable IT infrastructure that is good for the environment and good for their bottom line.”

With the UAE hosting the 28th Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP28) from November 30 to December 12, 2023, this topic has become more discussed locally and in the region.

“We also have a lot of push from industry and peers to ESG (Environmental, social, and governance) that encourage compa-

nies to act responsibly to the environment apart from social and management responsibilities. By incorporating sustainability in their IT, companies can improve their standing with customers, employees, and business partners. The first step to improve sustainability is to get buy-in from the leadership as part of ESG initiatives and then to do an assessment of the current situation within the organisation. This can be followed up with effective governance and conducting awareness campaigns widely within organisations,” says Jacob.

He further recommends some actions, “IT data centers produce a large amount of heat consume a lot of water for cooling and also use electricity for running the equipment. The major cloud service providers (Amazon, Microsoft, and Google) run the data centers in a much more environment-friendly manner than most enterprises and companies. Hence by migrating to the cloud, we will be promoting sustainability in IT. Some other areas where IT can help include using automatic lighting and cooling where lights will go off automatically at offices and home when not in use. We should also dispose of old equipment responsibly and there are a few local companies that can do this for us at very low costs if at all.”

For organizations looking to accomplish successful Business transformation with their IT strategies, they would indeed need to take a holistic approach that encompasses adopting new technologies as well as ensuring sustainability having robust cybersecurity.

AHEAD OF THE CURVE

The demand for flexible and reliable connectivity solutions has soared says Sakkeer Hussain, Director - Sales & Marketing, D-Link Middle East & Africa and he goes on to discuss how D-Link is focused on delivering solutions to address the need for a reliable and efficient network infrastructure of their customers.

How has the growth in Business segment products been for D-Link in the region this year?

In the current year, our business segment products have experienced a remarkable surge in performance, surpassing even our highest expectations. The market dynamics have been exceptionally favorable, with many organizations investing substantially in cloud and networking products. As offices have returned to running at full capacities, the demand for flexible and reliable connectivity solutions has soared, prompting businesses to prioritize this aspect like never before.

The digital era calls for a heightened emphasis on security, and it has become a top priority for organizations across the board. Companies are acutely aware of the evolving cybersecurity threats and are taking proactive measures to safeguard their sensitive information and valuable assets. They are also making concerted efforts to educate their staff on best security practices to foster a culture of awareness. They are also investing in cutting-edge security solutions to safeguard their digital infrastructures.

At D-Link, we are proud to be at the forefront of meeting these evolving market needs. Our range of products, tailored to cater to the demands of a dynamic business environment, offers robust connectivity solutions that are both powerful and user-friendly. Moreover, we continue to innovate and deliver top-notch security solutions that empower our customers to navigate the digital landscape with confidence.

Discuss the use of AI in your product line across both consumer and Business segments?

AI is now integral to our product and solution designing process. Several of our offerings have AI embedded into them. D-Link’s EAGLE PRO AI series brings AI-enhanced capabilities to optimize Wi-Fi, and the AI Assistant to intelligently monitor network usage to give simple, actionable recommendations to keep the network at peak performance.

D-Link’s AQUILA PRO AI M30 AX3000 dual-band Mesh

Wi-Fi 6 system features cutting-edge, MIT (Made in Taiwan) quality-assured mesh router, engineered to address the three most common pain points of Wi-Fi users: coverage, speed, and reliability. Featuring a built-in AI algorithm, the AQUILA PRO AI M30 is set to revolutionize the home networking experience.

What has the focus on IoT-enabled devices been to date at D-Link? Are they only on the consumer side or do you have such products for the Business segment as well?

IoT-enabled devices are the future. It was the starting point of change in the way we interact with technology and the world around us. At D-Link, we are focused on paving the path for innovation and have always tried to be ahead of the curve. We have several offerings on the consumer side for connectivity. Data-driven approach will unlock immense possibilities for businesses and peoples’ lives. Across verticals, from healthcare to smart cities to agriculture, IoT devices are an important element for growth. It has the capabilities to make businesses more efficient, intelligent and secure.

Discuss your distribution focus for Business solutions

We work with regional distributors and channel partners to help us position our offerings to a wide range of customers across verticals and geographies. Our focus is to ensure we are creating meaningful solutions for our customers’ biggest challenges and that our partners are our extended arms and well-trained.

Do you see demand for structured cabling solutions growing in the region?

Yes, I see a huge demand for structured cabling solutions growing in the region. The demand for structured cabling solutions is influenced by several factors, including economic growth, technological advancements, expansion of businesses, and the increasing adoption of data-intensive applications and services. Structured cabling forms the backbone of network infrastructure, providing the necessary framework for transmitting data, voice, and video signals within buildings and data centers.

The rising reliance on cloud computing, big data, Internet of

Things (IoT) devices, and other data-driven technologies can contribute to the need for robust and scalable network infrastructures. Structured cabling offers a standardized and organized approach to cabling, enabling businesses to adapt to evolving technology demands.

As e-governance initiatives and digital transformation projects gain momentum, the need for a reliable and efficient network infrastructure becomes paramount to ensure seamless communication between various government departments and agencies. The advantages of structured cabling are not limited to the present but also factor in future scalability. Businesses recognize that investing in a well-designed and future-proof cabling infrastructure saves costs in the long run. As technology continues to evolve, structured cabling ensures seamless integration of new devices and technologies without the need for extensive and disruptive network upgrades.

Elaborate on some new upcoming products?

D-Link’s primary business objective is to innovate, be transformative and to be several steps ahead of the market. With this as our guiding principle, we are working on exciting new launches around 5G, IoT, AI, smart home tech, Wi-Fi 6, cybersecurity and networking.

How are you enabling partners to enhance their selling into the SME segment?

We work really closely with our channel partners to ensure they have all the resources and information to position D-Link products and solutions effectively. We conduct regular training workshops and have in-depth sessions to iron out any issues partners might have. D-Link’s partner program and other incentive programs are designed to motivate partners to go beyond expectations. We also enable them to grow their operations and provide any kind of support they might need. After all, partners thriving in their business is also a win for D-Link.

"D-Link’s primary business objective is to innovate, be transformative and to be several steps ahead of the market. With this as our guiding principle, we are working on exciting new launches around 5G, IoT, AI, smart home tech, Wi-Fi 6, cybersecurity and networking."

REIMAGINING NETOPS AND SECOPS

Mohammed

Infoblox discusses the recent rebranding of the company as well as the company’s initiatives in the region

What is the significance of the new brand launch for local customers and partners in the Middle East & Africa region?

The rationale behind our new brand positioning is the fact that networking and security work better together when they share real-time visibility into application, user and device context. And real-time threat protection and more resilient network performance can only happen when networking and security work side by side.

Infoblox is uniquely positioned - we help enable NetOps and SecOps to work more efficiently by uniting their view of user context and DNS data, so everything runs faster, works better, and is more secure. And uniting saves NetOps and SecOps time, by uniting real-time user and device context, eliminating critical network and security bottlenecks. Unlocking this unparalleled visibility and control empowers customers to deliver the protection and performance they need today. We believe that security effectiveness depends on threat intelligence above all else. Using tools included in Infoblox BloxOne Threat Defense, security teams can collect, normalize and distribute highly accurate, multi-sourced threat intelligence to strengthen the entire security stack, secure DNS and boost SecOps efficiency.

Infoblox rebrand initiatives reflect confidence and business focus, shaping the company’s critical role in securing the networks of some of the world’s largest companies, appealing to both networking and security professionals alike.

A new brand launch can have a significant impact on local customers and partners in regions like the Middle East and Africa, as we weave a story around how our company is making the transition to a new world of protective services. We believe that the launch will increase awareness of our brand, create new business opportunities, and improve the customer experience.

What do you see as some of the regional trends in the networking and security space?

As cyberattacks are increasing in frequency and sophistication, companies in the Middle East and Africa are increasingly investing in cybersecurity measures to protect their networks and sensitive data. Spending on security solutions and services in the MEA re-

gion, including Israel, is expected to increase by 7.9% YoY in 2023, reaching $6.2 billion, according to the latest Worldwide Security Spending Guide from the International Data Corporation (IDC).

Within the cybersecurity domain, there will be increased Zero Trust adoption. Zero-Trust architectures have become a means for modern enterprise and government institutions to secure sensitive data in the face of digital transformation and the loss of the traditional network perimeter, as we move to borderless network architectures. And we will no doubt witness an increasing adoption in the MEA market by enterprises this year and beyond.

Companies are increasingly relying on Software-defined Wide Area Networking (SD-WAN), virtualization, and other cloudbased networking solutions. Cloud-managed networking provides the visibility, management, and scale needed to operate today's distributed cloud and on-premises network, security, and location infrastructure.

Over the past 9 years of operating in this region, we have observed a growing trend among various industries in bringing their networking and security teams together to achieve a more comprehensive and unified approach to securing their core network services, such as DNS and DHCP. In the financial industry, we have witnessed the largest banks and financial institutions in the GCC adopting a more collaborative approach between their networking and security teams to mitigate the growing threat of cyber attacks.

Similarly, in the healthcare industry, hospitals are also implementing this approach to ensure the security and privacy of patient data. We have also seen a similar trend in large enterprises across industries such as technology, retail, and manufacturing, where they are increasingly moving towards a more integrated approach between their networking and security teams.

Can you talk about Infoblox’s regional growth in the Middle East and Africa market. What are key drivers for the business?

Infoblox has made a significant investment across the META re-

gion with the idea of building out its presence in multiple countries, with offices in Saudi, UAE, Egypt, Kenya, South Africa, Morocco & Turkey. Infoblox has been expanding its operations in META over the past few years, as the region's digital transformation initiatives have increased demand for network automation and security solutions. The company serves customers across various industries, including telecommunications, finance, healthcare, education, and government.

As more organizations in the region move their operations online, the need for network and security to work together became paramount. Our solutions help both, network and security teams to protect networks from cyber threats, including malware, ransomware, and phishing attacks.

Many organizations in the region are embracing cloud-based services to improve operational efficiency and reduce costs. Infoblox offers cloud-based DNS and IPAM solutions that help manage and secure these cloud-based networks.

Infoblox's innovative partner program has been launched to play an instrumental role in meeting the growing demand for network and security solutions. By bringing together Network & Security teams, our partners are better equipped to position Infoblox's core technology value and deliver comprehensive solutions to customers. With our solutions, customers can achieve real-time visibility and control over their networks, enabling them to build safer and more resilient environments. Infoblox is committed to working closely with our partners to help organizations in all industries meet their network and security needs.

What are some of the investments that Infoblox is making in the region?

Our company’s training programs, mentorship initiatives, and collaborations with academic institutions are aimed at equipping the region's talent with the necessary skills and knowledge to tackle today's networking and cybersecurity challenges effectively. We believe that investing in regional talent is crucial to the success of our customers, and it is a responsibility that we take seriously. At Infoblox, we are committed to creating a diverse and inclusive work environment that nurtures and empowers our employees to deliver value to our customers. By investing in regional talent, we are not only contributing to the development of our employees, but also to the growth and prosperity of the communities we operate in.

What can customers in MEA expect from Infoblox in the next 4-5 years?

Below are our main priorities for the region:

● Continued investment in cloud-based network security: Infoblox will continue to invest in developing cloud-based solutions to help customers secure their networks and data. This could include offerings like cloud-based DDI (DNS, DHCP, and IP address management) and security services that provide visibility and threat detection across hybrid cloud environments.

● Expansion of network automation capabilities: Automation is a key focus area for Infoblox, and customers in the MEA region

can expect to see more automation features added to its solutions.

● Greater emphasis on user experience: Infoblox is likely to continue focusing on improving the user experience of its products, with a particular emphasis on making its solutions easier to use and more intuitive.

Are there any big channel initiatives planned for the region?

A big focus when it comes to the channel is on our recently launched “Skilled to Secure” partner program which reflects the changing security landscape and shifting customer requirements – and the need for providers of security solutions and services to adapt in response.

We have been heavily investing in our talented and experienced channel teams and I am proud to say that we currently have industry-leading channel executives across the region who are really able to transform the way we engage with our partners. We lay heavy emphasis on knowledge and skills development of our channel and we deliver a broad range of training programs. One of our key priorities is building out our channel ecosystem through recruitment of partners that share our vision, ideology and passion. And we find a great amount of interest from new channel companies interested in joining our program, largely based on the fact that they see huge market potential for our solutions and services. We also have a robust program - Expert Club, for our top performing partners, to incentivize them as they drive growth for our company.

ENHANCING THE SECURITY EDGE

Jamil Abu Aqel head of Mandiant systems engineering for MEA and Emerging region, Google Cloud discusses the focus of solutions from Mandiant, now part of Google Cloud.

Discuss your focus?

Mandiant focuses on proactive exposure management and digital risk protection. The Mandiant Advantage, an XDR platform is a large set of services that we provide our customers. We believe Technology is only as good as the people the expertise that is sitting behind it, and the intelligence that is feeding into it. So Mandiant is a vendor agnostic company that has the ambition of helping customers make the best of what they have, reduce any downtime potential that comes with a breach and help our customers be better prepared for an answer.

How is Mandiant helping organizations with their cybersecurity challenges?

Cybersecurity is an area that touches an organization on all levels. We work with organizations on the SOC level, to help them better respond to security incidents, to educate them regarding the best practices on managing an incident and how to contain it and how to recover from an incident. We help managers or executives design and build, manage, security, not only from the technical point of view, but in the unlikely situation of a breach, you need to talk to the media, you need to talk to stakeholders, and you need to talk to law enforcement agencies and we can help manage such incidents. We deliver more than 200,000 hours of incident response every year. We are more experienced than many of the players here in the market regarding how to manage an incident and we can help customers by sharing these experi-

ences, for them to be better able to respond to incidents.

Discuss your approach to attack surface management?

if you want to defend yourself, you have to defend yourself across all available domains, including IT/OT, on-prem, on cloud, physical and virtual, mobile etc. You should be protecting yourself across all these vectors. Our Attack Surface Management discovers external assets and identifies the exposures on them, enabling security teams to uncover shadow IT, remove sprawl, reduce exposure risk, and monitor and enforce security policies. Attack Surface Management has become a top enterprise priority because massive adoption of cloud, SaaS and mobile across a distributed workforce means an expanding, evolving and changing attack surface subject to an increasing number of sophisticated threats.

How has the growth been in the region for Mandiant?

Customer interest in cybersecurity is growing significantly. So we are seeing growing investments in cybersecurity. But we still know, the same way the good guys, the defenders are investing in cybersecurity, the bad guys too are developing more sophisticated attack methods. So this is a never ending battle to deliver security.

What is your go to market model?

We operate in a three-tier model. We work with our channel community, with our distributors and partners. And we can do spe-

cific arrangements for specific sensitive engagements. We will continue to evolve, as we are integrating with Google.

How do you reach out to customers who now have more choices in terms of vendor offerings?

We continue to enable and educate customers in the market. We are a trusted brand. Mandiant is like the doctor, who people come to and confide what they don't tell anybody else. Mandiant is this trusted brand that people come to when they are in trouble. We are helping many leading organizations all across the world recover from cyber attacks.

Managing Datasphere

Irfan Khan, President of SAP HANA Database & Analytics at SAP discusses how SAP is leading the charge in establishing an SAP business data fabric to harmonize all critical enterprise data and embedding AI technologies in all its solutions and partnering with other leaders in AI to ensure it remains ahead of the curve.

What does SAP Datasphere set to achieve?

Datasphere is a comprehensive data service that is set to achieve a single semantic integration layer, business data fabric layer, for all of your data, whether it's SAP or nonSAP. There is no bias or limitation in terms of what data you can access. In a federated model, you can access data from an on prem model, private or public cloud.

Discuss how SAP intends to use generative AI in its services?

First and foremost, we have a very substantial applications heritage. We will have embedded generative AI within all our services. I'll give you an example. If you think about SuccessFactors, which is our HR service that you provide, imagine that you'd want to do targeted recruitment. So directly within the HR modules and the learning module, we'll be tying together candidate profiles. And then using generative AI to understand internal candidates will be the best person that's gone through the training, has a history, has a resume, that will be the best suited for this job. Now, of course, it's a recommendation, not an exclusive explicit nomination list. But it gives you much

better understanding rather than trying to hazard haphazardly and going around the process of trying to find out. If you're a recruiter, and you're looking at external candidates, similarly, you may want to look at external candidate profiles, and know exactly what questions to ask them. So, we'll be able to generate the questions that will be most suitable to tie up the skill set based upon the profile of the person that you're looking for. And then thirdly, as well, when you've conducted the interview, because you may have lots of interviews conducted, you want to be able to rationalize stack ranking of who are the best candidates. This will also be then giving you the means being able to understand the criteria of selection so that you can have a far better experience on the onboarding side.

What could be other use cases? When it comes to various different industries, there's a lot of different learnings there are different case histories. So how are you training those models?

SAP is a leader in industries across a multitude of different environments. Looking at the supply chain side, for example, and the pandemic that just took place, we will be

able to generate recommendations for you. And this is exactly what the generative AI will now support us better in understanding what would be potential supply chain disruption. And that's not just a generative AI use case as it is a planning and analytics use case as well as a predictive use case. If you're in a region, and you know that the suppliers of your raw materials are coming from continents, or other countries that have already been disrupted, then you can guarantee there's going to be disruptions to you. So you've got to be able to predict not just what the current supply maybe but fast forward three months from now.

What is the likely road ahead for SAP regarding the use of generative AI?

We have a very substantial embedded intelligence objective; we want to be able to bring generative capabilities to every one of SAP applications. It shouldn't be something you add on top but should be something which is intrinsically tied to all SAP applications. Secondly, we want to be able to get the right data. Because if you don't have the clean data or the principal data, there's no value of what generative AI because data integrity isn’t there. With SAP Datasphere, we're providing the business data fabric to tie different disparate datasets from on premise, hybrid etc., all together. Through the ecosystem of SAP, we want to work with partners such as Deloitte, Accenture and Ey etc., who are all working very substantially with SAP to help customers go to that innovation journey.

How SASE can Solve a Lot of Problems at Once

Across the GCC, as businesses continue to digitize, the performance-vs-security issue can be largely resolved through SASE, which serves up an orchestra of functions that is in tune with business requirements and customer expectation says Toni El Inati - RVP Sales, META & CEE, Barracuda Networks

When today’s business looks to compete, it must do so digitally. This is true worldwide, but even more so in the GCC, where a young demographic means a consumer base more awash with tech-savvy people than many other markets. To cater to customers like these, the fundamentals are twofold: performance and security. This has long been a tradeoff for businesses. On the one hand, we have to cater to users that expect everything to work well every time and deliver to them a superlative experience. This want is delivered on the back of performance capabilities, so many have turned to the software-defined wide-area network (SD-WAN). On the other hand, users expect their data to be safe in the hands of the companies with which they interact. This requires security, and security software edge (SSE) works well in the cloud-first era. It gathers together a range of cloud-native security technologies designed for websites and cloud services across private, public, and hybrid setups.

But we can do better. Secure access service edge, or SASE, unites SD-WAN and SSE into a single cloud-native service. Across the GCC, as businesses continue to digitize, the performance-vs-security issue can be largely resolved through SASE, which serves up an orchestra of functions that is in tune with business requirements and customer expectations. SASE accounts for multicloud. It enables safe-responsive hybrid-working platforms. It is ideal for automation, field-connected IoT systems, and so much

more. Through SASE, the same business that was previously struggling to keep digital experiences slick while keeping sensitive data secure has become an agile innovation center – productive, cost-effective, and competitive – without having to compromise on security.

SASE addresses the core issues that have emerged since the region was plunged into a pandemic, accompanied by lockdowns and operational upheaval. The attack surface has expanded. More endpoints in the form of privately owned employee devices that may be riddled with vulnerabilities or perhaps even malware itself. More third-party networks that may or may not have adequate cyber-hygiene. This ecosystem is a candy store for attackers, who can target email systems, applications, cloud services, employees, supply chains and more. They can steal credentials, move stealthily and laterally through the environment, take their time, plan, and eventually strike.

Let’s SASE…

To describe what happens next would be superfluous. We have all seen the headlines. Let’s be more purposeful. Let’s explore how we stay out of the headlines. Let’s consider how SASE can be deployed as an ever-ready guardian against the threats we fear, and how it can lift us out of our anxiety to a place of confidence. Times have changed, so our business must adapt. The threat landscape has changed, so our security must adapt. Clearly an obsession with perimeters is incongruous when most of our users now work outside them.

Having accepted this perimeterless network, you might then set about securing everything separately. After all, isn’t that the best way to solve a complex problem? To break it down into manageable chunks? In modern cybersecurity, however, this classically sensible approach leads to a laundry list of problems. Many tools means many dashboards, many upgrades, and many telemetries. Imagine what this subsequently means for the security team. Siloed information allows attackers to subvert each individual tool by making sure their activities and payloads raise the lowest alert levels and never amount to a red flag. Point solutions lead to nothing more than cost, complexity, and blinded security analysts.

Because SASE unites everything under a single roof, it is able to eliminate complexity, deliver scalable, enterprise-grade performance, and secure users, assets, and platforms wherever they are. The security analyst that works in a SASE environment is master of that environment. Single-pane management gives back all the visibility and control that was lost in cloud migration. Through SASE, the business gains direct, efficient, secure connectivity to the cloud. Traffic is routed based on user intention and role. And because of this contextual approach, there is no need to redirect traffic back through the data center for authentication. As you may notice, this is a significant boon for performance. It is made possible through firewall-as-a-service (FWaaS) and secure web gateway (SWG), two of the many technologies that work discreetly under SASE’s hood.

Easy for you to SASE

SASE is a best-of-all-worlds technology family. Integration, visibility, and security all improve. Complexity is reduced and the

attack surface shrinks – along with the business’s list of security vendors and consequently, the cost of ownership of its security function. SASE provides powerful secure-access tools, creating a comprehensive identity for each person, application, or device that accesses the corporate environment. Each identity carries with it information such as location, local time, and a rich risk profile that includes whether the right security tools are installed and active, and whether applications are patched correctly.

This information, combined with governance policy and threat intelligence can be used to automate access to applications and data in real time. Is access granted, limited, flagged, or blocked? SASE applies zero-trust principles that account for identity and context. For example, an employee that uses a corporate laptop to access resources while in the office during working hours represents a very different risk than a connection via a smartphone in an overseas, public location.

SASE answers a lot of questions and solves a lot of problems for the region’s enterprises as they commitment themselves to providing secure, high-performance experiences for customers and employees. Cyberthreat actors are adaptable, so let’s take a page from their book. If we assume they will continue to evolve, we cannot hope to thwart their advances unless we allow for this sophistication. Visibility, control, and scalability without performance degradation or a loss of integration options is not an unreachable dream. It is attainable and it has a name. That name is SASE.

5 BENEFITS

EVERY DATA-FIRST MANUFACTURER ENJOYS

Vibhu Kapoor, Regional Vice President - Middle East, Africa & India, Epicor explains why Data-first, technology-forward manufacturing companies are trailblazers in today’s digital economy

According to the World Bank, UAE manufacturing stood at around 10% of GDP in 2021 with the share having continued to climb during the pandemic, suggesting that the sector is relatively robust when compared to its industrial peers. Operation 300bn and other government-backed initiatives call for manufacturing to continue on this trajectory. And they all suggest that technology is one of the ways to do it. In a McKinsey report examining the advantages of Industry 4.0, the analysts explicitly stated it was “not uncommon” among adopting manufacturers to see 50% reductions in equipment downtime, 85% surges in the accuracy of forecasts, and up to 30% increases in productivity.

What is the secret to such successes? Data. Data-first, technology-forward manufac-

turing companies are trailblazers in today’s digital economy. They look to their challenges — soaring costs, skills gaps, supply-chain breakdowns, and the rest — and see opportunities for business transformation. They overcome the present and arm themselves for the future.

When leaders use data to drive decision-making, the first casualty is uncertainty. When they gather data from across finance, marketing, operations, customers, and sales, they can analyse it more holistically, generating clear-eyed insights that can impact the whole business rather than a single department. Teams feel empowered by this and tend to become more willing to innovate when they have the means to evaluate and justify any decision. And these capabilities go beyond the day-to-day routine. Business cases for permanent change

in policies or procedures can be made more convincingly using comprehensive, homogenised data.

What follows are examples of the benefits the region’s manufacturing innovators are already enjoying because they embraced the data-first approach.

1. Enhanced employee experiences

Attracting talented people and keeping them in place has become tantamount to success across the GCC and beyond. Data-first strategies provide better work environments through insights that influence planning and operations, allowing people to remain efficient and productive. Automation can alleviate arduous workloads, which also leads to enhanced satisfaction and engagement.

Epicor’s recent report, Voice of the Essential Manufacturing Worker, found that 60% of employees would accept a pay cut to work at a more technology-driven factory. This is the latest of many such indicators that payroll budget alone will not be enough to stem talent attrition. For digital natives, technology is like a fifth limb. While it would be natural for boomers and Gen-Xers to insist on using their arms and legs to do their job, should we not expect similar demands from millennials and Gen Z when it comes to digital technology? In manufacturing, tech like automation, machine learning, digital twins, and predictive analytics can streamline processes and empower employees.

2. Faster time to value

When an organisation embarks on a programme to streamline processes, change comes more rapidly when stakeholders can see operational bottlenecks at a glance. Separating the “working” from the “hardly working” requires data. Another study from McKinsey suggests that companies that “maintained their innovation focus” throughout the 2009 financial crisis went on to “outperform the market average by more than 30%”. None of this would have been possible without first taking a deep dive into the data.

3. Enhanced customer experiences

Customers in the UAE and across the region are bearing the brunt of a series of global issues, most of them outside the control of manufacturers. But with rich enough data at their beck and call, the concept of control takes on new meaning. Manufacturers may be powerless to fix the underlying issues affecting supply-chain stability, but they can manage the situation through data that offers customers self-service facilities like order-tracking. They can supplement this with data feeds and analysis that allow them to predict when a supply crunch is coming and switch to a Plan B.

Customer satisfaction and loyalty are naturally enhanced by orders being on time every time, but failing that, information is critical. Many customers will forgive a late delivery if they have been consistently informed of its progress.

4. Reduced costs

Talent acquisition has, for decades, been the

natural first step in process-improvement for manufacturers. But data-first businesses need not resort to lengthy, expensive recruitment drives by default. They can turn to analytics to see what other improvement avenues are available. A digital solution may improve outcomes for customers, employees, and the balance sheet in a single bound.

A prime example for the manufacturing space is the use of digital twins. Firms can test-run any conceived scenario to understand cost levers associated with materials and waste, without ever incurring those costs in the real world. And predictive modelling can paint a clear picture of operational timelines, supply chains, and other areas to allow planning with regard to materials and personnel, which can greatly alleviate budget pressures.

5. A more sustainable business

In the face of intensified interest in ESG (environmental, social, and governance), manufacturing data is the only way to approach a sustainable future for the busi-

ness and the communities it serves. The standard prerequisite of improvement is the ability to accurately track a range of data points. Where are business costs concentrated? Where does the greatest waste occur and how can it be eliminated? It is worth mentioning here that automation is an essential cog in managing and monitoring sustainability programmes.

Let us not forget that sustainability has been compellingly linked to employee engagement. Our report also found that 60% of factory workers would take a pay cut to work at a more sustainable factory, suggesting that employees are not only more likely to remain in place if they regard their employer as a sustainability leader; they will be more likely to be vocal advocates of their company.

Data thirst

If challenges are really just opportunities, then it is data that will turn it around for the enterprise. Manufacturers who put it front and centre will emerge as leaders.

ENSURING A HOLISTIC APPROACH TO CYBERSECURITY

That IDC predicts a 7.9% yearon-year surge in the Middle East and Africa’s cybersecurity investment in 2023, to reach US$6.2 billion, is interesting. The projection of US$7.7 billion for the region’s digital defense spend in 2026 and the interim CAGR figure of 7.8% are thought-provoking. But none of these figures are as eye-popping as the fact that MEA cybersecurity spending in 2023 will take the biggest share (more than two-fifths) of overall IT investment, even beating back services and hardware for the podium position.

There was a time when this would have been unthinkable, as security would have been an afterthought at board meetings. But in a world made hybrid by the economic twists and turns of pandemics, recessions, and supply-chain ravages, the IT suite has become more complex, and attackers have become bolder. The sophistication shown in the threat actor’s methods of recon, deployment, and execution are, one has to grudgingly admit, impressive.

This is the online climate in which regional businesses commit more and more budget to cybersecurity. But as all savvy business leaders know, throwing money at a problem is not enough. Ensuring the investment builds the right capabilities to yield a return takes guile. In cybersecurity, the often-overused word to describe our goal is a “holistic” solution. To be clear, it is easy to just trot out some words to define what we mean — “universal”, “comprehensive”, “all-encompassing”, and so on — but I believe the goal is better explained by defining what legacy practices we are replacing.

No more silos

We are leaving behind information silos — a lot of point systems that do narrowly defined tasks very well, but which can be exploited by cybergangs to slip under the radar. This happens because attackers know what signals each tool goes after and so they are able to devise ways of registering as a low-level threat on each tool and therefore never being called to the attention of a security analyst.

In security investment, organizations must therefore think holistically about attack methods and inroads and design an “um-

Hadi Jaafarawi, Managing Director for Middle East, Qualys discusses 3 areas of focus that can prevent the MEA region’s cybersecurity investments going to waste

brella sentinel” system to detect behaviors and identify which ones may lead to harm in time to stop, or at least mitigate, their operation. At its heart, this methodology will employ risk-based assessment and allow for the unification of people, processes, and technology.

1. Patch management

If we take patching as an example, our holistic approach must see the whole board and ask how the organization can overcome problems of understaffing for smaller businesses, and the vast number of devices and business units responsible for various assets in the case of larger enterprises. Qualys data shows that attackers take an average of just 19.5 days to exploit a new software vulnerability, but security teams take an average of 30.6 days to patch them.

Interestingly, however, we found that average patching times for malware and ransomware were shorter than weaponization times, meaning these attacks must exploit older issues that have not yet been patched. When trying to concentrate resources in a cost-effective way, these areas — older vulnerabilities that could be easily exploited to cause great harm — would seem to be excellent starting points. Where possible, patching should be automated. Our data shows that where patches were eligible for automatic deployment, they were applied 45% more often and 36% faster than those that had to be deployed manually.

2. Initial access brokers

Initial access brokers (IABs) are becoming a growth industry within the threat community. They use phishing of users or misconfigurations in public-facing assets to gather the tools of infiltration and sell them to others. IABs target paths less likely to be patched quickly, so investment strategies and resource allocation should account for this “long tail” of risk.

3. Misconfigurations

Also worth addressing is the misconfiguration of Web applications and cloud infrastructure. The OWASP Top Ten list can help with applications, as can close collaboration between security and developer teams to improve products before they are deployed. In our research, Qualys found 25 million flaws in 370,000 deployed Web

applications, so prioritizing risk-mitigation at design time is a shrewd use of resources and budget.

On the infrastructure side, one of the most common causes of data leaks is sources mistakenly left accessible without passwords or encryption. Discovery of such misconfigurations should be automated so they can be flagged for immediate response. The Center for Internet Security provides benchmarks for security teams that operate under the three main hyperscale providers (Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Platform).

The CIS measures make life much harder for threat actors, but in many cases, large majorities of organizations have not implemented the most important benchmarks, or indeed, any of them. We live in a cloud-first world. Any security team that does not address the cloud and other infrastructure holistically (there’s that word again), ignores risk and invites disaster.

The CIS Hardening Benchmarks are extremely effective and directed towards plugging known gaps based on potential threats.

Know yourself

As in any warfare, local knowledge is a powerful advantage. Budget in hand, security teams must weaponize their own knowledge of the enterprise — its infrastructure, operations, people, and policies — to deploy security investment and resources where they will add the most value. Automation, best practices, and threat intelligence aside, it is important to remember that threat actors will never stop trying to come up with ways to breach, steal, and extort, so security teams should never stop trying to imagine how this might happen. Once one gap is plugged, another may appear. Any new device, application, or other network element represents a new potential for risk. Think about all assets, old and new, everywhere, every day. Or, to sum up… think holistically.

WHAT IS QUIET QUITTING? AND HOW CAN TECHNOLOGY HELP?

Ekta Puthran, Head of Sales APAC & MEACollaboration, Barco Shares insights from Barco Research into the challenges of quiet quitting across the hybrid environment

What are the causes of these hidden frustrations?

• 28% point to tech overload. Excessive use of devices reduces their capacity to accomplish their work. People have a hard time to “switch off” from their devices in their own personal time, due to work commitments.

• 25% of workers feel stressed out by all the meeting technology they are expected to use.

company values more than ever before. In turn, employers have a hard time reaching employees in formal online and hybrid meetings since these have replaced also the more informal chats at the coffee corner.

How can technology help?

The Barco Meeting Barometer, an annual index measuring the workers’ satisfaction within the hybrid meeting environment, found that 65% of workers are either back in the office full time or spend more time in the office than remote. However, 31% wish they could work from home more often. That said, quiet quitting has begun to take hold, as 23% of workers explicitly reporting disengagement from work due to poor management and tech overload (14%).

While it is clear that the hybrid model enjoys great popularity amongst workers due to the flexibility it offers, businesses must be careful that it does not become a double-edged sword. Remote colleagues may feel less able to communicate the pressures they are facing, masking work-related stress that may build into a larger disengagement issue if left unaddressed.

One in three workers mostly working in the office find it easier to tell when a colleague is overworked or stressed when seeing them face to face, leaving remote workers at risk of struggling under the radar of management teams.

• 19% state that hybrid working has had a negative influence on their collaboration with colleagues.

• 35% of remote staff state they miss in-person interactions with co-workers.

What is quiet quitting exactly?

Quiet quitting refers to employees who are doing the bare minimum in their job and putting in no more time, effort or enthusiasm than absolutely necessary. Quiet quitting does not mean employees have left their job, but they avoid working longer hours and set clear boundaries to improve work-life balance. It is a growing phenomenon in the hybrid workplace and one which employers will have to keep a firm grip on in order to manage staff wellbeing and productivity levels.

The term ‘quiet quitting’ may sound relatively new, the practise, however, isn’t. Employees have been quietly quitting because of poor management, workload, pay, burnout or lack of growing opportunities in the past too. However, since the Great Resignation and the shift to hybrid work, the phenomenon has been extrapolated and workers globally have started to question their work-life balance, salaries and

Employee experience is key for organizations fighting disengagement. Keeping communication lines open, asking for feedback and giving regular appreciation are focus points for mangers. Next to that employers can gain real benefit from enabling great collaboration experiences and investing in the right technology to improve inclusion and equity in the hybrid workplace. With the right tools, policies and practices in place, work-life boundaries can be respected, collaboration can be seamless and workers can feel truly engaged and included.

As many employees report disengagement due to the overwhelm caused by the various tech tools they’re being told to use, it is clear that the learnings from the last three years of hybrid work need a more concerted effort to be implemented correctly. If businesses expect to get the best out of their teams, they must provide them with the tools they need to feel supported and heard, wherever they are: remote or in-office.

The survey commissioned by Barco was conducted by 3Gem between the dates of November 4 and November 14, 2022. The survey was completed by 5,000 office workers across France, Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States (1,000 of each per in France, Germany and the UK, and 2,000 in the U.S.).

WHY ADAPTIVE AI SHOULD MATTER TO YOUR BUSINESS

Erick Brethenoux, Distinguished

VP Analyst, Gartner says Adaptive AI brings adaptability and resilience into design into organizations he;ping them react more quickly and effectively to disruptions.

Adaptive AI absorbs learnings even as it’s being built. Think about that for a second.

Adaptive artificial intelligence (AI), unlike traditional AI systems, can revise its own code to adjust for real-world changes that weren't known or foreseen when the code was first written. Organizations that build adaptability and resilience into design in this way can react more quickly and effectively to disruptions.

Flexibility and adaptability are now vital, as many businesses have learned during recent health and climate crises. Adaptive AI systems aim to continuously retrain models or apply other mechanisms to adapt and learn within runtime and development environments — making them more adaptive and resilient to change.

Gartner expects that by 2026, enterprises that have adopted AI engineering practices to build and manage adaptive AI systems will outperform their peers in the number and time it takes to operationalize artificial intelligence models by at least 25%.

Why adaptive AI matters to business

Adaptive AI brings together a set of methods (i.e., agent-based design) and AI techniques (i.e., reinforcement learning) to enable systems to adjust their learning practices and behaviors so they can adapt to changing real-world circumstances while in production.

By learning behavioral patterns from past human and machine experience, and within runtime environments, adaptive AI delivers faster, better outcomes. The U.S. Army and U.S. Air Force, for example, have built a learning system that adapts its lessons to the learner using their individual strengths. It knows what to teach, when to test and how to measure progress. The program acts like an individual tutor, tailoring the learning to the student.

And for any enterprise, decision making is a critical but increasingly complex activity that will require decision intelligence systems to exercise more autonomy. But decision-making processes will need to be reengineered to use adaptive AI. This can have major implications for existing process architectures — and requires business stakeholders to ensure the ethical use of AI for compliance and regulations.

Bring together representatives from business, IT and support functions to implement adaptive AI systems. Identify the use cases, provide insight into technologies and identify sourcing and resourcing impact. At a minimum, business stakeholders must collaborate with data and analytics, AI and software engineering practices to build adaptive AI systems. AI engineering will play a critical role in building and operationalizing the adaptive AI architectures.

Ultimately, though, adaptive systems will enable new ways of doing business, opening the door to new business models or products, services and channels that will break decision silos.

Adaptive AI implementation steps

AI engineering provides the foundational components of implementation, operationalization and change management at the process level that enable adaptive AI systems. But adaptive AI requires significantly strengthening the change management aspect of AI engineering efforts. It will defeat the purpose if only a few functions around this principle are altered.

Reengineering systems for adaptive AI will significantly impact employees, businesses and technology partners and won’t happen overnight.

First, create the foundations of adaptive AI systems by complementing current AI

implementations with continuous intelligence design patterns and event-stream capabilities — eventually moving toward agent-based methods to give more autonomy to systems components.

Also, make it easier for business users to adopt AI and contribute toward managing adaptive AI systems by incorporating explicit and measurable business indicators through operationalized systems, as well as incorporating trust within the decisioning framework.

In short:

• Adaptive AI creates a superior and faster user experience by adapting to changing real-world circumstances.

• Broadening decision making capabilities and flexibility happen while implementing decision intelligence capabilities.

• IT leaders need to reengineer various processes to build adaptive AI systems that can learn and change their behaviors based on circumstances.

HOW DOES YOUR BOARD MEASURE CYBER RESILIENCE?

Deryck Mitchelson, Field CISO at Check Point Software writes that while traditional cybersecurity measures primarily focus on threat detection and mitigation, adopting a prevention-first approach is crucial when it comes to shoring up resilience.

Organizations are facing an uphill battle. The volume of cyberattacks has risen year-on-year, with a 38% increase in 2022 compared to the previous year. In the UAE alone, an organization is being targeted on average 1403 times per week over the last six months. Supply chain attacks continue to challenge organizations. Zero-day vulnerabilities are being uncovered daily, with the most recent prolific incident being the 3CX compromise found in March 2023. The geopolitical landscape has never been more fractured in response to the Russo-Ukraine war, and ransomware has evolved beyond classic encryption to more sophisticated data extortion. All of this has created the perfect conditions for cybercriminals to thrive and for businesses to stay out of danger.

So, what is the solution? In today's interconnected world, where digital technologies play a vital role in business operations, organizations need a proactive and comprehensive approach to cybersecurity, one that goes beyond traditional preventative measures. Enter cyber resilience: the ability of organizations to withstand, respond to, and recover from cyber incidents while maintaining essential operations and protecting critical assets. Cyber resilience is not just about dealing with threats, it’s about the board’s overall ability to make informed decisions on how to mitigate risk and ensure that data is protected. With such a tall order, the question is - where do you even begin?

Taking a risk-based view

Many organizations opt for widely recognized guidelines and standards as a starting point to establish a common framework for cybersecurity and risk analysis. Two prominent tools are the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) framework and the MITRE ATT&CK framework. These provide organizations with structured approaches to identify, protect, detect, respond to, and recover from cyber threats. By adhering to these frameworks, businesses can enhance their overall cybersecurity posture and strengthen their ability to withstand potential attacks.

To implement such frameworks effectively, organizations should first assess their current cybersecurity capabilities and identify any gaps or vulnerabilities. This will help determine which framework is most suitable for their needs. Next, they need to establish a dedicated team responsible for overseeing the implementation and ongoing management of the framework. This team will map the framework's controls and guidelines to the organization's existing infrastructure and processes, ensuring the framework is aligned with the specific requirements and risks the business faces.

In the European Union (EU), recent developments have also highlighted the growing emphasis on re-

silience. The EU's Network and Information Security (NIS) Directive, implemented in 2018, requires organizations to adopt appropriate measures to ensure the security and resilience of their network and information systems. Furthermore, the EU Cybersecurity Act, enacted in 2019, establishes a framework for the certification of cybersecurity products and services. These developments demonstrate the EU's commitment to enhancing cybersecurity at both the organizational and regulatory levels.

The unfortunate truth is cybersecurity frameworks alone are no longer enough to protect organizations in a world where threats and data breaches are more than one-off occurrences. After all, cybercriminals do not care about frameworks – they care about breaking through a network’s defenses. Robust, proactive, and preparatory work is needed to ensure that businesses can mitigate these threats, reduce their overall risk posture, and orchestrate rapid-response remediation when required.

Resilience: Adopting a prevention-first approach

While traditional cybersecurity measures primarily focus on threat detection and mitigation, adopting a prevention-first approach is crucial when it comes to shoring up resilience.

Resilience refers to an organization’s ability to not only detect and mitigate threats but have real-time visibility over their networks and the ability to anticipate threats and execute rapid-response measures that reduce or eliminate downtime.

Rather than solely relying on reactive measures, organizations need to proactively build robust defenses that can withstand potential attacks. This approach emphasizes the importance of identifying vulnerabilities, implementing strong security controls, and continuously monitoring and improving security practices. To effectively address the challenges of the digital age, organizations should embrace the three C's and ensure their solution is comprehensive, consolidated, and collaborative.

Comprehensive security measures entail a holistic approach, encompassing all aspects of an organization's infrastructure, applications, and data. This includes implementing access controls, regular patching, and encryption protocols, among other measures.

Consolidation refers to the integration and centralization of security tools and technologies. A study conducted by Check Point and Dimensional Research found that 49% of all organizations use between 6 and 40 point security products, while 98% of organizations manage their security products with multiple consoles, creating vulnerability gaps and visibility blind spots. By reducing the number of disparate solutions and unifying security operations, organizations can achieve greater visibility and control over their security landscape at a time when network footprints are rapidly expanding. This enables more efficient threat detection, response, and recovery processes.

Collaboration highlights the importance of taking a cohesive and joined-up approach to threat detection and mitigation. If one endpoint is compromised, all areas of the organization – including its software supply chain – must mobilize from a security perspec-

tive to ensure the threat is contained and cannot spread laterally within the network or impact customer organizations as part of a supply chain attack. Real-time threat intelligence from enforcers, cyber analysts, and the broader cybersecurity community must also be pooled to ensure that the most up-to-date threat information is available to all.

Making cybersecurity more resilient

The concept of cyber resilience goes beyond traditional cybersecurity. It encompasses an organization’s ability to withstand and recover from cyberattacks. While cybersecurity focuses on preventing and detecting attacks, resilience aims to build a fortified environment that can withstand potential threats. In essence, it involves building that automated barricade rather than relying on an under-resourced army to detect and respond to attacks.

Resilience acknowledges that no security system is perfect, and breaches can occur despite robust preventive measures. Therefore, organizations must focus on building redundancies, developing incident response plans, and establishing backup and recovery mechanisms to ensure business continuity even in the face of a successful attack.

The modern threat landscape requires businesses to go beyond traditional cybersecurity measures and embrace resilience as a critical component of their security strategies. By adopting a prevention-first approach, leveraging comprehensive, consolidated, and collaborative security measures, and understanding the importance of cyber resilience, organizations can better protect their assets and mitigate the potential impacts of cyber threats. As the digital landscape continues to evolve, businesses must stay vigilant, adapt to emerging challenges, and prioritize resilience above all else. After all, it is better to build your barricades before your army.

Significance of ECM & BPM in Business Transformation

In the evolving digital era and growing business landscape, organizations face immense pressure to adapt and transform to stay competitive. Business Process Management (BPM) has emerged as a critical component in driving business transformation. Whether you own a small, medium, or large enterprise, implementing the business processes is of utmost importance to function efficiently.

Here, one of the core business processes is to manage the content lifecycle. And this can be achieved by implementing the ECM (Enterprise Content Management) throughout your organization.

What Is BPM?

Business process management is a set of processes that ease the business process via process automation, management, and optimization.

BPM works in combination with ECM that enables the automation of various activities such as accounts payable, contract management, content management, information security and governance etc.

Organizations employ BPM to optimize and standardize business processes, automate complex tasks, create and maintain SLAs, reduce dependency on manual tasks, elevate knowledge worker skills, and achieve digital transformation.

Further, businesses can reduce ad hoc workflow management tasks and scale the business processes to achieve future goals. The most common examples of using BPM in the organization are:

• Account opening and customer onboarding

• Accounts Payable

• Vendor Management

• Contract Management

• Expense Management

• Effective data management

• Project Management Service Requests Automation

Well, these are just the tip of the iceberg. BPM processes accomplish hefty tasks enabling smooth functioning business processes. Benefits of Business Process Management

Businesses that are unorganized and distorted not only prove inefficient for the workforce but also for their customers. Imagine a

business full of bottlenecks and traditional methodologies. That said, scalable Business Process Management helps remove bottlenecks, scan and eliminate the inefficiencies effectively. Here are the quick benefits of adapting BPM in the organization:

• Run daily business processes in automation

• Assess the risks in advance and mitigate them

• Optimize the complex operations

• Plan larger organizational goals

• Track processes as they move through the workflow.

• One of the major components of this holistic BPM process is ECM (Enterprise content management). The major goal of this part of business process management is to reduce the dependencies on paperwork and manage the content lifecycle of the organization.

What is ECM (Enterprise Content Management)?

Enterprise Content Management (ECM) refers to a set of strategies, processes, and tools used by organizations to manage the creation, capture, storage, retrieval, secure, distribution, and archiving of digital and physical content throughout its lifecycle. ECM encompasses a wide range of content types, including documents, images, videos, emails, web pages, and more.

The major goal of the ECM system is to reduce the dependency on paper documents, forms and organize the information in hierarchies or as the admins wish.

Importance of ECM

One of the major USPs of ECM is the way this approach works. It’s like having an x-ray of your content distribution system. ECM solutions are created to tackle the changing technology and organize the content silos to deliver the right information at the right time.

Here are the quick benefits of ECM systems in the organization:

• Better management of vast repositories of data to reduce clutter and provide visibility

• Increased accessibility to various types of data helps lower costs and save significant time

• Minimal use of paper-based tasks by leveraging cloud-based storage services.

Rahul Bhatia

-

ECM

Conversational AI at Finesse talks about the growing significance of ECM and BPM in business transformation and how they can simplify and streamline work.

• ECM also archives and collects the previous information in a structured way that can later be accessed from anywhere and anytime

• Connect and collaborate with the content team, stakeholders, team leads using a single unified dashboard

• Secured exchange of documents and risk management practices to avoid unauthorized access to documents.

ECM and BPM: Know the Difference OR Commonalities

The common misconception regarding the ECM and BPM is that it is almost the same. Though the two processes work towards a common goal, it would be wrong to consider them similar or to separate them with each other.

While ECM is a process that addresses the lifecycle of your content systems, BPM is more oriented towards improving the business process tasks in an organization such as the modification of existing processes and automation of the business indicators.

To explain it further, an ECM system is responsible for organizing, indexing , and preserving the specific files in an organization whereas BPM improves the business processes that don’t solely affect the content and document management.

Still, the confusion between ECM and BPM is because of some common features they possess. Let’s say, some BPM tools tend

to improve document management functions whereas some ECM tools improve the business process life cycles.

However, understanding the key functions of ECM and BPM can help organizations leverage the right tools to optimize both their content management and business processes. Let’s understand how ECM and BPM can work together.

How Do ECM And BPM Work Together?

BPMS or Business Process Management suite is a more holistic system that contains the features of both BPM and ECM. One of the major benefits of using BPM and ECM together is because of the system’s vast range of features along with customizable platforms.

The ECM and BPM should have some joint features that save costs, and time and boosts productivity. For example, ECM must contain digital signatures so that it guarantees the validity of the documents.

Integrating ECM and BPM

Imagine an example of an eCommerce website. A customer does market research, adds the products to the cart, makes the payment, and gets the shipment delivered.

Now, there is a vast amount of data and questions that you would want to collect:

Are they satisfied with the website experience and content?

Are they loyal customers?

Which suppliers do they prefer the most?

How long is the time to deliver the shipment?

A single customer process may contain large set of data that could potentially benefit your business.

The combined power of BPM and ECM integration empowers organizations to automate end-to-end processes, manage content effectively, improve collaboration, and optimize decision-making. It fosters a holistic approach to managing both structured processes and unstructured content, driving efficiency, agility, and innovation across the enterprise.

All in all, the interoperability between ECM and BPM in BPMS helps make data-driven decisions based on real data. This enables better customer satisfaction, increased operational efficiency, and scalability.

Final Thoughts

In conclusion, ECM and BPM create a powerful synergy that facilitates business transformation. ECM and BPM can turn out to be instrumental in transforming the business process through the use of modern technologies.

By embracing these disciplines, businesses can unlock their full potential, achieve operational excellence, and thrive in the digital age.

Combination of ECM and BPM lays a strong foundation of a digital enterprise.

Pure Storage announced the release of the next-generation FlashArray//X and FlashArray//C R4 models. The new FlashArray models deliver global enterprises with the data agility, performance, security, and cost savings needed to seamlessly and economically scale business operations with the most efficient storage product line in the industry.

The next-generation FlashArray//X and FlashArray//C support the industry’s agile storage needs by pioneering the industry’s leading all-flash platform that uniquely integrates hardware with a unified Purity operating environment across all products.

With a massive leap forward in performance and scale, FlashArray continues to lead the storage industry, powering the most demanding applications and business-critical workloads while reducing their overall management costs by up to 74% over legacy storage. Pure Storage Evergreen//Forever subscribers can take advantage of the massive performance and efficiency gains at no additional cost and completely non-disruptively.

PURE STORAGE NEXT GENERATION FLASHARRAY//X AND FLASHARRAY//C

Highlights:

• Up to 40% Performance Boost: The latest R4 models drive up to a 40% performance boost, over 80% increased memory speeds to support greater workload consolidation, and a 30% inline compression boost to stretch storage capacity further.

• More Choices for Business-Critical Workloads: By expanding its FlashArray//C line with FlashArray//C90, Pure Storage enables more customer choices for business-critical workloads and data where sub 2m second latency is not required, making it the perfect platform for operational databases, workload consolidation, BCDR, and file workloads, including VMware, PACs, and file stores.

• Industry’s Largest Flash Drives: FlashArray//C will include the upcoming release of 75TB QLC DirectFlash Modules (DFMs) with built-in non-volatile RAM, while FlashArray//X will include 36TB TLC DFMs. These DFMs deliver 1.5PB per 3RU, a 106% improvement in density per rack unit.

• Continuous Innovation, Without Extra Cost or Disruption: Pure Storage customers can take advantage of the R4 upgrades at no cost via a completely non-disruptive, no-downtime upgrade through Pure Storage’s patented Evergreen architecture and subscription offering.

AOC 100HZ MONITORS

AOC's 100Hz monitors are designed not just for gamers but for all home users, these monitors deliver unparalleled performance and seamless visuals. AOC is committed to facilitate its customers with the best experience that makes the entertainment superior, which is why AOC proudly presents 100Hz monitors refresh rate monitors, perfect for both work and leisure.

AOC's 100Hz monitors offer outstanding performance, accessibility, and convenience, all at a budget-friendly price compared to other high-refresh-rate monitors. Users can adjust these monitors' ergonomics to suit any setup

with VESA wall mount and tilt functions. Essential connectivity options, such as HDMI, are included. AOC is also committed to users' wellbeing, with flicker-free technology and AOC Low Blue Mode to protect users from harmful blue light output.

Highlights:

• AOC's 100Hz monitors offer nearly twice the frame rate of traditional monitors in the B2C category, providing versatility and fluidity for all users.

D-LINK 28-PORT NUCLIAS CLOUD-MANAGED POE SWITCH

TheDBS-2000 Series Nuclias Cloud-Managed Switches are deployed as pre-managed, zero configuration switches controlled through the D-Link Nuclias cloud. They are best-inclass switches designed specifically for enterprise environments.

Designed to be managed through the D-Link Nuclias cloud, DBS-2000 Series switches are easily set up with the help of the intuitive D-Link Nuclias browser-based or mobile app interface. Centralized cloud management allows for zero-touch provisioning, enabling businesses to quickly configure, deploy, maintain, and expand their network remotely. Configuration settings can be set up, managed, and deployed through the cloud anytime, anywhere through any web browser

or the dedicated mobile app, meaning devices can be deployed at a remote location without any need for trained on-site staff. Save time by configuring switches of the same model series in bulk. Similarly, if the same set of ports of multiple switches uses the same configuration profile, this port configuration can easily be deployed and updated in bulk.

Using D-Link Nuclias, businesses can now more effectively organize their entire wireless network, manage multiple switches simultaneously, and monitor live network statistics. With the user-friendly single pane of glass management console, administrators have access to an intuitive way of organizing the network into multiple sites, which simplifies management across multiple areas. With no limitation

on the number of devices, businesses can easily cater to the demands of a growing network by simply adding more devices to the network. Over the-air firmware updates can be automatically pushed to devices through the cloud.

Highlights:

• 24 x 10/100/1000BASE-T PoE ports

• 4 x 10/100/1000BASE-T ports

• 193W PoE power budget

• Supports IEEE 802.3at PoE

• Zero-Touch Deployment

• Cloud Management w/99.9% SLA

• WPA/WPA2/WPA3 Encryption

• Innovative D-Link Green Energy-saving features

• Experience a tear-free, immersive gaming experience, whether you're playing action-packed, twitch-sensitive games, or energy-intensive high-speed races. These monitors ensure your gaming experience is stutter-free and without blurry motion.

• These 100Hz monitors also offer effortless flow and comfort for your daily tasks, such as working on spreadsheets, typing emails, and engaging in creative design projects.

• Traditional work monitors don’t usually emphasize enhanced refresh rates, but AOC's 100Hz monitors deliver a comfortable, fluid experience, rendering every frame sharply for an improved user experience.

• AOC's 100Hz monitors provide high performance with practical simplicity. Each monitor features a 3-sided frameless design, saving space, minimizing distractions, and allowing for easy customization of your home setup.

• The sleek, ultra-slim design is modern and easily transportable, showcasing how these monitors deliver exceptional performance while maintaining optimal simplicity for users' convenience.

81% OF CIOS EXPECT TO GROW THEIR IT TEAM IN 2023

Large Enterprise CIOs Are Using Several Tactics to Execute Their Talent Strategy and Meet Critical Skills Demands in 2023

Eighty-one percent of large enterprise (LE) CIOs plan to increase their IT headcount in 2023, according to a recent survey by Gartner, Inc. Only 14% expect their IT staff to decrease and 5% expect their headcount to remain the same.

“Attracting and retaining technology talent remain critical areas of concern for CIOs,” said Jose Ramirez, Sr Principal Analyst at Gartner. “Even with advances in AI, Gartner predicts that the global job impact will be neutral in the next several years due to enterprise adoption lags, implementation times and learning curves.”

Only 4% of CIOs surveyed reported AI-augmented worker as a resource producing technology work today.

The Gartner survey was conducted from October through November of 2022 among 501 respondents, 182 of which were LE CIOs in North America, EMEA and APAC region. The LE segment consists of enterprises with a total annual revenue of $1B USD or more.

Why CIOs Plan to Increase IT Headcount in 2023

“Enterprises have undertaken various digital initiatives over the past two years, with operational excellence and customer or citizen experience being the most popular,” said Ramirez. “Still, these initiatives often do not meet enterprise needs quickly enough.” Sixty-seven percent of LE CIOs plan to grow their IT headcount in 2023 by at least 10% to support their enterprise’s digital initiatives.

While CIOs are looking to expand their IT teams, many have faced roadblocks in hiring due to economic conditions. Due to prevailing economic volatility, 41% of LE CIOs report slow hiring for IT roles, 35% report decreasing overall IT budget and 29% report an IT hiring freeze.

"CIOs are taking proactive steps to combat economic volatility by relaxing geographic and role requirements to expand their IT talent pipeline,” said Ramirez. “Some organizations have found success by hiring early-career technologists and providing upskilling opportunities to fill critical technology needs.”

The survey also found that full-time equivalents (FTEs) do the majority of tech work in the enterprise. Full-time IT employees perform 56% of the work,

while technology advancements such as automation and AI-augmented work account for just over 9% of work today.

“This reliance on FTEs to meet the demands of digital transformation explain why LE CIOs plan to increase IT headcount in 2023,” said Ramirez.

How CIOs Plan to Upskill IT Talent

With the growing demand for IT talent, the most important candidate qualities LE CIOs look for during the hiring process are having the requisite technical skills, soft skills (e.g., communication, relationship management) and cultural fit. LE CIOs cite cybersecurity, cloud platforms and customer/user experience as the three most critical technical skills in 2023.

Nearly half of LE CIOs plan to invest in training programs to upskill and reskill IT staff to ensure teams have the relevant roles, skills and capacity to meet enterprise objectives. Forty-six percent of CIOs also plan to establish fusion teams, and the same percentage plan to automate workflow to free up IT time.

“Recruiting the right IT expertise takes time and planning, especially for skills in architecture, cybersecurity, cloud computing and agile software development,” said Ramirez. “Ensure that IT has relevant roles, skills and capacity to meet enterprise objectives. This may require embracing a blended workforce model of IT and business domain roles.”

ITStaffing Steps Taken in Response to Economic Volatility