Smart Phases' Chief Technology Officer participates in the IBM Think2020 Event

IBM had to cancel the physical Think 2020 conference and go to a digital format like many other conferences. From May 4th to May 6th 2020, it wasn't stopping participants, including Smart Phases' Chief Technology Officer, Stephane Bilodeau, Eng., PhD, FEC to attend and participate to their Video conference and their tech lab. The recently appointed IBM CEO, Arvind Krishna, greatly discussed the company's vision for 5G edge and AI

We have been able to see the Quantum progress that IBM is demonstrating. It shows the traditional hardware DNA still delivers and in combination with software is a key differentiator that few other tech giants can compete with. IBM used the digital format to even expand its quantum presence at Think 2020. One of the clear upsides of the digital format. Needless to say, Covid-19 was present, and IBM showed how quantum technology is superior to simulating complex scenarios – like the spread of the SARS-COV-V2 virus. Being already involved in post-pandemic recovery plans, Smart Phases was actively contributing to Tech Lab related to COVID-19 as well.

During the event, Dr Bilodeau was actively involved in Artificial Intelligence Tech Lab that we're looking at new ways to use AI in complex applications. The main tool when it is IBM that is Watson. How well Watson is up to the task was explored and tested, its traditional expert system that is queried by a human and created / operated by a data scientist.

Of course, AI overall was not missing at Think 2020 and Smart Phases fully assenting with IBM new motto: 'Act – don't react'. It describes well the recent best practice change in our TESS+AI+Hybrid Cloud deployments… instead of humans analyzing data and then realizing something is wrong ('reacting') – it is key to close the insight to action loop. That has been the quest from the first systems and now achieved with the Novacab 5th generation.

Overall a good start in the virtual collaborative conference, from our CTO standpoint, for IBM under new leadership and a new executive team and in this almost post COVID-19 era, the coming new "normal".