November 2021 – Windy Haven USA Inc.

IBM, Amazon Web Services Join Forces to Help Oil & Gas Industry Accelerate Energy Transition

ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates, Nov. 15, 2021 — Today at ADIPEC, IBM and Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS), an Amazon.com, Inc. company (NASDAQ: AMZN) announced the two companies will combine the benefits of IBM Open Data for Industries for IBM Cloud Pak for Data and the AWS Cloud to serve energy customers. This comprehensive solution is built on Red Hat OpenShift and will run on the AWS Cloud, simplifying the ability for customers to run workloads in the AWS cloud and on-premises. The two companies also intend to collaborate on further co-development of future functionality to provide greater flexibility and choice on where to run OSDU applications.

As an IBM and Reuters whitepaper, sponsored by IBM, found, the energy industry is facing pressure to reduce greenhouse gases as demand for affordable energy continues to rise. Energy companies need solutions that help drive efficiencies to free up capital, time and resources to invest in discovering new, more sustainable energy sources for the future. Data and digital technologies can help to navigate this transition, yet an IBM survey found that less than half of oil and gas executive respondents are using data to drive that innovation. This is in part because most of the digitization efforts have been in proprietary closed systems, hindering the potential to combine and maximize the value of data.

The collaboration between IBM and AWS aims to accelerate reduction of data barriers in the industry. IBM Open Data for Industries is an open-source solution using the OSDU data foundation for the oil, gas and energy industry. IBM Open Data for Industries is fully integrated with IBM Cloud Pak for Data for easy data management, and built on Red Hat OpenShift, the industry’s leading Kubernetes platform and open architecture, designed so that companies can run and operate applications universally. With this collaboration, customers will gain the flexibility to run OSDU Data Platform applications in the AWS cloud or on-premises while addressing data residency requirements. Combined with the expansive cloud infrastructure of AWS cloud services, this data platform can help energy companies reduce the cost, time and resources needed to leverage the data to derive insight, streamlining operations and transition to sustainable energy generation.

“Much of the data needed to solve the complex energy challenges, such as superior subsurface decisions, already exists, yet is untapped. This is because one of the greatest values of that data is derived when it can be effectively combined, but usually this data is locked by data residency requirements, legacy applications or proprietary data formats,” said Bill Vass, vice president, engineering, AWS. “By collaborating with IBM and leveraging Red Hat OpenShift, we will be able to offer customers a global, seamless offering with the flexibility to run on virtually any IT infrastructure and drive longer-term digital innovation.”

The OSDU Forum is a cross-industry collaboration that provides a vendor-neutral framework for companies to develop data platforms against common energy industry standards. By working together, IBM and AWS will accelerate the value of this platform for global customers. The goal is that this combined effort will help serve the needs of energy companies today with flexibility to adapt to change amid energy transition.

“Data is a critical asset to help fuel energy transition, yet too often energy companies must choose between running applications on-premises or in the cloud, and often each deployment uses a proprietary data format,” said Manish Chawla, global managing director, energy, resources and manufacturing, IBM. “This means that rather than using all of that collective data to gather insights, augment operations and inform innovation, some of it was going unused. Our collaboration with Amazon Web Services is addressing the need to make it easier for energy customers to access their data and provides the industry with a flexible solution to meet the challenges of today, as well as more easily adapt as the industry evolves.”

This collaboration underscores the value of IBM and Red Hat to provide flexibility and unlock greater business value for operational data across industries.

Those attending the ADIPEC Exhibition and Conference are encouraged to attend a joint, fireside session hosted at the AWS booth, Abu Dhabi Convention Centre, Hall 13, AWS booth #13360, on Monday, Nov. 15th 12:30pm – 1:00pm GMT +4. AWS and IBM will further discuss this collaboration and meeting the challenges of the industry.

About IBM
IBM combines technology with industry expertise to help Oil & Gas clients digitally reinvent their businesses for resilience and sustainability. Pioneering advances in materials science from IBM Research accelerate energy transition. Data science and AI take the guesswork out of exploration. Predictive asset management raises production throughput. Supply chain insights and blockchain build trust and transparency across the downstream ecosystem. Customer experience experts reshape consumer connections at the gas pump or electric charge station. Through these solutions IBM helps Oil & Gas clients emerge smarter. For further information visit: https://www.ibm.com/industries/oil-gas

Red Hat, the Red Hat logo and OpenShift are trademarks or registered trademarks of Red Hat, Inc. or its subsidiaries in the U.S. and other countries.

IBM’s statements regarding its plans, directions, and intent are subject to change or withdrawal without notice at IBM’s sole discretion. Information regarding potential future products is intended to outline our general product direction and it should not be relied on in making a purchasing decision. The information mentioned regarding potential future products is not a commitment, promise, or legal obligation to deliver any material, code or functionality. Information about potential future products may not be incorporated into any contract. The development, release, and timing of any future features or functionality described for our products remains at our sole discretion.

IBM Unveils Breakthrough 127-Qubit Quantum Processor

– Delivers 127 qubits on a single IBM quantum processor for the first time with breakthrough packaging technology

– New processor furthers IBM’s industry-leading roadmaps for advancing the performance of its quantum systems

– Previews design for IBM Quantum System Two, a next generation quantum system to house future quantum processors

ARMONK, N.Y., Nov. 16, 2021 — IBM today announced its new 127-quantum bit (qubit) ‘Eagle’ processor at the IBM Quantum Summit 2021, its annual event to showcase milestones in quantum hardware, software, and the growth of the quantum ecosystem. The ‘Eagle’ processor is a breakthrough in tapping into the massive computing potential of devices based on quantum physics. It heralds the point in hardware development where quantum circuits cannot be reliably simulated exactly on a classical computer. IBM also previewed plans for IBM Quantum System Two, the next generation of quantum systems.

Quantum computing taps into the fundamental quantum nature of matter at subatomic levels to offer the possibility of vastly increased computing power. The fundamental computational unit of quantum computing is the quantum circuit, an arrangement of qubits into quantum gates and measurements. The more qubits a quantum processor possesses, the more complex and valuable the quantum circuits that it can run.

IBM recently debuted detailed roadmaps for quantum computing, including a path for scaling quantum hardware to enable complex quantum circuits to reach Quantum Advantage, the point at which quantum systems can meaningfully outperform their classical counterpoints. Eagle is the latest step along this scaling path.

IBM measures progress in quantum computing hardware through three performance attributes: Scale, Quality and Speed. Scale is measured in the number of qubits on a quantum processor and determines how large of a quantum circuit can be run. Quality is measured by Quantum Volume and describes how accurately quantum circuits run on a real quantum device. Speed is measured by CLOPS (Circuit Layer Operations Per Second), a metric IBM introduced in November 2021, and captures the feasibility of running real calculations composed of a large number of quantum circuits.

127-qubit Eagle processor

‘Eagle’ is IBM’s first quantum processor developed and deployed to contain more than 100 operational and connected qubits. It follows IBM’s 65-qubit ‘Hummingbird’ processor unveiled in 2020 and the 27-qubit ‘Falcon’ processor unveiled in 2019. To achieve this breakthrough, IBM researchers built on innovations pioneered within its existing quantum processors, such as a qubit arrangement design to reduce errors and an architecture to reduce the number of necessary components. The new techniques leveraged within Eagle place control wiring on multiple physical levels within the processor while keeping the qubits on a single layer, which enables a significant increase in qubits.

The increased qubit count will allow users to explore problems at a new level of complexity when undertaking experiments and running applications, such as optimizing machine learning or modeling new molecules and materials for use in areas spanning from the energy industry to the drug discovery process. ‘Eagle’ is the first IBM quantum processor whose scale makes it impossible for a classical computer to reliably simulate. In fact, the number of classical bits necessary to represent a state on the 127-qubit processor exceeds the total number of atoms in the more than 7.5 billion people alive today.

“The arrival of the ‘Eagle’ processor is a major step towards the day when quantum computers can outperform classical computers for useful applications,” said Dr. Darío Gil, Senior Vice President, IBM and Director of Research. “Quantum computing has the power to transform nearly every sector and help us tackle the biggest problems of our time. This is why IBM continues to rapidly innovate quantum hardware and software design, building ways for quantum and classical workloads to empower each other, and create a global ecosystem that is imperative to the growth of a quantum industry.”

The first ‘Eagle’ processor is available as an exploratory device on the IBM Cloud to select members of the IBM Quantum Network.

IBM Quantum System Two

In 2019, IBM unveiled IBM Quantum System One, the world’s first integrated quantum computing system. Since then, IBM has deployed these systems as the foundation of its cloud-based IBM Quantum services in the United States, as well as in Germany for Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft, Germany’s leading scientific research institution, in Japan for the University of Tokyo, and a forthcoming system in the U.S. at Cleveland Clinic. In addition, we announced today a new partnership with Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea, to deploy the first IBM quantum system in the country.

As IBM continues scaling its processors, they are expected to mature beyond the infrastructure of IBM Quantum System One. Therefore, we’re excited to unveil a concept for the future of quantum computing systems: IBM Quantum System Two. IBM Quantum System Two is designed to work with IBM’s future 433-qubit and 1,121 qubit processors.

“IBM Quantum System Two offers a glimpse into the future quantum computing datacenter, where modularity and flexibility of system infrastructure will be key towards continued scaling,” said Dr. Jay Gambetta, IBM Fellow and VP of Quantum Computing. “System Two draws on IBM’s long heritage in both quantum and classical computing, bringing in new innovations at every level of the technology stack.”

Central to IBM Quantum System Two is the concept of modularity. As IBM progresses along its hardware roadmap and builds processors with larger qubit counts, it is vital that the control hardware has the flexibility and resources necessary to scale. These resources include control electronics, which allow users to manipulate the qubits, and cryogenic cooling, which keeps the qubits at a temperature low enough for their quantum properties to manifest.

IBM Quantum System Two’s design will incorporate a new generation of scalable qubit control electronics together with higher-density cryogenic components and cabling. Furthermore, IBM Quantum System Two introduces a new cryogenic platform, designed in conjunction with Bluefors, featuring a novel, innovative structural design to maximize space for the support hardware required by larger processors while ensuring that engineers can easily access and service the hardware.

In addition, the new design brings the possibility to provide a larger shared cryogenic work-space – ultimately leading to the potential linking of multiple quantum processors. The prototype IBM Quantum System Two is expected to be up and running in 2023.

Statements regarding IBM’s future direction and intent are subject to change or withdrawal without notice and represent goals and objectives only.

IBM and David Clark Cause Crown Saaf Water Winner of 4th Annual Call for Code Global Challenge

Created to combat water quality-related deaths, the Saaf Water sensor and analytics platform for rural localities wins 2021 Call for Code Global Challenge

Technology using AI, Blockchain, and Cloud to verify, track, and reward waste removal in outdoor areas wins Call for Code University Edition prize

ARMONK, N.Y., Nov. 16, 2021 — Today, Call for Code founding partner IBM and its creator, David Clark Cause, announced the winner of the fourth annual Call for Code Global Challenge, which invited innovators across the globe to combat climate change with open source-powered technology. Call for Code is the largest and most ambitious effort to bring together the world’s software developers to take on pressing societal issues by using the latest advanced technologies to problem solve and create cutting-edge solutions. The top prize this year went to Saaf Water, an accessible water quality sensor and analytics platform created, in particular, for people living in rural localities.

Saaf Water will receive $200,000 and support to incubate, test, and deploy their solution from the IBM Service Corps and expert partners in the Call for Code ecosystem. The India-based team will also receive assistance from The Linux Foundation to open source their application so developers around the world can improve, scale, and use the technology.

“The groundwater quality monitoring tool developed by Saaf Water is promising, timely, and appears to have great potential for use by communities relying on groundwater for domestic use,” said Dr. Annapurna Vancheswaran, Managing Director, The Nature Conservancy – India. “This open-source technology could help avoid water-related health risks by indicating unsafe water quality. We certainly Look forward to the tool being scaled up for the benefit of communities.”

A panel of some of the most eminent leaders in sustainability, business and technology, including former President Bill Clinton, awarded Saaf Water the grand prize. Four runners-up were also recognized. Each finalist created a solution to problems addressing the climate change competition’s three sub-themes: clean water and sanitation; zero hunger; and responsible production and green consumption.

To date, more than 20,000 Call for Code applications have been built using open source-powered software such as Red Hat OpenShift, IBM Cloud, IBM Watson, and IBM Blockchain, as well as data from IBM’s The Weather Company and developer resources and APIs from partners like Esri and Twilio. Fourteen Call for Code projects have been adopted into open governance by the Linux Foundation.

“It’s incredibly inspiring to see the Call for Code global movement continue to grow, now with more than 500,000 developers and problem solvers participating across 180 nations,” said Bob Lord, senior vice president, worldwide ecosystems, IBM. “What makes Call for Code unique is the impact it is making on the ground through our deployments in communities around the world. The potential of these technologies, like Saaf Water, are vast and have the potential help save lives.”

2021 Top Solutions Tackling Climate Change

Four climate solutions were honored in addition to Saaf Water: Green Farm, an app to make agriculture more sustainable by, among other things, connecting local producers and consumers to each other, was awarded second place and $25,000; Project Scavenger, an app to enable individuals to responsibly dispose of their devices, was awarded third place and $25,000; Honestly, an online browser extension aimed at passing supply chain transparency to consumers, was awarded fourth place and $10,000; and Plenti, a mobile application designed to make inventory tracking and waste measurement processes user-friendly and easy to do at home, was awarded fifth place and $10,000.

“Since we launched Call for Code in 2018, developers and innovators from around the world continue to answer the call,” said David Clark, Call for Code creator, and CEO of David Clark Cause. “I continue to be amazed by the impact of Call for Code, in no small part thanks to the global reach and passion of IBMers driving it forward around the world, and to the support of our dedicated partners including The Linux Foundation and United Nations Human Rights.”

In total, 42 regional finalists and the local winners among them from Asia Pacific; Europe; Greater China; India; Latin America; the Middle East and Africa; and North America were celebrated at the event.

Winner in the University Category

Chelsea Clinton, vice chair, The Clinton Foundation, announced the winner of the Call for Code University Edition, a collaboration between IBM and the Clinton Global Initiative University.

Trashtag, technology using AI, blockchain, and cloud to verify, track, and reward waste removal in outdoor areas, took the top prize and will receive $10,000 as well as an invitation for team members to interview for potential roles at IBM.

Bringing Call for Code solutions to life through real-world deployments

The Call for Code ecosystem brings solutions to life through incubation and real-world deployments. Since winning the 2020 Call for Code Global Challenge, Agrolly has scaled its personalized farming technology app to more than 1,600 rural farmers across India and Mongolia.

In 2021, Prometeo, the winner of the 2019 Call for Code Global Challenge, open sourced its firefighter health monitoring and safety technology through the Pyrrha project governed by The Linux Foundation.

Additionally, during National Voter Education Week in October, IBM and the YMCA of Metropolitan Los Angeles deployed Call for Code for Racial Justice project Five Fifths Voter, a web-based application to help educate, empower and enable voters who are part of underrepresented and disenfranchised communities, in the United States.

IBM to Expand Security Portfolio with Plans to Acquire ReaQta

Launches IBM QRadar XDR Suite to Simplify Threat Detection, Investigation and Response

ARMONK, N.Y., Nov. 2, 2021 — IBM Security today announced an expansion of its cybersecurity threat detection and response capabilities with its plans to acquire ReaQta. ReaQta’s endpoint security solutions are designed to leverage AI to automatically identify and manage threats, while remaining undetectable to adversaries. This move will expand IBM’s capabilities in the extended detection and response (XDR) market, aligning with IBM’s strategy to deliver security with an open approach that extends across disparate tools, data and hybrid cloud environments.

As part of today’s announcement, IBM also detailed a new suite of XDR offerings under the QRadar brand. IBM QRadar XDR helps security analysts break down the silos between the proliferation of point products in the industry – providing comprehensive visibility across security tools and data sources, whether in the cloud or on-premises, and equipping security teams with the insights and automation they need to act quickly. Upon closing, ReaQta’s offerings will become part of this portfolio, adding expanded native XDR capabilities to IBM’s security portfolio aimed at helping clients adopt continuous monitoring and rapid response as part of a zero trust approach.

Companies today are struggling to secure increasingly dispersed IT environments, with the proliferation of devices, users, and technologies spreading across clouds and on-premises infrastructure. As a result, security events are becoming more difficult and costly to detect and contain, with data breaches costing over $4 million per incident and taking an average of 212 days to identify, according to the 2021 Cost of a Data Breach Report from IBM and Ponemon Institute.

“Complexity has created a cloak that attackers are operating under, furthering their ability to circumvent defenders,” said Mary O’Brien, General Manager, IBM Security. “The future of security is open, using technologies that can connect the security insights that are buried across disparate tools and advanced AI to identify and automatically respond to threats more quickly across their entire infrastructure, from endpoint to cloud. With our expanded capabilities via QRadar XDR and the planned addition of ReaQta, IBM is helping clients get ahead of attackers with the first XDR solution that reduces vendor lock-in via the use of open standards.”

IBM Announces Intent to Acquire ReaQta

IBM’s planned acquisition of ReaQta further differentiates the company’s portfolio of connected, open security tools to unify and speed response to security threats. ReaQta, whose primary business office is located in the Netherlands with headquarters in Singapore, will join the IBM Security business unit upon closing. ReaQta was built by an elite group of cybersecurity experts and researchers with AI and machine learning expertise and extensive backgrounds in security operations. Financial terms were not disclosed. The transaction is expected to close later this year, subject to customary closing conditions and required regulatory reviews.

ReaQta’s behavioral-based platform helps stop known and unknown threats in real-time and can be deployed in a hybrid model – on premise or in the cloud as well as air gapped environments. Through deep learning done natively on the endpoint the platform constantly improves on defining threat behavior tailored to each business per endpoint, allowing it to block any abnormal behavior. ReaQta’s platform also leverages a unique ‘Nano OS’ that monitors the operating systems from the outside, helping to prevent interference by adversaries.

“Our mission at ReaQta has been to better equip the defenders, who are tirelessly striving to stay ahead of cyber threats, with advanced technology to quickly identify and block new attacks,” said Alberto Pelliccione, CEO at ReaQta. “Joining forces with IBM will enable us to enhance and scale our unique AI capabilities across all types of environments via a proven platform for threat detection and response.”

QRadar XDR Suite: Open, Connected Approach to XDR

An evolution of the IBM QRadar security intelligence portfolio, IBM QRadar XDR is a suite of security software built on IBM’s open, cloud-native security platform, Cloud Pak for Security. IBM QRadar XDR spans the core foundational capabilities of threat detection, investigation, and response to help organizations modernize their existing IT and security infrastructure.

IBM is implementing an open connected approach to XDR, leveraging its commitment to open security and the Open Cybersecurity Alliance, as well as alliances and integrations with 200 plus cloud and security vendors, creating the industry’s largest XDR ecosystem. The QRadar XDR suite also includes IBM native security technologies that customers can choose to leverage for Security Information and Event Management (SIEM), Network Detection and Response (NDR), and Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR).

Now with the addition of ReaQta, the QRadar XDR suite will also include an option for Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR), allowing IBM to provide native capabilities for all core XDR functions, while also providing clients the option to leverage existing investments and third-party tools across IBM’s broad partner ecosystem. IBM QRadar XDR will also be designed to deliver more accurate alerts while helping reduce manual processes via pre-built detection and response automations.

IBM QRadar XDR is also designed to be deployed by managed security service providers, including IBM and others.

Connecting Existing Investments

Building further on IBM’s open approach to XDR, the company also introduced XDR Connect, which helps companies connect and automate threat detection and response across existing toolsets. Part of the QRadar XDR suite, XDR Connect provides a unified streamlined workflow for alert triage, investigation and threat hunting, automated root cause analysis, and response, by connecting to organizations’ existing tools or IBM’s own XDR technologies.

XDR Connect offers a centralized management of security incidents with pre-defined detection and response rules via more than 30 open source, pre-built integrations, and data connectors. It also provides access to the latest threat intelligence insights and data from IBM and third parties. This unique approach allows companies to better capitalize on existing security investments, modernize with new security tools and data sources, and simplify their overall security operations with unified, AI-driven workflows designed for faster, streamlined response.

Monthly Archives: November 2021