50% of UK companies don’t care about digital disruption

Not only do half of companies not care about disruption, 10% of them don’t think digital affects them at all.

disruption

Disruption in technology from innovators is rife, so traditional companies should be wetting themselves, right?

Not according to the Digital Disruptors’ report released from from Dell EMC, which describes whether UK businesses are aligning to the threat of digital disruptors in their market.

Astonishingly, more than half of UK organisations don’t view digital disruptors as a threat and 10% believe they don’t have any challengers at all.

Such data is insane, because at the same time 71% of business leaders are aware their organisation is under threat from digital transformation and more than 50% of business leaders feel their IT team has too much control and is a ‘barrier to innovation’.

Nothing like putting your head in the sand while looking the other way while turning a blind eye while turning a deaf ear.

The report focuses on which areas are going to be differentiators for businesses in the future. Which are on path to be disrupted and who will remain stagnant and face being overtaken by competition?

If this data is to be believed, at least 50% of them.

“Disruption isn’t new. Organisations of all sizes face new competition and changing market forces all the time. Digital disruptors have already shown their impact with everything from genome mapping to holiday rentals.

“In the age of disruptors, the corporate culture needs to shift to make the digital innovation agenda a focus for the whole board, not just the IT team,” said said Claire Vyvyan, Senior VP UK&I Commercial, Dell EMC.

* Independent research company Vanson Bourne conducted 500 interviews across the UK and Republic of Ireland. Respondents came from large companies and had to have 1000 or more employees (250+ in Republic of Ireland). Based on the size of the universe in the UK and Ireland, the margin of error for this research is 4.38%.

Save The Children and Amido sign IT partnership

children

Save The Children International has appointed cloud-first technical consultancy Amido to undertake a strategically important IT project to streamline and consolidate the charity’s IT systems.

Charities are not the most original when it comes to technology, digital or IT, so it’s interesting to note they’re using one of London’s most up-and-coming cloud consultancies to do so.

The charity is a leading international children’s relief organisation operating in 120 countries. They do whatever it takes to ensure all children get access to what they deserve – a healthy start, the opportunity to learn, and protection from harm.

By partnering with Amido, Save the Children International hopes to improve its IT efficiency whilst retaining its global brand presence worldwide and national localism in the international marketplace.

“This project will open a lot of doors for us. It’s been a project high up on our strategic technology roadmap for some time. Amido’s efforts will be critically strategic to our IT efficiency so that the charity’s money is spent on helping children – which has always been, and will remain, our only focus,” said Graham Kent, Director of IT Shared Services, Save the Children International.

Amido works with brands such as ASOS, CBRE, Global Radio, London City Airport and Coats to remove friction from their customers’ online and mobile experiences to drive revenue and engagement.

From social sign-in to smart content delivery and smooth transactions, it helps brands build loyalty through customer recognition by bridging systems in a powerful way, yielding real-time results for brands and their customers.

“Amido are proud to be in a position where we can give back. By hosting the solution on Azure, Microsoft’s Cloud Platform – who donate the consumption of their platform their philanthropic arm – we have designed a solution that is scalable, faster and more flexible than what is currently in place,” said Alan Walsh, CEO, Amido.

Welcome to the finalists for AppsAfrica.com Awards 2017

The best of African startups are shortlisted for the prestigious AppsAfrica.com 2017 Awards.

AppsAfrica.comThe shortlisted finalists for the annual AppsAfrica.com Innovation Awards 2017 celebrating the best in mobile and tech from across Africa have been announced.

The annual Awards now in their third year attracted more than 300 submissions from across 31 countries judged by an independent panel of leading industry experts from across the ecosystem.

“The AppsAfrica Awards were originally set up three years ago to celebrate the best in mobile and tech across the continent as many ventures do not get the visibility or recognition they deserve.

This year produced a vast array of great entries from exciting new technologies utilising AI, bots and drones to mobile, health and education initiatives scaling across Africa”, said Andrew Fassnidge, Founder, AppsAfrica.com.

The awards supported by Boomplay Music, Basebone, BBM, Content Connect Africa, Mobile Monday South Africa (MOMO) the Mobile Ecosystem Forum (MEF) celebrate the best in mobile and tech from across Africa, providing winners with global publicity, recognition and networking with 300+ industry peers at the Awards party in Cape Town on November 6th.

AppsAfrica Awards 2017 finalists

Best Social and Messaging Award
Flare – Kenya, Juntos – Africa, 1Fetch – SA, Kudi – Nigeria and Wetin Dey – Nigeria

Disruptive Innovation Award
Mastercard 2Kuze – Kenya, Medsaf – Nigeria, What3Words – SA, Trend Solar – Tanzania and Girl Effect – Tega – Nigeria

Best African App
Carter – SA, Asorbia – Ghana, TrueCaller Africa, Boomplay Music – Africa and FeastFox – SA

Enterprise Solution Award
What3Words – SA, Flutterwave – Nigeria, Asoko Insight – Africa, Morpheus Commerce – SA and Snode Technologies – SA

News and Entertainment Award
Bounce News – Nigeria, Jokko Text – Senegal, Vodacom Music! – SA, Vodacom Games! – SA and Sportsie – Nigeria

Educational Award

Mwabu – Zambia, Kukua – Sema Land – Kenya, Snapplify – SA, Xander Education – SA and Praekelt dig-it – SA

FinTech Award
NetPlus / Mastercard – SA, PesaChoice – Rwanda, WeCashUp – Africa, PiggyBank NG – Nigeria and Flutterwave – Nigeria

Social Impact Award
What3Words – SA, Flare – Kenya, Vodacom e-School – SA, WeFarm – Kenya and Medsaf Nigeria

mCommerce
Farmart – Ghana, VConnect – Nigeria, Jumia – Nigeria, Mazady – Egypt and DressMeOutlet – Nigeria

Changing Africa
Jumo – Africa, Mwabu – Zambia, RippleNami – Kenya, Vodacom Mum & Baby – SA and Vodacom e-school – SA

Crypto takes giant step with new UK property exchange

A new global exchange crypto platform means UK property can now be bought and sold with Bitcoin.


cryptoCrypto is the new Klondyke, Bitcoin a new type of currency and the blockchain a new type of mint… all of which are probably the future of money.

This attitude has been reinforced now that blockchain applications company TrustMe has created a peer-to-peer platform and UK property can become a globally tradable asset.

The company says it is ‘revolutionising the global real estate market’ by allowing the fractional trading of individual properties using ‘asset-backed certificates’ on linked and Bitcoin-denominated global property exchanges.

TrustMe’s Whitepaper allows homeowners to trade shares (‘property certificates’) in their property on an open market as a new type of tradeable asset-class. Clients on the property exchanges will be able to purchase up to 49% of the value of a property or residential home with Bitcoin or fiat currency, while the 51% owner-occupier continues to live in and manage the property.

The first crypto exchange will be rolled-out in London in October, with parallel TrustMe Property Exchanges launching shortly in Toronto and New York. The company will announce other cities over the next three months and will establish regulatory compliance in each region it operates in.

London is the first choice for the location of the initial exchange as it has a buoyant £2 trillion property market and well-established property laws, rights and processes. TrustMe wants to ‘democratise’ ownership by removing the capital threshold that had previously restricted the owning of property to a privileged few.

“The London property market has long been prohibitively expensive and needs to be democratised. Our Property Exchanges will allow existing homeowners to unlock the value of their own house or properties and to use these assets as a form of stored liquid wealth, similar to a 30-90 day bank account, by trading as much or as little of their asset as they wish in an efficient, transparent and auditable manner,” said Antony Abell, Co-Founder & Managing Director of TrustMe.

A blockchain is a data structure that makes it possible to create a permanent digital public ledger of transactions and to share it among a distributed network of computers. It uses cryptography to allow each participant on the network to add to a record on the ledger in a secure way without the need for a central authority.

Once a block of data is recorded on the blockchain ledger, it’s extremely difficult to ever change it or to remove it. When someone wants to add to a record, participants in the network run algorithms to evaluate and verify the proposed transaction.

If a majority of nodes agree that the transaction looks valid (that is, identifying information, timing, location etc… matches the blockchain’s history) then the new transaction will be approved and a new block added to the chain.

For those with access it provides a permanent and secure record of ownership of all registered items for all parties who use it and it can provide automated systems to remove significant cost overheads in physical and transactional distribution systems.

58% of UK parents hide online behaviour from their kids

As kids become more tech-literate, a new survey says parents are more worried about their own online posts than what their kids are posting.


parentsParents are good, parents are bad. The woman in the image accompanying this piece probably isn’t bad, but she’s certainly stupid.

So it is with digital personae and online personalities. Parents, especially those who use tech to distract young children, are having to lock down their devices as their children become more tech savvy, a new study by cyber security and online surveillance experts Online Spy Shop reveals.

* 70% of parents scaled back gadget access as kids got older

* 58% of parents cover their online tracks by deleting browser history or locking their kids out of shared devices

* Dads are more likely to hide browsing history from their kids – half have done this at least once

* 28% of parents have changed the passcode on their phone to lock out kids

* 20% of parents say they only locked out their kids to keep something a surprise

The majority (88%) of people who participated in the study said they’ve given their children access to their phone or computer to keep them entertained. But of those, 80% (70% of the total) say they’ve had concerns about their own privacy as their children got older.

On average, dads are more likely to cover their tracks than mums.Two-thirds said they had concealed their online behaviour from their children, compared to 49% of mums.

“Depending on the device, there are ways to restrict access and protect your own privacy without completely locking children out. So it’s not a surprise that some parents are now ‘covering their own tracks’ to keep their kids away from unsuitable content,” said Steve Roberts, Director of Online Spy Shop.

I blame the parents. Sic transit gloria mundi.