Microsoft and Intel invite you to see how Azure partners and customers are becoming more productive and agile with hybrid and multicloud solutions. The free Azure Hybrid and Multicloud event will take place on Tuesday, June 29, 2021, from 9 AM to 11 AM PT. [4 PM GMT, 7 PM EAT, 5 PM BST, 5 PM WAT, 6 PM SAT]
The two-hour event will start with a short keynote and followed by deep dives into key topics and real companies’ experiences. Check out the sessions below.
Intel and Microsoft: Partnering to deliver scalable, secure, and flexible hybrid infrastructure to customers.
Run Azure data services anywhere with the latest developments in Azure Arc–enabled data services. See how SKF Group and Dell Technologies are getting the most out of the latest generation of hybrid data offerings.
Quickly build, deploy, and update apps anywhere with Azure Arc. Learn how to ensure governance, compliance, and security for all deployments.
Get consistent operations and security for hybrid and multicloud environments—and learn to automate systems to meet security, governance, and compliance standards.
Modernize your datacenter and use Azure Stack HCI hybrid capabilities to help improve availability and performance across environments.
Microsoft says you’ll get to ask questions and get answers to your hybrid questions. From product experts during the live chat and from Microsoft leaders during the live Q&A panel.
Speakers at the event include Corey Sanders, Microsoft Corporate Vice President (CVP), Solutions, Roanne Sones, Microsoft CVP Azure Edge + Platform. Others are Jeremy Winter, Microsoft VP, Azure Compute, Rose Schooler, Intel CVP and General Manager, Global Data center Sales.
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Microsoft announces the appointment of Salima Amira as Country Manager for its operations in Morocco. In her new role as Country Manager, Salima will conceptualise strategies, allocate resources, oversee engagements, and highlight Microsoft’s work in Morocco. She is tasked with developing and maintaining relationships within the regional sales and marketing departments, as well as across Microsoft’s subsidiaries.
She has 17 years of experience as a leader within complex and competitive sales environments. Salima is an agile and analytical thinker with a strong technical background. Salima has held various roles within IBM and spent the last two years as Territory Manager for Morocco. Prior to this, she spent eight years selling services and solutions across industries. And six years at INWI in the telecommunication industry where she took on roles in B2B business development management and subsidiary management.
“I’m eager to join the Microsoft team in Morocco. To meet the people, get to know them, understand and embrace the culture, and support each member. Together as a team, I believe we can accelerate Microsoft’s plan for Morocco,” says Salima.
Salima expresses her goal of driving business development, client success, and partner empowerment by working closely with clients and partners to understand their market- and industry-specific needs. She is passionate about attracting talent and empowering people, linking their work to greater customer impact.
Salima Amira is a firm advocate for fostering a culture of inclusion, transparency, and trust. Guided by these pillars, she aims to successfully mentor her staff, instilling a resilient, growth-oriented mindset, to action the best strategies for scalable, innovative results that matter to clients, and the ecosystem at large.
Ibrahim Youssry, Regional General Manager for Microsoft’s Middle East & Africa Multi-Country Region, on her appointment, says, “We are thrilled to welcome Salima to the team in Morocco. With her wealth of experience and knowledge, she is set to successfully drive our shared goal of enabling digital transformation in the region.”
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Standard Bank and Microsoft announce a strategic partnership to accelerate the digital transformation of Africa’s largest financial institution and further drive the continent’s growth. The Bank’s growing investment in the Microsoft Cloud will enable the innovation, efficiencies, and resilience required to respond to market dynamics and customer needs.
This partnership builds on the 30-year relationship between the two companies and involves migrating workloads, applications, and platforms to Microsoft Azure to drive organisational efficiencies, as well as workforce collaboration with Azure, PowerApps, Workplace Analytics and Microsoft Teams.
“Investing in the cloud will allow Standard Bank to achieve its strategy to transform from a traditional financial services company into a digital platform company, providing financial services, plus ancillary and associated services. We have adopted a cloud-first strategy, underpinned by end-to-end security and data-driven insights that will enable transformation with tangible results,” says Standard Bank Group Chief Executive, Sim Tshabalala.
“Standard Bank’s cloud-first strategy underlines the growing momentum in financial services to deliver differentiated experiences that today’s customers expect,” said Judson Althoff, Microsoft’s executive vice president of Worldwide Commercial Business. “As a long-standing technology partner, we are pleased to collaborate with Standard Bank in realizing this strategy and in becoming Africa’s future-first financial services firm through digital skilling-focused initiatives that will expand economic opportunity for young people across Africa.”
As part of the partnership, the companies will also:
Establish the African Digital Foundry (The Foundry), a strategic alliance, for Standard Bank and Microsoft to collaborate to co-create unique solutions through new technology to meet the financial needs of Africa’s consumers. Through the Foundry, the companies aspire to reach 100 million customers in Africa over the next five years.
Bring together their resources and know-how to provide youth with the relevant digital skills needed to secure future-ready jobs and equip Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) with digital skills and capabilities so that they can take advantage of the growing shift to digital technologies.
The African Digital Foundry (The Foundry)
Standard Bank and Microsoft, through the Foundry, will co-create and execute joint go-to-market digital services related to trade, payment, and risk-based (lending and insurance) solutions. They will also develop ecosystems enabling digital trading to facilitate Africa’s growth.
“The Foundry is a digital initiative established in Africa, for Africans, to address the unique challenges the continent faces with customised innovations, services and solutions,” says Tshabalala. “The partnership will further enhance and create ongoing collaboration between our firms around co-engineering solutions for African consumers’ unique needs.”
Skills and Small Medium Enterprise (SME) Development
Harnessing the power and reach of both organisations, the partnership will also drive digital skills development, boost youth employment, and accelerate the growth of SMEs on the African continent.
Both organisations believe that digital transformation represents an opportunity for the continent to leap ahead, taking a leading role in enabling economic and societal growth in Africa.
Microsoft and Standard Bank will leverage their combined research, industry, partner and start-up programmes to impact the continent – where similar opportunities and challenges exist – using technology such as mixed reality and artificial intelligence.
“Continuing to build on the partnership is part of the ongoing journey that Standard Bank and Microsoft are on to invest in digital transformation as the enabler of meaningful and tangible innovation. Our journey is underpinned by collaborative efforts to develop, scale and roll-out digital solutions that will deliver personalised services to 100 million Africans and by meeting their unique and evolving needs and demands,” says Tshabalala.
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As part of their commitment to fostering innovation and building digital skills even in the remotest part of the country, Liquid Intelligent Technologies South Africa, today heralded in a new digital dawn in the Eastern Cape with the opening of the first Innovation and Digital Skills Centre (IDSC) in Mthatha.
Through this initiative, communities close to the Digital Skills Centre will be exposed to local learning and business opportunities. The IDSC will serve as a technology hub where learners and entrepreneurs can equip themselves with the latest and most relevant digital skills. The IDSC is equipped with state-of-the-art classroom learning facilities with high-speed connectivity, helping positively impact the education system in the city.
As part of the learnerships, the courses on offer will include:
Microsoft Office Fundamentals: In this training course, learners will learn basic Word, Excel, and Outlook skills.
Introduction to Design Thinking: This course will introduce learners to the Design Thinking process and illustrate best practices for each step along the way.
Introduction to C#: This is part of a three-part course where learners will be taken through the fundamentals, object-oriented programming concepts and instruction on data structures and algorithms
According to Deon Geyser, Chief Executive Officer Liquid Intelligent Technologies South Africa, “As we stand at the cusp of the 4IR, digital technologies such as artificial intelligence, machine learning, Big Data, Robotics, 3D technologies and many more have become the means and solutions to many of the world’s problems. We believe that empowering the youth with the necessary technological skills will prepare them to thrive in today’s digital age and become part of the digital revolution. The opening of the centre is a realisation of our commitment to future-ready local communities, upskilling the youth and accelerating digital adoption among entrepreneurs based in the Eastern Cape.”
Empowering South African youth and communities has always been at the core of Liquid SA. The organisation has implemented leadership programmes for 93 students in the Eastern Cape covering ICT while also awarding 20 bursaries to students through the Nelson Mandela and Walter Sisulu Universities for the 2020 Academic year.
Honourable Minister of Communications and Digital Technologies, Ms Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams says, “A key aspect of economic development and growth is the ability to enhance competitiveness through skills and competencies that are on par with international markets. The Department of Communications and Digital Technologies pro-actively developed the National Digital and Future Skills strategy to keep pace with the advancement of technology.”
Commenting on the opening of the centre, Honourable Premier: Eastern Cape Provincial Government, Mr L. O. Mabuyane said, “It is indeed heartening to see social partners, across the spectrum, including business, heed the call by government, to join in the pact towards a better life for all – of our people. The mastery of the set of skills that, in particular, an evolving curriculum and a refocused education outcomes agenda – towards a workforce that will be ready for the 4th Industrial Revolution, will place all of us and the future of generations to come on the right footing towards exponential growth and development in our province. Through innovation and digital technologies, we have the potential to tap into the full potential of the Eastern Cape and her peoples”.
To date, 140 underprivileged students benefitted from bursaries to leading tertiary institutions; 811 learnerships and internships have been implemented in various courses for learners, including those with disabilities. 50 unemployed youth were trained on Introduction to Programming, 630 mainstream schools and 20 learners with disabilities benefitted from ICT equipment and expos, while 389 learners went through The Virtual Mathematician maths and science schools in the Eastern Cape.
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Ten teams from across the globe are winners of the first Imagine Cup Junior AI for Good Challenge. The competition is an extension of the Microsoft Imagine Cup and targets secondary school students. Thousands of students, aged 13 through 18, participated in this year’s competition to come up with ideas to solve some of the world’s biggest challenges using the power of artificial intelligence (AI).
What I love most about Imagine Cup Junior is seeing educators embrace new technologies like AI and machine learning and then provide these experiences to their students, says Anthony Salcito, VP, of Education. Not only do students get the opportunity to learn about Microsoft’s AI for Good initiatives. But they also further develop and practise 21st-century skills like communication, collaboration, critical thinking, and creativity, he adds.
Despite the uncertainty during a global pandemic and adjusting to remote and hybrid learning, students found creative ways to bring their teams together, innovate, and learn about AI along the way. From hardships experienced by friends or family to issues, they have read about in the news, or their determination to preserve the earth and create a better world for future generations. The standard of the student submissions was truly awe-inspiring. Every student who took part brought their heart to their projects, which really came through to all the judges.
Imagine Cup Junior AI for Good Challenge winners
The top 10 global winners recognized this year and their concepts are:
“Here to Hear” from Western Canada High School in Canada: A language-learning tool that supports children with hearing impairments, helping to support inclusiveness in education for the DHH community.
“Sense and Save” from Daffodils Foundation for Learning in India: An AI-powered, bio-resistive graphene sensor for real-time amniotic fluid monitoring in pregnant women, supporting those who do not have regular or easy access to healthcare.
“Gaia Eye 80 degrees” from Beijing No. 80 High School in China: A global environmental diversity and anomaly discovery sharing platform, empowering people to report environmental concerns and observations and get feedback powered by AI.
“CORRA” from St Aloysius College in Australia: The “Companion Obedient Response Robot,” designed to interact with and support children with autism in the form of a robot doll that can be with them at all times.
“Titans” from Maharaja Agrasen Model School in India: A scan and check app for consumers to detect counterfeit medicine packaging, to help reduce the growing issues with counterfeit medicines being sold in India.
“HygieneNET” from Jesuit High School in Oregon, US: A deep learning and sensor-based system for enforcing hand hygiene compliance in healthcare facilities.
“Imagineering” from Hwa Chong Institution in Singapore: An AI-powered app that identifies any anomalies in a baby’s faecal matter to support and guide new parents and provide early diagnoses of any diseases.
“Ying Wa Crazy” from Ying Wa College in Hong Kong: Designed to bring Chinese medicine to a digital platform, embracing the major principles of Chinese medicine and building those into an app to increase the speed of diagnosis.
“G Force” from On My Own Technology in India: A non-invasive pressure mapping method to screen skin cancer and enable earlier detection.
“SMSR” from Hurlstone Agriculture High School in Australia: The “Smart Mobile Sanitizing Robot” to supply and clean feminine products to support period poverty and efficient waste management.
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