< PreviousExtreme Networks Launches Suite of New Solutions Extreme Networks has introduced a suite of new solutions, creating new ways for customers to drive better outcomes from their networks in the era of the Infinite Enterprise. The company has extended its ExtremeCloud portfolio to include new SD- WAN and AIOps with digital twin capabilities – enabling customers to deliver secure connectivity at the edge of the network, speed cloud deployments and uncover actionable insights – all from within a single platform. Extreme has introduced the 5720 Universal Switch, the latest in a series of high- performance, feature-rich wired switches for enterprise deployments. Jim Burke, Chief Information Officer, John Carroll University said, “CoPilot is a game-changer – its ability to proactively detect anomalies, prioritise actions and provide clear and meaningful insights is so far beyond what we’ve experienced in any other AIOps solution. We expect it will help to reduce risk across our organisation while freeing up our IT team to focus on fixing issues before they happen, not after they’ve caused significant disruption to business.” Mark Leary, Research Director, Network Analytics & Automation, IDC commented, “Productive and collaborative IT staff and teams, from networking to security to development and from engineering to operations to support, require complete network visibility and control to deliver on the full promise of networking in this hyper-connected digital era. Comprehensive network intelligence and insights serve to bolster service quality, problem resolution, threat mitigation and digital innovation. CoPilot’s emphasis on problem avoidance is a differentiated approach to applying AI/ML across the network. Further, leveraging a digital twin in a cloud networking environment will provide the confidence that investments are optimised, and system and service adjustments are battle-tested.” HyperSense Named in Gartner’s Market Guide Subex has been named in Gartner's Market Guide for Multipersona Data Science and Machine Learning Platforms (DSML). Through HyperSense, Subex has been listed as a representative vendor in the report. According to the Market Guide for Multipersona Data Science and Machine Learning Platforms, “Data science and machine learning are evolving rapidly with key trends such as augmentation and democratisation. To support the needs of an increasingly diverse group of technical and non- technical roles, data and analytics leaders should apply multi persona DSML platforms." “It is encouraging to be acknowledged by Gartner in their recent Market Guide for Multipersona Data Science and Machine Learning Platforms. HyperSense AI was conceptualised with an objective to democratise the use of Artificial Intelligence within the enterprise, starting with the telecom ecosystem. It helps enterprises leverage AI across their data value chain through a combination of no-code AI, AutoML and MLOps,” said Rohit Maheshwari, Head of Strategy and Products at Subex. This report feature comes on the heels of Subex being named as a representative vendor in Gartner’s Market Guide on AI in CSP Customer and Business Operations, through HyperSense. IT Complexity Impacts ROI for 84% of IT Professionals With hybrid and remote work amplifying the challenge of managing distributed IT environments, 84% of IT professionals believe the ROI of their projects has been negatively impacted in the last 12 months. This is according to new research from SolarWinds. The report, which examines the acceleration of digital transformation efforts and its impact on IT departments, also shows a third (33%) of IT professionals think complexity adds four to seven months of extra work to get their project to completion. Commenting on the news, SolarWinds President and CEO Sudhakar Ramakrishna said, “Many organisations are struggling to drive forward transformation amidst increasingly distributed and complex IT environments. “In this challenging landscape, IT professionals are increasingly looking towards observability to manage these growing levels of complexity. By understanding where to prioritise their efforts, teams can manage hybrid IT realities more effectively and achieve ROI targeted in their planned projects, which spells long-term success for teams, businesses, and their customers.” www.networkseuropemagazine.com NEWS IN BRIEF 10 SEH Technology Releases the New UTN Manager Version 3.4.3 After an extensive test series in cooperation with internal users and customers, SEH Technology has now released version 3.4.3 of its management tool UTN Manager. The software now supports Apple processors of the M1 series. In addition, the administration of all dongle and USB device servers from the SEH product portfolio and access to the USB dongles and devices connected to them, is possible without restrictions. With this release, SEH Technology nows offers compatibility with the current Apple operating system and its M1 architecture. With the introduction of the Monterey 12.x operating system, important classes and frameworks were no longer accessible at the end of 2020, meaning the previous UTN Manager could not be compiled there. As a result, no support for macOS 12 - neither based on Intel nor on Apple M1 processor technology - could be offered for the dongle and USB device servers. The UTN Manager is the control system and software tool for USB and dongle servers. The tool is used to establish and manage the connections to the connected USB devices. All device servers in the network are automatically found and included in a device list. As soon as one of the USB device servers is on the list, all USB devices connected to it are visible and can be managed. After clicking on a USB device icon and subsequent activation, the device is connected to the client just as if it were connected locally via USB. The software is installed on all clients that are to access a dongle or USB server provided in the network.Easy Migration Path With Single Pair Ethernet Cables Panduit has released its latest Single Pair Ethernet (SPE) cables to support building automation and industrial automation technologies. The cables, which are available globally, can support Fieldbus controls today and permit transition to Ethernet in the future, providing the intelligent infrastructure to reduce startup complexity and simplify application and device upgrades. Ethernet provides the platform of structured cabling offering a protocol independent physical layer that can be validated before network devices are installed. For the increasing numbers of applications required to drive industry 4.0, the Internet of Things (IoT) and smart buildings, single pair (SPE) copper cable provides the capability of data transmission speeds up to 10Mbit/s, with power up to 52W over distances of 100m being common, and maximum cable runs of up to 1000m. “Single Pair Ethernet infrastructure is gaining traction as a viable alternative for connecting systems within smart buildings and industrial automation,” said Tom Walsh, VP of Panduit Enterprise Business. “As building owners and manufacturers look to the future, the option to reuse infrastructure to evolve existing analog, serial and legacy communications applications to a unified Ethernet network is exciting and shows promising results.” Digital transformation of industrial sites requires architectures that permit networking of all components to allow data to be available both locally and centrally for analysis to unlock the organisations’ potential. Ethernet is the technology that improves network security, increases flexibility and device visibility, and allows organisations to standardise their expertise and tools. In conjunction with the cable introduction, Panduit and Fluke Networks have released a new white paper, Evolving Building, and Industrial Fieldbus to a Unified Ethernet Infrastructure. This peer-reviewed paper examines common Fieldbus applications for building automation and industrial automation and shows how they can transition to Single Pair Ethernet in the future. Iceotope Collaborates with Intel and HPE reducing power by up to 30% Ku:l Data Center is the product of a close collaboration between Iceotope, Intel and HPE and promises a faster path to net-zero operations by reducing edge and data centre energy use by nearly a third. Once the sole preserve of arcane, high-performance computing applications, liquid cooling is increasingly seen as essential technology for reliable and efficient operations of any IT load in any location. There is a pressing concern about sustainability impacts as distributed edge computing environments proliferate to meet the demand for data processing nearer the point of use, as well as growing facility power and cooling consumption driven by AI augmentation and hotter chips. Working together with Intel and HPE, Iceotope benchmarked the power consumption of a sample IT installation being cooled respectively using air and precision immersion liquid cooling. The results show a substantial advantage in favour of liquid cooling, reducing overall power use across IT and cooling infrastructure. To understand the operational advantages of Iceotope’s Precision Immersion Cooling system, Ku:l Data Center was compared to a traditional air-cooled system using a 19.6kW load comprising 16x HPE ProLiant DL380 Gen10 servers under stress test conditions. Laboratory tests, using industry-standard high power computing benchmarks across a range of ambient temperatures, demonstrated that the Iceotope Precision Immersion Cooled system enabled a 4% increase in performance with zero throttling in higher ambient temperatures at server level and consumed 1kW less energy at rack level than its air-cooled counterpart. This represents a 5% energy saving in the IT alone and a 30% saving at scale, based on a typical cooling power usage effectiveness (pPUE) of 1.4 in air and 1.04 in liquid-cooled data centres. Iceotope’s Ku:l Data Center solution was demonstrated at HPE Discover, housed in a standard Schneider Electric NetShelter rack with heat rejected to a Schneider heat removal unit (HRU). The integration with HPE ProLiant DL380 servers, as well as provision through channel partners is supplied, supported and warrantied by IT distribution giant, Avnet Integrated. The three companies announced their partnership to provide liquid-cooled data centre solutions in 2019. Air cooling cannot be used precisely or sustainably to cool high-power chips and processors, and it is commonly held that it is no longer a suitable approach for ensuring an appropriate operating environment for increasingly energy-dense IT equipment. Not only is liquid a significantly more effective medium for heat removal than air, but each liquid-cooled chassis is 100% sealed, protecting the critical IT from the surrounding atmosphere – rendering it impervious to dust, gases and humidity – and creating a stable operating environment. Isolating the IT from the external environment opens a world of potential facility sites and distributed IT locations that could not have been considered until now. Unlike air cooled infrastructure, Precision Immersion Cooling does not require rack depopulation at higher densities, enabling the racks to run fully populated to facilitate more servers and storage devices and/or denser IT loads. Additionally, Iceotope’s sealed liquid-cooled chassis enclosure simply converts off-the-shelf air-cooled servers to liquid-cooled servers with a few minor modifications including removing the fans. This means that industry-standard form factors, including edge and data centre racks, can be used to accommodate liquid-cooled IT, with maintenance and hot-swapping carried out on-site with familiar ease and no mess, without the need for heavy lifting gear or spill kits. www.networkseuropemagazine.com NEWS IN BRIEF 11 Do you have news to share? Do you have a product to promote, a company partnership to announce or a new recruit to introduce? Contact editor@networkseuropemagazine.comSnyk Supports Strong EMEA Growth With Regional Data Residency Snyk has announced the availability of new hosting in Frankfurt, Germany, offering further support for European businesses seeking to create secure applications while also maintaining EU data residency. Snyk has grown rapidly in EMEA over recent quarters and the move helps compound its appeal to enterprise customers in the region. The company now provides cloud-based developer security for over 1800 businesses, with this figure showing an annual customer growth rate of over 115%. The availability of EU hosting for Snyk comes at a critical time for cloud technologies and the regulations surrounding them. Digital transformation has increasingly taken application development into the cloud, with businesses in almost every sector creating cloud- based software, using cloud-based tools and components. Gartner predicts that in 2025, two-thirds of enterprise spending on application software will be directed at cloud-based technology. This explosive growth is reflected in the number of times Snyk is used to check application, cloud and code security: in Q1 2022 alone, its users performed 332 million non-recurring tests, over 400% more tests than the equivalent period in 2021. Responding to this digital transformation, governments, regulatory bodies and individual corporations have created new laws, requirements and rules, with many others in consideration. Building on the GDPR in the EU, these typically focus on the different methods by which data is processed, stored and shared. And increasingly, companies are being required to keep their data in a particular geographic location. Snyk’s Chief Technology Officer, Adi Sharabani, commented: “Whether because of legislative or regulatory demands, contractual agreements, or internal corporate policies, data residency has become a key consideration for enterprises when procuring and deploying new cloud-based software. Our opening in Frankfurt ensures Snyk will be able to continue to serve EU customers as new requirements emerge.” EMEA-based customers depend on Snyk to secure their applications and need to ensure that compliance requirements do not block access to the tool. At Skyscanner, a major travel agency serving multiple EU locations, it has become an essential part of the security toolkit. Alex Harris, Security Engineer at Skyscanner said: “Snyk is one of the most important security tools we use at Skyscanner. Our developers love the integration with their existing tools and into multiple stages of the SDLC, so we know we are protected. We like the fact that there is a multiple, layered approach. Snyk works well with how we do security here at Skyscanner.” Snyk has helped secure EMEA customers such as AB InBev, Bosch, Deliveroo, Ericsson, Revolut and Skyscanner since it was founded in London and Tel Aviv in 2015. In the region, it has offices in London, Tel Aviv, Stockholm and Zurich. Its recently appointed Chief Technology Officer, Adi Sharabani, is based in Tel Aviv, while UK-based Samantha Wessels joined the company in January as VP of EMEA sales. Sharabani and Wessels join more than 600 members of staff in EMEA, around half of Snyk’s total employees. Support for data residency in the EU is the latest example of Snyk’s continued investment in enterprise-grade security and compliance. Snyk is already compliant with all data protection laws and regulations applicable to its developer security platform, including GDPR, ISO 27001, ISO 27017, and SOC 2 Type II standards. The company is fully committed to meeting new data governance and protection requirements as these emerge and are required by its customers. Following the EU launch, Snyk plans to add support for data residency in additional regions around the world. Wessels said: “Snyk is proud to be expanding our investment into Europe. Snyk adoption started in the UK where we were founded. We are now starting to see similar traction in Europe. Not only do we want to meet our customers where they are, but with the explosion of developers in Europe and ‘shift left’ of security, we believe the time has come to invest and support the developer community, security practitioners and our partner ecosystem in Europe.” NEWS IN BRIEF www.networkseuropemagazine.com 12 STULZ Modular is the new name for Micro Data Centers and Modular Data Center Solutions STULZ has launched STULZ Modular - the new brand for its prefabricated modular data centres and micro data centre solutions subsidiary. STULZ Modular has appointed a new management team to lead the newly created entity to deliver its vision for a global gold standard in micro and modular data centre solutions. Dushyantha Goonawardhane, Managing Director of STULZ Modular said, “Companies specifying micro data centres and modular prefabricated data centres look for the quality and range of global providers, together with established local support to meet the needs of installation and ongoing maintenance and service. For instance, they demand a choice over how IT in distributed environments is cooled - STULZ Modular offers comprehensive options to meet cooling requirements in any location, even beyond 100kW rack densities.” To enable users to respond to quickly evolving infrastructure requirements STULZ Modular offers short lead times together with a scalable approach ranging from a single rack to multi-rack solutions, and enables users to specify their own preferences when it comes to power protection and other equipment, including cooling methodology. STULZ Modular solutions utilise CyberHub ECO.DC software to monitor, analyse and manage small to medium-sized data centres for reduced operating costs, a significant reduction in the impact of unplanned downtime, and the assurance of a quick response to external influences or defects. STULZ Modular meets today’s requirements for prefabricated solutions in a wide variety of applications as data processing gets moved ever closer to the point of production and consumption. Typical uses include everything from emerging edge computing facilities, content delivery networks and telecoms network expansions, to industrial automation (Industry 4.0) and Internet of Things (IoT)/ Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) applications.NEWS IN BRIEF www.networkseuropemagazine.com 13 Start your net zero journey at Smart Buildings Show With unprecedented temperatures of 40°C hitting the UK last month, concerns have heightened surrounding climate change and the ambitious target of the UK to reach net zero by 2050. Net zero was a popular topic at the recent SBS Round Table event. The consensus being that most people are fully behind becoming net zero but have no real plan of action. In fact, recent statistics from the British Business Bank confirm that only 9% of SMEs in the UK are measuring their carbon footprint. Panellists at the Round Table event agreed that there is a need for both behaviour and systematic change and that businesses need to address both old and new buildings with the same energy and enthusiasm to facilitate net zero. Furthermore, identifying the skills required while having skilled people in place to achieve these goals was deemed critical. Smart Buildings Show 2022 is the UK’s exhibition and conference event in the smart buildings industry which tackles challenging subjects such as net zero via its speaker programme and CPD- accredited training sessions from top names in the industry. The eagerly anticipated two-day show takes place on 12-13 October 2022 at London’s ExCeL and is free to attend. Leading exhibitors and industry experts will be on hand to advise on the latest energy-efficient technologies and innovations on the market. “Smart Buildings Show 2022 enables visitors to discover innovative solutions to meet net zero and implement strategies to achieve smart buildings. Providing a sustainable future is key for the next generation, therefore we’ll be delivering a strong focus on sustainability and ESG via our conference programme,” commented Ian Garmeson, Event Director. Click HERE to register for your free ticket to Smart Buildings Show 2022. Alternatively, discover more about the show HERE. Peer Software and Pulsar Security Announce Alliance Peer Software has announced the formation of a strategic alliance with Pulsar Security. Through the alliance, Peer Software will leverage Pulsar Security’s team of cyber security experts to continuously monitor and analyse emerging and evolving ransomware and malware attack patterns on unstructured data. PeerGFS will utilise these attack patterns to enable an additional layer of cyber security detection and response. These capabilities will enhance the Malicious Event Detection (MED) feature incorporated in PeerGFS. “Each ransomware and malware attack is encoded to infiltrate and propagate through a storage system in a unique manner that gives it a digital fingerprint,” said Duane Laflotte, CTO, Pulsar Security. As part of the agreement, Pulsar Security will also work with Peer Software to educate and inform enterprise customers on emerging trends in cyber security, and how to harden their systems against attacks through additional services like penetration testing, vulnerability assessments, dark web assessments, phishing simulations, red teaming and wireless intrusion prevention. Enreach Partners with Webfleet Solutions to Offer Telematics Enreach has partnered with Webfleet Solutions, offering world-class telematics to its customers in addition to the existing product portfolio. Roan Pratt, Director of Sales at Enreach UK, said that as a business, Enreach was, “always looking for new and better ways to support customers. “Our partnership with Webfleet Solutions to step into telematics makes perfect sense. Both Enreach and Webfleet Solutions have the same desires for customers, from being connected and communicating in real-time, to helping customers get the most from their business assets, making continuous improvements. Webfleet Solutions – a Bridgestone company – is the market leader for telematics in Europe, making the choice to work together, a smart one.” Enreach is now registered as a premium partner with Webfleet Solutions, a company with more than 20 years of experience in the telematics sector, operating across 38 European countries to provide high-quality vehicle monitoring and data capture. “Customers purchasing Webfleet Solutions from Enreach can expect to receive Enreach’s best-in-class approach to customer service, account management, engineering services, flexible packages and bespoke reporting,” added Pratt. “There are no hidden charges with transparent pricing at all levels, and all invoices can be viewed via the Webfleet Solutions customer portal. There is a full range of options to suit all fleet sizes, vehicle types, and requirements, which can also be accessed via the customer portal.” Beverley Wise, Regional Director UK & Ireland, Webfleet Solutions said: “By welcoming Enreach as an official business partner, we are strengthening our network of local resellers with a company that has a proven track record of providing great service and advice to business customers. This alliance will reinforce Enreach’s position at the fore of innovative technology solutions and help promote the far- reaching benefits of Webfleet to an even wider fleet audience.”Siemon Announces TechTalk with Arista Networks on Data-driven Infrastructure in Healthcare Siemon has launched a new educational webinar entitled ‘Data-driven Infrastructure Within Healthcare’. In this latest TechTalk, experts from Siemon and Arista Networks examine the current trends, technologies and standards that IT professionals in the healthcare industry need to be aware of when implementing a new network infrastructure. Applications such as remote surgery and monitoring, patient entertainment systems, as well as advanced AI/machine learning applications for early recognition of various diseases, will increase data use within the healthcare sector enormously in the coming years. These new technologies are increasingly benefiting from reliable infrastructure on both a physical and logical level. In this deep-dive session, Siemon, together with Arista, demonstrates how organisations benefit from a data-driven approach to their network infrastructure and how they can successfully identify and implement these technologies and approaches in their own projects. “Today’s healthcare applications require much higher bandwidths and higher speeds. This is because 4k/8k video and graphical files generated from advanced medical imaging are much larger in file size and need to be transported to many locations at ultra-fast speeds,” says Alberto Zucchinali, Senior Technical Manager at Siemon. “Therefore, when designing an optimal healthcare infrastructure, the network and cabling become a critical factor. Together with technical experts from Arista Networks, we explain what IT professionals need to look out for in the product selection process.” Healthcare professionals were also able to experience innovative IT network solutions from Siemon and Arista first-hand at the Zorg & ICT 2022 expo that took place in Utrecht, the Netherlands as part of the Dutch Health Week. Siemon provided valuable advice on how to support digital transformation in healthcare and benefit from operating healthcare facilities digitally with high- performance network cabling in place. Shielded category 6A and category 7A cabling solutions support 10 Gigabit Ethernet data transmission, offer more stable transmission performance when delivering power to connected devices and provide better immunity to EMI/RFI from diagnostics equipment that can interrupt or degrade data transmission. Since many areas of a healthcare facility, from the lab to the operating room, are considered harsh environments due to wash downs and chemicals, ruggedised cabling and connectivity are a valuable consideration. Arista Networks attended Zorg & ICT for the first time, with customers and partners curious to explore benefits such as high availability, performance and a high level of automation which are critical for the modern healthcare network infrastructure. Infinigate to Acquire the Nuvias Group Infinigate has announced the intended acquisition of Nuvias Group’s Cyber Security and Secure Networking business to create a pan-European Cyber Security powerhouse. The merging of the two businesses establishes Infinigate’s place as a leading VAD, focused on Cyber Security in Europe with an anticipated EUR1.4 billion in revenue. Subject to regulatory approval, closing is expected in the fourth quarter. This acquisition will create a platform of continued above-market growth in EMEA, bolstering Infinigate’s leadership position in Europe across Cyber Security, Secure Networking and Secure Cloud, serving the SMB to Enterprise and Service Provider market segments. Due to increased relevance, larger geographical footprint and extended vendor portfolio, Infinigate aims to continue to grow annually by more than 20%. The Nuvias Group has a strong heritage in VAD having begun its original trading journey 45 years ago. It specialises in Cyber Security and Intelligent Networking with a range of innovative services and solutions designed to secure customer success and accelerate partner and vendor growth. Infinigate Group has a track record of consistent year-on-year growth since its foundation in 1996 – something it attributes to its distinct customer-centric approach. Klaus Schlichtherle, CEO of Infinigate Group said: “Infinigate will become even more relevant and powerful. We will have a stronger geographical footprint, especially in the core markets in Europe – where we will have a strong position in 18 countries. Our complementary vendor portfolios will create a huge opportunity for growth. And bringing together so many skilled people will enable us to create lots of new development opportunities in a fast-growing company. Infinigate will continue to be an exciting place to be for key value-add talent and a place to develop competencies, careers and opportunities.” Simon England, CEO of the Nuvias Group said: “We are excited about joining forces and combining our assets to take the business and teams into the next phase of growth and expansion. Both companies value their people as their most critical asset, and the key to rewarding customer and vendor experiences in specialist distribution.” Aruba’s 30MW Roman Data Centre Campus Nears Completion Aruba's Hyper Cloud Data Centre (IT4) currently being constructed in Rome will be completed in the first quarter of 2023. The campus is set to be the largest data centre in Italy’s capital. Aruba’s Hyper Cloud Data Centre (IT4) is sat within a fully owned 74,000sqm site. At full capacity the campus will comprise five independent data centres of 6MW each, totalling 30MW of IT power and a redundancy level of 2N or higher and 100Gbit/s backbone links between Aruba Data Centres and major Neutral Access Points. Situated in central Italy within the area of Tecnopolo Tiburtino (East Rome), the project will extend Italy's most technologically advanced data centre network and enhance the company’s ability to offer hyperscale solutions to customers. Aruba will continue to provide both the private and public sectors with colocation, cloud and hybrid solutions while maintaining the company’s prerogatives of sustainability, security and infrastructure resilience. NEWS IN BRIEF www.networkseuropemagazine.com 14Absolute Software Partners with Ivanti Absolute Software has partnered with Ivanti to strengthen the health and resiliency of Ivanti Neurons for Unified Endpoint Management (UEM) with Absolute’s Application Persistence capabilities - amidst heightened threat levels in a work from anywhere (WFA) world. Research from Absolute Software’s The Value of Zero Trust in a WFA World report revealed that 97% of surveyed IT experts believe that remote workers are exposed to additional risk, with almost 47% believing that risk to be ‘high’ or ‘extremely high’. With the addition of Ivanti Neurons for UEM to Absolute’s Application Persistence ecosystem, joint Resilience customers can have greater visibility across their IT assets and extend Absolute’s firmware-embedded, self-healing device connection to Ivanti’s leading UEM solution to ensure devices remain healthy, installed and working effectively. Residing in over 500 million endpoints across the globe, Absolute’s Application Persistence technology leverages an unbreakable, two-way connection in order to monitor mission-critical security applications’ health and behaviour, identify missing or corrupted devices, and automatically repair or reinstall components where necessary, without requiring human intervention. Achi Lewis, Area VP EMEA for Absolute Software, commented: “By joining our Application Persistence ecosystem, Ivanti is taking the critical steps needed to empower our Resilience customers to harden their mission-critical application – and keep their sensitive data and devices protected.” “Absolute’s unique intelligence consistently shows that the complexity of today’s device environments has left endpoint agents under constant threat of colliding with other applications or being disabled by malicious or negligent users. By ensuring their app remains healthy and working effectively, Ivanti is helping to strengthen the overall security posture of our customers.” Daren Goeson, VP & GM of Unified Endpoint Management Products at Ivanti, said: “Organisations across the globe rely on Ivanti Neurons every day to deliver visibility into their device estate and provide the automation capabilities needed to improve productivity. The ability to extend Absolute’s undeletable line of defence to Ivanti Neurons gives us the confidence that our joint customers always know where their most valuable assets are – and with continuous secure access.” Eaton Brings the Acquisition of Tripp Lite to MEA Eaton is fast developing a new customer base in Europe, the Middle East and Africa for product lines emanating originally from the highly respected US brand, Tripp Lite. Eaton acquired Tripp Lite in 2021 and the outcome is a vastly expanded product portfolio together with further developed capabilities to support distributed IT and edge applications. Initially marketed under the ‘Tripp Lite by Eaton’ brand, the new products represent a huge opportunity for managed service providers and resellers that will either help them break into the market for power infrastructure, connectivity and peripherals or expand the size and comprehensiveness of their proposals by incorporating Tripp Lite server racks, enclosures and connectivity accessories. Jean-Marc Emonet, Marketing and Product Line Manager, Distributed Power Quality, Critical Systems Division, EMEA, said, “Tripp Lite and Eaton have worked with customers for many years to navigate rapidly changing technology landscapes. The evolution continues, with Eaton becoming a single source of power products and accessories for IT channel distributors thanks to its Tripp Lite acquisition.” The acquisition is proving a natural fit, with the Tripp Lite product portfolio complementing Eaton’s product range. The outcome is a broad-based ability to support edge applications and distributed networks for end-user vertical markets, data centres of all sizes as well as opening up the opportunity for the growing e-commerce business. Among the thousands of new products that Eaton is now offering are server racks, enclosures, cables and connectivity products such as docking stations, KVM switches, and a selection of other peripherals and accessories. “We have noted how the trend for hybrid home and office working has resulted in high demand for videoconferencing systems and new types of meeting rooms that require a lot of connectivity,” added Emonet. “Our newly-expanded portfolio means we can support IT distributors and resellers to respond to this opportunity.” The Tripp Lite brand is 100 years old in 2022, dating back to when Tripp Lite manufactured headlights for the nascent automobile industry. The Tripp Lite name will be retained when the new ranges are fully rebranded as the Eaton - Tripp Lite Series. NEWS IN BRIEF www.networkseuropemagazine.com 15 Share your news! Send your press releases or announcements to: editor@networkseuropemagazine.comPanasas Joins MLCommons to Advance Machine Learning Storage Innovation Panasas has announced its collaboration with MLCommons, the consortium behind MLPerf, to create industry-wide benchmarks for machine learning (ML) storage. Panasas will work with MLCommons to help steer these benchmarks by establishing best practices for measuring ML storage performance and ultimately help to develop the next-generation storage systems for AI/ML. Panasas builds price/performance data storage solutions that drive innovation across a vast range of computing environments. The Panasas ActiveStor portfolio features the all-NVMe ActiveStor Flash system, which enables outstanding small and random file performance and enhanced support for AI/ML projects. All Panasas solutions are powered by the company’s flagship PanFS parallel file system, a reliable and autonomic data engine that orchestrates networked servers into a single file system serving data to clients at up to hundreds of gigabytes per second. MLCommons, the open and global engineering consortium dedicated to making machine learning better for everyone, promotes widespread ML adoption and democratisation through benchmarks, large-scale public datasets, and best practices. Panasas approached MLCommons to discuss the storage challenge in the ETL (extract, transform and load) process and its impact on the overall performance of the ML pipeline. The discussion was timely, as MLCommons had been in the early stages of forming the MLPerf Storage working group to develop a storage benchmark that evaluates performance for ML workloads including data ingestion, training and inference phases. MLCommons invited Panasas to attend the foundational meetings, after which Curtis Anderson, Software Architect at Panasas, was named co-chair. “The end goal of the MLPerf Storage working group is to create a storage benchmark for the full ML pipeline which is compatible with diverse software frameworks and hardware accelerators,” said David Kanter, founder and Executive Director of MLCommons. “I’d like to thank Panasas for contributing their extensive storage knowledge, and Curtis specifically for the leadership he is providing as a co-chair of this working group.” “It is an honour to be a co-chair of the MLPerf Storage working group, and I look forward to the meaningful progress that this team will accomplish,” said Anderson. “AI/ML practitioners are doing some of the most revolutionary work today, and I am excited to help develop the benchmarks that will enable them to determine the storage systems they need to carry out their projects.” DataQube’s Podular Edge Data Centre Solutions now ICNIRP Compliant DataQube has announced that its portfolio of podular edge data centres can be delivered fully ICNIRP certified and compliant for use with all wireless communications technologies, including 5G. Introduced by the EU commission and adopted by Ofcom in 2020, ICNIRP legislation relates to small-area wireless access points used in many “small cell” infrastructures to ensure public health protection from electromagnetic fields associated with the shorter frequency ranges used for 5G transmissions. The ICNIRP standards are intended to accelerate the rollout of 5G coverage at street level to provide the high performance, capacity speeds needed for smart city, smart health, smart factory and smart transport applications as well as artificial intelligence and machine learning. DataQube’s portfolio of edge data centres is one of the few data centre solutions on the market that supports all wireless communications protocols. Its minimal fibre requirements make it perfectly suited for deployment in rural areas void of highspeed broadband as a single pod can deliver superfast broadband to multiple households without needing preinstalled fibre at street level. DataQube’s edge data centres are also ideally placed to deliver HPC private mobile networks (PMN) as they can be up and running within a 6-month timeframe, giving enterprises total control of their comms and data handling for traceability and accountability. IOTech announces a major new release of Edge XRT IOTech has announced the general availability of Edge XRT v2.0. This is a major release of its open software platform designed for time- critical and embedded OT applications at the industrial IoT edge. Edge XRT 2.0 greatly simplifies the development of OT applications and enables faster time-to-market for new edge systems. It is hardware agnostic, independent of the silicon provider (Intel or ARM) and operating system. Users have complete deployment flexibility. They can deploy it as a native application, containerised and/or into a virtualised environment. With its small memory footprint and efficient use of computing resources, Edge XRT 2.0 is also suitable for microcontroller-based applications where CPU and memory resources are limited. This makes it ideal for use cases such as connected commercial or consumer electronic devices (eg refrigeration unit), medical device applications or automotive engine management systems. The product's open APIs make third-party application integration very easy. Major industrial OEMs and ISVs are leveraging the product's multi-vendor OT connectivity, cloud interoperability and high- performance, real-time edge processing capabilities to create a new generation of protocol-agnostic edge solutions. "As a configurable, embeddable, high-performance OT platform, Edge XRT 2.0 is unique," said Andrew Foster, Product Director at IOTech. "It provides a rich set of OT and IoT capabilities that our customers can easily use to create their own edge solutions. In most cases, this is through simple configuration without the need for lots of custom code." For protocols that support device discovery such as OPC UA, BACnet and EtherNet/IP, devices can be discovered and then onboarded easily without any manual configuration. A new MQTT API allows Edge XRT clients to easily manage the lifecycle of connected device/sensors, support read/write OT data access, control device discovery and resource scheduling. NEWS IN BRIEF www.networkseuropemagazine.com 16Nebulon Boosts Ransomware Protection with ImmutableBoot Nebulon has unveiled Nebulon ImmutableBoot, the newest service in its cyber-resilience portfolio. As the first “reboot-to-recover” ransomware solution for bare metal Linux, ImmutableBoot protects application infrastructure from a ransomware attack or a misconfigured operating environment with a simple server reboot to a known, good operating system version. User misconfiguration and out-of-date server software often expose server infrastructure to security breaches, such as ransomware attacks. According to a recent report, threat actors continually leverage unpatched software vulnerabilities as their primary ransomware attack vector. IT organisations that are unable to enforce strict, centralised, and consistent patch and configuration management are particularly exposed as device-by- device management can result in misconfiguration, inconsistent patch levels, and server configuration “drift” (ie deviation from expected server software configurations). This problem is amplified when managing and maintaining hundreds or thousands of servers, making them vulnerable to undetected malware which may lay dormant within the infrastructure. Nebulon ImmutableBoot allows operations teams to protect their application infrastructure with immutable, or “frozen” server software, reverting infected or misconfigured operating systems and application configurations to a known, good version each time the server reboots. In other words, recovery teams simply reboot infected servers to restore a known, good instance of their operating system and application software. ImmutableBoot is bundled with Nebulon TimeJump, the first and only combined server- storage solution which delivers ransomware recovery in four minutes. TimeJump not only recovers critical application data but also infected operating systems. Now, with ImmutableBoot, TimeJump can serve a known, good version of the operating system as a part of the near-instant point-in-time rollback of the application infrastructure. “Any organisation concerned with cyber resilience should make immutability a key consideration when building its protection and recovery strategy,” said Nebulon CEO Siamak Nazari. “With TimeJump and ImmutableBoot, we are addressing protection and recovery for customers’ deep infrastructure, an area which has been previously ignored by the industry.” LMG Completes Ownership Change to Drive Next Phase of Growth LMG has completed a change in ownership as it embarks on the next phase of its growth journey. The new organisational structure will allow the company to accelerate major investments in technology and talent as part of its plans to transform the smart buildings industry over the next five years. Board directors, Leaun Rowe and Mike Hook have each acquired a 50% share in the business, with founder and Chairman Nigel Rowe stepping down. This strategic move will enable LMG to make the necessary investments to complete its portfolio of smart building services and deliver integrated OT/IT solutions to contractors, landlords and tenants as they look to provide their customers and staff with an exceptional, 5-star experience across their corporate real estate assets. Commenting on the company’s future plans, Rowe said: “LMG has been at the forefront of smart building innovation since 1986. We’ve built a successful business that is laser-focused on delivering outstanding quality of service to all of our stakeholders – from our customers and employees to our suppliers and partners. “With the new organisational structure, we can continue to build on this momentum moving forward – with renewed energy and vigour – as we look to develop our service delivery model and employ the very best talent in the industry to solidify our position in the market.” Hook also commented: “We have perfected the delivery of integrated, multi- technology smart building projects and their ongoing support over the past 10 years. In our next phase of growth, we’ll be focused on providing a full stack of software and services that enable the management and control of every aspect of a smart building. “Using our expertise and deep understanding of smart building infrastructure, we’ll also be expanding our role as a Master Systems Integrator (MSI) – not only to de-risk projects in terms of providing cost certainty and delivering our customers’ desired outcomes but also to future-proof buildings so that they avoid technological obsolescence.” Scality and HPE GreenLake Accelerate On-prem Cloud Services Scality has announced the availability of its Scality S3 Object Storage on the HPE GreenLake Cloud Services platform to accelerate on-prem cloud services for customers who want to retain their data sovereignty, scale easily and manage costs. The two companies are committed to solving the greatest data challenges across the globe and together are delivering innovation that helps more businesses achieve results that drive the success of their businesses. For organisations that house sensitive data, moving to the public cloud isn’t always the best option. Scality S3 Object Storage with HPE GreenLake provides these organisations with an alternative: on-premises, cloud-like data services that meet data sovereignty goals and requirements and keep data secure. This integration keeps up with increasing capacity requirements despite rapid growth and supply chain concerns. Together, HPE and Scality have deployed over an exabyte of storage, with hundreds of joint customers in more than 40 countries. Maurice Martin, VP, HPE GreenLake Partner Ecosystem, said: “Customers need storage solutions that can be customised to their specific need, especially when moving data to public clouds is not an option. What’s more, they need that solution to scale without excessive fees. HPE GreenLake and Scality have partnered to provide a future-proof solution for the modern business.” Gary Wong, Infrastructure Manager, Edmonton Police, said: “Scality gives us the flexibility to scale out our platform and store data, such as digital evidence files and camera footage, in the way that meets our needs. We sought a solution that was cost-effective and reliable for the foreseeable future, which is exactly what Scality through HPE GreenLake provides. Scality and HPE enable us to enjoy a cloud-like experience while keeping our data secure on premises.” NEWS IN BRIEF www.networkseuropemagazine.com 17Infovista and PCTEL Co-develop 5G Testing Use Cases Infovista has announced a strategic collaboration to co-develop joint 5G network testing use cases for mobile operators and industry regulators. The joint use cases will bring together PCTEL 5G scanning receivers and Infovista’s market-leading TEMS software to create differentiated and simplified solutions that address specific customer needs and requirements. The initial set of use cases include 5G C-Band interference monitoring, autonomous testing, beamforming configuration validation, automatic site location detection and automated interference detection, combining PCTEL’s scanners with Infovista’s AI-powered network testing and assurance software. One of the first joint solutions sees Infovista and PCTEL combining to deliver automated interference source detection and location. Leveraging Infovista’s NLA cloud platform for automated cross-domain troubleshooting, the solution uses network and service performance data from Infovista Ativa and its AI/ML analytics engine to rapidly identify and geo-locate cells affected by interference. With the approximate area of the interference identified, Infovista’s precision drive testing algorithms determine an optimal drive route and diagnostics workflow, and then a tester is dispatched with a PCTEL scanner and guided workflow to quickly find the source of the interference. Faiq Khan, President of Global Networks, Infovista, said: “Mobile operators and regulators are facing new and specific challenges as 5G spectrum is licensed and networks rolled out. Their complexity requires new approaches to network testing, using the latest in AI, automation and cloud-native technologies to reduce the time and cost of network testing and monitoring while also being more accurate and valuable to the business. The strategic collaboration between Infovista and PCTEL is driven by this customer need, and we’re excited about the future opportunities our combined customer program will unlock.” Arnt Arvik, Vice President & Chief Sales Officer, PCTEL, said: “Today, effective network testing and monitoring requires purpose-built scanning receivers to measure hundreds of channels across a broad spectrum including 5GNR and mmWave. Testing needs to be fast and accurate, conducted in multiple environments, and it needs to be capable of simultaneously testing multiple technologies and operator networks. We are delighted that our 5G scanning receivers will be paired with Infovista’s software solutions. Together we’re bringing the power of two teams to co-develop joint 5G testing use cases that solve tangible challenges facing our customers today and in the future.” Virgin Media O2 Business to Provide Dark Fibre for all Proximity Edge Data Centres Proximity Data Centres has announced it is joining forces with Virgin Media O2 Business to deliver fibre connectivity services across its portfolio of data centres. Virgin Media Business Wholesale and Proximity Data Centres are now working together to deliver network services including diverse dark fibre and optical high capacity services up to 100GB to customers across Proximity’s portfolio of regional colocation data centres. With nine already open, a total of 20 Proximity sites will be available within the next 12 to 18 months, providing nationwide coverage and reaching 95% of the UK population. Currently, over 50% of Proximity’s growing UK-wide network of edge facilities include Virgin Media Business Wholesale connectivity options, with the Nottingham Edge 1 data centre being the most recent to benefit from an upgrade to include two diverse Virgin Media Business Wholesale fibres. Proximity’s high capacity, scalable and resilient network of tier 3 facilities currently serves major conurbation areas in the North, North West, Midlands, Thames Valley, the South West and South Wales. It enables enterprise businesses, cloud and content providers to maximise competitive advantage through reduced latency and data transit costs, enhanced operational efficiency, and more responsive customer service. “We are extremely pleased a major player such as Virgin Media Business Wholesale has committed to extending its dark fibre presence across our rapidly growing edge colocation portfolio,” said John Hall, MD, Colocation, Proximity Data Centres. “This is a great example of best of breed network service and data centre providers working together to bring enhanced high-speed low latency services to UK businesses.” Diego Tedesco, Wholesale Fixed Director at Virgin Media O2 Business added: “We are very proud to partner with Proximity Data Centres as they build out their UK footprint. Virgin Media Business Wholesale is focused on leveraging our nationwide fibre network to connect next-generation digital infrastructure, and ultimately drive better outcomes for the UK. Together with Proximity Data Centres, we can offer high capacity, low-latency solutions that will meet the demands of a range of businesses, giving them greater choice in a rapidly evolving market.” NEWS IN BRIEF www.networkseuropemagazine.com 18 Share your news! Send your press releases or announcements to: editor@networkseuropemagazine.comKao Data to Host Speechmatics’ HPC and AI Supercomputer, Expanding Deep Learning Capabilities Kao Data has announced it has secured a new customer contract with Speechmatics providing highly accurate speech-to-text to global enterprise businesses. Speechmatics’ new high-performance computing (HPC) deployment includes NVIDIA A100 GPUs, housed within an advanced Supermicro computing infrastructure, which will be hosted at Kao Data’s Harlow campus. The supercomputer will allow Speechmatics to expand its GPU-accelerated neural network research and development, supporting increasing customer demand for its leading speech recognition technology. Kao Data was chosen as the UK’s premier location for HPC and AI, in addition to its commitments to sustainability and energy efficiency. Speechmatics’ high-density supercomputer will benefit from bespoke colocation, an SLA-backed PUE of 1.2, and will be powered by 100% renewable energy. Recognised in both 2020 and 2021 by the FT1000 as one of Europe’s fastest-growing companies, and named within NVIDIA’s prestigious Inception Program, Speechmatics exploits deep learning technology to deliver highly accurate and ultra-fast speech-to-text technology. The company utilises NVIDIA’s acclaimed GPU hardware to complete its aim of understanding every voice, regardless of demographic, accent or dialect. Speechmatics’ supercomputer will work in tandem with its hyperscale cloud deployments, providing a pioneering example of fluent, hybrid HPC in-action. Central to this capability is Megaport’s hyperscale connectivity solutions at Kao Data’s Harlow campus, which provide seamless connectivity and on-ramps between the on-premises supercomputer, and Speechmatics’ instances within Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud. “Powering modern Machine Learning research and development requires an advanced computing infrastructure which only becomes more demanding as you scale,” said Will Williams, VP, Machine Learning, Speechmatics. “As we continue to develop our technological edge through the use of self-supervised learning in our models, it’s crucial to ensure our data centre provider can scale with our compute demands, but in a sustainable way. Kao Data was the obvious choice for us as the best HPC data centre operator in the UK with the benefit of being powered by 100% renewable energy.” “The opportunity to support Speechmatics in this crucial phase of the company’s expansion is an exciting prospect for our organisation, and further underpins Kao Data’s position as the UK’s preeminent provider of sustainable data centres for HPC and AI,” said Lee Myall, CEO, Kao Data. “We look forward to working closely with Speechmatics to help power and support their unique approach of applying neural networks to speech recognition.” Speechmatics’ founder, Dr Tony Robinson, pioneered the approach of applying neural networks to speech recognition in the 1980s, and when higher-performance CPUs appeared in the early 2000s. The company was among the first developers to utilise the technology to process large datasets at volume. NEWS IN BRIEF 19 Reichle & De-Massari AG – Headquarters Binzstrasse 32, 8620 Wetzikon, Switzerland Connectivity infrastructures for data centers Total reliability from R&MNext >