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The impact of cloud services on businesses is revolutionary and immeasurable. Come join us in Hangzhou China as we explore the 2019 APSARA Conference.

The conference was from the 25th to the 27th September 2019. With three main halls and two main forums, more than 110 summits covering a range of topics from machine intelligence, Blockchain, 5G, cloud native database to biometrics, chip, self-driving, and heterogeneous computing.

Alibaba Group introduced its first AI inference chip during the Apsara Conference. The Hanguang 800's peak performance is 78,563 images per second in an inference image classification benchmark test on ResNet-50, four times higher than the current best AI microprocessors in the industry. The chip's peak efficiency is 500 IPS/W, 3.3 times better than the second-ranked one.

Don Omondi, NeXtGeN Solution Architect, Africa and Levant and Jessica Alabi Abimbola,NeXtGeN Platform Account Manager, West Africa had LIVE interviews during the conference. To get their view on the biggest Cloud Computing & AI conference, follow our YouTube Channel to watch the interviews.

 

 

We are committed to, and fully invested in driving change through the adoption of technology in Africa across all market segments. Our customer network is both broad and deep and something that we continuously seek to enhance.

Interdist Alliances is ‘Your Gateway into Africa’.

 

Sparc Systems Limited together with IBM and Interdist Alliances held an event in Lilongwe, Malawi on the 25th September 2019 for a discussion on Border Control and Cybersecurity.

 

 

Identity and Access Management (IAM)

With the annual costs of damage associated with cybercrime expected to reach $6 trillion by 2021, businesses need to focus on improving security measures and controlling user access to information. Our Identity and Access Management (IAM) solution by Micro Focus is a critical component of a successful protocol that helps organizations consistently enforce access rights across protected information and help businesses meet regulatory mandates with its integrated policies across local, mobile, and cloud environments by solving the following needs for our customers.

• Visibility - This is a big challenge for growing businesses. As more users join a network, more devices become active and new tools are added to support diverse workflows, it becomes difficult to get a handle on who has access to what resources and at what privilege levels throughout the user’s lifecycle. Our identity and access powered security management and sign-on procedures helps businesses achieve the dual goals of greater visibility and smoother user experiences.
• Pinpoint and Eliminate High-Risk Systems - Many businesses are still clinging to legacy systems for which support has long since ceased. Unpatched systems can become sources of breaches and make sensitive information readily available to hackers. Businesses that rely on these systems out of habit or in an attempt to avoid the hassle of upgrading need to take a step back and assess which needs these legacy tools are addressing and how they’re being used in workflows so that suitable replacements can be found. It may be possible to safely continue using systems for which support is still available, but seeking a fresh solution is still preferable because legacy tools often lack the options required for seamless integration into modern systems with diverse access requirements.
• Crack Down on Orphaned Accounts - Active user accounts contain all the information related to a user’s identity and his or her movement within a network, including access privileges. When a user is promoted to another position or leaves the company, these accounts should be removed. However, with the increasing burden on IT professionals and the lack of visibility in most business networks, this often doesn’t happen. Improper deprovisioning of users leads to an accumulation of accounts with no associated users. Known as orphaned accounts, these sets of credentials and provisions are easy targets for hackers inside and outside the network. Logging into an orphaned account makes it possible to launch phishing attacks using apparently legitimate email addresses, make unauthorized changes to the system and steal sensitive data. Fifty-five percent of enterprises fail to revoke the permissions for privileged accounts, which creates an even greater security threat due to the higher levels of access allowed by these accounts.

• Implement of Zero-Trust Security - In most business networks, it is safe to assume no one is trustworthy until proven otherwise. Our “zero trust” model relies on continuous authentication methods in which user behaviors are monitored and risk levels assessed throughout the duration of each session. By taking a dynamic and sophisticated approach, zero trust equips a system to detect aberrant behaviors indicative of a breach. Instead of taking the average 197 days to discover an intrusion into a system, businesses can identify potential threats and launch a proactive response the moment behavioral discrepancies arise. This prevents hackers from gaining free reign once inside a system and can avert the serious consequences associated with extensive breaches. 

• Find the Best Software Solution - Every business needs an IAM solution tailored to the specialized needs of its industry in general and its onsite systems in particular. Threats, risk levels and compliance regulations differ according to the unique combination of devices, user access requirements and tools needed to integrate applications with incompatible authentication protocols. The retention of legacy systems adds another element of complexity with its own related concerns. Streamlining workflows and optimizing productivity without sacrificing security are top priorities in our IAM platform, along with scalability to accept the introduction of new systems, applications and devices. IT professionals require an administrative dashboard with analytics tools, straightforward reporting and a high level of visibility to ensure all endpoints can be monitored continuously.

Key Benefits:

• Give users quick and secure access to resources base on need to know basis
• Secure and simple to remember passwords
• Control and monitoring of privileged users
• Strong authentication without restricting productivity
• Access governance for regulatory compliance
• Make it easy to gain access to IT resources

 

Interdist Alliances and Jetlink

 

Interdist Alliances, in partnership with Jetlink and IBM, hosted an event at the IBM Innovation Centre on Tuesday, 25th June 2019.

Markets experts at the event included Waheed Adeoye, Elochukwu Mofunanya and Chuks Obi discussing a range of subjects ranging from Power9 Accelerated Infrastructure Foundation, Data Driven by storage, IBM API Economy and IBM Cloud Private. IT influencers and decision makers from all over Nigeria attended this event. The impressive guest list made for an interactive and informative session. The sharp growth of the IT sector in this region is a testament of bigger expectation in the future.

 

 

Interdist Alliances and DataFlex

 

Interdist Alliances, in partnership with DataFlex and IBM, hosted an event at the IBM Innovation Centre on Thursday, 27th June 2019.

Guests were graced by industry experts, decision-makers and influencer focusing on IBM Solutions with an emphasis on "Speed meet's Simplicity".

 

Markets experts at the event included Foluso Jibowo, Funmi Alamu, Chuks Obi and Chukwudi Okafor. The main focus was Power9-Accelerated Infrastructure Foundation, Data Driven By Storage, IBM API Economy and IBM Cloud Private. The discussions were interactive and involved in depth analysis of the each of the solutions presented.