EMC Corporation, a global leader in enabling businesses and services providers transform their operations and deliver IT as a service on Wednesday hosted its first annual Forum in Nigeria, discussing the fundamental business challenges for organizations and proffering solutions to them.
One of the key topic at the Forum was cloud computing, which delivers the maximum possible IT efficiency and makes it possible to store, manage and analyze information as it continues to grow.
EMC had sponsored International Data Centre (IDC) research in 2012 which found that the digital universe will reach 40 zettabytes (ZB) by 2020, an amount that exceeds previous forecasts by 5 Zbs, resulting in a 50-fold growth from the beginning of 2010
In lieu of that, while delivering a key note address at the Forum, Patricia Florissi, EMC’s vice president and global chief technical officer (CTO) said although presently Big Data offers companies opportunity to know their customers faster, however, trust remains an issue in tackling security related issues in IT.
“Big Data is really influencing the future and companies are really excited about it. However, to overcome inherent challenges, organizations need to appreciate the fact that you cannot contain threats or mean customers’ trust through tradition or conventional thinking.
“While cloud computing offers the promise of transforming IT and significantly lowering operating costs, it is real-time Big Data analytics that will fundamentally transform businesses across Nigeria and by identifying new revenue opportunities through key competitive insights and timely decision-making and improved customer experience.
“At EMC, we strive to help customers achieve their objectives and drive business growth and that is what we showcased at EMC forum,” she added.
Earlier in an address, Rasheed Jimoh, regional manager for West Africa, EMC, said that EMC discovered the imperative of bringing conversations to Nigeria on cloud computing and inherent security concerns.
“We have hosted the EMC forum in several countries across the world and each time it has proven to be an effective platform for a convergence of experts and thought leaders to shape the direction of cloud computing and today Nigeria joins the train of success stories,” he said.
Jimoh added that EMC is certain that the conversation will continue to resonate and cause the IT transformation EMC would like to see in various industries across the country.
Through the many workshops and sessions during the Forum, EMC experts highlighted how the company’s software defined storage and tiered storage and scale-out NAS, virtualization, and next generation backup solutions can enable organizations to build their IT transformation strategies to drive maximized performance, cost reductions and agility.
The Forum also examined how security analytics transform security monitoring by leveraging the power of Big Data and how to achieve comprehensive IT security in the face of an ever-evolving cyber threat landscape with ‘Trust’ solutions from EMC and RSA, the security division of EMC.