Technology continues to evolve and affect our lives. In particular, technology infrastructure works affect our quality of life without our being aware of it. For example, companies like Lenovo are working early on solutions for the new era. So what about these investments? Burc San, General Manager of Lenovo Turkey Infrastructure Solutions Group, answered the questions.
Lenovo Turkey Infrastructure Solutions Group General Manager answered the questions!
- Could you give detailed information about your services as Lenovo Infrastructure Solutions Group (ISG)?
Lenovo Infrastructure Solutions (ISG) includes servers, storage, networking products, software and services powered by Intel®. During the technological transformation process in the world, Lenovo adopted 3 strong strategies in 2014.
The most important of the three strategies was to take advantage of today’s opportunities enabled by new technologies and to focus more on “Device + Cloud” and “Infrastructure + Cloud” areas. Within the scope of this strategy, a new restructuring was made within Lenovo and the “Lenovo Infrastructure Solutions Group”, that is, ISG, came to life as an independent company.
In 2017, he became the head of the ISG investment in Lenovo of Kirk Skaugen, one of the industry veterans with 25 years of data center management experience at Intel®. An important period has begun for both the market and Lenovo.
- How do you invest in technology as the Infrastructure Solutions Group?
We also lead Smart Transformation to create better experiences and opportunities for millions of users around the world by designing and building the world’s most complete portfolio of smart devices and infrastructure. Our Infrastructure Solutions Group is leading the modernization of information technologies.
Infrastructure Solutions Group (ISG), we offer industry-leading new Intel® powered ThinkSystem and ThinkAgile hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) solutions to support edge-to-cloud computing.
Lenovo’s new solutions, specially optimized to run demanding cloud workloads such as virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI), database and analytics, artificial intelligence, come with integrated security features to protect against data integrity and firmware threats.
- What were the advantages of accelerating digitalization with the pandemic?
Our dependence on a traditional workplace has decreased, at least for now. Businesses have seen how remote workers and decentralized offices can be successful, and digital transformation is at the heart of this change.
Now with most of the work done in virtual environments, the need for companies to digitize their data management processes has accelerated. Organizations face the continuing challenge of implementing a consistent data management system to analyze and process data more efficiently, while allowing it to be accessible and actionable from all locations.
On our Intel® powered servers, our data is no longer highly structured information from a limited number of sources. The reality business leaders are currently facing has evolved to put more emphasis on the way data is processed and stored in various forms and from a variety of sources. This has increased demand for platforms, tools, and flash array technology, as we saw in our Lenovo ThinkSystem DM Series Storage Manager Operating System to provide secure, flexible and agile data management.
- What exactly does Smart Transformation entail?
Simply put, Intelligent Transformation describes what happens when artificial intelligence (AI) powered devices and data center infrastructure work together to create powerful solutions. These solutions help improve customers’ lives and continue to move industries forward. It uniquely encompasses solutions that allow us to make things faster, cheaper, better and more personalized. In the near future, “Smart Transformation” will pave the way for unimaginable business models.
- Can you talk about your future goals?
First of all, our goal is to be one of the top 3 Data Center providers in the world. We aim to maintain our leadership in customer satisfaction and reliability. At Lenovo, we will continue to focus on smarter technologies for all, in line with our commitment to innovation. We believe that meeting the needs of the end users and keeping up with the technological developments is one of the basic conditions of being successful in this sector. We take innovative steps in this direction and continue our artificial intelligence investments.
- Could you tell us about Lenovo’s investments in the future of artificial intelligence and technology in the world and in Turkey?
When we look at the technologies of the future, we see that the concepts of internet of things, artificial intelligence and data analytics will come to the fore even more. According to the research of the World Economic Forum, the economic value created by digital technologies is expected to exceed 100 trillion dollars in the next 10 years.
According to the Artificial Intelligence Index 2019 Report, the global investment in artificial intelligence by the private sector in 2019 exceeded $70 billion. At Lenovo, we invest $1.6 billion a year in artificial intelligence while focusing on smarter technologies and innovation. We think that AR, VR, Supercomputing, artificial intelligence and 5G will enter our lives more and become widespread in the coming years.
As ISG, we continue to invest in innovative technologies that improve and strengthen the customer experience. “Artificial intelligence” is the leading subject among our future investment and innovation items.
We continue our investments in research centers and “Customer Innovation Centers”. We are developing new artificial intelligence technologies that will make both our work and the lives of our customers easier.
To help mitigate adverse climate change, researchers use “Geo-Spatial Image Analysis” and “Geospatial Image Analysis” to study and predict agricultural regions and crops that may be affected by floods or droughts. “Our Lenovo Artificial Intelligence Innovation Center”uses.
Artificial intelligence is already having a profound impact on traditional business strategies and scientific research, and many top leaders recognize it as a priority. We are determined to continue to implement critical artificial intelligence systems with our newly opened global artificial intelligence innovation centers and our comprehensive product and service portfolio.
We are currently operating three new AI innovation centers to help AI solve the most important business or human problems.
- in Morrisville(USA), Stuttgart(Germany), Beijing(China) More than 100 data science experts and expert artificial intelligence developers of Lenovo work in these centers.
- They are working to design AI-enabled solutions, such as patient imaging and examination/scanning, that can be used to detect, classify, and assist doctors in diagnosing tumors in the early stage of the disease.
- What are the roles and advantages of artificial intelligence in data management?
AI provides more automation and prediction in data management. Storage providers are increasingly turning to artificial intelligence and machine learning to build automated capabilities in enterprise data management systems. This can include anything from greater efficiency when monitoring capacity requirements to using your pre-existing data for predictive analytics and preventing problems from happening. In 2021, businesses are likely to continue to reduce human intervention throughout their data infrastructure management, instead placing additional responsibility on smart software solutions to address these issues.
Your Data Center should be seen as the heart of your AI architecture and therefore requires high performance. From pre-processing in feeding data to neural networks for model training, your Flash-based investments can eliminate performance bottlenecks and simply accelerate AI workloads.
By effectively leveraging AI capabilities, businesses can greatly improve the efficiency of their data management, especially in areas such as surveillance, performance, and security. With next-generation applications and digital transformation projects already being implemented, machine learning techniques allow you to analyze ever-increasing datasets to gain more accurate insights than would be possible without AI support.
- What awaits us with the spread of 5G technology in the near future?
The availability of 5G network is about to become crucial for many different business operations. With the natural growth of IoT devices leveraging 5G, the speed of data being created and analyzed will drive the need for high-performance, low-latency storage in edge locations.
5G will act as a catalyst for developing more advanced, data-hungry applications, allowing enterprise systems to stay up and running while processing data at lightning speed. In turn, enterprise business models will need to adapt to it, especially as it pertains to services provided to end users and customers. Therefore, robust, secure and highly efficient data management solutions will be a central component to tap into the enormous potential that a 5G network offers to business operations.
- As Lenovo, what is on your agenda to reduce the environmental impact of data centers?
About 40 million tons of electronic waste is produced each year, accounting for 70% of our total toxic waste. Moreover, it is estimated that data centers around the world will consume 13% of the world’s electricity by 2030. All this means that limiting wasteful storage practices through the cycle of data collection, storage, and eventual disposal is a growing problem.
The advent of cloud-based technologies and systems like Lenovo’s Asset Recovery Service is now encouraging organizations to reduce their reliance on server rooms. But more action will be needed to combat the resulting environmental impacts.
Business leaders need to pay more attention to reducing their carbon footprints for their data, not only by promoting more sustainable systems, but also by focusing on the overall efficiency of data centers to reduce e-waste at all stages. As data storage becomes more efficient from year to year, having the ability to reuse and recycle data can help create more sustainable data management practices going forward.