IBM announced last week it has moved its cognitive computing system into the cloud to form the Watson Discovery Advisor, allowing researchers, academics and anyone else trying to leverage big data the ability to test programs and hypotheses at speeds never before seen.

"I think there have been a number of ways that we have improved the system since Jeopardy", said John Gordon, vice president of IBM Watson Systems.

IBM has been honing Watson's capabilities over the last three years, reducing its size and upping its power since its famous appearance on "Jeopardy!" in 2011.

"Part of Smarter Cities was working with different municipalities and governments to determine how technology could help them provide better services to their constituents", Gordon said.Read more at: https://www.fedscoop.com/watson-cloud/

Data is the backbone of analytics and machine learning and hence one of the most important tasks in analytics is to get the right kind of data and in the required format.The importance of data can be understood by the fact that around 60 to 80 percent of the time of an analyst is spent in preparing the data.
What exactly is data preparation? In a nutshell, it is the process  of collecting, cleaning, processing and consolidating the data for use in analysis. It enriches the data, transforms it and improves the accuracy of the outcome.
How is it done? It is mostly done through analytics or traditional extract, transform and load (ETL) tools. ETL tools include self-service data preparation tools, data cleansing and manipulation tools, etc.
Since data is the foundation of the analytics, right data will helps in analysing the situation better and help organizations in reacting positively to the market shifts.
To know more read the full article by Ashish Sukhadeve (business analytics professional) at: http://www.datasciencecentral.com/profiles/blogs/why-data-preparation-should-not-be-overlooked

Organizations need databases which are needed to store data safely. Through databases one can solve problems from NoSQL and RDBMS framework to in-memory databases. This help banks to give quicker reaction times and viable examination, prompting better client experience and maintenance. Utilizing a center layer on top of various databases, banks can rapidly assemble information. For more read the article written by Nanda Kumar(CEO, SunTec Business Solution) : https://www.finextra.com/blogposting/12478/making-data-work-for-banks

It seems that the long winter of AI has come to an end and this field is enjoying the unstoppable progress in the spring stage. But the only way AI becomes more powerful is by getting fed with a tremendous amount of data. More the data, better the efficiency of the AI algorithms. Seeing the helpful uses of such AI based applications the users happily allow the access to any kind of data. In the coming times, there will be applications which would demand access to every kind of data you generate. And the truth is we will willingly submit our data. Because bigger the data sets are, smarter the AI. The major reason for feeding the AI algorithms is that is improving and helping the human life. Read more about it in the article written by Mike Elgan (author of  technology and tech culture) at: http://www.computerworld.com/article/3035595/emerging-technology/artificial-intelligence-needs-your-data-all-of-it.html

Effective data analysis is learned overtime. It takes time, patience and effort. Here are few tips which can help to make the journey of learning smoother.

·         Use simple analysis terms and methods rather than complex algorithms. If your customer and engineers are not able to understand your analysis then all the effort goes in vain.

·         Look for multiple data sources. 

·         Use familiar tools rather than new tools. We should stay updated with the newest technology in market but avoid abundant use of fancy new tools which are difficult to understand. Stick to classics.

·          Provide your insights with the indicators.

·         Clean your data.  Structure it properly. Look for the center, unusual features, spread, and shape of the data. 

·         It is important to move in the right direction rather than spending too much time on definitive answer.

·          Value how actually software works rather than how you understand or think software works.

Read the full article here:  http://dataconomy.com/7-habits-of-highly-effective-data-analysis/

Machine Learning is getting easier and accessible because of the computing power becoming affordable. Moreover, big enterprises are making their algorithm open source. This is because data is the food. More data an algorithm gets, the better it becomes. But from step 1, making algorithms, feeding data in humans play a significant role. Sometimes there are outliers which the algorithms cannot interpret. Here human intervention is necessary. They manually check such pieces. But when these are fed into algorithms, they make them robust by identifying outliers. Thus, human intervention is both necessary for accuracy and training. Read more at: http://insidebigdata.com/2016/01/11/human-in-the-loop-is-the-future-of-machine-learning/

Data is important when you target customers. You can also discover their age, location, and occupation. Through social media, you can discover their other interests. To know more about how data can be useful to segment and target your audience, follow: http://www.business2community.com/digital-marketing/using-data-segment-target-audience-01384351#5xGyKfZAbDXd6lYe.97

Need for Chief Data Officer (CDO) in boardrooms has increased now days. Importance of CDO is same as that of big data in companies, as a person in charge of data team. There has been increase in number of companies who are employing CDOs. At present 43% of executives reported that their firm had appointed CDO, while two years back it was only about 19%. During financial crises in 2008 many companies lost their significant amount of money after their data had been shown completely wrong. That gives rise to Chief Data Officer, a person that can be held responsible for validity of data. He can protect businesses from loss due to crises and also to help appease law makers who were going to require change within reporting and storage of data.  Read more at:

https://channels.theinnovationenterprise.com/articles/the-evolution-in-the-cdo-role

Big data for a long time has been handled wrongly, as there is problem lies in assigning meaning to data. There is acute skill shortage and the human factor also complicates big data. Here are a few ways how we can get better benefits from big data.
1. The business has to say what it wants to achieve from collating and analyzing data.
2. Asking relevant questions, so the data can provide answers.
3. Start small and then get bigger, trim irrelevant data.
4. Managing costs better
5. Understanding what data matters to the business the most.
To know more, follow: http://www.information-age.com/technology/information-management/123459617/big-data-phenomenon-broken-5-tips-doing-analytics-right-way

Big data is growing now days because companies are demanding more output from big data. Data and data management solutions have helped companies to modify the customer interaction and tackle the risk of uncertainty in timely communications. After having good views of customers, agents can help transforming marketing qualified leads into sales qualified leads with smarter interactions. There has been a change in the role of Chief Data Officer (CDO) who was earlier working as data scientist to help transforming big data into new repositories. Today there is compensation for CDO for the value they extract from all sources of data. The large volume and variety of data from other sources and social media has made the marketers very busy. CDO’s are held responsible to judge the relevance of consumer data and assign a particular value.  Read more at: http://www.smartdatacollective.com/gayle-nixon/332221/data-within-and-data-without

Initially social media was used for socializing but with the progress of time it has undergone an impactful makeover. It is not only about advertising to a huge section of consumers but it is also the fundamental tool to influence customers. Firms will be able to determine basic information about their customers while marketing over social media and as a result the probability of obtaining clear data rises. This enables quick and easy access to data. The data collected from social media platforms are more or less accurate. However companies should take advantage of the various social media networking sites for trading their products and thereby improving both data and content.

To know more about this study, please follow the link: http://www.business2community.com/social-selling/social-media-purchasing-feature-changing-marketing-01283019

Data provides valuable information to a firm to optimize its performance. Decision makers and strategists analyze data and take optimal decisions. Data analysis shows the firm its ongoing productivity and making predictions will lead to future growth. Employees also get benefit in terms of more productivity when they use data-driven tools providing more enhanced methods which they can use. Customer relations have been improved, as employees are more productive and can give more enhanced solutions to their customers. Analyzing the data collected from social media can determine how successful the conversations have been. This is possible just because of changing consumer behavior and innovations that lead to such change. Ideal business is one that reacts to social change. Analytical tools enhances culture among employees. More data is needed to improve customer service than before. Today there is a lot of pressure on employees as work is increasing with large data size. Here the data-driven technique  plays its role helping them to handle such pressure leading them to be more interactive and informative. Improvement in employee's performance will result in enhancement of sales process, training and innovation. This change will bring some excitement for employees, working with modern tools far better than those boring traditional tools. Building up the transparent system will bring good feedback from upper management for employees leading them to provide more optimal output. Read more at: http://www.smartdatacollective.com/daanpepijn/329438/data-changing-way-enterprises-optimize-employee-productivity

Data provides valuable information to a firm to optimize its performance. Decision makers and strategists analyze data and take optimal decisions. Data analysis shows the firm its ongoing productivity and making predictions will lead to future growth. Employees also get benefit in terms of more productivity when they use data-driven tools providing more enhanced methods which they can use. Customer relations have been improved, as employees are more productive and can give more enhanced solutions to their customers. Analyzing the data collected from social media can determine how successful the conversations have been. This is possible just because of changing consumer behavior and innovations that lead to such change. Ideal business is one that reacts to social change. Analytical tools enhances culture among employees. More data is needed to improve customer service than before. Today there is a lot of pressure on employees as work is increasing with large data size. Here the data-driven technique  plays its role helping them to handle such pressure leading them to be more interactive and informative. Improvement in employee's performance will result in enhancement of sales process, training and innovation. This change will bring some excitement for employees, working with modern tools far better than those boring traditional tools. Building up the transparent system will bring good feedback from upper management for employees leading them to provide more optimal output. Read more at:http://www.smartdatacollective.com/daanpepijn/329438/data-changing-way-enterprises-optimize-employee-productivity

Today not only big companies are enjoying benefit of big data but also the small and medium sized companies are in the line. Many SME’s have become big data users. The size of data has categorized the type of data users. These are high data user, medium data user and small data user. While the high data users are more sophisticated in tools and more proficient in the storage and accessing of data, all of them share the same problem. Earlier SME’s were not able provide information to decision makers in a timely manner and they find difficulty in presenting and sharing information in proper formats. This problem led SME’s to access the big data technology which made it easier for them to present and share the information in easy to understand formats. Big data technology not only applies to private data but can also be applied to combination of private and public data. This is possible only due to the property of big data technology that it can handle both structured and semi structured data. Its design allows it to work on data stored on cloud and to deal with dynamic processing requirement. Big data technology is mature, flexible and affordable. It can alter the way of doing work with data, decision tools are easily accessible and information provided within the documents can have better view. When a company becomes large, its systems will become large, information and data become large leading to difficulties in handling them. Big data technology has provided a road to have more efficient systems and better techniques. Read more at:http://www.smartdatacollective.com/bruce-robbins/331325/how-business-users-will-benefit-joined-data

Businesses should always keep invoking new technology in their systems to keep themselves updated. A recent study has revealed that innovation occurs when business models can be matched with one or more of the six patterns where technological advances and market needs overlap, thus leading to growth and transformation. These six points of overlap are named as Six Degrees of Innovation which are as follows:

(i) Meeting customers’ individual needs with tailor-made products and services.

(ii) Achieving sustainability by minimizing waste and managing resource cost.

(iii) Possessing jointly owned assets to boost efficiency and minimize cost.

(iv) Saving money whenever possible by paying only for the services that are used.

(v) Monitoring supply chains effectively by using tracking systems.

(vi) Using data and analytics to gauge customer needs and easily adapting it. Read more at:      http://www.businessnewsdaily.com/8199-innovation-technology-adoption.html

Earlier, the concept of cloud security was obscure and hence corporate executives and IT professionals used to tremble even at its very mention. The reason behind it was that only few could protect the data. Since data is vulnerable to hacking therefore any minor negligence could put the enterprise at risk. However, things changed in 2015. Businesses need not have to be concerned about cloud computing security due to the following reasons:

• Introduction of new and effective methods to safeguard data through company suites, backups/redundancy and virtualization.
• One needs to be extremely cautious while choosing a vendor and it is highly recommended to visit their site in person in order to scan their system.
• Finally, with the advent of advanced technologies companies started using cloud computing without any worries.

Read more at: https://channels.theinnovationenterprise.com/articles/why-businesses-shouldn-t-worry-about-cloud-computing-security

The automobile industry can make use of data to improve vehicles, sustainability and profitability. Smart cars are the next generation of cars and data will assist in building these. Surveys have revealed that customers prefer cars with features that save time, ensure safety and sends warning alerts in case of malfunctions. In order to accomplish these needs, integration of technologies is required. Services based on car data can be introduced like sending a warning alert to replace car battery prior to its depletion. Smart infrastructure can be built by connecting roadside sensors, traffic signals and remote data centers to ensure a safe and smooth ride. Data can be analyzed to map travelling patterns by looking at how individuals behave in various road scenarios. Read more at: https://channels.theinnovationenterprise.com/articles/7719-what-smart-carmakers-can-learn-from-the-smart-phone-industry

With every passing day it is becoming very important to safeguard data by companies both small and big. It can be done in the following ways:
1. Prioritize the issue – The issues must be computed and addressed regularly.

2. Understand what your data assets are – It will be beneficial if the data assets of a company are identified beforehand.

3. Learn about what you are up against – The Company should have at least an idea on how the hackers might steal or compromise the data.

4. Communicate issues with employees – The employees should be encouraged to take up habits that reduce data breaches and awareness should be spread.

5. Be ready to react – The Company and its IT experts should be alert and ready to react in any emergency situation.

Read more at: http://www.smartdatacollective.com/keithrbr/326717/5-tips-protecting-your-data-assets-more-effectively

Data is collected through various paid, owned and earned media channels. Currently, B2B companies have started to emerge which is indeed a good news for marketers. Forward-looking media companies are investing to furnish superior quality prospects and performance data in order to generate new customers. They are as follows:

1. Data as the new media and marketing currency - Media companies uses data in association to their content and customer's marketing assets.
2. Behavioral prospect data and signal intent - It helps to figure out the best opportunities by encouraging prospects in a more targeted manner.
3. Company content consumption data for account-based marketing - It aims to target companies that B2B marketers finds ideal for their product.

Read more at: http://www.business2community.com/big-data/your-best-marketing-data-provider-may-be-right-underneath-your-nose-01264168

An effective way to communicate is to visualize the rightful information.  The trending problem is to properly present a data than just collecting it. The ‘infographics’ is the most widely used tool to communicate and avoid ‘chartjunk’ ,which leads to less loss of data. The visual way should be easily interpretable and easily communicable. The visual data should have the quality of explaining the business information. The visual communication is most widely used and is more acceptable to human brain. The data should be simple enough to reach and communicate the masses for better and efficient business. Read more at: http://www.business2community.com/business-intelligence/business-intelligence-insights-present-visual-data-team-understands-01263960