Edge technologies are projected to experience the highest investment increase in 2022, growing 76% to $462,000 according to a new Gartner, Inc. survey.

Looking back to 2021, 5G drew the highest average investment in 2021, with survey respondents reporting an average of $465,000 invested in the technology. This was followed by IoT at $417,000 and edge technologies (i.e., edge AI and edge computing) at $262,000. 

The edge architecture is allowing AI to become more actionable. Moving AI inferencing closer to the point of data generation is making the edge more intelligent, which is improving decision-making within organizations and data-driven outcomes. In conducting AI inferencing on the edge, the data is processed in real time to generate actionable insights for decision-makers.

It makes sense that among the reasons organizations are using edge technologies and 5G are to improve employee productivity, augment existing products and services by making them more connected and intelligent, and automate business processes. Asset intensive industries such as manufacturing, natural resources and energy are among the early adopters of ET to solve core business problems. 

It’s interesting to note that the decisions to invest in these emerging technologies (ET) no longer solely rest with IT. The survey showed that Boards of Directors are among the main decision makers for ET investments in over half of surveyed organizations, just behind CIOs and CTOs, signaling that the business has more confidence in the ROI these technologies bring.

In fact, counter to conventional thinking, most survey respondents reported that ET investments are meeting or exceeding user expectations. When enterprises are choosing between two vendors’ ET offerings, the vendors’ ability to provide demonstrable use cases and a track record of success ultimately clinches the win. Product managers should look to focus on these success stories and ensure short deployment/ implementation timelines when targeting business users to adopt ET.
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Gartner surveyed 500 global respondents from mid-sized and larger organizations in September and October 2021 to understand buying behavior when investing in emerging technologies.

Predictions indicate that a nanometer-sized wave-based computer could solve equations in a fraction of the time of their larger, electronic counterparts.  
Booting up your laptop may seem like an instantaneous process, but in reality, it’s an intricate dance of signals being converted from analog waveforms to digital bytes to photons that deliver information to our retinas. For most computer uses, this conversion time has no impact. But for supercomputers crunching reams of data, it can create a serious, energy-consuming slowdown. Researchers are looking to solve this problem using analog, wave-based computers, which operate solely using light waves and can perform calculations faster and with less energy. Now, Heedong Goh and Andrea Alù from the Advanced Science Research Center at the City University of New York present the design for a nano-sized wave-based computer that can solve mathematical problems, such as integro-differential equations, at the speed of light.
One route that researchers have taken to make wave-based analog computers is to design them into metamaterials, materials engineered to apply mathematical operations to incident light waves. Previous designs used large-area metamaterials—up to two square feet ( ∼0.2 m2)—limiting their scalability. Goh and Alù have been able to scale down these structures to the nanoscale, a length scale suited for integration and scalability.
The duo’s proposed computer is made from silicon and is crafted in a complex geometrical nanoshape that is optimized for a given problem. Light is shone onto the computer, encoding the input, and the computer then encodes the solution to the problem onto the light it scatters. For example, the duo finds that a warped-trefoil structure can provide solutions to an integral equation known as the Fredholm equation.
Goh and Alù’s calculations show that their nano-sized wave-based computers should be able to solve problems with near-zero processing delay and with negligible energy consumption.

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Here are a few FinTech firms that are emblematic of how technology innovation is shaping the future of money across a variety of financial services.

Versapay—Accounts receivable
In its quest to rid companies of paper checks, Toronto-based Versapay has developed one of the first collaborative accounts receivable platforms, combining advanced invoicing, automation, and payments technology to deliver improvements and efficiencies for its 250,000 business clients. It has mushroomed during the pandemic, which fueled a demand for digital payments, including the digitizing of accounts receivable services. In a recent interview, Versapay CEO Craig O'Neill said a large majority of finance leaders will adopt digitized payments in the next few years. "Surveys show that 93% of finance leaders are saying they're going to digitize how they do business on both the accounts payable and accounts receivable side. There's going to be a sea change over the next couple of years, which will really change the face of business: paper goes away completely, including check stock, and will set people free to work wherever they want," he said.  

BestEgg—Personal lending and financial management resources
This Wilmington, Del.-based FinTech, is on a mission to help people feel more confident about their everyday finances by making money accessible through fast, simple, and easy personal loans. BestEgg has created a proprietary AI platform to deliver digital products including loans for debt consolidation, credit card refinancing, home improvement, moving, vacation and baby adoption. BestEgg recently introduced an online financial health platform to bolster confidence for consumers in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has had a debilitating effect on many peoples' finances. "The future of digital finance is human," says Sabrina DeVito, chief strategy officer for Marlette Holdings, which operates BestEgg. "Digital can come across as cold, but the winners are going to be those who not only use digital to create extraordinary experiences but also are human in how they come across," she said.

Kabbage—Small business financing
Small businesses took a beating during the coronavirus pandemic—large numbers shut down permanently, crippling local communities both economically and socially. Fortunately, more small businesses are forming in the shadow of the pandemic, and one FinTech is helping to make that possible. Kabbage, backed by American Express, is a one-stop FinTech resource for small businesses, providing access to cash flow solutions such as business checking, flexible funding, and payment processing services. It recently launched Kabbage Funding, which provides flexible lines of credit between $1,000 and $150,000, and Kabbage Checking for online business checking accounts.
"We saw a technology opportunity; a way to use an API to automate serving a business that couldn't have been served previously," said Kathryn Petralia, co-founder of Kabbage. Petralia says what she's seeing with small businesses is that there's more support by many other companies to serve these unserved small businesses. "They're a vital part of the economy—a vital part of job growth and so now we can do that using technology where we couldn't do it before because it was always hard to market to small business. But thanks to the data and these new technology platforms, we can do it," Petralia said.

UpTip—Cashless tipping
This new startup replaces cash tipping with an e-payment platform and enables users to provide ratings on service providers such as wait staff and limousine drivers. Companies are given a QR code after registering with UpTip. Customers scan the code on their smartphone to view the company's profile, give a star rating, leave feedback and, of course, provide a tip. Tips are deposited directly into a debit card or bank account of choice.
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The travel and hospitality industry is still struggling in the wake of COVID and so are the people whose lives and livelihoods have depended on tipping. Eric Plam, UpTip's founder, believes the pandemic has been a catalyst to help people figure out how much they value people who serve them and the services they provide. UpTip will help collect the data used to determine how much service staff are valued. "We really believe that personality, enthusiasm and merit should be rewarded and so this is one reason we enjoy tipping and that's one thing we do with our service and ratings platform—we try to raise people who are doing a great job because we want to help them advance in their careers", Plam said.

SeaTable is software for combined information management. The software allows data of different types to be collected, prearranged, and analyzed. It uses an in-built spreadsheet web interface with customizable web forms for its data entry. 

SeaTable offers over 20 different column types, sorting, filtering, and grouping for its data organization. Besides the charts and pivot tables as traditional evaluation tools, it also offers application-oriented visualizations, including map views, gallery, Gantt charts, and Kanban.

The SeaTable software is available in 3 different versions, including on-premises, dedicated, and cloud variants. The on-premises variant is designed for large and medium-sized companies that don't want to outsource their data but prefer to store their own data center. Besides this, it offers a spreadsheet solution for teams that want flexible ways of working on projects, tasks, and ideas.

The spreadsheet solution doesn't limit users to texts and numbers; it also captures all information and stores documents, emails, URLs, check boxes, images, drop-down lists, etc. According to the CEO & Founder, Christoph Dyllick-Brenzinger, "SeaTable generates enormous added value for teams that want to work together on ideas, tasks or projects. With SeaTable, you have all your data in one place and can access it flexibly from anywhere. Since our launch in July 2020, we have developed rapidly. We generate many new customers every day who have the goal of working in a structured and, above all, more efficient way."

SeaTable Offers Unique Use Cases
SeaTable has different use cases. It can work as a bug, survey software, tracking system, project management tool, archiving solution, and a collaboration platform. Therefore, everyone, including agencies, developers, content creators, project managers, and market researchers, can use SeaTable to consolidate their project details.

The software can work as a collaborative database application. It offers advanced functions beyond what traditional spreadsheets can do. As a web application, it doesn't require any program installation, download, or configuration. All users require is to register on the platform and get their data organized.

"Over 100,000 downloads via Dockerhub and high customer satisfaction speak for our first-class and innovative software. With the development of SeaTable, it is always important to us to offer our spreadsheet solution across as many areas and industries as possible. Our spreadsheet & database hybrid supports many businesses around the world every day, either in the cloud or in their own data center," said Philipp Braun, CMO at SeaTable GmbH.
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As a collaborative tool, it allows the exchange of data with third parties in several ways. Through efficient management and organization, the collaboration between customers and the team is well facilitated and optimized. It allows users to switch to five languages, including English, Russian, Chinese, German, and French. Versions are available from free to €148 per year.

AR has populated science fiction, specialized industries, and high-tech experiments for decades. But in the 2010s, major companies—and countless startups—began treating AR headsets as a potential mass-market platform.

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg predicted in 2017 that televisions and phones would be replaced by holographic glasses. Apple CEO Tim Cook called AR “a big idea, like the smartphone.” Microsoft envisioned people watching the Super Bowl in its HoloLens headset. Google launched its ambitious Glass platform as a potential successor to phones, then helped propel the AR startup Magic Leap toward billions of dollars in investments. More recently, telecoms have partnered with AR companies like the Chinese startup Nreal, hoping high-bandwidth holograms will create a demand for 5G networks.

These companies’ products—as well as those of other major players, including Snap, Vuzix, and Niantic—often look very different. But most of them promise a uniquely powerful combination of three features.

• Their hardware is wearable, hands-free, and potentially always on—you don’t have to grab a device and put it away when you’re done using it
• Their images and audio can blend with or compensate for normal sensory perception of the world, rather than being confined to a discrete, self-contained screen
• Their sensors and software can collect and analyze huge amounts of information about their surroundings—through geolocation and depth sensing, computer vision programs, or intimate biometric technology like eye-tracking cameras

Over the past decade, nobody has managed to merge these capabilities into a mainstream consumer device. Most glasses are bulky, and the images they produce are shaky, transparent, or cut off by a limited field of view. Nobody has developed a surefire way to interact with them either, despite experiments with voice controls, finger tracking, and handheld hardware.

Despite this, we’ve gotten hints of the medium’s power and challenges—and even skeptics of the tech should pay attention to them.

In 2016, for instance, millions of people fell in love with the phone-based AR game Pokémon Go. When players logged on to catch virtual monsters, many discovered parts of their neighborhoods they’d never thought to visit. But they also found a world built on data that placed more gyms and PokéStops in white and affluent neighborhoods. They forged in-person connections by sharing virtual experiences, but those connections could also allow for real-world harassment.

The effects went beyond people who played the game. The owners of some homes near Pokémon Go gyms experienced a sudden influx of trespassers, leading a few to sue its developer Niantic and secure tweaks to the game’s design. Public memorials like the US Holocaust Museum asked players to respect the space by not chasing virtual monsters into it. Even this early foray into augmented reality exported some of the internet’s biggest flaws—like its ability to collapse context and overwhelm individuals with its sheer scale—into physical space.

Writer and researcher Erica Neely says that laws and social norms aren’t prepared for how AR could affect physical space. “I think we’re kind of frantically running behind the technology,” she says. In 2019, Neely wrote about the issues that Pokémon Go had exposed around augmented locations. Those issues mostly haven’t been settled, she says. And dedicated AR hardware will only intensify them.
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Smartphone cameras—along with digital touchup apps like FaceTune and sophisticated image searches like Snap Scan and Google Lens—have already complicated our relationships with the offline world. But AR glasses could add an ease and ubiquity that our phones can’t manage. “A phone-based app you have to actually go to,” says Neely. “You are making a conscious choice to engage with it.” Glasses remove even the light friction of unlocking your screen and deliberately looking through a camera lens.

Office 365 users are now in cybercriminals' crosshairs in a new phishing campaign, according to a warning the Microsoft Security Intelligence (MSI) team issued via Twitter. Malicious actors are using email addresses that appear to be legitimate, with display names that mimic bona fide services to dodge email filters.
Microsoft cautioned cybercriminals are going above and beyond to use detection-evasion techniques that are convincing and authentic-looking.

"An active phishing campaign is using a crafty combination of legitimate-looking original sender email addresses, spoofed display sender addresses that contain the target usernames and domains, and display names that mimic legitimate services to slip through email filters," MSI explained on Twitter.

The deceptive phishing campaign targets Office 365 organizations with employees who often send attachments to co-workers. MSI found phishing emails that seemed as if they were sent from a trusted source. Many of these emails contained faux Microsoft SharePoint attachments with labels such as "Price Books," "Bonuses" and "Staff Reports."

The phishing emails use a tactic called "typosquatting," which involves registering deliberately misspelled domains that, at first glance, look close to a well-known brand. Most quick readers would overlook the subtle typo.

If users fall for the bait and click on the "Open" link, it will lead them to a page that lures them to type in their Microsoft or Google credentials. According to MSI, these sign-on pages look very convincing, making users believe that they're on a trustworthy path to a legitimate website.

MSI kept emphasizing how authentic these phishing emails looked. Employers may not be able to rely on their employees' good judgment to identify suspicious-looking emails. That's why MSI shamelessly plugged its Microsoft Defender for Office 365 program as a solution, adding that this software "detects and blocks" these emails.
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Phishing attacks are a huge thorn in the side for many popular companies like Netflix and PayPal, but the Redmond-based tech giant should be particularly concerned. According to a CheckPoint Research study, Microsoft topped the list as being the most imitated brand for phishing attacks.

Benefits. A well-known example of an emerging technology is artificial intelligence (AI). This technology has many facets, including machine learning, natural language processing and speech recognition. In September/October 2020, the Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA) and Protiviti conducted a global survey of over 7,400 IT audit leaders and professionals to get their perspectives on the top technology risks their organizations will face in 2021. Nearly 50% of the over 4,500 global respondents to the ISACA survey showed they are already using AI technologies (22%) or are in the planning and pilot stages of adopting them (27%).

Companies that have adopted emerging technologies, such as AI, hope to benefit from the competitive advantages that these technologies can provide. For example, cost savings and heightened revenues are made possible through increased efficiency and enhanced customer products and experiences.

Companies can speed up the adoption of emerging technologies by investing broadly across the company and using technologies in a way where the responsibility resides with the process owner. This approach generates better cost savings as process owners can solve a business problem specific to them, resulting in operational efficiencies and an increase in quality analysis.

Internal audit can also embrace AI technologies to enhance risk monitoring and control effectiveness. In a use case-specific example, machine learning can analyze general ledger data and pinpoint incorrect or fraudulent journal entries among thousands of other transactions. Note that larger and more complex business problems—which may have a broader impact across multiple areas of the business or have aspects that present greater risk to the company—would require collaboration and consultation with data scientists, who could be internal personnel or consultants.

Risks. Companies adopting emerging technologies must not only consider the benefits but also the associated risks. To develop an understanding of individuals' perceptions, the ISACA survey asked respondents to indicate their views on the risks of adopting AI technologies. Most respondents rated the risks associated with AI to be low (30%) or medium (33%), whereas only 9% determined AI to be high risk. In practice, companies must consider the maturity and complexity of the business processes using AI to determine true risk to the company.

One risk is that these emerging technologies will not achieve companies' expectations. To combat this risk, a clear vision needs to be established and supported by defined objectives with realistic targets. Due diligence involves thorough research to identify requirements for new projects that have a significant impact on the company. IT governance should play a substantial role as emerging technologies are being integrated into the business, including representation across different IT groups—such as application development, security, and infrastructure—within the IT governance process. This will enable communication across various parts of the business and help identify additional needs while streamlining project implementation. Monitoring and regular status updates should be communicated to senior leadership throughout the project, as well as post-launch to help determine if ROI was achieved or miscalculated.

Risks can also emerge from changing regulations that may limit the success of an emerging technology. For example, privacy laws related to the collection of consumer data could impede a company's ability to use successfully certain emerging technologies by disrupting current products and services in production. New regulations are imminent, especially surrounding algorithmic bias for technologies that affect customers. Continuous monitoring of new regulations and nimble development processes are necessary to ensure models comply with changing and new regulations.

Finally, there is a risk that a misconfiguration of the technology could cause an algorithm error issue, which would affect data quality and create threats to data security. These risks can be mitigated by putting strong change management processes in place. These processes ensure test cases are effectively designed and performed, that version controls appropriately log changes to models and source code repositories, and that peer reviews are conducted for coding and model changes. During the planning and building phase, it is critical to be mindful of the data set to identify potential biases and ethical dilemmas.
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Adopting emerging technologies can create competitive advantages, but these benefits are naturally accompanied with risk. Process owners can take a proactive approach to identify risks by engaging with internal audit or enterprise risk management. Starting discussions about risks and controls early in the technology's implementation will help identify any unaddressed issues and process improvements and ensure emerging technologies are successfully integrated into the business.

Zoom has announced that it’s acquiring a company known as Kites (short for Karlsruhe Information Technology Solutions), which has worked on creating real-time translation and transcription software. Zoom says the acquisition is a move to help it make communicating with people who speak different languages easier, and that it’s looking to add translation capabilities to its video conferencing app. 

According to its site, Kites began at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, and its technology was originally developed to act as in-classroom translation for students who needed help understanding the English or German their professors were lecturing in.
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Zoom already has real-time transcriptions, but it’s limited to people who are talking in English. On a support page, Zoom also clarifies that its current live transcription feature may not meet certain accuracy requirements. The company says it’s considering opening a research center in Germany, where the Kites team will be staying.

A respected Apple analyst recently made a startling prediction about mixed reality/augmented reality (MR/AR): “We believe that MR/AR products could replace all display-equipped electronics in the long-term,” said analyst Ming-Chi Kuo. He expects Apple to play a big part in taking these emerging technologies mainstream.

He predicts that Apple will build several MR/AR products, eventually leading to augmented reality contact lenses. Because of these predictions, he believes that MR/AR could be the default human-machine interface in the future.

Part of Kuo’s job as an analyst for TF International Securities is to make projections about future technology. Often, he looks no farther ahead than the next iPhone, but a note sent to investors recently covers forecasts for at least a decade of change.

He believes Apple is committed to augmented reality because “MR/AR will be the next critical technology to define the innovative human–machine interface for electronic products,” according to the analyst. It will “redefine human behavior in creating, processing, and receiving information.”

For a look at what this prediction would mean in everyday life, a concept artist dreamed up a future Mac that uses AR to replace physical displays.

Kuo uses the term “MR/AR” in his research note, but both mean nearly the same thing. Each term has its fans. Whatever the acronym, the tech involves combining computer-generated images with reality to present additional information.

As the company that popularized the mouse and the multitouch screen, Apple has a long history of redefining the human–machine interface, which Kuo says gives it a leg up in making AR a mainstream technology.

AR Products Coming in Three Phases. Apple put a Lidar scanner in the iPhone 12 and the iPad Pro for enhanced AR, but these haven’t exactly taken the world by storm. Kuo says Cupertino won’t be successful in this area until it makes “standalone devices designed for MR/AR applications.” But the analyst believes Apple is committed to rolling out dedicated MR/AR devices over the coming years, though not as quickly as some have predicted.

Kuo says the first will be a headset. This will use “Sony’s Micro-OLED displays and several optical modules to provide a video see-through AR experience,” according to Kuo. But it might also include virtual reality capabilities and be integrated with Apple Arcade and Apple TV+.

A drawback of current VR headsets is that they are bulky. Kuo indicates Apple is trying to get its product down to between a quarter-pound and just less than half a pound (100g to 200g).

Kuo predicts the headset will launch in 2022 for about $1,000. This is in-line with a previous prediction from analysts at JPMorgan Chase.

Phase 2 will be AR glasses. And despite promises that these will debut soon by other sources, Kuo sees them launching “in 2025 at the earliest.” There’s allegedly not even a prototype yet, and the analyst didn’t guess at a price.

The headset is intended to be used in the home or workplace, but the AR glasses are for on the go. And that’s why they might not replace future headset versions in Apple’s product lineup.

And Apple augmented reality development won’t stop there. Kuo forecasts that the eventual culmination of Apple’s efforts in this area will be AR contact lenses. They will “bring electronics from the era of ‘visible computing’ to ‘invisible computing,’” according to Kuo.
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Of course, this product is well beyond current technology. That’s why the analyst will only predict, “We expect this product to be available after 2030.”

Editor’s note: In late February, Microsoft President Brad Smith testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee on emerging technologies and their impact on national security. Later, he also testified at the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on the SolarWinds hack.

Read Brad Smith’s written testimony from the Senate Armed Services Committee hearing here and watch the testimony here.

Read Brad Smith’s written testimony from the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence hearing here and watch the testimony here.

The following is a Microsoft blog post from Brad Smith.
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For two centuries, technology has changed the nature of what it takes to defend a nation. In early 1940, improved tanks rendered worthless two decades of French investment along the fortified Maginot Line, as the German army simply plowed around it. And in late 1941, the United States learned that advances in naval aviation meant that battleships could no longer defend Pearl Harbor. Today, foreign cyberweapons pose a similar threat for the future.

Congress this week will explore the role digital technology’s influence on American power and security. While committees in both the House and Senate will rightly focus on the threats cyberweapons pose, the broader topic of the Senate Armed Services Committee’s hearing focus on the higher stakes represented: digital technologies across the board are rapidly redefining the way we secure the peace, maintain our defense and, when necessary, fight wars.

But today one would be hard-pressed to say that the country has a comprehensive strategy to harness these technologies for the country’s defense. A more cohesive approach is needed, in terms of infrastructure defense, military expertise and global engagement.

The recent SolarWinds cyberattack on the tech sector’s supply chain was a wake-up call. And just last week in Texas, nature demonstrated the vulnerability of our power grid. Yet, since 2014, Russian agencies have intruded into the U.S. electrical grid, and we shouldn’t assume they were alone or had benign intent.

This means we must prepare for more sophisticated foreign attacks. We need to strengthen our software and hardware supply chains and modernize IT infrastructure. We must also promote broader sharing of threat intelligence, including for real-time responses during cyber incidents.

Let’s start with the need for more open sharing of information. Today, too many cyberattack victims keep information to themselves. We will not solve this problem through silence. It’s imperative that we encourage and sometimes even require better information sharing, including by tech companies.

But cybersecurity is just the start. Emerging technologies such as cloud and edge services, AI and 5G will redefine the requirements for military operations at mission speed, based on their ability to harness massive amounts of data and computational power.

The Pentagon needs to move more quickly to use, secure and adapt commercial advances for military applications. This will require more agile procurement, more digital skills in personnel training, and a closer partnership between the government and the tech sector.

The development of digital technology often starts with commercial technology and then moves to military and intelligence adaptations, rather than the other way round. This is the opposite of the Cold War, and it changes almost everything.

It means that military supremacy in digital technology is dependent on broader national leadership in the field. And, while the computer revolution took root on American soil, it is now a worldwide endeavor with global powers, including China, competing in and sometimes leading the race.

This requires a holistic approach to government-sponsored basic research and technology trade policy. The United States has unmatched capability for basic research through our research universities. Yet government research spending has declined, and within the next few years China is expected to surpass us.

We also need to strengthen ties with our allies, building on the global nature of technology innovation. Microsoft’s quantum computing efforts illustrate this well, with labs in Indiana, California and Washington, as well as Denmark, the Netherlands and Australia.

Finally, global technology leadership requires successful work to promote standards and technology protocols that reflect American inventions. The U.S. has excelled in these fields through decades of international outreach. This can’t stop now.

A lot is at stake, including the nation’s unique role in providing global leadership. When we think about the role of technology for the country’s defense, our ability to establish and defend the most important connective tissue of the international order – in areas such as finance, cybersecurity, healthcare and transportation – marks one stronghold of American power and security.

We will need to lead with moral authority and not the strength of technology alone. As in the past, there is no substitute for technology the world can trust.

For the last 70 years, the United States has provided what we might think of as the global public operating system. The next 70 years will witness this not just as a metaphor, but as real software power. Our national security strategy therefore must continue to offer the best options for countries around the world as they transition every part of their national lives to a digital age.