Latest news with #emergingtech
RNZ News
23-05-2025
- Business
- RNZ News
"South Auckland to the Tech World" the future isn't just in Silicon Valley
Be creative and express yourself! That was what students and young people in South Auckland were told during a special New Zealand Tech Week event featuring live demonstrations of the latest in emerging tech including AI interviews, Holobox and fogscreen projections. The Cause Collective event themed, "Bringing South Auckland to the Tech World", came with a powerful message for young minds: the future is not just in Silicon Valley it's also in your hands. It connected high school students, young people and community leaders with guest speakers from major tech companies including Apple, Spark, Moa Thought, DNA Digital and Ideas at Work. With interactive displays showcasing the endless possibilities when technology intersects with culture and purpose. Photo: Nick Monro Creative Lead Muliagatele Danny "Brotha D" Leaoasavai'i said introducing young Maori and Pacific students, with unique styles of learning, to different kinds of technology is crucial. "Creating awareness and exposing our young people to the different type of technology that we have here today, I think is really important. "Our young people need to understand technology isn't just about sitting in front of a computer or cybersecurity or IT," Brotha D said. "There's a lot of different aspects of technology, and there's a lot of creative technology as well. And for us, Maori and Pasifika, our brain leads more to the creative side." He said that is what spawned the idea of gathering stakeholders with a creative approach to technology. "I called it the South Auckland to the Tech World because I really wanted to, as a lot of people know, I always fly the flag of South Auckland everywhere I go. And you know, this is a great industry to be flying a flag in," Brotha D said. Graphic Designer Mataafa Pio Mulipola said he saw a lot of youth come through the doors who left with a sense of direction. "They might not know what they're doing with their careers, you know, they might not know what's possible in the tech space," Mataafa said. "So they do a bit of animation, bit of graphic, bit of photography and things like that. And then they're able to find what strengths they have, and then they can go off and maybe do further study, or even create their own ideas" Photo: Nick Monro Former Pakuranga student DJ Taivairanga completed the cause collective tech course and expressed his enthusiasm to pursue his passion further. "At first I thought it was just designing as a foundation. But then slowly, I started really learning more about graphic designing and like, how can sort of pursue that and it just slowly became my passion," Taivairanga said. "It doesn't matter what people like, express your mind," he said. Papatoetoe High School students Rishka Chand and Eshana Parapilly-Bijo were really excited to attend. Rishka Chand said she's inspired to pursue a career in cloud architecture. "When I grow up, I want to be a cloud architect, where I want to design web pages and I want to start coding and things like that, which I think would be very beneficial for me," Chand said. Photo: Nick Monro Eshana Parapilly-Bijo said after attending tech week she is open to other opportunities. "I might actually start looking into tech at this point because this is very, I don't know, like inspirational maybe. "There aren't many people who get this opportunity," Eshana Parapilly-Bijo said. Tech Week, Aotearoa's largest technology and innovation celebrations, ran from May 19-25 with events in 18 regions.
CBC
22-05-2025
- Business
- CBC
Former BlackBerry exec Jim Balsillie to co-lead Manitoba innovation task force
A former BlackBerry executive will be co-chairing a new task force whose goal will be to use emerging tech to propel productivity in Manitoba. Jim Balsillie, the former co-CEO of Research In Motion, the Waterloo, Ont.-based tech company behind the BlackBerry, has been tapped to help drive innovation in the province as part of an advisory group that includes several Manitoba business leaders, the province said in a Thursday news release. The innovation and productivity (or "IP") task force will advise the NDP government on implementing new and emerging technologies to "support the economy and promote data-driven decision-making," the release said. Its mandate includes creating a strategic plan that's expected to be delivered to the province's technology minister later this year. Minister of Innovation and New Technology Mike Moroz said in the news release his department is considering implementation of artificial intelligence, an intellectual property policy and "sovereign cloud strategies" to store and process data without going to jurisdictions that don't have the same protections Manitoba has. Balsillie said in the news release there is "tremendous opportunity for Manitoba to turbocharge its economic resilience and prosperity" through "sovereign strategies across all sectors and industries." Other members of the task force announced Thursday were: Adam Herstein, partner at Pitblado Law. Clara Buelow, director of marketing and communications at the Manitoba Chamber of Commerce, and previous lead on the Digital Manitoba Policy Initiative. Jacqueline Keena, managing director of the Enterprise Machine Intelligence Learning Initiative. Gerry Price, president of Price Industries. Gautam Srivastava, professor of computer science at Brandon University. Debra Jonasson-Young, executive director of entrepreneurship at the Asper School of Business. Dr. Ernest Cholakis, founder of Cholakis Dental Group.
Coin Geek
07-05-2025
- Business
- Coin Geek
APAC sets pace in global workplace digital transformation
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready... The Asia Pacific (APAC) region is leading global trends for digital transformation in the workplace, outpacing other regions by a country mile in several metrics. According to a report by Zoho, APAC is moving fast toward workplace digital transformation, leaning on emerging technologies. The report confirmed that APAC is ahead of the global average of 62.3% for digital maturing, scoring an impressive 66.35% across the board. Per the report, APAC workplaces are turning to artificial intelligence (AI) in droves, with Zoho tagging adoption rates at 54% in 2024. APAC's AI adoption figures almost double the global average, powered by rising use cases in customer care, coding, automation and personalization services. Outside of generative AI, APAC workplaces are showing an increasing appetite for novel cybersecurity solutions as an added layer of security. A close look at the trends reveals a spike in the use of multi-factor authentication tools and a wave of cybersecurity training at 40% and 44% respectively. Compared to the global average, APAC's cybersecurity adoption rates are above its peers, recording impressive figures in remote work policies. Security-wise, APAC continues to blaze a trail with the rise of access controls based on employee roles and password managers. Incident reporting in APAC workplaces lags behind the global average, triggering a cause for concern in overall security standards. Another surging area of APAC's workplace digitization is in the area of collaborative tools like team chat apps and internal request management tools at 72% and 56% respectively. However, Zoho's report identified chinks in APAC's armor, highlighting unsatisfactory numbers in structured document collaboration at only 32%. A bird's eye view reveals that APAC workplaces still have significant room for improvement despite their impressive metrics. Heightened investment will birth even higher metrics for APAC The report notes that an investment in digital transformation will radically improve APAC's workplaces in the coming years. While AI and cybersecurity standards are leading the trend, experts predict increased blockchain use cases for security and automation in the workplace. China and Vietnam are increasing the size of their investment in blockchain for payments while Hong Kong is broadening Web3 use cases. Hong Kong and the rest of Southeast Asia will be the biggest needle movers for workplace digitization with emerging technologies. Malaysia's political party uses blockchain for internal voting amid concerns Malaysia's Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) party has turned to blockchain to elect officials to run its affairs for the next three years. The recently concluded internal party election is the first time the PKR has turned to blockchain for its voting process. While the move garnered praise from several quarters, controversy trailed the voting process over claims of manipulation and sabotage. However, Tuaran PKR division chief Razeef Rakimin defended the party's decision to use a blockchain-based voting system. Rakimin admitted that the application of blockchain in the internal voting process may not have been seamless, but several silver linings are to be gleaned. The party chieftain notes that blockchain's security and immutability features set it apart from traditional voting systems, while the prospect of smart contract automation puts it ahead of the curve. 'Of course, there will be some shortcomings as it's a new system,' said Rakimin. 'However, for a system that has strong security like blockchain, it is almost impossible to be breached.' Rakimin noted that claims of vote sabotage stem from the discrepancies associated with poll results for division chiefs and deputies. Jarring poll inconsistencies have raised eyebrows, while critics are taking swipes at the entire process. 'For example, in Team A, the division chief candidate received 700 votes, while the deputy and committee members got between 1,400 and 1,600 votes,' said Rakimin. 'But for Team B, the division chief received 1,500 votes while the deputy and others only received between 600 and 800 votes.' A handful of prominent party officials lost their seats in the voting process, amplifying the criticism of the entire process. Official poll results have not yet been published, with Rakimin noting that the party's central leadership council will convene to measure the weight of the irregularity and recommend the next steps. Despite the lapses in the inaugural attempt at blockchain-based voting, Rakimin argued that the process was seamless, leaving room for improvement. Malaysia is integrating emerging technologies into its economy While blockchain-based voting had a shaky start in Malaysia, use cases in finance are off to a flying start. Malaysia's central bank is exploring tokenization for on-chain settlement while leaning on blockchain to stifle corruption. Furthermore, the Southeast Asian country is advancing its blockchain ambitions with nationwide policies to promote adoption. In one impressive use case, the country is exploring issuing halal certificates on blockchain to fight fraud and counterfeit products. In order for artificial intelligence (AI) to work right within the law and thrive in the face of growing challenges, it needs to integrate an enterprise blockchain system that ensures data input quality and ownership—allowing it to keep data safe while also guaranteeing the immutability of data. Check out CoinGeek's coverage on this emerging tech to learn more why Enterprise blockchain will be the backbone of AI . Watch: Importance of digitalization for enterprises title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen>
