Our thoughts on Arvind Krishna’s Keynote from Think 2021

by Rob Davis

| 5 minute read

I always enjoy listening to Arvind speak and his keynote from Think2021 is no exception. IBM technology has been at the forefront of underpinning some of the world’s most important systems during the pandemic but it’s not just about the ‘plumbing’ which, often, we take for granted.

However, as good as IBM is at the ‘plumbing’, as businesses and governments plan to emerge and grow in a post-pandemic world, I was impressed with the strong, strategic announcements IBM made today to enable our customers to emerge and become stronger as the future unfolds.

Some of the thoughts and insights Arvind shared that I think were valuable:

✅ The increasing emergence of hybrid multi-cloud combined with Red Hat changes (for the better) how data is managed and secured across an organisation. This is not the standard ‘cloud-first’ message the market has been accustomed to over the last 10 years. This is something to pay attention to and something that we often refer to as Cloud2.0.

✅ The role that AI plays is clearly an ever-evolving topic as we progress into the ‘Digital Century’. AI is not going away and is becoming infused into nearly every aspect of our lives. This is a hot topic, one in which IBM is well versed, and with a slew of initiatives to emphasise that with Codenet and Watson Orchestrate being instrumental, IBM will continue to be a major player.

✅ With a focus on enhancing customer experience, innovating with resilience and addressing the $7.4Trillion Digital marketplace, as clients consider what to do with the remaining 75% of workloads not in the cloud, it’s an exciting time to be an IBM Business Partner. What is clear though is that the fundamentals of availability and security are not going away and in truth will only likely become more important with the hybrid cloud extending from the core of an organisations IT to the Edge.

And some topics, notable for their absence:

❌ No mention of the spin-off (aka “Kyndrl”) and what this means for clients – after all ‘what is an independent’ IBM company?

❌ I was hoping that he would have addressed some of the concerns that clients may have as IBM embraces its ecosystem approach and moves away from a direct engagement model (in some sectors). Personally, I think that this presents an opportunity for us as an IBM Business Partner to enhance the service that we provide and only see it as a positive but fear that clients are a little in the dark as to what this means for them. We are here to support our clients (old and new), as we always have.

All in all, very excited for the potential of 2021/2022 to add new value, reduce costs, drive benefit from IT expenditure and help our clients and partners to grow their businesses.

Those are my thoughts, what did you take away from the keynote from THINK?

To view for full address on-demand, click here https://ibm.app.keynote/think2021