Moor Insights & Strategy Weekly Update Ending May 6, 2022

By Patrick Moorhead - May 9, 2022

I hope you all had a great month!

Last week, several of us from the team attended Dell Tech World (Matt, Steve, Will, and myself). Over the last few weeks, I have also been busy with advisory meetings in Seattle and Phoenix. I traveled to New York to participate at Infosys Cloud as a panel moderator. I also attended the Oracle Lab Grand Opening in Chicago. Paul attended BigTech Neuromorphic Computing, IBM Quantum Open House, and advisory meetings. Will attended Open Networking & Edge Executive Forum. Matt was busy attending HPE Houston Open House. Steve attended NetApp Investment Analyst Day, NVIDIA Investment Analyst Day, and NAB Show.

This week, I will be attending IBM Think with Steve. I will also be traveling to Orlando for SAP Sapphire. Will and Anshel will be attending MediaTek Analyst Day in Scottsdale. Matt will be going to Red Hat Analyst Summit and Intel Vision (with Steve and Will). Melody will be attending Envestnet Advisor Summit.

It has been challenging figuring out hybrid work as we aren’t tied to our desks, but on the road!

Our MI&S team published 62 deliverables:

15 (Forbes or eWEEK) insight columns
20 MI&S blogs
22 podcasts
5 research papers

The press quoted us with 49 citations. Journalists wanted to hear about AMD, Ampere, Apple, AWS, Bytedance, CNN, Dell, Google, Facebook, Fintech, IBM, Intel, LogicMonitor, Metaverse, Microsoft, NetApp, Nothing Company, Oneplus, Oracle, Pelaton, Protocol, Qualcomm, Synaptics, Unreal Engine, and YouTube.

Quick Insights:

A.I./Machine Learning (Paul Smith-Goodson)

I have closely followed China's use of quantum computing and AI. The US needs to maintain its lead in both of these sciences. According to some reports, China is using AI extensively in constructing dams both to monitor the maintenance and the actual building process through 3D printing. This is interesting, and I will be following up on its activities. Experience gained in such an activity would help build structures on Mars before any human landings. China also has a very active space program that includes Mars and a possible moon base.
IBM has an extensive research program developing AutoAi (automating) almost every aspect of artificial intelligence. AutoAI extends the automation of model building to the entire AI lifecycle. Like AutoML, AutoAI applies intelligent automation to the steps of building predictive machine learning models. These steps include preparing data sets for training; identifying the best model type for the given data, such as a classification or regression model; and choosing the columns of data that best support the problem the model is solving, known as feature selection. Automation can test various hyperparameter tuning options to reach the best result as it generates and then ranks model-candidate pipelines based on metrics such as accuracy and precision. Here is the link to my Forbes article about IBM AutoAI: here.
IARPA has an AI/ML research program called Deep Intermodal Video Analytics (DIVA)in progress that uses automated software to watch videos and detect certain specified behaviors and actions. The software can currently detect about 75 percent of the activities it has been programmed to watch for with a 2 percent error rate. Once perfected, it will be able to continually monitor multiple video streams for a wide variety of security activities.
Groceries and GPUs - Kroger and NVIDIA are collaborating on an AI project that augments Kroger's freshness initiatives. A state-of-art AI lab and demonstration center will be built to improve shipping logistics and create a better shopping experience in stores through digital twin simulations that simulate store layouts and other operations. The lab will be located in Kroger’s Cincinnati-based headquarters office and will use the NVIDIA AI Enterprise software suite for retail. NVIDIA Omniverse Enterprise will be used to build the digital twins.
Combining quantum and AI, IonQ and Hyundai Motor are in a partnership that will develop quantum machine learning (QML) models to detect and recognize traffic signs and identify 3D objects such as pedestrians and cyclists. IonQ has already completed the difficult computational part of the project. It has trained quantum machine learning models (QML) using a standardized 50,000 image database to recognize 43 different classifications of road signs.
- I'm looking forward to seeing the results when IonQ tests its QML model under real-world driving conditions on Hyundai's test track.
Unless you are a farmer or otherwise involved in agriculture, you probably don't know that John Deere has farm equipment equipped with sophisticated GPS and AI. Tractors and other equipment have self-driving and machine learning software for crop management and weed control. Fields can be plowed, weeded, and fertilized without any human intervention. This technology is important in today's labor market with its shortage of workers. Deere has plans to apply AI to other farm functions as well.
Clearview AI has the most extensive available database of over 20 billion public-sourced facial images sourced from news media, mugshot websites, public social media, and other open sources. Ukraine is using it to identify dead Russian soldiers so the next of kin can be notified. It is not an act of kindness; Ukraine is doing it to turn the Russian public against the war. So far, almost 600 Russian soldiers have been identified. It was published in the Hill; according to its CEO, Ton-That, the AI can identify one face out of 12 million with 99.85% accuracy. He has provided it to many law enforcement agencies, the FBI and DHS. We need to be aware of the dangers of facial recognition: you can be identified in public places without your permission. It could be used for enhanced stalking and identifying fraud, just to name a few.
Transformers have become a dominant factor in AI, especially for language AI because of their ability to understand context and antecedents. NVIDIA believes we are quicking moving towards trillion parameter models. One of the changes in NVIDIA's new Hopper H100 compared to the A100 is that the Hopper's transformer capabilities allow it to dynamically change core calculations to speed up the training of transformer neural networks. According to NVIDIA, the training needs of transformer models are growing by 275X every two years.

AR/VR (Anshel Sag)

Carrier/Wireless (Will Townsend)

T-Mobile recently announced enhancements to its 5G fixed wireless access service for home broadband. I like the price lock for life, but its no risk before you buy; the 15-day trial can tremendously accelerate subscribership.
US Cellular recently announced ten new 5G mmWave deployments in ten rural metro areas. It's wise to focus its effort on fixed wireless access to provide broadband services to the home. Inseego is a key partner and is beginning to demonstrate its capabilities to move from hotspot devices into cellular infrastructure.
Deutsche Telekom recently raised its equity stake to over 48% in T-Mobile U.S. The parent company's intention is not abundantly clear. Still, I hypothesize that it could lead to further collaboration to bolster T-Mobile's enterprise service offering on the heels of the recent T IoT collaboration.

Datacenter:

Storage- (Steve McDowell)
- Hard drive earnings suffered in Q1 as the predicted supply-chain issues and an unpredicted COVID lockdown in China impacted sales and profit. There were bright spots, as both companies were each up about 25% year/year in hyperscale near-line storage. Both companies also are predicting a stronger 2H as the supply chain stabilizes and OEM client shipments increase.
- Cloud storage continues to get faster as AWS debuts its latest storage-optimized instances. The updated I4i instance types, based on Intel Xeon Ice Lake servers and up to 30TB of AWS Nitro NVMe-attached SSDs, deliver up to 60% lower latency than older versions of the instance type. AWS’s Nitro architecture, coupled with PCI v4, clearly makes a huge difference in I/O performance.
- Infinidat bests itself as it delivers its new high-end InfiniBox SSA II array. The updated array delivers more than 50% greater IOPs and throughput while cutting latencies down to about 35 microseconds. Bundled into the announcements are new capabilities for cyber-resilience and AIOps. There’s a lot of goodness in Infinidat’s new offering.
Networking- (Will Townsend)
- Girls in ICT Day was held on April 28. Cisco asked me to be a guest blogger on its newsroom site, and I contributed an article, given both of my daughters are pursuing STEM careers. In writing, I discovered several Cisco CSR programs ensure inclusion for women within the networking infrastructure giant's ranks, including Cisco Networking Academy, the Women Rock-IT online magazine, and Women of Cisco. In my opinion, Cisco is trailblazing the effort to ensure that today's young women have a place in the technology industry.
- Juniper Networks recently announced 1Q earnings, and its service provider business was down, an unusual occurrence for its traditionally strong market segment. However, I view this as an aberration given its need to balance its enterprise networking performance. Given its Mist AI portfolio and a robust automation platform buoyed by acquisitions and a partnership with Anuta Networks, the latter is doing well.
- Cable provider Spectrum recently launched its Enterprise Network Edge solution aimed at helping enterprises better manage larger, more complex networks. It is an intelligent move as cable companies need to bring new services or risk financial harm given declining ARPU on the consumer broadband and content side.
Server- (Matt Kimball)
- AMD had another solid quarter overall, with an incredible showing in datacenter. The company shows strong growth with an 88% y/y growth in its EESC business, with a record $2.5B in revenue. The indicators show EPYC finding more robust traction in the enterprise space, perhaps the most conservative segments.
- As if to not be outdone with its performance in the previous quarter, the team at AMD announced it is working on integrating Xilinx technology into EPYC as an AI engine. According to the company, the intent is to build a CPU that will excel at inference. While this is going to be a killer part, I believe there’s something else in what Lisa Su said that is perhaps even more interesting – the company will be investing a lot of money to develop software tools aimed at utilizing the AI engine for both inference and training. This signals a changing culture at AMD – one in which the importance of the software ecosystem is recognized – and providing the tools that enable easier adoption of silicon is thought of upfront. It sounds like the company has learned a thing or two from NVIDIA.
- Intel also announced earnings this past week, and the company also saw strong revenue growth on the datacenter front (up 22% y/y), though profit and margins were even to down y/y. This makes sense as the company faces competitive winds like never before – both from AMD and the Arm ecosystem. I think the company is doing the right things. Use its market position to hold its customers as it drives toward Sapphire Rapids and executes against its strategic vision. Funny that we would think that the company is “hurting” in its datacenter business on $6B in profit and $1.7B in operating income.
- I know I said this many times before, but I am excited to listen in on two events next week – Intel’s Vision Day and the Red Hat Analyst Summit. Both companies are so foundational to the enterprise datacenter.
- Is the global economy headed for a cliff? More and more think the US – and the globe – are headed for a recession. After a surge in spending by companies responding to and recovering from Covid - are we about to see a corresponding downturn in IT spending? I believe the answer is yes, and infrastructure vendors would be wise to continue driving toward consumption-based models in anticipation of smaller capital budgets. In response to the pandemic, modernization efforts undertaken or accelerated should be somewhat resilient. And the IT organizations that navigate this anticipated downturn wisely can give their business a decided advantage over those competitors that lagged in modernizing.
- Data is arguably the most precious commodity a business owns. It is being generated at unprecedented levels and mined in ways never imagined. With this said, is it any wonder that the data management market is exploding? From traditional relational databases to unstructured data and the rise of NoSQL, businesses utilize more database platforms, repositories, and analytics tools to respond to the market. This leads to a lot of questions – who wins? Who loses? What happens to the traditional SQL databases during this rise of Snowflake, MongoDB, Couchbase, and others? The answer is simple – these new data platforms rise to meet particular enterprise needs and use cases in a way that traditional databases can’t (or, more accurately, can’t optimally). But the traditional database market isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
- I’m excited for Intel’s Vision Day – even if it is virtual, and I’ll be distracted a dozen times. I’m curious how the company responds to an increasingly aggressive AMD in the datacenter. AMD’s re-emergence has been well documented and heralded quite a bit. Conversely, Intel has been somewhat quiet, though I am sure it has been very active with key customers across the cloud, hyperscale, and enterprise space.
- I have visited customers, partners, and friends in Silicon Valley, Houston, and the greater Boston area. Somewhere along the way, I realized how much I’ve missed how much more productive and complete in-person interactions are. Zoom is great. Virtual meetings and virtual conferences are good. But a lot is missed over Zoom – a lot you don’t realize until you are once again sitting across a table from a peer or in the audience during a group briefing. Those tech companies opening up conferences and analysts summits/meetings are a step ahead of those limiting attendance or entirely virtual.
- When meeting with startup intelligent building startup Embue, I fully grasped the power of analytics—not simply gathering a lot of data and visualizing it into many pivot tables or charts – real, relevant analytics that can deliver real, relevant value. Collecting data is the easy part. Knowing what questions to ask – and aligning to desired outcomes is the art & science of analytics. And this understanding is the key to successful digital transformation/modernization efforts. If I were controlling the narrative and messaging for IT solutions vendors and data management companies – I would be aligning my messaging accordingly.
- Ampere is going public! I am excited to see companies in the Arm ecosystem having success and planning for strategic growth. Ampere, in particular, has been so smart in the way it has approached the market and managed its growth. The company knows where it has a strong play (cloud) and allows that market to build gravity in other markets (enterprise, transactional). One can see the smarts of an Intel groomed leadership team coming influencing its business and go-to-market efforts. For those who say the company will be challenged in the enterprise market, I say you’re misguided. There is so much cloud business for this company that is strong in Oracle Cloud, growing in Alibaba cloud, and just scratching the surface in Azure. Hats off to Oracle for its investment in Ampere, which will surely pay off handsomely.
- Having met with the team at Stratus this week, I’m more convinced than ever that edge computing will remain a very difficult space for IT solutions vendors to address appropriately – and will remain so for some time. There seem to be two distinct approaches to this market – one in which companies just provide compute platforms for ISVs and SIs to build upon, and one in which some level of vertical integration is required. But each vertical/sub-vertical is unique in its needs and requires a highly focused partner program that is staffed, funded, and led. Additionally, edge investments must be accompanied by patience. Stratus is one of the few companies I’ve spoken with that seems to understand the edge and is structuring itself and its programs appropriately.

FinTech (Melody Brue)

Robinhood has acquired UK-based digital asset firm, Ziglu, expanding the company’s footprint into the UK and possibly parts of Europe. Robinhood launched in the UK in 2019 and then pulled out of the country in early 2020. Robinhood's initial launch in the UK was potentially just bad timing. Although it could have benefitted from Covid lockdowns, building a team and launching a market under those conditions is not ideal, particularly in a sensitive regulatory environment. This expansion is now focused on crypto, a significant part of Robinhood’s business. The Ziglu acquisition certainly helps them do that without the regulatory hurdles the company would have to overcome on its own. Ziglu was one of the first crypto companies to obtain a license from the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) which takes a hard line on regulating crypto firms. Many firms still have applications pending, while many other fintechs chose to domicile elsewhere to avoid FCA licensing and regulation. Robinhood is making the right move to expand to the UK and Europe and expand its userbase in a down market.
“Fee-free” has largely been the rallying cry for fintechs, particularly trading platforms like Robinhood and neobanks like Chime and Revolut. Now many of them have introduced new subscription services for customers. Robinhood Gold, Coinbase Pro, and Revolut Plus/Premium/Metal offer various upgraded features and perks for a monthly fee. As trading volumes are lower and revenue has slowed for many of these companies, we will see more of this trend. By offering premium features, platforms can attract more sophisticated investors who are likely to trade at a higher volume and value. Novice investors have access to more sophisticated features that will likely increase engagement and volume. As a business model, the subscription isn't necessarily the revenue driver. Loyalty, increased engagement, community, and more customer and behavioral data that comes from those things will drive the LTV of that customer.
While many companies strive to accelerate their green initiatives and meet ESG goals, we see green initiatives across IT, FinServe, and retail. Lenovo, Dell, HPE, Apple, and others all have a takeback program, encouraging circular IT versus ownership, creating value from old equipment, and converting it to new offerings and revenue. Cisco has launched Cisco Green Pay, a new payment model available from Cisco Capital with a 5% incentive, predictable payments, and circular economy certification, enabling customers to build a sustainable IT strategy to reach their environmental goals. Cisco Green Pay gives customers flexibility on their IT solutions while allowing them to enter or expand their presence in the circular economy. The offer is available to customers of all sizes and is currently available in select countries across Europe and the Middle East. That availability is likely to expand into the US soon but has not yet been announced. The initiative is part of Cisco’s commitment to 100% product return and supports Cisco’s goal to be net-zero on Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions by 2040.
Zilch, a credit payment fintech company, has partnered with Experian to measure consumers’ affordability and better inform lending decisions in the BNPL space. Zilch partnered with the credit information services company to add reciprocal reporting of payment plans to its platform, which uses CRA data, open banking data, and proprietary behavioral data to make consumer lending decisions. The more insight into someone’s financial situation through affordability technology a company or platform has, the more it enables it to make more informed lending decisions. Companies like Zilch must understand consumers' real-time data to support responsible lending in the BNPL market. The BNPL market has had to adjust its priorities regarding financial health amid rising concerns around responsible lending ahead of regulation crackdowns.
Meta has announced its plans to monetize the metaverse. Horizon Worlds, a “free” social VR experience game, will support in-world purchases via the sale of virtual items. Creators are not happy with the 25% take from each transaction - which comes from what’s left after the 30% paid to the Oculus store or other future platforms. While transactions and payments in the metaverse are evolving, some banks are staging their presence in the metaverse to learn more about it and how to navigate the space and the demographic of young gamers who inhabit it. Likely, traditional banking and financial services will eventually offer metaverse services and experiences that tie back to a “real-life” transaction, experience, or infrastructure.

IIoT and IoT (Bill Curtis)

This week, Arm announced new “Total Solutions for IoT” deliverables in three areas – Corstone, virtual hardware, and Centauri. Here’s a summary. (1) Corstone defines reference architectures for specific high-volume IoT use-cases. Specifications include processors, app-specific IP blocks, power control, system interconnect, and security, delivered as tools, physical IP, models, FPGAs, and test chips. Reference architectures reduce TTM and cost by simplifying design, testing, and software integration. This week’s announcement adds new “total solutions” for voice recognition and cloud-native edge devices. The voice recognition use-case builds on the new M85, Arm’s highest performance microcontroller, plus the Ethos-U55 ML processor. (2) Virtual hardware for IoT, introduced last October, had limited success because it didn’t extend to in-field devices, didn’t adequately integrate with existing DevOps flows, and didn’t support enough device types and third-party hardware. This week’s announcement addresses these limitations by adding support for seven new M class processors, integrating several essential development tools (i.e., Keil, Jenkins, GitHub), and enabling virtual hardware support for third-party silicon ecosystems. I think this is a game-changer for Arm’s Virtual Hardware offerings. (3) Project Centauri specifies standards, security, and ecosystems under a unified strategy for Cortex-M MCUs. It’s the microcontroller counterpart to Project Cassini, a similar ecosystem for Cortex-A MPUs. Project Cassini includes support for Open-CMSIS-Pack (including freeRTOS and TensorFlow Lite), Open-CMSIS-CDI (community support), and the Open IoT SDK framework. Together, these three initiatives bring us a step closer to IoT plug-and-play.
Insteon died suddenly last Friday. “Insteoff,” I suppose. The company (SmartLabs Inc.) had been on life support and trying to find a buyer for two years. Although Insteon customers knew death was imminent, the shutdown happened suddenly and without warning or explanation, abruptly disabling control systems in over a million homes (including mine). Founded in 2005, the company pioneered home automation, producing one of the first practical and affordable home control product portfolios. Insteon failed because management didn’t recognize the importance of standards and open ecosystems, sticking with proprietary protocols until the end. I own quite a few Insteon products in addition to Z-Wave, Zigbee, and Thread. I’ll be transitioning to Thread / Matter as new products become available. My Insteon devices have many capabilities that other ecosystems do not have, and I’ll miss them.
Singapore-based Unabiz bought Sigfox SA and Sigfox France SAS for about 25M euros. The US business is in bankruptcy. Unabiz is a service provider specializing in metering and monitoring with a large Sigfox installed base, so it’s a good fit.
Voice is coming to small, cheap devices in a big way as new low-power SOC designs incorporate ML acceleration. But silicon isn’t enough. Product developers need voice-savvy device software supporting beam-forming multi-microphone audio, on-chip ML, and online training tools. NXP just announced Voice Intelligent Technology to streamline on-device voice app development. VIT enables application developers to move beyond simple wake-word detection and implement autonomous voice control with up to 12 commands from an extensive dictionary.
The Sigfox drama continues as Singapore-based UnaBiz competes with France-based OTEIS to buy the remaining assets. OTEIS still has the inside track as the French nationalism trend increases, but UnaBiz won a week’s delay until April 21 to “convince the government.” Good luck with that.
I attended an open house event at John Deere’s new Austin R&D office. The company focuses its research primarily on precision farming. How precise? With Deere’s RTK (real-time kinematic) enhanced GPS, positional accuracy is an astonishing 2.5 CM. The autonomous tractor package has the usual self-driving sensors and processors, including a 360-degree 3D view from six stereo camera pairs. The 8R tractor with this package can autonomously plow an entire row-crop field. Why Austin? Agricultural automation competes with other high-tech companies for talented engineers with advanced AI, big data, and IoT skills. The attractive office is near downtown in the trendy SoCo area, above a boot store, with an 8R tractor in the parking lot.

Personal Computing/ Collaboration (Anshel Sag)

Quantum Computing (Paul Smith-Goodson)

Argonne National Lab has teamed up with the University of Chicago to develop a new qubit platform unique from current technologies in use today. The essence of the technology is the use of electrons from a light bulb sprayed and trapped on a frozen microchip of neon gas. The system uses a chip-scale microwave superconducting resonator that allows electrons and photons to interact at near absolute zero with hardly any loss of energy or information. It allowed coupling between an electron in the vacuum and a microwave photon in the resonator. The team claims the qubit equals any being used today. It appears it has the potential to perform substantially better than other qubits with additional research and optimization.
PASQAL, a neutral atom quantum computer startup, announced that its machine is online via PASQAL Cloud Services in a private beta with several customers. The processor uses an open-source framework for pulse level control of the QPU and allows arrays to be formed in different geometries with the proper laser pulses.
A Japanese company, Adamant Namiki Precision Jewelry Company, and Saga University have created a new manufacturing process for 2-inch diamond wafers that have the storage capacity of one billion Blue-Ray discs. Diamond nitrogen-vacancy technology is also being investigated to create quantum computers. The company is planning to commercialize the manufacturing process, but it will be a while before the technology can be used.
HSBC and IBM will be exploring applications for quantum computing in financial services in a new three-year collaboration. HSBC is interested in developing expertise in quantum computing and preparing for the future. HSBC will also join IBM's Quantum Accelerator program to access IBM's premium plan of quantum computing systems which includes the 127-qubit Eagle processor. Like other financial companies, HSBC will use quantum computing for pricing and portfolio optimization to advance its net-zero goals and mitigate risks, including identifying and addressing fraudulent activity.
Several quantum and AI mobility research projects are in progress. Battery research and machine learning are important technologies for electric vehicles. Batteries are a significant cost component of electric vehicles and an essential factor that determines vehicle range, which is important to potential buyers.
PsiQuantum (photonic qubits) announced a new analysis of how electrolyte molecules in Lithium-ion batteries (LiB) can be simulated on a fault-tolerant quantum computer. Lithium-ion batteries function during charge and discharge cycles by moving charge from one electrode to another across an electrolyte material. New and improved electrolytes will significantly impact various aspects of battery performance, including energy efficiency, charging speed, battery life, range, cost, and safety. PsiQuantum investigated quantum algorithms for simulating the effects of the common electrolyte additive, fluoroethylene carbonate. They demonstrated the utility of a method specific to photonic quantum computing known as interleaving (paper on arXiv.org), which allows a quantum computer's time and memory resources to be traded off. Note that PsiQuantum's solution requires a large, fault-tolerant quantum computer, which is not yet available.
In February, IonQ and Hyundai Motor Company announced a partnership focused on using quantum computing to study lithium compounds and battery chemistry. The partnership combines IonQ’s quantum computing expertise with Hyundai's lithium battery knowledge. The partnership aims to create an advanced battery chemistry model for quantum computers. Such a model would require an advanced quantum computer equipped with high-quality logical qubits and capable of running very deep quantum circuits. It also requires a quantum algorithm that makes looping calculations to optimize molecular energy levels through a classical computer.
We can add Japan to the list of new countries building a quantum computer. Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has added quantum computing in his New Capitalism plan and is part of the Japanese government's economic policy framework. Japan's objective is ambitious, with plans to have a machine up and running in 12 months with 10 million quantum users in a decade.
Quantinuum's System Model H1-2 doubled its performance to become the first commercial quantum computer to achieve a measured Quantum Volume of 4096. Quantum Volume is a holistic benchmark developed by IBM in 2019 to measure quantum computers' overall capability and performance. The achievement meets a goal established by Honeywell Quantum Solutions before its merger with Cambridge Quantum in late 2021 to form Quantinuum, to increase the performance of its trapped ion technologies by order of magnitude each year for the next five years.

Security (Will Townsend)

Cisco recently released its Cloud Controls Framework to quickly help enterprises achieve required security certification. It is a templatized approach that has the potential to facilitate a build once and use many scenarios. I applaud Cisco for publishing its security tools and blueprints openly. It is in stark contrast to many security companies that employ a walled-garden approach to sell adjacent services and products.
Microsoft reports that its security business is growing faster than all other divisions. The software giant's security top-line revenue of $15B represents an astonishing gain of 40%+ year over year. This momentum could give its Azure cloud service a competitive advantage over AWS longer-term as recent geopolitical events put more enterprise scrutiny on cyber defense.
New concerns are materializing related to the security implications of the metaverse. Many theorize that given the virtual land rush and monetization potential, bad actors will follow the money. It will be interesting to see if cybersecurity companies develop discrete solutions to neutralize the threat. I also suspect that Meta/ Facebook will also jump into the fray.

Space (Paul Smith-Goodson)

Podcasts:

The G2 on 5G by Moor Insights & Strategy, with Anshel Sag and Will Townsend

G2 on 5G Podcast - Standalone Episode 7 - Ep 98 – OpenRAN
- Qualcomm is undeniably at the center of the #5G ecosystem. In our latest Standalone G2 on 5G podcast - we discuss the company's transformative impact in #vRAN & #OpenRAN with Qualcomm, HPE, AT&T & Vodafone ahead of Qualcomm's 5G Summit on May 9-11.
The G2 on 5G Podcast - Ep 97 – Dish Launches 5G Network, T-Mobile Uncarrier, US Cellular mmWave
- Dish Launches the first market in Las Vegas and strikes a $1B deal with Samsung for 5G vRAN, O-RAN, and handsets - can it quickly replicate to meet its coverage deadline?
- T-Mobile Earnings and Uncarrier Event – Consumer and Business Broadband Unleashed
- US Cellular launches 5G mmWave internet service in 10 cities - is it a smart move?
- Google Cloud Acquires MobiledgeX and what it could mean for Google’s 5G edge and XR play
- AST SpaceMobile to test satellite-based services on AT&T's spectrum - what are the implications
- C-Band fight continues, FAA says that airlines will need to pay for upgrades to altimeters after Dept of Transportation Sec. Buttigieg says the issue won’t be completely resolved by summer
The G2 on 5G Podcast - Standalone Episode 6 (Ep 96) with Dish Wireless’ Marc Rouanne
- How is DISH differentiating itself relative to the more established incumbents, like AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon? How will the company compete for enterprise business – which is arguably the lion’s share of 5G use cases?
- One of the aspects that I find interesting about DISH is the nearly 1M pre-paid subscribers that have materialized out of the Sprint/ T-Mobile Boost divestiture and your more recent MVNO acquisitions. How will that factor into your development of discrete 5G services?
- My coverage as an analyst includes XR (AR/VR) and the Metaverse. Beyond what we have seen from AT&T and Verizon in proofs-of-concept, do you envision any compelling applications on the enterprise side that can be brought to market soon?
- This is a broad question, but do you envision any competitive advantage in deploying such a highly virtualized, cloud-native 5G network from the ground up? Will your competitors be at an agility disadvantage given their transition from traditional network architectures to new, highly disaggregated ones such as Open RAN?
The G2 on 5G Podcast - Ep 95 - Verizon bets on Casa Systems, T-Mobile dominates Ookla Rankings
- Verizon’s $40M bet on Casa Systems (9.9% stake)
- T-Mobile continues to dominate on speeds thanks to its mid-band deployments
- GM Deploys Cisco wireless backhaul tech for vehicle testing
- OpenRF Association plans to have devices this year?
- Huawei is winning 5G and cloud deals in UAE and Middle East markets - where are the deployments?
- Samsung 5G speeds beat Apple’s Ookla’s Speedtest finds
The G2 on 5G Podcast - Ep 94 – DT Increases T-Mo Stake, Dish Low-Band 5G CA, Intel Buys Ananki
- Deutsche Telekom increases its stake in T-Mobile US to nearly 50% - what could it mean for the new 5G service delivery, especially in the enterprise?
- Dish testing 5G Carrier Aggregation at 600 MHz
- Intel buys open-source startup Ananki for its 5G SaaS portfolio - can it bolster the semiconductor giant’s networking portfolio and push into telco infrastructure?
- AT&T asks FCC for two experimental 6G licenses
- Australian utility deploys 5G drones to service its power grid - what are the benefits, and can it serve as a model for the rest of the world?
- Linux Foundation and Google Cloud launch Nephio to automate 5G Edge
The G2 on 5G Podcast - Ep 93 - NTIA & DOD 5G Challenge, Northrup and Lockheed Partnership, And More!
- NTIA and DoD launch the 5G Challenge - can it accelerate a more open 5G ecosystem?
- Northrup Grumman inks 5G IoT deal with AT&T and Lockheed announces long-term partnership with Intel on 5G.MIL initiative for edge to cloud 5G
- Is fiber backhaul foundational to mobile 5G network deployments - are Vodafone UK, T-Mobile, Dish, and other operators exposed?
- Deutsche Telekom continues to roll out 5G SA across Germany, Rogers, and Ericsson launch Canada’s first commercial 5G SA network (overflow from last week)
- Who is Omnispace, and can their plans for a 5G hybrid terrestrial/ LEO satellite network and collaboration with Microsoft Azure address connectivity needs in underserved regions?
- T-Mobile diversifies FWA supply chain with MediaTek-based Arcadyan 5G FWA gateway in addition to Nokia it originally launched with (talk about FCC teardown)

DataCentric Podcast by Moor Insights & Strategy, with Matt Kimball and Steve McDowell

The Changing Face of Cyber-Security
- Who is Hillstone?
- Application-aware Security
- Using AI and Machine Learning to enhance security
- How has the treat landscape evolved over the past few years?
- Protecting data in the cloud
- Security Kubernetes & container-based workflows
- Who are Hillstone's customers?
- What's next for Hillstone & cyber-security in general?
- Evolving threat landscape
High-Performance Storage, with Infinidat's Eric Herzog
- Infinidat CMO Eric Herzog joins host Steve McDowell, principal analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy, to walk us through how Infinidat can increase throughput and IOPs by more than 50% in the new array while also ensuring a compelling level of data protection and cyber-resilience. The guys also talk about the continuing evolution of storage, with a deep dive into AIOps and how new workloads (such as cloud-native) impact storage architecture.
The Data Center is Changing: Are You Ready?
- Matt & Steve are joined by an expert in this field, Zac Smith. Zac is the cofounder of Packet and the current head of Edge and Metal Infrastructure at Equinix.
High-Performance Storage, with Infinidat's Eric Herzog
- Infinidat CMO Eric Herzog joins host Steve McDowell, principal analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy, to walk us through how Infinidat can increase throughput and IOPs by more than 50% in the new array while also ensuring a compelling level of data protection and cyber-resilience. They talk about the continuing evolution of storage, with a deep dive into AIOps and how new workloads (such as cloud-native) impact storage architecture.
Intelligently Managing Multi-Cloud Environments
- Introducing Cisco's Todd Brannon
- What are the biggest cloud-related challenges facing IT today?
- Solving the common needs of enterprise IT
- Cisco Intersight Services for Cloud
- Autonomous Infrastructure
- We've talked a lot about software -- what's happening in the hardware space?
- Cloud is one thing -- what's happening at the Edge?
- Roll Credits!

The Six-Five Podcast by Moor Insights & Strategy and Futurum Research, with Patrick Moorhead and Daniel Newman

Ep121: Dell Technologies World, AMD & Lattice Earnings, T-Mobile, Honeywell HCE, Qualcomm Wins VW
- Dell Technologies World Observations
- AMD Earnings
- Lattice Earnings
- T-Mobile's "Internet Freedom"
- Honeywell HCE
- Qualcomm Wins VW
Ep 120: Talking Microsoft, Google, Qualcomm, Honeywell Earnings, Oracle Launches Industry Labs
- Microsoft Earnings
- Google Earnings
- Intel Earnings
- Qualcomm Earnings
- Honeywell Earnings
- Oracle Launches Industry Labs
Ep 119: Talking IBM & SAP, Intel 2040 Eco Goals, Earth Day, SAP Exiting Russia, TSMC's Quarter
- IBM Earnings
- Intel Net Zero by 2040
- Earth Day Device Hypocrisy?
- SAP Earnings
- SAP Pulls Completely Out of Russia
- TSMC Big Quarter Reflect Chip Strength?
Ep 118: Talking Qualcomm, Stellantis, Honeywell, Box, DOJ, Elon & Twitter, Six Five Summit, and more
- Qualcomm Announces 14 Brand Stellantis Auto Win
- Honeywell Aerospace UAS/UAM Tour
- Box Announces Canvas
- DOJ Proposes Patent Protection Changes
- Elon Goes Hostile on Twitter
- Apple’s Tim Cook Heads to Washington
- Six Five Summit 2022 Event Overview
Ep117: Talking AMD Buying Pensando, Qualcomm Closes Arriver, LeadershIP Event, Six Five Summit 2022
- AMD Acquires Pensando
- Qualcomm Closes Arriver Acquisition
- IBM Announces z16
- LeaderShIP Event
- Azure Goes Arm with Ampere
- Six Five Summit

Moor Insights & Strategy Podcast

Ep16: #RetailTech & #FinTech Friday Metaverse IRL, Investment Platform Subs, Crypto Mortgages & more
- The Metaverse IRL
- Investment Platform Subscriptions
- Crypto Mortgages
- Acronym of the Week: STAMP
Ep15 #RetailTech & #FinTech Friday: Talking about Making IT Green, The New Pay Cycle, and more!
- Make IT Green
- The New Pay Cycle
- Acronym of the Week: EWA
- The Retail Moment: The Experience Experiment
- What’s Coming Up?
We are LIVE! talking with Syed Alam, Semiconductor Global Lead at Accenture Strategy
- Semiconductor Manufacturing Investments
- Semiconductor Value Chain
- Semiconductor Talent Shortage
- Semiconductor Sustainability and Environment
We are LIVE! Part 2 with Bob Coecke, CF Scientist at Quantinuum, talking quantum compositionality
We are LIVE! Talking with Ken Wong, Pres, Lenovo SSG, about the one year anniversary of Lenovo’s SSG
We are LIVE! Talking with Bob Coecke, CF Scientist at Quantinuum, about #quantum #NLP. Part 1

Press Citations:

AMD / Austin American Statesman https://www.statesman.com/story/business/2022/05/05/amd-reaches-inflection-point-narrowing-gap-intel/9646253002/
AMD / Seekingalpha https://seekingalpha.com/article/4501094-amd-dropped-below-100-again-buy-before-it-reverses-up
AMD, Pensando / Windowscentral https://www.windowscentral.com/amd-purchases-pensando-improve-data-center-optimization-and-compete-intel-and-nvidia
AMD, Pensando / Austin American Statesman https://www.statesman.com/story/business/2022/04/04/amd-keeps-growing-acquire-cloud-startup-pensando-1-9-b-deal/9459570002/
Ampere, Oracle, Chips/ Siliconangle https://siliconangle.com/2022/04/11/ampere-oracle-backed-arm-server-chip-startup-taking-intel-amd-files-ipo/
Apple / AndroidCentral https://www.androidcentral.com/phones/subscription-service-apple-google (Anshel Sag)
AWS / SiliconAngle https://siliconangle.com/2022/04/01/database-competition-heats-up-as-aws-oracle-and-snowflake-reshape-the-landscape-cubeconversations/ (Matt Kimball)
Bytedance, Pico Neo 3 / Androidcentral https://www.androidcentral.com/gaming/virtual-reality/pico-neo-3-europe-launch
CNN / Meaww https://meaww.com/donald-trump-celebrates-cnn-closure-a-month-after-launch
Dell, Hybrid Cloud / PRNewswire https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/reimagined-work-demands-redesigned-machines-301532430.html
Dell, Hybrid Cloud / Bloomberg https://www.bloomberg.com/press-releases/2022-04-26/reimagined-work-demands-redesigned-machines
Dell, Hybrid Cloud / Marketscreener https://www.marketscreener.com/quote/stock/DELL-TECHNOLOGIES-INC-50061235/news/Managing-Device-Fleets-in-the-Hybrid-Work-Era-40163954/
Dell, laptops / AWN https://www.awn.com/news/dell-reveals-new-latitude-9330-and-precision-7000-series-machines
Dell / Siliconangle https://siliconangle.com/2022/05/02/dell-partners-snowflake-ease-access-premises-data/ (Steve McDowell)
Dell . SiliconAngle https://siliconangle.com/2022/05/03/dell-revamps-powermax-powerstore-powerflex-storage-arrays-500-software-updates/ (Steve McDowell)
Dish, 5G / Lightreading https://www.lightreading.com/open-ran/dishs-first-5g-service-plan-underwhelms/d/d-id/777291 (Anshel Sag)
Facebook, Oculus / Androidcentral https://www.androidcentral.com/gaming/virtual-reality/the-quest-2-is-great-but-i-still-dont-use-it (Anshel Sag)
Fintech, Robinhood / Protocol https://www.protocol.com/amp/robinhood-ziglu-uk-2657131320 (Melody Brue)
Google / Thebytenews https://thebytenews.com/google-stays-mum-on-pixel-watch-leak-despite-past-track-record-of-quashing-rumors/
Google / Thebytenews https://thebytenews.com/google-stays-mum-on-pixel-watch-leak-despite-past-track-record-of-quashing-rumors/ (Anshel Sag)
Google / Androidcentral https://www.androidcentral.com/wearables/google-stays-mum-pixel-watch-leak (Anshel Sag)
IBM / Techcrunch https://techcrunch.com/2022/04/20/ibm-q1-2022-earnings-growth/ \
IBM, AI, AWS / SDXCentral https://www.sdxcentral.com/articles/analysis/can-ai-save-ibms-mainframe-biz-from-aws/2022/04/
IBM / Siliconangle https://siliconangle.com/2022/04/05/ibm-unveils-z16-mainframe-real-time-fraud-detection/
IBM / CIO https://www.cio.com/article/307884/ibms-z16-mainframe-boasts-on-chip-ai-acceleration.html
IBM / ZDNet https://www.zdnet.com/article/the-first-ibm-mainframe-for-ai-arrives/
IBM / Networkworld https://www.networkworld.com/article/3655975/ibm-z16-a-mainframe-designed-for-ai-hybrid-cloud-security-and-open-source.html
Intel, Earnings / Siliconangle https://siliconangle.com/2022/04/28/intel-beats-expectations-lower-outlook-sends-stock-4-late-trading/
Intel / SDXCentral https://www.sdxcentral.com/articles/news/intel-acquires-granulate-to-boost-data-center-efficiency/2022/04/
LogicMonitor / Yahoo Finance https://finance.yahoo.com/news/logicmonitor-announces-lm-elevate-2022-125600791.html
Metaverse / Androidcentral https://www.androidcentral.com/virtual-reality/is-the-metaverse-necessary (Anshel Sag)
Microsoft . Inferse https://www.inferse.com/65117/windows-11-will-leave-millions-of-pcs-behind-and-microsoft-is-struggling-to-explain-why-the-verge/
NetApp / Techtarget https://www.techtarget.com/searchdatamanagement/news/252515719/NetApp-acquires-Instaclustr-for-database-as-a-service (Steve McDowell)
Nothing Company, Android / AndroidCentral https://www.androidcentral.com/phones/not-convinced-nothing-can-become-something (Anshel Sag)
Oneplus / Androidcentral https://www.androidcentral.com/phones/one-plus-10-base-model-when (Anshel Sag)
Oracle, Heatwave / Wikibon https://wikibon.com/cube-power-panel-astonished-oracle-mysql-heatwaves-torrid-innovation-pace/ (Matt Kimball)
Peloton / Wired https://www.wired.com/story/peloton-guide-body-tracking/ (Anshel Sag)
Protocol, Crypto / Protocol https://www.protocol.com/newsletters/protocol-fintech/wealth-management-subscriptions?rebelltitem=1#rebelltitem1
Qualcomm, Earnings / Siliconangle https://siliconangle.com/2022/04/27/qualcomms-diversification-strategy-pays-off-crushes-expectations-earnings-sales-growth/
Synaptics / KULR8 https://www.kulr8.com/news/money/synaptics-flexsense-4-in-1-sensor-fusion-processor-ushers-in-era-of-intuitive-iot-applications/article_7d9f2bba-5a35-5b36-a3f3-c53a5eb8d635.html
Synaptics / FierceElectronics https://www.fierceelectronics.com/sensors/synaptics-looks-support-iot-sensor-fusion-flexsense
Synaptics / Fox4kc https://fox4kc.com/business/press-releases/globenewswire/8532593/synaptics-flexsense-4-in-1-sensor-fusion-processor-ushers-in-era-of-intuitive-iot-applications/
Synaptics / Gurufocus https://www.gurufocus.com/news/1700073/synaptics-flexsense-4in1-sensor-fusion-processor-ushers-in-era-of-intuitive-iot-applications
Synaptics / Globenewswire https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2022/05/02/2433144/0/en/Synaptics-FlexSense-4-in-1-Sensor-Fusion-Processor-Ushers-in-Era-of-Intuitive-IoT-Applications.html
Synaptics / Stockhouse https://stockhouse.com/news/press-releases/2022/05/02/synaptics-flexsense-tm-4-in-1-sensor-fusion-processor-ushers-in-era-of-intuitive
Unreal Engine, Metaverse / Spectrum.ieee https://spectrum.ieee.org/amp/unreal-engine-5-metaverse-2657146077 (Anshel Sag)
Youtube / Androidcentral https://www.androidcentral.com/streaming-tv/youtube-music-is-great-but-it-isnt-popular (Anshel Sag)

Company:

Dell Technologies, Hybrid Cloud https://investors.delltechnologies.com/news-releases/news-release-details/reimagined-work-demands-redesigned-machines
HPE, Data https://www.hpe.com/us/en/insights/articles/how-the-remote-workforce-is-impacting-the-way-we-store-and-acces-2204.html (Steve McDowell)

New Gear or Software We are Using and Testing that is Public Knowledge

HP Omen 45L Desktop
HP Omen 27c Gaming Monitor
Lumina webcam
MSI Creator 15 OLED Laptop
Microsoft Surface Go 3 with LTE
Samsung S22 Ultra and S22.

Events MI&S Plans on Attending In-Person or Virtually (New)

May
- MediaTek Analysts Day, Scottsdale, May 9-11 (Anshel Sag, Will Townsend)
- IBM Think, May 9-13 (Steve McDowell, Patrick Moorhead)
- SAP Sapphire, Orlando, May 9 (Patrick Moorhead)
- Red Hat Analyst Summit, May 10-11 (Matt Kimball)
- Intel Vision, May 10-11 (Matt Kimball, Steve McDowell, Will Townsend)
- Envestnet Advisor Summit, Charleston, NC, May 10-13 (Melody Brue)
- All In Summit, May 15-17, Miami (Patrick Moorhead)
- Big 5G Event – Austin, May 16-17 (Will Townsend)
- AWS Summit, Atlanta, May 18-19 (Steve McDowell)
- GlobalFoundries GTS, May 19 (Patrick Moorhead)
- Plaid Forum, May 19 (Melody Brue)
- Stripe Sessions, May 24 (Steve McDowell)
June
- LogicMonitor Elevate speaking engagement, NYC, June 1 (Patrick Moorhead)
- RSA – San Francisco, June 6-9 (Will Townsend)
- Pure//Accelerate TechFest, L.A., June 7-9 (Steve McDowell)
- Six Five Summit 2022, Virtual, June 6-9 (Patrick Moorhead, Paul Smith-Goodson)
- Microsoft Industry Clouds Tour for Analysts, Boston, June 8 (Melody Brue)
- Google Applied ML Conference, June 9 (Paul Smith-Goodson)
- AMD analyst Day, June 19 (Patrick Moorhead)
- Lenovo Analyst Summit, June 13-15, (Matt Kimball, Pat Moorhead)
- Cisco Live, June 12-16 (Patrick Moorhead, Will Townsend)
- Zscaler Cloud Summit – Las Vegas, June 21-23 (Will Townsend)
- HPE Discover, June 28-30, Las Vegas (Matt Kimball, Paul Smith-Goodson, Steve McDowell, Will Townsend)
July
August
- Flash Memory Summit, Aug 2-4, Santa Clara (Steve McDowell)
- VMworld, San Francisco, Aug 28-Sept 1 (Matt Kimball, Steve McDowell)
September
- Quantum Open House Event, TBD (Paul Smith-Goodson)
- Intel InnovatiON, San Jose, Sept 27-28 (Steve McDowell)
- SNIA Storage Developer Conference, San Jose, Sept 28-29 (Steve McDowell)
October
- Open Compute Global Summit, October 18-19 (Steve McDowell)

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The Team

Analysts, Analysts In-Residence, Contributors

Patrick Moorhead, Founder, CEO, Chief Analyst; Broad technology coverage plus deep insights into Cloud & SaaS, Personal Computing, Semiconductors, Automotive
Bill Curtis, Analyst In-Residence, IIoT, and Deep IoT Technology
Matt Kimball, Principal Analyst, Datacenter Servers, CI, and HCI
Melody Brue, Principal Analyst, Financial Tech
Steve McDowell, Principal Analyst, Datacenter Storage, and Storage Technologies
Anshel Sag, Principal Analyst; V.R., P.C. Gaming, Mobile Platforms
Paul Smith-Goodson, Principal Analyst; Machine Learning, A.I. and Quantum Computing
Will Townsend, Principal Analyst; Security, Carrier Services, Networking
Chris Wilder, Contributor, Security

Operations

Dan Pickens, Business Director
Paula Moorhead, Marketing Director, Website, and Social Media
Walker Pickens, Media Relations, and Writer
Zane Pickett, Office Manager, AP., AR, travel, writer
Lee LeClercq Williams, Business Associate
Nigel Church, Business Associate, Writer, Editor
Jacob Freyman, Writer, and Researcher
Connor Kenyon, Six Five Sales & Business Development

Patrick Moorhead

+ posts

Patrick founded the firm based on his real-world world technology experiences with the understanding of what he wasn’t getting from analysts and consultants. Ten years later, Patrick is ranked #1 among technology industry analysts in terms of “power” (ARInsights) in “press citations” (Apollo Research). Moorhead is a contributor at Forbes and frequently appears on CNBC. He is a broad-based analyst covering a wide variety of topics including the cloud, enterprise SaaS, collaboration, client computing, and semiconductors. He has 30 years of experience including 15 years of executive experience at high tech companies (NCR, AT&T, Compaq, now HP, and AMD) leading strategy, product management, product marketing, and corporate marketing, including three industry board appointments.