Wednesday, February 13, 2019

How Technology is Revolutionizing Healthcare and Helping Save Lives - Dell EMC Certifications


Did you know that while we humans are 99.9 percent identical at the genome level, it is the 0.1 percent variation that explains many of our individual traits, including our susceptibility to diseases?

“Rare” disease


Did you also know that what is termed “rare disease” is actually not so rare, as modern medical discoveries continue to reveal novel conditions that limit people’s everyday lives and were previously undiagnosed and untreated? According to Rare Disease UK[ii], there are between 6,000 and 8,000 known rare diseases with around five new rare diseases described in medical literature each week. Actually, one in 17 people around the globe will be affected by some form of rare disease, either seriously or in a less serious form. In fact, the carriers of rare diseases globally are easily equivalent to the population of a large country.

And, to add to this, there is of course cancer, which comprises a genetic disease category in its own right. Non-medical people, like me, tend to forget that cancer isn’t just one disease – it’s actually hundreds of diseases forming thousands of combinations, each requiring a personalized and adjustable treatment plan.

Modern personalized diagnostics


The good news is that over the past ten years, tremendous biotechnological advances have not only changed the way we diagnose and treat genetic disease (and other more common disorders) but have also created a wealth of biomedical data. This has contributed hugely to our genetic disease knowledge, leading to a self-feeding loop of improved diagnosis and treatment. The key technology – Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) – allows for cheap, fast and accurate acquisition of a person’s whole or partial genome with countless applications, spanning disease diagnosis treatment to lifestyle decisions.

Rapid diagnosis


Going back to disease susceptibilities, were you aware that genetic disorders are a leading cause of infant deaths? Unfortunately, diagnosing acutely ill babies is a race against the clock. While standard diagnostic methods are usually too slow to make a difference, an NGS technique called Whole Genome Sequencing (WGS) can meet the critical time window to save lives. As WGS has become more affordable, it is also becoming more broadly available to patients. Today, new-born screening is currently available for about 60 genetic diseases with more to follow. As Dr. Stephen Kingsmore, President and CEO of Rady Children’s Institute for Genomic Medicine said, “Rapid diagnosis of critically ill newborns is no longer an academic exercise; it’s a reality for critically ill new-borns.”

In addition to new-born disease screening, WGS is also used to end the diagnostic odyssey of children and adults, who suffer from unusual genetic disorders and cannot reach a diagnosis through traditional methods.

Immune and gene therapy


Likewise, immune therapy and gene therapy – the process of treating an acquired disease like cancer either by using the patient’s own immune cells or by modifying their DNA – is also part of the present-day clinical treatment toolkit. This high accuracy, ultra-rapid method allows the simultaneous evaluation of nearly all 5,000 known genetic diseases in a single test, all enabled by guess what? Yes, believe it or not – a high-performing IT technology compute and storage solution!

Precision medicine


These are two great examples of what the healthcare industry calls precision medicine – treatments that look at the genetic profile and genetic characteristics of the patient as well as the specific disease that the patient is dealing with. Using this information, doctors are then able to create a personalized treatment plan for each patient that continues to evolve and adapt as required.

How we support healthcare


As western healthcare systems creak under the pressure of aging populations with chronic diseases and not enough funding to cope, health care authorities and hospitals are rapidly moving to adopt big game changers, like whole genome sequencing.

Globally, we at Dell EMC OEM are working with a number of specialist companies in this field, sharing our expertise on the underlying compute and storage technology involved. For example, one of our partners, HybridStat has developed Geniasis, a DNA analytics platform, powered by Dell EMC architecture, which performs WGS analysis for diagnostic purposes. HybridStat also offers bioinformatics consulting services to life scientists.

Deepening understanding and enabling new products


We also work with organisations like Genomics England, Genomics Scotland, Genomics France and Genomics Wales, who do great work to expand the medical world’s understanding of diseases. For example, at the end of 2018, Genomics England achieved its goal of sequencing 100,000 genomes from around 85,000 people.[iii] This project – the largest national sequencing project of its kind worldwide – is enhancing researchers’ understanding of diseases while also supporting the development of products for earlier detection and treatment. You can read more about our work with Genomics England here.

In a separate development, the British Government also announced plans last year to use artificial intelligence to diagnose cancer at earlier stages, which they believe will prevent 22,000 deaths by 2023.[iv]

IT technology has enabled progress


What has driven this revolution? Of course, medical research has made and continues to make huge advances but there’s no doubt that IT technology has been a significant enabler. Up until now, genome scale data management, annotation, interpretation and reporting were expensive and complicated, especially for clinical purposes.

Now, thanks to rapid IT technology developments, DNA sequencing has become faster and cheaper with scientists now sequencing an entire genome in 22 minutes, while the process previously took days.[v] However, despite such advanced progress, experts say that the whole genome sequencing process needs to become even more automated if it is to realize its full potential.

The rocket fuel


How do we get to this next stage? Of course, it goes without saying that we need scientists and continued investment in medical research. However, researchers also need the right tools like high performance computing and storage. The current estimate is that up to two billion genomes will be sequenced by 2025 and that storing, and processing genome data will reach up to 40 exabytes, exceeding the computing challenges of running YouTube and Twitter.

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Tuesday, January 29, 2019

Server Security: What to Look for in 2019 - Dell EMC Certifications


Following a challenging year for server security, one big question remains: where is the industry headed in 2019? How do we rethink our approach in the wake of Spectre & Meltdown? What are the dangers on the horizon, and what sort of innovation can businesses use to combat them?

I spoke with our Dell Fellow, Mukund Khatri to get the answers to all of this and more.

What do you think customers will be dealing with this year?


Customers will continue to be plagued by increasing vulnerabilities and security challenges this year. Last year started with Spectre/Meltdown followed by seemingly endless other side-channel issues, sending many companies into a security maelstrom.

Companies are in the midst of digital transformation. For digital transformation, security transformation is essential. There are predictors that indicate ransomware will continue to increase, as well as smarter means of harvesting credentials. Timely infrastructure patch management is a challenge that customers will have to address to decrease their exposure. If consumers don’t have adequate encryption and encryption management, their data is insecure and at high risk for data loss and exfiltration.

These issues will require customers to handle increasing privacy regulations – like the EU’s GDPR, Australia’s new encryption law, and California’s new privacy regulation which goes into effect at the end of this year. Customers will need to determine the best way of balancing risk, while meeting regulations at the same time.

What security innovations do you see coming in 2019?


There will be many. I believe some of the major innovation focus areas will be in supply chain security. Also, I expect we’ll see innovation in encryption and encryption management with data at the edge, not just in the cloud or in the data center. I think there will be enhancements to monitoring and remediation technologies using AI and machine learning (ML) to enhance the security of their systems.  Customers will be looking for innovative and easy ways to stay current with patch management tools. These tools will be key to minimizing the impact to their business, resource allocations, and other business disruptions.

I believe we will see innovations leveraging new technologies like AI, blockchain, and multi-factor authentication across various security solution spaces, including supply chain risk management, advanced threat monitoring solutions, and enhanced access and identity management (AIM). Secure enclaves for better protection of secrets is another emerging solution space.

Is it true that businesses only have to worry about security with their software, and all servers have the same security features?


Absolutely not! It might have been that way in the past, but hardware technology continues to evolve. Of course software must continue to be a critical focus for security, but there is a growing recognition that the hardware infrastructure must be protected as well. Think of it this way – would you buy a house at the beach without checking its foundation? That would not be very smart! Your server is the foundation of your data center, and it should have security built in to confidently build upon.

Security must be designed within the architecture of the server to effectively withstand sophisticated cyber-crime: phishing attacks that harvest credentials, advanced persistent threats (taking control of your firmware), data exfiltration (stealing your data). Server and server supply chain security must be looked at and considered as critical criteria in your purchasing decisions. Whether you are the CIO, the IT manager, or the IT admin, you want to know that you have made the right choice and are protecting your data center and your data from the ground up.

How can a business focus on their growth, and not concentrate most of their resources on security within their data center?


In the current environment, and for the foreseeable future, security will continue to remain top of mind for everyone. If you are moving data to the edge, utilizing AI or ML, or a hybrid cloud customer, you will need a trusted partner to manage resources that implement these new technologies.

I wish I could tell you that you didn’t have to do anything regarding your infrastructure security, but that is unrealistic in the world we live in. You will have to focus on security, but sometimes challenges grow at a faster rate than investments grow. To enable a business to focus on their growth, they need to have trusted infrastructure. Infrastructure within businesses will continue to grow, increasing the likelihood of threats, but with a trusted partner you focus more of your resources on growth, rather than managing threats. This is where Dell EMC can help. We want our customers to be able to focus on their growth and innovations, and let us focus on creating, delivering and managing a security enhanced product for their data center.

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Wednesday, January 16, 2019

A Science to Dell EMC Storage - Dell EMC Certifications


The world of data storage is a confusing place – it is easy for organizations to invest in solutions that aren’t up to the task.

IT Managers need a hero. A guru who can spread the truth, simplify the data storage landscape, and help businesses choose the right solution for their specific needs.

Be that hero to your customers.

The Science of Storage is a series of bite-sized animated videos following the adventures of Steve the IT Manager and Archie the Storage Guru. The series covers a range of storage topics, dispels storage myths, and reveals the science behind Dell EMC’s leading data storage portfolio.

How to utilize the series


The Science of Storage helps drive conversations with customers regarding their data storage pain points and proves that there’s a science to the Dell EMC storage portfolio.

Become a storage guru for your customers. Simply:

  • Watch the full series
  • Become familiar with the topics
  • Share relevant episodes with customers via The Science of Storage YouTube channel
  • Visit the Partner Portal for additional sales assets
  • Have valuable data storage conversations with customers

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Thursday, January 3, 2019

If Santa Replaced Magic with IoT Technologies - Dell EMC Certifications


The holiday season brings songs and stories about Santa Clause with his sleigh full of toys which he delivers around the world to good boys and girls. Magic may not be able to make digital transformation happen, but Santa…Santa runs on magic (along with milk and cookies and lots of imagination).

Should Santa’s magic run a bit low, he and his team could turn to IoT technologies to support many of the use cases needed to deliver millions of packages in one around-the-planet journey.

Predictive Maintenance and Route Optimization


How Santa and his sleigh move through space and time so quickly is part of the magic IoT cannot replace. However, the flight mechanics on the sleigh likely need multiple servicing stops. Sensors and smart gateways with VMware Pulse IoT Center mounted near moving parts can aggregate data on actual conditions. This data should be analyzed on-sleigh as much as possible as the latency and networking costs to send data continuously to the North Pole would be staggering.  However, key alerts of emerging issues can be sent to the Central Elf datacenter environment, where more in-depth analytics can be run and software fixes sent OTA back to the sleigh.  Also, the datacenter/cloud environment could deliver insights from the ground that impacts Santa’s route. Weather-related insights can be used to identify risky storms and low visibility areas for re-routing. Not to mention, we know Santa can only deliver presents to houses where children are asleep. The sleep-monitoring system can stream in final, last-mile adaptions to Santa’s route.

Energy and Health Monitoring


Christmas Eve is a physically demanding shift for the reindeer, and Santa is a strong promoter of a healthy workplace. Health monitoring is a key use case he can implement to ensure the reindeers’ heart rate and lung capacity stay within a healthy range. Also, Santa’s blood sugar can spike too high if not carefully managed during an evening full of cookies. This too can be remotely monitored…with ongoing reports sent down to Santa’s physicians and Mrs. Claus.

Asset Management and Delivery Verification


Santa needs to manage millions of presents and ensure each one is delivered to the right house. Santa is being asked for increased regulatory and compliance reporting and has a need for more proof of delivery for any legal challenges that come up in January. One always controversial input into present allocation is the role of the Naughty vs Nice algorithm. Many children improve markedly in late December and earn their way to the Nice list, and Santa wants to be agile and have flex inventory on hand to deliver to everyone.

Santa would be a challenging customer, requiring a broad team of Dell Technologies experts as well as specialized technologies from our partner ecosystem. These challenges are a fun and accessible way to think through the art of the possible, which is an important part of how we work with our customers every day. Let’s all enjoy the magic of the holiday season and we look forward to working with customers on their own IoT magic next year. Happy New Year!

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Monday, December 17, 2018

10 Things to Know about Test Drive for PowerMax and Unity - Dell EMC Certification


The Dell EMC Test Drive program consists of pipeline accelerator events for the Dell EMC Enterprise product portfolio. For partners looking to grow deals (and potentially win them faster), here are 10 things you need to know.


  1. Test Drives are designed to increase sales closure rates. Getting a prospect into the Test Drive seat offers a chance to accelerate and close deals.
  2. They can potentially lead to higher-value deals. The experience is designed to build familiarity and trust in the product—potentially opening the door to bigger and better deals within an account.
  3. They can potentially lower the cost of sale. Test Drives are designed to significantly reduce the time and resources needed to close a typical opportunity by helping to simplify and shorten the sales cycle.
  4. It’s a hands-on experience for the prospect. Test Drives are one-day, immersive experiences for your prospects. It lets them “get behind the wheel” of an infrastructure product to better understand their use case and prove viability.
  5. These events are for the technical crowd. When you reach out to prospective Test Drive accounts, make sure they can send technical decision makers and/or influencers. The experience is focused on the end user.
  6. The ideal time: Consideration and Evaluation stages. Test Drives offer a deeper, practical exploration of a product for prospects that have been researching their options and are nearing a decision.
  7. They can happen anywhere in the world. Test Drive events are accessible to just about any prospect. Events can take place at a Dell EMC site, a partner site, or at a prospect’s office—across the globe and available in 10 languages.
  8. Up to 16 prospects can attend. You can bring a maximum of 16 prospects to any one Test Drive. Ideally, you’ll have at least eight unique prospects with a maximum of two attendees per company.
  9. It’s an event in a box. Leave it to the pros to drive the right curriculum and logistics behind the scenes for your key prospects.
  10. It’s all about building confidence. The most important potential outcome of a Test Drive is, in one word, confidence—in the product, in making the right decision and in value of the investment.

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Tuesday, December 11, 2018

3 Secrets to Fast Tracking Your IT Priorities

Easy efficiency


PowerEdge tower servers are built to process and transmit data quickly. This will enable your everyday business applications to run faster and reduce the amount of interruptions. They simplify team collaboration, giving you peace of mind that you are working on the latest revision. They also save data automatically, reducing the threat of re-work.

PowerEdge towers are ideal for on-site, remote, and branch office use. By managing multiple remote servers via one intuitive platform, you can save a trip across town, states, or even countries, depending on your office locations. Additionally, you can choose to conveniently receive alerts and access hardware remotely anytime and anywhere, saving you time and money.

With the ProDeploy suite of services, you can let Dell EMC do the heavy lifting while you focus on your business. Simply tell Dell EMC what applications you’d like to run, and we’ll configure and deploy the server in your office. Set up as much as 66% faster with our ProDeploy suite of services.2 Our team is here to answer any questions and help you plan for your future growth.

PowerEdge towers offer automated proactive and predictive support technology. Resolve potential issues with up to 72% less IT effort using ProSupport Plus and SupportAssist.3 This technology can automatically notify Dell EMC of a potential threat to get a jump start on a solution.

Revenue growth made easier


You run critical business applications that enable you to connect with your customers, prospective customers, and your team. The PowerEdge towers are ideal for most business applications such as file and print, point of sale, collaboration/sharing, databases, mail, and messaging.

PowerEdge towers enable business applications to run quickly with powerful computing capability. These tower servers enable multiple team members to work on the same file and print multiple documents efficiently. The servers also enable faster and reliable payment processing with a secure infrastructure. It allows you to collaborate and connect quickly and efficiently with customers and colleagues around the world.

Time is money. As a business, you never want any of your business applications to stop working. PowerEdge servers are reliable and can reduce the risk of downtime with a hot plug drive option. This would enable your server to work while being serviced. This will keep your business operating around the clock, allowing you additional opportunity to drive your business.

The easy choice for expense reduction


One of the key IT business priorities is to reduce expenses. Among many important things to consider while reducing expense, IT security is imperative. It’s important to not take IT security for granted given all the recent data breaches. One of the best ways to keep expenses down and customer loyalty up is to avoid a security breach.

The average total cost of a data breach in the United States is $7.9 million. The global average total cost of a data breach increased 6.4% from the previous year to $3.86 million.4

With the purpose of protecting our customers, every PowerEdge server come with built-in security. Simply bolting security on after the fact doesn’t work. PowerEdge towers can protect your server from malicious changes with iDRAC9 Enterprise Server Lockdown mode. You can also have peace of mind that your data is backed up automatically.

PowerEdge tower servers can be safer and cheaper than public cloud alternatives. As a matter of fact, Independent research commissioned by Dell EMC uncovered that over 50% of midmarket organizations that have moved a workload from a public cloud service back to on-premise infrastructure cited security and/or cost as a reason for this decision.5

Additionally, PowerEdge tower servers help with future expense reduction because they are made to grow with your business over time. As you continue to scale your business with more demanding business applications, more customers, and more employees, your servers’ will also be able to scale with you.

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Wednesday, December 5, 2018

DES-2T13 Specialist – Cloud Architect, Cloud Infrastructure Exam


Overview


This exam is a qualifying exam for the Specialist - Cloud Architect, Cloud Infrastructure (DECS-CA) track. This exam focuses on knowledge and skills to successfully design a cloud infrastructure that supports multiple types of services. It tests the ability of data center technology professionals to design robust cloud based infrastructure incorporating components such as cloud management, consumer resources, elasticity, metering, hybrid capabilities, and disaster recovery. Dell EMC provides free practice tests to assess your knowledge in preparation for the exam. Practice tests allow you to become familiar with the topics and question types you will find on the proctored exam. Your results on a practice test offer one indication of how prepared you are for the proctored exam and can highlight topics on which you need to study and train further. A passing score on the practice test
does not guarantee a passing score on the certification exam.

Exam Topics


Topics likely to be covered on this exam include:

Introduction to Cloud Design and Design Parameters (10%)
• Describe digital business imperatives, cloud concepts, cloud
  infrastructure design approaches and goals
• Describe cloud solutions design project lifecycle phases
• Describe cloud reference architecture and various cloud design considerations for compute, storage,     network, CMP, hybrid and multicloud, and application platform and PaaS solution

Data Collection and Analysis (12%)

• Describe data collection process, metrics, and tools
• Describe analysis process, business value analysis, and design best practices

Architecting a Do-It-Yourself Solution (25%)

• Explain the benefits, challenges, and considerations for designing various compute technologies in      a cloud infrastructure
• Explain the benefits, challenges, and considerations for designing various network technologies in      a cloud infrastructure
• Explain the benefits, challenges, and considerations for designing various storage technologies in a cloud infrastructure

Architecting a CI / HCI Solution (18%)

• Explain design decisions and considerations for converged infrastructure
• Explain design decisions and considerations for hyper-converged and cloud in a box infrastructure

Cloud Management Platform (10%)

• Describe the key functions of a CMP, CMP reference architecture, and CMP infrastructure
• Describe the key requirements and considerations for designing CMP solutions

Hybrid Cloud and Multi Cloud (15%)

• Describe the design considerations for hybrid cloud and multicloud
• Explain disaster recovery considerations

Application Development and Deployment Platform (10%)

• Describe the application development and deployment environment and its requirements
• Explain the design considerations of Do-It-Yourself and Packaged PaaS solutions

The percentages after each topic above reflects the approximate distribution of the
total question set across the exam.