IBM Expands Social Networking and Big Data Analytics Portfolio

Vangie Beal

Updated · Jun 23, 2011

IBM (NYSE: IBM) has expanded its software portfolio to help organizations embrace the power of social business with the announcement of a new version of IBM Connections — a social networking platform with real-time compliance capabilities.

The new IBM Connections 3.01 software uses microblogs, wikis, communities and activities to collaborate with clients, partners and employees. The social networking platform delivers enterprise-quality compliance capabilities, providing the ability to monitor, track and quickly pull out relevant data around conversations, posts and file uploads in real-time.

“The benefits of social business are too great to ignore,” said Alistair Rennie, general manager for collaboration solutions at IBM. “With these new advancements around compliance enablement, a social business can confidently activate networks of people to use a variety of collaborative tools, to improve and accelerate innovation.”

The data can then be analyzed and is also discoverable in real-time using the IBM Connections active compliance service. This electronic trail of online interactions helps organizations meet their policy needs while working at the speed of social networking, IBM said.

IBM Boosts Big Data Analytics with New Netezza Appliance

Big Blue this week also expanded its big data analytics portfolio with a new analytics appliance — the IBM Netezza High Capacity Appliance — that allows organizations to analyze up to 10 petabytes of data in a matter of minutes.

According to IBM, its new IBM Netezza appliance, the first since IBM acquired Netezza last year, addresses a growing challenge where organizations are amassing huge amounts of data. Banks, insurance companies, healthcare organizations and communications services providers are required by industry regulators to retain massive amounts of data — in some cases up to a decade.

Using the new appliance, businesses can now more easily sift through petabytes of data, including banking and mobile phone transactions, insurance claims, electronic medical records and sales information. Companies can also analyze this information to reveal new trends on consumer sentiment, product safety and sales and marketing effectiveness.

IBM Netezza technology joins IBM’s Hadoop-based BigInsights software, as well as Streams software (both born in IBM Research), creating what IBM says is the industry’s broadest portfolio of workload-optimized Big Data technologies.

The software incorporates Watson-like technologies, including unstructured text analytics and indexing that allows users to analyze rapidly changing data formats and types on the fly.

Vangie Beal
Vangie Beal

Vangie is a freelance technology writer who covers Internet technologies, online business, and other topics for over 15 years. SEO Content Writer with high-quality organic search results. Professional freelance technology writer with over 15 years experience. - Understands the technology trends in SMB and Enterprise markets. - Proficient in email marketing and social media campaigns. - Trusted and respected voice in small business marketing via e-commerce. - Knowledgeable in how to incorporate sales initiatives and assets into articles or Web content. Experienced social media marketer. Specialties: SEO. Electronic commerce, small businesses, Internet. Computers, servers, networking. Computer science. Terms, terminology. Social media, email marketing. Mobile apps. Operating systems. Software and hardware. Interviews, tips, advice, guides and feature articles. Marketing, slideshows, how-to guides. Search engine tools.

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