Technology – Page 21 – PPI News Agency

March 26, 2018

Information Technology University invites Applications for Civic Innovation Fellowship Program

Lahore, March 26, 2018 (PPI-OT):The Information Technology University (ITU) the Punjab’s Center for Civic innovation (CCI) has invited applicationsfrom recent graduates, graduate students, faculty and staff for its Civic Innovation Fellowship Program latest 9th April 2018. The duration of this fellowship will be 6 months and the selected fellows will be paid a monthly stipend. This Fellowship is accepting for research on core problems in all socioeconomic areas using the data provided by the Punjab Information Technology Board (PITB).

The Civic Innovation Fellows will be required to research, design and execute community interventions and innovative solutions to combat local problems. The Fellows will be mentored by the ITU faculty and various experts working in relevant fields which are in line with the Fellows’ research objectives. The goal of the Civic Innovation Fellowship is to gather key researchers to produce tangible outcomes such as policy briefs, research papers, mobile and web applications and startups. These outcomes will serve to guide the local government on implementing feasible solutions to cater to socio-economic problems faced by our community. For further details visit website: www.cci.itu.edu.pk

For more information, contact:
Punjab Information Technology Board (PITB)
11th Floor, Arfa Software Technology Park,
346-B, Ferozepur Road, Lahore, Pakistan
Tel: +92-42-35880062
Fax: +92-42-99232123
Email: info@pitb.gov.pk
Website: www.pitb.gov.pk

March 16, 2018

PITB’s Health Watch App Reports Staff coverage improvement from 25% to 98%

Lahore, March 16, 2018 (PPI-OT): Over 3,000 health facilities across the Punjab under e-monitoring through android phones by 281 health officers including the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Health, District Officer Health (DOH) and Deputy District Officer Health (DDOH) under Health Watch program launched across the Punjab in collaboration with the Punjab Information Technology University (PITB) has shown improvement in health staff coverage from 25 % to 98 %. The three major indicators being monitored through this program include attendance of the staff, availability of Medicine / Stock- outs and review of the overall health facility condition / highlight non-functional equipment.

The Health Watch program IT enabled performance audit of health facilities aims to empower public health sector mangers at district level by providing them timely, authentic and well-tabulated information on the status of health facilities in terms of human resources, medicines, equipment availability / functionality and utilization of facilities. Currently 1773 Basic Health Units (BHU), 808 24/7 open Basic Health Units (BHU), 305 Rural Health Centers (RHC), 109 Tehsil Headquarters (TH) and 34 District Headquarter (DH) facilities are being watched under this automated system.

The DHMs submit their inspection data through the Health Watch application developed by the PITB. The data submitted through application automatically pops-up on a map using GPS in real time. Multiple other reports are available on a web-based dashboard for departmental review and decision-making.

The dashboard has received more than 200,000 entries from the field mangers. Data shown on the dashboard is used for formulating and devising strategies by the relevant departments. The consolidated data gathered through Health Watch is presented monthly in a departmental meeting chaired by the provincial health minister and Primary and Secondary Health secretary. These DHMs follow pre-assigned monthly targets for visiting healthcare facilities in their respective jurisdictions. The purpose of the program was to monitor the quality of health services extended to citizens of the province at all kind of health facilities.

March 16, 2018

Balochistan seeks Technology Assistance from Punjab Information Technology Board

Lahore, March 16, 2018 (PPI-OT): A delegation from government of Balochistan led by the Provincial Secretary Science and Technology Mr. Aftab Ahmad Baluch visited the Punjab Information Technology Board (PITB) to seek technological assistance in various sectors here today.

The senior officers of PITB briefed the delegation regarding the technological interventions being practiced in the Punjab. The Director General e Governance Sajid Latif, Waqar Naeem Qureshi DG, IT Solutions and Saima Raoof Shaikh, Director Training and Development gave presentations to the delegation regarding education, health, eVaccs, law and order, police, revenue, eKhidmat, eRozgaar, eStamping, Plan9 incubation center and other various projects, which have started delivering encouraging resulted in real and stipulated time.

The delegation was informed that PITB was already extending assistance and necessary training to the government of Balochistan for automation of police, law and health sectors on complimentary basis. The delegation identified the new area of interest including eFiling, education, Data Center etc. The participants acknowledged that the youth of Balochistan have the talent potential and outstanding ideas to move forward for strengthening the incubation activity, which would gear up with the China Pakistan Economic Cooperation (CPEC) in the province.

The other members of the delegation including the Director General IT Baluchistan, Tariq Qamar, Engr; Arsalan Baseer, Director Tech and Farhan Shakeel focal person took a round of various projects and appreciated the PITB’s unprecedented assistance for the public sector departments of the government of Balochistan.

March 13, 2018

Distribution of Smartphones among farmers a revolutionary step: Dr. Ayesha Ghous Pasha

Lahore, March 13, 2018 (PPI-OT): The distribution of AgTech Smartphones among farmers is a revolutionary step of the Punjab Government, which will benefit and strengthen the economy through growth in agri products. This was stated by Dr. Ayesha Ghous Pasha Provincial Finance Minister while addressing the launch of smartphone apps developed by Punjab Information Technology Board (PITB) for Punjab Agriculture Department here today.

She added that 24/7 PITB’s helpline would respond and resolve all kind of problems and would guide the farmers on regular basis. Addressing the event the Chairman PITB Dr. Umar Saif said that launching a technology-enabled platform to give small (mostly landless) farmers loans, subsidies, location-targeted advice on yield growth, pesticides, fertilizer, seeds using smartphones has proved that AgTech revolution has reached Pakistan. Out of the 16,911 farmers given smartphones and apps in the initial phase, 14,523 (85%) use our apps every day – 77.39% in Urdu, 13.92% in Punjabi and 8.69% in Saraiki. Our apps have been used 663,596 times to date, he informed.

Dr. Saif added that 40 lakh farmers have been registered so far in the Punjab Province under PITB’s developed centralized system for managing the database, helping raise efficiency and accountability of the scheme for the Punjab Agriculture Department’s initiated interest-free loan scheme for small farmers. The scheme provides loans to farmers possessing land less than 12.5 acres and has a flexible repayment option while data of the owners of 5 crore 70 lakh rural land has been digitalized. The Agriculture e-Credit Scheme has improved liquidity in the agriculture sector, timely availability of crop inputs, an increase in yield and higher profit margins, he said.

He added that the platform would reduce the chances of middleman’s exploitation, corruption, delays and would ensure required assistance and advice to the farmers in real time. The information gathered in the system includes demographics, contact details, crops, landholding patterns, livestock, irrigation system and mechanization. This initiative has resulted in appropriate allocation of schemes to the right farmers, ease in broadcasting message to larger mass and the creation of a centralized database.

The distribution of mobile phones with 10 agriculture-related applications to enhance their capacity and to disburse loans directly to the farmers through mobile valet by automating all processes involved in loan allocation also aims to consolidate recipients’ information for transparent and efficient implementation of these interventions. In the conventional method for loan processing, an applicant would have needed to visit the PLRA and bank more than 10 times to secure the loan, but with the help of this system, the number of visits has been reduced to only three. More than 55 million households are directly or indirectly tied to this sector.

The salient features of 10 mobile applications include On boarding/Tutorial to welcome the newly-registered farmers and verify their credentials, Weather Alerts to show the forecasts based on the latitude and longitude of the farmer’s location for 5 days, Crop Calendar to provide crop specific advisories, educate farmers about new technologies, methods and techniques related to various crops, Video on Demand to primarily serve the needs of farmers whose mobile literacy is low, Expert Opinion to talk to an expert, Crop Yield Calculator to allow farmers to calculate the approximate cost of seeding, fertilizer and pesticide usage and crop yield based on their land size and crop type, Mandi app to connect farmers with potential buyers and to use EasyPaisa Mobile Wallets for payments, Supply Chain Tracking to help farmers to browse, compare and buy various farm supplies such as fertilizers, seeds and pesticide from their mobile phones, Agriculture Subsidy to enable farmers to redeem subsidies given through various types of tokens (e.g. Potash Fertilizer Subsidy) through this app and Hyper spectral Imagery to capture satellite imagery of land and check the health of the crop, soil moisture, pest information and then using the above mentioned parameters to recommend remedial measures.

March 12, 2018

Washington’s Road User Charge Goes Live

ISSY LES MOULINEAUX, France, March 12, 2018 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — emovis, the mobility solution provider of the world’s leading highway management firm, Abertis, is thrilled to announce the start of the Washington Road User Charge (WARUC) Pilot Project.

For 12 months, 2,000 volunteers will participate in the pilot in order to experience the replacement of the gas tax by a pay-per-mile travelled charge. Drivers will simulate paying for the miles they drive rather than the gallons of fuel they buy. The results of this year-long trial will help shape the state’s future transportation funding policy. Piloting Road User Charge in the State of Washington

emovis is proud to take part in this initiative that seeks to explore new ways of providing sustainable transportation revenues to maintain critical road infrastructures in the US. This exciting project illustrates emovis’ long history of Road Usage Charge projects in the US, where the company is involved in Oregon’s RUC Pilot (wwww.myorego.org) as well as similar projects in Europe. emovis is committed to continuous innovation in conceiving smart road-based mobility solutions.

Cloud-based Mobility Solution
In addition to implementing a cloud-hosted back office solution, emovis provides On-Board Diagnostic (OBD-II) mileage recording devices and smartphone app technology, thanks to its partnership with Automatic®.

Automatic® is a San Francisco based leader in connecting every car on the road to the internet and empowering drivers with knowledge about themselves and their cars. Through this strategic partnership, emovis is leading the way in introducing a commercially available off-the-shelf consumer product and applying it to a road user charge solution.

The Challenge of Out of State Drivers
As with any state-based road charging program, out-of-state drivers pose a challenge in terms of compliance and revenue enforcement for state road authorities.

One of the key objectives of WARUC is precisely this—to test multi-jurisdictional charging by relying on the location-aware capabilities of the on-board mileage recording devices. The simulated charges applied to the participants’ trips differ depending on the location of each recorded mile travelled. All of this is achieved while adhering to strict privacy and data protection guidelines set out by the State.

About WARUC (www.waroadusagecharge.org)
Washington state is testing a Road Usage Charge (WARUC) where drivers simulate paying for miles driven rather than gallons of gas purchased. Various methods of mileage reporting will be tested during this trial.

This pilot is aimed at exploring new ways to fund the upkeep of roads as states are confronted with fast declining gas tax-based revenues.

In September 2017, following a competitive tender, emovis was selected to provide a turnkey RUC solution in support of the Washington State Transportation Commission’s RUC pilot project.

About emovis
emovis is focused on keeping roads moving through toll-based smart mobility solutions. With over 600 employees worldwide, the company operates some of the world’s largest free-flow tolling infrastructure in the UK, Ireland, U.S., and Canada.

In addition to being awarded the WA RUC project in 2017, emovis successfully launched UK’s second All Electronic Tolling near Liverpool (www.merseyflw.co.uk) last October. The company is 100% owned by Abertis (www.abertis.com), the international market leader in the management of toll roads, managing over 5,300 miles (8,600 kilometres) of high capacity and quality roads in 15 countries in Europe, the Americas and Asia.

www.emovis.com
Media Contact: Benoît ROSSI
communication@emovis.com

A photo accompanying this announcement is available at http://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/a36cf3b5-7286-4328-9c6c-4da005563877

March 7, 2018

WANdisco Launches OEM Sales Partnership with Alibaba Cloud

LONDON, March 7, 2018/PRNewswire-FirstCall/ —

WANdisco Fusion to be embedded as a standard component in selected Alibaba Cloud solutions
Represents WANdisco’s first OEM agreement in China significantly expanding addressable market

WANdisco (LSE: WAND), the Live Data Company, announces it has entered into a non-exclusive OEM (‘Original Equipment Manufacturer’) sales agreement with Alibaba Cloud, the cloud computing arm of Alibaba Group.

Under the sales agreement, WANdisco Fusion, a solution that seamlessly replicates transactional data at petabyte scale without downtime or disruption, will be sold as a standard component on Alibaba Cloud, covering several key aspects including Live Data migration to Alibaba Cloud, Alibaba Cloud for disaster recovery and hybrid big data with Alibaba Cloud. The partnership represents a substantial increase in WANdisco’s addressable market and a significant extension of its channel strategy.

Mr. Hong Tang, Chief Architect of Alibaba Cloud, commented:

“We believe WANdisco’s unique Live Data platform can significantly help our customers to leverage cloud for their data computing demands, whether it is to migrate their on premise data to our cloud, utilize cloud for disaster recovery solutions or maintain a hybrid-cloud solution, while ensuring their data is always available, accurate and protected.“

Mr. David Richards, Chief Executive Officer and Interim Chairman of WANdisco, commented:

“Partnering with Alibaba Cloud marks another significant milestone in our emergence as a critical part of cloud infrastructure. Our channel strategy has enabled us to expand our addressable market by; opening up new use cases for WANdisco Fusion, moving into new sectors, and now, growing our platform in new geographies. This is our first OEM agreement in the Chinese market and Alibaba Cloud is the largest provider of public cloud services in China, which adds significant market reach and scale to our business.“

About WANdisco

WANdisco is shaping the future of data infrastructure with its groundbreaking Live Data platform, enabling companies to put all their data to work for the business – all the time, at any scale.

WANdisco makes data always available, always accurate, and always protected, delivering hyperscale economics to support exponential data growth with the same IT budget. With significant OEM relationships with IBM and Dell EMC and go-to-market partnerships with Amazon Web Services, Cisco, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Oracle and other industry titans – as well as hundreds of customers among the Global 2000 – WANdisco is igniting a Live Data movement worldwide.

For additional information, please visit http://www.wandisco.com.

For further information, please contact:
FTI Consulting +44-(0)20-3727-1000
Matt Dixon / Harry Staight / Leah Dudley / Kwaku Aning wandisco@fticonsulting.com

Source: WANdisco

March 1, 2018

du Collaborates with Cisco on IP Core Network Modernization and Expansion

New agile network is foundational for du’s rapid transformation into a digital ICT service provider; Supports plans for next-generation applications and services for the 5G era

BARCELONA, Spain, March 01, 2018 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Mobile World Congress — UAE-based telco ‘du,’ from Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Company (EITC), and Cisco announced a collaboration to build a future-proof network that is designed to support du’s rapid transformation into a digital service provider. The announcement was made to coincide with Mobile World Congress 2018, being held 26 February to 1 March this year.

Demand for more bandwidth is rising exponentially as consumers and businesses embrace new digital applications, services and technologies. In order to meet this demand, du is replacing its existing IP core network with a scalable and 5G-ready infrastructure that will reduce network complexity and enable it to become a more agile and flexible market player.

du selected Cisco IP core network to modernize, expand and complete a seamless migration to virtualised and native cloud architecture. The network modernization will increase the capacity of the core network to 24 terabytes per node, making du’s network ready for ultra-broadband services. This enables du to offer next-generation digital services pertaining to augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (AR), in addition to other new applications and services made possible by 5G.

Saleem Al Blooshi, EITC’s Chief Infrastructure Officer, said: “du is already supporting the realisation of the UAE’s Vision 2021 by empowering the digital economy and driving Dubai’s transformation into a smart city. 5G is going to play an important role in that. 5G is a phased approach and we will continue with trials until we officially launch it. With the deployment of a more scalable and agile network, we will be well-placed to support 5G, smart city services, the IoT and other new, innovative digital services.”

As both consumer and commercial 5G use cases gain traction, demand for mobile and ultra-fast broadband services continues to accelerate in the UAE. The expanded capacity of du’s network will help stimulate local innovation, particularly around the application of Artificial Intelligence (AI), smart city and IoT technologies, while supporting the country’s vision for a data-driven future.

Ali Amer, Cisco’s Managing Director of Global Service Provider for Middle East and Africa, added: “By working with Cisco, du’s 5G-ready network will deliver a more virtual and far more scalable infrastructure that forms the foundation for future solutions and new business opportunities.”

About du:
du is a vibrant and multiple award-winning telecommunications service provider serving 9 million individual customers with its mobile, fixedline, broadband internet, and Home services over its 4G LTE network. du also caters to over 100,000 UAE businesses with its vast range of ICT and managed services. Since its launch in 2007, du has many UAE firsts to its credit, including introduction of Pay by the Second® billing system, IPTV and self-service portal.

du is ideally placed to support the realisation of UAE Vision 2021 and transformation of Dubai into a Smart City. du is also the official strategic partner of the Smart Dubai Office and the platform provider for Smart Dubai. Following the successful testing of the Middle East’s first Internet of Things (IoT) network, du is on course to complete deployment of its IoT network in 2016.

Brand Finance ranked du as the 12th most valuable brand in the Middle East in 2016. du previously won the coveted Brand of the year title by Superbrands Middle East in 2013. The company has been recognised with several other awards such as ISO 27001 certification of Managed Security Services and having the distinction of opening UAE’s first LEED Platinum Certified Green Shop. du also has the unique distinction of the first telecom in the world to release Sustainability Report based on GRI-G4 guidelines in 2014. du is also credited with du’s world-class teleport is the largest of its kind in the Middle East and ranked among the top teleports in the world by World teleport Association.

du is 39.5 percent owned by Emirates Investment Authority, 19.75 percent by Mubadala Development Company PJSC, 19.5 percent by Emirates Communications and Technology LLC and the remaining by public shareholders. Listed on the Dubai Financial Market (DFM), the company trades under the name ‘du’.

About Cisco
Cisco (NASDAQ:CSCO) is the worldwide technology leader that has been making the Internet work since 1984. Our people, products, and partners help society securely connect and seize tomorrow’s digital opportunity today. Discover more at thenetwork.cisco.com and follow us on Twitter at @Cisco.

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