Here is the top tech news from the week.
Skypad in the Cloud
Sky IT Group’s Skypad, the SaaS data reporting platform for retailers and brands, said it is transitioning to Google Cloud. The platform offers product sales trends and insights. The sell-through data from Skypad is culled from more than 200 retailers, 4,000-plus luxury and beauty brands, and more than 30,000 stores.
Due to the company’s growth, Skypad has teamed up with Google Cloud, which the company said “will assist Skypad in delivering high performance standards, in a protected, scalable, cost-effective space.”
“The partnership will alleviate the need for constant maintenance, and rather offer a very adaptable structure that is not constrained with capacity limitations on legacy systems,” the company said.
As a result of the partnership, Skypad will be able to offer more services to its retail and brand clients, which include encryption and AI capabilities as well as business continuity. The company said that Google Cloud will assist it in continuing to provide its retail and brand clients “with instant responsiveness to data insights that they are used to – data on-demand that is self-serve, and readily available at their fingertips.”
Natan Stein, chief technology officer at Skypad said the move to Google Cloud “will bring significant benefits to our team, as well as to our Skypad community. We expect a substantial increase in scalability, improved security, shorter implementation timeframes, and additional reliability.”
Stein said the bottom line is that the move to Google Cloud will allow Skypad to better serve their clients while helping them to grow their business.
Introducing Amazon Q
Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS), a subsidiary of Amazon.com Inc., announced the rollout of Amazon Q, which the company describes as a cutting-edge generative artificial intelligence (AI) assistant designed to revolutionize software development. The company said Amazon Q enhances productivity by generating accurate code and managing tasks like debugging, testing and upgrading software.
Amazon Q’s capabilities extend beyond software development, offering features that analyze and answer questions relating to business data, from company policies and product details to business outcomes. In a significant addition, AWS introduced Amazon Q Apps, enabling employees to create AI-powered apps using simple descriptions to automate tasks and streamline workflow.
“Amazon Q presents the foremost advanced generative AI capacities with unmatched precision and comprehensive security, significantly enhancing developer productivity and accelerating business decision-making,” said Dr. Swami Sivasubramanian, AWS’s vice president of artificial intelligence and data.
In terms of security improvements, the company said Amazon Q sets a new standard in vulnerability scanning and remediation, delivering scanning capabilities that outperform other leading tools and ensuring the secure development of applications.
On the business front, Amazon Q Business links to over 40 common business tools, managing and extracting useful insights from an extensive range of data silos. Security and privacy are foundational, with rigorous integration of existing identity and access management protocols to assure that business interactions remain secure. Also, Q Apps now empowers employees to swiftly create AI-driven applications tailored to specific data-driven tasks, enhancing operational efficiency across departments.
AWS said also it remains committed to enhancing its services to support various workloads, with expansions planned across global regions to include data centers in countries like Malaysia, Mexico, and Thailand.
AWS’s initiative aligns with Amazon’s mission to prioritize customer needs, innovate persistently, and uphold excellence in operations. As AWS and Amazon continue to pioneer technological advancements and sustainability efforts, Amazon Q stands out as a transformative tool set to redefine the landscape of business and software development.
