How nanotechnology can revive Nigeria’s textile industry

Yannick Folly/AFP via Getty Images Agbaje Lateef, Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, Ogbomoso

Nigeria’s cotton production has fallen steeply in recent years. It once supported the largest textile industry in Africa. The fall is due to weak demand for cotton and to poor yields resulting from planting low-quality cottonseeds. For these reasons, farmers switched from cotton to other crops.

Nigeria’s cotton output fell from 602,400 tonnes in 2010 to 51,000 tonnes in 2020. In the 1970s and early 1980s, the country’s textile industry had 180 textile mills employing over 450,000 people, supported by about 600,000 cotton farmers. By 2019, there were 25 textile mills and 25,000 workers.

The industry competes in a global textile market that was valued at US$ 993.6 billion in 2021 and is expected to grow at a rate of 4.0% from 2022 to 2030. Once the continent’s leader, Nigeria spends on average US$4 billion a year to import textiles that it could produce itself. Imports put pressure on foreign exchange reserves, jobs and local demand for cotton.

Technical innovation could make the textile sector more competitive – not only by improving cotton production but also by improving textile quality. This can be achieved in Nigeria.

Nowadays, textiles’ properties can be greatly improved through nanotechnology – the use of extremely small materials with special properties. Nanomaterials like graphene and silver nanoparticles make textiles stronger, durable, and resistant to germs, radiation, water and fire.

Adding nanomaterials to textiles produces nanotextiles. These are often “smart” because they respond to the external environment in different ways when combined with electronics. They can be used to harvest and store energy, to release drugs, and as sensors in different applications.

Nanotextiles are increasingly used in defence and healthcare. For hospitals, they are used to produce bandages, curtains, uniforms and bedsheets with the ability to kill pathogens. The market value of nanotextiles was US$5.1 billion in 2019 and could reach US$14.8 billion in 2024.

At the moment, Nigeria is not benefiting from nanotextiles’ economic potential as it produces none. With over 216 million people, the country should be able to support its textile industry. It could also explore trading opportunities in the African Continental Free Trade Agreement to market innovative nanotextiles.

Nanotextiles in Nigeria

Our nanotechnology research group has made the first attempt to produce nanotextiles using cotton and silk in Nigeria. We used silver and silver-titanium oxide nanoparticles produced by locust beans’ wastewater. Locust bean is a multipurpose tree legume found in Nigeria and some other parts of Africa. The seeds, the fruit pulp and the leaves are used to prepare foods and drinks.

The seeds are used to produce a local condiment called “iru” in southwest Nigeria. The processing of iru generates a large quantity of wastewater that is not useful. We used the wastewater to reduce some compounds to produce silver and silver-titanium nanoparticles in the laboratory.

Fabrics were dipped into nanoparticle solutions to make nanotextiles. Thereafter, the nanotextiles were exposed to known bacteria and fungi. The growth of the organisms was monitored to determine the ability of the nanotextiles to kill them.

The nanotextiles prevented growth of several pathogenic bacteria and black mould, making them useful as antimicrobial materials. They were active against germs even after being washed five times with detergent. Textiles without nanoparticles did not prevent the growth of microorganisms.

These studies showed that nanotextiles can kill harmful microorganisms including those that are resistant to drugs. Materials such as air filters, sportswear, nose masks, and healthcare fabrics produced from nanotextiles possess excellent antimicrobial attributes. Nanotextiles can also promote wound healing and offer resistance to radiation, water and fire.

Our studies established the value that nanotechnology can add to textiles through hygiene and disease prevention. Using nanotextiles will promote good health and well-being for sustainable development. They will assist to reduce infections that are caused by germs.

Despite these benefits, nanomaterials in textiles can have some unwanted effects on the environment, health and safety. Some nanomaterials can harm human health causing irritation when they come in contact with skin or inhaled. Also, their release to the environment in large quantities can harm lower organisms and reduce growth of plants. We recommend that the impacts of nanotextiles should be evaluated case by case before use.

Reviving Nigeria’s textile sector

In addition to government’s efforts to revive Nigeria’s textile sector, opportunities in nanotechnology should be explored. Smart nanotextiles that can compete favourably with foreign textiles could be produced locally.

Agriculture can benefit from nanopesticides, nanofungicides and nanofertilizers boosting crop yield. This has been applied to cotton farming. Nanotechnology is also useful to treat effluents of the textile industry in an eco-friendly manner.

Together with higher cotton production, nanotextile products can return Nigeria’s textile industry to glory. This is a unique way to improve Nigeria’s economy by nanotechnology.

Agbaje Lateef, Professor of Microbiology, Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, Ogbomoso

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Citing blogs in academic publications: lessons from urban planning in COVID

Blog art. Shutterstock. www.shutterstock.com

Abeer Elshater, Ain Shams University and Hisham Abusaada, Housing and Building National Research Center

Blogs are a double-edged sword. These online essays can be produced by anyone with access to a computer and the internet. The writers could be well-informed experts with valuable insights to share, or official government agencies. Some bloggers are outstanding academic authors who have published their work in accessible databases, like Scopus, Web of Science and Google Scholar. Others may be poorly informed people simply sharing a biased opinion.

Although readers might be able to comment on a blog, the material doesn’t have the status of peer-reviewed academic research. Checks for quality and reliability aren’t built into blog publishing as they are in academic journals. Previous research has discussed the role of blogging communities as reference sources in scientific manuscripts. The University of Cambridge has warned its researchers not to rely on them.

But some blogs still have appeal as sources of information and ideas for researchers because they often deal with new situations that haven’t yet been covered in the traditional academic literature.

The emergence of COVID was a perfect example of a new and fast-changing situation like this. Vast amounts of information were becoming available online — some of it in blogs that were reliable and useful to the public and to academics, some not.

Researchers and students need to know how to balance their data sources.

Little is known about how to identify reliable blog content in our field of study, urban planning. We decided to explore this, starting by looking at which kinds of blogs were already being cited by academics, and what criteria they were using to guide their choice of blogs.

We found the blogs cited in academic publications were mostly published by governmental and non-governmental organisations. We analysed the ways in which these blogs had influenced the public dialogue over COVID, and demonstrated that they were founded on unique ideas that had not yet undergone peer assessment.

We also came up with three tips that academics can use for citing blogs in their research.

Citing blogs about COVID-19

A lot of academics and researchers of city planning and design turned to blogs during the coronavirus outbreak for information. We conducted a scoping study in 2020, analysing 31 samples from four types of blogging sources cited in 10 publications published in seven journals. We looked at social sciences journals published in 2020 and searched for blogs that were used as references in such articles about COVID-19.

We found that in the year 2020, academics and researchers in urban planning and design used blogs produced by four types of publishers: government agencies, nongovernmental organisations, private groups, and individuals.

Moreover, we found that academics and researchers cited blogs for three reasons:

• collecting quantitative data resulting from statistical analysis

• shedding light on qualitative knowledge related to social solutions like social distancing and lockdown

• confronting the challenges of pandemics through the principles of urban planning.

Criteria for citing blogs

This analysis was part of a wider study of the use of blogs by academics. Based on this work, we have three tips for finding blogs that publish scientific findings on vital topics like COVID-19 and can be cited in scholarly articles.

1. It is possible for academics and researchers in urban planning and design to cite blogs in their scholarly works. This is done by selecting posts that provide relevant analysis, results and findings done by government agencies and nongovernmental organisations.

2. For blogs written by individuals or private groups such as Brookings and CityLab, it crucial to keep track of bloggers in scientific databases, like the Web of Science, Scopus or Google Scholar. Several metrics can help to understand bloggers’ standing, including the number of citations, h-index, and normalised citation impact.

3. Citing blogs can be based on the number of views or reviews, which can indicate the possibility of an open-ended debate about the post. However, it is important to remember that while blog views can seem important, they are not necessarily a reliable metric to cite blogs. Blog views reflect the importance of the topic rather than the reliability of the information provided in the blog.

By following these tips, academics and researchers can use blogs as reliable sources of information. They can be cited in scholarly publications for emerging issues such as COVID-19 in its early stages. These tips can guide academics and researchers when they tackle topics still under research or not covered in scientific studies.

Abeer Elshater, Professor, Ain Shams University and Hisham Abusaada, Professor in Housing and Building National Research Center (HBRC), Cairo, Egypt, Housing and Building National Research Center

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Ride-hailing in Lagos: algorithmic impacts and driver resistance

A driver checking the Uber App. Simon Maina/AFP via Getty Images Daniel Arubayi, University of Oxford

In July 2014, the ride-hailing app Uber emerged in Lagos, offering the public improved mobility through technology. Uber, at the time, was valued at US$18 billion and had launched in 205 cities. Its competitor, Bolt, arrived in Nigeria in 2016.

These apps enable passengers to request a taxi service immediately. They can see information like the fare range, driver ratings, trip distance and driver’s arrival time. The driver sees the passenger’s location, fare range and passenger rating. The driver gets a short time in which to accept or reject a trip request.

Lagos was an obvious market for a transport solution. The city is Nigeria’s financial, economic and digital hub, with over 15.4 million people and a public transport system under strain. From the rider’s point of view, Uber and Bolt offered the benefit of improved vehicles, cheaper fares, efficiency, traceability and safety.

The benefit for potential drivers was employment.

When Uber came to Nigeria, the unemployment rate was around 4.6%. By the time Bolt arrived in 2016, it had increased to 9.1%. Youth unemployment increased from 8.1% to 12.4% in the same period, and there was a recession. It was easy for these platforms to tempt potential drivers and employees with popular phrases like “be your own boss”. These platforms advertised that drivers made between about US$286 and US$477 a week. The minimum wage was 18,000 Naira (US$43.34) a month at the time and even white-collar workers were poorly paid and sometimes had to wait a long time to be paid.

In 2017, Uber claimed to have 276,000 riders and 7,000 drivers in Nigeria.

Uber and Bolt seemed to perfect the platform idea. The systems created digital identities for drivers and managed them through algorithms. This was supposed to create transparency, accountability, autonomy, flexibility, safety and security. But it also created challenges for drivers.

I researched this for my PhD thesis, exploring the impact of algorithmic management on platform drivers in Lagos and how they resisted these hidden forms of control.

For the advantages of ride-hailing platforms to outweigh the challenges, algorithms must reflect the realities of drivers and nuances of the city where they are used. Traceability and safety on platforms must be improved, too, especially as the business model is adopted by more startups across the transport, delivery and domestic work industries.

Impacts of algorithmic management in Lagos

The design of the Uber and Bolt platforms demands top-notch service from drivers. This is done through performance evaluations (such as ratings, and acceptance and cancellation rates); transparency of payment (dashboard display of earnings); incentives (promotional trips); and sanctions (disciplining bad or unsafe behaviours by blocking or deactivating drivers).

To understand how this worked in practice in Lagos, I interviewed 25 drivers over six months, took 40 platform trips and carried out three focused group discussions with both platform drivers and traditional taxi drivers. I also used online worker groups on Facebook and interviewed passengers, policy representatives and venture capitalists. In total, about 70 people were directly involved in this study.

In this article, I summarise some of the challenges and strategies of resistance that my research revealed.

The first challenge the platforms present is that drivers can be exposed to danger. A ride-hailing driver has to register with a platform by providing personal information such as a valid driver’s licence, certifications such as proof of the vehicle passing inspection, address and guarantors to validate worker details. Passengers provide less personal information: contact numbers, bank card details (optional), email addresses and addresses which are not verified. Drivers are vulnerable to passengers. One driver said:

A good number of drivers have been killed by riders because platforms do not profile them well. They do not often input their correct information in the app; they are collecting cars and killing people.

Even if passengers are blocked from the app following drivers’ complaints, they can re-enter the platform ecosystem with different accounts. In contrast, drivers can be temporarily or permanently deactivated if a passenger complains – even falsely. Drivers are calling for better scrutiny of passengers because they do not feel safe on platforms.

Drivers complain they are sometimes misled into traffic jams. Daniel Arubayi

The second challenge is the inaccuracy of embedded digital maps. In a city like Lagos, a poorly built environment without a proper address system, the app can mislead drivers to traffic jams, bad roads or areas undergoing infrastructural construction. This can delay pick-up or arrival times, lead to conflict with passengers, affect the fare, increase cancellation rates, and reduce ratings.

Passengers complicate this issue by switching pickup locations or providing false locations. This affects drivers’ arrival times and hence their performance record. The algorithms don’t properly account for these realities of driving in Lagos.

Escaping the app

Drivers have found ways to resist the algorithms to make more income. For instance, drivers ask riders to cancel a trip so they (drivers) aren’t penalised by cancelling it themselves. They earn a cancellation fee and then take the passengers on the trip anyway – offline.

Drivers persuade passengers to do this by raising the possibility of traffic jams, dangerous or very distant locations and bad roads. They then suggest that the rider cancel the trip and go offline on a better route at a lower fare.

Sometimes, passengers initiate offline trips, especially if they go to multiple destinations or travel out of the city. It suits the drivers because they are not entirely subject to the algorithm in terms of payment, ratings and directions from embedded maps.

Social media and communication networks such as Facebook, WhatsApp and Telegram are central to drivers’ resistance strategies. These online environments serve as daily commentary on the job and a source of tricks for how to resist algorithms. Drivers can comment on whether a proposed offline fare is reasonable, for example, or share details of a passenger for safety.

One informant told me a story about a female passenger who refused to pay a driver:

When this was posted in the WhatsApp group, about 27 drivers visited the lady, seized her iPhone, and collected the fare, including money for damages.

Build in local realities

Platforms such as Uber and Bolt possess the power to fully digitise the transport industry in Lagos with their technology.

But platform algorithms in isolation cannot solve the challenges drivers experience, mainly when contexts are so different from the global north where the platforms were designed.

Daniel Arubayi, Researcher, University of Oxford

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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What is Conversational AI? Conversational Ai In Customer Self-service

 

Customers prefer to interact with brands that think beyond their products and value customer experience over everything else. Increased adoption of digital technology has led to a rise in customer expectations. Customers are ready to pay premium rates for convenience and knowledge.

Self-service has gained popularity among tech-savvy customers as they do not wish to wait and want a quick resolution of their issues. They expect brands to be proactive and make the required information available on their portal. Companies are adopting the latest technologies to keep pace with increasing customer expectations.

They are enriching their knowledge base with high-quality and relevant content. Advanced technology like Conversational AI, ML, and Deep Learning makes the content easily accessible to customers. These practices also help organizations improve their customer retention and loyalty rates.

Here we give you an overview of how augmenting Conversational AI is beneficial for enhancing the customer self-service experience:

What is Customer Self-Service?

Customer self-service involves making product-related, troubleshooting, and other critical information readily available to customers. Self-service is empowering your customers to resolve their issues by themselves. It includes answers to FAQs, how-to videos, tutorials, and other relevant content.

Customer expectations have risen manifolds with the rapid adoption of digital tools and procedures. Research shows that over 88% of customers expect a company to provide self-service support through their portal. They want quicker resolution of their problems. With easy access to the internet, they even prefer doing it on their own.

Companies can benefit from the strategic implementation of self-service. It is a step towards achieving higher levels of customer satisfaction. Self-service options offer you the following benefits:

24/7 support
Reduced cost of call center resources
Decrease in customer wait times
Increased service agent productivity
Delight customers through personalized support
Identify customer pain points through analytics of knowledge base search data
Find scope for product improvements or innovations

What is Conversational AI?

Conversational AI enables the automation of customer support processes by driving human-like conversations. It involves implementing AI-powered chatbots, Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems, and speech-based assistants to resolve customer queries. Unlike traditional chatbots, these do not run on pre-programmed algorithms.

Instead, AI-enabled automation tools work on advanced technologies. They use Natural Language Processing (NLP) and Machine Learning (ML) technologies to learn and comprehend customer behavior. Their interactions are more human and meaningful.

The major advantages of implementing Conversational AI for customer service are:

Effectively handle multiple queries at a time
Personalized and relevant responses to customer queries
24/7 availability across multiple devices
AI helps improve capabilities over time

Role of Conversational AI in Delivering Customer Self-Service

Conversational AI is transforming customer service and effectively meeting rising customer demands. Prioritizing self-service helps to make the buyer journey more convenient. It builds trust and assures the customer of quality assistance throughout the day.

Here is how Conversational AI is transforming customer self-service:

Improve Productivity of Support Teams: Companies can improve the productivity of their human agents by implementing an AI-backed self-service strategy. Customer self-service enabled through Conversational AI-backed bots helps in reducing the number of calls and emails landing at your human representatives. It frees your support teams to handle more complex queries and address customers in need of emotional assistance.

Reduce Churn Rate(RCR): Customers value experiences over products. Research shows over 32% of customers would quit transacting with a company after a bad experience. Virtual agents reduce churn rates by addressing 100% of support requests. In case the query is complex, conversational AI routes it to a human representative.

Offers Unmatched Convenience: Conversational voice assistants deliver more human-like experiences compared to text-based chatbots. Users save time and effort by speaking their questions instead of typing them. Voice bots respond to customer queries in real-time and offer hyper-personalized solutions. They offer friendly and engaging conversations leaving your customers delighted.

Components of Conversational AI

Customer self-service tools efficiently reduce the number of contacts a customer makes with your service agents. Conversational AI comprises the following components:

Natural Language Processing & Understanding: Conversational AI-based bots recognize customer intent through their speech patterns and choice of words.

Automatic Speech Recognition(ASR): It recognizes local accents and lingo to understand customer requirements. ML-based bots learn the local language through several voice samples. They constantly improve their abilities over time by interacting with more customers.

Takeaway

Providing your customers with a frictionless self-service experience is important to retain them and build lasting relationships. Implementing chatbots and virtual assistants across all your organizational platforms, including social media channels, keeps the experience consistent.

AI-driven bots respond effectively to customer queries. They can even help your customers by digging up and sharing links to valuable resources from your database. In case of increased complexity, they can leverage intelligent call routing to connect customers to live agents.

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Things To Consider For Selecting An Efficient Gps Tracking Software?

 

 

Gone are the days when the managers had to work tirelessly to manage various aspects of fleet operations. Nowadays, their job has become much more convenient with the introduction of GPS tracking software. It allows everything from managing trips and monitoring location to ensuring fuel efficiency.

Due to the time-tested effectiveness of the vehicle tracking systems, many fleet businesses are deploying them around the globe. However, choosing the monitoring solutions with utmost care is integral for getting the best possible outcomes. Let us look at the various things to consider before selecting the vehicle tracking system.

Mobile App Availability:

Nowadays, fleet operations are very fast-paced, and keeping up with them requires mobile monitoring. As a manager, you would want to remain updated while on the move, and for that, the mobile app is required. Therefore, you should check whether the tracking solution offers a mobile monitoring app or not.

In addition to the mobile monitoring app, modern tracking solutions also come with a GPS tracking app. These apps can act as an alternative for the tracking devices as they provide live location updates about the driver’s whereabouts. Therefore, you should also look for the GPS app before selecting the monitoring solution to avoid the tracking device expenses.

Customer Support:

Customer support is an important thing to take into account before selecting any service. As many queries emerge while using a new software, it is essential to have efficient technical support. A fully designated team of professionals should be available to provide installation and answer client queries.

The purpose of customer service is to provide technical assistance and help clients get maximum output. As a client, you would not want to be restricted while asking for assistance; therefore, go for a solution that offers 24/7 support.

Notifications:

Real-time notifications are one of the essential features of
GPS Tracking Software . Notifications for different aspects like ignition status, motion status, unsafe driving, excessive idling, fuel leakage, etc., can be received.
They help managers to keep up with the changing operational activities and have complete control over the working of a fleet.

Checking the availability of notifications before selecting the tracking solution is essential. Moreover, make sure that a variety of notifications are offered that cover the various aspects. It will save you from sitting in front of the monitoring screen all the time, ensuring convenience.

User-friendliness:

If the software is not easy to use, it cannot be considered a good choice regardless of its other qualities. Therefore, it is essential to go for a solution that is easily understandable and convenient to navigate. Look for a system that is insightful and helps new users in exploring all the features easily.

A user-friendly system does not need to be simple in technology. With state-of-the-art functionality, the interface design should be simple and easy to navigate. It helps the user save excessive time spent on exploring the system.

Integration with other Software:

To manage fleet operations effectively, you need to have several solutions ranging from GPS tracking software to a financial management system. It is convenient for a manager to have a centralized platform integrated with all the other systems. A tracking solution integrated with other software provides the ideal situation for the managers as they can find everything in one place.

If you are looking for a solution that offers the best possible convenience, choose the one that comes with an integration option. As a manager, it will save you from checking multiple systems to access different types of data. It can help save time and be more productive.

Safety and Security:

Every business wants to achieve foolproof safety and do everything possible to ensure that. Software that contains all the safety features is the right option to choose. Some key features to look for in a system are Live Location Tracking, Alarm Systems, Driver Identification, Real-Time Notifications, Geofencing, etc.

An ideal solution covers every aspect of fleet safety, ranging from theft and accident prevention to data security. Moreover, it should offer assistance to meet the compliance requirements.

Pricing:

Budget is another essential factor to take into account while looking for tracking solutions. Make a priority list and categorize the most important features that you need in your GPS tracking software. If the software provides all of them at a reasonable cost, it is advisable to go for it.

It is essential to understand that the absolute price of different systems does not make them economical or expensive. The return on investment (ROI) tells you the cost-effectiveness of software. A little expensive system offering great ROI is better than a less expensive option with poor ROI.

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What Is The Big Data? You Need To Know

 

 

WHAT IS BIG DATA

Big Data is a collection of data that is largely characterized by the following components:

• the large volume of data which exists
• the wide variety of data types
• the velocity at which much of the data is generated, collated, processed and disseminated
• the veracity, meaning the reliability or truthfulness of the data
• the value, or the worth of the information which can be attained by the processing and analysis of large datasets

Big data gives you new insights that open up new opportunities and business models. Getting started involves three key actions:

1. Integrate

Big data brings together data from many disparate sources and applications. Traditional data integration mechanisms, such as extract, transform, and load (ETL) generally aren’t up to the task. It requires new strategies and technologies to analyze big data sets at terabyte, or even petabyte, scale.
During integration, you need to bring in the data, process it, and make sure it’s formatted and available in a form that your business analysts can get started with.

2. Manage

Big data requires storage. Your storage solution can be in the cloud, on premises, or both. You can store your data in any form you want and bring your desired processing requirements and necessary process engines to those data sets on an on-demand basis. Many people choose their storage solution according to where their data is currently residing. The cloud is gradually gaining popularity because it supports your current compute requirements and enables you to spin up resources as needed.

3. Analyze

Your investment in big data pays off when you analyze and act on your data. Get new clarity with a visual analysis of your varied data sets. Explore the data further to make new discoveries. Share your findings with others. Build data models with machine learning and artificial intelligence. Put your data to work.

BIG DATA BEST PRACTICES

1. Align big data with specific business goals

More extensive data sets enable you to make new discoveries. To that end, it is important to base new investments in skills, organization, or infrastructure with a strong business-driven context to guarantee ongoing project investments and funding. To determine if you are on the right track, ask how big data supports and enables your top business and IT priorities. Examples include understanding how to filter web logs to understand ecommerce behaviour, deriving sentiment from social media and customer support interactions, and understanding statistical correlation methods and their relevance for customer, product, manufacturing, and engineering data.

2. Ease skills shortage with standards and governance

One of the biggest obstacles to benefiting from your investment in big data is a skills shortage. You can mitigate this risk by ensuring that big data technologies, considerations, and decisions are added to your IT governance program. Standardizing your approach will allow you to manage costs and leverage resources. Organizations implementing big data solutions and strategies should assess their skill requirements early and often and should proactively identify any potential skill gaps. These can be addressed by training/cross-training existing resources, hiring new resources, and leveraging consulting firms.

3. Optimize knowledge transfer with a centre of excellence

Use a centre of excellence approach to share knowledge, control oversight, and manage project communications. Whether big data is a new or expanding investment, the soft and hard costs can be shared across the enterprise. Leveraging this approach can help increase big data capabilities and overall information architecture maturity in a more structured and systematic way.

4. Top payoff is aligning unstructured with structured data

It is certainly valuable to analyse big data on its own. But you can bring even greater business insights by connecting and integrating low density big data with the structured data you are already using today.
Whether you are capturing customer, product, equipment, or environmental big data, the goal is to add more relevant data points to your core master and analytical summaries, leading to better conclusions. For example, there is a difference in distinguishing all customer sentiment from that of only your best customers. Which is why many see big data as an integral extension of their existing business intelligence capabilities, data warehousing platform, and information architecture.
Keep in mind that the big data analytical processes and models can be both human- and machine-based. Big data analytical capabilities include statistics, spatial analysis, semantics, interactive discovery, and visualization. Using analytical models, you can correlate different types and sources of data to make associations and meaningful discoveries.

5. Align with the cloud operating model

Big data processes and users require access to a broad array of resources for both iterative experimentation and running production jobs. A big data solution includes all data realms including transactions, master data, reference data, and summarized data. Analytical sandboxes should be created on demand. Resource management is critical to ensure control of the entire data flow including pre- and post-processing, integration, in-database summarization, and analytical modelling. A well-planned private and public cloud provisioning and security strategy plays an integral role in supporting these changing requirements.

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Here's Why You Should Automate Your Home Now

 

The future is now, and you need to embrace it wholeheartedly. When it comes to your home, the one thing you look for is quality, and automating your home may help you achieve just that. You can also guarantee that your home is future-proofed for your potential children, or the next person who buys it. It also provides you with a home that guarantees convenience at the touch of a button.

1. Full control of your home

One of the best things about home automation London is that you’ll be in full control of everything, whether you’re in or out of your home. Say goodbye to worrying about whether or not you left the light or heating on, as you can simply check to make sure that you’ve turned them off.

2. Convenience at your fingertips

You don’t have to stand up and turn on any lights that you need, or check if the radiator is running with a fully automated home. Not only that, but with certain features, you can adjust temperatures, move security cameras around, and more right at the tip of your fingers. There are plenty of products and applications available to ensure that you can make full use of ...
... your home automation in London.

3. Save on bills and utilities

Because you can also set your lights and heaters to turn on and off in certain conditions, such as time, outside temperature, and more, you can also find that you save quite a bit on your utility bills. Find that you can save up to 25% of your monthly expense on utilities by fully automating your home.

4. Safety and security

There are plenty of cases of incidents happening outside your home due to poor lighting or a lack of security cameras to catch the culprit. With a fully automated home, you’ll be able to set lights to turn on when there is movement or help you not trip over yourself in the dark. It also gives you access to a live security feed of your CCTV cameras at home.

5. Environmentally conscious

Home automation has also proven to help with the environmental cause. Thanks to it being able to turn lights off when no one is around, you can find that you’ll be using a lot less energy in your home, making it more sustainable for your wallet, and the environment as well!

6. Everyone benefits

Finally, the benefits of a fully automated home encompass everyone who lives there. Children in your home can learn more about technology today, and can even bring your family closer together as you all learn about the benefits of home automation. The persk listed above are another thing that everyone benefits from as well.

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