I woke up excited about the events I had booked in for, The Art of Work (Microsoft & SAP) & HoloCare (Sopra Steria & Microsoft) Wow. The Art of Work. From the event description, my interpretation was that art would be used to describe the digital transformation of the businesses of Centrica, City & Guilds, and Co-op using Microsoft and SAP. The transformations were artfully described by the leaders of the three businesses, together with the key lessons learned. The artwork however was only a gimmick, sadly. The Architecture Social Club had provided interactive and audio visually stimulating sculptures based on the digital world. These installations were interesting but did not add to the story of the digital transformations being highlighted. There were also interesting unique 3D printed sculptures set on the stands for the Microsoft partners present. The sculptures were devised based on a series of questions answered by the partners. Again these did not really inform how they represented the various aspects of the partner companies. Maybe my expectations were too high. I suppose, recently having visited the Picasso exhibition at the Tate Modern, 1936: Love, Tragedy and War, which portrayed various pieces, depicting the journey of Picasso through that year, I was expecting the Art of Work pieces to represent the various stages of transformation and this was not the case. Again, this was purely from my perspective, although a fellow attendee also pointed out that it was not what thry expected either. The venue and the art installations were good, and stimulating, but however were not indicative of the transformation journey as far as I could see. That is only my interpretation and my opinion. Besides the art, there were key lessons to be learned from the event. After a brief introduction from the MD of SAP, UK and their offering, the customer case studies, were introduced by Clare Barclay from Microsoft. It was interesting to hear how Centrica were gathering huge amounts of data from their Hive devices, and Smart Meters, that had previously so difficult and manual to collect. This data was then being used to inform decisions around demand of energy in geographical regions as well as when it was hitting its peaks. City & Guilds story of how it moved to the cloud, and how pleased they were with the support and expertise they had received from Microsoft and SAP during the process. The representative from Co-op was also keen to describe how they were trying to put the right stock in the right shop at the right time. They were using their data to ensure that they knew what stock should be in place as well as locally sourcing it where possible. It was good to hear how they had also leveraged the SAP and Microsoft tools in order to do this. For me, the real reason for me to attend the event, was Lord Coe's talk. I wanted to hear about his transformation effort of taking London's Olympic Bid from a pitch to the huge success that it was. He talked about how a sporting event early on in his career had shaped his approach and philosophy around transformation, whether it be personal or business. He highlighted that there was more to transformation than the technical challenges to be faced. Key tips he included: His talk inspired, and you felt you were there with him, in his shoes, and felt the range of emotions, as he described the significant events. There were the obligatory quips, and jokes, and it was overall an excellently delivered and very entertaining talk. I enjoyed it immensely and found it informative, and could relate to the transformation journey he described, whether it be the digital one or any other kind. It was definitely the highlight of the event. Overall, I enjoyed it very much and am pleased I attended. It was not altogether what I expected in terms of the Art, and it could have been used in a far more representative way, but it was still a fantastic idea to include art in the technology event, and the pieces of art work were very cleverly designed. Thanks to all involved. HoloCare - Augmenting Surgery with the use of HoloLens. At first the venue and the preparation for the event in Sopra Steria DigiLab, did seem a little bit disappointing. However, the content of the event was so exciting, it didn't matter about the surroundings, and they just seemed like unnecessary frills. I am not overstating the level of energy in the room. This was not just due to the demo HoloLens headsets present. The key speaker was John Berland, from Sopra Steria. He relayed an inspiring tale of how Sopra Steria had teamed up with Oslo University to produce specific personalised 3D models of organs, in this case a heart, and use it in conjunction with the HoloLens to enable surgeons to practice the surgery more to increase the success rate of heart surgery in babies. There was a description of the meaning of mixed reality. It was extraordinary story, that took us from the accidental invention of the XRay by Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen to the use case of 3D modelling of the heart, and training surgical interactions using the HoloLens. It was also peppered with stories of how to use innovation and the path to take it from an idea to delivering real value to people. This was inspiring enough in itself. Then came the questions to the panel including representatives from Sopra Steria and Microsoft. The questions ranged from required compute power, to possible use cases, to speed of modelling, to speed of the sensors to feedback information, to the types of cameras used by the HoloLens, to the cost, to the possible business model, to the ethics and morality around using this technology. It was quite rightly expressed as an extra super power for people of X-ray vision. It could be used, to explore interactions with real physical structures, in a variety of different states without changing the original physical structure itself with the added benefit of having a mobile device that responded to gestures and spatial points. People were enthused and energised to hear more. I, for one, not only learned lots about the technology, the journey to develop it, and the possible uses for it, but was amazed by how quickly the project had progressed. The event went over time, but I think that was a good indication of the level of interest. It only goes to show that inspiring and interesting content will always capture people's imagination. The beer and pizza were good too. Again, thanks to all involved. All in all, a good Day one of the London Tech Week.
Technology

← Back to blog