RSS Feed Source: MIT Technology Review

In July 2024, a botched update to the software defenses managed by cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike caused more than 8 million Windows systems to fail. From hospitals to manufacturers, stock markets to retail stores, the outage caused parts of the global economy to grind to a halt. Payment systems were disrupted, broadcasters went off the air, and flights were canceled. In all, the outage is estimated to have caused direct losses of more than $5 billion to Fortune 500 companies. For US air carrier Delta Air Lines, the error exposed the brittleness of its systems. The airline suffered weeks of disruptions, leading to $500 million in losses and 7,000 canceled flights.

The magnitude of the CrowdStrike incident revealed just how interconnected digital systems are, and the extensive vulnerabilities in some companies when confronted with an unexpected occurrence. “On any given day, there could be

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RSS Feed Source: MIT Technology Review

In December 1947, three physicists at Bell Telephone Laboratories—John Bardeen, William Shockley, and Walter Brattain—built a compact electronic device using thin gold wires and a piece of germanium, a material known as a semiconductor. Their invention, later named the transistor (for which they were awarded the Nobel Prize in 1956), could amplify and switch electrical signals, marking a dramatic departure from the bulky and fragile vacuum tubes that had powered electronics until then.

Its inventors weren’t chasing a specific product. They were asking fundamental questions about how electrons behave in semiconductors, experimenting with surface states and electron mobility in germanium crystals. Over months of trial and refinement, they combined theoretical insights from quantum mechanics with hands-on experimentation in solid-state physics—work many might have dismissed as too basic, academic, or unprofitable.

Their efforts culminated in a moment that now marks the dawn of the information

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RSS Feed Source: MIT Technology Review

During Black Friday in 2024, Stripe processed more than $31 billion in transactions, with processing rates peaking at 137,000 transactions per minute, the highest in the company’s history. The financial-services firm had to analyze every transaction in real time to prevent nearly 21 million fraud attempts that could have siphoned more than $910 million from its merchant customers. 

Yet, fraud protection is only one reason that Stripe embraced real-time data analytics. Evaluating trends in massive data flows is essential for the company’s services, such as allowing businesses to bill based on usage and monitor orders and inventory. In fact, many of Stripe’s services would not be possible without real-time analytics, says Avinash Bhat, head of data infrastructure at Stripe. “We have certain products that require real-time analytics, like usage-based billing and fraud detection,” he says. “Without our real-time analytics, we would not have a few

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Across industries, enterprises are increasingly adopting an on-demand approach to compute, storage, and applications. They are favoring digital services that are faster to deploy, easier to scale, and better integrated with partner ecosystems. Yet, one critical pillar has lagged: the network. While software-defined networking has made inroads, many organizations still operate rigid, pre-provisioned networks. As applications become increasingly distributed and dynamic—including hybrid cloud and edge deployments—a programmable, on-demand network infrastructure can enhance and enable this new era.

From CapEx to OpEx: The new connectivity mindset

Another, practical concern is also driving this shift: the need for IT models that align cost with usage. Rising uncertainty about inflation, consumer spending, business investment, and global supply chains are just a few of the economic factors weighing on company decision-making. And chief information officers (CIOs) are scrutinizing capital-expenditure-heavy infrastructure more closely and increasingly adopting operating-expenses-based

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