To be competitive in these uncertain times, means working smarter than ever before. As your human workforce is often constrained by how and where they can work that involves a reliance on the latest technologies — especially AI-driven innovation. To be ready for this new reality and work from anywhere, however complex the task, requires the unrivalled power, security and reliability of the latest workstations.
Difficult times, like the pandemic, bring unprecedented business challenges. How do you predict consumer demand, and organize your supply chain to meet that, when there is disruption at every stage?
How do you provide clients with the 24x7 support they want during lockdown?
More especially, how do you support your workforce and ensure it is business as normal as it can be, when restrictions mean they are limited as to what they can do and where?
AI comes of age
The answer has been to accelerate the creation of a more blended workforce and introduce artificial intelligence (AI)-driven technologies to augment productivity.
AI itself isn’t new. The term was coined some 65 years ago. But it is now making good on its long-awaited promise. Described as the ‘defining technology of our age’ by PWC1, it has made possible everything from intelligent data analysis to better decision-making and the speech recognition that is powering the era of chatbots online.
These online digital assistants are now widely accepted as the first line of support in areas as different as online retail, healthcare, financial services and government.
More than three-quarters of consumers (77%) use AI-powered applications and the market for such products is growing rapidly. They are expected to be worth more than $15.7 trillion to the global economy by 2030,according to PwC1. AI, and the automation it brings, will also be the business advantage of the future, believe 72% of business leaders in the US.1
Tech’s 507,019 year advantage
Such technological advances are only possible because the hardware to power them is also smarter. It’s difficult to overestimate the magnitude of improvement in computing capacity and processing speed that powers the new reality.
For example, a graphics processing unit (GPU) today can run over 16 trillion calculations — decisions — every second. Put a human employee next to them to make the same number of decisions and they would take 507,019 years.
Be close to your workstation, remotely
Today’s workstations have the power, speed, configurability, security and reliability required for the new era of smarter working. They can run the demanding applications like CAD software, machine learning and data science that are fundamental to so many businesses.
To tackle these challenging workflows and keep everything running smoothly, it is vital that your people, wherever they are, can access the high-end power they need.
That was a particular concern during the pandemic, where remote working was the norm for many.
The good news is that power users can do their work without being at their workstation. Remote visualization technologies now enable users to access their machines anywhere, from any other device. More importantly, they can do so with minimal latency and the same smooth, desktop-like experience they would get with the machine close at hand.
In addition, data is secure as users access a centralized workstation and team collaboration is simple, as several remote users can share a machine at the same time.
Mobilize your high-end resources
When you really do want high-tech to hand, mobile workstations ensure you have on-the-go performance and power to rival many desktops.
The next generation desktop workstations are also designed for running ever more complex, power-hungry applications, in compact yet portable frames.
Lenovo’s ThinkStation P620, for example. It is the world's first Threadripper™ Pro workstation. What is remarkable is that it delivers a dual-CPU experience in a single-processor system. The result is limitless possibilities and a truly cost-effective alternative to dual socket systems. Now you can visualize, compute and create on one system with unmatched ROI.
However, you configure your workplace and workforce, it is the power of the workstation, in all its forms, that is driving new data-driven technologies like AI — enabling a smarter way of working, whatever the task.
1 Global Artificial Intelligence Study: Exploiting the AI Revolution, PwC
2 www.gartner.com/en/newsroom/press-releases
