Wisk Aero and NASA have signed a new five-year partnership to advance the safe integration of autonomous, all-electric aircraft into U.S. airspace, focusing on urban air mobility and regulated eVTOL flight. Electrek reports: Wisk Aero shared details of its refreshed partnership with NASA this week. The autonomous aviation specialist has signed a new five-year Non-Reimbursable Space Act Agreementwith the renowned space administration. Per Wisk, this new agreement focuses on critical research led by NASA's Air Traffic Management Explorationproject, which is centered around the advancement of commercialized autonomous aircraft travel under Instrument Flight Rulesin the National Airspace System. As a specialist in autonomous, zero-emission aircraft, Wisk intends to continue its research alongside NASA to help regulators determine future eVTOL flight procedures and capabilities in the US. Regulatory developments on the to-do list for the latest NRSAA include optimizing airspace and route designs for highly automated UAM operations, establishing critical aircraft and ground-based safety system requirements for autonomous flight in urban environments, and establishing Air Traffic Controlcommunication protocols and procedures for seamless integration of future UAM aircraft. To achieve these goals, Wisk said its research with NASA will more specifically focus on utilizing advanced simulation and Live Virtual Constructiveflight environments, which combine live flights with a simulated airspace to enable researchers to assess future operations. The teams from Wisk and NASA already met last month, continuing their research while beginning to determine how instrument flight procedures and advanced technologies can work together to enable safe autonomous passenger flights by 2030. Wisk Aero is a wholly owned subsidiary of Boeing based in California. The aerospace manufacturer said last year that it expects its pilotless air-taxi to begin carrying passengers "later in the decade." of this story at Slashdot. #wisk #aero #nasa #sign #5year

The artist takes me on a whistle-stop tour of the Auntieverse. #quotbefore #was #living #life #full

22 May, 2025 The Type Tasting founder's new podcast shows how visuals intersect with our other senses. She tells Rob Alderson why she thinks this could help save graphic design. Sarah Hyndman has an experiment she has been running at events for several years. She asks people to sniff two bottles of perfume and then say what they smell in each. Both perfumes are identical – only the typography on the bottles is different. And yet 72% of participants, nearly three quarters, describe the perfumes differently. It’s a perfect example of the sorts of insights Hyndman has been sharing through her books, talks, and other projects for the past 12 years. Having worked as a graphic designer – “one of the original Mac monkeys” – and run her own agency, Hyndman started Type Tasting in 2013, inspired by Stefan Sagmeister’s regular client-free sabbaticals. She wanted to research type’s ability to influence our other senses, find evidence to back up her intuition, and bring this knowledge to a broad audience. Now in her new podcast, Seeing Senses, she is interviewing chefs, psychologists and perfumiers, “to discover how they connect what we see to what we sense and feel.” We sat down with her to find out why she thinks multi-sensory design might help save the industry. Sarah Hyndman’s podcast Seeing Senses How does your podcast build on Type Tasting’s work? From the outset, Type Tasting was always multi-sensory, but I was looking at typography because it was a niche area. Type was just the gateway into the other senses. So we start with what you see, vision. Vision is about what gets your attention – that’s what branding and packaging does. But in my opinion, what we’ve forgotten in design is the follow-through – that senses like smell and sound boost the mood more than vision. So you need to back up the experiences you are designing with all the other senses if you’re going to create an emotional connection, make something feel personal, and create memories. What does that mean for graphic designers and their work? I think graphic design, as a term, is too one-dimensional. The visuals are the flag for your brand, so you can recognise it really quickly. But what does it sound like? What does it smell like? What does it feel like? How does your experience of this product change from location, to moment, to experience? I think we need to rewrite our job descriptions, so that we start thinking in a multi-sensory way from the outset. Who cares if it wasn’t in the brief? We need to be the challengers, the rebels that are saying “No, I think you need to think about this differently.” If we keep doing what’s already been done, that’s what AI could do. Our job is to find the gaps, to be the mavericks, and to do the lateral and creative thinking which, at the moment, AI can’t do. That infamous Future of Jobs report, that said graphic design was at risk of becoming extinct, was a wake-up call. That report is based on what business leaders think will be important over the next five years. Why is graphic design not seen as a useful skill? And do we need to talk about what it does in a different way? Yes, absolutely. Leaders need to see designers doing something, or being something, different. It always used to be that clients loved visiting their agencies. Why aren’t businesses excited by designers any more? I think we need to show people something that makes them say, “Oh, we need that.” Rather than showing them something which will win them awards. Type Tasting activations at Adobe Max. Photo by Grant Terzakis. As someone now studying neuroscience, how do you see the relationship between science and creativity? I did science all the way through school. I’ve never studied graphic design, so nobody ever told me I wasn’t allowed to experiment. As designers, we’re given permission to come up with solutions that fit the brief, but we’re not somehow given permission to go out and experiment. And there is a big misconception that science is very rigid, and will take all of your creativity away. Whereas real research is about constantly interrogating every statement. Always asking why, like an annoying five-year-old. And that same curiosity is key to good design as well, right? Exactly. But as designers, I think we’ve lost a bit of bravery to do that. So my thing is – think more like a scientist. Science is about proving yourself wrong, and finding what’s right. The interesting stuff, when it comes to my experiments, are the really weird answers, the outliers. That’s where the magic is – when someone tells you something different, and you discover it’s because they grew up somewhere where that means something else, or they’ve had an experience where that means something else. A lot of your experiments seem to be very fun – is that an important part of designing them? If I want people to take part, I have to make them really understandable. I have to make them fun. And if I’m going to gather your data, I need to give you something – some insight or learning. I did a talk for 1,000 people in Germany not so long ago, where we gave them all pairs of jelly beans, and I played a load of different stimuli, to show how it changed what they tasted. I talked them through the science of what happens, so that everybody could feel for themselves how it worked. A Type Tasting event at London Design Festival. Photo by David Owens. Is there any tension between that sense of fun, that showmanship, and the scientific rigour you are clearly interested in? I like that I sit in the middle. I think as designers, we are basically showmen. Packaging, branding, everything that we do is about showmanship. It’s about catching attention, selling imagination, sensation transference. But then in spaces like FMCG, they have consumer neuroscientists, and everything is measured to an infinite degree. What’s your hope for the podcast, and the new books, you are working on? Hopefully they will help graphic design to keep changing, so this amazing profession can stay alive, but also evolve as it needs to. Type Tasting does wine tasting in London. Photo by David Owens. Design disciplines in this article What to read next #graphic #design #too #onedimensional #sarah

The ocean. Inspiration doesn’t come much bigger than that, and it’s the theme French artist Jean Jullien is celebrating with his latest work – Osaka Kaiju. The installation, now on display in the France Pavillion at EXPO 2025 in Osaka, is an enormous whale-like being, which might just be the biggest piece in the artist’s career so far. Kaiju come from Japanese folklore and continue to feature in popular culture, in Japan and around the world. They’re the monsters you see in the Godzilla films, but Osaka Kaiju isn’t bent on destruction. His mission is a peaceful one: his skin tells the story of the ocean so people realise the importance of the sea and protecting it.Yuki OnishiNanzukaNanzuka “Osaka Kaiju’s body is covered in drawings, lines, scars or tattoos – however you want to see it – creating a panorama of the many myths, gods and legends that tell of our relationship with the ocean,” says Jean. “From Poseidon to European sea dragons to Inca deities, with a large emphasis on Japanese Yokai as well.” As the artwork continues along his flanks, new mythical creatures appear, which Jean has created to represent topics like over-fishing, dangerous migration by sea, climate change, plastic pollution and more. “I’ve always been fascinated by storytelling and how mythology manages to sum up big, complex notions and funnel them into characters. I wanted to use that language to address contemporary matters,” he adds. Typically, Jean Julien’s work consists of highly accessible, humorous, hand drawn, comic strip-style artwork. Here he is taking it into three dimensions, painting directly onto the surface of the sculpture. Inside Osaka Kaiju is a metal and wooden frame, which is covered in a balloon-like material. The installation was built in a warehouse in Tochigi by AD Japan and the Nanzuka art gallery for Jean.Balthazar JullienBalthazar JullienBalthazar Jullien When complete, the skin was removed, and the artwork transported to the pavilion and reconstructed. To accompany the piece, the artist’s brother Nicolas Julien has composed thematic music which plays as Osaka Kaiju floats among colourful fish, illuminated in its darkened space. Evenly lighting the creature was one of the trickiest parts of the display. “The ocean is important to me for two reasons. Sentimentally, first, because of my upbringing and family roots in Britanny. I grew up in Nantes and we would go to Lesconil where the fishing industry was alive but slowly declining,” says Jean. “Secondly, it’s important to me as a human being, because we literally can’t live without it. It’s an essential part of life. Without it we all die.”NanzukaNanzuka And the big message in this enormous work? “You have to know where you come from in order to know where you’re going,” says Jean. “It's important to realise that as our knowledge of the ocean has deepened, how we tell its story has lightened. In mythology it’s often threatening, dark, mysterious and a bringer of death. Now, when we tell stories its incarnation is often very friendly and joyful. I'm hoping installations and narratives like the Osaka Kaiju can inspire younger generations to become positive actors for the future.” Osaka Kaiju is a collaboration between Jean Jullien and the Tara Ocean Foundation, in partnership with AXA, Cofrex and Nanzuka. The gentle creature will be on show at EXPO 2025 until 12 June. #jean #jullien #having #whale #time

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Images: CrytekCrysis was released back in 2007, and it was beautiful, which meant it had pretty high hardware demands – something that players still joke about with the "Can it run Crysis?" meme.Crysis's director and Crytek founder Cevat Yerli explained that the team wanted to "make sure Crysis does not age, thatis future proofed, meaning that if I played it three years from now, it should look better than today."If you are curious what was going on at Crytek during the development, you're in luck: Michael Khaimzon, former art director at Crytek, who worked on the game, generously shared some insights that you should hear."The back-stories are almost as crazy as the visuals, so I figured I’d start sharing a few," he said on LinkedIn.The developers, based in Frankfurt, Germany, were tasked to build "the most realistic jungle ever.""What do we know about jungles? We book tickets to Tahiti. The brief is simple: study how a real jungle works and shoot enough photos for textures. ... Ironically, none of the photos we took were usable. In the end we decided to model every single vegetation texture in 3D instead. It sounds insane, but that call ends up driving one of the biggest leaps in real-time graphics. So the trip was essentially useless other than a pack of reference shots."With Crysis, the team wanted to delve into photorealism: "Not “pretty,” not “stylized” – we wanted players to squint and wonder if it was real." Before, Far Cry was lauded for its amazing jungle environments, but for this game, the "trick of hand-painting specular and bump effects straight into textures wasn’t gonna cut it.""At the time, no one used high-poly models for foliage. Leaves were painted, not sculpted. Modeling them sounded insane – until we did it. Suddenly, we had full control over layout, and flawless normal maps where every leaf caught light at its own angle."Another solution that made Crysis look so good was light scattering. The developers simulated the color shifts and shadow plays of leaves, used vertex color and bone rigs to make leaves sway realistically, and did some manual alpha tuning for mipmaps to fix long-distance opacity glitches, "but honestly, the two real breakthroughs were high-poly leaves and subsurface light scattering."Yerli wanted to create "something the world has never seen," so art director Magnus Larbrant provided a concept showing winter in the jungle."As production rolled on, our regular jungles started looking insanely good – photoreal, even by today’s standards. Next to them, the icy levels felt gimmicky, but we’d promised them, so they stayed. ... Sometimes the image that sells the game isn’t the one that defines it. Still, that frozen-jungle concept sparked the entire franchise, so here it is for the history books," Khaimzon explained.What players do remember is the Nanosuit, which, it turns out, "wasn’t even planned until a year into production." Apparently, Delta Force agents were supposed to wear tank-looking supersuits mid-game, but "that didn’t strike a nerve, and Cevat was never satisfied with mediocrity," so the developer tried to focus on "the rubbery muscle structure" from early concepts, but it was not enough, still."And then came the franchise-defining idea: strip away all the armor. Keep the muscles only. Let’s go for a ninja-like figure – black, agile, enhanced. We made our first actual nanosuit... ...but it still didn’t work."The muscles were flat, Khaimzon says, so Crytek asked an external concept artist to look at the suite "with a fresh set of eyes, to take our design and separate each major muscle group as much as possible." This resulted in "the most amazing concepting and modeling feat I’ve ever seen."Crytek's artists created a low-poly model using smoothing groups to separate muscles and then a detailed high-poly sculpt."The Nanosuit was born."In 2004, voxels were all the rage, but they didn't suit the game: "No creature with an IQ over 1 would build a spaceship out of blobs and mush." Playing with the shapes, Crytek loved the organic feel and started looking into blending organic and technological forms, "how to make something that looked alien, but also engineered.""We quickly realized that the key to making it look like advanced technology was in repeating, parallel elements – something that looks artificially crafted."Once that was done, the team focused on zero gravity, which sounds great but demands a lot from developers. Players could get nose-to-nose to textures with zero gravity, but they didn't look good that close; they were "pixely and blurry." "Add detail textures, and they barely helped – they only showed when you were right on top of the surface. Using lots of unique textures wasn’t the answer either – it ate up memory and made the surface look noisy and chaotic from afar."So Crytek invented "one of the most unconventional art pipelines" it'd ever used: designing all alien objects using only tiled textures. The entire 1000-meter alien ship and its interiors were built with a handful of unique textures."Artists had to break objects into clearly defined zones, each mapped with a repeating texture. The structure and flow of the texture became part of the design itself. The real challenge? Creating compelling, alien shapes under such a strict limitation. A huge task."I'd say the developers succeeded in their task, creating a game that will stay with gamers for years to come, thanks to its amazing environments, characters, and mechanics that Crytek worked so hard on making work.Khaimzon has shared 6 parts of this exciting journey, and if you want to know more, follow him on LinkedIn.Also, join our 80 Level Talent platform and our new Discord server, follow us on Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Telegram, TikTok, and Threads, where we share breakdowns, the latest news, awesome artworks, and more. #making #crysis #former #crytek #developer

Tech Wheeled, rugged robot dog built for extreme industrial missions New robot to revolutionize industrial inspection and disaster response Published May 22, 2025 6:00am EDT close Wheeled, rugged robot dog built for extreme industrial missions The machine is designed to inspect industrial sites, respond to disasters, carry out logistics operations and support scientific research. Deep Robotics, a company from China, has unveiled a durable four-legged robot built to operate in extreme environments that humans struggle to traverse. It's called the Lynx M20, and it builds upon the agility of its predecessor, the Lynx robot dog.This versatile machine is designed to handle anything from inspecting industrial sites and responding to disasters to carrying out logistics operations and supporting scientific research. Here’s what you need to know.JOIN THE FREE "CYBERGUY REPORT": GET MY EXPERT TECH TIPS, CRITICAL SECURITY ALERTS AND EXCLUSIVE DEALS, PLUS INSTANT ACCESS TO MY FREE "ULTIMATE SCAM SURVIVAL GUIDE" WHEN YOU SIGN UP! Lynx M20Advanced terrain capabilities set the Lynx M20 apartThe Lynx M20 combines wheels and legs to traverse challenging terrain. It can move at an average speed of 4.5 mph, but in optimal conditions, it can go up to 11 mph. It can also walk and climb obstacles using its independent wheel-locking mechanism. Its impressive traversal makes it able to cross rugged mountain paths, muddy wetlands and urban ruins.The Lynx M20 is also great at navigation and monitoring, with its 96-line lidar system, which gives it 360-degree awareness. It also has a front-facing wide-angle camera capable of livestreaming and bidirectional lighting for venturing into dark environments.AI-powered intelligence for real-world challengesWhat really sets the Lynx M20 apart is its use of advanced artificial intelligence. The robot is equipped with AI motion-control algorithms that allow it to autonomously perceive and adapt to its environment, adjusting its posture and gait to handle everything from rocky trails to debris-strewn ruins.Thanks to reinforcement learning, the Lynx M20 can actually improve its performance over time, learning from experience so that it gets even better at tackling new or unexpected obstacles. This means it's not just following a set of pre-programmed instructions but is actively making decisions and getting smarter with every mission.The robot's dual 96-line lidar sensors and wide-angle cameras feed data into its onboard processors, enabling real-time mapping, omnidirectional obstacle avoidance and autonomous navigation, even in low visibility or completely dark environments.WORLD'S FIRST AI-POWERED INDUSTRIAL SUPER-HUMANOID ROBOT Lynx M20IP66 rated: Built to be toughThe Lynx M20 features IP66 water and dust resistance and operates in temperatures from minus 4 degrees Fahrenheit to 131 degrees Fahrenheit. This toughness makes it suitable for harsh weather conditions. Weighing 72.8 pounds, it can carry up to a 33-pound payload, climb 31.5-inch obstacles and navigate 45-degree inclines. The robot runs for 2.5 to 3 hours per charge with a hot-swap battery system to keep it going longer. Lynx M20The pro variant has advanced featuresThe Lynx M20 also has a Pro version, which includes autonomous charging, SLAM-based positioning and advanced navigation tools. It has more connectivity options, like USB and Gigabit Ethernet, to enhance its functionality.PricingThe price of the Lynx M20 is unknown as Deep Robotics has yet to reveal the details. However, its standard Lynx robodog is estimated to cost around meaning this could cost more.CHINA'S TRON 1 ROBOT HURDLES OVER OBSTACLES LIKE THEY'RE NOTHING Lynx M20What does this mean for you?If you work in industries like construction, energy, logistics or emergency response, the Lynx M20 could be a game changer. Its ability to handle rough terrain, carry heavy loads and operate in extreme weather means you can send it into places that are risky or even impossible for people to reach.Whether it is inspecting power lines after a storm, delivering supplies across a muddy worksite or helping out in disaster zones, this robot is designed to keep your team safer and your operations running smoothly. Its hot-swap battery system also means less downtime, so you can rely on it for long shifts without constant recharging interruptions.Kurt's key takeawaysThe Lynx M20 isn't just any robot. It's a tough, smart machine built to handle some of the hardest jobs out there. By combining wheels and legs, it moves in ways that most robots can't, making it perfect for tricky terrain and tough conditions.We don't know the exact price yet, but judging by what it offers, it's clearly designed for serious work. If you're dealing with challenging environments and need a reliable helper, this robot might just be the partner you've been waiting for.CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APPWhat are your thoughts on how industrial inspection robots like this might transform workplace safety and efficiency? Let us know by writing us at Cyberguy.com/Contact.For more of my tech tips and security alerts, subscribe to my free CyberGuy Report Newsletter by heading to Cyberguy.com/Newsletter.Ask Kurt a question or let us know what stories you'd like us to cover.Follow Kurt on his social channels:Answers to the most-asked CyberGuy questions:New from Kurt:Copyright 2025 CyberGuy.com. All rights reserved. Kurt "CyberGuy" Knutsson is an award-winning tech journalist who has a deep love of technology, gear and gadgets that make life better with his contributions for Fox News & FOX Business beginning mornings on "FOX & Friends." Got a tech question? Get Kurt’s free CyberGuy Newsletter, share your voice, a story idea or comment at CyberGuy.com. #wheeled #rugged #robot #dog #built

News Former ICAEW operations chief heads up BCS BCS CEO Sharon Gunn wants to open up membership to broadest range of people to promote professional and ethical practices By Cliff Saran, Managing Editor Published: 22 May 2025 10:38 BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT has appointed Sharron Gunn as its new group chief executive officer. Gunn takes over leadership from interim CEO Rob Deri, and she has been working for BCS since February to transform its learning and development and membership divisions.  She previously worked for 23 years at the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales. For the past three years, Gunn was the organisation’s chief operating officer where she focused on enhancing organisational efficiency and leading the redesign of the professional membership organisation’s ACA accountant qualification redesign. According to her LinkedIn profile, during her time at ICAEW, Gunn created the Academy of Professional Development and championed several equality, diversity and inclusion initiatives, including the Women in Leadership programme. She also led the ICAEW’s involvement in Rise, an initiative aimed at enhancing social mobility by equipping young people with essential business skills.   She said the team at the ICAEW influenced policy in the public interest by leveraging “the deep technical insight and real-world experiences of our members”. At BCS, she has been working to transform its learning and development and membership divisions. Commenting on Gunn’s role as the new CEO, BCS president Daljit Rehal said: “Sharron brings unrivalled experience in maximising the impact and influence of professional bodies. She has a clear vision for developing the breadth of BCS’ membership and for ensuring the tech profession is seen as a trusted partner across industry and government.  My thanks on behalf of our entire community go to Rob as interim CEO for his commitment to the cause of Making IT Good for Society.”  Outgoing interim CEO Rob Deri said: “Sharron will be an outstanding CEO with the dedication to ensure BCS brings together professionals in diverse areas from cyber security to government to academia, who all share the ambition to make the voice of our profession heard where it matters.”  Gunn’s ambition is that people who work in IT will consider BCS as a core part of their profession. She said: “It is a huge privilege to be asked to lead the professional body for IT, at a time when emerging technologies like AI and quantum computing are transforming society and the economy.  “That’s why focussing on the value of professional qualifications, certifications and Chartered status, as a way of demonstrating trust in our vital profession, is more important than ever before. We are already developing our five-year strategy to ensure BCS is in the best position to respond to dynamic policy and market changes, for example the creation of Skills England.  “Even in the age of AI, technology is about the people leading and creating it. I want to make sure anyone working in a technology role can consider BCS their professional home. Joining our incredible membership community, including Fellowship, should be within reach of the broadest possible range of people, united by an aspiration to prove not just competence, but commitment to ethical practice and accountability.” In April, the BCS submitted a response to the government’s consultation on the role of computer evidence in courts. In its submission to the call for evidence, BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, said: “The presumption that computer-generated evidence is inherently reliable is increasingly unfit for purpose in modern criminal prosecutions.” BCS stories Government launches £8.2m plan to encourage girls into AI: The government is investing in teacher training and student support to get more girls into maths classes, ultimately leading to AI careers. BCS report shows lack of improvement in tech diversity: Research from BCS shows very slow progress when it comes to the number of women and people from under-represented groups in tech over the past five years. In The Current Issue: UK critical systems at risk from ‘digital divide’ created by AI threats UK at risk of Russian cyber and physical attacks as Ukraine seeks peace deal Standard Chartered grounds AI ambitions in data governance Download Current Issue Microsoft entices developers to build more Windows AI apps – Cliff Saran's Enterprise blog Red Hat launches llm-d community & project – Open Source Insider View All Blogs #former #icaew #operations #chief #heads

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SAP executives, led by CEO Christian Klein, told IT and business leaders attending this year’s SAP Sapphire event that by tapping into SAP’s “flywheel” combination of the broadest suite of enterprise apps, context-aware data, and world-class Business AI, they can conquer uncertainty. In a kickoff keynote at the Orlando event, they unveiled a raft of new AI tools, business apps, and partnerships designed to help customers overcome these challenges, transform their operations, and “bring out your best.” Uncertainty “All of us face one problem – every company, no matter which industry or geography. And that problem is uncertainty,” said Klein. “Uncertainty about trade disruption, about new regulatory requirements, and about how AI will transform my business and impact my workforce.” SAP can’t take away macroeconomic uncertainty, he said, “But you have my commitment that we will help your business become more resilient and more resilient – especially in times like these. We will help you bring out your best.” Flywheel effect SAP can do this by utilizing what Klein and other senior SAP executives called the “flywheel effect,” explaining that in physics this is about bringing individual elements together to create new energy. “The first element of the SAP flywheel is our applications,” Klein explained. “Not only do we have the broadest application portfolio in our industry, we also run the most-mission critical business processes end-to-end. No one understands business and industry like SAP does.” The second element of the flywheel is data. “The apps give us the richest treasure of mission-critical business data, and no other tech company has more access to semantically rich business data,” he said. This data then feeds into the third element of the flywheel: AI. Having access to an enormous amount of business data is key to developing extremely powerful Business AI. SAP Business Suite “Then we make the flywheel spin by infusing AI back into the apps, which run your company,” Klein said before introducing the first of several on-stage demos showing how a company can manage uncertainty like shifting tariffs with the power of SAP Business Suite and AI. Expanding the flywheel theme, Muhammad Alam, member of the Executive Board of SAP SE leading SAP Product and Engineering, noted that the demo highlighted how the flywheel of apps, data, and AI is critical to the company’s quest to reimagine business applications. To achieve this, a company needs an application suite that is end-to-end and seamlessly integrated; a data layer that provides a harmonized data model with high-quality data, strong governance and a rich semantical context; and AI that is built on high-quality data and natively available in the apps used every day. Alam noted that while the concept of the flywheel effect isn’t new and most company CIOs have been working hard to achieve it, they have been frustrated by the disparate and heterogeneous applications landscape often built up over time out of necessity. Fragile balance Most companies spend a significant amount of time and money integrating the apps they use together and extracting and bringing together disparate data sets. “In fact,” Alam said, “We estimate that organizations can spend up to 80 percent of their effort and budget in putting together this fragile balance of apps and data, leaving only 20 percent of your resources to focus on value creation.” While this fragile balance has existed for a while, he explained that it breaks down completely in the age of AI, because to create exponential value you need to have your data available with the end-to-end business process context. “Enabling this in a disparate, disconnected landscape is close to impossible,” he said. The only real solution is to move to a best of breed as a suite, or what SAP calls “suite-as-a- service,” Alam told the audience. “The new SaaS is what will allow you to take advantage of the flywheel effect.” “In the age of AI, true differentiation will lie in how you create value from this end-to-end context for your organization,” he said. “This can only happen when you simplify and innovate your core, and not add another layer of complexity to your landscape.” This is what the SAP Business Suite offers. SAP Business Data Cloud Klein and Alam also emphasized the importance of the launch of SAP Business Data Cloud in February and its positive reception from customers and partners. Klein described it as “the crystal ball we need in times of uncertainty, because it offers you the biggest semantical data layer in the industry harmonizing SAP and non-SAP data.” Klein also announced the expansion of business data analysis capabilities in SAP Business Data Cloud through a new partnership with Palantir, while Alam unveiled a new partnership with Adobe to develop an intelligent application on SAP Business Data Cloud that combines SAP Cloud ERP data with data in the Adobe Experience Platform. To enhance the power of the flywheel, Klein and Philipp Herzig, CTO and chief AI officer of SAP, also made a series of AI-related announcements. “At SAP, our goal is to make every end user 30 percent more productive,” said Klein. Joule To achieve this goal, SAP is enabling end users to use human language to interact with Joule, SAP’s generative AI copilot, as our new UX, he said. Joule will provide answers to any business questions they have, while in the backend, very smart Joule Agents will take over tasks from employees across end-to-end processes. “Today we are proud to announce that we are making Joule available to you everywhere and giving you answers on everything,” the SAP CEO said. By combining Joule with WalkMe, the adoption platform acquired by SAP last year, Joule becomes an omnipresent, always-on, proactive, and personalized AI assistant. “No matter in which app the end user is working, SAP or non-SAP, Joule will be everywhere,” Klein said. In addition to making Joule available everywhere, SAP is also enabling Joule to answer everything through a new partnership with Perplexity whose CEO, Aravind Srinivas, joined Klein onstage to demonstrate how Perplexity’s answer engine will integrate with SAP data to provide trusted answers to everyday business questions. Business AI During his keynote section, Herzig highlighted the progress made with SAP Business AI. “We committed that 80 percent of our most-used transactions would be managed via Joule, and we have delivered more than 1,600 skills supporting a wide range of tasks across HR, finance, supply chain, and more out-of-the-box,” he said. “We also introduced Joule for developers and Joule for consultants, helping tens of thousands of people every day to achieve more.” Herzig said SAP is on track to deliver more than 400 AI scenarios by the end of this year, and he is thrilled to see more than 34,000 customers are already using SAP Business AI every day to transform the way they work. For example, he shared that British Telecom is already saving 85 percent of the time it took to find the right skilled candidates for jobs with Joule, which is also helping employees to complete HR tasks in 40 percent less time. “Our AI strategy is super simple, it’s really about three things,” Herzig said. “Joule as the new UI in the age of AI, its Joule Agents to reimagine business processes and AI Foundation on SAP BTP, which is becoming the operating system for AI.” Joule Agents While Joule transforms the experience layer, Herzig said, Joule Agents are transforming the business process layer, “reimagining business processes from the ground up.” Instead of designing enterprise apps around the principle of “insight-to-action,” Joule Agents streamline decision-making through reasoning and action. “With this, we are making a paradigm shift in enterprise software, going really from insight to action to reason and action with AI,” Herzig said. “Joule Agents will take your business processes to a completely new level.” Soon, he said, companies will have a huge team of agents – Joule Agents, third-party agents, and custom agents built in Joule Studio – as part of their workforce. To control and govern these agents, Herzig announced the launch of AI agent hub in SAP LeanIX. “SAP LeanIX already knows your business processes and enterprise application landscape, so it was just a logical step to expand the methodology to Joule Agents too,” he said. Among other innovations, Herzig announced that SAP is introducing more than 60 new and updated capabilities into AI Foundation, including a prompt optimizer in AI Foundation developed in joint collaboration with Not Diamond, a frontier AI lab out of San Francisco. Prompt optimizerautomatically converts existing prompts to different models, and a futuristic new partnership with Neura Robotics and Nvidia is designed to blend digital and physical worlds and help empower humanoid robots to achieve business outcomes. SAP runs SAP Rounding out the kickoff keynote, Sebastian Steinhaeuser, chief operating officer and newest member of the Executive Board of SAP SE, explained how the company has achieved considerable gains by running its own operations on SAP using the combined power of apps, data, and AI. “With Joule, our developers, consultants, and HR are seeing strong efficiency benefits today. Across SAP, we track several hundreds of millions in AI-powered efficiency gains committed to our budget.” Steinhaeuser also discussed the benefits of SAP Business Data Cloud, noting, “Earlier this year, we became customer zero of SAP Business Data Cloud, offering us distinct advantages: First, we can connect all data in one semantically rich data layer. Second, this helps us generate better insights faster, and across our financial, workforce, and sales planning. And third, we can fuel even better Business AI.” Next up, he said, we are excited to go live with the first set of intelligent applications, starting with People Intelligence. Moving to SAP’s own app layer, Steinhaeuser shared more about SAP’s own RISE with SAP journey. He also emphasized the importance of tools like SAP Signavio and SAP LeanIX in mapping process landscapes and enterprise architecture, for SAP’s own transformation journey. “Many of our meetings no longer start with PowerPoint, instead we use Signavio and LeanIX to discuss how we can improve our processes and architecture,” he said. Summary Summing up the keynote messages, Christian Klein said: “Together we have seen how the SAP Business Suite infused with Business AI can help you in times of uncertainty, and how we help you to get there faster, simpler, and at lower cost.” “Let me finish this keynote with a personal commitment which is really dear to my heart: We will continue to listen to your needs, we will continue to deliver great innovations, and we will stay by your side along the entire journey – especially in times of uncertainty – so that you can run your business in sheer harmony.” This story also appears on SAP.com. #sap #unveils #new #capabilities #help