The ‘new normal’ is NonStop

As we enter the last month of the genuinely unprecedented year 2020, it is fair to say that it has been an incredibly challenging year for many of us both in our personal and business lives. We have been in and out of different forms of lockdown and perhaps self-isolation. We’ve seen many infections and fatalities around the world, and we had to cope with working from home, conducting our business by using various online tools like Zoom, Slack and others. I, for one, had to celebrate my father’s 80^th Birthday via a Zoom call with family and friends.

However, the pandemic has focussed many people and organizations on digitization and has helped to accelerate many digitization projects beyond our wildest imaginations. Many services, which previously were only provided in a ‘manual fashion’, are now possible and available, courtesy of modern technology. I can now have a consultation with my GP by video chat; I can order my food and drinks online from a restaurant. Online grocery shopping and online delivery services have seen a significant surge here in the UK and around the world and have become the new normal for many households. Online and mobile payment services are the crucial backbone of an always-on and always scalable economy. To me, this new normal says ‘NonStop’ every time’!

comforte had to change its modus operandi from mainly office-based work to 100% working from home within a few days when the pandemic started back in March, which allowed everyone in the team to continue to work productively throughout.

With the global restrictions on business travel and a common ban of face-to-face meetings, the NonStop community events scene had to change as well. Many of the user group meetings were cancelled or postponed to 2021, but we still experienced the need to get together and communicate the latest news to our NonStop users and partners. The virtual NonStop user group meetings (VIRTU-NUG) in June and July made a successful start and culminated in the virtual NonStop Technical Bootcamp (vTBC) in November. What an event!

The vTBC has broken every record. The event sold out with 2,000 registrations! Nearly five times as many attendees than the number of participants at the traditional, in-person TBC. Many of these attendees were first-timers who had never been to a TBC before. The virtual character of the event allowed many more people to watch presentations for a few hours over three days without the lost time in travelling to California, or even the lost time of travelling between conference rooms, with the inevitable payback for the coffee I borrowed, a visit to the restroom.

Three tracks in America and one track each in Europe, India, Asia Pacific and Japan, provided content in these respective time zones, making it very convenient to attend the event.

The Whova platform coped well, and despite some functional differences between the web version and the mobile app, it worked rather well. The capabilities of the virtual exhibition were somewhat limited and needed improvements to allow more interaction with attendees, but all in all, it worked fine for comforte.

The content provided by HPE, users and vendors was engaging and very well received.

HPE announced some exciting technical news about the next generation NonStop systems – the NS8 X4 and NS4 X4 – and strategic plans for SQL/MX as well as HPE NonStop SQL Cloud Edition. Plans were laid out for HPE GreenLake and the inclusion on HPE NonStop describing HPE’s move to usage-based provision of IT services, which users can consume and pay for every month. This represents the general shift of the IT industry towards on-demand, subscription models, and HPE NonStop is part of this through HPE GreenLake. A growing number of HPE NonStop users will pick up on this model, and it is only a matter of time before it becomes the new normal. Vendors like comforte are working on ways to adapt their business models to the changing landscape.

comforte delivered four different talks on data-centric security, digital transformation, and launched its new security solution SafePoint LogStream and Security Dashboards. If you missed these talks or if you would like to watch them again, please head to comforte’s YouTube channel and search within the channel for ‘TBC2020’.

If you would like to discuss data-centric security in more detail, or how we can help with future-proofing your HPE NonStop environment, or indeed, if you are interested to learn more about our new SafePoint LogStream and Security Dashboards solution, then please contact us.

Last but not least, a BIG Thank You to Karen Copeland, Kristi Elizondo, Kelly Luna, Stacie Neall, and everyone else who helped to pull this event off together!!

Despite the positive experience with virtual events and remote working in 2020, we are increasingly looking forward to meeting our NonStop customers, partners and friends in the real world next year.

We at comforte wish you a safe and Happy Festive Season!