Importance of eDiscovery for Banks

Growing technology has permeated almost every aspect of our lives. With the internet becoming an essential global phenomenon, resulting in many activities being handled electronically, time and distance have become irrelevant for many transactions. Over the years there has been a huge change in the transformation of traditional banking to e-banking. With an increase in the numbers of corporate investigations, lawsuits and regulatory audits, most companies often choose to retain almost every business record as nobody knows for certain what may be used as evidence for litigation in the future. Most courts make it clear that compliance with eDiscovery is a must and that any form of non compliance can result in companies and organizations paying huge fines.

The rate at which data is growing is one of the largest problems in the eDiscovery minefield. It becomes more time consuming and expensive to recover huge amounts of electronic data. Furthermore, every document recovered needs to be reviewed by a lawyer. According to a recent study by The Radicati Group, in 2007 a typical corporate account generated around 4.3 gigabytes (GB) of electronic data per user. That number is expected to grow to 6.7 GB per year by 2011. Forrester estimates that technology spending on eDiscovery will top $4.8 billion by 2011. It is imperative for businesses to have a clear policy on data retention so as to facilitate easy retrieval. There have been instances when financial institutions have lost their cases because of the failure to produce adequate evidence. It is therefore very important for banks to have a sound eDiscovery solution, especially in sectors like banking and insurance, as there is a colossal amount of data that needs to be stored and retrieved as and when required. Banks are under more government regulation (e.g., SEC) than some other industries and often do discovery specifically for regulatory requests.

Advantages of eDiscovery in the Banking Sector

eDiscovery solutions enable you to respond effectively to eDiscovery requests. They reduce the volume of data subject to the discovery process and aid in the management of data according to the banking business value and risk. eDiscovery provides an end to end solution so as to enable the processing and review of information in response to litigation. Some of the advantages are:

Effective Litigation – It enhances the effectiveness of litigation by identifying and collecting potentially germane information rapidly and precisely.

Decrease in Costs – It leads to a reduction in costs as in-house eDiscovery make the process more automated and dependable.

Increased Efficiency – Introducing the business value of ESI can simplify the identification and retrieval of information, thus increasing efficiency.

Mitigation of Risk – Many financial services measure risk mitigation factors very closely. eDiscovery certainly aims at reducing all the risks.

As there are rules that have complex implications for all banks and other organizations, it is vital to know what electronic information they are storing and where it is. Banks are in a better position to deal with pre-existing requirements related to electronic information as they already have some experience with managing electronic information in a structured fashion. eDiscovery is of prime importance to banks as banks are always subject to high expectations and standards.

 
Know more on : internal investigation, legal hold

 

Manage Processes by Adopting Application Lifecycle Management

Application lifecycle management (ALM) is not easy to define. Different vendors have a different perspective towards it, but what it encompasses is important. In today’s fast changing world organizations that depend on software to run their businesses must adopt Application Lifecycle Management (ALM). This platform helps software development teams to manage their processes from requirements to release.

 

According to Forrester’s Dave West, “If you aren't doing ALM today and software is important to your business, you need to start thinking about how to get transparency, how to get understanding of the application process flow, and to think of software as a business process.”


Advantages of Application Life Cycle Management  

One of the most important benefits of Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) software is that it empowers organizations to enforce best practices across verticals. ALM solutions facilitate information sharing, helping organizations from repeating past mistakes, so that the software they create in future is rolled out in time and meets the expectations of customers or end users.


Apart from this other advantages include:

Increased Efficiency – Increase productivity of your development and QA teams with ALM software by implementing best practices across all related processes, as well as allocation of resources by providing full traceability and visibility for the entire process. An integrated ALM allows teams, individuals and organization to gain better insight into the application development process. Functional and non-functional requirements, constraints, use cases; user stories and high level processes can be collaboratively composed and maintained in a single system.


Enhanced Team Collaboration - ALM provides system administrators and project owners with the ability to granularly control access to sensitive business data offering enterprise collaboration features, with integrated wiki- and document workflows, real-time activity streams, notifications, alerts, Escalation Management and more. This helps bring together the various teams that participate in the software development process, facilitating instant communication and information-sharing giving everyone timely insight into the project in real time.


Faster Time to Market - ALM helps you to manage your requirements, including defining releases and managing your requirements. Traceability and compliance information are automatically derived from the system. Project management, resource planning, integration, and other critical development functions are fully automated, streamlined, and simplified ensuring the designing, deploying and delivering of software is faster. Thus with reduced development lifecycle, enhanced team collaboration, purging of errors delivery of software meeting of deadlines becomes easier.


Superior Customer satisfaction: Adoption of ALM processes ensures that all developmental activities are aligned with customer needs. The customer gets access to real-time updates on the progress and development of the ALM support lifecycle knowing exactly which stage is being implemented.

Improved Product Quality – Application lifecycle management ensures that organizations adhere to Quality assurance (QA) guidelines. As a result the software that is developed effectively satisfies all user needs and is built in accordance with the highest quality standards.


Application Lifecycle Management improves the predictability and efficiency of all related processes, ensuring increased control over and visibility into the entire project from end-to-end. Using one tool eliminates the need to integrate between modules, allowing organizations to easily generate real time analytics and reports.

Virtualization- Helping to Improve the Security Position

Driven by the enhanced cost-effectiveness and increased server utilization, the number of virtual machines has risen tremendously in most organizations. Although many organizations have not accounted that each server needs to be individually configured, patched and secured, there has been an increase in the number of devices connected to the network. Virtual machines have network access and can be hacked, infected and compromised just like a dedicated physical device. When managed properly, they can actually improve security posture, being more dynamic. When organizations not have effective management strategies in place and are unaware of the number of operating virtual machines, they have the same risk at the endpoint like their physical counterparts. With an unmanaged virtual sprawl, management practices can be decentralized.

Automating the essential tasks

By adopting virtualization solutions, organizations are compelled to change processes and think differently. Without authorization and coordination of the security team, the new servers and applications can appear to be faster and easier. Security and IT administrators need to aggressively and incessantly monitor for new devices, servers and services with the increased number of machines to safeguard. Automating the processes behind vulnerability management will be necessary. Although there are various tools to do this, the result has been semi-automatic with manual intervention required to deploy, verify and report the activity. The volumes of virtual machines that are added to the network entail continuous response that is fully automated and linked at every stage. Virtualization will be more reliable, if new tools and security best practices improve automation to align with the management of virtual machines.

Offline Security

By addressing Green IT there are many enterprises that have a significant number of virtual machines offline. Bringing these offline machines online and configuring those to be safe against potential threats can be a time-consuming and a difficult operational task. The vulnerability to a particular threat is significantly reduced when a virtual machine is managed and secured in their offline state. When a patch requires a system reboot, security can be boosted by the ability to use virtual machines that have been patched offline for critical system back-up. Waiting for a time when critical systems can be taken down, is the most common strategy that is currently used.

An organization’s vulnerabilities are increased when workspace virtualization is implemented without proper security. It is therefore essential to appropriately secure the virtual machines with thorough planning and continuous processes even before they come online. This way the vulnerability windows to the threats are diminished, letting an organization to experience an enhanced level of security with virtualization.

Know more about: VDI solutions and virtual desktop

Tips for Success in Enterprise Desktop Virtualization

An enterprise needs to examine each part of the IT infrastructure to decide on the best suited strategy to virtualize the IT environment. Enterprise desktop virtualization is the sharing of a global pool of infrastructure resources across applications. With the value proposition of the virtual desktop being apparent, the IT department will be able to manage and maintain the environment easily with this technology, resulting in the end user being free to rely on a single endpoint device. Although there are a few critical areas that provide quick savings from the virtualization initiatives, the following tips can ensure success in the enterprise.

1. Reducing Maintenance Time with desktop virtualization

Due to maintenance issues and upgrades associated with the hardware or software running on them, physical desktops are usually difficult to manage and maintain. With the user activity also being a factor to the wear and tear, the enterprise has to shoulder the responsibility of maintaining user productivity. Desktop virtualization has the ability to resolve issues relating to viruses attacks, operating system configuration issues, etc. With the use of a thin client as the user device, there is a single point of entry for OS image patches, maintenance updates, and application deployment. Consequently, the users have a secure access to applications whenever they need them, thereby streamlining the maintenance process for IT. There is a substantial increase in productivity as thin clients are not prone to failures. By innovating in desktop technology, desktop virtualization maximizes the value-added time contributed to businesses.

2. Consolidation of multiple physical devices with server virtualization

Server virtualization facilitates greening of the data center as it allows the consolidation of several physical services onto fewer hosts, reducing the space, power, cooling and ultimately, the capital spent on future server purchases. With server virtualization, there is a diminished risk of server failure. If there is a server failure, these virtualized server environments recover in minutes, thereby offering significant capital savings. Enterprises can have tremendous savings by minimizing the potential for long, unplanned application outages.

3. Enhanced Capacity management with storage virtualization

Most projects sometimes never use half of the space requested with the traditional methods of managing Storage Area Networks. When the full space is allotted to a project, the space used on the array cannot be reclaimed. Due to this, whenever there is a request for additional storage requests, storage needs to be purchased to match the capacity that is requested. With storage virtualization there is a complete pool of storage and abstracts disks and RAID groups from the administrator. This virtual provisioning facilitates the full amount of requested space to the project, although the space is consumed as it is used. By using the accessible capacity more efficiently unnecessary storage purchases are prevented.

It is necessary to take a holistic approach to virtualization when an enterprise wants to make the most out of its virtualization initiatives. By choosing the right virtualization solution, your enterprise can move towards success.

Know more about: VDI software, virtual desktop

Protect your Employees Health with the Right Hearing Protection Devices

OSHA, or the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, makes it mandatory for enterprises to provide hearing protection devices to employees working in high noise areas or where sound levels exceed 85 decibels. Hearing loss is caused by the excessive noise in places like airport tarmacs, industrial environments, factories, music events, etc. Loss may be full or partial and may also result in other hearing related problems, such as a buzzing in the ears.

Employers should conduct sound surveys to identify high noise areas and control noise exposures, enroll affected employees in a hearing conservation program and provide hearing protection devices (HPD) and rehabilitate workers who have suffered noise induced hearing loss to end highly preventable noise-induced hearing loss.

Choosing the right hearing protection device (HPD) or the right communication headsets  like Ear Plugs and Ear Muffs for yourself or your employees is important.  In some cases inspite of providing headsets, fewer personnel are wearing these HPDs due to improper selection of the headset and thus exposing themselves to potential health problems. Points to keep in mind while selecting a HPD:
·         Noise Level - Access the noise level before selecting the device. Hearing protection device you choose should effectively protect against any type of noise.

·         Lower overall attenuation Select a device that provides moderate to maximum attenuation. These can be adjusted according to changes in background noise that are intermittent, continuous or high impact.

·         Communication – HPD should have communication capabilities. Major reason for employees not wearing HPD is not being able to communicate. With these devices having built in communication, users can communicate face to face at short and long distances via a two way radio, Bluetooth cell phone or hands free communication with VOX activation in high noise environments.

·         Devices for Workers with hearing Problem - Special HPDs are manufactured for people who are already suffering from hearing loss. These devices compensate for lost hearing at the same time providing them protection.

·         Comfort – HPD’s should be comfortable to use else it will be removed by the employee. They should be simple to use, extremely comfortable and allow face-to-face, two-way or cell phone communication beyond 85dB.

·         Situational Awareness - Situational awareness is very important to avoid accidents. Employee should be able to determine the nature, distance and direction of speech and other sounds like alarms, vehicle noise while working.

Thus providing a good hearing protection devices like ear plugs and earmuffs makes a huge difference to the health of your employees, makes them more focused and change your workplace in many ways, all for the right reasons.

Noise Protection – Benefits of New Age Noise Protection Earmuffs

Hearing damage is a result of a combination of high noise measured in decibels along with the time for which an individual had been subjected to a loud noise background. Hence, permanent hearing loss can occur to a working staff when exposed to a high noise background, for instance a factory outlet or a mining spot continuously at a stretch.

Therefore, hearing protection needs attention as once any auditory damage takes place it is certainly not possible to treat it back to normalcy. The best measure to adopt is to resort to  hearing protection devices that blocks out harmful sound levels. In the recent past, there have been numerous companies manufacturing new age earmuffs and earplugs that are apt for industries such as aviation, construction, mining, and the like. These devices provide optimal comfort level that makes it convenient for the wearer to sport it for longer periods.

Eminent brands dealing in HPD’s offer innovative noise protection solution for purposes such as VIP visits, training taking place in high noise backgrounds and even group tours. Noise protection equipments manufactured by these companies enables interaction in loud noise surroundings where both hearing and communication is of utmost relevance. The speech enhancement and noise suppression technology used helps people to interact within a radius of 50 meters and in noise levels that go up to 106Db. Furthermore, this technology also helps people to interact face-to-face, to a sound level of 97Db and within a radius of 1 to 3 yards. Other features of the noise protection earmuffs and devices are as follows:-

·         Offers protection against all sorts of  noise, namely continuous, intermittent and impact

·         Provides a two way radio interface

·         MP3 interface

·         Industry ruggedized

·         A continuous talk time of 12+ hours

·         Long-lasting adjustable headband

·         Offers a wireless Bluetooth connection to cell phones

·         Allows you to detect the background and hear the speech simultaneously

·         There are easy buttons for physical adjustments and can be done without taking off the earmuff

·         The earmuffs are equipped with Binaural capability

·         There is soft ear cushions so that one is able to wear them for long hours

The market today is booming with new age noise protection equipments manufactured by renowned companies that cater to the various needs and requirements of individuals and organizations. These set of earplugs and earmuffs are affordable and user friendly.

Know more on:

·         industrial ear plugs

Trends that Drive Social Intelligence

Forrester defines Social Intelligence as, “the concept of turning social media data into actionable marketing and business strategy.” An increasing number of marketers are leveraging Social Intelligence to better understand where, when and how to connect with their target audiences. As Social Intelligence can be transformative, a company needs it to maintain meaningful, productive relationships.

How Social Intelligence helps

The social and business strategies of an enterprise can become tangled with the use of Social Intelligence. To produce a substantial value for the organization, the data that is collected from the social sphere is examined. This process aids in disclosing who a customer is, what they may want, and how the customer feels about what they want. With this information the business can anticipate the customer’s needs and try to fulfill them. Organizations need to decide to move from the concept of simply monitoring social data to applying Social Intelligence. With social communities continuing to evolve, those that don’t leverage Social Intelligence won’t be able to act on insights that help them get ahead of competition.

The data collected can be used by businesses to optimize everything from advertising campaigns and engagement programs to product development and revenue efficiencies, and this data can redefine the social landscape. Some of the main trends that drive social intelligence can be identified as:

  • Social Intelligence, the new business intelligence

Personal interactivity between businesses and individuals is finally being realized through the power of social networks. With the ocean of information that is available with an individual’s social identity, a large number of businesses are able to draw on the enormous amounts of data to engage with their constituents in a personalized approach.

  • Analytics drives insights

In many organizations, Business Intelligence has been substituted with Social Intelligence. The driving force between an organization’s successes has become the social platform. This is mainly due to the fact that social analytics drives insights. Consequently there is a greater understanding of customers and markets that generates pioneering products, improved customer targeting, better pricing, and advanced growth in both revenue and profits.

  • Cloud computing to generate more value

Cloud computing revolutionizes the way an organization uses its data. These cloud categories allow organizations to not only integrate business processes with partners and suppliers , but also enable to extract speed to market and agility.

With Social Intelligence being the buzz word in organizations, there is a rethinking in how organizations are thinking their decisions and strategies, even re-coining their vision statements.

 

Retail Distribution Important Module in Supply Chain

In the supply chain module, retail distribution is the crucial link between manufacturer and the consumer. In today’s highly competitive retail sales business world, getting the right goods, to the right place, at the right time is vital to the profitability of the vendor. Customer demand speed, convenience and unlimited accessibility, whether they are buying online or in a store, for distributors, this means on-time delivery to the retailers.

To meet these demands retailers and distributors are increasingly partnering with experts who have the technology and business skills required to assist with complex strategy decisions, build reliable solutions, and manage and improve existing applications.

These Retail and Distribution Management Solutions package products for installation or store shelves, ship products directly to the retailer, distributor or any other destination, fill orders directly and global supply chain track progress from inventory to delivery right from your desktop.

The new business challenges and opportunities linked to the constantly changing market dynamics and emergence of new consumerism and shifting distribution pipelines have unveiled the new model of retail. Today you see retailers widely adopting tools that help optimize core business functions: supply chain performance, merchandise planning, promotions management, loss prevention, customers purchase or basket analysis and workforce management.

To provide high quality service at an affordable cost to customers, organizations are constrained to find innovative ways to respond and efficiently meet their demands. To meet these demands organizations need to partner with experts in supply chain management to provide customized end-to-end retail distribution solutions that not only help companies realize cost benefit but also transform their core retail systems and processes to meet their warehousing services and distribution needs.

When crafting you retail distribution automation strategies your solution should have in-house IT capability, with expandable distribution services. The outsourced cost should be variable and tied directly to demand. Your distribution network should seamlessly integrates into the service providers supply chain postponement models.

Learn more about :- Systems Integration & evaluation system

 

Advantages of Using Liquid dispenser

Liquid dispensers are today widely used at home and in businesses whether offices or hotel and are available in a wide range of styles, colors, shapes and capacities. They are no longer a luxury item but have become a necessary part of our life. These liquid dispensers dispense the exact amount of liquid making it cost effective option.

Liquid soap dispensers help reduce the exchange of germs and bacteria between users that is spread by contact, a reason why people today prefer liquid soap over shared bar soap. This dispenser is perfect for use in bathrooms, kitchens, offices, schools, hospitals, hotels and restaurants.

With a variety of liquid dispensers available, thought should be given to what type of liquid dispenser to select. Selecting the best type depends on several factors like:

Capacity - is a prime concern, especially for business use. Choosing the size of dispenser depends on the number of people who will be using and the place where it will be used. This will ensure regulated supply of liquid and keeping maintenance time to a minimum.

Convenience - Refills and cleaning are quick and easy with liquid dispensers and they not only reduce mess but reduce waste as well which is ideal for use in businesses. At home using a liquid dispenser  
prevents germ and there is less likelihood of spreading infections or illnesses among users.

Cost – Liquid dispensers are available online and in shops at wholesale discounted prices.

Variety – There is a huge variety of liquid dispensers to order from. Style, colors and shapes are plentiful to fit almost any décor at home or in an office or business setting. They can be wall mounted or push pump that releases a limited amount of soap available in different sizes.

Protection - Irrespective of whether it is lotion pump or liquid dispenser, it should protect and preserve its contents from contamination. A good packaging can protect its contents from getting contaminated due to climatic effects, hazardous chemicals, infestation and so on.  

Eco Friendly Products - The most preferred materials that are currently used for making these dispensers include glass, aluminum, paper, bamboo, and wood etc. These are recyclable, bio-degradable, and non-polluting. 

 This is why many homes, schools, hospitals, nursing homes, business offices, gyms and doctor's offices rely on using liquid dispensers in restrooms, kitchens, patient rooms and other common areas. 

Lotion Pump – Innovative Packaging Solution for Body Care Products

When you think about Lotion pumps, the obvious image that flashes is that of hand cream lotions, facial cleansers, body lotions and other body care products. In such kind of products the volume and amount of the liquid contained is a significant factor. In fact, these pumps have a huge role to play in the application of the content. In addition, to that the outlook, appearance and packaging plays an active role in brand loyalty and customers’ product selection process. Brand loyalty can be attained once the pumps and lotion bottles pass the required quality standards surpassing the facilities that are offered by the competitor brands. At the same time, it needs to live up to the expectations of the users and customers at large.

The modern day customer is not only brand but also product conscious, which makes him meticulous about quantity, quality and product cost. In addition to that, a user would also prefer to look at the various product variants that are on offer. Lifestyle and lifestyle product choices today has acquired greater significance. Hence, it is advised that marketers use excellent quality lotion pumps for manufacturing their pod cuts. Eminent service providers of lotion pumps and other liquid dispensers adhere to this practice. These companies have an efficient Resource and Development team that ensures that the lotion pumps and its product variants are of superior quality. Other benefits that these companies offer include a competitive cost, for marketers to avail these innovative packaging solutions.

Lotion pumps are available in various sized and designs. At the same time, any type of personalization of any selected product can be offered within a reduced lead-time. This enabled the markets to get on with their product launches and promotions.

Service providers of lotion pumps understand the importance of packaging. They acknowledge that aluminum bottles used for these pumps and others sprays are a popular choice today. Hence, most of these products are available in aluminum bottles with quality packaging solutions. At the same time, the elite customers and users who are fashion and status conscious prefer aluminum packaging to others in terms of beauty, cosmetic and skincare products. The product variants for the same are available in various shades and designs and are durable that other components. The price range too is affordable and varies from one product to the other.