\u201cWe\u2019ve spent a lot of time on improving that within the organisation, because garbage in, garbage out. AI can start to just go completely on a different tangent to what you\u2019re after.\u201d<\/p>\n
With AI evolving so quickly, it requires continued education, especially when it comes to the security elements.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe run an ISO 27001 operation; we are all security compliant,\u201d Lowe said. \u201cWe\u2019re going down the path of being certified for ISO\/IEC 42001 which is the international standard for AIMS [artificial intelligence management systems] over the next six to 12 months.\u201d<\/p>\n
Any organisation\u2019s biggest concern should be the risk of something exposing information across the business, he pointed out.<\/p>\n
Navigating change<\/p>\n
As ASI navigates the changes needed for AI, Lowe said since the last time he spoke with ARN in April, the upcoming Windows 11 changes hadn\u2019t yet created urgency around a hardware refresh.<\/p>\n
\u201c[Financially, ASI] ended up 20 per cent up on last year, and a lot of that had to do with large [hardware device refresh] towards the end of the financial year,\u201d he said. A lot of the organisations that have done it probably planned accordingly, and I\u2019ve got no doubt there\u2019ll be an element of customers that go, \u2018What do we do? Can you help us?\u2019 \u201c<\/p>\n
\u201cIt becomes a compliance risk more than a security risk and no CIO wants end up with a breach as a result of not swapping out older devices into the Windows 11 fleet.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI think there\u2019ll be a little bit of rush from organisations. They\u2019re probably still trying to work out budgeting post-financial year.\u201d<\/p>\n
As for ASI, it\u2019s navigating the continued changes from vendor partners for IT service providers.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe did get a termination letter from for VMware \u2026 we\u2019re not a large partner of theirs,\u201d said Lowe. \u201cI think that probably makes sense [with] what they\u2019re doing, and I think, if anything, it\u2019s probably helped us convert some customers to other technologies.\u201d<\/p>\n
For example, its New Zealand cloud offering has \u201cgone gangbusters\u201d, which is on Nutanix\u2019s platform.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe biggest change we\u2019re seeing is that customers are leaving other platforms because they don\u2019t want to pay the maintenance and renewal fees on those systems.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAs for Microsoft moving away from EA to CSP, we\u2019re not EA partners so I think it\u2019s going to be a positive for us.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat that means, I guess we\u2019ll wait and see. I don\u2019t know what sort of impact that will have, if any, until that obviously starts to funnel and filter out across the across the market.\u201d<\/p>\n
Excitement over the future<\/p>\n
Despite these shifts in the technology industry, Lowe is excited about where ASI is headed, as the rate of change continues to require IT service providers to make internal changes.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe competitors seem to get smaller and consolidating further and further,\u201d he said. \u201cEvery week, I think I read that someone acquires someone \u2026 we\u2019ll just keep doing our thing. I think we\u2019re excited, and I\u2019m far too young to retire.\u201d<\/p>\n
However, Lowe said while the pace of technology is changing at a exponential rate, he sees the move towards shifting perceptions of gender in the IT channel following at a slower pace.<\/p>\n
\u201cI definitely think having been brought up by a mother [Maree Lowe] who ran a technology business starting in the 80s [has] given me a fairly good lens on things,\u201d he said. \u201cEveryone knows probably what it was like in the 80s and 90s while raising four kids. In saying that, I\u2019m a middle-aged white man.<\/p>\n
\u201c[We have] a champion of change for women \u2014 women in IT in particular \u2014 so it\u2019s given us a good lens on that.<\/p>\n
\u201cCould we be doing more? We definitely could be doing more as an organisation and as an industry. The challenges in technology \u2014 it\u2019s always a challenge.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou look at the process, and it\u2019s probably very similar to the split of where we\u2019re at the moment.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lowe also questioned how the channel can get more people interested in the industry to get a better balance.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe resumes you get through the application process is probably very similar to the split of where we\u2019re at [as an industry],\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
While that will take a whole industry to change, ASI plans to celebrate its 40-year anniversary, this includes a recent internal company kick-off where it flew in everyone from across Australia, New Zealand, and some staff from the Philippines.<\/p>\n
The three-day event was held in August at the Hyatt Regency in Darling Harbour and was a really great opportunity for the IT service provider, said Lowe.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was called Connect, and it was all around connecting, collaborating, and communicating effectively across the wider teams,\u201d he explained. \u201cLike most organisations, the bigger you get, the more important it is to have those open lines of communication happening.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt resonated really well with the team, and now we\u2019re planning a roadshow for customers across Australia to double down on who we are and what we do as an organisation \u2026 40 years is a long time.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cWe\u2019ve spent a lot of time on improving that within the organisation, because garbage in, garbage out. AI…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":100884,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[64,63,257,105],"class_list":{"0":"post-100883","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-computing","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-computing","11":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100883","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=100883"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100883\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/100884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=100883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=100883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=100883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}