By Adam Lidgett ( December 20, 2024, 10:00 PM EST) — A California federal judge has partially denied a Samsung contractor’s attempt to beat a suit alleging two of its products infringe a pair of technology patents, only agreeing to narrow which claims can move to trial…. Law360 is on it, so you are, too. A Law360 subscription puts you at the center of fast-moving legal issues, trends and developments so you can act with speed and confidence. Over 200 articles are published daily across more than 60 topics, industries, practice areas and jurisdictions. A Law360 subscription includes features such as Daily newsletters Expert analysis Mobile app Advanced search Judge information Real-time alerts 450K+ searchable archived articles And more! Experience Law360 today with a free 7-day trial. source

This is a VB Lab Insights article presented by Nvidia. At the recent Microsoft Ignite conference, Nvidia and Microsoft unveiled innovations that will power the next wave of generative AI from cloud to PCs and fuel a new era of industrial AI. These announcements span across the full-stack including next-gen AI infrastructure powered by Nvidia Blackwell, new Omniverse workflows for digital twins and visual generative AI, and tools to enable Windows developers to build and optimize AI-powered apps on RTX AI PCs. Together, Nvidia and Microsoft are helping businesses across industries unleash the full potential of AI and drive more efficiencies and transformation through a comprehensive, full-stack approach. Check out some of the new announcements to come from Microsoft Ignite: Nvidia Blackwell empowers next-gen AI on Microsoft Azure Microsoft announced the launch of the first cloud private preview of the Azure ND GB200 V6 VM series. Based on the Nvidia Blackwell platform, this is a new AI-optimized virtual machine (VM) series and combines the Nvidia GB200 NVL72 rack design with Nvidia Quantum InfiniBand networking. Optimized for large-scale deep learning workloads, including trillion-parameter scale AI model training and inference, as well as complex tasks in advanced natural language processing, computer vision and more, it complements the previously announced Azure AI clusters with ND H200 V5 VMs, powered by Nvidia H200 GPUs. Azure Container Apps enables serverless AI inference with Nvidia Microsoft Azure Container Apps now supports Nvidia accelerated computing for simplified and scalable AI deployments. Serverless computing gives AI application developers more agility in deploying, scaling and iterating on applications without worrying about underlying infrastructure, improving functionality while minimizing operational overhead. Additionally, Nvidia and Microsoft will bring Nvidia NIM microservices to serverless Nvidia GPUs in Azure to optimize AI model performance. Omniverse reference workflows unveiled for industrial AI and visual generative AI The Nvidia Omniverse platform on Azure includes new reference workflows for industrial AI. These workflows can help developers build 3D, simulation and digital twin applications on Nvidia Omniverse and Universal Scene Description (OpenUSD). The reference workflow for 3D remote monitoring of industrial operations will enable customers to connect physically accurate 3D models of industrial systems to real-time data from Azure IoT Operations and Power BI. The Omniverse Blueprint for precise visual generative AI enables developers to build applications that empower nontechnical teams to generate AI-enhanced visuals aligned with brand assets. Nvidia introduced the Nvidia Nemovision-4B Instruct, a new multimodal small language model (SLM) for RTX AI PCs and workstations, which will enable digital humans to understand visual imagery and provide relevant responses. Nvidia also announced updates to Nvidia TensorRT Model Optimizer (ModelOpt) to enable Windows developers to optimize models for ONNX Runtime deployment. With these new features and optimizations, Windows application developers can deploy AI models with faster throughput and minimal accuracy loss, allowing them to run on a wider range of PCs. Watch on-demand sessions about Nvidia AI on Azure At Microsoft Ignite, Nvidia and Microsoft shared how these recent technologies can accelerate generative AI, help launch new AI applications quickly and bring new digital capabilities across industries. Whether you missed Microsoft Ignite or want to check out these in-depth presentations again, these sessions are now available on-demand:  Accelerate generative AI adoption with Nvidia AI on Azure  Discover how enterprises can leverage the Nvidia accelerated computing platform on Azure to transform with generative AI. Along with enterprise-grade software and services, you can optimize performance, reduce total cost of ownership and accelerate time-to-solution.  Get from pilot to production the quick, easy, optimized way  Explore the latest development of Nvidia NIM microservices within Azure AI Studio to get your generative AI applications into production successfully. Learn how you can streamline workflows, enhance performance and quickly move from pilot to production.  The new era of industrial digitalization and manufacturing innovation  Hear from Nvidia and Microsoft experts about the latest advancements in computer graphics, data interoperability, generative AI and accelerated cloud computing. Learn how Azure IoT Operations, powered by Nvidia Omniverse Cloud APIs and OpenUSD, is enabling manufacturers to digitalize operations.  Explore a new era of digital manufacturing  Check out this hands-on demo of how Azure IoT Operations and Power BI can provide real-time monitoring, collaboration and physically based visualization capabilities for production insights and new operational possibilities.  Harness the power of RTX AI PCs to elevate next-gen AI applications  See how Nvidia RTX AI provides an end-to-end, GPU-accelerated platform for building and deploying advanced models and applications that keep your data private while tapping into the power of AI on your PC. Understanding and accelerating business decisions for M365 data using AI Enterprises are leveraging AI to accelerate their business but face challenges integrating diverse, siloed data into AI services. Learn how Cohesity, with Nvidia generative AI and Microsoft Azure OpenAI, provide instant, high-quality insights from secondary data. Learn more about Nvidia and Microsoft solutions The announcements and sessions at Microsoft Ignite reinforced that accelerated computing technology from Nvidia and purpose-built AI architecture from Microsoft Azure are helping organizations empower new capabilities and revolutionize whole industries. Check out the Nvidia partner page for on-demand sessions, demos, special offers for developers and more from Microsoft Ignite. VB Lab Insights content is created in collaboration with a company that is either paying for the post or has a business relationship with VentureBeat, and they’re always clearly marked. For more information, contact [email protected]. source

An interactive voice response (IVR) system provides an automated phone menu for callers to interact with instead of a live agent. They present a tree of options for customers to serve themselves, thus giving businesses an efficient and cost-effective way to route calls and solve certain issues. For callers, an IVR can reduce wait times and deliver a better customer experience. As long as it’s easy to navigate, customers can quickly interact with a reliable system on their own and find solutions whenever they want or need. 1 RingCentral RingEx Employees per Company Size Micro (0-49), Small (50-249), Medium (250-999), Large (1,000-4,999), Enterprise (5,000+) Medium (250-999 Employees), Large (1,000-4,999 Employees), Enterprise (5,000+ Employees) Medium, Large, Enterprise Features Hosted PBX, Managed PBX, Remote User Ability, and more 2 Talkroute Employees per Company Size Micro (0-49), Small (50-249), Medium (250-999), Large (1,000-4,999), Enterprise (5,000+) Any Company Size Any Company Size Features Call Management/Monitoring, Call Routing, Mobile Capabilities, and more Designing an elegant IVR phone tree Not too long ago, changing an IVR phone tree required a call to the vendor — these days, most changes can be handled in house by an administrator.  Modern business phone services and call center software make setting up an IVR phone tree fairly easy, with drag-and-drop builders to help people visualize call flows, define prompts, and ultimately guide callers. Administrators can configure the menu structure, assign actions (such as forwarding to specific agents or departments), and set up voice recordings for each menu option. The technical steps are easy — the hard part is designing a really useful IVR phone tree that fully meets the needs of your customers. Clear, intuitive navigation and that minimizes customer frustration is the goal. A poorly structured IVR phone tree can lead to confusion, long wait times, and higher call abandonment rates. Every business is different, but there are some practical, proven tactics you can use to help callers help themselves. Below are some key best practices to consider when designing and maintaining an effective IVR system. Best practices for IVR phone trees 1. Limit menus to 5 options People can easily process and remember a small number of choices. When there are too many options, it can overwhelm callers, leading to confusion and frustration. The rule of thumb for the industry is to keep phone menus limited to five options. Less is better. A cluttered menu increases the chances of errors, longer call durations, and even abandonment. By sticking to five or fewer options, you make it easier for callers to navigate the system quickly and efficiently, improving their overall experience and reducing the likelihood of them needing to call back for assistance. To account for more complex queries, use a tiered or nested menu structure, where callers can choose a broad category first and then select from a smaller set of options within that category.. For example, after a general greeting, you could offer main options like “Billing,” “Technical Support,” and “Sales,” and then present a second level of more specific choices once the caller selects a category. This keeps the initial menu simple while still accommodating a larger number of options, which follows IVR design best practices and is familiar to most callers. 2. Conduct regular IVR phone tree testing Let’s assume that when you first set up your IVR call flow, it was perfectly matched to your customer needs and business outcomes. Even so, you want to revisit this design on a regular basis to make sure that your IVR is doing the best job possible. Without regular testing, issues such as confusing menu options, incorrect routing, or broken links may go unnoticed, leading to customer frustration and longer wait times. Testing also helps identify any technical glitches or areas for improvement, ensuring that callers can easily navigate the system and reach the right destination. Periodic testing should also ensure that IVR phone trees are up to date, and that they reflect any changes in business operations, staffing, or service offerings. A product name-change that is not addressed in your phone tree is going to cause massive confusion for callers and agents alike. Busy offices and contact centers can use analytics to find opportunities for improvement, such as unused phone menu options, drop-off points, and other signs that callers aren’t getting what they need. 3. Create crisp, high-quality IVR recordings A phone tree’s main objective is to provide customers with personalized self-service. Since this involves interacting with customers in natural language, it behooves you to select a natural-sounding, realistic voice that puts them at ease — or at least one that doesn’t stand out. To achieve this, most IVR platforms allow you to record and upload your own audio recordings. Alternatively, you can also use text-to-speech (TTS) technology to convert text prompts into spoken audio. With some platforms, you can even choose a hybrid of human voice actors combined with TTS. Having a clear, natural-sounding voice for IVR recordings is essential because it enhances the overall caller experience and ensures that the information being conveyed is easily understood. A clear voice helps prevent misinterpretation of options, reducing caller frustration and the likelihood of mistakes in navigating the menu. 4. Provide language options first If your product serves an international audience, start by having callers select their language of preference right away. It’s simply not a great idea to subject your callers to lengthy bits of information in a language they don’t understand. Instead, ensure your callers are greeted in their local language, facilitating meaningful communication. In addition to using multilingual services when warranted, you should also try to use unique verbiage for each menu option. If everything sounds similar to callers because you’ve used the same phrases and words, it could be more difficult than it has to be for them to differentiate between menu options. Furthermore, spicing up the menu is appealing and natural sounding to callers. 5. Offer callers clear off-ramps An effective IVR phone tree should not only guide callers efficiently but

最新研究《香港的海鮮貿易，港口和進口管制措施——「魚」公移山》發現，雖然香港在全球海 鮮貿易中擔當重要的角色，但缺乏必要的進口管制，以確保合法而可持續的海鮮流入市場。香港每年平均進口超過 35 萬噸海鮮。以價值計算，本港是世界第 14 大海鮮進口地區，按進口量 計算則位列全球首 20 位。香港是各項高需求奢侈品的重要貿易樞紐，包括食用活珊瑚魚、魚翅、 海馬、海參和花膠，並且涉及大量受威脅物 種。研究亦顯示，香港在管制海鮮進口方面落後於中國大陸，以及印尼、日本、歐盟和美國等主要司 法管轄區。因此，非法、未報告及無管制(IUU)海鮮幾乎亳無阻礙地進入本港。海鮮的可追溯性 措施亦相當缺乏。 本地進口及分銷商 M&C Asia 的 César Maresville 指，香港收集用作追蹤海鮮進口來源和合法性的數 據只佔全部百分之十二。數據缺乏透明度使我們無法確定海鮮是否來自合法源頭、可持續捕獲或 生產，或不含毒素。相比之下，其他國家例如日本對文件的要求更高，成為現今香港監管框架無 法達到的參考標準。 由於非法和不可持續的開採方式導致過度捕撈問題持續，香港的主要貿易夥伴正在逐步實施本港 一直缺乏的港口措施和可追溯性的規定。許多國家正在參與《港口國措施協議》，一項針對 IUU 捕魚問題的具有國際約束力協議。中國已經表明有意成為協約國。 此報告強調，香港過時的法律框架使問題變得複雜。在 1940 年年代制定的海鮮貿易法例未能跟上 全球海鮮貿易發展的節奏。 香港是全球食用活珊瑚魚消耗量最大的地區之一，這部分保守估計佔總進口量的四分一(加上未 通報的本地卸運量)，但活海鮮進口的監管卻是最寬鬆。 最近一項由香港大學及城市大學的研究1發現，過去十年期間，本港的食用活珊瑚魚貿易量(包括 石斑魚、隆頭魚和笛鯛等物種)多達 20 萬公噸，價值超過 20 億美元。儘管這貿易具經濟重要性， 研究亦揭發多個問題牽涉不準確、不齊全及過於簡化的貿易數據，並且提出改善數據收集和相關 法例的建議。 香港環保海鮮聯盟主席及本地進口分銷商 178 Degrees 創辦人 Benjamin So 指，全球近五分一海鮮 可能來自 IUU 漁業，香港的海鮮來自超過 165 個國家/地區，加上管制寬鬆，流入香港的非法海鮮 量有機會更高。這些非法活動不但削弱全球可持續發展的漁業，亦會影響以負責任方式捕魚維生的沿海社群。 置地文華東方酒店米芝蓮二星級兼綠星餐廳 Amber 的廚藝總監 Richard Ekkebus 表示，香港缺乏海鮮標籤法例，標籤語意不清，消費者缺乏重要的海鮮資料，例如物種、捕獲或生產的地點及方式。這剝奪消費者做出明智選擇的能力，最終影響消費者。 最近日台韓等鄰近地區增加進口規例，以打擊 IUU 海鮮，而尚未作出行動的香港被置於不利位置。 為保持競爭力，此報告促請香港特區政府加強進口管制，與國際標準和最佳操作守則一致，包括 實施港口國措施、擴大捕撈記錄計劃、強制要求所有進口水產品提供衞生證明書、完善數據收集平台，以及要求報告特定於物種的數據。透過這些行動，香港既能保護海洋生物多樣性，亦可確保進口香港的海鮮是合法、可持續和安全食用。 LinkedIn Email Facebook Twitter WhatsApp source

Setting up a virtual call center is easier and faster than you might think. A lot of people waste too much time trying to plan every detail to perfection. But the best approach is to jump in and learn by doing. This guide explains how to set up a virtual call center in just four steps (or three if you don’t need to hire). How to start a virtual call center in four steps You don’t need to spend months to launch a virtual call center. The entire process should involve some basic planning, the right call center software, and (maybe) a remote team. Once it’s live, you can make adjustments and experiment with new features as needed. Using RingCentral to set up your virtual call center is my top recommendation. But these steps still work even if you’re using something else. Be sure to check out our RingCentral review and our guide on the best call center software if you’d like to learn more about your options. Step 1: Set the groundwork This planning phase should only take a few hours at most. In most cases, it doesn’t even take that long. All we’re doing here is thinking through the basics just enough to know what we need before we go any further. Here’s what you should be thinking about: Are you setting up an inbound or outbound call center? Maybe one that does both? What is the purpose of your call center and what are you trying to achieve? How much money are you willing to invest upfront? What about your monthly or annual budget? Are you strictly handling phone calls, or will you have a multichannel contact center? Do you need to hire employees? How soon does this need to happen? Don’t get too deep into the weeds here. All you need is a simple call center business plan that defines your goals and general sense of direction. Make sure you’re not overthinking things too much, and definitely don’t wait until your plan is “perfect” (or you’ll never start). As I said earlier, you’ll figure everything out along the way. Step 2: Sign up for RingCentral I recommend RingCentral for most call centers because it works equally well for small businesses, growing call centers, and even high-volume omnichannel operations. Small or new call centers can get by just fine with RingEX. This is RingCentral’s business phone plan – it starts at just $20 per user per month (if you pay annually) and includes all the lightweight features you’ll need. It’s less than half the price of a dedicated call center solution, and it supports unlimited inbound and outbound calling throughout the US and Canada. All RingEX plans come with SMS messaging, an IVR call menu (which is a must-have for call centers), and AI-powered call transcriptions. But I recommend starting with the Advanced plan if you can — it adds automatic call recording, advanced call monitoring features, and CRM integrations for just $5 more per month. Pro-tip: Change the number of users slider to 1-5 on the pricing page— you’ll see an option to try any of RingCentral’s business phone plans for free.  For high-volume call centers, fast-growth, or larger teams, I recommend starting with the RingCX Contact Center plan. It comes with the basics plus a range of advanced features that’ll help you improve contact center CX for agents and callers. Some of these advanced features include: Unlimited domestic inbound calls. Per minute outbound usage pricing. ACD, IVR, and skills-based routing. 20+ contact center support channels. Queue callbacks. Call recordings. Service desk integrations. Customer surveys. Built-in AI assistance. RingCentral’s contact center plans start at $65 per agent per month. This is a great deal when you consider how feature-packed the plan is on top of top-tier reliability and five-star customer service. Before moving on, choose a RingCentral plan and go through the signup process. You should set up voicemail, extensions or lines for your team, a basic IVR (with pre-recorded greetings), and CRM integration at the very least. All the other bells and whistles can come later while you wait for volume to start picking up. Remember, the main goal here is to get everything launched as fast as possible. Step 3: Build your team (if needed) You can skip this step if you’re not planning to hire anyone right now. It’s a good reference if you decide to add to your team later, but it won’t be super helpful for you until then. For those of you who do need to hire employees to run your virtual call center, I recommend slowing down for a minute and thinking carefully about the roles and responsibilities you need to hire for. If you’re small, a few generalist agents might be enough. But that’s not the only type of job that exists in a virtual call center. Do you need a manager to oversee your agents? Do you need to recruit people in different time zones who are available to take calls at different hours? What skills are the most important to the stage you’re at right now? Depending on your call volume and goals, you might have two different job listings — one for inbound customer service and another for outbound sales. These are two very different roles with different requirements and skillsets. You may also want to hire a quality assurance analyst among other roles for workforce optimization, agent engagement, and more. From there, you should set up an onboarding flow for remote employees. This could include pre-recorded training, video calls with yourself or other team members, setting up payroll information, or reading through SOPs and documentation. Thinking through this ahead of time ensures each new hire gets off to a great start. For the actual recruitment and hiring process, you have two options. The first is outsourcing the bulk of this work to a recruiting agency. It’s more expensive, but it’s less work for you to handle on your own. They’ll find candidates, qualify

00:00 Hi everybody, welcome to DEMO, the show where companies come in and they show us their latest products and services. Today, we have a special episode. Zscaler is going to show us their data protection offering, but they’re not here. Instead, we’re going to go out to San Francisco and meet one of our co-hosts, Brandon Mahne. Brandon, take it away. 00:15Thanks, Keith. I’m here today talking data security with the Zscaler team. Welcome, Moinul, would you like to introduce yourself? 00:23Absolutely, Brandon. First of all, thanks for having me, I really appreciate it. My name is Moinul Khan. I’m Senior Vice President and General Manager for Zscaler data security business. 00:34Welcome. We are excited to have you on the show. We’re talking about data security, a hot button item. Why don’t you tell us about Zscaler’s data protection and how it helps keep data secure? 00:47Yeah, absolutely. With distributed data, with the cloud and mobility, enterprise customers are facing a lot of complexities when think about data security, data is everywhere. There are a lot of data flows going on between user to applications, between applications to applications, between API to API. And what we really strive to achieve, when we think about this data security, is how can we deliver a fully integrated, very comprehensive data security solution for all different type of use cases. So if you look at our current solution today, we are protecting structured data and unstructured data. We are protecting it for data in motion, data at rest, and data in use. What that really means is with one single classification engine, you can protect all your exfiltration channels. Your exfiltration channels are web and SaaS-based services, the data that is sitting in public cloud infrastructure. There is sensitive data sitting on the endpoint. A lot of data breaches are happening through corporate exchange and corporate Gmail, and there is a lot of data security concerns when employees are using their BYOD and personal assets. And once again, what we strive for is a fully comprehensive data security platform, one classification engine that is protecting all your exfiltration channels. 02:19Sounds amazing, I’m excited to see it today. You know, as a chief technology officer, I know how I would use this, but who else is going to utilize this software, who is your target? 02:28This is primarily for CISOs. When you think about CISOs, this is for enterprise customers. So small enterprise customer, mid-sized enterprise customers, large enterprise customers, Fortune 500 companies. Everybody needs data security, right? Data breaches are happening everywhere, in all kinds of verticals. 02:55So this is really for the security team, SaaS organization, and as they start to grow, what do you see? Are the problems that you’re trying to solve in a first, second or third? 03:01The data breaches look at how [they are] evolving. It is evolving in many different ways. Just about a couple of years ago, our customers would say, “Do you have a DLP solution, data loss prevention?” people were looking for CASB, cloud access security brokers, for their cloud traffic. Today if you ask me what are some of those hot topics: GenAI security. The users, they’re crazy about these GenAI applications. They want to use ChatGPT, they want to use Gemini. These tools are making these employees super productive. So they want to use it, yep, but the concern for the CISO is, are we leaking our sensitive data? Are we losing our intellectual property? This space is constantly evolving because of the new trend in the market. 04:00I see it every single day and all the conversations that I have is on everybody’s mind. So if it weren’t for Zscaler, what else would people be doing today? A homegrown solution? How do you solve this? 04:13Organizations, they’re trying to do data security for years, but the main problem is the complexities that existed in the market for last 15-20, years, and they’re stuck with compliance. They’re not really solving the data security problem, the number one issue that we see in the market is these enterprise customers. They’re stuck with six, seven different DLP products. When all these different DLP products are running, they’re all disjointed, they’re all stand-alone products, point solutions. So the way to really focus on the data security issue is one single classification engine. You can create policy once and then the same policy should be applicable. Doesn’t matter if the users are working from offices or they’re remote, they’re working from home. Doesn’t matter what devices they’re on. All of that needs to be covered with a fully integrated solution, and that’s exactly what we are delivering to the market. 05:15Outstanding. I’m excited to see it. Take it away. 05:19So Brandon, what I’m going to do is, you know, we are pressed for time. I can’t really show you all the tools, but two tools are really driving a lot of adoption today. The first one is GenAI security. I’m going to show you how we secure GenAI, and then I will also demonstrate DSPM, data security posture management. This is a hot topic. This is all about securing data in public cloud infrastructure. So let’s start with GenAI security. What we really do is, we are a man in the middle proxy. That means all internet traffic, our customers’ internet traffic, they’re egressing through our proxy. We have a very scaled infrastructure. This is all cloud delivered security. We have 160 data centers around the world. We are inspecting 500 billion internet transactions today, so it’s very easy first to provide that visibility. The first thing we do is, you know how many applications your users are using, how they are using it, what kind of data leaks that are happening. So if you as an administrator, when someone logs into our interface, our zero trust exchange interface, right away, they can get that visibility. In this particular test instance, I am demonstrating that a total of 18 applications are being utilized. As you can see on

The demand for new data centers isn’t showing any sign of slowing. With new projects being announced each week, keeping track of the latest data center developments is not always easy. To keep you informed about the latest data center news involving design, construction, and related developments, we bring you the highlights from the past month. This curated selection will help you stay on top of the latest data center development news with ease. North American Data Center Deals As experts came forward with their initial thoughts on how a second Trump presidency could shape the nation’s data center industry, new development announcements continued to pour in. DC Blox is developing four hyperscale edge node data centers across the southeast. The facilities will be in Montgomery, Alabama; North Augusta, South Carolina; and Huntsville, Alabama; in addition to the location in Conyers, Georgia that was made public earlier this year.  Cologix, meanwhile, is expanding its central Ohio footprint after acquiring 154 acres of land in Johnstown. The operator is planning to develop an 800 MW campus to support the region’s “rapidly advancing digital economy.” In Virginia, Iron Mountain said it acquired two data center development sites to strengthen its presence in the region. The purchase of the Richmond and Manasses will add an estimated 350 MW of planned future capacity.   Related:Financing Strategies for Data Center Operations: A Comprehensive Guide Core Scientific says it will spend $6.1 billion to turn its bitcoin mining site in Denton into an AI data center. The investment is expected to lead to $194 million in property tax over a decade, according to The Dallas Morning News. The news comes as CleanArc said it’s developing a new data center in Virginia’s Caroline County, while AVAIO Digital said approval has been granted for its 76-acre Perseus Data Center Project at the Pittsburg Technology Park.  Meta continues to target multibillion-dollar data center investments, with reports this month indicating the Facebook parent company is planning to build an AI-ready facility near the city of Monroe, Louisiana.   The demand for nuclear projects continues, with Meta announcing it was seeking as much as 4 GW of new nuclear energy as the company looks for a reliable electricity source for its data centers.  The news came as Amazon said it would build a data center campus next to a Pennsylvania nuclear plant after US regulators rejected a special power deal, and Oklo agreed to deliver as much as 750 MW of electricity from nuclear reactors it plans to build to two data center companies. Related:How Data Center Reference Design Can Streamline Your Infrastructure Planning Microsoft said it is building its first wooden data centers made with superstrong ultra-lightweight wood in a bid to slash the use of steel and concrete, which are among the most significant sources of carbon emissions.   More North American data center news: Infrastructure-as-a-Service provider servers.com announced the opening of a new data center in Miami and expanded operations in Amsterdam, San Jose, Washington, Dallas, and Singapore   A rendering of WS Computing’s new data center facility in Gromstul, Norway. (IMAGE: SKANSKA) European Data Center Developments In Europe, UK data center operator Latos Data Centres said it will be delivering its first hyperscale data center in Cardiff, Wales, and a total of 40 new data centers across the UK by 2030.  The Cardiff data center will be a Tier III facility designed to meet the needs of the most demanding global technology companies, the company said.  Meanwhile, Nordic colocation provider atNorth is planning to expand two of its data centers in Iceland. The ICE02 campus near Keflavík, will gain an additional capacity of 35 MW, and the recently opened ICE03 site in Akureyri will gain additional capacity of 16 MW. Related:Global Data Center Market Projected to Near $500 Billion by 2029 The announcement came as Skanska signed a $50 million contract with WS Computing AS to build the core and shell for a new data center facility at Gromstul, Norway. Backed by investment management firm DTCP, GreenScale launched with the acquisition of Atlantic Hub, Northern Ireland’s largest data center based in Derry, complemented by a strategic site in Donegal, Ireland, totaling 170 MW of capacity.  More European data center news this month:  T-Mobile and CE Colo Czech are launching a new section of DC7 data center in the Czech Republic, covering an area of up to 3,500 sq m.  Asia-Pacific Data Centers Builds In Asia-Pacific data center news, GDS International announced its entry into Thailand with a committed investment of up to $1 billion to develop a hyperscale data center park in Chonburi province, southeast of Bangkok.  Indian developer RMZ Corporation is spending $1.7 billion in building two data centers, and Canada Pension Plan Investment Board announced a $700 million joint venture with Pacific Asset Management Company to develop carrier-neutral hyperscale data centers in South Korea.   Shanghai DC-Science, a Chinese data center developer and operator, is seeking a loan of about $600 million to $700 million to fund a data center project in Malaysia.  More Asia-Pacific data center news this month:  Equinix entered into a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) with Sembcorp Power to secure 58.5MW of power from a solar project in Singapore.  Teraco started construction of a new 40 MW data center near Johannesburg, South Africa. (IMAGE: TERACO) Middle East and Africa Data Center Investments Teraco said construction commenced on a new hyperscale data center with 40 MW of critical power load at its Isando Campus in Ekurhuleni, east of Johannesburg, South Africa.  The facility, known as JB7, is currently scheduled for completion in 2026 and will incorporate the latest environmentally sustainable cooling and water management designs, the Digital Realty subsidiary said.  Ezditek broke ground on its flagship data center facility, RUH01, in Riyadh to support AI and cloud growth in Saudi Arabia. The facility is expected to go live in Q1 2026.    Batelco signed a memorandum of understanding with Qareeb Data Centers at the Gateway Gulf Investment Forum 2024. The collaboration aims to create a new data center in Bahrain.  Finally, Equinix opened new data centers in Türkiye and Oman.  source

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Product catalog templates can act as an internal database for storing and organizing all of your product information, including prices, suppliers, variants, and descriptions. Or you can use them to showcase your products to potential customers. No matter how many items you’re selling and whether they’re physical or digital products, this curated list of templates has something for everyone. Knack: A customizable product catalog database for displaying products online Knack is a no-code application builder that shines for its asset management and online database capabilities — two things that are crucial for product catalogs. With Knack, you can manage your entire catalog with a fully customizable database on the backend. From there, you can embed it on your website or mobile app for customers to look through on their own. It can also work well as an internal database, but it truly shines for showcasing your offers. Use Knack to create an embeddable product catalog database without writing a single line of code. Image: Knack.com If you have an existing website but aren’t able to sell products or add ecommerce functionality, you can embed your product catalog instead of switching and rebuilding your website somewhere else. As a no-code builder, it’s much easier than writing custom code and faster than starting over from scratch. You’ll be able to control every aspect of your database and set up admin accounts so your team can add or update products as needed. This template makes it easy to group products into categories, add details related to size and color, and add as many products as you’d like with no limitations. You can also add images, other variations, customization options, and more. But what makes this template (and Knack) better than the rest for embedding your products is that you can easily integrate it with PayPal or Stripe. If you want to learn more about the differences between the two, check out our guide on the best ecommerce payment solutions. Once that’s set up, users will be able to browse your database and buy whatever they’d like in a few clicks. Despite Knack’s drag-and-drop no-code nature, it still requires technical expertise and time to set up. You’ll also need to maintain it on your own. Knack offers a 14-day trial so you can see if it’s right for you before investing. Notion: A simple product catalog template to organize your data Notion is an incredibly flexible productivity platform with collaborative docs, relational databases, tables, and lightweight project management features. It’s a great way for individuals and small teams to stay organized and centralize everything in one place. It’s a bit of a blank slate when you first sign up — rather than being ready to use out of the box, you can transform your workspace into whatever you need. Thankfully, templates make it easier to get started. My favorite product catalog template is simple and streamlined for internal use. More on Notion: Notion Review | Notion vs Asana | Notion vs Todoist. Notion makes it easy to store and organize details about every product in your catalog. Image: Notion.com The creator of this template has been using Notion for over five years and has a team of 30+ people working for the three digital brands he’s built. As such, it’s been tweaked and improved over time. His real-world experience with Notion has also clearly been applied to this template. There’s also a free video you can watch to see how it works. At its core, it’s a simple and straightforward database for your products. You can keep track of every detail you care about with its built-in table and gallery views. Out of the box, you’ll be able to categorize them by type, give each product a status, set variants, add pricing information, and upload images. You can also add your own custom fields or edit the existing fields to keep track of whatever you need to. If you use Notion for other elements of your business, the simplicity of this template makes it easy to integrate it into your existing set up. The template is technically listed as free, but it’s locked behind a “name a fair price” paywall that starts at $2. There are also various add-ons you can buy, including a product development template, a full suite of templates for product and commerce teams, and access to all product templates from the creator. Airtable: An advanced product catalog database Airtable is one of the most flexible relational database solutions. I’ve used it for years to manage nearly every aspect of my business — it’s powerful, customizable, and capable of streamlining processes and workflows across your entire company. The free plan supports up to 1,000 records and five users. From there, you can scale as much as you need — regardless of how much your catalog expands, you’ll never outgrow Airtable. More on Airtable: Airtable Review | Airtable vs Asana | Airtable vs Trello. Airtable works just as well whether you have a hundred items or thousands. Image: Airtable.com As one of the most scalable options on my list, Airtable works really well for large product catalogs. If you have a handful of products, it’s probably not worth the hassle of learning how to use it — because of its flexibility and infinite scalability, it has a steep learning curve. But the reason it’s hard to learn is what makes it so powerful. You can build custom applications and trackers, build on top of existing templates or bases, and ultimately centralize everything in one place if you’re willing to put in the time. This template makes it easy to get started building and managing your product catalog. It has built in list and gallery views with dozens of other options you can add in a few clicks. You can sort, group, filter, and view everything however it makes sense for you. There are custom fields for tags, materials, dimensions, price, color, units sold, gross sales, and more. Beyond adding and managing

Join our daily and weekly newsletters for the latest updates and exclusive content on industry-leading AI coverage. Learn More Creating fancy generative AI images can be fun and useful, but that’s not all enterprises need. Enterprise text-to-image generation is about more than just creating images. It’s about integration with existing workflows and other enterprise AI tools. That’s a direction that Stability AI, the vendor behind Stable Diffusion, understands. Today, Stability AI and Amazon Web Services (AWS) jointly announced that Stable Diffusion 3.5 Large is available on the Amazon Bedrock service. AWS is the only public cloud service offering the flagship Stability AI models.  The move isn’t just about simple availability. It’s about integration and a go-to-market strategy that breathes more life into Stability AI’s efforts as the company’s new CEO brings renewed focus to meeting customer needs. Amazon Bedrock provides a single, unified API that allows enterprises to access and use multiple AI models, including Stable Diffusion. That’s important, as AWS’ own research shows that most enterprises use more than one model at a time. It’s an approach that users including the National Football League (NFL) and Stride Learning are already benefiting from.  Stable Diffusion 3.5’s Amazon Bedrock deployment comes as Stability AI faces an increasingly competitive landscape with rivals including Google, Midjourney, Ideogram and Black Forest Labs’ Flux Pro, among others. The company aims to differentiate with more image diversity in terms of style, prompt adherence and enterprise workflows. “There’s a reason that we’re on AWS,” Prem Akkaraju, CEO of Stability AI, told VentureBeat in an exclusive interview. “It’s because that’s where the developers and the creators are, and we want to bring our tools and our models where they are. Our goal is to empower professional content creators.”  AWS has its own image generation tech, why does it need Stable Diffusion? The increasingly competitive text-to-image gen AI landscape also includes models from Amazon. At the beginning of December, the Amazon Nova AI model family was announced, including image generation models.  Baskar Sridharan, VP of AI and ML services and infrastructure at AWS told VentureBeat that having multiple text-to-image generation models provides user choice. Amazon Bedrock provides a single unified API for users, so they can choose to deploy any model that’s available on the platform using the same API. Sridharan also noted that AWS provides model evaluation tools that can help enterprises choose the best tool for a specific deployment. Not surprisingly, Akkaraju sees Stable Diffusion 3.5 as being superior to other models. That’s an assertion that Stability AI has backed up through reported benchmarks on prompt adherence. “We show in our research that Stable Diffusion 3.5 Large leads the market in prompt adherence, allowing for models to closely follow a given text prompt and really making it the top choice for efficiency and high quality performance,” said Akkaraju. How enterprises can fit Stable Diffusion into an Amazon Bedrock AI workflow Stable Diffusion 3.5 large has been available to Stability AI users via the company’s API as well as its Stable Assistant service since late October. Stability AI doesn’t see any real price difference between using Stable Diffusion on its API or via Amazon Bedrock. The real benefit for enterprise users having Stable Diffusion now available on Amazon Bedrock is the ability to fit into larger, more complex enterprise workflows. Enterprises can benefit from a unified workflow that ties multiple models from different vendors all together with a single API. It’s an approach that the NFL is already using. The NFL has an application called “My Cause, My Cleats” that uses Amazon Bedrock to enable a collaborative, community-focused experience for creating custom cleat designs. Sridharan explained that the application uses both Anthropic Claude and Stable Diffusion. The NFL uses Claude to create detailed prompts that understand user preferences and determine what they want. That prompt is then fed into Stable Diffusion to generate the image. The entire process and workflow is done on Amazon Bedrock without the need to jump between different services. Another organization that has benefitted from the integration is education vendor Stride Learning. The company needed images to support its online learning game Legends Library — a lot of images, up to 1,000 images per minute. Amazon Bedrock provides the infrastructure to support that scale for running Stable Diffusion. Beyond just high-performance scale, there was also a need to secure image generation output. That’s where the Amazon Bedrock Guardrails API fits in. Sridharan noted that with guardrails, Stride Learning is able to meet responsible AI policies for image generation. “When you do this all using a single API endpoint, it makes it very easy for customers to build these kinds of applications,” said Sridharan. Stability AI’s eventful 2024 and the road ahead with its new leadership The Stable Diffusion 3.5 update and availability on Amazon Bedrock caps off an eventful year for Stability AI. The company’s founder and former CEO Emad Mostaque resigned in March amid concerns about focus and lack of revenue. It took until June for Stability AI to find a permanent replacement with the appointment of Akkaraju.  So far, Akkaraju had been at the helm for a series of model updates. He has also helped to bring in new investors such as Napster founder Sean Parker and advisors including acclaimed director James Cameron in September. Akkaraju comes from a visual effects background and helped make movies including Cameron’s Avatar. In his view, the professional visual media industry will completely transform over the next several years, moving to generated content rather than rendered content. “It’s a good thing that we work a lot in the creative business, because those are probably some of the  most demanding clients that we could ask for,” Akkaraju said. Looking forward, he joked that Stability AI’s plan is world domination. On a more serious note, though, he expects continued innovation as his company strives to meet real workflow needs. “We’re going to continue to push the model forward,” said Akkaraju. “You might even see us do another release