The conference cover the latest trends and technologies in cloud computing and development, from Infrastructure and Platforms (e.g. IaaS & PaaS) , Big Data and Analytics, Java and JVM languages, Continuous Delivery and Deployment, Microservices and Containers, Functional Programming, Internet of Things, DevOps, Performance & Optimisation, Architecture & Security and Development Methodologies.
The region has a well established base of companies making world-class cloud technology with a global reach – including industry leaders like Oracle, HP, IBM, Cray and Amazon as well as fast growing startups such as ClusterHQ, JustOneDB and ForgeRock. Many of these companies have started to work together as part of the HBB Cloud Special Interest Group (SIG) to help develop the region as a globally established centre of excellence for cloud computing.
Phil Bates was a key influencer in bringing Voxxed Days to Bristol. As the leader for Oracle’s cloud development centre in Bristol, and one of the champions for the cloud technologies cluster around Bristol and Bath, he said;
“A Voxxed Days event at the Watershed is great news and a recognition of the strength of the software development community in the area, particularly with respect to cloud computing and big data / analytics. Oracle has significant and expanding cloud and business intelligence/analytics product development teams in Bristol. The south-west is a great place to develop technology and conferences like Voxxed Days provide a great opportunity for developers to share expertise, learn from each other’s experience and get a handle on what’s next in Java, Cloud and Big Data/Analytics.”
Each Voxxed Days is spearheaded by local communities so each event retains a unique regional flavour, whilst being part of the overall Voxxed movement. “I’m delighted we can add Bristol to the list of cities hosting Voxxed Days events in 2016,” said Mark Hazell, Director of VOXXED, the equivalent in Europe of the Java One conference in the US. “Voxxed Days is all about sharing expert software development experience directly with developers on the ground. Attending the event will equip developers from the area with the kind of knowledge that will improve their day-to-day efforts The Bristol area already stands out as a great location to be a developer, with it’s vibrant communities and willingness to share, and we’re please that Voxxed Days will help grow that effort.”
“High Tech Bristol & Bath CIC was set up to support the cluster around the city regions and high profile events like this are excellent vehicles for doing that. They afford fantastic opportunities for knowledge sharing and developer engagement, together with providing a real boost to our international profile as a great place to be an engineer in the high tech industries,” said Dr John Bradford, High Tech Bristol & Bath.
Bristol startup Zeetta Networks has raised £1.25m to commercialise its software-defined networking technology to smart enterprises and Internet of Things (IoT).
The company, a spin-out from the University of Bristol’s High Performance Networks group, is an internationally renowned team for their expertise in software-defined networking and network virtualization, focusing on the design, development and marketing of open networking solutions.
Zeetta has developed a unique open networking platform called netOS based on industry-standard hardware and powerful orchestration software which manages, automates and monitors the whole network while significantly reduces its costs. This offers a “USB-like”, plug-n-play management of different types of connected network devices and enables the construction of virtual “network slices”, for example separate logically-isolated sub-networks for the deployment of business-to-business or business-to-consumer services, such as Ultra HD wireless video distribution, city-wide Wi-Fi, IoT and other applications. This is being used for the Bristol is Open network across the city.
The funding, which is being provided by existing investor IP Group and new investor, Breed Reply, means that Zeetta can significantly accelerate its growth plans. This will enable the company to expand its commercial and technical teams and target new markets.
Zeetta Networks has been a virtual member of the Bristol SETsquared Centre since September 2015 and they will be looking to take up residence in the Bristol SETsquared Centre, housed in the iconic Engine Shed, as soon as possible.
“Since the formation of our company last May we have achieved many impressive milestones including considerable revenues from our first customers and grant funding from the European Commission through our participation in the REPLICATE lighthouse project. The investment from IP Group and Breed Reply cements the confidence of the market in our technology and our team,” said Vassilis Seferidis, CEO of Zeetta Networks.
Breed Reply, Reply’s advanced incubator, funds and supports the development of start-ups on the Internet of Things (IoT) in Europe and the USA. Based in London, with operational offices in Italy and Germany, Breed Reply supports entrepreneurs and young talent by quickly bringing new ideas to the market. This is done via funding at seed and early stage level; considerable support with significant know how transfer of business, managerial and technological expertise; and medium-term involvement to establish start-ups in their market. In the IoT sector, the main areas Breed Reply focuses on are fitness and wellness, healthcare, smart home, manufacturing, transportation and energy.
Bristol is building on its strength in driverless car technology, hosting a £5.5m project to test out communications systems for driverless cars, while Bristol companies are involved in projects around the country.
The three year FLOURISH project links several members of the current VENTURER driverless car project with Airbus, Age UK and artificial intelligence experts React AI to develop innovative new tools to improve the understanding of user needs and expectations of connected and autonomous vehicles. It will be based in the Bristol City Region and will test capabilities in both urban and suburban networked environments.
The UK is rapidly becoming one of the best places in the world for companies to develop their Intelligent Mobility business,” said Roland Meister, Head of Transport at Innovate UK. “Driven by our work with the Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles this competition has connected together the UK’s fantastic automotive industry, the research base, the insurance sector, public authorities with high growth businesses working in human behavioural science, telematics, information technology, communications, simulation, advanced sensor systems and machine learning.”
Importantly, FLOURISH will address vulnerabilities in the technology operating connected vehicles, with a focus on the critical areas of cyber security and wireless communications. The consortium will seek to develop tools that enable vehicle manufacturers and transport authorities to provide a safe and secure ‘V2X’ communications network that combine vehicle to vehicle (V2V) and vehicle to infrastructure (V2I) technologies.
“FLOURISH is an exciting addition to our portfolio of research in the field of connectivity for autonomous vehicles,” said Professor Andrew Nix, Dean of Engineering at the University of Bristol. “I particularly welcome the opportunity to work closely with Bristol City Council and South Gloucestershire Council on the real-world testing of autonomous vehicles. This will leverage existing investment in the Bristol city region to expand our validation and test capabilities in both urban and inter-urban networked environments.”
Dr Theo Tryfonas, Senior Lecturer in Systems Engineering and a member of the project team, commented: “The security and trustworthiness of wireless connectivity, as well as the privacy of the relevant data in terms of location, personally identifiable attributes of users etc. will be a factor of paramount importance for their successful operation and integration with society.”
The project will bring together industry and academic experts in the fields of wireless connectivity, cyber security, data innovation, human factors and social research.
Fusion Processing, based at the EngineShed in Bristol, is part of the £2.2m Insight project to develop driverless shuttles with advanced sensors and control systems and trial them in city pedestrian areas, with a particular focus on improving urban accessibility for disabled and visually-impaired people.
Researchers from the universities of Bristol and Keio with industrial partners have unlocked 80 THz of fibre-optic bandwidth that will enable future exascale data centres and transform 5G networks.
The collaboration between the University of Bristol’s Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Keio University and numerous Japanese industrial partners, have designed, developed and prototyped a pioneering all-optical router that can unlock 80 THz of bandwidth across a newly defined frequency band named T-Band (thousand band) and O-Band (original band). The adjacent bands span from 1.0 μm (300 THz) to 1.36 μm (220 THz) and are able to support 1600 channels at 50 GHz spacing.
Dr Georgios Zervas, Senior Lecturer in Optical and High Performance Networks in the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, said: “The technology and system proposed and prototyped will unlock the new frequency band and networks to support future exascale data centres, ‘zero-latency’ tactile optical internet, internet of everything, smart cities, fog computing and big data infrastructure among others. This is the outcome of a recent collaboration between Bristol, Keio and other Japanese institutions that brings together people with complementary yet common vision and pioneering concepts.”
The technology fabricated and tested is based on cascaded arrayed waveguide gratings (AWGs) and is designed to potentially construct a 1600 x 1600 wavelength router that can guide data at the speed of light. Specially designed quantum dot chips are used for light sources which were originally developed by NICT in Japan.
This single passive optical system can interconnect over one million end points such as, broadband home users, IoT devices, data centre servers, while offering at least ten Gb/s per end point. Critically it is also future proof since it’s transparent to any communication signal and it can also potentially consume zero power due to its passive nature.
Hiroyuki Tsuda, Professor of Faculty of Science and Technology at Keio University, added: “The enabling technologies for the new frequency band are the quantum dot based optical devices and the silica planar lightwave circuits designed for the new band.
“The collaboration between the University of Bristol who has extensive knowledge of the network architecture, and our Japanese research group with device technologies will create an ultra-high capacity, power-saving optical network system, in particular, for data centres.”
SW Innovation News is written by a team of experienced science and technology journalists covering innovation in the SouthWest of the UK. The region is already a global centre of excellence for silicon design, aerospace, nanotech and creative media alongside world leading university and commercial research, and this site aims to assist collaboration between companies and universities in the region and around the world
