Tag: ITBusiness.ca

Trust in fintech suffers from a generational divide [Portfolio]

/ Gary Hilson

The big banks may have more time than they think before their “Uber moment” arrives based on this year’s Digital Money Trends Report, which found that Canadians are still wary of fintech, even as they increasingly search for information about financial products online.

The second annual report released by online financial comparison site RateHub.ca found that Canadians to not place a high level of trust in fintech companies yet, especially compared to their counterparts in the U.S., as there are fewer players here and less awareness. In addition, fintechs in Canada are newer and Canadians tend to have entrenched loyalty to the Big Five banks, unlike the fragmented financial services south of the border.

Read my full article on ITBusiness.ca.

Flourishing Internet of Things still faces adoption, security challenges, Juniper finds [Portfolio]

/ Gary Hilson

Internet of Things (IoT) growth predictions have been bullish for a number of years, and new data from Juniper Research predicts the number of connected devices will triple in the next five – but that rosy forecast comes with some caveats.

The recently released The Internet of Things: Consumer, Industrial & Public Services 2016-2021 predicts the number of connected IoT devices, sensors and actuators will hit more than 46 billion in 2021, which is a 200 per cent increase from 2016. The growth will be driven in large part by a reduction in the unit costs of hardware, the organization found, forecasting that industrial and public services will post the highest growth over the next five years, averaging more than 24 per cent annually.

Read my full article on ITBusiness.ca.

Juniper predicts more chatbots and fintech in 2017 [Portfolio]

/ Gary Hilson

Ashley Madison users have already unwittingly encountered a great deal of bots, but in 2017 they are going to become more prevalent – and more transparent to the user, according to U.K.-based Juniper Research.

In its top 10 predictions for the year, the organization forecasts that chatbots – virtual agents which operate via social networks and messaging platforms – will grow in presence and popularity, streamlining e-commerce activities such as booking flights and hotels, or to order items directly by speaking with a bot through an app.

Read my full article on ITBusiness.ca.

‘Fourth revolution’ driving Thomson Reuters’ upcoming tech centre, VP says [Portfolio]

/ Gary Hilson

Thomson Reuters earned a lot of buzz two months ago after announcing that it would create 1,500 jobs as part of a new technology centre in Toronto. But while that initiative is still taking shape, it’s actually part of broader strategy that includes a network of labs around the world, including existing facilities in Canada.

For example, the Canadian media/financial and legal information giant already has a lab in Waterloo, started more than two years ago, which Mona Vernon, the vice-president of Thomson Reuters Labs, said it’s part of the company’s strategy of associating itself with innovative ecosystems. In the case of Waterloo, that includes connecting with Communitech as well as local startups, while its data scientists leverage the technology corridor connecting that region to Toronto.

Read my full article on ITBusiness.ca.

A CMO to Know: Kevin Suitor, TELoIP [Portfolio]

/ Gary Hilson

Kevin Suitor to didn’t set out to become a CMO, but his college co-op placement changed his intended career path. “I got the selling bug,” he says.

The newly appointed CMO of TELoIP Inc. went to Ottawa’s Algonquin College for electronics engineering and, thanks to one of his professors, found a co-op placement with Bell Canada that would put him down the path of sales rather than technology.

Read my full article on ITBusiness.ca.

Customers sharing data want to know what’s in it for them

/ Gary Hilson

It’s eleven o’clock. Do you know how your data is being used?

According to research recently released by marketing analytics firm Aimia, the average consumer now realizes their data is valuable to marketers – 42 per now see their data as being highly valuable – but they still don’t understand how it’s being used. Nor do they know how their data is being collected, what is being collected, or how they can maintain control over their personal information.

This insight arrives courtesy of Aimia’s annual Loyalty Lens report, which involved surveying more than 15,000 customers in nine countries in order to predict customer loyalty standards for the year ahead.

Optimism drives tech sector hiring in 2017, but skills shortage remains a challenge – Hays [Portfolio]

/ Gary Hilson

Technology companies in Canada are optimistic about hiring next year, but some are skittish about investing in new grads, despite a shortage of talent, according to this year’s Hays Salary Guide.

Now in its seventh year, the annual survey polled employers across the country and in multiple industries for their take on 2016 and what lies ahead, and found the Canadian IT sector was among the country’s most optimistic.

In fact, Hays found that more than three-quarters of IT employers anticipate business growth in the new year, but in true Canadian fashion, they are playing it safe.

Read my full article on ITBusiness.ca.

Canada’s brain drain under control – but mainly flowing to cities, LinkedIn says [Portfolio]

/ Gary Hilson

Canada’s brain drain to Silicon Valley has been a perennial concern for the IT sector, but the flow has stabilized, according to LinkedIn Corp., even if it’s arriving at only a handful of destinations.

Large hub cities such as Toronto are the primary beneficiaries of what appear to be significant spikes in tech-based entrepreneurship and software talent, the company’s Talent Buzz 2016 found, and it’s too soon to tell if a Trump presidency will dramatically redirect the current.

In fact, the report found that entrepreneurship was Canada’s top growing job function, with the number of Canadian sole proprietors increasing by 13 per cent this year, followed by businesses with one to 10 employees, which rose 3 per cent.

Read my full article on ITBusiness.ca.

Canadians are keeping their e-commerce dollars in the country, PayPal says [Portfolio]

/ Gary Hilson

The “buy local” mentality is not only benefitting bricks-and-mortar shops in Canada, according to research from PayPal Canada, but e-tailers and their social media marketing departments too.

The digital payments company conducted its study in collaboration with Ipsos ahead of Black Friday and found that three out of four Canadian shoppers plan to buy holiday gifts online from Canadian retailers instead of buying from U.S. or international websites, with 43 per cent of those people planning to buy more gifts from Canadian retailers than they did last year. Millennials, meanwhile, are even more apt to buy online from a domestic e-tail site – 83 per cent, in fact.

So why is it cool to shop online in Canada now?

Read my full story on ITBusiness.ca.

Foster innovation and inclusivity through storytelling, Google-led report says [Portfolio]

/ Gary Hilson

Using innovation and digital storytelling to both foster inclusivity and break down silos between the arts and business communities appears to have been the key message to emerge from a recent joint effort to discover what’s necessary for building a creative and entrepreneurial Canada.

Google Canada, Startup Canada, and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) recently embarked on a three-month national dialogue series tapping 1,000 Canadian artists, content creators, cultural entrepreneurs and leaders within the innovation, entrepreneurship and academic communities, organizing forums in six cities, a digital consultation, and dozens of in-person interviews to discover ideas that were common across the country.

Read my full article on ITBusiness.ca.