Google and Spotify alumni launch Epiminds with $6.6M to build marketing teams for the AI era

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 14, 2025 by itnerd

Brilliant marketers are still buried in dashboards, spending more time on reports and clicks than on strategy and creativity. Epiminds was created to solve this problem. The company, founded by Swedish entrepreneurs Elias Malm and Mo Elkhidir, today announced its public launch from stealth alongside $6.6 million in funding led by Lightspeed Venture Partners with participation from EWOR, Entourage, and high-profile angels including the former CMO of Booking.com. In just twelve weeks from ideation, Epiminds already signed major agencies that manage over 240 brands in their platform.

Agencies today are squeezed from both sides: clients demand more transparency, faster reporting, and measurable ROI – all with smaller budgets. Inside agency walls, insights are scattered across platforms, making decisions slow or reliant on gut instinct, while the rapid rise of AI creates uncertainty about which tools to adopt and how to scale capacity sustainably. The traditional fixes – hiring more specialists, layering on dashboards and optimizers, or making reactive choices once problems surface – only raise costs and complexity without solving the underlying inefficiency. Worse, they don’t prepare agencies for where the future of marketing is heading. Epiminds solves each of these problems, and more.

The company creates advanced multi-agent AI systems that agencies can train and evolve over time. At the core is Lucy, an AI marketing manager that leads a dynamic team of more than 20 specialized agents working together across reporting, optimizations, budget pacing, bidding and creatives. Agencies can onboard a client in less than 30 seconds and instantly get an AI-powered marketing team capable of running campaigns from A to Z. Lucy and her team doesn’t just surface insights but executes them, learns each agency’s playbooks, and proactively monitors accounts to flag risks before they hurt performance.

“Marketers are under more pressure than ever to do more with less ,” said Mo Elkhidir, Co-Founder of Epiminds. “Lucy and her team take on the busywork so that marketing talent can do their best work. This is not about replacing creativity; it’s about giving it room to flourish.”

The vision was born out of the founders’ own frustrations. Malm, who ran an agency and later worked at Google leading agency partnerships across the Nordics, saw firsthand how talented teams were stuck in inefficient processes. Elkhidir, a Sudanese-born machine learning expert who led technical teams at Spotify and Kry, spent years researching multi-agent systems, teaching AI agents to collaborate to solve complex tasks. The spark came during a weekend project simulating Sweden’s 10.8 million citizens in AI, each with hundreds of attributes. When they discovered that 23,400 of them were marketers, the idea crystallized: an AI-powered marketing workforce that could free real marketers to focus on strategy and creative impact.

The impact is already visible. Agencies using Epiminds report faster onboarding, better performance, less wasted spend, and teams that can shift focus back to creativity and strategy. The dynamic multi-agent system seamlessly handles everything from everyday tasks like reporting and pacing to advanced capabilities such as audits, creative analysis, competitive insights, and strategic planning. By connecting insights to action across platforms, Lucy enables a 10x increase in output without adding headcount.

The timing is crucial in filling a big market gap. Legacy dashboards and optimization tools remain siloed, requiring heavy manual work. Point AI tools solve one-off problems but fail to orchestrate the bigger picture. Epiminds’ multi-agent approach creates an integrated, adaptive system that continuously learns and improves.

After just twelve weeks of joining EWOR, which has a a 0.1% application success rate, Epiminds signed major agencies managing over 240 brands on their platform.

Looking ahead, Epiminds plans to expand Lucy’s capabilities across more integrations, increase level of autonomy, and self-improving capabilities. Each new feature strengthens the entire system, creating a network effect where every agency benefits from smarter, more capable AI.

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Guest Post: Minimizing liability is not the same as security: Lessons learned from Collin’s Aerospace cyberattack 

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 14, 2025 by itnerd

By Martin Kraemer, CISO Advisor at KnowBe4

In late September 2025, several European airports reported significant delays and flight cancellations due to issues with their check-in and passenger systems. Collin’s Aerospace, the vendor of the vMUSE check-in system, had been hit by a ransomware attack. 

Collins Aerospace operates ARINC AviNet, a virtual environment that hosts their ARINC vMUSE ground system for customers. Attackers exploited vulnerabilities in the ground system and its proprietary network, resulting in significant operational delays, reputational damage, and a loss of passenger trust. It is believed that the attackers accessed the shared AviNet network and subsequently encrypted portions of the ARINC Multi-User System Environment (vMUSE). 

Strategic Lessons for Executives

Despite comprehensive regulations like NIS2, most organizations significantly underestimate the security risks stemming from a lack of visibility into their vendors’ security posture. Vendor risk management is not merely a compliance checkbox but a strategic issue of resilience, as this incident demonstrates how a third-party ransomware attack can ripple across entire ecosystems. 

The incident was likely a result of security negligence. Researchers discovered several outdated systems (IIS 8.5, Glassfish 2014, Oracle 2015, and end-of-life Cisco ASA devices) that presented predictable vulnerabilities for attackers. Legacy systems represent not just technical debt but also significant business continuity risks. Therefore, modernization programs and operational investments must be integrated. 

The effort airports invest in continuity planning was evident as fallback procedures were successfully invoked. While fallback was available, it proved highly disruptive. Furthermore, when experts attempted to restore the software, they were re-infected, indicating the ransomware was still present on the system. This highlights that detection, response, and recovery must be considered as a holistic process. 

The incident clearly underscores the need to elevate cyber risk to the board level. The outage affected passenger experience, operational continuity, and brand reputation. 

Strategic Imperatives

Supply chain security requires visibility, not just assurances, to mitigate the ripple effects when a vendor is compromised. Security assurance from vendors must evolve beyond simple checkbox exercises to in-depth analysis of their practices and configurations. Merely documenting compliance with ISO 27001, NIST, and NIS2 will no longer suffice. As high-impact cyber-attacks persist, organizations, especially those in critical infrastructure, will demand greater visibility and transparency from their vendors. When it comes to maintaining a country’s operations, the focus must shift from minimizing liability to ensuring continuity. 

In sectors where legacy systems are prevalent, rigorous legacy management is essential. For systems with unpatchable vulnerabilities, compensating controls must be implemented, and a phased retirement of high-risk systems must be planned. Legacy systems are common in critical infrastructure, often deemed essential for continued operations and complex to replace. Without proper monitoring and maintenance, outdated systems and missing patches, as seen in cases like Collin’s Aerospace, will expose an organization’s vulnerabilities. 

Strengthening supply chain governance is a critical step forward. Organizations should map out dependencies, conduct joint exercises, and establish contractual obligations for security monitoring. Developing resilience by design is the optimal approach. Investments in redundancy, the development and testing of rapid recovery processes, and regular crisis simulations are valuable tools for organizational preparedness. 

Conclusion

Organizations in critical infrastructure must immediately stop prioritizing liability reduction which compliance requirements often falsely are interpreted as. Instead, nation-states must incentivize business continuity and offer guidance and oversight to small and medium businesses that cannot afford to develop their own resilience functions. Incentives must be structured so that organizations perceive expensive cybersecurity investments as worthwhile, leading to greater risk reduction and fewer losses. 

This approach is crucial for improving supply chain risk management in critical infrastructure, where adversaries are likely to exploit weaknesses. Policymakers must advocate for stronger regulatory oversight and shared responsibility models, particularly in aviation. Executives must view cybersecurity as a strategic business enabler, rather than a technical afterthought. 

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Guest Post: 2025 seeing a 47% spike in ransomware attacks

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 14, 2025 by itnerd

Ransomware attacks continue to rise in 2025, with 6,330 cases recorded so far, underscoring escalating risks for small and medium-sized businesses

The latest data analyzed by NordStellar, a threat exposure management platform, reveals that the number of ransomware incidents in 2025 is continuing to grow. Between January and September 2025, 6,330 ransomware cases were exposed on the dark web, representing a 47% increase compared to the 4,293 cases recorded in the same period last year.

 “So far this year’s results are highlighting a worrying trend — the number of ransomware cases continues to grow steadily,” says Vakaris Noreika, cybersecurity expert at NordStellar. “The majority of the growth we’re witnessing right now is most likely a direct result of the increase in ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) that allows cybercriminals to scale their attacks and has lowered the entry barrier for bad actors. Another key factor is the significant increase in the number of active ransomware groups, which has reached an all-time high.”

Noreika explains that the number of active ransomware groups has been consistently increasing over the past five years. In September alone, NordStellar traced back the ransomware incidents to 66 different groups.

Prime targets in Q3 2025: The US, SMBs, and the manufacturing industry

In July-September 2025, 1,943 ransomware cases were exposed on the dark web, a 31% increase compared to the same period in 2024 (1,484 cases). US businesses were the most targeted, accounting for 54% of the 1,274 cases that could be traced to specific victim countries. Canada holds the second spot with 62 incidents, followed closely by Germany (60), the United Kingdom (54), and France (35).

“The findings mirror the results we have been seeing all year,” explains Noreika. “The US is home to numerous profitable public businesses, and this, coupled with strict regulations, makes them an attractive target for cybercriminals. Their potential for high profitability, combined with a higher likelihood of meeting ransomware demands to resolve incidents quickly, increases the chances of success for attackers.”

Ransomware data from July to September 2025 revealed that the manufacturing industry was the most affected by ransomware, with 245 cases, mirroring the results of the previous quarters. It was followed by professional, scientific, and technical services (107), information technology (103), construction (91), and financial services (69).

“Companies operating in the manufacturing industry experience high operational downtime costs, making them more inclined to give in to ransomware demands to resolve the incident as soon as possible. They also often rely on outdated or unpatched software and systems and are more likely to experience supply chain vulnerabilities due to reliance on third-party vendors, partners, and logistics providers,” says Noreika.

He explains that companies operating in the professional, scientific, and technical services industry often work with confidential customer data, intellectual property, and critical business tools, making them an attractive target for ransomware actors. According to Noreika, businesses in the information technology industry are targeted because they handle large volumes of valuable data and are key components of the supply chain. This means that attacking them can spread ransomware to multiple businesses simultaneously.

Small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) were the most affected. The data revealed that organizations with up to 200 employees and revenues of up to $25 million experienced the most attacks.

“As in the first half of 2025, SMBs continue to remain the primary targets for ransomware. Ransomware actors usually perceive smaller businesses as lower-risk targets because they might lack a sophisticated IT infrastructure, operate on low cybersecurity budgets, and not have the means to investigate or report attacks to authorities,” says Noreika.

He adds that smaller revenue companies may also be more likely to meet attackers’ demands since the cost of downtime, data loss, or reputational damage from a full-blown ransomware attack could devastate the business financially. As a result, many of them could view paying the ransom as the only option, making them a higher success target for ransomware attackers. 

Old players take the lead

The ransomware group Qilin was responsible for the most attacks in Q3 2025, with 241 incidents, and continues to hold the number one spot from the previous quarter. It’s followed by Akira (190), INC Ransom (146), Play (102), and Safepay (92). 

“Qilin, Akira, and Play are more experienced players, active from 2022-2023, and are known for their double extortion models and large victim scope. They are also more likely to keep their operations in-house, without utilizing or offering RaaS, so as not to compromise their operations,” says Noreika. “Safepay is the youngest group, first detected in the fall of last year, but so far has been consistently among the top perpetrators this year. INC Ransom was first discovered in late 2023 and is generally lesser-known. However, this year, they have been quite consistent with their attacks as well.”

According to Noreika, ransomware groups are highly organized. He explains that business leaders are not always fully aware of the danger they pose — for example, that they often seek out top talent in cybersecurity or might even recruit insiders to carry out a targeted attack against an organization, making them a threat that companies cannot afford to underestimate.

Main mistakes that make a business more vulnerable to ransomware

Noreika explains that the first step in making a company ransomware-resistant is prevention. He highlights cybersecurity hygiene as the primary foundation.

“Most attacks happen due to user error. As a result, raising cybersecurity awareness and increasing training, as well as promoting good cybersecurity hygiene, is the basic first step,” says Noreika.

He continues by saying that employees who can recognize phishing scams, understand the importance of proper password management, and recognize the necessity and importance of utilizing tools like multi-factor authentication or a VPN are less likely to open the company’s network to cyber intruders.

“Another important factor is monitoring and addressing unknown cybersecurity gaps. With more businesses embracing hybrid or remote work models, introducing unmanaged devices and relying on third-party vendors, the attack surface is expanding, and any endpoint can be exploited,” says Noreika.

To stay ahead of attackers, he advises companies to monitor for external vulnerabilities before they are exploited, as well as any potential data leaks on the dark web, to minimize the possibility of a more sophisticated attack. Noreika emphasizes that recovery plans and backing up critical data are among the essential steps to reduce the impact of a potential ransomware incident.   

Disclaimer: While the total number of 1,943 ransomware attacks in Q3 2025 is accurate, the figures presented for each category (industry, company size, and country) may be slightly higher. This is because a number of incidents were missing data needed for categorization and thus were omitted.

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Ericsson and Vodafone announce major five-year programmable networks partnership

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 14, 2025 by itnerd

Ericsson and Vodafone, one of the world’s leading telecommunications companies, have announced a five-year strategic partnership to modernize Vodafone’s network footprint using Ericsson’s high-performing programmable network solutions across several key markets.

Ericsson will be Vodafone’s sole RAN vendor in Ireland, Netherlands, and Portugal, as well as a major vendor in Germany, Romania, and Egypt. This move further deepens the long-standing, strategic relationship between the two companies.

The modernization of Vodafone’s RAN infrastructure and management will lay the foundation for widespread deployment of 5G Standalone, enabling Vodafone to offer differentiated connectivity solutions with guaranteed, performance-based characteristics for their consumer and enterprise customers.

Under the partnership, Vodafone will deploy Ericsson’s state-of-the-art and Open RAN-compatible Massive MIMO radios and RAN Compute solutions, as well as 5G Advanced RAN software capabilities extensively across their networks in these markets.

The pan-European deal introduces Ericsson Intelligent Automation Platform and a number of AI-powered rApps which will be deployed market-by-market to deliver automated RAN optimization, energy efficiency, and management of the multi-vendor network.

Germany will be the first market to deploy the platform and rApps for Ericsson and multi-vendor RAN management, with work beginning in Q4 2025. The comprehensive AI and network evolution partnership will elevate Vodafone’s infrastructure to world-class standards, taking the first steps towards autonomous networks and ensuring their networks are at the forefront of technological advancement and capable of meeting future demands.

Vodafone will further enhance its network infrastructure by using Ericsson 5G Advanced RAN software solutions that employ AI and automation to enable intelligent, real-time network management, improve operational and energy efficiency, deliver superior device and network performance, and create opportunities for new revenue streams through differentiated connectivity services.

By embracing high-performing programmable network architectures, this partnership sets the stage for accelerated innovation and the development of new use cases across Vodafone’s markets. This forward-looking approach will ensure Vodafone’s network infrastructure is fit for the future and adaptable to emerging technologies, solidifying the company’s position as a leader in the global telecommunications landscape.

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Review: 2025 Ford Expedition King Ranch – Part 1

Posted in Products with tags on October 14, 2025 by itnerd

Over the years I’ve reviewed a lot of vehicles. But I have to admit that this is the most difficult vehicle that I have ever reviewed. Before I get to why it was difficult to review, let’s take a look at the vehicle.

Meet the Ford Expedition. This vehicle is simply huge. And I am not the target audience for it. Why is that? This is for someone who wants a a huge vehicle that carries a lot of people, or stuff, or both. And tows a lot. That’s not me. Sure I could get my wife and I along with both our road bikes in it. But we can do that in an Explorer or even an Escape as well. Thus to properly review this, I need to climb inside the head someone who would use this vehicle for what it is intended to be used for.

This is the King Ranch edition. Which I always thought was a F150 trim level. But clearly not. You see the King Ranch influence everywhere. Including:

The wheels

The interior:

And the door sill plates. There’s more places where you see this influence, but we’d be here all day if I were to point them all out. And for what it’s worth, King Ranch is a real ranch in Texas.

A big vehicle needs a big engine. Right? Well sort of. This Expedition comes with Ford’s 3.5L V6 EcoBoost Engine. It’s mated to a 10 speed automatic transmission. This combo is good for 400 horsepower and 480 pound feet of torque. So while a lot of these body on frame SUVs come with a V8, this one has a V6. And I don’t think that this is a downgrade. Because you can tow 9000 pounds with this setup. And at no point did I feel that I lacked power to merge onto a highway or pass anything. What’s even more impressive is the fact that power is easily modulated with your right foot. The only gripe that I had was that it took me a bit to get used to braking which is able to bring this rather huge SUV to a stop very quickly should the need arise. But I suppose this is a non issue if you daily drive it.

When it comes to fuel economy, it’s not as bad as you might think. The Expedition is rated for 15.4 L/100 KM city, 10.7 L/100 KM highway, and 13.1 L/100 KM combined. I hit 13.1 L/100 KM during my week with the Expedition which was better than I was expecting.

Now this vehicle as I said is huge. And this took me some getting used to as I am coming from an SUV that is much smaller. I will not call it agile, but it had a surprisingly decent turning radius. You can also get it to change lanes in a hurry if needed on the highway without it complaining. Having said that, condo owners like me should take this vehicle off your shopping list as the height of this vehicle is close to the maximum limit of my garage. And parking it in my parking spot was to be frank, comical. I say that because what is normally a 1 minute exercise is 5 minutes with this vehicle as I was taking care to make sure I didn’t hit anything. Thus I spent a lot of time shuffling this vehicle back and forth to get it into my spot without hitting the pillar to my right, or the car to my left. Good thing that it has an array of sensors and cameras to warn you if you are getting too close to an object. That helped immensely. In terms of noise, vibration, and harshness, the Expedition is generally quiet except for tire noise. And while it does bounce if you hit a bump that a bit too big, it wasn’t anywhere near as bouncy as I was expecting it to be.

One other note:

Because this vehicle has about 9″ of ground clearance, this trim level comes with retractable running boards. And if you’re anything shorter than 5′ 5″ tall, you will need them to get in and out of the vehicle.

Tomorrow I’m going to walk you through the interior of the Expedition. But here’s a spoiler alert, it’s on another level.

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SimonMed Imaging Pwned By Medusa

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 13, 2025 by itnerd

Comparitech has reported SimonMed Imaging over the weekend confirmed 1,275,669 people had been affected in its January 2025 data breach, which was claimed by ransomware gang Medusa with a $1 million ransom demand.

Rebecca Moody, Head of Data Research at Comparitech has this comment: 

“This attack on SimonMed Imaging becomes the second-largest data breach on a healthcare company this year (via ransomware). Overall, we’ve noted 96 attacks on healthcare providers (worldwide) this year with over 8.7 million records breached across these attacks. The average ransom across these attacks has been $660,000, putting Medusa’s demand of $1 million from SimonMed well above average. 

The attack also highlights our recent findings that healthcare providers are facing an increased threat of attacks via the third parties they use to carry out certain services. In the case of SimonMed Imaging, it appears that this attack was successful due to a breach of one of its vendors. With such highly sensitive data on offer, healthcare organizations remain a key target for hackers and even those with the most robust of cybersecurity practices can still find themselves at the center of devastating breaches due to attacks via the third parties they use.”

Ensar Seker, CISO at SOCRadar follows with this comment:

“The SimonMed breach illustrates the perfect storm we often fear in healthcare cybersecurity: a long dwell time, a wide scope of compromised data, and a ransomware group bold enough to publicize both the theft and ransom demand. Attacks like this are not just about health records they compromise full digital identities, from SSNs to login credentials, and create cascading risks of identity theft, insurance fraud, and even social engineering attacks on hospitals or insurers.

What’s especially troubling here is the theft of authentication credentials, which could be weaponized for secondary attacks or network persistence.

This attack isn’t a good one. And I have the feeling that this one will have far reaching effects for some time to come. By that I mean months or even years.

Healthcare organizations remain attractive targets because of their sensitive datasets, complex third-party ecosystems, and historically underfunded cybersecurity operations. Ransomware gangs like Medusa don’t just want to encrypt but they want to extract maximum leverage by exfiltrating and publishing stolen data. This reinforces the urgent need for real-time anomaly detection, segmented architectures, and a zero-trust posture across healthcare networks. It’s also a wake-up call that disclosure timelines must improve; weeks of unauthorized access is far too long in any sector, but in healthcare, it’s catastrophic.”

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Forcepoint Expands Self-Aware Data Security Platform to Enterprise Databases and Data Lakes with AI-Native DSPM

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 13, 2025 by itnerd

 Forcepoint has announced the expansion of its Self-Aware Data Security platform to protect enterprise databases and structured data sources. With this launch, Forcepoint is the first to extend AI Mesh Data Classification technology across both structured and unstructured data throughout the hybrid enterprise, delivering unified Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) and adaptive data loss prevention in a single platform.

As enterprises accelerate SaaS, cloud and AI adoption, structured data remains a critical blind spot. Databases and data lakes house customer records, financial assets and intellectual property but have lacked consistent visibility and policy enforcement alongside files, emails and SaaS apps. By extending AI Mesh Data Classification to structured sources, Forcepoint enables organizations to discover, classify and remediate risks in real time with a single-policy framework.

With Forcepoint DSPM, enterprises and government agencies can discover and classify regulated and proprietary information across databases, data lakes and files, track its movement and apply safeguards in real time, without manual queries or fragmented tools. This automation is enabled by Forcepoint’s AI-native approach to Self-Aware Data Security, which unifies visibility and enforcement in a continuous loop, making security responsive and adaptive, not static.

A Self-Aware Approach to Data Security 

Self-Aware Data Security is Forcepoint’s AI-native strategy that turns risk visibility into protection. Rather than separating discovery from enforcement, it creates a continuous, adaptive loop, analyzing context, posture and intent, while discovering sensitive data, classifying it, prioritizing risks, remediating exposures, and protecting information across all environments, everywhere people work today. The result is security that knows, adapts and protects automatically as data moves — for example, coaching users in real-time, adjusting access or blocking attempts to share sensitive data externally.

Powered by AI Mesh, Forcepoint delivers precise, explainable and customizable data discovery and classification, while a single-policy framework applies consistent prioritization, remediation and protection. In this self-aware architecture, data is governed consistently at rest, in use, and in motion, closing gaps legacy tools leave behind.

With the Forcepoint DSPM expansion, organizations can simplify security, reduce risk and cost, and accelerate AI and cloud initiatives with confidence. Leaders gain insight into where data resides, how it’s accessed and what risks it carries, all in a single, unified system. Compliance teams benefit from nearly 2,000 policy templates, automated reporting and explainable, auditable AI, making it easier to keep pace with complex regulations. Employees work without disruption, knowing sensitive information is protected wherever it moves. 

How Forcepoint DSPM Closes Gaps in Controlling AI and Data Risk:

  • Structured Data Discovery and Classification. Extends Forcepoint’s industry-leading discovery and classification to Microsoft SQL, Oracle, MySQL and other enterprise databases and data lakes like Databricks and Snowflake, unifying risk management across structured and unstructured data.
  • Precise Enforcement and Remediation at Scale. Beyond visibility, admins can adjust file permissions, prevent oversharing, move sensitive files to secure repositories, or clean up redundant, outdated or trivial (ROT) data. Integration with a single-policy framework applies controls across SaaS, email, websites, networks, endpoints, clouds and AI workflows.
  • Enterprise-Ready Compliance. AI Mesh delivers more accurate, customizable and explainable classification than generic LLM tools. Integration between policy templates, automated reporting and transparent AI logic streamlines compliance and audit readiness while reducing false positives.
  • Executive Risk Visibility. Dashboards surface high-level trends in regulated data exposure, helping leaders prioritize mitigation with less overhead.
  • Financial-Impact Estimates. An industry-first capability estimates breach or compliance costs, helping leaders prioritize remediation and data access governance. 

Forcepoint AWARE 2025, Oct. 7-8

Forcepoint’s premier AI data security user conference is a two-day virtual summit providing actionable strategies to safely adopt AI innovations. With high-profile speakers, a dynamic agenda and tailored breakout sessions, attendees will explore how to control AI workflows, simplify compliance, and transform security into a competitive advantage. Register today to attend live or access content on-demand.

To learn more about Forcepoint DSPM, visit the product page, data risk assessment page, or read the blog Forcepoint DSPM Adds Structured Data Support.

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Hammerspace Demonstrates Breakthrough in GPU Storage Performance at Oracle AI World 2025

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 13, 2025 by itnerd

Hammerspace today announced that it will demonstrate the power and performance of its Tier 0 architecture at Oracle AI World 2025, October 13–16 in Las Vegas. With Tier 0, Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) Supercluster – a bare metal GPU server cluster – operates with ultra-high-performance shared storage, helping to reduce bottlenecks and minimize GPU idle time.

By transforming existing local NVMe storage in OCI GPU shapes into a persistent, ultra-fast shared storage tier, Hammerspace eliminates data silos and unifies storage, unlocking a new level of efficiency and performance for AI workloads. Hammerspace will demonstrate its Tier 0 architecture, which enables AI training, checkpointing, inference and agentic AI workloads to run with higher throughput, lower latency and better GPU utilization, while providing access to all this data in a single namespace.

Performance That Redefines the Rules
Recent benchmark testing on OCI proves the power of the Tier 0 architecture, which includes:

  • Up to 7x improvement in latency vs. traditional cloud file storage.
  • Up to 6x improvement in storage performance vs. traditional cloud file storage.
  • Checkpointing at extreme speeds, crushing idle time.
  • Throughput so fast it keeps GPUs fed 24/7, not waiting on data.
  • Policy-driven flexibility to move cold data to lower-cost tiers without touching the hot path. 

In addition, Hammerspace will demonstrate the power of Tier 0 at the event:

     Topic: Increase Performance and Reduce Idle Time of Your GPU Workloads in OCI
     Presenter: Raj Sharma, Cloud Field CTO, Hammerspace
     Location: NVIDIA Booth #1013
     Date/Time: Tuesday, October 14, 5:30–6:00 p.m.

Learn More:

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Surfshark launches the world’s first 100Gbps VPN servers

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 10, 2025 by itnerd

Surfshark has announced that they have introduced 100Gbps bandwidth servers in response to the growing demand for higher bandwidth and to ensure VPN services won’t become a bottleneck as internet speeds continue to rise.

Surfshark’s new 100Gbps servers allow VPN technology to be future-proof and ready for the growing demand when the shift to higher-capacity hardware happens.

Increased bandwidth also reduces the need for throttling or deprioritizing traffic, allowing users to get closer to their maximum internet speeds more often, even when backing up heavy documents to the cloud or downloading a game.

For this solution, Surfshark has chosen the Amsterdam location due to its impressive internet exchange (AMS-IX), which handles over 14 trillion bits per second, making it one of the world’s largest internet exchanges by traffic volume. To put this into perspective, that’s roughly 1.75 terabytes of data every second, ~560,000 simultaneous 4K streams, equivalent to about 7.5 million people watching TikTok videos simultaneously, or around 63 million people playing Fortnite at once.

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Anker SOLIX announces the C2000 Gen 2 Portable Power Station

Posted in Commentary with tags on October 10, 2025 by itnerd

Anker SOLIX has announced the C2000 Gen 2 Portable Power Station, a 2-kWh unit that brings flagship-level efficiency, charging speed, and flexibility to the portable power category.

Launching today, the C2000 Gen 2 will be available for pre-order at this link for $1,999 CAD and will begin shipping to customers on October 28.  

Anker SOLIX C2000 Gen 2 also features: 

  • 2,400 W output / 4,000 W peak power – enough for 99% of home or RV appliances 
  • 58-minute full recharge via AC + solar (2,600 W input) 
  • Ultra-low 9 W standby draw, the most efficient in its class 
  • LFP battery rated for 4,000 cycles, or up to 10 years of daily use 
  • Compact 18.9 kg frame, 25% lighter than competing 2 kWh units 
  • Expandable to 4 kWh with the BP2000 Expansion Battery 
  •  

This announcement comes on the heels of Anker’s recent SOLIX lineup expansion, including the F3000, X1 and most recently, the C1000 Gen 2. Following its debut, the C1000 Gen 2 now headlines Anker SOLIX’s Fall Prime Day event (Oct 7 –10) with discounts of up to 55% off (CAD $449), or CAD $699 with a 200 W solar panel — setting the stage for the C1000 Gen 2’s debut as its bigger, faster sibling. 

Compared to the C1000 Gen 2, the new C2000 Gen 2 doubles capacity (1024 Wh → 2048 Wh), increases power output by +400 W, adds RV compatibility via a TT-30 port, and retains the record-setting 58-minute recharge speed. 

Following Amazon Prime Days, you can still get a steal on the Anker SOLIX C2000 Gen 2 with the following early bird deals: 

  • From October 10-27, signups open on ankersolix.ca for a 45% off redemption code to receive a free C200 DC with adjustable strap. 
  • From October 28-November 3, during official launch, the Anker SOLIX C2000 Gen 2 will be available on both ankersolix.com/ca and Amazon. You can get a single-unit C2000 Gen 2 at a discounted price of $1,099. 

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