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Kalman Tiboldi - CTO & Founder at GemOne-TVH - Simplify or Die: Why Complexity Is the Real IT Challenge
Italy Sep 25, 2025 Invitation Only Physical italian
Nel percorso verso l’AI e la trasformazione digitale, dati e automazione sono gli elementi centrali di ogni strategia tecnologica. Ma senza una governance chiara, rischiano di diventare non solo fonte di inefficienza, ma anche di rischi e incoerenza. Come garantire che i dati siano completi, accessibili e affidabili? Come automatizzare le operation IT e i processi aziendali mantenendo controllo, compliance e sicurezza? Durante questa roundtable esclusiva, organizzata da CIONET Italia e IBM, affronteremo: La governance come abilitatore di dati affidabili e automazione sicura. Come prepararsi a un’adozione dell’AI realmente scalabile. Il ruolo di controllo, resilienza e gestione del rischio nell’innovazione.
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Belgium Oct 16, 2025 Invitation Only Physical english
AI isn’t just another tool. It changes how we work, how we think, how we organise ourselves.Yet most organisations still approach it like a digital upgrade, deploying assistants, automating workflows, testing use cases inisolation.The results are predictable. Short-term wins. Long-term confusion.Effort spent. Value unclear.Many companies can’t connect AI to their actual strategic goals,and the promised ROI never materialises.At the same time, something deeper is shifting.AI can now reason, decide, adapt. Not just mimic processes butcontribute to them.The technology is evolving, but the way we implement it hasn’tcaught up.If your AI still fits inside a single department, you’re likely solvingthe wrong problem.If it works only for individuals, you're missing how your teamsactually deliver value.If it replaces people instead of supporting them, you're buildingfor today, not tomorrow.The next step isn’t more AI. It’s the right AI.Built for your business, your teams, your way of working.Not a tool to add but a structure to build around.Are we ready to treat AI as a shared capability, not a scatteredexperiment?Can we move beyond individual efficiency and build systems thatcollaborate, learn and adapt with us?Those are the questions we’ll explore at the round table.
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Germany Oct 28, 2025 Country Members Physical german
Am 28. Oktober lädt CIONET CIOs und Digital Leaders nach Köln ein: hier stellen wir reale Anwendungsfälle vor, in denen KI-Agenten Aufgaben autonom übernehmen, Prozesse beschleunigen und Entscheidungen vorbereiten – mit messbarem Nutzen für das Business.
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France Nov 4, 2025 Country Members Physical french
À l’ère des mutations géopolitiques et réglementaires, l’établissement d’une souveraineté numérique est devenu un élément stratégique essentiel pour les entreprises. Ce dialogue stratégique mettra en lumière le rôle fondamental du réseau dans la mise en place du contrôle, de la confiance et de la résilience. Nous explorerons comment une infrastructure moderne et résiliente permet d’appliquer des politiques de gestion des données et d’assurer la continuité opérationnelle. Ce dialogue stratégique, réservé à un groupe restreint de pairs, est conçu pour permettre aux leaders du numérique d’échanger sur l’un des enjeux les plus urgents aujourd’hui. Nous discuterons des réseaux « sovereign-ready » et débattrons des préoccupations croissantes autour de la souveraineté des données, qui motivent l’adoption de politiques de confidentialité et de protection des données de plus en plus strictes à l’échelle mondiale.
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Netherlands Nov 10, 2025 Public Physical english
CIONET Nederland vertrekt met een groep Nederlandse CIO's en digital leaders 10 t/m 12 november 2025 voor de geheel verzorgde CIO Innovation Trip naar de Web Summit in Lissabon, Portugal. Reis jij mee of neem je collega(s) mee!
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Putting the power behind Hotelbeds’ soaring business
A scalable, cloud-based server platform makes staying ahead in the travel industry more affordable.
Overview
Staying at the forefront of today’s travel industry means Hotelbeds Group has to manage hundreds of millions of online transactions every day. And that number’s always growing. Keeping on top of that growth meant investing in more and more computing hardware. As a result, the group had around 700 servers, hosted in a third party data centre. But it needed a smarter solution.
With our Cloud Compute platform, the group could scale up fast. And more affordably. Our professional services team made sure migration went smoothly. Now the group has near-limitless capacity and the assurance that our security products and experts are keeping cyber-threats at bay.
The challenge
The Hotelbeds Group’s platform connects travel services providers with travel sellers across the globe. With upwards of 430 million data requests a day from users worldwide to manage, the group was buying hundreds of new servers to keep up. As a result, the company’s physical estate had grown to around 700 servers, hosted in a third party data centre. It simply wasn’t sustainable.
We need to be able to quickly and flexibly increase our compute capacity. The only way to do that economically is in the cloud.” Álvaro de NicolásCIO, Hotelbeds Group
The group needed a better way to manage its growing number of transactions. One that meant they could scale their services more affordably, make the most of their existing investments, and keep their whole operation secure at the same time. They knew that meant looking to the cloud.
The solution
With our Cloud Compute platform, the Hotelbeds Group can do things like deploy and monitor its own cloud services. Or create hybrid environments to address both private and public requirements. Everything’s easily managed via a set of tools in a self-service portal.
The Hotelbeds Group solution runs across one of our BT data centres and a Hotelbeds Group data centre, both in Madrid. They’re linked over our IP Connect Global network for high availability and easy connection to the company’s operations in Europe, Asia and the US.
To kick things off, our professional services team hosted a number of workshops with the Hotelbeds Group IT team to develop a transition plan. We also prepared briefings to help the company communicate the plan to staff and senior management.
Once everything was agreed, the professional services team looked after the group’s migration to the cloud and made sure things ran smoothly and didn’t affect day-to-day business.
Our Cloud Compute solution features Cisco Unified Computing System (UCS) hardware “For us it’s important that BT runs Cisco appliances,” says Álvaro de Nicolás. “UCS provides a combined computing, networking and storage solution that means a faster and more reliable network.”
The great thing about Cisco UCS is that it decouples scale from complexity. So, whether you’ve got one server, or a thousand, it’s all easy to manage. It also makes it quick to deliver new services, with end-to-end provisioning and migration support for both virtualised and non-virtualised systems.
BT Cloud Compute running on Cisco hardware increases scalability at lower cost for global travel services provider Hotelbeds.
The result
As well as being far more sustainable, our Cloud Compute means the Hotelbeds Group can better align IT investment with growth thanks to flexible commercial terms. New virtual servers offer near-limitless capacity and sure up business continuity. And they mean new servers can be deployed in minutes, rather than weeks, making the whole business more effective.
Better still, Hotelbeds Group is redeploying 200 of its existing servers to our private cloud. The remainder removed or re-used for non-core applications in its HQ in Palma, Mallorca, so nothing goes to waste. The Hotelbeds Group Oracle database will be hosted on physical servers within the BT private cloud and the rest of the infrastructure will be fully virtualised in our public Cloud Compute zone in Madrid.
And everything’s kept secure. Our contract with Hotelbeds Group also sees us provide security services like firewalls and DDoS attack prevention.
“In fact, security is one of the key items on my agenda and the CEO’s agenda,” confirms Álvaro de Nicolás. “BT helps us with firewalls that protect our websites, as well as allowing us to move and redirect traffic in case of cyber-attack.”
All in all, the new solution means the whole business can react to a growing and changing market faster. Sam Turner, Sales Director at Hotelbeds Group, sums up: We’ll also reduce cost per transaction, which in a scale-and-growth business is very important.”
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CIOFEST 2025 - From Order Taker to Proactive Disruptor
Geopolitical tensions have dominated the headlines for over two years now. In this context, the cyber threat landscape is also evolving rapidly. The protection and security of critical infrastructure – both physical and digital – is becoming increasingly important.
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