An Egyptian mummy: clogged arteries

For many companies, calculating the actual value gained from their IT systems is almost intangible. While there is a raft of standards to help companies implement and gauge the success of IT in their organisation, more often than not it is an unknown variable.

Ireland, however, is taking a lead in this area. The Innovation Value Institute (IVI), housed at NUI Maynooth and hosting a strong consortium of leading industry players and academia including Microsoft, Google, the Boston Consulting Group, BP and Northrop Grumann, wants to change the way value from IT is measured and understood.

The institute is focused on developing a global standard for the realisation of business value from IT investments and has been designing frameworks such as its IT-CMF, on which more than 120 global companies from 20 countries have engaged.

The IVI recently held an American conference where it gave an update on its progress. Director of the IVI and global director of innovation at Intel Martin Curley, who addressed the meeting, told Tech Week about the direction of IVI.

He said the group was mostly focused on research at the moment and the development of new knowledge and a beta version of its IT-CMF framework.

Such has been the institute's progress that the government has declared it a centre of competence and despite the economic gloom has remained committed to funding IVI to the tune of €1m a year over five years.

"I think the government thought hard about it. For Ireland to be successful in the sciences and technology we have to invest and the government realised this and kept their commitment to assist the project," said Curley.

The most pleasing thing about this project is its Irish roots – developed by NUI Maynooth and Intel Ireland, its continued success could mean that this country will be centre stage in the development of a worldwide technology standard.

Initial results are also impressive. Using some of the principles in the early stages of the IT-CMF framework, petroleum company BP saved £50m by consolidating its server base using virtualisation software.

IVI is also focusing on tailoring its efforts for SMEs in the hope that it will use them to accelerate their growth.

Come summer the Maynooth-based project will be holding its European conference here and revealing further developments – it will be one to watch.

Software body to 'matchmake' companies with universities

While Ireland often gets lauded for its software sector, the impressive figures trotted out by government and other state bodies are usually inflated by including multinational companies' returns.

The local software sector is not in as good a shape as the Leinster House mandarins might have you believe.

In an attempt to give a boost to the indigenous sector here, the Irish Software Association (ISA) has launched the Irish Software Innovation Network (ISIN).

The goal of the network is to act as a free "matchmaking" service between software companies and third-level research institutes, connecting businesses to the expertise available in Ireland's universities.

According to ISIN's manager Michael Martin there is huge potential to boost innovation, enterprise and employment "if we can get our software companies to work more closely with research institutes".

To this end ISIN has developed a dedicated database to simplify and speed up the matchmaking process.

According to ISIN, the network will be of interest to any business that wants to commercialise a specific technology, but which may not have the internal resources needed to conduct the research themselves.

Michael Martin has encouraged software companies to get in touch saying: "If a company is interested in participating, we will meet with them to discuss their research requirements. We will then identify potential academic partners and match the appropriate academic expertise to support the company. We'll provide ongoing support throughout the process, including progress monitoring, guidance and fundraising advice." This is to be welcomed, particularly in economically downcast times. Entrepreneurship and innovation are cornerstones to economic recovery. Matching the brightest and best in our local software industry with similarly-minded folks in academia is an excellent move.

For more details check out www.isin.ie which will give direction on funding, IP licensing, R&D tax credits, case studies, events and a search facility that companies/research institutes can use to locate matching technology requirements.

Proof that Mummies were always prone to getting heart disease

Heart disease is often thought of as a modern affliction – more stress coupled with bad eating and exercise habits. Yet technology has revealed that even ancient societies had cardiac problems.

Through the use of a SOMATOM Emotion CT scanner, researchers have discovered arteries in a 3,500-year-old Egyptian mummy had atherosclerosis (clogging of the arteries).

"While we do not know whether atherosclerosis caused the demise of any of the mummies in the study, we can confirm that the disease was present in many. It obviously was rather common in ancient Egyptians of high socio-economic status living as much as 3,500 years ago," said Dr Gregory Thomas, a clinical professor of cardiology at the University of California, Irvine.

Who knew that the full Irish breakfast made its way to Egypt?