computer parts

A few years ago, asking an AI assistant to retrieve sensitive financial information on behalf of a bank customer would have seemed far-fetched. However, this is the vision of Scott Totman, head of mobile technology, payments and innovation at Capital One, had for the US bank.

Earlier this year, Capital One created a virtual assistant application - or ‘skill’ - for Amazon’s Alexa platform. The voice-activated service allows customers to use voice commands to perform actions such as tracking recent transactions on credit and current accounts, balance checking and even bill payment.

Speaking at AWS Re:Invent in Las Vegas this week Totman revealed how the company created the AI platform.

The project started by running face-to-face consumer research sessions with customers to work out if they would be willing to bank using voice with Alexa.

Totman found customers had a common set of concerns they would need to overcome before launching the service. These included account security, a lack of physical privacy and sensitivity around data sharing with third parties.

Capital One realised early on that security would be integral for customer confidence in the platform. The skill is one of the first to use the open standard OAuth so no information is passed between Capital One and Amazon. Furthermore, the initial linking of accounts isn’t a simple mobile integration but a two-step verification where a secret phrase is sent to a user’s mobile device to authenticate the integration.

Totman identified two primary customer needs: the ability to perform a task without having to stop what they are doing, and performing basic financial health checks, what Totman calls “Am I OK?” questions.

He said that when the team developing the Alexa skill “had to balance security and convenience, so that people felt comfortable using it but not making it so inconvenient that you would just go on your mobile app and do it just as fast”.

David Isbitski, chief evangelist for Alexa and Echo added: “Skills should provide an experience that is easier than using your phone,” otherwise people won’t use them.

Semantic search

Next, Totman and his small developer team had to work out how to communicate with customers using Alexa.

“Take ‘what’s left in my checking account?’, so is the person asking this affluent? Probably not, so we have to bear in mind. While the Alexa platform, through the commercials, has been brought with humour and levity, finances aren’t necessarily humorous to a lot of people. It’s stressful and personal so we had to be sensitive to that,” Totman said.

At first Capital One wanted customers to state their account number or type to get a balance request, however “we found that people ask things in all sorts of ways,” Totman said.

Through its call centres, user lab and actual feedback from the skill, Totman saw that people asked for information in a number of ways, and the skill now allows for more than 150 query types.

“Sometimes people don’t give us any information at all, they ask “what did I buy” and we have to figure out the time period, account and help the user get some useful information without making them work for it,” Totman added.

Finally, voice brought a new set of challenges for user experience (UX) designers as people don’t speak in a linear way. Totman explained the challenge: “There is a strong breadcrumb trail in web and mobile apps, you know where they came from and are going. With conversations they can go from asking for an account balance to wanting to pay a bill,” so it is important to work out context and understand when customers switch intent.

Avoiding the bad first date

Totman had some advice for fellow Alexa skill developers which he described as similar to avoiding a bad first date, namely avoiding awkward silences, forced conversation, a lack of personality and talking too much.

When it comes to silences: “Unlike a web page where you have process bars, when you have a silence from an Echo it is ten times more painful than a webpage, so you have to have extremely responsive APIs,” Totman said

Then, in order to avoid forced conversation you have to continue iterating the skill and responding to feedback so that all questions can be answered because “if you put in a feature that no one uses it doesn’t clutter up anything, it is just a question that no one asks. Just put it in,” Totman advised

He added that looking for opportunities for humour and making sure responses aren’t too verbose are good guidelines when developing an Alexa skill.

What next?

Capital One is investigating how to offer customers more capabilities to perform core banking activities with Alexa, such as locking or activating credit cards without having to pick up the phone.

Totman said the Capital One developers are working on a skill which allows you to ask Alexa what happened last night. Totman demoed it on stage and Alexa responded to the query with: “I don’t know what happened to you but I know what happened to your money”, and then “make better choices Scott.”

Explaining how they achieved this Totman said: “It’s not that complicated behind the scenes. We grab transactions between 8pm to 3am and if it is over a threshold we shame you and if it is lower we congratulate you.”

No Man's Sky's amazing infinite universe is now available on PS4 and PC, but it'll take you 585 billion years to explore all of its planets! Here's all the latest news and rumours about No Man's Sky following a controversial launch, including the first big update and the official ASA ruling. See also: Most anticipated games of 2016 and 2017

No Man's Sky release date: When is No Man's Sky coming out?

No Man's Sky PS4 release date: 10 August 2016 (UK and Europe)

No Man's Sky PC release date: 12 August 2016 (Worldwide)

It was confirmed that after a two-month delay, No Man's Sky would launch in the UK on 10 August 2016 with a PC variant launching two days after the PS4 release. Xbox fans are out of luck though, as it looks unlikely that an Xbox One version of the game will be released. The Mac version is looking like a long shot too, although our colleagues on Macworld feel that a late-2016 launch isn't an impossibility. More here: No Man's Sky for Mac release date rumours.

It appears that No Man's Sky may be available for VR as Sean Murray, creator, has hinted in big style to Games Radar.

"I don't know what I'm allowed to say," he said on the subject. "It's something we're thinking about. Morpheus, Oculus... There's nothing more cool and sci-fi than VR and a big procedural universe. I think that, for the people who want to just explore, and even for the space combat and things like that, it would be a good fit. Let's put it that way."

No Man's Sky: Price and where to buy

No Man's Sky is available to buy now for PC and PS4 at both Amazon (£54.99) and GAME (£49.99).

No Man's Sky news: What has happened in the world of No Man's Sky since launch?

While No Man's Sky launched with incredible day-one sales, as the days and weeks went on, gamers started to complain about the procedurally-generated game. Claims of false advertising were rife, and many requested refunds from both Sony and Steam with both companies happy to comply. The game had many bugs at launch, and the planets weren't as... abundant as we were lead to believe. Many planets in the universe were barren, with only a handful of animals in the area at one time - a far stretch from the planets teeming with life that we were shown prior to launch. 

So, what's happened since then? While there was a period of silence from No Man's Sky developer Hello Games, a lot has happened in the past few weeks.

'Foundation' update 1.1 hits PS4, brings many fixes and new features

A huge, free update for No Man's Sky recently went live on PlayStation 4, with Hello Games adding a ton of new content to the procedurally generated universe. Patch 1.1, otherwise known as the "Foundation Update" introduces three different "rule sets", the ability to build bases, save points, new tech and items along with cargo freighters and a myriad of smaller additions and much-needed bug fixes. 

While Hello Games has provided an in-depth changelog in a recent blog post, along with a YouTube video outlining the changes, here are the main changes that NMS gamers can expect:

• Three different game modes: Normal, which is (rather obviously) the original experience; Creative, which promises an unlimited universe and big bases and last but not least; Survival, which provides a much tougher exploration experience to test your skill and endurance. 
• As discussed before launch, users can now establish a home base on any planet of their choosing. The shelters can be used for shelter, storage and alien tech research, and can be reached by teleporting from any station.
• Players can farm crops, including new planets and resources.
• Players can leave notes for other explorers at communication terminals.
• Players can now save the game at any point, instead of waiting for an auto-save point.
• Freighters are also available to buy, and can be manned by alien NPCs. The freighter will sit in a planets orbit, and can be used to store items and resources. 
• Improved quick menu
• PS4 version has a photo mode

In fact, the update was so big that lead designer Sean Murray broke his silence on Twitter to alert everybody to the update, as seen below. 

If you could have lived our lives over the last months, you'd know how meaningful this is.

Here's update 1.1https://t.co/4TelmFIgsK

— Sean Murray (@NoMansSky) November 27, 2016

The tweet is the first to appear on Murray's social media account since August 18, days after the game initially launched. The Foundation Update is the first of many free updates to come according to the company, with the recent update laying the foundation for future updates. 

ASA rules that Hello Games did not falsely advertise No Man's Sky

The UK's Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has officially ruled that Hello Games did not mislead consumers with its use of screenshots and trailers on its' Steam listing, following 23 complaints that it received from disappointed gamers. According to the ruling, Hello Games may keep the screenshots and trailers currently featured on the Steam listing, with the ruling extending to the listing on the PlayStation Store.

Mounting a passionate defence, Hello Games used the procedurally generated functionality of the game as the main excuse as to why gamers felt cheated. The developer claimed that due to the procedurally generated nature of the game, "it was difficult to recreate the exact scenes from the ad". However, Hello Games went on to say that it believed that "it was fairly straightforward to locate content of the type shown in the ad and to demonstrate that such content was commonly experienced by all users who played No Man's Sky for an average period of time".

The official ASA ruling states the following: "The summary description of the game made clear that it was procedurally generated, that the game universe was essentially infinite, and that the core premise was exploration. As such, we considered consumers would understand the images and videos to be representative of the type of content they would encounter during gameplay, but would not generally expect to see those specific creatures, landscapes, battles and structures."

While it conceded that changes had been made to the heads-up display and aiming systems when compared to screenshots on the listing, it wouldn't affect a potential buyer's decision to buy the game. Why? "as they were superficial and incidental components in relation to the core gameplay mechanics and features".

No Man's Sky: Podcast discussion

We discuss No Man's Sky as the main topic on our podcast - listen below.

Read next: HTC Vive review: The most immersive VR headset of 2016

Ark: Survival Evolved was announced back in June 2015, showcasing an open world game complete with a robust collection of dinosaurs coming to PC, Mac, Xbox One and PlayStation 4 in 2016. The graphics, for a game that is still in development, are extremely impressive and the gameplay is phenomenal. But, we’ll get to all that. Here’s everything you need to know about Ark: Survival Evolved including its release date, platforms, gameplay information, best mods, videos and screenshots. Read next: Most anticipated games of 2016

Ark: Survival Evolved PS4 release date: When will Ark be released for the PS4?

Ark: Survival Evolved PS4 release date: 6 December 2016

Originally, Ark: Survival Evolved was due for full release on PC, Mac, Linux, Xbox One and PlayStation 4 by June 2016 according to the developers via the Ark: Survival Evolved Steam page. However, as we mentioned at the time, it’s worth taking developer estimates with a pinch of salt as unseen delays can push back the release date time and time again – and it seems we were right. The full release was delayed again, this time until Winter 2016.

"ARK's success has increased our content goals and Early Access players have helped us raise our ambitions with their invaluable feedback," said Studio Wildcard co-founder Jesse Rapczak. "When we first announced, we said 70 dinos, now we’ll have over 100. We never anticipated adding modding, local multiplayer, split screen, or numerous other upcoming features. The game at launch will be far more robust than originally conceived, but it takes a little extra time to wrap it all up.”

Following months of silence on the PS4 variant, Studio Wildcard today announced that it would be released on 6 December 2016 in North America and Europe. The Ark: Survivor's Pack will be available across the US and Europe from next week, offering the base game, Survival Evolved, along with the desert-themed expansion, Scorched Earth. The PS4 variant also comes bundled with exclusive DLC, including a Bionic Gigantosaurus skin and a Manticore armour set. 

In terms of pricing, it'll cost $54.99 in the US and €49.99 in Europe, with UK pricing yet to be confirmed. Those of us in the UK and the rest of Europe also have the option of buying the game separately, with the base game costing €34.99 and the expansion costing €19.99. According to Studio Wildcard, it's unable to sell the content as two standalone items in the US until Spring 2017. 

Read next: Best PS4 games of 2016

Ark: Survival Evolved Xbox One and PC release date: When will Ark be released for PC and Xbox One?

Back in June 2015 the developers announced that Ark: Survival would be coming to Steam as part of the Early Access Program, allowing gamers to play Ark while still in development. The gameplay was buggy to begin with but as time progressed and the game became ever more popular (with over 5 million sales at the time of writing), it became more stable, offering more in terms of gameplay than originally planned. You can find Ark: Survival Evolved on Steam, and it’ll set you back £22.99.

That’s not all, though – the developers announced months later that Ark: Survival Evolved would also make its way to the Xbox One as part of Microsoft’s “Game Preview” program (essentially the same as Steam Early Access). Xbox gamers should be happy to know that along with the full game, the Xbox One variant offered a handful of exclusive features including a bionic T-Rex and a Safari hat. It’s slightly more expensive than its PC counterpart though, costing £27.99 on the Microsoft Store.

We’re not sure of an exact official full release date for the Xbox One and PC variant, but we imagine it’ll be released at the same time as its Mac counterpart.

Read next: PS4 vs Xbox One

Ark: Survival Evolved Gameplay: What is Ark: Survival Evolved?

So, what is Ark: Survival Evolved? It reminds us of a cross between Jurassic Park and Minecraft, where you start off with no clothes or weapons and you have to craft items, grow crops, research technologies and build shelters to protect yourself from the elements. It sounds simple but it’s not, thanks to other online players in the same situation as you, and, of course, wild dinosaurs roaming around.

The environment itself is vast, with many environments from swamps filled with Titanoboas and huge crocodiles, to snowy mountains and vast forests full of Velociraptors. It’s not just above ground either, as there are many caverns to explore and even underwater caves (if you can survive the marine life). By exploring the environment, you’ll develop your in-game ARK map, as well as being able to add custom points of interest. You’ll come across random creatures, as well as Explorer Notes that have been left behind by past explorers.

Some dinosaurs can be tamed though, and you should experiment with different kinds of plants and meat as they all have varying effects on different dinosaurs. Or, if that’s a bit tame for you, you can always weaken it, knock it unconscious and then nurture it until it’s healthy again. The options are there; you just have to find the style that’s right for you. You can fly a Pterodactyl, race through forests on the back of a Raptor or even destroy an enemy base on the back of a Gigantosaurus.

You have to keep on top of your food and water levels, as without it you’ll die. Different foods will have different effects on you just as it varies with dinosaurs, and all physical actions come at a cost of food and water – even walking around. The changing weather pattern will also have an effect on your water and health levels, as hotter weather will decrease your water levels faster as you become dehydrated in the sun.

As we mentioned earlier, it’s an online game and is essentially PvP (Player vs Player). You can choose to work with other players in your world, or go to war with them. If you decide to work together, groups of players can form tribes, allowing anyone in your tribe to command or ally your pets. Also, don’t worry about dying, as your tribe will be able to respawn at any of your home spawn points (as long as there’s a bed).  With regards to communication, you can chat to players via proximity text and voice chat, or long-distance radio once you’ve crafted them.

HPE has been pushing its Synergy composable infrastructure platform as the next step in enterprise IT architecture following its launch last year, and the vendor was keen to showcase early-adopter use cases at its Discover event in London this week. 

The idea behind composable systems is that hardware components – compute, storage and networking – are managed entirely via software commands. Pools of resources are created and assigned automatically to meet the demands of individual applications in near real-time.

Read next: Composable infrastructure – the next step towards the software defined data centre?

It is early days, but HPE's Synergy platform has been well received both by analysts and its early customers. 

There are currently close to 100 HPE businesses trialling the technology, which will be widely available at the start of next year, with some using it in production already. Among those testing Synergy are Saxo Bank, Cerner and Ericsson.

“Since we unveiled Synergy we have almost 100 customers in deep-test and some are even using it in production environments today,” said Ric Lewis, HPE’s SVP and general manager, Software Defined and Cloud Group, speaking at Discover. He said that there are "several thousand" orders for Synergy modules ahead of the the full launch in January.

UK healthcare software provider EMIS is also using Synergy to allow developers to get faster access to infrastructure needed to create new products and services.

David Gee, technical solutions manager at EMIS, said that Synergy enables software to be pushed from test to deployment on the same platform by allocating more storage or compute resources where necessary.

“What we are working towards is a scenario where we can cut off a bit of the Synergy Frame, give it to the developer and let them work out if it is a production service,” he told press at the event in London’s Excel Centre. “When we have identified that and we know it is working and it can go live, it goes live on that same infrastructure.

“The segregation of dev and test environments of the past has started to disappear with the feature-set that the Synergy Frame gives us.”

Another beta test customer is telecoms and TV firm Liberty Global, which owns Virgin Media. Liberty Global’s data centre technology VP EMEA, Colin Miles, said that the company can use Synergy to support different workloads on one infrastructure platform.

One of the feature of Synergy is the ability to run both cloud-native applications - based on containers and microservices - and traditional workloads on the same infrastructure.

“We had individual architectures designed for each workload and that creates a real challenge in managing and being able to deploy services,” he said. “With Synergy we can use a single platform to deliver across those multiple workloads.”

He added that the next steps are to incorporate Synergy into its hybrid cloud environment.

“We have already been on our cloud journey for some time with infrastructure as a service and platform as a service, both public and private. We [will] spend the next few months working on integrations into that cloud environment, making sure that we can start to leverage the capabilities of Synergy with the open API capability and open integration into our cloud architecture.”

HPE also announced new hybrid cloud capabilities for Synergy at the event, based on its OpenStack-based Helion CloudSystem 10. This allows users to move workloads from Synergy on-premise out to public cloud providers.

HPE's Lewis said: "It is not just about private cloud, we can also provision public cloud services in our CloudSystem 10 software. So our customers can have private cloud that does traditional, new style and off-prem public cloud provisioning inside the same platform."

The Helion functionality will be available along with the full Synergy launch next year.

Cutting-edge features, powerhouse performance, an incredible screen, flagship powerwithout a crazy flagship price  – all these factors explain why a large crowd of phone enthusiasts were willing to queue up for several hours on a chilly November Thursday to buy the new OnePlus 3T.

Outside London’s central O2 Oxford Street store, some buyers waited for over three hours to get their hands on OnePlus’s latest smartphone, with O2’s angels providing refreshments and the OnePlus team dishing out T-Shirts and stopping to talk phones. Inside, O2’s team set up contracts and sold PAYG phones over the counter, with nearly everyone in the queue going home with one of OnePlus’s beautifully designed backpacks as a bonus gift. OnePlus experts were around to talk phones and exchange tips, while fans could take part in the Dash Charge Challenge; a motion-controlled 3D runner game played out on a six-foot vertical screen. Collecting sparks of energy and dodging red blocks took some pretty active hip-wiggling, but the day’s highest scorer, Ricky, went home with a free OnePlus 3T. Ryan Fenwick, OnePlus’s Head of Communications, was pleased to see so many people queuing up. ‘Android phones aren’t necessarilythe kind of productsthat people want to come and line-up for, but what we’ve seen with OnePlus is that, anywhere we go, we get a pretty good turnout. We’ve got nobody but our amazing community to thank for that.’

Why? You only had to speak to those in-line to find out. Right up at the front of the queue, Rahul had been waiting for over three hours to buy the 3T. ‘It’s the functionality, the way it looks’ he said. ‘You get a flagship phone at half the price – it’s really good.’ He’d decided on a OnePlus phone having tried his brother’s OnePlus 3, but had opted to go one better. ‘It’s exciting’ he said as the first customers were allowed in store. ‘I just want to get in there.’

Rob, meanwhile, was making the switch from iOS. ‘I’ve had an iPhone for eight years and this year I’m upgrading, but it’s nearly £1,000 for the new iPhone and it’s basically the same as the one I’ve had for the last two years. It’s time to change.’ Rob had seen reviews of the OnePlus 3 and planned to buy that, but couldn’t resist the lure of the new 3T. ‘It’s compelling’ he said. ‘Line it up next to the Google Pixel XL and it’s basically neck and neck in terms of technical specifications, but less than half the price….value for money and the reviews I’ve read are definitely pointing me in this direction.’

‘The OnePlus 3T is, for the specification and the price, the most advanced phone out there’ said Oz, a student at nearby University College, London. ‘It has 6GB of RAM and the latest processor, but it’s still £150 cheaper than the nearest rival phone.’ ‘OnePlus gives you value for money’ he explained, ‘and there’s more of a focus on what the user gets out of it.’ Oz feels that where other manufacturers make you pay through the nose for extra storage then lock you into their own ecosystem, OnePlus always puts its users first.

Moaad was another keen buyer. ‘I want to get a new 3T. I wanted to get the 3 to begin with, but I’ve waited for a while to see what would come out by the end of the year.’ For Moaad, it’s OnePlus’s integration of brilliant hardware and dazzling software that makes its phones so special. ‘I like the Oxygen OS – I think it’s brilliant – and I think the specs are really good for the price.’

The OnePlus 3 remains an amazing phone, but the 3T goes even further, with features like its Dash Charge feature, which gives you enough power to last the day in just half an hour. Faster, cooler and safer than other fast-charge technologies, it can charge your phone at the same steady rate even when you’re involved in processor-intensive tasks like playing games. Meanwhile, the upgraded 3400mAh battery – a 15% increase on the OnePlus 3 – gives you enough juice from a full charge to get you through one day and into the next.

That’s not the only cutting-edge feature in the new 3T. With the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 821 processor, running at 2.46GHz, plus a colossal 6GB of RAM, it leads the field in terms of raw performance, handling every task you throw at it without a stutter and running the most demanding games with butter-smooth frame rates and everything maxed out. The 3T also matches the OnePlus 3’s stunning 16MP rear camera with a new 16MP front-facing camera, optimised for HD live streaming and low-light shooting, with the same Smile Capture feature to ensure you get the best shot, every time.

OnePlus’s Ryan Fenwick sees these advances as a crucial part of OnePlus’s success. ‘Our business model and I think our user-friendliness is something that people really like’ he told us, ‘but I think it’s the quality of the product that really drives everybody to buy it. As long as we keep making the best quality products – the hardware, software, all of that together in one package – we’ll have a phone that you can’t really beat.’

Click here for more details on the OnePlus 3T

Windows 10 is no longer a free-upgrade, Windows 10 Home costs £99.99 and the Pro version will set you back £189.99. Here we’ll outline the system requirements so you can tell if your PC or laptop is powerful enough to run Windows 10 (it most likely will be). See also: Windows 10 hands-on review | Should I upgrade to Windows 10?

Updated 28 November 2016 with updated information.

Which versions of Windows can I upgrade from?

First you need to find out which version of Windows you have, open Control Panel and go to System. The precise Windows version will be listed. It doesn’t matter if it’s 32- or 64-bit.

Alternatively, click here to see which version your __computer is running. 

Only the following versions are eligible for the update (previously the free-upgrade):

• Windows 7 SP1 (Service Pack 1)
• Windows 8.1 Update
• Windows Phone 8.1

These versions are not eligible (some merely require updating to the versions above):

• Windows 7 RTM (this can be updated to SP1 for free)
• Windows 7
• Windows 8 (this can be updated to 8.1 Update for free)
• Windows 8.1 RTM (this can be updated to 8.1 Update)
• Windows RT (the version of Windows used on the Microsoft Surface and Surface 2 – cannot be updated)
• Windows Phone 8.0 (updates may be available from your mobile operator or Microsoft)

In terms of specific versions, the upgrade will work on a “like-to-like” basis:

Upgrade from Windows 7:

Upgrade from Windows 8:

What about Windows 10 Insiders testing the preview builds?

If you haven't reserved your free copy of Windows 10 prior to 29 July 2016, there might be a slim chance that you've still got a free copy waiting for you. If you ran the preview/insider builds of Windows 10 in the past (even on a separate hard drive) you should be able to get the final version for free.

There are two options here: If you clean installed the Windows 10 preview, then you'll have the option to get off the preview/insider builds through the Settings.

If you upgraded a qualifying version of Windows 10 preview, you can get the final version straight away, by installing Windows 10 through a fresh install and using your Microsoft account or the Windows key to grant your free Windows 10 key.

Also see: Windows 10 Creators update UK release date, price and new features.

What are the system requirements for Windows 10?

Just because your computer, tablet or phone runs one of the eligible versions of Windows doesn’t guarantee it will get the update. There are some hardware and software requirements as well.

These are the minimum hardware specifications needed to run Windows 10:

• Processor: 1GHz or faster processor
• RAM: 1GB for 32-bit or 2GB for 64-bit Windows 10
• Hard disk space: 16GB for 32-bit or 20GB for 64-bit
• Graphics card: DirectX 9 or later
• Display: 1024x600 pixels or higher (virtually all devices have this)

Also see: How to install Windows 10.

Will I lose my files and programs by upgrading to Windows 10?

Your files, settings and applications will be kept, but some settings and applications won’t be ‘migrated’ as Microsoft puts it.

For example, anti-virus software won’t be moved. Windows 10 should keep your anti-virus settings and install the latest version of your AV software after the update, assuming your subscription is current.

If it isn’t, Windows Defender will be enabled instead.

Other apps which may not be moved include those installed by your __computer manufacturer, as well as those which aren’t compatible with Windows 10.

As before, you’ll get a list of any such issues before beginning the actual update, so you can choose whether or not to proceed with it. Most applications which run in Windows 7 and 8 will work fine in Windows 10, so there shouldn’t be many problems in this area.

Also see: Quick fixes for common Windows 10 problems.

Windows 10 upgrade: Which features will I lose during the update?

You will lose some apps, games and features. For a full list see Worst Windows 10 sacrifices

Windows 10 upgrade: Will I get Cortana, Windows Hello and Continuum? 

Cortana will be available on Windows 10 for the United States, United Kingdom, China, France, Italy, Germany and Spain. For speech recognition you will need a microphone of course, but for “better speech experience” you will need a ‘high fidelity microphone array’.

Windows Hello is a new way to log into the OS using facial recognition or a fingerprint. For that, you’ll need either a special infrared camera or a fingerprint reader which supports Windows Biometric Framework.

Continuum is where Windows 10 will switch between laptop and tablet modes. There will be a manual switch in all Windows 10 editions, but on some devices it will switch automatically, or be configurable to switch automatically.

Organisations want to know what their customers want, how they respond to social campaigns and what they can do to attract potential customers.

Social media is a great platform for testing new products, engaging with consumers, gaining a competitive advantage and complementing ongoing marketing efforts.

Social media analytics can provide a wealth of data that - if used right - can build brands fast and open up revenue streams that otherwise wouldn't have been available.

We look at some of the top platforms on the market.

Read next: 10 of the best self-serve analytics and business intelligence tools for enterprises

1. Best social media analytics software: Crimson Hexagon

Aimed at the enterprise, Crimson Hexagon offers detailed and segmented analytics via an easy to use, robust dashboard.

Based on machine learning algorithms, Crimson provides live social monitoring, keyword and hashtag comparisons and interactive graphs and charts to illustrate basic social metrics.

Generally costing between £1500 and £2000 per month, Crimson is definitely pitched at businesses running multiple social media campaigns across numerous accounts. Notably, Crimson has worked with Starbucks, Twitter, Microsoft and Greenpeace.

Data collected by Crimson can be isolated into topics, geography, social channel, volume, demographics, affiliates and top sites (to name a few), that can provide detailed insights into audience growth, engagement and trending topic analysis.

One drawback is that Crimson only provides social monitoring for Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram so businesses using other channels such as LinkedIn or Pinterest might want to consider a different monitoring tool.

2. Best social media analytics software: Hootsuite

Hootsuite is a popular social media management program that, unless you've been living under a rock, you'll have heard of.

This software as a service (SaaS) social analytics tool offers 'social listening' and in-depth analytics while also providing a suite to publish and schedule tweets or posts.

Its social media analytics insights include metrics, detailed reports, and a live data stream for numerous social channels and accounts.

Starting at £7,99 per month, Hootsuite Pro offers populated data streams for each social channel, page view analysis, engagement reports and click statistics. What's more Hootsuite offers support for Twitter, Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, Wordpress, Instagram and Youtube.

Interestingly, Hootsuite has made all of its APIs open source, meaning that a variety of useful integrations are now available, from CRM systems to collaboration tools such as Yammer and Microsoft Dynamics.

3. Best social media analytics software: Lithium

Following a similar layout to Hootsuite, Lithium offers social media analytics, campaign planning, content and posting recommendations and a global content calendar.

With Lithium, users can identify key social 'influencers', which essentially points them in the direction of important people to engage with on their chosen social channel.

What's more, Lithium provides Buzz Tracking, which enables users to the 'buzz' volume of traffic on a certain topic in real-time, so a trending topic is never missed.

Lithium also offers a wide range of client-facing services looking at an organisation's social media strategy. These include a social media roadmap, business alignment and full assessment.

4. Best social media analytics software: Sprout Social

Sprout Social's offering is pretty unique. Like others it does provide social monitoring, in-depth reports and a live data stream, however, Sprout Social offers Google Analytics integration, making it a powerful social media analytics tool.

The user interface is simple and well designed, displaying all major social channels, trending topics, engagement levels and social channel comparison.

One major drawback of Sprout Social is some Facebook and Twitter analytics reports suffer from a lag of up to 24 hours.

Sprout Social is probably best matched with SMBs as it offers a 30-day free trial and its starting prices range between $59 (£47) to $99 (£79) per month or from $500 (£400) for larger enterprises or agencies.

5. Best social media analytics software: Synthesio

Like Crimson Hexagon, Synthesio offers 'social media intelligence for the enterprise', including social 'listening' and analysis, which aim to draw realistic ROI conclusions.

With no limit on users, data storage and keyword searches, this social analytics tool is ideal for scaling businesses and enterprises running multiple campaigns over various social channels.

Similar to Crimson Hexagon, Synthesio is one of the more expensive social media platforms listed. What's more, Synthesio does not offer social publishing like most other tools listed, so for organisations wanting to post on various social media channels a supplementary social media manager might be a good option.

6. Best social media analytics software: Buffer

Perhaps thought of as more of a social publishing manager, Buffer also offers detailed analytics about social posts across popular social media channels.

While more fitting for small to medium sized businesses, Buffered does provide post publishing, filtering and individual post analytics. Users can categorise posts by number of clicks, comments, likes and shares.

Compared to others listed, Buffer might seem small and relatively young, and for the most part this is true. Organisations looking for in-depth analytics and insight reports should look to bigger (and more expensive) platforms. However, those starting to analyse their social campaigns or are only using social media on a small scale, Buffer should be one to consider, sadly this one is not of large enterprises.

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UK social landlord Sanctuary Group has replaced legacy HR, finance and customer service tools with a single SAP platform in order to improve delivery of digital services – the first in its industry to make such a move.

Sanctuary Group is primarily a social landlord but also conducts maintenance, manages care homes, student accommodation and develops housing projects, with a pipeline of 24,000 new homes in the next ten years.

In order to modernise its IT estate and provide mobile services both to tenants and its 5,000 staff, the group saw the need for overhaul of its business and customer-facing applications. This led to the creation of a single software platform, named OneSanctuary, built on a real estate-specific ERP suite from SAP. This promised an easier route to implementation.

Staff are now using the system daily for back office functions such as finance, HR, payroll and procurement, as well as enabling front line housing officers and assistants to manage tenancies and estates. Customer service operators are using the CRM system to see the history of interactions with the tenant, any outstanding maintenance work and issues.

"We focused on what it would mean for front line staff and customers,” said Kevin Heslop, SAP programme director at Sanctuary Group.

“Housing officers deal with tenants, issues with neighbourhoods and provide opportunities for people to move on and progress in their lives. So we want to maximise their time and not have them in the office.

"These were the differentiating factors, how we provide for the mobile worker, so things like SAP Fiori and Personas around being able to change the way we deploy the system for mobile devices."

Read next: Barnsley Council digitises paper absence forms with SAP Fiori mobile app

Service centres

Before moving to SAP the customer service call centre agents were interacting with three systems to get a view of the customer. Now, using SAP CRM the agents can see a full view of each customer straight away.

Heslop admits that call lengths remain the same since moving the system last year but "it used to be that the majority of time was spent on the phone with the customers and the wrap up time was minimal as we weren’t collecting as much information about the calls because the system didn’t support that," he said.

Housing officers app

Sanctuary is moving to more mobile working, with plans to give housing officers a mobile device and app to log interactions while in the field. Up until that point they have to write things down and return to the office to log them. "We don’t want people returning to the office, we want them doing more of that customer interaction instead", Heslop said.

Sanctuary is also looking to extend these integrated back-end processes to benefit the tenants themselves, with plans to build a mobile accessible customer portal in 2017. Here tenants will be able to log in and view information, make payments and log maintenance requests.

Future plans

Heslop says that organisations within the housing sector have been slow to adopt ERP and CRM systems, but others are starting to follow suit. "There is a change in the sector and we are aware of a handful of projects with the larger housing associations looking to do something similar. It will be interesting if they work with SAP or if things have moved on since we made that play with Oracle or Microsoft Dynamics."

Now that it has SAP in place Sanctuary is very much on the S/4HANA roadmap, Heslop says. "We will be doing more work with Success Factors but at the time we were making these decisions S/4HANA and the thinking wasn’t as defined at the time."

Read next: SAP baffled by lack of S/4HANA awareness in its UK and Ireland user group

Also, now that Sanctuary can log all of its properties into SAP it can track the condition of the property and make more effective reinvestment plans and forecasts. Heslop says that Sanctuary is even considering sensors and internet of things (IoT) use cases for more predictive maintenance of assets like boilers.

The total investment is in the "multi million pound" bracket according to Heslop, and "our return on investments plan for the project is an eight year return and we are ahead of that" thanks to the early gains in back end processes and service centre efficiency.

Alibaba Cloud, the cloud services arm of the Chinese ecommerce giant, revealed plans to push into the increasingly crowded European infrastructure as a service market this week with a new data centre in Germany.

The move is part of wider investments aimed at growing its European business, with recruitment of sales and support staff also underway. It is early days for Alibaba, but as other recent data centre expansions have shown – such as those in the US, Australia and the Middle East – China’s biggest public cloud provider has ambitions to replicate its success outside of its home country.

"Since last year, we have a strategy to go global," says Yeming Wang, head of Alibaba Cloud Europe, speaking to Computerworld UK recently.

In 2009, Alibaba created its cloud service based on the internal IT capabilities that power its huge ecommerce business, essentially offering its expertise out to customers.

Like Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, Google, and others, Alibaba cloud offers a range of basic infrastructure as a service products- compute, storage and so forth – with a focus on providing data analytics to customers.

Since joining the company in the last six months, Wang was tasked with building out the firm's European presence, recruiting staff in London, Paris and Germany, and building links with systems integrators. He says that Alibaba will prioritise selling to European web-based businesses.

"The focus from the very beginning will be on several areas, especially for those industries which are very heavily reliant on the internet," he says.

"For example, the gaming sector and the media sector or digital advertisement or ecommerce. These businesses are very much internet-based and they need big data and cloud services to be agile."

European expansion

The company is also targeting industrial firms, particularly around the Internet of Things 

"Recently, we are talking with some of the automotive companies from Europe to try to talk not only cloud but a total solution of how to provide the connected car or smart solution," Wang says.

Alibaba has already won contracts with large European businesses, including multinational firms Schneider and Philips, with the latter using Alibaba to build out its internet of things platform for Chinese customers.

Wang says that in Europe the company is currently working with two types of "mainstream" clients. One set is "European clients who want to go to China, or go to Asia" and the other is Chinese companies that are expanding their operations in the opposite direction.

Another cloud competitor

So, can Alibaba offer a real alternative to the more established cloud providers vying for the attention of CIOs? There are a number of challenges the company will have to face. One is its product features, with leading cloud providers offering more extensive options for analytics, machine learning and serverless computing functionality (such as AWS Lambda).

However, Wang says that the company is creating artificial intelligence tools as part of the cloud platform.

He adds that the main selling points of Alibaba’s cloud services are around its big data capabilities and security – which he says has been proven by supporting the ecommerce business' operations for a number of years. 

"We believe that our solution has several [advantages]," he explains. "The first could be our security solution. As Alibaba internally we are using Alibaba Cloud, because the Alibaba internal business is also our customer."

The company will also face a challenge in convincing CIOs, who have become used to dealing with the likes of AWS and Microsoft for their public cloud requirements.  

Its decision to set up a data centre in Frankfurt – co-located in a Vodafone facility – along with its rapid growth of data centre locations, should appeal to customers in more regulated industries. But competitors have extensive cloud networks too.

However, it is likely that Alibaba will offer services to European customers at a lower price than its competition.

Ultimately, Wang says that the expansion is about offering a greater choice to customers.

"Of course there are a lot of different players, no matter if it is AWS, or Microsoft or IBM, but Alibaba offers an alternative choice," he says. "We come to Europe not for competition, not to grab a certain market share from anybody else, but we want to provide a second choice and we have our value proposition and we believe certain clients will value that." 

The latest edition of the TOP500 supercomputers was released on 14 November. China and the United States are now level in the battle for global dominance, with 171 systems apiece in the new rankings, with the US accounting for 33.9 percent of the total to China's 33.3 percent. The two nations are also steaming ahead in aggregate Linpack performance (a measure of a computer's floating-point rate of execution).

The two countries can ill afford to rest on their laurels while a series of hungry rivals from around the world breathe down their necks. Also on the latest list are a number of new entries, while some perennial contenders have enjoyed rises and endured falls. We countdown the 11 fastest supercomputers in the world.

1. Sunway TaihuLight

Extending its reign at number one is the __computer installed at the National Supercomputing Center in Wuxi. It’s China’s first system to reach number one that is built entirely out of local components and is capable of performing around 93,000 trillion calculations per second.

Top speed: 93 petaflops

Total cores: 10,649,600

2. Tianhe-2

Bolstering the Chinese claim to supercomputing superpower is another monolith that has retained its previous high rank. Also known as Milky-Way-2, it was knocked off the top spot in June by the Sunway TaihuLight, which boasts three times the speed of its predecessor.

Top speed: 33.9 petaflops

Total cores: 3,120,000

3. Titan

The first American entry on the list has more than earned its imposing name. It’s contributed to research breakthroughs at the Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility (OLCF) that have improved nuclear power plant safety and performance, boosted drug development, and improved the understanding of climate change.

Top speed: 17.6 petaflops

Total cores: 560,640

4. Sequoia

The IBM construction was named the world’s fastest supercomputer in June 2012, but has slowly slipped down the list. It’s primarily used for nuclear weapons simulations.

Top speed: 17.2 petaflops

Total cores: 560,640

5. Cori

The third consecutive American entry in the top five, Cori was named after American biochemist Gerty Cori, the first woman to win a Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine. It’s installed at Berkeley Lab’s National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC).

Top speed: 14 petaflops

Total cores: 622,336

6. Oakforest-PACS

Japan’s highest entry in the TOP500 is powered by the same Intel “Knights Landing” Xeon Phi 7250 processor as the Cori __computer that pipped it into the top five. It’s run jointly by the University of Tokyo and the University of Tsukuba.

Top speed: 13.6 petaflops

Total cores: 556,104

7. K computer

The second consecutive Fujitsu-manufactured Japanese entrant on our list reached number one in its 2011 prime. It’s used in a range of fields including meteorology, disaster prevention and medicine. Like 99.6 percent of the TOP500 list, it uses Linux as its operating system.

Top speed: 10.5 petaflops

Total cores: 705,024

8. Piz Daint

Europe’s fastest supercomputer was named after an Alpine mountain less than 80 miles from its Swiss National Computing Center home. It held onto its number eight ranking thanks to a newly installed NVIDIA P100 Tesla GPU that gave it a 3.5 petaflop upgrade. It’s also the second most energy-efficient supercomputer in the TOP500, with a rating of 7.45 gigaflops/watt. The top-ranked DGX SATURNV came in at number 28.

Top speed: 9.8 petaflops

Total cores: 206,720

9. Mira

According to manufacturer IBM, if every person in the United States performed one calculation every second, it would take them almost a year to do as many calculations as Mira can in just one second. The machine was initially deployed to work on sixteen research projects selected by the Department of Energy.

Top speed: 8.6 petaflops

Total cores: 786,432

10. Trinity

The first of four Cray Inc. offerings in the TOP500 list shares a name with the first detonation of a nuclear weapon in 1945, and is run by the same laboratory that developed that bomb. No prizes for guessing what it was built to support.

Top speed: 8.1 petaflops

Total cores: 301,056

11. Cray XC40

Britain’s fastest supercomputer will power the country’s foremost forecasting agency, the Met Office.The £97 million behemoth is said to be worth around £2 billion in socio-economic benefits due to better forecasts.

Top speed: 6.8 petaflops

Total cores: 241,920

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The great thing about the internet is that anyone can make a website, a blog or post self-made videos to YouTube. All these mediums are good for reviewing products but these days you don’t even need to go to that much effort to start on your journey to becoming a tech reviewer.

Before you start out, though, consider why you want to do it. If it’s just a hobby and you want to do it for fun, great. If you’re doing it with a view to starting a career in journalism, absolutely fine. But if you’re purely doing it to try and get free or discounted products or make money, be careful. As long as you offer an honest, unbiased opinion and you’re able to tell others whether a product is better than its competitors, you’ll do well.

How to become a tech reviewer: Amazon

Update 24 November 2016: Since its policy chance in October 2016, Amazon has applied the same policy for reviews through its EU and UK sites - sellers have received an email (see screenshots below) containing the new policy change - whereby they aren't allowed to offer products for a discounted or free price. Its Vine system detailed below will continue as normal, however.

Update 4 October 2016: Amazon has now banned incentivised reviews for tech after research led it to believe people were awarding higher ratings than a product was given to them for free or at a discounted price. 

Amazon is, of course, the biggest site for user reviews. Every time you buy something you’ll be sent an email asking you to rate and review it, the company that sold it and even the packaging it arrived in. This is the easiest place to start.

It takes only a minute to review a product after clicking on the link in the ‘please review your recent purchase’ email. However, if you want to be taken seriously, you’ll want to invest a lot more time than that.

Getting your first review published on Amazon is just the first step. You’ll need a ‘portfolio’ of reviews if you want to rise up the ranks of Amazon reviewers and get noticed.

It’s well worth checking and developing your public profile – there’s a link in the menu bar. Add some information about yourself, your interests and also contact details if you want companies to approach you to review products. This could be an email address, a website or both.

You may be invited to join Amazon’s Vine Programme. Vine Voice is for the “most trusted reviewers”, and you can’t ask to join: you have to wait to be asked.

When you review products as a normal Amazon customer you’ll get ‘helpful’ votes and a reviewer rank. There are various ‘badges’ on offer, which will mark you out as a ‘top reviewer’. You can read more on Amazon’s website about reviewer ranks.

How to become a tech reviewer: YouTube & video reviews

You don’t necessarily have to be a great writer to become a tech reviewer, but it helps. An alternative is to make a video review, which you can also do on Amazon.

YouTube is a better place to try and build a following, though.

Making video reviews is considerably harder than written reviews, unless you’re a natural in front of the camera or are a video-editing ace that can add panache with effects and voice overs.

Some products are better suited to a video review anyway: you can show people how something works for easier in a video than trying to explain it in words.

How to become a tech reviewer: Learn to write a good review

Before you even start a review, you ought to know a product inside out. This is why it’s a good idea to review products you’ve owned for a while.

It’s not enough to know just its features and specifications, but its strengths and weaknesses. What does it do, or have, which competitors lack or, conversely, what doesn’t it do which rivals can. Does it work reliably? Does it perform well?

You can run tests or benchmarks on some products to find out how they perform and including these – in addition to opinions – will always add to your review.

It’s your opinion of the product that matters most, though. That, of course, is subjective. Whether it’s the design, build quality or performance, you’ll need to know how it compares to similar products, which is why it’s hard to review a camera, a PC monitor or a pair of headphones if you don’t have much to compare it with.

You can run tests or benchmarks on some products to find out how they perform and including these – in addition to opinions – will always add to your review.

Most importantly, put yourself in the shoes of the reader and answer questions that they can’t. You have the product in your hands and they don’t. It’s not particularly useful to talk about features and specifications they can find in the product’s listing. Far more useful is to explain whether those features work well or not. How long does a battery-powered product really last? How loud are the speakers? Is it well made?

Give a more detailed breakdown of the overall score, and avoid giving things full marks unless you can justify why this product is the best of its type.

Don’t make the mistake other reviewers do and mark a product down because it arrived late or damaged. The review is of the product, not the delivery service. It shouldn’t be too short or too long. This will depend on the product: a more complex product will require a longer review. But people want the key points, so a summary at the top of a long review will prove helpful.

The review should be accompanied by good-quality photos that highlight points you make in the review. If it’s a video, be sure the lighting and sound are good and keep it relatively short.

The basics are, then, mainly common sense.

How to review products without buying them

This is probably the most-asked question of all. If you’re just starting out reviewing tech products, companies aren’t going to send you stuff simply because you send them an email asking to review it.

This is where it will help if you have a website, blog and / or YouTube channel with a catalogue of reviews already in place. Companies will look at your following – your audience and influence – as well as the quality and quantity of reviews.

Some Amazon reviewers have found they receive emails such as the one below offering a choice of products to review. Typically, these will be provided at no cost to the reviewer as ‘payment’ for the review. You then get to keep it.

It’s crucial you don’t give products full marks just because you were given it free, or at a discount.

As certain Hall of Fame Amazon reviewers have discovered to their cost, awarding five stars to everything without reviewing it properly is a good way to have your reviews and profile deleted.

It's that time of year again when the UK's biggest retailers do battle to see who can come up with the best Christmas TV ad. It's a title John Lewis has held for many years, though it's increasingly seeing some stiff competition from the likes of Sainsbury's and M&S. Watch the best Christmas ads of 2016 here.

For those of you thinking it's a little early to be celebrating Christmas, Bah Humbug to you! We love Christmas and nothing says Christmas quite like heartwarming ads from companies wanting to get their mitts on our hard-earned cash. Below we've rounded up some of the best Christmas TV ads from recent decades, and we'll be adding to our list over the next few weeks as retailers announce their 2016 Christmas TV ads - there are a few already.

See the best Black Friday deals 2016

Best Christmas TV ads 2016

The hotly anticipated John Lewis Christmas ad is here to tell another heart warming Christmas story with the hashtag #BusterTheBoxer, following a student's work which went viral. There are also some great adverts from the likes of Very, TK Maxx and Bell's below. We're still waiting for the likes of Sainsbury's and M&S so stay tuned - we've added some great ads from the likes of Aldi, McDonald's and even Apple.

John Lewis Christmas ad 2016: Buster the Boxer

John Lewis Christmas ad 2016: Fake video goes viral

Now the below video isn't this year's John Lewis commercial but the video has gone viral. It's a student's A-Level coursework and his attempt at creating a similar style advert to go along with an essay.

M&S Christmas ad 2016: Christmas with love from Mrs Claus

It's early days, but many people are saying M&S' new Christmas ad is actually better than John Lewis' Buster The Boxer - have a look below and see what you think.

Sainsburys Christmas ad 2016: The Greatest Gift

Lidl Ireland Christmas ad 2016:

Very Christmas ad 2016: Get more out of giving

Aldi Christmas ad 2016: Kevin The Carrot

Alzheimer's Research UK Christmas ad 2016: Santa Forgot

McDonald's Christmas ad 2016: The Doll

Heathrow Airport Christmas ad 2016: Coming Home For Christmas

TK Maxx Christmas ad 2016: The sing-song

Apple Christmas ad 2016: Frankie's Holiday

Argos Christmas ad 2016: Yetis

Bell's Christmas ad 2016: #WhatTheBells

Littlewoods Christmas ad 2016: The Christmas Walk

Stop Fund Hate: Response to Christmas ads

Best Christmas TV ads ever

We've also rounded up what we think are the best Christmas TV ads ever to whet your appetite for this year's offerings from the likes of John Lewis, Sainsbury's and the rest - which we will add to this page as and when they launch.

Coca-Cola Christmas TV ad: Holidays are coming

John Lewis Christmas TV ad 2011: A Long Wait

Iron-Bru Christmas TV ad 2006: Snowman

Yellow Pages Christmas TV ad 1992: Mistletoe

Quality Street Christmas TV ad 1992: Magic Moments

John Lewis Christmas TV Advert 2013:  The Bear and the Hare

Sainsbury's Christmas TV Advert 2014: Christmas is for sharing

Debenhams Christmas TV Advert 2014: Found it

Waitrose Christmas TV Advert 2014: The gingerbread stall

Marks & Spencer Christmas TV Advert 2014: Follow the fairies

Boots Christmas Advert 2014: Special because

Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond has outlined some of the Conservative government's fiscal policy in today's Autumn Statement, placing a keen emphasis on science, technology, startups, and 'productivity'.

Although it's unclear precisely what Hammond meant by productivity, he announced a £23 billion "national productivity investment fund" that will aim to foment a high-skill, high-wage and high living standard economy. There's every chance this will run parallel with the stated mission to boost the technology sector – a point in the Statement he was keen to emphasise.

Hammond said that Britain does not invest enough in innovation – and that the country will need to plug that gap with an extra £2 billion to be made available for research and development by 2021. This is likely to be cautiously welcomed, but it is also in contrast to the fact that EU grants will no longer be so readily available for academics working in post-Brexit Britain.

Hammond also laid out plans to commit £450 million for digital signalling on railways, and £390 million to "build a competitive advantage" in low-emission vehicles and connected autonomous vehicles. Again, this is likely to be welcome news to a degree – but there are problems with self-driving cars even the biggest hitters like Google are struggling to implement, so it is difficult to picture how much of an impact this money will have.

Additionally, Hammond committed to opening up 5G spectrum across the UK, and connecting homes and businesses through a fast "full-fibre" network.

Shaun Collins, CEO of telecommunications analyst house CCS Insight, said: "Any investment in the UK digital backbone is welcome, and the commitment to 5G is admirable. However, realistically 5G services are unlikely to be available before 2020 in the UK. This investment only offers a small step in that direction."

"High-quality broadband has become essential to support an increasingly digital workplace and home," he continued. "The UK has lagged behind other nations, and this has to be addressed quickly."

The government will also create a £400 million venture capital fund with the intent of incubating startups and growing them on British soil – Hammond said he wants startups to grow to scale, rather than to be sold off at the earliest opportunity, and so will launch a Treasury review into accessing capital.

Hammond later name-checked the acquisition of Cambridge-based chip design company ARM by Japanese conglomerate Softbank – seeming slightly at odds with his message about keeping technological success stories in Britain. ARM continues to operate in Cambridge but its valuable IP is now owned overseas. Despite this, he said the Softbank acquisition confirms the UK's ability to perform its role in technological progress.

There were also nods towards clamping down on tax evasion and avoidance – something the technology sector, and in particular big Silicon Valley players, have come under fire for. He claimed reforms here should bring £5 billion to the UK from April 2017, and will pursue "large businesses" which operate at a "substantial profit", but will also cut down on schemes that see large corporations taking advantage of their cross-border structures to manage tax liabilities.

The announcements were met with a welcome response from some corners of the technology industry. Tech UK, a lobby for technology businesses in Britain, said in a statement that the focus on backing tech and "unleashing a new wave of productivity is exactly the vision needed for an uncertain period ahead."

Charlotte Holloway, policy director at TechUK, said: "Investment in innovation is critical for driving tech-led growth and productivity, and it's great to see the £2 billion extra investment in R&D for new technologies by 2021, and a £23 billion productivity investment fund to give a focal point to the level of the UK's national ambition."

But there are other questions raised in the statement – the wider financial outlook was painted by critics of the government as a tacit admission of economic failure, said John McDonnell in his counter-statement.

Former digital minister and MP for Newcastle upon Tyne Central Chi Onwurah told Computerworld UK that the Statement seemed to miss the realities of technology impacting lives today.

"The Autumn Statement demonstrates the Chancellor knows it's important to talk as if he believes tech is important but that he doesn't understand why tech is important or how to deliver the environment tech needs," Onwurah said. "Cliches about innovation, some relatively minor but welcome new funds – though these may prove to be the promised replacements for European funding and not actually new money – but no industrial strategy and particularly no reference to skills."

"The National Productivity Investment Fund does not mention skills, which is stunningly short-sighted. Hammond seems to believe that tech is all about the future. He doesn't realise that it is right here, right now the enabling platform for key sectors and he needs to have a strategy for supporting and developing it."

And proposed changes to the IR35 self-employment tax laws were met with concern by the Association of Independent and the Self Employed. The new terms are designed, Hammond said, to crack down on tax avoidance from self employed workers.

In a statement, the IPSE's chief executive Chris Bryce said: "The Government must now justify this decision. It has chosen to ignore the advice of the business and freelance community. We want to know why. It would be totally justified for contractors to walk away from the public sector."

His comments chimed with Geoff Smith, MD for IT resourcing business Experis, who warned that significant changes to the ways contractors must pay their tax could risk further contributing to a post-Brexit skills gap that is already a reality.

"While HMRC's intentions to amend existing IR35 legislation in a bid to crack down on tax avoidance should be lauded, we're concerned about the impact that the change in regulation will have on the IT sector," Smith said. "In an industry where organisations are already struggling to find the right talent, there is a serious risk of 'brain drain', whereby projects could be ground to a halt until they find individuals willing and able to work under the new regulations."

"In fact, we wouldn't be surprised to see how such a change might encourage existing IT professionals to set their sights abroad to countries courting their talent in a post-Brexit world," Smith said.