Category: 3. Business

BÖBLINGEN, Germany, July 2, 2025 /PRNewswire/ — Today, IBM (NYSE: IBM) is announcing that Deutsche Telekom, one of the world’s leading providers of telecommunications and IT services, serving millions of residential and business customers, will implement the AI-powered solution IBM Concert, enabling intelligent automation in patch management and the orchestration of security-related activities.

Patches are a necessary part of software lifecycle management. They help systems stay secured, functional, and relevant in a fast-changing IT landscape. Without patches, software would quickly become vulnerable, unstable, and obsolete. But handling patches is a challenge as well. IBM can help companies accelerate vulnerability protection in their IT systems while boosting operational efficiency. IBM Concert helps companies to reduce operational costs and the effort required for patching vulnerabilities, increasing the speed of response and the efficiency for improving the security of all systems.

One billion apps by 2028

According to an IDC study, there will be one billion additional applications by 2028 – an increase that will be driven by AI innovations. Even for minor changes and updates, complex coordination between app owners, development, security, and operations teams is necessary to ensure smooth operation for millions of customers and users. The large number of manual process steps to prepare, execute, and document the end-to-end patching process increases the risk of errors.

Deutsche Telekom turned to IBM for an approach that could scale faster and dramatically improve overall efficiency. The IBM Software Development Organization had developed a solution specifically for this purpose, IBM Concert, which IBM had initially tested on itself as “Client Zero,” after facing a similar complexity challenge.

Ten times faster patching

IBM Concert provides Deutsche Telekom with intelligent resilience for complex IT operations, with a single source of truth for vulnerability management, patching, and reporting. The solution brings together all relevant data and specializations, creating contextual information that enables end-to-end AI-powered automation.

The fully automated patching process for operating systems has been designed to reduce patching time from 90 minutes to a maximum of 20 minutes per instance. This dramatic time savings gives IT teams new freedom for strategic tasks, innovations, and optimizations.

During the successful pilot implementation of IBM Concert, Deutsche Telekom was able to achieve a 10x reduction in a key metric “Median Time To Patch,” going from 80 hours per critical vulnerabilities to eight hours. This acceleration of the rollout of patches increases IT security and also improves business risk and compliance, enabling Deutsche Telekom to manage risks for its IT operations much more effectively.

“Secure operating systems form the foundation for all applications, databases, and services that we offer our customers. When it comes to patching, the time factor has taken on a critical role in the AI era. Those who use available updates immediately and automatically can reduce security risks. We face this challenge together with our partner,” explains Dr. Peter Leukert, Group CIO of Deutsche Telekom. “We were looking for a standalone solution on the market that combines all the complex aspects of patch management and reliably automates everything.”

Steve Canepa, Global Managing Director at IBM, says: “Security and trust are the cornerstones of success for all telecommunications companies. IBM Concert incorporates modern AI and automation technologies so that Deutsche Telekom can stay ahead of the dramatically escalating number and complexity of critical vulnerabilities across their Hybrid Cloud platform.” 

Dinesh Nirmal, Senior Vice President IBM Software, adds: “By intelligently orchestrating and automating security-critical processes, clients like Deutsche Telekom can not only respond faster to new threats, but also use resources more efficiently using IBM Concert. In doing so, they are creating a solid foundation for a future-proof, scalable and highly secure IT operating model with the help of AI.”

Notes to Editors

About IBM Concert

IBM Concert is a comprehensive AI-powered automation solution using IBM watsonx that provides AI-driven recommendations and workflows to automate and optimize IT operations, including the patching process. IBM Concert:

• Integrates, aggregates, and analyzes existing data sources such as security scans, application and infrastructure information, and publicly available CVE databases
• Uses a generative AI approach to develop an optimized and prioritized patching plan based on extensive information about system topology, dependencies, maintenance windows, and business requirements
• Generates ServiceNow change requests and process documentation in the IT service management system (ITSM), ready for approval by experts
• Upon approval, orchestrates fully automated installation of operating system patches for Microsoft Windows Server, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and other Linux distributions within maintenance windows, integrating, for example, Ansible Playbooks in the AWS Cloud
• Documents the results in the ITSM system, providing a quick overview, facilitating traceability of changes, and improving compliance for the entire hybrid cloud environment

About Deutsche Telekom

Deutsche Telekom is one of the world’s leading integrated telecommunications companies, with more than 261 million mobile customers, 25 million fixed-network lines, and 22 million broadband customers. Deutsche Telekom provides fixed-network/broadband, mobile communications, Internet, and IPTV products and services for consumers, and information and communication technology (ICT) solutions for business and corporate customers. For more information, see https://www.telekom.com/en/company/companyprofile/company-profile-625808

About Deutsche Telekom IT GmbH

Deutsche Telekom IT GmbH (DTIT) is the IT company of choice of Deutsche Telekom Group. DTIT is responsible for the design, development and operation of all its own and transferred IT systems to support Deutsche Telekom’s business processes. DTIT creates the basis for an integrated, cross-channel customer experience with Deutsche Telekom Group.

About IBM

IBM is a leading provider of global hybrid cloud and AI, and consulting expertise. We help clients in more than 175 countries capitalize on insights from their data, streamline business processes, reduce costs and gain the competitive edge in their industries. Thousands of governments and corporate entities in critical infrastructure areas such as financial services, telecommunications and healthcare rely on IBM’s hybrid cloud platform and Red Hat OpenShift to affect their digital transformations quickly, efficiently and securely. IBM’s breakthrough innovations in AI, quantum computing, industry-specific cloud solutions and consulting deliver open and flexible options to our clients. All of this is backed by IBM’s long-standing commitment to trust, transparency, responsibility, inclusivity and service. For more information, see www.ibm.com.

Pictures:

•  Corporate headquarters in Bonn. (Deutsche Telekom, picture: Norbert Ittermann)

Media Contact:

Sabine Buettner

IBM Unternehmenskommunikation DACH

Mail: sabine_buettner@de.ibm.com 

Deutsche Telekom: media@telekom.de

 

SOURCE IBM

Referrals from ChatGPT to news publishers are growing, but not enough to counter the decline in clicks resulting from users increasingly getting their news directly from AI or AI-powered search results, according to a report from digital market intelligence company Similarweb.

Since the launch of Google’s AI Overviews in May 2024, the firm found that the number of news searches on the web that result in no click-throughs to news websites has grown from 56% to nearly 69% as of May 2025.

Not surprisingly, organic traffic has also declined, dropping from over 2.3 billion visits at its peak in mid-2024 to now under 1.7 billion.

Meanwhile, news-related prompts in ChatGPT grew by 212% from January 2024 through May 2025.

For news publishers, the rapid adoption of AI is changing the game. Visibility in Google Search results and good SEO practices may no longer deliver the value they did in the past, as search rank isn’t translating into as much website traffic as before, the firm pointed out.

At the same time, ChatGPT referrals to news publishers are growing.

From January through May 2024, ChatGPT referrals to news sites were just under 1 million, Similarweb says, but have grown to more than 25 million in 2025 — a 25x increase.

Of course, when the industry is facing even massive declines in organic search traffic, this increase is hardly enough to make up for publishers’ losses.

The report also noted that some websites are faring better than others when it comes to AI referrals.

Sites seeing the most increases in ChatGPT referral traffic include Reuters (up 8.9% year-over-year), NY Post (up 7.1%), and Business Insider (up 6.5%). Meanwhile, The New York Times, which is suing OpenAI over allegedly scraping its works without permission, is seeing far fewer ChatGPT referrals. Though still in the top 10 sites receiving ChatGPT referral traffic, it’s only seen a 3.1% increase.

Topics like stocks, finance, and sports are currently accounting for the majority of these ChatGPT news-related prompts, but Similarweb’s report notes other topics are seeing growth, too, like politics, the economy, weather, and others.

This, the firm theorizes, may signal a move away from more “reactive information” and toward deeper “issue-driven engagement” via AI.

Alongside the AI referrals growth, ChatGPT’s website and app users have also seen greater adoption.

Over the last six months, app users have more than doubled, while website visitors were up 52%, Similarweb said.

The firm is now offering a service for brands and businesses that allows them to track how and where their brand shows up in GenAI tools like ChatGPT, and how that compares to their competition.

Solutions to the news publishers’ crisis are few and far between.

Under pressure from news publishers as AI kills their traffic, Google recently launched a service called Offerwall that allows publishers using Google Ad Manager to experiment with other means of monetization beyond more traffic-dependent options, like ads. With Offerwall, publishers can instead try things like micropayments or asking users to sign up for newsletters to access their site’s content, for example. They can also customize the Offerwall screens with options of their own, Google said.

Other sites are experimenting with paywalls or other means of monetization. Many have since conducted mass layoffs or even shut down their operations.

In a recent interview with The NYT’s Hard Fork podcast, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman responded to a question about AI’s impact on the job market by saying, “I do think there will be areas where some jobs go away, or maybe there will be some whole categories of jobs that go away. And any job that goes away, even if it’s good for society and the economy as a whole, is very painful — extremely painful — in that moment … there is going to be real pain here in many cases.”

Valeo was recognized for strategic partnership, innovation and proactive cost and process optimization.

The Volkswagen Group highlights Valeo’s “exceptional achievements and innovative strength”.

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‘Pain of Brexit’

Challenging for consumers and dealers

An ex-banker who gave his wife £78m will not have to split it equally with her following their divorce, according to a supreme court ruling experts say sets a precedent for dividing up assets after a marriage ends.

In 2017, prior to their divorce, Clive Standish, 72, transferred investments worth £77.8m to his wife Anna as part of a tax planning scheme. These assets had originally been Clive’s non-matrimonial property, the court was told.

The couple married in 2005 – this was the second marriage for both – and have two children together. However, the marriage broke down in 2020.

In 2022, a high court judge split the family’s total wealth of £132m by awarding Clive £87m and Anna £45m. The former challenged this decision at the court of appeal, arguing that the majority of the money, including the transferred assets, was earned before they began living together.

Last year, court of appeal judges assessed that 75% of the near-£80m had been earned prior to the marriage and cut Anna’s share to £25m.

The supreme court has now upheld the £25m figure after five justices unanimously agreed that because most of the sum of money had been earned prior to the marriage, Clive was entitled to keep the largest share.

The landmark judgment might involve the super-wealthy but is “relevant to everyone,” said family lawyer Caroline Holley, partner at law firm Farrer & Co.

The law firm Stewarts, which represented retired banker Clive in the case, said: “Divorcing couples across England and Wales now have clearer guidance on how their assets will be categorised upon divorce.”

Legal experts suggested the judgment could increase demand among couples for prenuptial agreementsand postnuptial agreements as a way of protecting people’s interests if it all goes wrong later.

Clive Standish, being domiciled in the UK, was worried about paying millions in inheritance tax if he died with the assets in his name, Lords Burrows and Stephens explained in their ruling on Wednesday.

They said: “In short, there was no matrimonialisation of the 2017 assets because, first, the transfer was to save tax, and, secondly, it was for the benefit of the children, not the wife.

“The 2017 assets were not, therefore, being treated by the husband and wife for any period of time as an asset that was shared between them.”

Clive Standish expected his wife to use the money to set up two offshore trusts, but she did not do that and remained the sole owner of the assets when legal action began, the court heard.

Chris Lloyd-Smith, partner in the matrimonial team at law firm Anthony Collins, said: “With the judgment being in favour of Mr Standish, the court has set a precedent of firmer boundaries between personal and shared wealth.”

He said “the most important takeaway” was that transparent financial planning in relationships was crucial. “When it comes to managing expectations and reducing legal uncertainty, pre- and postnuptial agreements that are reviewed regularly are important tools to divide and protect assets with clarity. This way, you protect yourself and set your own terms, instead of relying on a court decision.”

Del Monte Foods, the 139-year-old company best known for its canned fruits and vegetables, is filing for bankruptcy protection as U.S. consumers increasingly bypass its products for healthier or cheaper options.

Del Monte has secured $912.5 million in debtor-in-possession financing that will allow it to operate normally as the sale progresses.

“After a thorough evaluation of all available options, we determined a court-supervised sale process is the most effective way to accelerate our turnaround and create a stronger and enduring Del Monte Foods,” CEO Greg Longstreet said in a statement.

Del Monte Foods, based in Walnut Creek, California, also owns the Contadina tomato brand, College Inn and Kitchen Basics broth brands and the Joyba bubble tea brand.

The company has seen sales growth of Joyba and broth in fiscal 2024, but not enough to offset weaker sales of Del Monte’s signature canned products.

READ MORE: What happens to DNA data of millions as 23andMe files bankruptcy?

“Consumer preferences have shifted away from preservative-laden canned food in favor of healthier alternatives,” said Sarah Foss, global head of legal and restructuring at Debtwire, a financial consultancy.

Grocery inflation also caused consumers to seek out cheaper store brands. And President Donald Trump’s 50% tariff on imported steel, which went into effect in June, will also push up the prices Del Monte and others must pay for cans.

Del Monte Foods, which is owned by Singapore’s Del Monte Pacific, was also hit with a lawsuit last year by a group of lenders that objected to the company’s debt restructuring plan. The case was settled in May with a loan that increased Del Monte’s interest expenses by $4 million annually, according to a company statement.

Del Monte said late Thursday that the bankruptcy filing is part of a planned sale of company’s assets.

New tariffs in 2025 have exposed vulnerabilities and increased uncertainty across regions and industries. The effects on information technology are real and immediate: tighter regulations, rising costs, and more complexity, particularly in China and other geofenced markets. While the pace of decoupling varies, the direction is clear: Tech environments are becoming more regionalized and risk sensitive.

For technology leaders, this means rethinking core decisions—vendor strategy, architecture, and the operating model. Tech executives will need to deliver results in a more fragmented, more expensive landscape. Understanding five key trends can help leadership teams build smarter, more resilient strategies.

• Hardware: Shifting away from China comes at a premium. As companies move production out of China, hardware costs are rising—by up to 20% in some categories. The added effort to qualify new suppliers, build buffer stock, and manage a broader vendor base is straining budgets and creating near-term supply risks.
• Data: Localization redefines architecture needs. Tougher data privacy and AI regulations increasingly require companies to store and manage data locally. That means duplicative cloud setups, region-specific security tools, and in some cases, split AI and data platforms—all of which drive up cost and complexity.
• Cloud: Fragmentation erodes scale advantages. Hyperscalers are investing in sovereign cloud, in-country AI, and multiregion infrastructure to meet local demands. While necessary, these investments are pushing up cloud computing costs and reducing the savings of a centralized model, requiring greater architectural planning and financial discipline.
• Cybersecurity: Rising geopolitical risk increases threats. As global tensions rise, so do cyberthreats—from state-sponsored attacks to vendor breaches and phishing campaigns themed around tariffs. Companies will need sharper monitoring, stronger vendor oversight, and continuous employee upskilling to stay ahead.
• Talent: Mobility constraints reshape delivery models. Limits on cross-border talent movement are pushing companies to shift toward more onshore, nearshore, or insourced teams. That means new cost structures, capability trade-offs, and a rethink of how and where tech work gets done.

Act now, plan ahead

To navigate this new terrain, tech leaders must balance near-term moves with longer-term bets. In the short run, that means managing exposure, triaging IT budgets, reassessing vendor footprints, and exploring workforce levers. Longer-term, the focus should shift to reimagining sourcing, architecture, and the operating model to thrive in a more fragmented future.

Santander’s takeover of TSB will be music to Rachel Reeves’ ears: sparing the under-pressure chancellor the potential embarrassment of having to explain why a major high street lender had given up on Britain.

On Tuesday night, Spanish-owned Santander said it would buy TSB from its fellow Spanish owner, Sabadell, for £2.65bn, ending months of speculation over the future of the British bank – and reaffirming Santander’s commitment to the UK.

Rumours had emerged in January that Santander UK could pull out of high street banking, potentially reversing gains made in stepping up its British presence with the acquisition of Abbey National two decades earlier. Bosses had started slashing 2,000 jobs months earlier, fuelling speculation that it was trying to create a leaner business that could lure potential suitors.

The chatter sparked panic, feeding into a growing existential crisis over whether allegedly burdensome regulation was driving potential investment and foreign firms away from the City – which was already losing stock market listings and floats to foreign rivals .

Publicly, Santander repeated that the UK was a core market, with 14 million customers served through 350 branches and 18,000 staff. But in Madrid, executives led by executive chair Ana Botín, were said to be increasingly frustrated over UK regulations and costs that were dampening profitability.

That included post-financial crisis rules such as ring-fencing, which protect and separate consumer deposits from riskier operations including investment banking, but are criticised as costly and complex by banks. Meanwhile, Santander’s frustrations were compounded by the car finance commission scandal, which could lead to a £1.9bn compensation bill for the bank’s aggrieved borrowers.

Reeves and her Labour government, however, appeared alive to the threats.

Months earlier, the chancellor had ordered City watchdogs to do more to promote growth and competition, including by watering down financial crisis regulation that she claimed had “gone too far”. By late January, the chancellor was attempting to intervene in a supreme court case over the car finance scandal, concerned it could curb lenders’ activities.

Days after her intervention emerged, Reeves met with Botín on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. While in the Swiss Alps, Botín declared: “We love the UK, it is a core market and will remain a core market for Santander. Punto [fullstop], that’s it.”

Speculation of its sale continued to swirl, but Santander finally put its money where its mouth is: agreeing to buy TSB from Spanish rival Sabadell in a deal that could eventually hit £2.9bn if the smaller bank’s profits meet forecasts.

For Santander, the takeover will help fend off competition from the likes of Nationwide Building Society, which has been nipping at the bank’s heels after its own £2.9bn acquisition of rival Virgin Money. It will add 5 million customers to its books, and make Santander the fourth largest mortgage provider and third largest bank in terms of personal current account deposits, behind Lloyds and NatWest.

But for TSB, the future of its 5,000 staff and 175 branches is at stake. Santander will have to consider how to strip out duplicate roles and branches and whether to scrap the 215-year history old TSB brand, which could disappear from UK high streets following the takeover.

Santander bosses told analysts on Tuesday night that they were aware of duplications, including “overlapping branches”.

Meanwhile, unions have been holding urgent talks with TSB to try to get some clarity for staff, who have been subject to a tumultuous 12 years, marked by ownership upheavals and a disastrous IT meltdown that tarnished its reputation for years.

Hived off from Lloyds Banking Group as part of state-aid rules following its £20.3bn government bailout in 2008, TSB again became a standalone brand and floated on the London stock exchange in 2014. It was delisted following its takeover by Spanish lender Sabadell in 2015, in a major cross border deal that the Treasury hailed as a “vote of confidence” in the UK.

But the party did not last. As soon as 2020, Sabadell began exploring a sale of TSB after the botched launch of a new IT system two years earlier sparked a tech meltdown, locking millions of customers out of their bank accounts. It caused a customer exodus, executive resignations, financial losses and a £48m fine from regulators.

Sabadell eventually swallowed the losses, and was heartened by TSB’s recovery, even rebuffing a £1bn approach by the Co-operative Bank in 2022.

It took a hostile bid for Sabadell by Spanish rival BBVA for the bank to reconsider a sale, with proceeds from TSB’s sale due to be distributed among shareholders who it hopes will see less benefit in agreeing to the takeover.

But Sabadell’s loss could be Santander’s gain, and provide a timely boost for Reeves as she fights to keep the trust of the City courted on the election campaign trail amid a gloomy economic outlook.