Regulatory Obstacles in South Africa - Starlink's operation in South Africa is hindered by regulations requiring 30% equity to be given to black people, a condition Elon Musk has resisted [1] - South Africa is exploring an "equity equivalent" workaround, allowing investment in black businesses and infrastructure instead of equity transfer [2] - Proposed regulatory changes face pushback from lawmakers and are subject to public comment, potentially delaying resolution by several months [3] Geopolitical Context - Starlink's regulatory issues in South Africa may have been used as a bargaining chip in negotiations between South African and US presidents [4][5] Starlink's African Expansion - Starlink operates in approximately 18 African countries, with Nigeria being the largest market and recent expansion into Congo [6] - Many African countries have eased licensing regulations to facilitate Starlink's operation [7] - Starlink offers a potentially cheaper connectivity solution for rural Africa, where traditional infrastructure rollout is expensive [7]

Market Volatility and Systemic Risk - Financial institutions face systemic risks amplified by geopolitical shocks, tariffs (spiking costs by 10-20%), and regulatory changes, necessitating proactive risk management [1] - The interconnectedness of global economies means events in one region (e g, Japan, London) can impact others, highlighting the importance of mitigating systemic risk [1] - Traditional risk models often struggle to keep pace with intraday market volatility, requiring faster data processing and analysis [7] Data and Technology Challenges - Many financial institutions still rely on legacy systems for risk management, which are inadequate for today's volatile environment [1] - Institutions face a data explosion when performing risk calculations like Monte Carlo simulations, generating 15+ terabytes of data daily for a 10-day VaR calculation [5] - Moving data to and from the public cloud for calculations can be slow (e g, taking 3 hours to retrieve 15 terabytes), hindering timely risk analysis [8] Hybrid Cloud and Data Architecture - Hybrid cloud environments are becoming essential, allowing institutions to leverage the scalability of the public cloud while keeping sensitive data on-premises due to regulatory requirements [10][39] - A well-designed data architecture is critical for CIOs, enabling them to leverage different environments for their respective strengths [44][45] - DDN enables a hybrid multi-protocol environment, allowing institutions to keep sensitive data on-premises while running analytics and making the results available quickly [44] DDN's Solutions and Capabilities - DDN offers data intelligence solutions, focusing on providing relevant information up the stack rather than just storage [1] - DDN's Infinia platform can achieve up to 8x faster performance compared to legacy NAS architectures in grid runs with Murex and scenario reloads [28][29] - DDN's data ocean concept allows institutions to leverage data where it sits, avoiding slow and difficult data movement, and provides thousands of tags for finding relevant data [36][37]