Author: Nick Farrell

NortonLifeLock’s Avast deal interests watchdogs

Posted on March 29, 2022 by - News

The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has announced that NortonLifeLock’s proposed acquisition of Avast is going to get  put under its antitrust microscope.

For those who came in late, NortonLifeLock announced last year that it was to acquire LSE-listed cybersecurity vendor Avast for as much as $8.6 billion in a deal that it claimed would create an “industry-leading” consumer cybersecurity business.

But the CMA revealed in January of this year that it had launched an inquiry into the merger before stating earlier this month that the deal “may be expected to result in a substantial lessening of competition within a market or markets in the United Kingdom”.

HP makes Poly gone

Posted on March 29, 2022 by - News

HP is buying video conferencing vendor Poly in an all-cash transaction worth $3.3 billion paying $40 per share at $1.7 billion and take on Poly’s net debt.

HP CEO Enrique Lores said the acquisition of the video conferencing, headsets, video and software vendor will mean HP can benefit from the shift towards hybrid working and represents a “once-in-a-generation opportunity to redefine the way work gets done”.

The acquisition will drive growth and scale HP’s peripherals and workforce solutions business, HP says, with the former representing a $110m opportunity growing nine per ent annually and the latter a $120 million opportunity growing at eight percent each year.

“Combining HP and Poly creates a leading portfolio of hybrid work solutions across large and growing markets. Poly’s strong technology, complementary go-to-market, and talented team will help to drive long-term profitable growth as we continue building a stronger HP.”

Apple might move to subscription model

Posted on March 28, 2022 by - News

Fruity cargo cult Apple has worked out that its products are so expensive it might be a wizard idea to move to a subscription model for iPhones and other hardware.

Bloomberg claims the tech giant is looking at making hardware ownership similar to paying a monthly app fee. The project is still in development, the sources said, but would mark a significant push towards recurring sales from the vendor.

The scheme is not going to be anything like a hire purchase arrangement.  There would be an as yet undecided monthly fee that depends on which device the user selects.

Enterprises spend more on cloud than traditional IT

Posted on March 28, 2022 by - News

Enterprise IT spending on public cloud computing will overtake spending on traditional IT in 2025, according to research by Gartner.

This rapid shift in buying habits, driven in part by the COVID-19 pandemic, has seen widespread adoption of cloud-based infrastructures, applications and business process services. In fact, Gartner says almost two-thirds (65.9 percent) of spending on application software will be directed toward cloud technologies in 2025, up from 57.7 percent in 2022.

There is a shedload of pressure for suppliers to come up with viable options.  Gartner vice president Michael Warrilow said: “Technology and service providers that fail to adapt to the pace of cloud shift face increasing risk of becoming obsolete or, at best, being relegated to low-growth markets.”

Public cloud services are expected to exceed $480 billion this year. Much of the optimism for this growth is based on the big cloud suppliers’ strategy towards industry clouds, virtualised cloud solutions based on increasing sophistication and integration of services. Last year, all three suppliers announced industry cloud strategies.

Smart building use predicted to increase

Posted on March 28, 2022 by - News

Juniper Research has found that the number of buildings globally deploying smart building technologies will reach 115 million in 2026, from 45 million in 2022.

This growth of over 150 per cent reflects increasing demand for energy efficiency from businesses and residents alike, as energy costs spike. Juniper Research defines a smart building as a building that uses connectivity to enable economical use of resources while creating a safe and comfortable environment for the occupants.

The new research, with the punchy title,  Smart Buildings: Key Opportunities, Competitor Leaderboard & Market Forecasts 2022-2026, found that by enabling buildings to monitor and automate common functions, significant efficiency gains can be made while improving the environment for workers and residents. The report recommends that vendors focus on building analytics platforms for the most value to be driven from deployments. 

Much muttering among Microsoft partners

Posted on March 25, 2022 by - News

Microsoft partners down under have started an online petition disapproving of newly announced Microsoft partner programme changes, which they universally declare to be “not fair dinkum”.

The petition dubs the tech giant’s new partner scoring system “impossible to achieve as it’s heavily biased toward ‘new sales.’”

One of the petition organisers told the local press that suppliers were concerned that this is going to continue and it’s going to go down the path of Microsoft wanting to ultimately be that direct relationship with the end-user.

Basically, the fear is that Vole will eventually incentivise customers to work directly with the vendor by sticking partners with higher prices and less favourable contract offers.

Nvidia-Intel alliance could scare rivals

Posted on March 25, 2022 by - News

Yesterday’s news that Nvidia and Intel are snuggling up for a glorious alliance could cause some major headaches for the industry.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said during a press briefing that he was in talks to use Intel foundries to produce GPUs, a development that could see the dogged rivals join forces.

Data centre tech is based around GPUs and Nvidia holds an 81 percent market share.

All this could be problems for others in the industry especially AMD’s data centre supercomputing ambitions and TSMC’s foundry business.

AMD and Nvidia use TSMC’s foundry. AMD’s strategy so far has been to produce cheaper GPUs with a slightly better performance than Nvidia.

NTT DATA UK loses CEO

Posted on March 25, 2022 by - Moving People, News

NTT DATA UK announced that its current CEO, Simon Williams, will be exiting the business.

Williams has led NTT DATA UK for the past five years, more than doubling the size of the business and increasing its profitability by a factor of 10. He will remain as the CEO of NTT DATA UK until 31 March 2022.

Williams’ involvement with NTT DATA dates back to 2011 when the IT services provider acquired his former business, Value Team. He then went on to become Head of Telco, Media and Technology for NTT DATA UK and helped to create NTT DATA Digital, before becoming CEO of the organisation in 2017.

Only a third of IT workers staying put and not blinking

Posted on March 24, 2022 by - News

Beancounters at Gartner have added up some numbers and reached the conclusion that only 29.1 percent of IT employees have solid plans to stay with their current employer.

In its latest Global Labor Market Survey, the number crunchers at Big B said that depending on where those IT workers are located, that number can be much lower.

In Asia, just 19.6 percent have a high intent to stay in their current job while in Australia and New Zealand, just 23.6 percent feel the same.  In Latin America, the number is 26.9 percent. Even in Europe only four in 10 IT workers expect to stay in their current organisations, according to the survey.

In general, IT workers are 10.2 percent less likely to stay in a job than non-IT employees, according to the survey. This is the lowest out of all corporate functions.

Apple snaps up Credit Kudos

Posted on March 24, 2022 by - News

Apple is acquiring the UK-based fintech startup Credit Kudos for an undisclosed amount.

Neither Credit Kudos nor Apple will confirm the deal, which was first reported by the crypto-focused publication The Block, citing three sources close to the deal. The privacy policy link on the Credit Kudos website redirects to Apple’s privacy policy.

Distology hires for Darby as sales director

Posted on March 24, 2022 by - Moving People, News

Security outfit Distology has hired Rob Darby as its sales director.

Darby brings 20 years of experience to the role and has worked across the tech sector – including for Pulsant, Ingram Micro and Comms-Care.  His role will be relationship management with partners and vendors and helping the business expand its team.

Darby said that the channel was his passion and has been the key focus of his career.

 Perfect Image snaps up Technique

Posted on March 23, 2022 by - News

Perfect Image has written a cheque for managed services provider [MSP] Technique.

Perfect Image said that it wanted to expand into the South of England. Technique operates from Berkshire. Pixel Group, the parent company of Perfect Image, already has offices covering the North in Newcastle, Glasgow and Northern Ireland.

The deal will increase the depth of Perfect Image’s managed services products. It is the second deal the group has made in a year, having picked up cyber security specialist Cyphra last June.

Technique’s existing management team will stay on board with its newly appointed general manager Greg Baker staying on to ensure a smooth transition to a fresh owner. The business will continue to operate as a specialist MSP, with a focus on providing secure solutions to mid-market and SME customers across the UK.

Softcat becoming fat cat

Posted on March 23, 2022 by - News

Marlow-based Reseller Softcat posted profits “ahead of expectations” and steep revenue growth across all business segments.

For the six months until 31 January 2022, gross invoiced income grew by 33 percent to £1.16 billion, while revenue under IFRS 15 grew by 33.6 percent to £770.9 million.

Operating profit increased by 12.4 percent to £64.1 million over the six-month period, while gross profit grew 11.7 per ent to £150.2 million. Average gross profit per customer grew by 12.4 percent to £30,200 with Softcat claiming that it continued to grow its customer base.

Softcat claims that it made “good progress” across all customer segments and across software, hardware and services.

Telefónica Tech swallows Microsoft Dynamics

Posted on March 23, 2022 by - News

Telefónica Tech has bought Microsoft Dynamics partner Incremental for up to £175 million.

Telefónica Tech claims the deal will “strengthen its capabilities and presence” both in the UK and Ireland.

Incremental is based in Glasgow but with offices in India and Bulgaria, Incremental focuses on the data and analytics market and has been a Microsoft Business Applications Inner Circle member for the past three years.

Telefónica Tech CEO José Cerdán said that the move strengthens his companies position as a leader in the UK market for IT services.

“We are now able to provide end-to-end Microsoft services, including digital transformation, managed services and data analytics, and achieve attractive cross-selling synergies with Telefónica Tech UK&I, complementing and positioning us as a leading Microsoft-focused company in the UK.”

Giacom increases in size

Posted on March 22, 2022 by - News

Small business Cloud business Giacom has grown by 20 percent to £58.6 Million and is increasing its hires.

The company said it wanted its team to grow by 22 percent in 2022 across all departments and most of the hires will come from the local Hull community.

To nurture young local talent, Giacom has started apprenticeships within its Marketing and IT departments. The company has also encouraged training opportunities internally and recently launched its Personal Development Plan Scheme, which is available to all staff to up-skill themselves. This has lead to nine staff applying for the highly regarded CMI management certificates.

Additionally, in October 2021, Giacom announced its new partnership with cyber security giant Sophos, being chosen as one of three UK MSP distributors for Sophos.