Author: Nick Farrell

AVI-SPL snaps up Sonics

Posted on February 24, 2022 by - News

Audiovisual reseller AVI-SPL has written a cheque for the Dublin-based AV integration specialist Sonics.

Sonics partners with the likes of Zoom, Sennheiser, Logitech, NEC, Polytech and LG.

AVI-SPL claims it sees “tremendous growth opportunity with Sonics in its local market” and hopes to bolster its operations there, while it also plans to “significantly strengthen its capabilities in Europe and beyond”.

AVI-SPL  MD Michael Kellaway said: “Both companies have led the way in creating customer success with leading-edge AV and unified communications deployments and exceptional day-two services to support them. I’m thrilled to welcome Sonics to our team.”

The acquisition is expected to close next week and will see Sonics become an extension of the existing AVI-SPL UK team.

HP seizes shedloads of fakes

Posted on February 23, 2022 by - News

HP says it has seized more than 3.5 million fraudulent print products, parts and components during the past year.

The maker of expensive printer ink said that counterfeiters are increasingly protected by selling their goods online which makes them harder to catch.

HP’s Anti-Counterfeit and Fraud team confiscated 646,000 counterfeit print products across EMEA, an additional 400,000 across the Americas, and a further 2.5 million across the APAC region. While that seems a lot most of the products seem to be ink and toner cartridges.

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Cisco puts ThousandEyes into the channel

Posted on February 23, 2022 by - News

Cisco is converting its ThousandEyes arm into a channel proposition.

Cisco channel leader Oliver Tuszik said it had got to a point where the company wanted to put the network visualisation tools into the hands of its partners so they could react to growing demand from customers for greater visibility and improved security.

He said: “We are helping our partners further deliver on their commitment to customers by announcing that Cisco ThousandEyes is moving to a full channel sales model.”

“I am thrilled about this and the work our teams are doing to support partners’ needs in adding this capability to their Cisco portfolio. Delivered as a SaaS [software-as-a-service] solution, ThousandEyes is another important Cisco component in driving more subscription-based annual recurring revenues – an important shift we know is just good business for our partners’ bottom line.”

Intel wants ARM now

Posted on February 23, 2022 by - News

While it is unlikely to happen, it seems that Intel is considering snapping up British chip manufacturer ARM.

Nvidia officially announced the termination of its $40 billion acquisition from owners SoftBank Group (SBG) earlier this month due to “significant regulatory challenges”.

Shortly after its collapse, ARM confirmed it was preparing for an IPO within the fiscal year ending March 31, 2023.

Now, Intel is weighing up its own offer for ARM. Kicking Pat Gelsinger has said Intel would be interested in participating if a consortium emerges to own the UK semiconductor company.

Exclusive Networks has record breaking fourth quarter

Posted on February 22, 2022 by - News

Exclusive Networks has announced a record-breaking quarter in its fourth-quarter and full-year results, which ended December 31, 2021.

The distribution giant logged gross sales of €1 billion, a spike of 31.4 percent year on year. For its FY2021, the group’s gross sales were also up double-digits rising 29.5 percent to €3.3 billion.

CEO Jesper Trolle said the distributor’s latest financials amounted to a “symbolic milestone” for the channel firm. “For the first time in its history, Exclusive Networks exceeded €1 billion of gross sales in a quarter”, he said.

“This is not just a symbolic milestone in our journey and demonstrates our success addressing the compelling demand for cybersecurity solutions and offering the optimal go to market platform to guide customers in the ever-changing environment with best-in-class solutions. ”

Havas swallows Inviqa

Posted on February 22, 2022 by - News

Havas Group has snapped up “digital experience” outfit Inviqa.

More than 150 Inviqa employees across eight offices, will be integrated into Havas Creative’s dedicated customer experience network, Havas CX, to significantly expand its specialism, scale, and capabilities in experience design, software engineering, technology consulting, and ecommerce.

As part of Havas CX, Inviqa will merge with Havas’ existing UK-based digital experience agency, ekino London. The combined company, which will be headquartered out of Havas’ UK Village in London’s King’s Cross, will retain the Inviqa brand and be led by Inviqa founder and CEO Yair Spitzer. ekino will continue to operate as a standalone brand within Havas CX in non-UK markets including France, New York and Singapore.

Dell wants to boost partner relationships

Posted on February 21, 2022 by - News

Dell Technologies has a new vice president of channel strategy and VMware channel sales.

The Grey Tin box shifter has promoted Lukas Bedi, who says he has a cunning plan to  “strengthen” partner relationships and ensure the channel has the “tools” it needs.

He will be responsible for setting Dell’s overall channel strategy, designing Dell Technologies Partner Programme incentives, competencies and requirements, as well as accelerating Dell’s solid VMware channel business. Bedi’s focus in his new role will be on the operational and strategic momentum of Dell partners.

Snyk has Fugue

Posted on February 21, 2022 by - News

Security outfit Snyk has snapped up cloud security and compliance company Fugue.

The outfit claims the buy will allow it to enter the cloud security market. Fugue claims to protect the entire cloud development lifecycle—from infrastructure as code through the runtime—with the same platform and the policies across AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud.

Snyk highlighted Fugue’s Unified Policy Engine which connects cloud posture back to configuration code, using one set of policies in order to manage compliance and security throughout the entirety of the software development lifecycle (SDLC).

Number of women tech CEOs falls

Posted on February 21, 2022 by - News

The numbers of female CEOs running Fortune 500 tech companies have sharply declined over the last five years.

Cloud talent creation firm Revolent added up some numbers and divided by its shoe size and found that only seven percent of CEOs of tech companies in 2016’s Fortune 500 identified as female.  This fell to just 4.41 percent in 2021 – a 14 percent decrease during the five-year time frame.

The research also found that none of the female tech CEOs in either 2016’s or 2021’s Fortune 500 list were founders of their company.

Check Point’s new UK head heralds expansion

Posted on February 18, 2022 by - Moving People, News

Israeli security outfit Check Point’s new UK head will grow the volume of business the security player does with its channel partners, the company has announced.

Adam Bradley has worked for Sophos, Appsense and Forcepoint as regional director for UK and Ireland.

Check Point said that UK companies experienced, on average, 399 cyber attacks per week last year, which was a 103 percent increase from 2020.

Earlier this month, Check Point launched its SMB Security Suite, which armed its channel with a package that includes a firewall, cloud email protection, and endpoint and mobile security. It is available in four options to appeal to a range of customer needs.

Chess takes TTNC

Posted on February 18, 2022 by - News

Chess boardChess has acquired telecommunications solutions provider TTNC which is its second buyout in six months.

TTNC provides cloud-based telecoms solutions to businesses, including services including call management packages, cloud numbers, voice over IP services, SIP trunks, call tracking and bespoke telephone answering services.

The vendor’s portfolio spans connectivity, cloud, digital and security solutions, business broadband, telephony, unified communications and professional managed services.

In August it wrote a cheque for penetration testing services firm Armadillo.

The company said the rationale behind its latest acquisition is to enhance its “small business customer experience”.

Daisy buys XLN as phone expansion

Posted on February 18, 2022 by - News

Daisy has snapped up broadband provider XLN to expand its broadband and phone division.

London-based, XLN claims it has 100,000 small businesses with business broadband, phones and card payments for clients.

Becoming part of Daisy will create a division with upwards of 200,000 customers. It will extend Daisy’s own portfolio and enable it to offer the “widest choice of solutions” to the business market.

An upcoming analogue switch-off will mean UK businesses will need to shift to digital services, Daisy claims, putting it in an advantageous position to help customers make the transition.

Daisy chairman Matthew Riley said: “With so much investment across the UK to improve the fibre infrastructure, Daisy is now well-positioned to help unlock the enhanced speed, reliability and security that customers want in their offices and shops up and down the country. There is also a vast opportunity in the creation of jobs as we need more staff to help deliver that service.”

AI market set to boom

Posted on February 17, 2022 by - News

Beancounters at IDC have added up some numbers and divided them by their shoe size and reached the conclusion that the AI market – which includes AI software, services and hardware will break the $500 billion mark by 2023.

For partners investing in artificial intelligence, it’s services that IDC are forecasting to deliver the fastest spending growth over the next five years with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 22 percent.

Meanwhile, the CAGR for AI hardware will be 20.5 percent, while AI software will see its share of spending decline slightly in 2022 as spending for hardware and services grows more quickly: a trend that IDC says will continue into 2023.

IDC group vice president, worldwide AI and automation research Ritu Jyoti said that AI emerged as the next major wave of innovation.

Blue Blue snaps up cloudy Neudesic

Posted on February 17, 2022 by - News

Biggish Blue has acquired Microsoft Azure partner Neudesic to expand the tech vendor’s portfolio of hybrid multi-cloud and artificial intelligence services.

IBM said that Neudesic gives it more Azure cloud, data engineering and data analytics capabilities  The company has more than 1,500 cloud and data workers in the US and India.

IBM and Neudesic signed a definitive agreement for the acquisition in the fourth quarter of 2021, according to the statement.

Communication service providers are behind on 5G

Posted on February 17, 2022 by - News

Nokia has presented new research showing that communication service providers (CSPs) are behind in having the right software solutions to help them monetise their 5G networks with new services and network management tools.

The report said that CSPs and enterprises need to modernise their legacy monetisation systems with new service offerings and application development ecosystems to generate returns beyond the traditional data plans of the 3G/4G era. New monetisation systems that enable operators to deliver new services, like slicing, faster and at scale, are a critical enabler of helping CSPs and enterprises realise faster returns on their network investments.

But the Nokia-commissioned global survey of 100 CSPs worldwide found that only 11 percent of respondents have sufficient Business Support Systems (BSS) in place to meet the needs of 5G-enabled business models. BSS is a critical patchwork of business applications, including monetisation tools, that help CSPs manage their operations and supply chains through functions like billing and charging and deliver a solid customer experience.