Author: Nick Farrell

Businesses are taking cybersecurity procurement more seriously

IDC’s Future Enterprise Resiliency and Spending (FERS) report claims that enterprises are now taking cybersecurity procurement more seriously in an effort to try and stave off a business-threatening event.

The report said that those companies are transforming their business models from linear-based value chains to integrated ecosystems leveraging shared data and insights, applications, and operations.

It said that organisations need to adapt to disruptive trends by forming partnerships that “extend beyond their respective industries” to generate value, build resiliency, foster innovation, and anticipate threats and opportunities.

IDC Future of Industry Ecosystems & Product Innovation Strategies research VP, Jeffrey Hojlo said the industry was still in a version 1.0 phase of IT investment for the future of industry ecosystems with the future of industry ecosystems technology investments still at an early stage.  This highlighted customer data management and systems integration as other key areas for investment.

Microsoft saw a 20 percent hike in revenue

Microsoft campusSoftware King of the World, Microsoft, reported a revenue hike of 20 per cent in the second quarter of its fiscal 2022 financial results, earning revenues of $51.7 billion.

Operating income for the quarter ended December 31, 2021 saw double-digit growth of 24 percent to $22.2 billion.

The boost, which shocked the cocaine nose jobs of Wall Street, was due to a tremendous growth seen in its Microsoft Cloud business, which spiked 32 percent year on year to reach revenues of $22.1 billion.

VMWare announces new BT agreement

BT has signed up for VMware’s Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) as a managed service.

The agreement will mix BT’s networking capabilities and in-depth security expertise with VMware technology to help customers accelerate their digital transformation.

BT says the managed service will provide employees with flexible, secure, and reliable access to cloud-based applications and services, deployed in private clouds, SaaS, or at the enterprise edge. It also aims to support the adoption of technologies such as the IoT and hybrid working.

Enterprise server market slumps

The latest Context figures show the enterprise server market slumped by 15 percent in the fourth quarter of 2021 and declined 4.4 percent across the year.

The IT market intelligence company said the decline was driven by “product supply issues and the reintroduction of stricter Covid-19 measures and resulting business uncertainty”, as well as long-term trends like “migration to hybrid cloud infrastructure and the increasing software-centric datacentre”.

Vectra snaps up Siriux Security

Security outfit Vectra AI acquired Siriux Security Technologies, a leading provider of identity and software as a service (SaaS) posture management.

The acquisition means Vectra can configure and detect active threats in cloud identity and SaaS areas, including Microsoft Azure AD and Microsoft 365.

Vectra AI CEO  Hitesh Sheth said: “SaaS applications have become a haven for cyberattacks and cloud identity is the way in. Through the combined expertise of the teams at Vectra and Siriux, we are now able to deliver the best protection for customers facing these threats.”

Arrow gives partners Pure as-a-Service and Pure Cloud Block Store

Global technology provider Arrow Electronics has added Pure as-a-Service and Pure Cloud Block Store to ArrowSphere, its global cloud delivery and management platform. Under the agreement with Pure Storage.

The solutions will be available to channel customers in a number of regions and countries across Europe, including the UK, Belgium and Netherlands, Denmark, Finland, France, Italy, Spain and Sweden.

Pure as-a-Service is a service-oriented flexible consumption model for delivering Pure’s solutions in a pay-as-you-go format. Pure as-a-Service helps deliver more than simply operating expense savings, it transforms customers’ enterprise infrastructure environments by providing services, such as monitoring, service-level objectives (SLOs), and specific service level agreements (SLAs).

Computacenter had a great year

Computacenter said that it had a record 2021  with its services business reaching its highest growth rates in 20 years.

The Hatfield-based reseller said total group revenues are set to increase by 23 percent for the year ending 31 December 2021 including the effects of acquisitions made since the beginning of 2020. Revenues will increase by 27 percent.

The reseller claims it finished the year strongly and ahead of expectations, and expects adjusted pre-tax profits for the year to be slightly higher than £250 million.

Half of UK prefers multicloud

Nuanix research has found that more than half of UK respondents have a multi-cloud IT environment, substantially more than the rest of the EMEA region and globally.

Continuing this trend, 82 percent of UK respondents said they intend to be using multiple clouds in the next one to three years, with 21 percent already using three or more public clouds and 80 per cent naming hybrid multi-cloud as the ideal operating model for their business.

Survey respondents were asked about their current cloud challenges, how they’re running business applications now and where they plan to run them in the future. Respondents were also asked about the impact of the pandemic on recent, current and future IT infrastructure decisions and how IT strategy and priorities may change because of it.

Nutanix General Manager Alan Campbell,  said: “UK companies are leading the global pack in deploying multi-cloud environments that span a mix of private and public clouds while acknowledging the potential hurdles with multi-cloud management, security and application mobility as they ramp up adoption.” He said:

“These concerns represent an urgency for cloud-agnostic tools that provide unified visibility, security and control of an entire hybrid multi-cloud infrastructure as the vast majority of UK businesses now cite this as the optimal operating model for their businesses.”

Acronis releases CyberFit Partner Programme

Cloudy security outfit Acronis has released details of its Acronis #CyberFit Partner Programme which it claims places increased emphasis on supporting partner development.

Acronis’ cloud ecosystem has more than doubled since 2018, with 2021 proving to be the most significant year in Acronis history, with now over 750,000 businesses using Acronis Cyber Protect and receiving a recent $250 million round of funding from CVC Capital Partners VII and others.

Acronis has made yearly updates to its partner programme, based on feedback and says the changes will enable partners to earn more while deploying cloud-based solutions that are uniquely suited to meet their clients’ modern protection challenges and marketing needs while offering a competitive migration programme for those looking to make the switch to Acronis.

Net zero or zero government contracts

Decarbonisation or net-zero strategies will soon be a prerequisite for any IT provider wishing to compete for public sector procurements.

Resellers have lost business due to a lack of credentials around sustainability, and it is widely expected that a net-zero requirement for suppliers will soon become a pre-requisite for most public sector procurements in the future.

Anzu.io hires Blight

Chris Blight has joined in-game advertising company Anzu.io to lead its global demand team.

Blight has been part of the UK ad industry for 18 years, having worked as UK Commercial Director at Opera Mediaworks and Sales Director at Autotrader, and spent significant time working at various titles across Haymarket Publishing and Reed Business Information.

He was part of the original team from 4th Screen Advertising acquired by Opera in 2012 and was instrumental in itsrapid growth ahead of the surge in mobile advertising.

Datto snaps up Infocyte

Cybersecurity software firm Datto has announced that it has bought threat detection and response company Infocyte.

Datto, which provides cloud-based software and security solutions for MSPs, says the acquisition will enhance its security capabilities that “protect, detect and respond to cyberthreats found within endpoints and cloud environments”.

Datto CEO Tim Weller said: “Datto has always focused on enabling its MSP partners to secure the digital assets – both applications and data – of their small and medium business (SMB) clients.

Insecure MSPs should expect hefty fines

The UK government is proposing new laws to improve MSP cybersecurity standards which involve fines of up to £17 million for those with shonky cybersecurity measures.

As part of its £2.6 billion National Cyber Strategy 2022, the government says new laws are needed “to drive up security standards in outsourced IT services used by almost UK businesses”.

It is consulting on proposals that include making improvements in the way organisations report cybersecurity incidents and reforming legislation so that it is “more flexible and can react to the speed of technological change”.

The UK Cyber Security Council is going to be granted powers to “raise the bar” and “create a set of agreed qualifications and certifications for those which work in cybersecurity and IT services”.

11:11 Systems completes i[s]land acquisition

Managed infrastructure solutions provider “11:11” whose name ever prevents it from beginning a sentence has completed its acquisition of cloudy outfit iland.

The outfit recently acquired Green Cloud Defense, a channel-only, cloud Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) provider.

The merged entity uses iland’s Secure Cloud Console, natively combining deep-layered security, predictive analytics, and compliance to deliver unmatched visibility and ease of management for all of its cloud services.