Category: News

LG and Ricoh make pact for European partnership

LG and Ricoh have formed a  European partnership that will give businesses access to the tech giant’s range of display devices through a single trusted partner.

Effective from 1 April, companies of all sizes and across all sectors will have access to LG technology through Ricoh’s Communications Services portfolio, including market-leading products such as LG’s UHD IPS displays.

Security world going subcription

The security world is moving ever closer to a subscription-based model, according to the analyst outfit Canalys.

In a report, the analysts noted that although the vast majority of cybersecurity sales remain traditionally delivered, this is starting to change to something more subscription based and  Canalys expects it to speed up over the next couple of years.

Cyber security spending topped $10 billion for the first time in the fourth quarter of last year.  It thinks that by 2020 $42 billion will be spent annually worldwide on products and services.

TP-Link uses channel to hit SMEs

Networking maker TP-Link is leaning on its channel in its push to drive its SME business.

The firm has seen its channel business increase  by a third last year and has already rolled out products that have been designed to be delivered by partners to the SME customer base.

The outfit has created an SMB Forum community site for resellers to share best practice and is continuing to expand the headcount on its internal channel team.

Ben Allcock, commercial director for B2B at TP-Link, said that the channel had grown in importance to the firm and it now a 50/50 split between the consumer and business markets.

Brexit and trade tensions will slow tech market

Donald Trump’s trade war with China and Brexit will make for much misery in the tech market, according to bean counters at Forrester.

After a “stronger than expected” 2017 and first half of 2018, analyst firm Forrester has predicted that the effects of global trade frictions, political uncertainties such as Brexit and erratic oil prices will hamper the UK and other key markets.

Although the US looks set to ride out the storm, economic weaknesses in Europe, China and emerging markets will result in tech market growth slowing to 4.5 percent in 2019 – down from five percent in 2018 – before declining further to 3.8 percent  in 2020.

IPC signals push into Greece

Network outfit IPC has announced a partnership with one of the largest IT and telecommunications companies in Greece and Cyprus, Cosmos Business Systems, to extend IPC’s product suite into the region.

The collaboration is set to capitalise on the upward trajectory of the Greek financial sector. S&P’s recent EMEA Financial Institutions Monitor views the economic risk trend in Greece as positive. The global rating agency expects Greece’s GDP to grow around 2.4 per cent from 2018 to 2021, and that stable economic growth coupled with improving investor confidence in Greece could translate into a more supportive environment for the banking sector.

Zombie assets may cost UK businesses £280 billion

UK businesses could be wasting as much as £280 billion a year by failing to have adequate asset management strategies in place.

Research based on 500 UK businesses commissioned by Troostwijk found that a third of businesses haven’t appointed a manager in charge of asset management. As a result, assets are left to zombify, instead of much needed capital being released from them which can serve as an alternative growth stream.

40 percent of UK businesses fail to protect their server

UK Businesses are risking a potential data breach due to a lack of adequate server security, new research has revealed.

A survey of 1,050 UK workers in full or part-time employment, carried out by technology services provider Probrand.co.uk has revealed that a shocking 44 percent of businesses are failing to properly protect their client and employee data by not adequately securing their server.

Ruckus Networks teams up with Glide to connect students

Ruckus Networks announced a strategic partnership with Glide, the leading provider of managed internet services for students. The partnership will help connect thousands of students across the UK, taking Glide’s innovation to the next level with tailor-made connectivity products and services.

UK student populations continue to grow with nearly 1.9 million full-time students — approximately 1-in-3 people — according to the ONS. In addition, Gartner estimates that there will be 20.4 billion connected “things” by 2020. This represents a challenge for the multi-dwelling unit (MDU) market since students demand constant Wi-Fi connectivity for their multiple devices.

Glide offers fibre-to-the-flat connectivity. It has deployed Ruckus’ specialist switching infrastructure into a number of its refurbished student housing locations to complement the Ruckus H510 indoor wireless access points installed in each room.

Intel chip shortages to end soon

The PC market will return to growth in the second half of this year as the Intel processor shortage begins to ease,

Beancounters at the analyst outfit Canalys has been gazing into the office crystal ball and reached the conclusion that PC shipments will rise 0.4 per cent year in the second half of the year.

Chipzilla’s chip supply shortage in the first half of the year will result in an overall decline this year.

Canalys thought that 57 per cent of the 270 channel partners it surveyed expect a “medium to severe” impact to their business this year as a result of the Intel shortages.

Data gap between IT managers and employees

There is a gap between IT leaders and employees over data security and ownership that is undermining attempts to stem the growing tide of insider breach incidents, according to new research.

Data security company Egress announced the results of its first Insider Data Breach survey, examining the root causes of employee-driven data breaches, their frequency and impact.

The research was carried out by independent research organization Opinion Matters and incorporated the views of over 500 U.S. and U.K.-based IT leaders, and over 4000 U.S. and U.K.-based employees. The survey also explored how employees and executives differ in their views of what constitutes a data breach and what is acceptable behavior when sharing data.

GDPR didn’t solve data security problems

Ten months after GDPR came into force there are still issues using and protecting data, according to a Veritas report.

Analysts at Veritas have discovered that customers continue to struggle to find, manage and use their data continues to be a concern with some in the industry blaming it for causing productivity and revenue losses.

Users are unable to get their hands on data quick enough and it slowed productivity, with some wasting up to two hours a day looking for information they needed. The net results were that UK organisations could be losing £1.2 million annually.

There were various reasons why employees could not find data, including the lack of tagging, wading through large volumes of material or they didn’t have access.

Jasmit Sagoo, senior director, Northern Europe, Veritas, said that the introduction of GDPR has not had impact on many firms, partly because so far there seemed to be little consequences for those that failed to abide by the rules.

“My observations are that a lot of organisations have done the bare minimum. GDPR hasn’t solved the problem. Customers haven’t seen any big fines or faced the wrath so organisations are a bit relaxed about that.”

“There has been a carrot and stick approach and if you don’t see the right results then you might see the stick coming out soon. Something has to happen to provide a catalyst for it to be taken more seriously,” he said.

He added that there was an opportunity for the channel to go out pitching tools like intelligent automation to support more precise data management practices.

“There is an opportunity. The future of our society and businesses will become even more data driven,” he added “People are not harnessing its value and protecting it properly and they need to.”

“Organisations have access to a wealth of data that can create significant opportunities if they use it intelligently. Unfortunately, employees waste precious time searching for useful, and potentially business-critical, data in fragmented IT environments,” he said.

HP getting tough on counterfeiting partners

HP saw its EMEA sales fall nine per cent and it has been swift to blame partners trading in ‘imitation and counterfeit’ print supplies as the main reason.

HP’s business model depends on the sale of expensive printer ink and consumables and it feels that some of its channel partners have betrayed it by offering cheaper knock-offs

It has issued a warning that it will aggressively combat partners trading in counterfeit, cloned and imitation print cartridges.

HP’s EMEA print general manager David Ryan has told the press that he is taking a zero-tolerance approach as it looks to stem the bleeding in its print supplies business.

He said that some partners don’t realise that these cartridges are violating intellectual property, and that is something we will tackle vigorously.

HP will work with “loyal partners” to take all the action we can where illegal trading practices are being engaged.

He said imitation cartridges that HP has tested have “high failure rates and poor print quality”, while many fail Blue Angel tests (a German certification for environmentally friendly products) or can damage the printer.

These reasons, he claimed, can mean that buying cheaper cartridges is more expensive in the long run.

HP has blocked the use of third-party cartridges in its printers.

In 2016 it pushed a firmware update that blocked the use of unofficial HP cartridges in its printers, claiming it was to protect customers, only to reverse the decision following public outrage.

This time the cunning plan is to educate  channel partners and customers on why its own products are the better option.

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Gradwell scores 3CX contract

Gradwell Communications has been confirmed as 3CX’s first solutions provider for the UK as the company moves from a traditional box-shifter and software licence flogger to more value-add solutions and services.

Gradwell’s channel community will now have the opportunity to take full advantage of increasing demand for 3CX’s IP PBX, plus the telephony solutions and services that wrap around it.

3CX CEO Nick Galea said that Gradwell was a visionary in the UK business communications market, having been one of the first to launch a SIP trunk service.

“It’s an honour to be able to team up with an established and leading provider in delivering a complete solution for the on-premise and cloud market. Customers and partners will have peace of mind that they are buying a solution fully supported and guaranteed end-to-end,” he said.

“Delivering successful VoIP solutions is about so much more than providing the required number of IP PBX licences, and that’s where Gradwell’s value-add services come into play,” explained Gradwell’s founder and CTO, Peter Gradwell. Gradwell is one of the UK’s fastest growing cloud communications providers focusing on small to medium-sized enterprises.

As well as 3CX’s licences channel partners will now be able to drive new business and revenue generating solutions, from a single supplier, by offering Gradwell’s wraparound solutions including highly-secure hosting, server provisioning, SIP trunks, session border controller (SBC) installation, CRM integration and handsets. The Gradwell team also has extensive expertise with 3CX’s Call Flow Designer so can implement all necessary call routing requirements.

“Gradwell is the only provider to have developed solutions, specifically designed for the channel, which complements the features and functionality of the 3CX IP PBX. For example, with a Gradwell solution, the end user can push call recordings to cloud storage devices, freeing up considerable server space,” the company said.

Other value-add offerings from Gradwell include a team of 3CX accredited engineers dedicated to hosting and supporting 3CX, onboarding resources working exclusively on 3CX and a 20 strong front-line support team to answer and manage any issues.

Jamie Ward is now Gradwell’s newly appointed sales, and marketing director said that the new agreement with 3CX with other channel changes means he has taken the job during interesting times.

“Gradwell wants to provide the channel community with VoIP solutions that give them a huge opportunity to drive new business and increased revenue. The agreement with 3CX does just that. Our complete solution eliminates all the complexity around the deployment of a VoIP solution, not just for our resellers but for their customers. Happy customers, mean happy resellers and happy resellers mean repeat business for 3CX and Gradwell,” said Ward.

 

G-Cloud 11 starts Monday

 

Crown Commercial Service (CCS) has revealed that the application process for G-Cloud 11 will start on Monday,

CCS sent out a tweet today confirming that it will open the eleventh iteration of the framework on 25 March.