Tag: microsoft

Microsoft posts strong results

Posted on January 28, 2021 by - News

Microsoft campusMicrosoft posted strong second quarter figures, showing a sizable increase to both revenues and profits as a shift to remote working continues.

Revenues surged by 17 percent year on year to $43.1 billion while operating income grew by 29 percent to $17.9 billion.

In a webcast following the results, CEO Satya Nadella told investors that we are amid “the dawn of a second wave of digital transformation sweeping every company and every industry”.

The figures showed that Azure, Dynamics 365 and Office 365 were boosted by work from home economy and this lifted Microsoft’s second quarter and highlighted the strength of its cloud offerings.

US cloud is strangling European rivals

Posted on January 19, 2021 by - News

Amazon Web Services, Microsoft and Google are killing off European Cloud provider according to new data from Synergy Research.

The European cloud market tripled since the beginning of 2017, hitting €5.9 billion in Q3 of 2020. But European cloud providers have seen market share decline from 26 percent to 16 percent.

WS, Google and Microsoft now account for two-thirds of the regional market, with the remainder of the market made up of smaller US and Asian providers, who are also losing market share.

Synergy also estimated that the full-year European cloud infrastructure services revenue for 2020 will be over €23 billion, a 31 percent increase on the previous year. IaaS and PaaS services makeup nearly 80 percent of that market and are growing much faster than the smaller hosted or managed private cloud segment, it revealed.

Microsoft, c3.ai and Adobe take on Salesforce

Posted on November 2, 2020 by - News

Microsoft campusMicrosoft and Adobe are launching a new platform to take on the market dominance of Salesforce.

C3 AI CRM is powered by the core functionality of Dynamics 365 and is combined with Adobe’s real-time customer profiles and journey management, as well as c3.ai’s industry-specific AI capabilities.

The AI-driven CRM platform is, it’s claimed, purpose-built for specific industries and uses data from any source to produce meaningful business insights. The collective claims that conventional CRM is not sufficient for the modern age, given that AI can’t be used to analyse much of the data because they weren’t built with the appropriate architectures.

Cyber security providers benefit from EU and local regulations

Posted on November 2, 2020 by - News

Enterprises in the UK are looking to cyber security providers to help them comply with European Union and local regulations, and protect data as employees work from home during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a report published today by Information Services Group (ISG).

The 2020 ISG Provider Lens Cyber Security – Solutions & Services Report, for the UK finds enterprises in the country counting on cyber security providers to help them comply with UK privacy and cyber security rules passed as the country separates from the European Union. At the same time, U.K. companies must continue to comply with E.U. data privacy regulations because of the country’s economic connections to continental Europe.

Jan Erik Aase, director and global leader, ISG Provider Lens Research said that UK enterprises are prioritising cyber security as most business processes have gone digital.

Content+Cloud endorsed by Microsoft

Posted on October 28, 2020 by - News

Microsoft has given Content+Cloud “preferred partner” accreditation, meaning that it is one of 17  top level firms worldwide delivering Project Cortex.

Project Cortex is a Microsoft attempt to integrate artificial intelligence with Microsoft 365.

Microsoft’s partner plans for Cortex includes three tiers – preferred, chartered and associate.

Content+Cloud worked on the development of Project Cortex. Because of that relationship, the firm claims that it had an early start in implementing the scheme.

It said that it has implemented Project Cortex at a major unnamed global financial institution.

Pay-once-use-forever ain’t dead yet says Microsoft,

Posted on September 24, 2020 by - News

Software King of the World is dusting off an Office licence which you only need to pay for once.  This is much like the good old days, when you owned your own software and did not have to always pay for a subscription.

A new perpetual licence version for Office will be released in the second half of 2021, Microsoft announced on Tuesday at the Ignite 2020 virtual event.

While the company did not disclose the name of the product, it did reveal that the new version of Office will be available for Windows and Mac.

Vole said that the details regarding the official name, pricing and availability of the product will be revealed later — so be still your beating hearts.

Microsoft spruces up Defender options

Posted on September 23, 2020 by - News

Microsoft campusSoftware king of the world, Microsoft, has announced a host of new security updates as part of its cunning plan to shove all its detection and event management services under the new Microsoft Defender brand.

The move means Vole’s extended detection and response (XDR) tools will now sit alongside its suite of security information and event management (SIEM) software, offered as a single umbrella brand .

For customers, this new direction will take the form of two separate packages, namely Microsoft 365 Defender, tailored for end-user environments, and Azure Defender, built for cloud and hybrid infrastructure. Both of these packages bring their own product name changes, with Microsoft effectively abandoning the ‘advanced threat protection (ATP)’ theme for most products.

Microsoft teams up with Refinitiv

Posted on September 14, 2020 by - News

Microsoft has announced a new strategic partnership with financial data firm Refinitiv which specialises in providing data, insights and analysis tools to financial communities.

The outfit is now creating new products and go-to-market services on Microsoft Azure, and expand its use of Microsoft 365 and Teams.

Microsoft says the strategic partnership will help Refinitiv’s customers to capitalise on growth opportunities, as well as strengthen its own commitment to the financial sector.

Cindy Rose president of Microsoft’s Western Europe division said: “Through the powerful combination of our shared skills, experience and technology, we can help organisations unlock valuable insights from their data and spark a new level of productivity, collaboration and communication.”

Microsoft’s commercial cloud revenue up by 30 percent

Posted on September 14, 2020 by - News

Software king of the world Microsoft appears to be doing better than Amazon and Google in the cloud stakes.

According to the research data analysed and published by StockApps.com, during the fourth quarter of its fiscal year 2020 which ended on June 30, 2020, Microsoft had an increase of 30 percent in commercial cloud revenue.

While commercial cloud revenue totalled $14.3 billion, Intelligent Cloud revenue was $13.37 billion. This marked an increase of 17 percent year on year and surpassed analysts’ expectations of $13.11 billion according to FactSet. The Intelligent Cloud segment includes such products as Azure, Windows Server and GitHub among others. More Personal Computing, which includes Xbox and Surface, was up 14 percent. Productivity and Business Processes, whose products include Office and Dynamics, was up six per cent. Overall revenue increased 13 percent year on year to $38.0 billion.

Microsoft has new UK managing director for enterprise commercial business

Posted on September 8, 2020 by - Moving People

Gavin Jackson has joined Microsoft as the vendor’s managing director for enterprise commercial business in the UK.

Jackson said: “I am excited to join Microsoft, whose cloud business has gone from strength to strength in the UK thanks to a reputation for putting customers first and supporting businesses on their digital transformation journeys.

Five cloud services providers took more than a third of the market

Posted on August 21, 2020 by - News

Beancounters at IDC claimed that the global public cloud services market totalled $233.4 billion (£176 billion) in 2019, representing a 26 percent increase year on year.

The report claims that the top five public cloud service providers – Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google, Microsoft, Oracle and Salesforce.com – accounted for more than a third of the worldwide total, growing a combined 35 percent year over year.

Software as a service (SaaS) remained the largest segment of public cloud spending with revenues of more than $122 billion in 2019, an increase of 20 percent year-over-year. IDC expects SaaS growth to continue as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, as businesses shift to subscription-based models and look to software collaboration tools to facilitate remote working.

IDC’s Rick Villars said that the cloud is expanding far beyond niche e-commerce and online ad-sponsored search and underpinned digital activities that individuals and enterprises depend upon as we navigate and move beyond the pandemic.

Cognizant signs off on New Signature takeover

Posted on July 29, 2020 by - News

New Signature has been acquired by services giant Cognizant.

Cognizant said the deal will expand its “hyperscale cloud advisory services”, adding that 500 employees across predominately the UK, the US and Canada will join the business.

New Signature CEO Jeff Tench said: “New Signature’s success is built upon helping clients create and accelerate their business transformation through the adoption of Microsoft cloud technologies. In joining Cognizant, we will have access to Cognizant’s deep industry expertise and global scale, and together, provide best-in-class cloud solutions for the intelligent workplace, applied innovation, and managed services.”

Uncrowd wins Microsoft up-start gong

Posted on July 14, 2020 by - News

Uncrowd, a British company  developing a  customer analytics platform for retailers, is this year’s winner of Microsoft’s inaugural global award for start-ups.

London-based Uncrowd, offers a customer analytics platform that enables retailers to understand customer preferences and behaviour, make immediate changes to marketing and operations, and dramatically increase sales.

Threatscape gets Microsoft gold status

Posted on June 24, 2020 by - News

Cyber-security service provider Threatscape announced that it has been awarded the coveted Gold Security Partner designation by Microsoft.

Gold status  recognises  Volish partners who have demonstrated the skills and expertise to design, deploy and manage security solutions to protect enterprise-scale clients against sophisticated cyber threats.

The award acknowledges Threatscape’s continued investment in its Microsoft Security Practice, which has completed projects around the world using its team of consultants who have all been accredited to the highest level by Microsoft including M365 (MS 500) and Azure (AZ 500) security certifications.

Microsoft buys Metaswitch in 5G push

Posted on May 18, 2020 by - News

Microsoft has acquired a UK-based 5G specialist Metaswitch Networks, which has a number of high profile customers including BT and Sprint.

Microsoft said Metaswitch’s portfolio of cloud-native communication software will be expanded into its own range of services aimed at the telecommunications industry. It  said that it intends to use the talent and technology from Metaswitch’s portfolio to extend Azure’s reach in the telecoms industry.

Yousef Khalidi, corporate VP of Azure Networking, wrote in his bog: “We have a long history of working with operators as they increasingly embrace software-based solutions and continue to support the advancement of cloud-based networking while helping create new partnership opportunities for existing network equipment providers. Our intention over time is to create modern alternatives to network infrastructure, enabling operators to deliver existing and value-added services – with greater cost efficiency and lower capital investment than they’ve faced in the past.”

Vole has been busy building its 5G skills by acquisition. Two months ago it snaffled cloudy based Affirmed Networks.