Author: Nick Farrell

Ryde raises £2.5 million for new plans

Posted on August 16, 2021 by - News

Ryde, formerly Ryders, a SaaS platform for last-mile delivery, has raised £2.5 million as part of its cunning plan to become a fully integrated delivery management system.

This seed round was co-led by Forward Partners – which recently announced its IPO –  and Triple Point, with participation from current investors Seedcamp and Swiss Founders Fund.

Alongside the institutional investors, the company continues to build an impressive list of angels, including Michael Pennington (Gumtree), Will Neale (Fonix), Matt Robinson (Go Cardless) and Ines Ures (former Deliveroo CMO).

Ransomware is the enema of the channel

Posted on August 16, 2021 by - News

Beancounters at IDC have warned that ransomware attacks are becoming common and in most cases, customers were left in a position where they felt they had no option but to pay the ransom demanded.

The firm also found that manufacturing and finance were the verticals hit most by ransomware, while transportation, communication and utilities/media industries reported the lowest rates of attack. The average ransomware payout was almost $250,000, but several incidents topped $1 million.

NortonLifeLock is buying Avast to get vaster

Posted on August 13, 2021 by - News

NortonLifeLock has confirmed it is buying Avast for as much as $8.6 billion as part of its cunning plan to create an “industry-leading” consumer cybersecurity business.

The transaction, made up of a combination of cash and new shares, will value LSE-listed Avast at between $8.1bn and $8.6 billion.

The deal represents a 20.7 percent premium on Avast’s closing price of 504.2 pence per share as of 14 July 2021.

Once the acquisition closes, the combined business will be listed the Nasdaq exchange and be headquartered in Tempe, Arizona and Prague in Czech Republic.

Avast’s chief executive Ondrej Vlcek will join NortonLifeLock’s board and will be appointed president of the combined business while NortonLifeLock CEO Vincent Pilette will become chief executive of the combined business.

Apple and Google app stores in trouble over the pond

Posted on August 13, 2021 by - News

There is mounting political opposition to the way that Apple and Google distribute apps through their various stores.

Three US senators introduced a bill to promote competition in the app store space, which Apple and Google currently dominate.

The Open App Markets Act, sponsored by Democratic Senators Amy Klobuchar and Richard Blumenthal, as well as Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn, aims to set “fair, clear, and enforceable rules” to protect competition within the app market, and to strengthen customer protection.

If the Bill gets through the Senate it will prevent large app stores (with 50 million+ US users) from requiring developers to use their own payment system. It will also prevent them from punishing developers that offer different conditions or prices through alternative app stores.

Accenture denies ransomware attack hurt

Posted on August 13, 2021 by - News

Accenture was the target of a LockBit ransomware attack, but the company insists that it had “no impact” on its own operations or on its clients.

LockBit published more than 2,000 files on the DarkWeb following the attack, including PowerPoints and case studies.

But in a statement, the global IT consultancy firm downplayed down the whole thing.

“Through our security controls and protocols, we identified irregular activity in one of our environments. We immediately contained the matter and isolated the affected servers. We fully restored our affected systems from back up. 

“There was no impact on Accenture’s operations, or on our clients’ systems.”

Green IT Restore snaps up PRM Green Technologies

Posted on August 12, 2021 by - News

Data management and recycling specialist Restore has made good on expansion plans and written a cheque for IT recycling and asset disposal (ITAD) specialist PRM Green Technologies.

Last month the firm revealed it was engaged in more than 25 ongoing acquisition discussions, with several deals expected to be completed in the second half of 2021.

The first of those is IT recycling and asset disposal (ITAD) specialist PRM Green Technologies, with 100 percent of the share capital being picked up by Restore for an undisclosed sum.

PRM is based in Cannock with sites in Carlisle, Taunton and Alton. It has  59 staff, who will remain with the business. The firm has its own e-commerce platform and has built a reputation in the education market, having helped more than 8,000 schools, colleges and universities across the UK dispose of equipment.

It also has an average yearly revenue of £3 million and an average net income of £900,000 achieved over the past three years.

HPE insists employees are double vaccinated

Posted on August 12, 2021 by - News

HPE has issued an order that all its employees are double vaccinated before they are allowed to return to the offices.

In a tweet yesterday, CEO Antonio Neri said he “didn’t take the decision lightly”.

“HPE will be requiring all team members, contractors, and visitors to be fully vaccinated as a condition of entering our sites and attending business events where legally permitted”, he said.

“Throughout this pandemic, we have continually assessed the ever-changing dynamic, we have addressed what we can control, and we have adapted. It is now clear that COVID-19 is going to be with us for a while, and that getting back to normal will take more than masks and distancing.”

The US is seeing an increase in cases due to the spread of the Delta variant with 726,160 confirmed new cases within the last seven days.

HPE announced last year that it intends to move its head office to Houston, Texas and build a new 440,000 square foot campus to accommodate its existing 2,600-strong workforce in the area. However, this is ground zero for the coronavirus surge.

Other tech giants including Microsoft and Google adopted the same policy in requiring proof of vaccination before entering their offices.

 

The Great Resignation is upon us

Posted on August 12, 2021 by - News

Software King of the World Microsoft is warning that we are in the times it calls the “Great Resignation” which is set to hammer the channel.

Vole has asked more than 30,000 people and found that more than 40 percent of people are considering leaving their employer this year. If you compare this to last year four million people, or 2.8 percent of the workforce, resigned.

For some workers, the pandemic precipitated a shift in priorities, encouraging them to pursue a ‘dream job’, or transition to being a stay-at-home parent. But for many, many others, the decision to leave came because of the way their employer treated them during the pandemic.  Workers stayed at companies that offered support and left those that didn’t.

A recent Stanford study showed many of these companies with bad environments doubled down on decisions that didn’t support workers, such as layoffs, while, conversely, companies that had good culture tended to treat employees well. This drove out already disgruntled workers who survived the layoffs but could plainly see they were working in unsupportive environments.

Welsh MSP Capital Network Solutions forced to go with the Flow

Posted on August 11, 2021 by - News

Welsh MSP Capital Network Solutions (CNS) has been bought out by Flow Communications.

This is Flow’s first acquisition under new leadership in the shape of Capital Network Solutions (CNS), a Premier-level Cisco partner and a Microsoft, Barracuda Networks, Gemalto and Dell partner based in the Vale of Glamorgan in Wales.

The deal gives Flow Communications a secure operations centre (SOC) as well as skills across cloud, cybersecurity and infrastructure.

Crossword Cybersecurity swallows Stega

Posted on August 11, 2021 by - News

Cybersecurity MSP Stega has been swallowed by Crossword Cybersecurity in a £1.8 million deal.

Crossword says the acquisition of the threat intelligence and monitoring business will provide it with “30 new clients”, mainly in the financial sector, and will take its total number of fee-paying consulting clients to over 100.

Tom Ilube, CEO of Crossword Cybersecurity said: “Following our successful fundraiser last week, I am pleased to welcome Phil Ashley and his team at Stega to Crossword. Stega’s threat intelligence and monitoring services are a great addition to Crossword’s range of services which help to reduce cyber risks for our clients. Stega, Crossword’s second acquisition of 2021, will be an important part of our plans for continuing revenue growth.”

Pen pushers come up with ideas for channel sales pitches

Posted on August 11, 2021 by - News

If the channel wants to look for good ideas that civil servants think should be pitched at their masters they should have a look at the Civil Service Data Challenge.

The Challenge is a list that civil servants think would improve the current use of data within government and boost efficiency, improve public services and strengthen policymaking.

Nearly 200 submissions were received, which were then whittled down to the current longlist of eight.

Lenovo launches three tears and devises ass-service model

Posted on August 10, 2021 by - News

Lenovo is offering all its devices ranging from laptops to tablets on a monthly as-a-service model.

This means that partners now have access to the DaaS offering, claims Jane Ashworth, director of SMB and channel for the UK and Ireland.

Lenovo’s DaaS offering is split into three tiers: Simplify, Accelerate and Transform, accessible through the Lenovo Partner Hub or through Lenovo.com.

Its Simplify tier is intended as a “starting point” and is targeted at small businesses. After that, partners can use Lenovo’s online tool to add devices and services on behalf of the customer and calculate the total monthly cost of the service.

Cloudsoft helps UK government trial a COVID-19 test

Posted on August 10, 2021 by - News

Cloudsoft, a Scottish managed services provider, supports a  UK government trial a Covid-19 test that can detect COVID-19 using only voice data.

Dubbed  ‘cough-in-a-box,’ the application uses artificial intelligence (AI) to diagnose Covid-19 through audio recordings of a user coughing directly into their smartphone’s microphone.

Analysing more than 70,000 recordings submitted by volunteers, which included around 2,500 from people confirmed to have Covid-19, researchers from MIT trained the AI model to correctly identify 98.5 percent of positive cases, including 100 percent of asymptomatic patients.

Tech Data wants more Cradlepoint partners

Posted on August 10, 2021 by - News

Tech Data has launched the next phase of its recruitment drive for Cradlepoint partners.

The outfit formed a partnership with Cradlepoint in November last year and has recruited and enabled more than 25 resellers onto the vendor’s multi-tier channel programme and supported them in completing a significant number of sales. It is now making further resource investments to drive business development and partner recruitment.

Tech Data, UK and Ireland Endpoint Solutions James Reed, managing director, said his outfit had made great strides with Cradlepoint. However, it saw even more potential ahead.

“We believe there is a great opportunity with Cradlepoint – and we are ready to work with more partners and get them trained and enabled to take solutions to market.”

Channel players face stiff staff shortages

Posted on August 9, 2021 by - News

The KPMG and REC-generated UK report on jobs survey in the channel suggests that salaries have been rising because of a significant shortage of candidates.

In the post-COVID crisis, the demand for talent has been outstripping the number of people available in the market and forcing those who want to move to jack up their prices.

Kate Shoesmith, deputy chief executive of the REC, said it was a good time for people to be looking for a new job, with rewards on offer for those interested in the tech industry.