Author: Nick Farrell

VMWare completes Pivotal acquisition

Posted on December 31, 2019 by - News

VMware has completed its acquisition of Pivotal Software in a move that adds Pivotal’s cloud application platform and development tools to VMware’s technology portfolio.

VMware completed the acquisition, which carries a $2.7 billion price tag.

VMware CEO Pat (kicking) Gelsinger said in the statement that the combination of VMware and Pivotal is “poised to be the leading enabler of Kubernetes with a deep understanding of both operators and developers”.Gelsinger said that Ray O’Farrell, previously VMware’s CTO, would lead VMware’s new Modern Applications Platform business unit, which will include the Pivotal and VMware cloud-native applications teams. As announced at VMware’s VMworld conference in August, O’Farrell will serve as the business unit’s general manager and retain his executive vice president rank.

Allvotec snaps up ISG Technology

Posted on December 30, 2019 by - News

Allvotec has written a cheque for networking and physical infrastructure provider ISG Technology.

The move expands the partner-only IT service provider’s operations, bolstering its networking, Wi-Fi and physical infrastructure capabilities, while also adding ISG’s experience and expertise to the business.

Launched in June 2019 as a rebranding of Daisy Partner Services, Allvotec has positioned itself as a partner-exclusive provider with broad experience across public and private sectors.

Capita launches consulting arm

Posted on December 30, 2019 by - News

KR9984 Milan, Italy – August 10, 2017: Capita
logo on the website homepage.

Troubled outsourcing giant Capita is launching a consulting arm with the imaginative title Capita consulting.

The outfit is trying to paddle its way upstream with its hefty debt burden and perception issues.

The new division has 30 partner-level consultants and 270 analytical and technical consultants; this will grow to 450 consultants in total by the end of next year.

CEO Jon Lewis said: “Our new consulting business will challenge the established companies in this market, by offering practical, hands-on expertise drawn from 30 years of designing, building and running the processes of hundreds of organisations.”

Resellers optimistic about next year

Posted on December 24, 2019 by - News

Resellers had a pretty good year and are expecting things to be even better next year, according to a survey by Context.

According to Context’s has produced its latest ChannelWatch report which is based on the 6,500 resellers across the EU, optimism is higher now than it was at this point a year ago. That is largely down to the momentum that has been generated in 2019 and a feeling that it will continue into 2020.

Retailers face Christmas fraud

Posted on December 24, 2019 by - News

Boxing Day is almost here, historically one of the biggest sales events in the retail calendar.

This year, powered by the rise of digital competition and a further decline in footfall, retailers slashed their prices weeks ago, with this trend likely to continue into next year. For the first time, over half – 53 percent – of shoppers are expected to purchase through online channels during the festive season.

Retailers have been forced to adapt to an unprecedented change in consumer habits as people favour the convenience of buying goods online and via their smartphones. Mobile transactions have increased by eight percent to make up nearly a quarter of total Christmas sales.

TIBCO cloud runs on Azure

Posted on December 23, 2019 by - News

TIBCO Software said that its cloud product is available on Microsoft Azure.

The company said that with all of the TIBCO Cloud Integration application’s capabilities now running natively on Azure and Amazon Web Services (AWS), customers and partners can easily connect applications and resources hosted both on-premises and in the cloud from their environment of choice.

TIBCO chief operating officer, Matt Quinn said that users who have standardised on Microsoft Azure or are planning to embrace a multi-cloud approach can use their preferred TIBCO Cloud Integration environment when deploying cloud-native applications and connecting applications and services across a business.

VMware spruces up its channel programme

Posted on December 23, 2019 by - News

VMware is improving its channel programme by rewarding partners for competencies and services.

The outfit is planning to re-launch its channel programme in February 2020 and is rewarding partners for competencies and delivering customer outcomes within the new Partner Connect programme.

The company said that it needed some different capabilities from partners than it needed in the past.

MTI Technology serves up TePAS to UK public sector

Posted on December 23, 2019 by - News

IT services outfit MTI Technology is now an officially authorised TePAS supplier and has MTI approval to provide IT products and services to organisations across in the UK Public Sector.

The Technology Products and Associated Services framework, or [TePAS] is the Crown Commercial Service’s pan-government collaborative framework agreement for the supply of commodity technology goods and associated services for use by whole UK public sector.

This framework is one of the most significant of its kind in the UK, with estimated revenues circa £6.5 billion due to flow through this agreement over its two-year lifecycle. This framework replaces the existing Technology Products 2 agreement and can be used by public sector bodies with immediate effect.

Allvotec swallows ISG Technology

Posted on December 20, 2019 by - News

Allvotec has today significantly expanded its operations following the acquisition of networking and physical infrastructure services provider, ISG Technology for an undisclosed fee.

The acquisition enables Allvotec, a partner-only provider of managed and professional services in the UK, to bolster its networking, Wi-Fi and physical infrastructure capabilities, while also adding the expertise of the Egham-headquartered ISG team to its business.

Following the launch of Allvotec in June this year, this latest move adds an additional 175 staff across the UK and Bulgaria and in excess of £25 million of revenue and is further evidence of the company’s intent to become the leading Unified Communications and Technology Services Provider to UK Partners.

Arkphire acquires Trilogy

Posted on December 20, 2019 by - News

IT procurement and services firm Arkphire has acquired Trilogy Technologies, one of Ireland’s independent ICT managed services providers.

Arkphire claims the takeover marks the “first major move of significant scale” towards industry consolidation in the Irish ICT managed services sector.

It thinks that businesses are rushing to seek outsourced support to meet the increasingly more complex and demanding IT infrastructure and business transformation challenges.

The enlarged group now creates the largest and fastest-growing Irish-headquartered IT procurement and IT managed service business, with 220 staff on its books and combined revenues of almost €150 million.

Canalys names 12 Channel heroes

Posted on December 20, 2019 by - News

Analyst outfit Canalys has named its 12 channel champions for the year.

The EMEA Channel Leadership Matrix puts 12 vendors in the champion category with a magnificent seven of which have maintained that status since 2018: Fortinet, Fujitsu, HP, Lenovo, NetApp, Palo Alto and Veeam. Making up the rest of the dirty dozen are APC, Cisco, Kaspersky, Nutanix and Trend Micro.

HPE, AWS, Dell EMC and Juniper Networks were seen as contenders and Canalys noted that they had made significant channel investments but needed to work harder getting partner sentiment to improve. The growers: Apple, Huawei, IBM, Microsoft and VMware, had improved over the course of 2019.

Thomas Rollin is Nutanix’s EMEA person

Posted on December 19, 2019 by - Moving People, News

Nutanix has appointed Thomas Rollin as Director of Global Accounts for its EMEA region. He will focus on heightening customer service delivery for the company’s global accounts, accelerating sales growth and providing trusted advisor services.

Rollin said: “After 16 years at NetApp, I am looking forward to building a best in class EMEA organisation, focused on customer experience. One that delivers a white-glove experience to customers as we help them on their journey to the cloud.”

In his time at NetApp, Rollin was tasked with driving sales, improving customer experiences and growing the company’s C-Level engagements and relationships by establishing himself as a trusted advisor to their businesses. 

Fiat Chrysler-Peugeot £38 billion merger might fail on poor tech

Posted on December 19, 2019 by - News

Mike Kiersey, Principal Technologist at Boomi – a Dell Technologies business – has warned that, unless applications and data are adequately integrated, Fiat Chrysler-Peugeot £38 billion merger might be set to fail:

While the Fiat Chrysler-Peugeot merger points to the birth of a titan of the automotive industry, but this cannot happen unless integration is made a priority. This should be carried out immediately in order to reduce cost, make sure productivity does not falter during the process, and ensure shareholders keep seeing a profit, Kiersey said.

This merger will be complex with a myriad of systems, applications, complex processes and data flows, coupled with the complexity of disparate supply chains. Harmonising theses will be problematic and costly, he said

Silver Peak working with Ciena

Posted on December 19, 2019 by - News

Silver Peak has expanded its partnership with Ciena.

The idea is to use Ciena’s universal customer premise equipment (uCPE) to create new service delivery models for communications service providers (CSPs) that bring new levels of flexibility to global enterprise customers.

The Silver Peak Unity EdgeConnect SD-WAN edge platform unifies SD-WAN, routing, segmentation and WAN optimisation into a single NFV software instance that runs on the Ciena 3906 and 3926 platforms, creating the foundation for a modern business-driven WAN edge.

EIZO signs deal with CI Distribution.

Posted on December 17, 2019 by - News

Visual technology outfit EIZO has partnered with IT provider CI Distribution.

This means that EIZO’s range of visual technology products will be distributed to CI Distribution’s UK customer base, which includes the public sector, private sector and MOD.

The move is part of EIZO’s cunning plan to reach out to new vertical industries, increase its product portfolio to the wider UK market and grow the business through new strategies, it said.