Author: Nick Farrell

Dell suffering from server slump

Tin box shifter Michael Dell is having difficulty getting rid of servers at the moment.

Dell Technologies reported its third straight quarter of large server revenue declines and the problem appears to be other suppliers coming in with large bids.

Jeff Clarke, vice chairman of Dell Technologies, during Dell’s third fiscal quarter earnings call with media and analysts said: “It’s an aggressive marketplace from a pricing point of view. We’re competing, but those bids are clearly competitive. Probably the other thing that’s important to notice, [server deals] are taking longer to close. The caution that we’re seeing with our large customers is certainly being seen in our ability to close transactions or how long it’s taking to get the order closed.”

Colt gets new CEO

Colt Data Centre Services (DCS) has announced the appointment of Niclas Sanfridsson (pictured) as its new chief executive officer.

The move follows CEO Detlef Spang’s decision to retire at the end of the year. Spang  led the firm since its inception as an operationally-independent business from the Colt network business in 2015. During his tenure, Spang drove the data centre business and accelerated growth of its hyperscale footprint, Colt DCS said, enabling it to realise its vision of becoming the “most trusted and customer-centric” data centre operator.

Origin report into successful media plans is out

Origin Comms, an information security and technology PR specialist, today announced findings from new research into the media consumption trends of 201 UK-based IT decision-makers.

The research highlights that, since last year, the proportion consuming IT security content via IoT-enabled devices such as smartwatches or Amazon Alexa has leapt from three per cent in 2018 to 11 percent in 2019. Furthermore, for consuming IT content generally it has jumped from seven percent in 2018 to 19 percent in 2019 using the same sources.

SUSE’s partner Centiq gets top tier

SUSE has announced that its partner, Centiq, has earned the highest partner tier in the SUSE Partner Programme, becoming a Solution Partner for SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP.

The move solidifies Centiq’s place as the top UK reseller for SAP HANA and S/4HANA support.

Matt Eckersall, Regional Director, EMEA North at SUSE said more businesses are turning to SAP to unlock data intelligence, drive innovation and deliver agility.

Gloves come off as Xerox gets agressive with HP

Copy company Xerox has decided to get nasty in its bid to merge with HP and refuses to apologise for “aggressive” tactics.

Xerox said it will approach HP shareholders directly to acquire the firm several weeks after HP’s board rejected a takeover bid in excess of $30 billion.

The company’s leadership has expressed its intent to pursue “aggressive” tactics after initially setting a deadline for 25 November for which it expected HP to engage in mutual due diligence.

Apollo ups Tech Data bid

Apollo has upped its bid for Tech Data to $6 billion after an unnamed firm made a late bid for the outfit.

Tech Data shareholders accepted a $5.4 billion bid for the firm earlier this month, but it has been revealed that a second, more attractive bid was then received.

Apollo responded quickly, upping its bid to $6 billion, which has now been accepted.

Tech Data said: “The Tech Data board of directors has unanimously approved the amendment and recommends that Tech Data shareholders vote in favour of the transaction.”

The distributor said the rival bid came during a “go-shop” period, which was an agreement as part of Apollo’s initial bid, inviting other parties to propose a takeover.

 

MPS partners help HP in growth

HP saw double-digit revenue growth in managed print services during its latest quarter, partly offsetting the company’s continued decline in supplies revenue.

HP’s recently appointed CEO, Enrique Lores, said MPS partners have been critical to the growth.

“We are getting great momentum with our channel partners in the contractual space, and this momentum is now translating into sales.”

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Dell sees better than expected profits

Michael DellTin box shifter Dell reported mixed results for its fiscal third quarter. Profits were better than expected, but revenues were slightly below Wall Street’s projections. Dell reduced its full-year forecast for revenue, due in part to tight supplies of Intel microprocessors.

For the quarter ended 1 November Dell posted revenue of $22.8 billion, up two percent year over year, but slightly below the Wall Street consensus forecast of $23.04 billion. Non-GAAP profits were $1.75 a share, ahead of the Street’s consensus forecast of $1.62.

McAfee warns of struggle with cloud security

Beancounters at a cybersecurity firm McAfee HQ in Satan Clarafound that 40 percent of large UK businesses expect to be cloud-only by 2021, with 70 per cent expecting to be cloud-only at some pointin the future.

However, establishing who is responsible for cloud security in an organisation is struggling to keep pace.

Optiv downsizes in the UK

MSSP Optiv has confirmed it is “downsizing” of its UK operation, claiming the move is temporary as it turns its attention to M&A.

Specifically, the Top 200 MSSP is downsizing its UK efforts near-term — through Optiv says it remains committed to a global strategy.

“In January 2018, we expanded our global footprint to the UK, predicated on a strategy of growth by acquisition. Optiv evaluated 40 different European companies and simply couldn’t justify the high valuations of these companies. After a comprehensive strategic review, we’re downsizing our London-based organic operations. We remain committed to serving the European market, clients, partners and prospects”, the outfit said.

The company said that operations and investment in Canada and India are not impacted. In fact, it was expanding its space in both locations. Optiv’s first Canadian-based security operations centre (SOC) should open in the first quarter of 2020 and it is exploring the possibility of leasing an additional floor in its Bangalore office to accommodate as many as 70 additional new hires on its India team next year.

“Optiv has a proud history of serving clients in Europe and in 70+ countries around the world, and that is not changing. We plan to consider M&A opportunities again in the future, once European valuations right size. We remain 100 per cent committed to our international strategy and to delivering innovative cybersecurity solutions that create simplicity and confidence for clients around the world”, the company said.

 

 

 

Juniper Networks pushes 400Gbps Ethernet live traffic over 1,300 miles

Juniper Networks said it had successfully trialled delivering 400Gbps Ethernet live traffic over 1,300 miles. The trial was conducted in conjunction with SCinet, the Supercomputing 2019 Conference’s high-capacity network. SCinet used Juniper’s PTX10003 Packet Transport Router to deliver, it’s claimed, unprecedented capacity, flexibility and programmability.

This field trial marks an important step toward progressing the transition to 400GbE network capacity, which is vital to support bandwidth demands from advanced high-performance computing, next-generation cloud data centre architectures, emerging 5G networks, augmented and virtual reality and 4K video production and distribution. The trial held the week of November 18, 2019, was conducted between Denver and Chicago, using Juniper’s PTX10003, the industry’s first fixed-configuration core router to support 400GbE.

OTT helps pay-TV businesses to improve

Beancounters at GlobalData have decided that the amalgamation of over-the-top (OTT) content into pay-TV offerings will help pay-TV businesses to enhance their service proposition and drive revenue in the coming years, says GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.

According to GlobalData pay-TV Forecast Pack, the adoption rate of OTT video platforms is increasing across all geographies and has built pressure on traditional pay-TV operators to create an interactive content library, provide on-demand video, and update their portfolio with HD and 4K content.

Europe’s technology industry deals slow

Big snail in Old TaipeiEurope’s technology industry saw a drop of 0.3 percent in overall deal activity during the third quarter of 2019 when compared to the four-quarter average, according to GlobalData’s deals database.

A total of 1023 deals worth $21.18 billion were announced for the region during the third quarter of 2019, against the last four-quarter average of 1020 deals.

Of all the deal types, venture financing saw the most activity in the third quarter of 2019 with 465, representing a 45.5 percent share for the region.

Magma Digital expands management consultancy arm

Magma Digital is expanding its management consultancy service.

The outfit has always offered consultancy services but is now expanding that offer, with an expert team providing organisations with a range of support in team development, technical change, strategy design, service design and transformation programmes.

Salvation Army plays Strawberry Fields forever with Cybertill

The Salvation Army has opened Strawberry Fields in Liverpool, with a new fully integrated software suite provided by retail tech firm, Cybertill.

A suite of technology will assist in the running of the charity’s operation, including a visitor exhibition with omnichannel ticketing, and EPoS for the gift shop and cafe, simplifying processes by using one integrated software package to manage the site, from beginning to end.