Canon helps the partners out

Posted on April 2, 2013 by - News

canonCanon is helping its channel partners to generate additional revenues with the launch of two new series colour multifunctional devices (MFDs).

According to the company, the i-SENSYS MF8200 and MF8500 both offer high quality and connectivity features and all five new compact laser devices will enable partners to help their small to midsized customers work faster.

Anil Jagpal, European Marketing Manager for i-SENSYS at Canon Europe, said customers were increasingly asking Canon partners to provide office technology products that supported a more connected approach to working and increased the productivity of end-users.

The company also referenced its own recent research that found more than two-thirds of end-users felt that printers or scanners with Wi-Fi connectivity could improve their productivity.

“Our refreshed i-SENSYS range provides our partners with a great business opportunity to convert the strong desire for quality, connectivity and productivity into sales,” Jagpal added.

The new i-SENSYS MFDs are said to be designed to be shared and come network-ready as standard. They are claimed to provide users with the ability to print from a range of mobile and other web-connected devices, using Canon’s Mobile Printing App, Apple AirPrint or Google Cloud Print.

The i-SENSYS MF8280Cw and MF8580Cdw also feature Wi-Fi connectivity, and the i-SENSYS MF8500 series enables users to capture paper-based documents and send them straight from the device to an email address or network folder.

The MF8500 series also support PCL, which allows partners to integrate these devices into their customers’ existing IT and printing environments as well as offering security features that allow partners to meet their customers’ increasing demand for keeping company information safe.

The new i-SENSYS devices will be available from 15 May 2013.

Microsoft rumoured to be building smaller Surface tab

Posted on April 2, 2013 by - News

surface-rtMicrosoft is once again trying to ensure that Surface does as well as it possibly can.

According to Softpedia, the company is apparently working on a smaller sized Surface tablet in a bid to compete with the more miniature devices on the market.

It is thought that the new tablet will have a display around seven or eight inches and run Windows Blue after eagle eyed sources spotted a job ad on Coroflot’s job page asking for developers.

It said the Surface Team focused on building devices that “fully express the Windows vision.”

It hinted at a smaller tab, claiming that a “fundamental part” of its strategy  was having “desirable and powerful devices that enable the experiences people want, and elicit their excitement.

“We are currently building the next generation and Surface needs you,” the ad concluded.

Microsoft hasn’t faced the figures it had desired with its new baby. Last month Bloomberg reported that the company had sold about 400,000 Surface Pro tablets since their debut last month. In addition, it only managed to sell a little over a million Surface RT tablets.

It’s tried to conquer this by making more railroads into China, deciding last month to extend its selling channels for the Surface RT tablets, which it previously only sold through two distributors- its online store and chain store for electronics, Suning.

Previously the giant had not been able to go through further channels as a result of an exclusive distie deal with Suning, but last month sources said that this deal expired in February, paving the way for Microsoft to pick up new channels.

In a bid to boost sales it was rumoured to be turning to four new distribution partners aboard. These included PC Mall, Sundan, One Zero and 360buy.

M-commerce survey reveals strong growth

Posted on April 2, 2013 by - News

SmartphonesA survey carried out by Stibo Systems has revealed that the number of m-commerce purchases has increased by 19 per cent over the last year.

The study found that the number of purchases made over e-commerce increased from 40 per cent to 59 per cent in 12 months. However, the survey also established that 17 percent of consumers aren’t too keen on m-commerce channels when they can’t find the necessary information using their tablet or mobile.

Finding product info using a smartphone should be relatively straightforward, but 48 per cent of respondents said small screens make it very hard to read information once it has been found. In other words, m-commerce outfits should start using bigger fonts. Another 46 per cent said they are still concerned about security, reports QRcodepress.

SEO Positive exec Ben Austin said the ever evolving smartphone and tablet market is making mobile purchases much easier than before. The added level of convenience has managed to attract more consumers, but more work needs to be done.

“This research also highlights the need for the information on mobile sites to be clear and secure,” he said.

The industry needs to do more to address security concerns, which are overblown as it is, and they apparently need to redesign their mobile shopping sites to improve readability on small screens. The latter part sounds easy enough, but strengthening confidence in mobile security might prove a bit more challenging.

Tourists bounce through UK stores over Easter

Posted on April 2, 2013 by - News

highstreet South endTourists from across the pond helped boost Easter trading figures in blighty, research has found.

According to the latest figures, tourists flocked to UK stores in a bid to find British gifts for their pals back home, pushing up footfall and finances.

The New West End company, which represents 600 retailers on Bond Street and Oxford Street in London, told the Express that it had seen more feet through doors with a 2.3 percent rise on Good Friday and Easter Saturday compared to last year.

It said people, including those from the US, France and Germany  made the most of exchange rates and splashed around £75 million over the two days, a huge jump of £15 million more than 2012.

And it wasn’t just London which had financial success with coastal towns also raking in the cash over the Easter period.

Ofcom finds Orange is a lemon

Posted on March 29, 2013 by - News

OrangeOrange and TalkTalk have once again found themselves in the bottom of a customer satisfaction survey.

The pair faced the most complaints in Ofcom’s latest research into the level of service for
major telecoms and pay TV providers between October and December 2012.

Despite the total volume of complaints made to Ofcom falling during the last quarter of 2012 – the sixth consecutive quarter of decline – Orange and TalkTalk still weren’t performing well enough to satisfy their paying customers.

TalkTalk scraped the bottom in the landline telephone market,  generating the most complaints during the final quarter of 2012, with 0.36 complaints per 1,000 customers.

Ofcom pointed out, however, that the company’s complaints continued to fall quarter on quarter, although they remained at almost double the industry average, with consumers mainly complaining about service faults and customer service problems.

BT complaints fell slightly from 0.21 complaints to 0.20 complaints per 1,000 customers in Q4 2012, however, it still remained above the average, while Sky and Virgin Media both generated complaints below the industry average.

Virgin Media had the fewest number of complaints, at 0.11 complaints per 1,000 customers, while Sky attracted 0.12 complaints per 1,000 customers.

When it came to broadband Orange usurped TalkTalk to gain the most complaints at 0.70 per 1,000 customers, increasing from 0.50 per 1,000 customers three months earlier.

The data found that complaints about Orange hit a peak in October, which Ofcom said  related to the company’s decision to withdraw its free broadband offer unless customers also purchased line rental from the firm.

TalkTalk was the second most complained about broadband provider. Its complaints continued to fall quarter on quarter – from 0.35 to 0.33 complaints per 1,000 customers – although they remained higher than the industry average. BT also generated above average complaint levels at 0.30 per 1,000 subscribers. Sky’s broadband service attracted the fewest complaints at 0.08 per 1,000 customers.

Orange again found itself at the top of the complaints pops when it came to paid mobile services with above average figures of 0.21 per 1,000 customers. This was, again, largely driven by the withdrawal of its free broadband offer.

T-Mobile also generated complaints in excess of the industry average, with consumers mainly complaining about billing and how their complaints were handled. Three’s complaints were equal to the industry average.

O2 was the least complained about mobile provider with 0.06 complaints per 1,000 customers. O2, Virgin Mobile and Vodafone all achieved fewer complaints than the industry average.

People regret boozy online buys

Posted on March 29, 2013 by - News

boozebeltAccording to a new OnePoll study, nearly a quarter of British consumers have bought products online while under the influence of happy juice. Needless to say, they regret their purchases, like most other things we do while inebriated. 

Two thousand consumers took part in the survey and the results indicate that the convenience offered by e-commerce services is a double edged sword. It is not like e-commerce outfits are targeting drunk consumers, but the ease of spending hard earned cash with just a few clicks seems to be a bit too much for some jolly consumers to miss out on. Spending too much money while drunk tends to be a bad idea, whether you do it online or out on the town.

In addition, the interfaces of e-commerce sites are susceptible to all kinds of shopping mistakes. A total of 56 per cent of consumers admitted that they regretted buying clothing items online, while 22 per cent felt buyer’s remorse after getting a gadget, reports shopsafe.co.uk.

It is estimated that British consumers spend over £1,000 online a year on average. It seems that a good chunk of that is spent after a few glasses behind the laptop.

Metro.co.uk reports the case of a 22-year-old man, who somehow managed to order 22 tickets to an Oasis concert after a drinking session. The drunken shopping spree cost him over £2,000. It is not clear whether he enjoyed the gig.

eBay gets ever so bullish

Posted on March 29, 2013 by - News

smartphone-shoppingeBay has driven up its share value after making bold forecasting claims.

In its forecast of annual earnings the net giant said it would push for an earnings growth  of 15 percent to 19 percent over the next three years.

Speaking to investors yesterday the company’s head honchos said this was mean a projected revenue of $21.5 billion to $23.5 billion in 2015, compared to $14 billion in 2012.

They said this would be made possible through the company’s global expansion as well as drilling down focus in local commerce areas.

They added that the company would also embrace the mobile trends more fully.

And there was a good news for the company’s marketplaces business, which hosts external merchants will bring in around $110 billion in sales in 2015, a huge jump from the $75 billion in 2012.

The bold claims have now seen its shares rise by more than four percent, a feat which is sure to impress shareholders and show that chief executive John Donahoe, who joined the company in 2009, has fulfilled part of his promise to get the company back on track after it fell on the wayside amidst strong competition from Amazon.

Google tests same-day delivery online

Posted on March 29, 2013 by - News

google-ICGoogle is not content with dominating the search and mobile OS space. Now it wants to deliver our groceries, too. The company is about to roll out a new same-day delivery service in San Francisco and several suburbs south of the city, AP reports. 

Google Shopping Express will provide same-day delivery of food and other products bought online. If it takes off, Google will expand the service to other markets.

“We hope this will help users explore the benefits of a local, same-day delivery service, and help us kick the tires on the new service,” Google said in a statement.

It is an interesting twist in Google’s cunning plot to take over the world. Google wants to increase consumer reliance on the internet, even when it comes to mundane chores. The hope is that Google’s shopping push will attract even more merchants to buy online ads.

The biggest drawback of most online shopping outfits is that they cannot guarantee same-day delivery, which means their services can’t be used for perishable goods. Besides, you can already get a week-old salad at Tesco.

Several major merchants have already signed up for Google’s new service, including Target and Walgreen. The merchants will sell some items through a central website, run by Google. Google will then hire courier services to pick up and deliver the items to shoppers. The couriers will be driving Google trucks, in Google uniforms.

Blackberry hit by yearly revenue drop

Posted on March 28, 2013 by - News

ripeunripeBlackberry lost two percent of revenue in its fourth quarter of fiscal 2013, down $49 million, and a massive 36 percent drop from $4.2 billion year on year. However, it forecasts breaking even for the next quarter and a mobile analyst has told us the company should be financially viable for some time to come.

For the quarter, hardware accounted for 61 percent of the revenue, 36 percent for service and three percent for software and other revenue. It shipped six million Blackberry smartphones and roughly 370,000 Playbook tablets.

One half of the two-headed dragon that founded and used to run the company, Mike Lazaridis, will be leaving the company.

For its outlook, Blackberry said it will be increasing marketing spend for Q1 of fiscal 2014 to support Blackberry 10. This is a planned 50 percent increase in marketing, and the firm thinks it will be near breaking even, citing lower cost base, a more efficient supply chain and better hardware margins.

Jim Dawson, analyst at Ovum, told ChannelEye that every other company that’s suffered a severe drop in device revenues has struggled because cust cotting at a rapid rate is difficult. “Blackberry appears to have done a great job executing on its CORE strategy which includes reducing costs, and has managed to bring costs down significantly,” Dawson said. “As such, it was profitable this past quarter and should break even next quarter”.

“Given its good cash balance and lack of debt, it should be financially viable for quite some time at this rate, so I’m not overly concerned about the drop in revenues,” Dawson said. “I’m more concerned about the drop in subscribers, which is a longer-term indicator that it’s losing customers faster than it can win new ones”.

Dell could go down like Richard III

Posted on March 28, 2013 by - Opinions

Battle_of_BosworthTin-box shifter Michael Dell has found himself in the middle of a three-way proxy war for control of his company and might go out like Richard III screaming for a horse and ending up under a carpark.

Dell hit the headlines by allying with Silver Lake in a bid to take his company private. Really, that should have been the end of matters. Dell owns a big chunk of company stock, he founded the company in the first place and it desperately needs a restructuring.

Shareholders should logically be pleased to see a return on their cash at all, as the value of the outfit is likely to get a lot worse before it gets better, if it gets better. For some reason they are not.

Instead we are seeing the various big shareholders ganging up to try and take control before Dell can get the company private.

The question is what they hope to gain. In the middle of a recession, where Dell’s traditional buyers are saving their pennies, the company is paralysed. The only part of the IT industry that is moving at all is the mobile sector and Dell is not a big player there. Dell is doing alright in enterprise.

Logically a company in Dell’s position should restructure, cut back to basics and survive on its cash reserves until things pick up.

This is the opposite of what shareholders want. They want the company to show continual growth so that the share price will increase. By going private, Dell is protected from the wrath of shareholders and can look to the longer term.

While all sides are talking about having the best interests of the company and shareholders at heart, it is fairly clear that the only one who really cares about Dell as an ongoing concern is Michael Dell himself.

Blackstone, Carl Icahn, and Silver Lake Partners all have ideas to take the company private. But their idea can only be to take over and flog off all the company assets and distribute the last of the cash.

This can be the only reason why they are swarming around Dell like flies.

Otherwise any observer who lifts the bonnet of Dell has to take a sharp intake of breath and admit that in the short term Dell is buggered. Its core business market is rotting and its quarterly sales in its consumer sector are sliding.

A management plan presented to the board last July expected $5.6 billion in operating income this year. That was later reduced to $3.7 billion, but is likely to be revised lower still.

Global shipments for PC makers declined 3.2 percent last year and are predicted to fall more than 10 percent in the current quarter. Dell has not really seen any benefits from the launch of Windows 8 or the Ultrabook.

This puts Dell’s board in a difficult position. So far they have supported Michael Dell but now they have to work out if offers from Blackstone and Icahn will lead to a better bid than the one from Michael Dell and Silver Lake.

They will have to look at the deal in terms of cash. They can’t take the perspective that it’s better for the company to go with Michael, they always have to say “the average shareholder will do better”.

The three rival offers are critically different. Dell and Silver Lake will buy out shareholders for $13.65 a share, valuing Dell at $24.4 billion. If the preliminary offers from Blackstone and Icahn do not firm up, this is the best shareholders can expect. Currently you can pick up a second hand Dell share for $14.50 so a lot of people will be out of pocket.

To make matters worse, few people will invest in Dell shares while there is a big argument about the outfit’s future. Corporate buyers thinking about getting in a few Dell boxes want to know if the company is going to be around in a few years.

Blackstone’s offer of more than $14.25 a share to all investors who want to cash out would mean that Dell is worth $25 billion.

Icahn, on the other hand, is offering to buy 58 percent of shares for $15 apiece.

At the moment, analysts say that Blackstone has the highest chance of success. That could cause Dell some major headaches. For a start it is likely that Michael Dell himself will be removed from the company.

There are rumours that Icahn submitted his proposal only to keep discussions going, because he thought Blackstone may not submit an offer. It is likely that he will walk away from the deal but wants to make the most of his billion dollar investment in the company. He will want a large special dividend before he ties up with a rival bid, probably Blackstone.

Michael Dell’s own involvement with Blackstone would seal it, but it does not seem to be playing out that way. Earlier this week the Blackstone deepthroats were telling the press that he would be fired if they had anything do do with it. Officially, though, Dell has said that he will “explore in good faith” the possibility of working with Blackstone or Icahn.

He claimed he would be like Switzerland in favouring a form of armed neutrality.

But Blackstone wants to asset strip Dell’s financial services unit, worth an estimated $5 billion, and has apparently asked ex HP chief Mark Hurd about running the company. Dell, who is always a little hands on, has good reasons why he would not want this to be the case.

Either way all this is going to get a lot messier and is going to take months to sort out. What the three factions have to realise is that Dell, the company,  could be killed off by their final Battle of Bosworth.

PCs plunge as smartphones and tablets soar

Posted on March 27, 2013 by - News

ipad3The latest survey of connected intelligent devices from IDC has revealed what we were all beginning to suspect – the day of the PC has gone, while tablets and smartphones continue their inexorable ascent.

The survey covers PCs, notebooks and smartphones.

IDC thinks that shipments of tablets will exceed desktop PCs in 2013 and topple notebook PCs next year. The tablet market is expected to grow year on year by 48.7 percent, representing 190 million units, and the smartphone market  will grow 27.2 percent to 918.5 million units.

Apple did better than expected in the fourth quarter of 2012, closing the gap with Samsung. That’s because of sales of the Apple iPhone 5 and the iPad Mini, meaning that Apple had 20.3 percent unit shipment market share compared to 21.2 percent for Samsung.  However, from a revenue point of view, Apple had 30.7 share compared to 20.4 percent for Samsung.  In short, Apple kit is more expensive.

During the rest of the decade, tablets and smartphone sales will continue to rise, as they are taken up by emerging markets.  Notebook PCs will only show single digit growth and desktop PCs will continue to fall. By 2017, desktop PCs will show to practically no growth.

Megha Saini, IDC research analyst, said that in emerging markets in particular, consumer spending starts with mobiles but move directly to tablets before they think about PCs.

Workplace discrimination still rife

Posted on March 27, 2013 by - News

old schoolDespite more and more women finding themselves in top level jobs, workplace discrimination is still rife, research and legal experts have said.

Earlier this month research conducted by Microsoft in Ireland to mark International Women’s Day identified gender discrimination, demands from home, and a lack of support for working mothers as the main perceived barriers to workplace promotion. Microsoft UK in 2011 was itself accused of sexism and hush money to silence critics.

Over in the US, a 2011 survey suggested that nearly two-thirds of Americans reported sexual harassment was a problem with around a quarter of women reporting to having been harassed at work, while UK figures suggest that around 50 percent of women in employment are, or have been, subject to sexual harassment of some form or other.

A partner at Aspen Morris Solicitors also confirmed that there had been a rise in discrimination cases over the past few years.

“We have seen a number of women coming to us complaining of this practice in the workplace,” the partner told ChannelEye. “This has ranged from sexual harassment to trouble when they have tried to go back to work after taking maternity leave.”

The latter is something one mother experienced when she tried to return to her job in a high profile technology company after having her daughter.

“I asked to take on part time hours, a request which was rejected,” she told ChannelEye.

“I then asked if I could work from home one day a week, which the company also rejected.

“After realising I was tied to a full time post I agreed to go back under these terms. However, before I could resume my position I received a phone call telling me my post had suddenly been made redundant.”

She is still locked in a legal dispute with the company, a well known international brand.

For another woman working in a predominately male industry, it was a case of grin and bare it.

“I had comments about my boobs, if my hair or make-up wasn’t perfect I’d also be asked if I’d had a “late night” followed by nudges,” she said. “However, because I was the only girl there I had to take it as banter.”

One woman however who didn’t sit on her laurels was Adria Richards who was given the sack and subjected to online abuse when she tweeted about her experiences of sexual discrimination in the workplace.

The developer evangelist at Sendgrid, a tech company that manages emails, was an attendee at PyCon, a tech conference. However, she took to heart a conversation two male developers, employed by Play Haven, were having behind her during the conference.

She claimed within this they used the words “dongles” and “forking”, which although can be used legitimately in technology, could also be taken as offensive innuendo. Adria took them to be used in a sexual way – she snapped photos of the men and posted them on Twitter, along with their comments.

One of the developers was sacked as a result, leading to offensive comments being directed at Adria as well as a DDoS attack on SendGrid’s site.

Connections Recruitment increases IT job reach and apprenticeships

Posted on March 27, 2013 by - News

Hands across the waterConnections, a family owned recruitment company, is increasing its client and candidate reach.

It has also said it will broaden its offerings and recruitment for IT posts as well as make more moves into apprenticeships.

The company, which has survived tough economic times, running since 1985, employs 15 recruitment specialists and operates from offices in Manchester city centre, Sale and Stockport.

It currently rakes in a turn over of £5 million, but has said that it now wants to ramp this up by 20 percent .

It claims that over the the past 28 years it has placed in excess of 15,000 people in permanent jobs throughout the North West, while it’s also doing its bit for apprentices recently promoting its first apprentice and planning to take on a second to train them in all administrative aspects of the job.

The move is sure to please Prime Minister David Cameron who earlier this month claimed that apprenticeships should  become the “new norm” for school kids who choose not to get into debt by going to university.

Connections works with clients from sole traders to global PLCs and recruits for roles in administration, customer services, accounting, finance, HR, recruitment, logistics, buying, textiles, sales and marketing.

Jonathan Dobkin, co-owner of Connections, said the company’s plan had always been to grow the business organically and expand divisional offering.