Comms Dealer

In its Strategic Review of Digital Communications published today comms watchdog Ofcom has stopped short of forcing the break-up of BT but told the company it must open up its telephone poles and ducts to allow rivals to build their own fibre networks and facilitate greater competition.

A forced break-up of BT is still possible if it fails to create more independence for Openreach under a stricter regulatory environment with wide-ranging proposals put forward by Ofcom.

BT Chief Executive Gavin Patterson said: "Openreach is already subject to regulated service standards and we are happy to work with Ofcom to improve them.

"Ofcom has explained why breaking up BT would not lead to better service or more investment and that structural separation would be a last resort.

"The focus now needs to be on a strengthened but proportionate form of the current model and we have put forward a positive proposal that we believe can form the basis for further discussions with both Ofcom and the wider industry.

"Our proposal includes a new governance structure for Openreach as well a clear commitment on investment. Openreach is already one of the most heavily regulated businesses in the world but we have volunteered to accept tighter regulation to bring matters to a clear and speedy conclusion."

"We are happy to let other companies use our ducts and poles if they are genuinely keen to invest very large sums as we have done. Our ducts and poles have been open to competitors since 2009 but there has been little interest to date. We will see if that now changes."

ITSPA welcomed Ofcom's announcement on the future of Openreach but warned that constant scrutiny is required to ensure it meets its new obligations.

In response to the regulator's review, Eli Katz, Chair of ITSPA, said: "We believe that Ofcom's proposals for further scrutiny and an increased focus on service quality will ensure a fairer marketplace for all Openreach customers while also supporting vital investment in faster broadband services.

"We also support the proposals to encourage the roll out of new 'fibre to the premise' networks by ensuring competitors have better access to BT's mast and duct infrastructure.

"This will improve competition, drive up performance and service levels as well as reduce costs for both individuals and businesses in the UK."

In other areas of the review ITSPA supports Ofcom's continued commitment to improving the switching process for consumers and call for the regulator to reform the current number portability process.

"It is simply not fit for purpose in its current state and should be a priority in Ofcom's work in the switching area," added Katz.

CityFibre CEO Greg Mesch also welcomes the recommendations made by Ofcom in its review.

"The report’s conclusions are clear, that to meet the UK’s current and future digital communication needs and enable widespread availability of competing fibre to the premises networks, a strategic shift to support large-scale investment in end-to-end fibre is required," he stated. 

"To accelerate this, Ofcom recommends the promotion of investment and competition, and provisions such as the assurance of meaningful access to BT’s physical infrastructure. 

"The conclusions in Ofcom's report will considerably strengthen CityFibre’s capability to drive forward an alternative fibre future for Britain." 

Dido Harding, CEO of TalkTalk Group, commended the watchdog but is concerned that words will not be translated into action. She said: "Ofcom has done well in identifying many of the worst problems, including recognising, finally, that BT's control of Openreach creates a fundamental conflict of interest which hurts customers.

"But having accepted all this, Ofcom has produced 100 pages of consultation with little concrete action behind it. The risk is that we end up with 10 more years of debate and delays, rather than facing into the problems and delivering improvements for frustrated customers now.\"

ISPA Chair James Blessing also welcomed Ofcom's 'ambitious vision and proposals' on how the UK's connectivity needs can be transformed over the next decade. 

"With ISPA members investing heavily in their networks across the country - locally and nationally utilising a range of technologies - ISPA supports the report’s objectives to improve performance, enhance competition and investment and make rolling out networks easier in this data-driven age," he said.

Distributor ALSO has reported record results for 2015. "The EBT increased by 30% to €103m before special items. This result was achieved thanks to consistent management decisions and significant investments in infrastructure to ensure sustainable profitability," said Gustavo Möller-Hergt, CEO. 

In fiscal 2015, ALSO Group sales improved on the previous year by 7.7% to €7.8bn euros and earnings before taxes (EBT) by 10.9% to €90.8m, it has reported.

The EBT margin increased year on year from 1.1 to 1.2%. Net income increased to €62.9m, passing the previous year by 3.3%.

In the Central European market segment, ALSO increased its sales over the previous year by 7.5% from €5.709bn to €6.140bn. This was mainly due to the stronger performance of Alpha International B.V. the second half of 2015 and the encouraging strong growth in France and in the Netherlands.

In Northern / Eastern Europe, sales rose by 8.6% to €1.805bn, following €1.663bn in the previous year. EBT rose by 32.5%, from €15.4m to €20.4m. There were positive developments in all countries except of Poland, which is currently being restructured.

In 2015 ALSO employed an annual average of 3649 employees from 50 countries - 223 employees more than in the previous year (+6.5%). The increase was due to acquisitions and growth in Solutions and Services. 

Annodata is celebrating a double win at O2's Direct Partner Network Awards 2016, picking up the Customer and Digital Excellence accolades.

Stuart McAlpine, Head of Annodata Communications, said: "The mobile market is incredibly competitive and, increasingly, it is service that is the key differentiator between one dealer and the next. It's clear that we are doing something right."
 

Polycom handed over its Reseller Partner of the Year award to Gamma during the vendor's TEAM Polycom annual partner conference held in Nashville, USA.

Andrew Robinson, Head of Hosted Sales at Gamma, commented: "Our partnership has grown and solidified over the course of 2015 mainly due to Polycom's commitment to the SMB sector through the development of its VVX range of handsets."

Manchester-based UC wholesaler Zest4 has linked-up with VoxSmart to launch a mobile voice recording solution.

Zest4 will provide the VSmart cloud-based service which is compliant with the EU legislation Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID) expected to come into force in January 2017.

Under new rules financial organisations and their employees will need to record and store all calls related to 'firm business' for a period of at least five years.

This includes internal as well as external calls, plus text and all other types of messages.

VSmart operates on any mobile network and integrates with in-house recording machines.

The launch of a mobile voice recording system follows Zest4's introduction of M2M solutions last year.

Mandy Fazelynia, Operations and Business Development Director, said: "The addition of mobile voice recording and M2M to our portfolio ensures that our partners have access to complete UC solutions."

Ericsson has struck a deal with Amazon Web Services to act as a bridge for its telecom operator customers to use public cloud services.

The pact is part of a broader push by Ericsson to drive telecom service providers toward adopting cloud services instead of relying entirely on their own internal computer operations.

The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Cisco, Ericsson and Intel are to develop and trial what is expected to be the industry's first 5G router, using Verizon within an ecosystem to accelerate the pace of 5G.

The companies expect the next-generation 5G router to enable business and residential customers to achieve significantly faster networking speeds, lower latency, and the ability to handle exponentially more Internet-connected devices.

This advancement is intended to help accommodate the expected explosion of the Internet of Everything, and the streaming of high definition video content.

The solution will offer Gigabit-per-second speeds by combining Cisco's enterprise networking innovations with Ericsson's 5G mobile networking technology and Intel's 5G silicon.

It also advances the strategic partnership between Ericsson and Cisco to create the networks of the future, which was announced in November 2015.

Gamma reaches final of European Business Awards          

Gamma has been named as a finalist and Ruban D' Honneur recipient in the 2015/16 European Business Awards sponsored by RSM.

It was chosen from 678 National Champions by a panel of judges made up of European business and political leaders, academics and entrepreneurs.

The company is one of 110 Ruban D' Honneur recipients chosen from across Europe.

Gamma will now undertake a face-to-face interview with the judges in the hope it will be named as one of the overall winners of the Awards' 11 categories at a Gala Ceremony in June.

Gamma has enjoyed strong organic revenue and EBITDA growth driven by high percentage of repeat revenues.  

The business has over 620 employees and operates across six main locations, headquartered in Newbury with offices in Port Solent, Manchester, Glasgow, London and Budapest.

The European Business Awards engaged with over 32,000 companies from 33 countries this year, a 33% increase from last year, and a record-breaking number for the competition now in its ninth year.

Adrian Tripp, CEO of the European Business Awards said: "To survive in this economic climate is hard enough, so to innovate, prosper and grow in the way this year's Ruban D'Honneur recipients have is truly remarkable. Europe needs more companies like these."

Bob Falconer CEO of Gamma, added: "We are delighted to be a Ruban D'Honneur recipient and to have now reached the final stage of the awards. The key principles of ethics, innovation and financial success, upon which the awards are based, are very much at the heart of how we operate and it is a privilege to have this recognised."

Running alongside the independent judging part of the competition is a public vote, which will decide the 'National Public Champions' of the competition for each country for which Gamma has submitted a video.

To vote for Gamma go to www.businessawardseurope.com.

The winners of the public vote will be announced on 7th March.

Gamma has been named as a finalist and Ruban D' Honneur recipient in the 2015/16 European Business Awards sponsored by RSM.

It was chosen from 678 National Champions by a panel of judges made up of European business and political leaders, academics and entrepreneurs.

The company is one of 110 Ruban D' Honneur recipients chosen from across Europe.

Gamma will now undertake a face-to-face interview with the judges in the hope it will be named as one of the overall winners of the Awards' 11 categories at a Gala Ceremony in June.

Gamma has enjoyed strong organic revenue and EBITDA growth driven by high percentage of repeat revenues.  

The business has over 620 employees and operates across six main locations, headquartered in Newbury with offices in Port Solent, Manchester, Glasgow, London and Budapest.

The European Business Awards engaged with over 32,000 companies from 33 countries this year, a 33% increase from last year, and a record-breaking number for the competition now in its ninth year.

Adrian Tripp, CEO of the European Business Awards said: "To survive in this economic climate is hard enough, so to innovate, prosper and grow in the way this year's Ruban D'Honneur recipients have is truly remarkable. Europe needs more companies like these."

Bob Falconer CEO of Gamma, added: "We are delighted to be a Ruban D'Honneur recipient and to have now reached the final stage of the awards. The key principles of ethics, innovation and financial success, upon which the awards are based, are very much at the heart of how we operate and it is a privilege to have this recognised."

Running alongside the independent judging part of the competition is a public vote, which will decide the 'National Public Champions' of the competition for each country for which Gamma has submitted a video.

To vote for Gamma go to www.businessawardseurope.com.

The winners of the public vote will be announced on 7th March.

Atos has appointed Jon Pritchard as the new CEO of Unify, which it acquired in November last year.

Pritchard, who was previously Unify's Executive VP Channels, will also join the Atos Executive Committee.

He has 25-plus years industry experience including a stint as President at Comstor where he led the $2.5bn channel IT business which operated in 40 countries.

Jen Wilson has been appointed by Commsworld to oversee the installation and running of new IT and telephone services for the City of Edinburgh Council.

Her appointment is one of 16 new postings made by the company, including six women. Commsworld hopes her high profile appointment in an IT and telecoms business will inspire more women into 'male dominated' industries.

Wilson previously worked at Capita and brings more than 20 years experience across varying roles within the IT industry.

She said: "The culture within Commsworld has been a breath of fresh air. The sector has for so long been male dominated but there is no reason for that to be the case.

"It is a matter of diversity, and a range of backgrounds is absolutely essential in any industry to instil a broader range of thinking."

Commsworld's headcount has grown from 47 to 63 following its partnership with CityFibre to deliver the ultra-fast Edinburgh CORE network, as well as its contract win with CGI, where it became a key provider in the £186m City of Edinburgh Council ICT contract.

Ricky Nicol, Chief Executive of Commsworld, said: "There have been some important additions to the team but we are particularly pleased to secure the appointment of Jen to lead the major work with the Council.

"Jen's comments on encouraging diversity in the industry are especially pertinent. Creativity of thinking is now absolutely essential and we must look to encouraging people of all backgrounds to view this industry as exciting and open to all sorts of opportunity."

Commsworld's integral role in the Council ICT project is to deliver a 400 site Wide Area Network (WAN), delivering faster and more reliable connectivity for schools, libraries and other council buildings.

Commsworld will also rollout an IP Telephony solution for 7,000 users and a 250 seat Contact Centre. These key aspects of the ICT contract will deliver significant benefits to the end users, while also creating a number of new jobs in the Scottish IT market.

The WAN will utilise Edinburgh CORE, the pure fibre network Commsworld launched in May 2015 with infrastructure provider CityFibre.

More than half of Northern Powerhouse councils are missing the Government's pledge to spend £1 in every £3 with small businesses, especially when it comes to their IT outsourcing activities, according to research from IT services aggregator Streamwire, under Freedom of Information requests.

Furthermore, 86 per cent have no plans to increase their IT services allocation to SME suppliers.

A Freedom of Information (FOI) request was sent to all 34 councils who make up the UK's Northern Powerhouse to ascertain the proportion of the IT services spend allocated to small and medium sized enterprises. 
 
The results seemingly highlighted a disconnection between government policies to encourage local spend with SMEs, and the actual spending habits of local councils. 
 
Anne Stokes, CEO of Streamwire, urges Northern Powerhouse councils to take a more concerted view to spend with SMEs: "The key objective of the Northern Powerhouse was to establish the region as a beacon for 'doing things differently', strengthening the area as an economic hub and showcasing how other regions could adopt similar innovation and best practice in their communities.

"Councils can play a powerful role by using their budgets to procure more from SMEs, which are more than likely to be regional businesses. Unless local councils take up this mantle, the government's goal of building an economic stronghold in the North is surely going to be very difficult to achieve sustainably."