Comms Dealer

ISPA, the voice of the UK Internet industry, has initially responded to the publication of the Draft Investigatory Powers Bill.

ISPA believes law enforcement should have reasonable access to data and we support this new legislation as it tries to simplify the myriad of existing laws governing this area.

ISPA Secretary General Nicholas Lansman said: "ISPA welcomes the attempt to modernise and clarify the law. We will work with Government to ensure that the Bill provides ISPs with a clear and stable legal framework that balances necessary powers with oversight whilst minimising the impact on business."

The Draft Bill is highly complex and some of the provisions seem to be an extension of existing powers, for example the inclusion of a "request filter" and how Internet Connection Records are defined. ISPA will be responding more fully in the coming days on the implications of the new legislation.

ISPA looks forward to working with members and intends to give evidence to the Joint Committee scrutinising the Draft bill in the coming weeks. ISPA Chair James Blessing will further be giving evidence to the Science and Technology Committee's inquiry into this subject on Tuesday 10th November.

Union Street has implemented a new Agile framework into the company's development and project management processes, led by José Fernandez, Chief Operating Officer.

Agile software development is a term used in the software industry to describe a group of development practices which promote the organic evolution of solutions through close collaboration between developers, project managers and key stakeholders.

Agile development methods have become increasingly popular in recent years thanks to a number of benefits including speed, accuracy and increased adaptability in the development process.

With a team of 40 developers in-house and high annual investment, last year amounting to over £1m, Union Street believes that implementing an Agile framework into its development processes will lead to big increases in efficiency, allowing the company to leverage its development resources to even greater effect.

Fernandez said: "High quality software development lies at the heart of the Union Street proposition, which is why we continually invest such high levels of revenue back into R&D.

"We're also very proud of our development team which comprises of some of the most talented people the industry has to offer.

"Moving to an Agile process will enable us to unlock the true potential of our development resources and deliver feature rich software releases for the whole of our customer base with increased frequency and with absolute certainty. This will of course lead to a number of benefits for our clients, including the opportunity to have a greater level of input into our development process."

Interoute has announced the completion of its £402 million acquisition of European managed services provider Easynet. The UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) officially cleared the acquisition to go ahead on November 3, completing the final step in the process.  
 
With this acquisition Interoute has almost doubled the size and scale of its enterprise ICT services business (now over 70% of the group's overall business). On a pro forma basis, after giving effect to the acquisition, Interoute would have had total revenue of over €700 million in the 12 months ended 30 June 2015.
 
The acquisition will enable enterprise, government and service provider customers of the merged group to access a full suite of the combined companies' products and services. In addition to increased products and services, the acquisition brings an enhanced and expanded set of skills and capability to serve both companies' existing customers and new prospects across the world.
 
In the future the combined group will trade under the Interoute brand. Until this is fully implemented Easynet will continue to operate under its own brand name and will be known as 'Easynet, an Interoute company'. While the integration plans are in the process of being finalised both businesses are working in tandem and cooperating closely.

Gareth Williams, Interoute's CEO, commented: "The completion of this acquisition is a big step forward as we continue on our path to create Europe's leading, independent ICT provider. 

"The additional scale, skills and services within the combined business will bring significant benefits to our national and multi-national customers and prospects."

A new cloud-based unified communications service aimed at helping organisations streamline communication and collaboration between staff has been launched by Capita.

The Cisco Powered Capita Unified Communications in the Cloud service combines the Cisco Hosted Collaboration Solution (HCS) with Capita's secure cloud and service management expertise to deliver collaborative technologies including instant messaging, voice, video, conferencing and presence from desktop phones, PCs, tablets and smartphones.

The service can help organisations reduce costs and transform the way they work, helping to increase productivity and deliver service without the need for significant capital expenditure.

Cisco HCS is an end-to-end solution that allows partners to create Cisco Powered cloud services around Cisco Collaboration technologies, including Unified Communications (UC), voice, TelePresence, Video and Cisco WebEx.

The private cloud service is hosted in Capita's secure, tier 3 UK data centres, guaranteeing UK data sovereignty and data security up to OFFICIAL.

Organisations will also benefit from predictable utility pricing - pay per user, per month - and the ability to flex the service according to needs, such as when there is increased demand during election periods. Updates are included as part of the monthly subscription, ensuring customers are always up-to-date with the latest tools and features at no extra cost.

Capita has partnered with VOSS Solutions to build a cloud migration programme to enable thousands of users to migrate to the new platform without business disruption.

Unified Communications in the Cloud is part of Capita Collaboration Suite, which delivers back office unified communications, together with front office contact centre technology, both from the cloud, both managed on the same platform.

Peter Hands, executive director, Capita IT Enterprise Services, said: "We work with public and private sector organisations across the UK and understand the challenges they are facing, including the need to reduce costs while maintaining service levels.

"Capita Unified Communications in the Cloud helps councils meet those challenges, enabling smarter ways of working and allowing staff to make the best use of multiple communication channels."

Virgin Media Business, the division of Virgin Media that provides products and services to UK businesses, has announced the launch of broadband speeds up to 300Mbps early next year.

The current top speed for Virgin Media business customers is 152Mbps.

Peter Kelly, Managing Director of Virgin Media Business, said: "Every day businesses tell us that faster broadband speeds increase productivity and help deliver better services for customers."

Virgin Media is investing £3 billion in its infrastructure to bring the fastest broadband to nearly 17 million UK homes and businesses. As the network is built out, more businesses will be able to utilise the new speeds.

Virgin Media's network currently reaches approximately 44 per cent of UK premises - this will increase to 65 per cent once the £3 billion investment has been fully rolled out.

Last month, Virgin Media Business launched a report, 'The UK's £92 billion Digital Opportunity', which revealed digital technologies could boost the UK economy by 2.5% of GDP (or £92 billion).

A report last month from the Federation of Small Business (FSB) also stated that almost all small business owners (99 per cent) rate the internet as being highly important to their business with half of all small businesses (51 per cent) already offering services online, and an additional 15 per cent planning to do so in the near future.

Emma de Sousa is to join Outsourcery as MD in April 2016, moving from technology provider Insight.

Based in Outsourcery's Manchester headquarters her primary focus will be to drive the firm's sales and marketing activity.

de Sousa joined Insight in 2003 and held a variety of positions including Operations Director for EMEA, Managing Director of Germany and Regional Vice President of Southern Europe.
 
Piers Linney, Co-CEO of Outsourcery, commented: "I have no doubt that Emma's extensive experience and strong track record will prove to be of immense value to the business as we look to further develop our go-to-market activities for the public and commercial sectors.

"There is a great opportunity ahead for our Skype for Business and IaaS solutions and I am confident Emma can drive our sales strategy in areas where Outsourcery has a clear competitive advantage."
 
de Sousa added: "Outsourcery has a proven track-record of helping customers transform their businesses, reduce costs and improve productivity. There is a substantial market opportunity in this area and I look forward to leading the strategic initiatives that will see Outsourcery accelerate growth and increase market share."

Ahead of the Draft Investigatory Powers Bill being published tomorrow, ISPA has produced a checklist for MPs and Lords to consider as they embark on 12 weeks of pre-legislative scrutiny via a Joint Committee.

The checklist's five main points are:

1. Full, extensive Parliamentary scrutiny and consultation with all stakeholders

2. Effective on a technical and public policy level

3. A stable framework that complies with all relevant legal obligations

4. Adequate balance of powers, oversight and transparency

5. Full consideration of impact on business.

"Overall ISPA supports new legislation as it updates the myriad of outdated legislation, and we believe the checklist should be followed to make sure new powers are effective, technically feasible and adequately balance the impact on business with security," said a spokesperson.

Azlan has extended the capabilities of its Business Solutions Centre (BSC) in Heathrow by equipping the demonstration facility with the latest IBM enterprise solutions and technologies.

Azlan has installed a range of the IBM solutions, including the company's Watson predictive analytics and data visualisation system, its Security software suite, Storage solutions, IBM VersaStack integrated infrastructure, the IBM PureData data management system and its scale-out Linux on Power offerings, within the BSC.

All the IBM solutions have been deployed to enable on-premises, cloud-based and hybrid scenarios to be set-up and demonstrated within the BSC. With immediate effect IBM partners will be able to apply to Azlan to set-up and run demonstrations, proof-of-concept testing and sales and technical training in the BSC. There is no charge to resellers for using the centre and Azlan's own technicians and professional services experts are available to assist partners at all times.

Rob Tomlin, Enterprise Business Unit Director for Azlan, said that the investment that Azlan has made to implement the latest IBM solutions within the BSC underlines its commitment to IBM and its partners.

He said: "We are seeing a real shift in the enterprise market towards solutions that can enable transformation and deliver competitive advantage. IBM has some the most sophisticated and advanced solutions in both of these areas and with the added investment we've made in the BSC and our team of dedicated IBM and professional services experts, Azlan is ready to help partners take full advantage of the opportunities that we now see developing around big data and analytics, advanced security and on-demand infrastructure solutions."

Astro Communications is opening up a new office location in Newark, Nottinghamshire.

Steve Hodges, Managing Director, commented: "with a growing number of staff based outside of the South East London and Kent areas and with customers located across the length and breadth of the country it makes sense that we have a permanent office for the team to be based at in the midlands.

"Dartford will continue to be our head office and the home of the network operations centre (NOC) but we will have a number of technical and sales staff based from Newark."

Astro has a strong partnership with Newark-based ISP Timico and the benefits of having an office location near the Timico data centre also helped in the decision as to where to locate the new office. Regular access to the data centre and the ability to readily engage with the teams there is key to ensuring a proactive as well as responsive service to Astro's customers.

Hodges continued: "By expanding our office locations to include sites in both the South East and the Midlands, we will not only continue to improve our ability to serve our existing and future customers but also increase the appeal of attracting new staff to the team from further afield.

"We have ambitious growth plans that are built around a strategy of a first class, professional and personalised customer experience matched with technical excellence and anything we can do to support that strategy is a great step forward."

Over recent years Astro has implemented a new strategy with the restructuring of its management team, a change in sales approach and key developments within its product portfolio including building a core network and becoming an independent ISP.

Avnet has completed the acquisition of Orchestra Service, a German IT distributor of storage solutions and services for EMC products.

Headquartered in Munich, Germany, Orchestra provides strong storage-centric expertise to help its customers grow and take advantage of the many opportunities that exist in areas such as cloud computing, big data and information management. Founded in 1998, Orchestra is a leading value-added distributor focused on backup and recovery, archiving, high availability replication and storage.

"The acquisition of Orchestra is part of our long term strategic plan to expand Avnet's solutions portfolio in the region while strengthening our EMC partnership in Germany," said Patrick Zammit, president of Avnet Technology Solutions, global.

"Orchestra's capabilities are an excellent complement to our converged infrastructure solutions offerings and enhance our ability to accelerate growth for our partners throughout the EMEA region."

Orchestra generated revenue of approximately $95 million in the 2014 calendar year. The acquisition is expected to be immediately accretive to Avnet earnings and achieve its return on capital goal of 12.5%.