Comms Dealer

The power of education as a door opener to adjacent markets has been emphatically underscored by the success of Daisy Distribution's Partner Academy launched in April.

The scheme has already seen scores of mobile-centric partners extend their portfolios and market reach in areas once alien to them.

Dave McGinn, Daisy Distribution MD, said: "Airtime was our bread and butter, it's our heritage and many of our partners' too. So to expect them to just grasp connectivity, Wi-Fi and cloud etc overnight would be foolish of us. That is how the Partner Academy came about."

Six sessions have been completed by 64 partner delegates with a further 94 booked into the scheme.

The distributor has already seen 45 of those traditional mobile partners place orders for lines and calls, broadband, Ethernet, hosted voice, mobile and Wi-Fi.

"It's fantastic to see in such a short space of time how these sessions have helped our historically mobile-centric partners open up their businesses to new opportunities," added McGinn.

"It's about us connecting with our partners in a way that allows them to connect with their customers and play an important part in their digital journeys."

Subjects covered by the Partner Academy so far include Daisy's hosted voice solution HV.Select, Break-fix Maintenance, Daisy Wi-Fi and Intelligent Mobile.

Two more themes will be added later in the year -Connectivity for Productivity and the Digital Workplace.

Channel Telecom MD Clifford Norton is already in a full swing of anticipation ahead of the firm's upcoming annual partner golf day, the ninth of its kind and this year staged at the dazzling RAC Club, Woodcote Park in Surrey, on July 27th.

"This exceptional course offers players the opportunity to enjoy one of the most superior golfing day's available in the country and we're thrilled to be able to share the experience with our hard working partners," he enthused.

"This event is a key date in our calendar. It's a great way to network and keep up to date with industry peers, and it's a token of appreciation that we are able to extend to our loyal associates. Bring your game, it's going to be a great day!"

A deal between Welsh mobile network RWG Mobile and broadcaster S4C will catalyse the development of a digital platform to provide RWG's customers with S4C content including coverage of live sporting events on their mobile phones.

The deal follows investments in RWG Mobile by Finance Wales and S4C's commercial subsidiary SDML.

RWG Mobile launched its mobile network less than a year ago targeting the Welsh market and aims to secure 90,000 new customers within its first three years.

RWG Mobile founder and CEO Andrew Davies said: "In bringing together a media company and our mobile network we aim to share information, develop our capabilities and open the door to creating a cross-platform communications company for the future.

"The bigger mobile networks use their size and buying power to leverage deals and offers from lots of different providers, such as tickets to concerts or sporting events for example, but these offers are not always relevant to people living and working in Wales.

"Our model is based on local partnerships and, as our subscriber base grows, we will develop an incentive programme that meets the needs of our users."

Figures suggest that one in ten Welsh consumers access the Internet exclusively through a mobile phone, thought to be more than twice the UK average.

RWG Mobile delivers mobile communication via its own SIM card that offers pan-Wales and UK coverage as well as international roaming capability and 4G connection.

To complement the service the company has developed and launched an app for Apple and Android smartphones and tablets, allowing customers to use multiple numbers to make and receive calls over the Internet using Wi-Fi connection.

"The business and farming communities in Wales will appreciate the value and advantages of the app as it allows calls to be made using their business number where mobile signals are weak, helping to negate the notorious 'not spots' effect within Wales," added Davies

Elin Morris, Corporate and Commercial Director at S4C, added: "S4C viewers will be able to watch our content without eating into their mobile phone's data allowance."

Pictured: RWG Mobile founder and CEO Andrew Davies

AudioCodes has signed a pan-EMEA distribution agreement with distribution business Nuvias. The move follows the launch of Nuvias' Unified Communications (UC) Practice across EMEA.

Nuvias is now able to offer end-to-end solutions and technical support for Skype for Business and BroadSoft Business UC environments, based on AudioCodes' Session Border Controllers (SBCs) and handsets.

As part of the agreement, Nuvias has also been appointed as master distributor for AudioCodes' range of Skype for Business and SIP handsets across EMEA, to ensure a rapid response to meet growing demand from the channel.

AudioCodes worked with SIPHON Networks in the UK for two years prior to SIPHON being acquired by the Nuvias Group at the end of 2016, and AudioCodes now sees the opportunity to replicate this successful relationship across EMEA.

The initial focus will be on 16 key countries where Nuvias is already well established including DACH, France, Spain, Italy and the Nordics.

The worldwide total converged systems market increased 4.6% year-over-year to $2.67bn during the first quarter of 2017, according to analyst house IDC, including a big jump in hyperconverged sales.

Hyperconverged revenues grew 64.7% year-over-year during the first quarter, generating $665.1m in sales, amounting to 24.9% of the total converged market value.

"Converged systems have become an important source of innovation and growth for the data centre infrastructure market," said Eric Sheppard, an analyst at IDC.

"These solutions represent a conduit for the key technologies driving much needed data centre modernisation and efficiencies such as flash, software-defined infrastructure and private cloud platforms."

IDC's converged systems market view covers four segments - integrated infrastructure, certified reference systems, integrated platforms and hyperconverged systems.

"A key characteristic of hyperconverged systems that differentiate these solutions from other integrated systems is their scale-out architecture, and their ability to provide all compute and storage functions through the same x86 server-based resources." added Sheppard.

During the first quarter, IDC said the combined integrated infrastructure and certified reference systems market generated revenues of $1.37bn, which represented a year-over-year decrease of 3.3% and 51.3% of the total market.

Dell EMC was the largest supplier of this combined market segment with $647.8m in sales, or 47.2% share of the market segment. Dell EMC was followed by the Cisco/NetApp alliance in second place and HPE.

Integrated platform sales declined 13.3% year-over-year during the first quarter, generating $635.9m worth of sales. This amounted to 23.8% of the total market revenue.

Oracle was the top-ranked supplier of integrated platforms, generating revenues of $348.7m and capturing a 54.8% share of the segment. Oracle was followed by HPE in second, and IBM and Hitachi who tied for third.

Struggling outsourcing firm Capita has sold its Capita Asset Services (CAS) business to Sydney-headquartered Link Administration Holdings for £888m in cash to help reduce its debts.

CAS provides asset and company administration, sourcing investment, distribution, governance, finance and accounting and data analytics.

There will be £72m in costs related to cutting out CAS from the wider Capita business, including a £17m one-off pension contribution at the Leeds-headquartered business. Link provides outsourced administration services and employs 4,300 people across 11 countries.

Capita issued its first-ever profit warning last year, related to the IT reseller and recruitment sector segments of the business, and problems with a couple of big outsourcing contracts.

Capita CEO Andy Parker, who resigned in March and who will leave once his replacement is found, said of the CAS sale: "Last year, we set out a strategy to simplify and streamline Capita by repositioning the group and refocusing on delivering technology-enabled business and customer management solutions that make business processes smarter and deliver better customer service.

"This disposal is an important step in realising this strategy. We have achieved an attractive price and the reduction in leverage is significant."

Bitglass has signed distribution agreements with a number of distributors across EMEA to drive sales for its cloud access security broker (CASB) and agent-less mobile security solution.

US-headquartered Bitglass entered the EMEA market at the beginning of this year. It has now signed distribution agreements with Ignition in the UK, NEOVAD in France and Lidera Networks for both the Spanish and Portuguese markets.

Bitglass offers real-time, end-to-end data protection for cloud apps, including Office 365, Salesforce and the G Suite to devices.

"There has been a huge surge in demand for cloud security from enterprises as cloud adoption accelerates," said Eduard Meelhuysen, VP sales EMEA at Bitglass.

"We look forward to building close relationships with partners in the region."

Sean Remnant, chief strategy officer at Ignition Technology, said: "The increasing demand for solutions that protect data across cloud environments and mobile devices has started to manifest into real budget lines which is a great opportunity for our channel partners."

"Adding Bitglass to our growing portfolio of software-based security solutions allows our channel partners to address many of their customers' growing data protection challenges, including GDPR, shadow IT, BYOD and the prolific rise of malware. We're already working with a handful of strategic partners and are looking to grow to around eight focused UK partners in total."

In February 2017, Bitglass announced a new technology partnership with intelligent AV vendor Cylance to bring advanced threat protection to the cloud and BYOD. The combined solution is designed to stop the proliferation of 'all threats', including zero day exploits, on any device - managed or unmanaged - and any enterprise cloud application.

With such a wide range of solutions, and engagement just a click or two away, the managed services industry faces a challenge in how it chooses which products and which other partners to work with, according to IT Europs.

"In recent months we have seen many initiatives from distribution, vendors and managed services players to help build a co-operative approach to solving customer business issues, but it is not easy," says John Garratt, director of the Managed Services & Hosting Summit to be held in London on 20th September.

"The managed services market is in a very healthy state, but needs to evolve further to meet the challenges posed by rising customer demand for digital transformation."

The scale of the challenge and the opportunities it creates will be the focus of the first keynote to be announced for the event: Mark Paine - Research Director at Gartner will present on 'Do You Have What It Takes To Sell Digital Business Solutions?'.

Most digital business solutions, especially IoT, comprise products and services from a number of sources. No one provider can do it all, he says. "So how do you choose the right partners and how do you shape your go-to-market strategy? This presentation will explain why a co-ordinated approach is so important in digital business and how to go about it," he says.

The demand for IT provision as a managed service continues to rise. The pace of change of technological advance also continues to accelerate and with over two-thirds of enterprise customers planning to review and change their IT sourcing in the next two years, competition amongst Managed Service Providers (MSPs) looks set to be severe.

With more vendors now entering the sector this year's Managed Services & Hosting Summit is attracting record levels of both delegates and sponsors. Leading industry names already signed as sponsors include: SolarWinds MSP, Highlight, Mimecast, Datto, Kaspersky, ConnectWise, Kingston Technology, Autotask ESET, DataCore Software, Cisco, WatchGuard, Continuum, Deltek, RapidFireTools, Altaro, APC by Schneider Electric and Kaseya.

For many in the audience, the interest will be in learning how other MSPs successfully built their sales and business models and the agenda will feature several presentations from MSPs themselves on how they have grown their business and partnered to deliver new technologies or extend coverage and support.

The Managed Services and Hosting Summit-UK 2017 will take place at 155 Bishopsgate, London, on 20 September 2017 and is organised by IT Europa and Angel Business Communications.

Despite their awareness of a widening skills gap within their workforces many organisations are struggling to find solutions to narrow the gaps, according to a report from CompTIA.

Nearly half (46 percent) of the 600 executives surveyed for the report 'Assessing the IT Skills Gap' believe skills shortcomings within their organisations have grown over the past two years.

Skills gaps are not confined to technology alone, the surveyed revealed. Executives also reported skills issues in areas such as marketing, sales and business development, operations, customer service, and accounting and finance.

"The 'skills gap' is often a catch-all phrase for other workplace challenges, such as a labour supply gap or generational differences in work styles," said Charles Eaton, CompTIA's executive vice president for social innovation and CEO of Creating IT Futures.

"But whatever the cause there is clearly a wide chasm between the skills employers want and their perception of the skills their workers have."

The consequences of workforce skills gaps can affect many areas - lower staff productivity, lower sales and profitability, delays in bringing new products and services to market, and losing ground to competitors.

Yet just one in three organisations said they have a formal process and resources in place to address their skills gap challenges. The remaining companies reported having only an informal process or no process at all.

"More than half of organisations acknowledge they struggle in identifying and assessing skills gaps among their workforce," said Amy Carrado, senior director, research and market intelligence, CompTIA.

"Knowing what to fix must precede discussions of how to fix it, and to fix it soon. The breadth and pace of innovation point to a widening skills gap, putting further pressure on organisations."

The speed of innovation is one of the biggest challenges companies face in keeping their employees skills up to date, a challenge that show no sign of abating.

"Organisations testing the waters with the Internet of Things, artificial intelligence, robotics, and other emerging technologies face even greater skills gaps due to the fast-moving nature of these innovations," Carrado noted. "It takes time for training materials to reach the market and for opportunities to gain hands-on experience to arise."

Four directors from South West Communications Group have scaled the UK's highest three peaks to raise money for the Prince's Trust.

swcomms' MD Brian Lodge and fellow board members Jon Whiley, John Holdstock and Sean Doyle climbed Ben Nevis, Scafell Pike and Snowdon in 23 hours and 20 minutes to beat the required Three Peaks Challenge 24-hour deadline.

They also achieved this 29 mile, 3,064 metre feat on one of the hottest days of the year.

Lodge said: "It was an experience I'll never forget. I was very proud of the total commitment shown from a great team who despite some serious pain never had it in their heads to fail."

ICT director John Holdstock added: "It was one of the most physically enduring thing I have ever participated in. However, it was also one of the most fun things I have been part of. It's a thin line between pain and ecstasy!"

Engineering director Sean Doyle, however, whose knees were strapped for the entire challenge was more concerned about the pain.

He said: "It hurt up mountain one. It hurt more up mountain two. It hurt so much more on mountain three. I will never walk up a mountain again! Other than that, I really enjoyed it."