Comms Dealer

Genius Networks, a provider of global network services, has unveiled a new online Portal designed to give its resellers immediate access to a suite of services designed to increase competitive advantage.

Linked to best-of-breed carriers that support the Genius routing infrastructure, the Portal allows resellers to price and provision network connectivity from a single platform, enabling those at the smaller end of the market to work and compete at the speed and efficiency enjoyed by larger players.

The provisioning capability ensures simplicity in the process of delivering a network solution. Transparent access to all major carriers and all the Genius products ensures the most appropriate and cost effective solution can be put together. Other features include access to network monitoring, help desk support and marketing materials.

The Portal is provided as a white label service, allowing resellers to brand the user interface with their own styling, giving clients of managed service providers the confidence that comes with a consistent corporate identity.

Mike Walsh, Abzorb Director, has adopted the Portal using the Abzorb branding: "The Genius Portal offers full, transparent, online pricing and ordering. Working with Genius means we can offer the whole package from best-of-breed carrier connectivity to cloud services. Ordering through the Portal is slick, quick and simple."

James Arnold-Roberts, Genius Director, says: "Resellers are crying out for connectivity services that remove the complexity of provisioning and enhance speed of deployment both nationally and internationally. Genius has developed the Portal with the reseller in mind and we believe it provides them with everything they need to gain a competitive edge."

NEC's key distributors and business partners from over 40 countries across EMEA converged on the vendor's EMEA Partner Conference 2014 held in Cape Town (23-26 April).

The three day conference was themed 'Now! Next! NEC!' and saw Paul Kievit, President at NEC Enterprise Solutions, express his appreciation for the strong commitment the business partners have shown and congratulated them with their significant achievements.

"Our growing market penetration and expanding partner community is reflected in the increased number of participants, this year comprising more than 250 participants from different partner organisations across the region", said Kievit.

Awards presented during the Gala Dinner included those for top distributors, resellers, system integrators and selected areas of excellent performance.

"It is immensely inspiring to experience the enthusiasm of our business partners for our brand, our strategy and our portfolio. The awards we are presenting are recognition of our mutual commitment and business success. We look forward to a fruitful continuation of the way we are serving EMEA Enterprise IT & Communications markets together," said Ronald Schapendonk, Marketing Director at NEC Enterprise Solutions.

Spectralink's in-building wireless solutions based on DECT (Digital Enhanced Cordless Technology) have successfully completed interoperability verification testing with Cisco Unified Communications Manager version 9.1.

Spectralink DECT solutions integrate to Cisco Unified Communications environments to provide mobile communications for specialised working environments such as healthcare, manufacturing and retail. Specific solutions include the Spectralink IP-DECT Server 400 and Spectralink IP-DECT Server 6500, which power the Spectralink DECT handsets.

Spectralink IP-DECT solutions support seamless handover between base stations, extensive radio coverage, messaging to handsets and value-added. Spectralink also offers a license option that allows you to only pay for the users you need.

Sten Dyrmose, CEO at Spectralink, said: "Many businesses, both large and small, are looking to Cisco as an integral part of their UC roadmap and it's essential that our products can support that move."

Nimans has established a new business partnership with 2N, an international manufacturer of comms products such as analogue and IP gateways, intercoms and public address systems.

The alliance sees Nimans adding a new name to its brand line-up, stocking SIP door entry and PA systems as well as GSM gateways and a host of other products.

Purchasing Director Andy Winfield said: "2N is a European ICT company operating worldwide, specialising in the development and manufacture of telecommunication solutions which are exported to more than 125 countries around the world.

"Its product portfolio includes door and security intercoms, IP public address systems, M2M solutions and a wide range of GSM/UMTS gateways, LTE/UMTS routers and PBXs, focusing on SME, LME, system integrators and operators. This new alliance will open more sales doors for resellers and is a great fit for Nimans as we continue to evolve."

Scott Foster, 2N's UK Business Development Manager, added: "Nimans' long standing trading pedigree, industry reputation and large client base are a perfect combination to take our brand further forward," Scott explained.

STL's Sales Director Philip Donigan is limbering up to compete in the Blenheim Triathlon (June 7-8th) in aid of The Cystic Fibrosis Trust, a charity close to his heart.

"A very old friend of mine lost his brother to the condition when we were at school together in the Middle East," he explained. "My friend suffers from Cystic Fibrosis too and continues to fight a daily battle with the condition.

"Unfortunately there is currently no cure, so anything that can be done to raise awareness of the condition is a good thing. Any funds that can be raised for the trust will be most gratefully received."

To support Phil's charity challenge please visit www.justgiving.com/Philip-Donigan2

Genius Networks has launched two deals giving resellers the opportunity to profit from growing demand for network and voice services in the UK and Europe.

Prices for 10Mb, 100Mb and 1Gb Ethernet connectivity across the UK have been cut by up to 15%, while a bundle of SIP, MPLS and call billing services across Europe offer a low cost, profitable solution to resellers extending their client base overseas.

James Arnold-Roberts, Genius Networks Director said: "The two deals are the first in a long-term programme of activity designed to help our partners succeed in an increasingly competitive networking market.

"The deals are examples of how our core routing infrastructure and access to 'best of breed' global carriers give us important advantages in the cost and the agility of our services which we can pass on to our reseller partners."

Both deals, like all Genius Partner services, can be delivered under white label and backed up with a range of online support from the Genius Partner Portal, giving the partner direct access to pricing, monitoring, help desk and marketing services.

IT and computing professionals saw demand for their services increase further in April, but the Report on Jobs, published by KPMG and the REC, also showed that growth of demand for permanent IT workers softened slightly from March's recent peak.

Meanwhile, the latest rise in demand for temporary IT staff was slightly stronger than that seen one month previously.

The index measuring permanent IT staff demand registered 68.5, down marginally from 68.8 in March, placing the sector sixth out of nine in the demand for staff 'league table'. By comparison, the index for all types of permanent staff in the UK registered 67.3.

For temporary IT workers, the index rose from 63.7 in the prior month to 64.0 in April. This was slightly below the UK average of 65.0. The IT category was in fifth place in the demand for temp staff 'league table' during the latest survey period.

The index tracking demand for permanent employees in the IT & Computing sector has signalled stronger growth than that for temp staff for four-and-a-half years.

Heath Jackson, partner in the CIO Advisory practice at KPMG, said: "With starting salaries rising at their fastest rate for almost seven years and temporary placements in the IT sector stronger than that seen in the previous month, people would be forgiven for thinking that the time is right to change jobs. After all, for many months the focus has been around how long employees would wait before deciding it's time to try something new. Yet the truth is far different. The number of people putting themselves on the jobs market has dropped at its sharpest rate since 2004. It is this shortage of skilled labour that is forcing employers to tempt talent with improved pay, rather than new-found confidence.

"With employers focusing their attention on trying to win over talented people with proven skills and track records, there remains one unanswered question. We have growing numbers of new entrants to the marketplace looking for work and employers will ignore them at their peril. Not acknowledging what they have to offer continues the very real risk of losing a generation of talent - it makes no business sense, because without a blend of youth and experience the workplace will no longer reflect the marketplace.

"Of course, with the economy growing and the pound strengthening, we could potentially see this trend reversing in the near future. As consumers begin to spend more in their personal lives, confidence is likely to return in a professional capacity. When that happens, candidates are more likely to be looking for a new challenge, meaning that employers will have to focus equally on both retention and recruitment."

8x8, a provider of cloud contact centre and UCC solutions, has linked up with workforce optimisation (WFO) solutions provider KnoahSoft to deliver a bundled cloud-based contact centre solution.

The new offering combines KnoahSoft's enterprise-level interaction recording, quality management, coaching, learning, and analytics functionality with 8x8's multi-channel customer interaction management capabilities to help users better optimise call centre staff performance.

"8x8 and KnoahSoft have created a cloud-based solution for optimising the efficiency of call centre agents in single instance within 8x8's call centre solution," said 8x8 Senior Vice President of Business Development Huw Rees.

"This integrated cloud solution was developed to help organisations improve their customer relationships by making it easy to find agents who are not interacting well with customers and to improve these relationships."

8x8 Virtual Contact Centre and KnoahSoft Harmony function as a single SaaS instance helping enhance agent efficiency. The solution gives supervisors the data collected on customer interactions to help improve agent performance and reduce agent churn by enabling a collaborative environment through messaging, monitoring, e-learning and coaching modules.

DMSL is aiming to take the VoIP services market by storm following its link up with Plusnet.

The SMB-focused distributor of connectivity and cloud solutions is on a mission to advance Plusnet's proposition to partners with an invigorated hands-on strategy to drive sales of VoIP services and connectivity.

"Business efficiency is enhanced with VoIP services," said DMSL MD John Carter. "Staff are able to hot desk with an IP phone making them always available on a direct dial number. New users can be added almost instantly and a full set of features - voicemail, call forwarding, call recording, conferencing, auto attendant features and much more are all available. Meanwhile, integration with CRM systems enables even more efficient working and enhanced customer service.

"VoIP remains a big opportunity for dealers addressing the SMB market, but you need reliable broadband with prioritised service to make it truly effective."

Nick Silverwood, Head of Business for Plusnet, added: "VoIP offers significant potential for SMBs to reduce their costs with many smaller businesses looking to adopt this technology. To do this, they require a reliable business broadband platform, provided by a trusted brand, and the personal guidance of their local dealer. 

"Plusnet can provide a dependable and affordable broadband service over a network design that proactively prioritises VoIP traffic through protocol detection. This optimises the VoIP experience and ensures low latency needed to guarantee call quality, allowing local dealers to recommend VoIP to their customers with complete confidence."

With a primary focus on broadband, Plusnet has 17 years experience in providing Internet service solutions to small businesses across the UK.

Technology IPOs in Europe are lagging behind other markets though the continent is ranked second in all funds raised for IPOs across all other sectors in Q1 2014, says PwC newest study on Global Technology IPO Review.

Rising investor confidence coupled with Chinese stock exchanges led to a very strong quarter for technology IPOs. And year over the total number of technology IPOs saw a 160% growth while its value increased fourfold to $6.8bn (€4.9bn), the study says.

In terms of countries the top performers were China, Japan, Ireland and the US.

In the first quarter of 2014 twelve IPOs were completed in the US against eight completed in Q4 2013. Overall US IPO proceeds went up by 71% y/y to $1.6bn (€1.15bn) with US being the most active country in Tech IPO in Q1 2014. At the same time Europe saw only one tech IPO completion at $500m (€358.9m). According to Raman Chitkara, Technology Industry Leader at PwC, Europe entered into a new aberration pattern after it experienced a very strong Q4 2013.

He says: "Momentum from Q4 2013 led to a very strong start for technology IPOs in 2014. Investors continue to demonstrate a strong appetite for high-growth companies with disruptive technologies. This should lead to continuation of a positive environment for technology IPOs in 2014."

Breakdown by subsectors shows that internet software and services accounted for 42% of deals in Q1 however it was ranked second in terms of the overall value which stood by $1.8bn (€1.3bn). It was overtaken by computer storage and peripherals subsector which raised around $3.8bn (€2.7bn).