Comms Dealer

Three charities are set to benefit when a team from Bury-based Pennine Telecom take part in a Top Gear style Bangers and Cash car challenge.

Led by sales director Geoff King the four strong team is set to journey across Europe in a 12- year-old BMW bought for just £395 to compete in the Gamma Ball Rally II.

The event will see them travelling over 1,000 miles in the Y-registration estate car on a journey that will take them from Newbury to Budapest via Brands Hatch, Bruges, Warburg and Vienna. Along the way they will also complete four laps of the infamous Nurburgring, a private motorsports track that includes a GP circuit.

Despite visiting both UK and German tracks the rally is not a race. Instead competitors will earn points by completing tasks set along the way. They must tackle the journey in a car which they have bought for less than £500 and, if it breaks down, face the embarrassment of completing the trip in the official back up vehicle - a pink Ford Ka!

The Pennine team's participation has already ensured that two charities are £500 better off. The rally's organiser - business communications and software services company Gamma - has arranged for all entry fees to directly benefit Action Through Enterprise, which aids starving Ghanaian children, and East Cheshire Hospice.

In addition Pennine are seeking to raise further funds for Bury Hospice which it already sponsors.

"It looks like a great challenge, one that promises a lot of fun, some potentially embarrassing moments and, whatever happens, will raise a good deal of money for some excellent charities," commented King. "We already support Bury Hospice and know the absolutely fantastic work it does so this is the perfect opportunity for us to raise funds for them. We encourage our customers and suppliers to donate via our JustGiving page."

The team will compete as "4 Mancs in a Car" with Geoff joined on the four day challenge by operations manager, Xavier Senelle, mobile business manager, Steve Tipper, and Adam Brierley, a Manchester-based account manager for Gamma.

The team will depart from Newbury on Wednesday 11th September and, if all goes well, are due to arrive in Budapest on Saturday 14th September. If and when they make it to the Hungarian capital they'll then attend a gala prize-giving dinner and a "money can't buy" charity auction. They can then choose whether to tackle the return journey in their jalopy or have it recycled and instead fly back. "I think we'll play that one by ear" says Geoff tentatively!

To sponsor 4 Mancs in a Car and support Bury Hospice visit www.justgiving.com/Pennine-Telecom.

Pragma has become Ericsson-LG's sole UK distributor following a period of growth in which Pragma, founded in 2012 by David George, Tim Brooks and Will Morey, demonstrated a high degree of competence and capability in the distribution and support of Ericsson-LG's end-to-end solutions from voice products to data and applications.

Ahed Alkhatib, Head of Enterprise Solutions international sales division of Ericsson-LG, said: "Ericsson-LG has decided to build on the early success and momentum by forging a closer relationship with Pragma. We will continue to invest in expanding our market share in the UK market with Pragma as our sole distributor."

Tim Brooks, Managing Director, Pragma commented: "With Ericsson-LG's product portfolio, its focus on support for the UK market, we are excited to be working together to grow our UK market share."

An upsurge in demand from the energy sector at home and overseas has spurred Xtreme Business Solutions to expand its workforce with eight new recruits.

The Westhill-based company's headcount now stands at 48 after winning a clutch of new contracts for clients including Transocean, Genesis and Technip.

Further major projects with a combined value of £1.2m have been secured for 2013, including rig fleet refurbishment work on behalf of Diamond Drilling and Transocean.

Over the past two years Xtreme has invested in specialist equipment and offshore survival training for its team of fibre and data engineers.

This investment has allowed the company to offer its clients in the energy sector a range of onshore and offshore communications solutions.

"It is encouraging that oil and gas companies are making use of our capabilities to tackle rig cabling, maintenance and refurbishment projects and overseas," said Graeme Duncan, MD.

"Over the past few months we have tackled a diverse range of jobs from the installation of complete network infrastructures in new office buildings to fibre work for CCTV systems on offshore rigs."

Communicate Better has snapped up Salford-based ConvergeOne for an undisclosed sum, its third acquisition this year. According to Wayne Cartwright, CEO of Communicate Better, the move enables the business to hit its target of doubling turnover for the third year running.

The acquisition will help us achieve a turnover of around £8m this financial year and improve our cloud offering," he said.

ConvergeOne, an IT and cloud solutions specialist, will enable Communicate Better to enhance its cloud services provision and offer new product offerings to the existing customer base.

ConvergeOne will become part of the Communicate Better group but continues to operate under the ConvergeOne name.

Existing staff are being retained, bringing additional technical expertise to the company and taking Communicate Better's employee numbers to over 60.

The acquisition includes a number of key contracts and a wide range of customers within the legal and associated sectors.

Cartwright added: "The acquisition has accelerated our development by around two years and also offers a significant opportunity for cross sales.

"We have no plans for further acquisitions in the remainder of the year and shall spend our time consolidating the business and ensuring continued customer service for all of our customers.

"However, needless to say, we are now looking for larger premises within the region to accommodate our growing team."

The acquisition comes after Communicate Better acquired SCT Systems and TTS Communications earlier this year.

Jabra has signed a new European contract with distribution partner Ingram Micro, building on their previous agreement in key regions and expanding the offer of Ingram Micro Advanced Solutions, the value-add division that provides resellers with the opportunity to grow their UC category.

The agreement also allows for the launch of SMB channel programmes and the Channel Transformation Alliance (CTA) education module, which will supply resellers with additional ways to maximise sales and services opportunities.

Christophe Mory, Senior Manager UC EMEA at Ingram Micro, said: "In the UK and in Germany our partnership with Jabra has been a great success and we're excited about the prospect of expanding our relationship into all of Europe."

Andrew Doyle, Senior Director, Jabra Channel Sales EMEA, commented: "This European agreement will allow Jabra to work with Ingram Micro to educate resellers on the importance of audio devices within UC deployments and enable them to offer optimised solutions that will increase their revenue and grow their headset category."

Senior Labour MP Andy Burnham officially opened the offices of managed services and cloud computing firm Intrinsic Technology.

Burnham, who is also shadow health secretary, cut the ribbon outside Intrinsic's new building at The Parks, Haydock, following a tour of the premises.

The office move caps off years of consistent growth for Intrinsic, with the business set to continue its impressive growth in the coming years.

The company also works in the healthcare sector, carrying out numerous ICT projects to help improve efficiency of hospitals and NHS trusts across the country.

Adam Jarvis, CEO at Intrinsic Technology said: "It was an honour to have Andy with us to officially open our new offices. Our move here was an important step, and we're in the perfect position now to really push on and expand further."

Burnham said: "It's always satisfying to see businesses in the North West enjoy such success on a national scale, and I take great pride in opening Intrinsic's new offices as it looks to build on its recent growth.

"I congratulate Adam and the team for the great work they continue to do, particularly in improving ICT in the healthcare sector, and wish them the very best for the future."

An epidemic of Nomophobia, the fear of being without a phone, has spread across the UK according to new research.

First identified in 2008, Nomophobia is still a problem for the majority of the population with over 54% suffering from the condition. Women suffer most and are 17% more likely to be afflicted by men, finds the survey.

The study among 1,000 people in employment, commissioned by AppRiver, found that people are now so obsessed with the need to be connected to their phones that even when they are away on their annual holiday, 42% will take their devices down to the beach with them.

The survey discovered that 28% of people will also look at their work emails while on away from home, with men slightly more eager to catch their emails than their female counterparts.

And it seems the bedroom, rather than a haven of relaxation, is instead another favourite place to work as 17% of people checking their emails in bed. Many risk indigestion as 25% feed their email addiction or text during a dinner date, with women once again 10% more likely to do so than men.

With phones now holding so much valuable information, it is worrying to note that just 50% of people bother to secure them with a password or any other form of security and 70% have no way to remotely wipe the device were their phone to be lost or stolen.

Fred Touchette, senior security analyst at AppRiver said: "It's clear that we're a society totally reliant on our phones not only for personal use but business use too. Even when we're away on holiday, lying in bed or on a dinner date many of us just can't help looking at our emails, no matter what time of day or the situation.

"What worries me is that, with so much information stored on them - from confidential office documents, contact details, emails, photos, bank log-ins, etc, when these devices get lost or stolen and end up in the wrong hands the information is so easily exploited as little to any security precautions are taken.

"Our advice is always to protect your phone with security - at the very least with a password, and if you're using it for work get your IT department to secure them with encryption or even better the ability to wipe them remotely."

The boss of cloud and colocation firm, UKFast, is launching a fund to help protect businesses from online threats.

UKFast's BASE (Building A Safer Environment) fund makes top quality security solutions available to businesses who can't cope with suddenly-inflated prices from IT companies hoping to cash-in on their fears of online attacks.

The pot of cash is put aside by Lawrence Jones - the entrepreneur behind Manchester's fastest-growing tech company - to help businesses add security features to their network and grow to the next level. UKFast grants £5,000 for each business that qualifies for the funding to boost their solution.

Jones says: "It is common place to have online shops hosted on networks and environments that aren't behind a firewall. Many trusted sites that you'd assume would take this seriously are opting out, knowing that customers never check.

"The problem is less about people's desires to create a safe environment and more to do with astronomical pricing for firewalls and online security.

"If making your website safe is cost prohibitive, it's often the things you cannot see that are compromised, quite literally.

"We want to make it easy. We are demonstrating our longer-term commitment by being prepared to invest in the clients' firewall too. The BASE Fund is designed to help businesses get the security they need.

"It makes sense and seems logical to me. It's a small price to pay when you consider the £12m we put into developing our own data centres.

"I'd like to think that one day all hosting providers will be doing the same.

"We're hearing from businesses who are seeing their security costs multiply because their hosting provider is taking advantage of growing fears around safety online. People are hearing more and more about DDoS attacks and some companies are using that to hike their prices up.

"Businesses are being forced to upgrade their firewalls and pay excessive costs for a basic safeguard. It's wrong! Britain's businesses shouldn't be held to ransom on this and forced to operate without the fundamental protections because of cost.

Jones is determined to protect business people from the kind of problems that can bring a company to its knees.

He added: "With the explosion of cloud, businesses are opting for convenience. It's quick and easy. Yet with data on US servers, often with little or no protection, it is a sure way to fail when things go wrong.

"We see both sides of the equation. Business people who have lost everything. If I can save one person from the despair that I have been unfortunate to witness in the past then it's worth the investment. We make our profits on retaining clients and building long term lasting relationships. I believe this is another sound way of building a safer environment together."

BASEfund provides anti-virus, backup systems, safety protocols and 24-hour monitoring at no extra cost for UKFast dedicated or managed hosting clients.

Grants of up to £5,000 per businesses are available to anyone hosting on the UKFast network.

Big hearted Richard Reid of Watford-based audio visual and telecommunications reseller RCS has netted £2,380 by completing the Rays of Sunshine Children's Charity Bike Ride with the help of sponsor New Star Networks.

The charity gives children living with serious or life threatening conditions and illnesses the chance to enjoy a moment of escape and an opportunity to realise their dreams.

The carrier router/switch market is coming back in 2Q13, with previous backslider Europe gaining too. Market research firm Infonetics Research released vendor market share and preliminary analysis from its 2nd quarter 2013 (2Q13) Service Provider Routers and Switches report.

"The 2nd quarter is usually up for carrier routers and switches, but this one is exceptional given the sluggishness of the past few years. Every major geographical region except Japan notched double-digit sequential growth and, more important, gained from the year-ago quarter," reports Michael Howard, principal analyst for carrier networks and co-founder of Infonetics Research.

"In Asia Pacific, carrier router and switch revenue jumped 45% from the previous quarter thanks in large part to Huawei's and ZTE's stellar performance," Howard adds. "And even recent laggard Europe/EMEA gained nicely, possibly signaling a pitch forward."

Globally, service provider router and switch revenue is up 27% in 2Q13 from 1Q13, to $4 billion, showing that service providers are ready to spend after holding back in the previous quarter. In the overall carrier router and switch market, Huawei gained 4 market share points in 2Q13, rising back into the #2 spot behind leader Cisco. IP edge (edge routers and carrier Ethernet switches) revenue grew 30% sequentially in 2Q13, attributable in part to an uptick in the move to 100GE on routers and 100G in optical transport.

Meanwhile, core routers grew the slowest quarter-over-quarter where Alcatel-Lucent, Cisco, Huawei and Juniper together account for about 90% of total router (edge and core) revenue in 2Q13. Over the past 2 years (4-quarter rolling average), Huawei gained the most edge and core router market share points of any vendor, up 5.6 points.