Comms Dealer

Channel friends of the Fidelity Group set off for a fun day at the Henley Regatta on June 30th after an early morning Mad Hatter's tea party at the company's HQ. Pictured is MD Alan Shraga with guests suitably attired for a day in Wonderland!

Alex Proud, founder of London's Proud venues, and Venus Business Communications presented the benefits of being a 'Gigabit Business' at a 'super-connected' event during London Tech Week.

The event showcased how Proud Camden, which is connected via Venus' London fibre network, has transformed into a Gigabit business, realising significant savings through resource efficiencies.

These include reduced computing costs, more reliable connectivity for faster transactions, and the ability to stream HD CCTV direct to police for safety.

Proud Camden is also protected against costly and lengthy broadband downtime, which would have a dramatic impact on customer payments for example.

Brian Iddon CEO at Venus said: "This event raised awareness of the opportunities for resellers in economic centres such as London that need more reliable connectivity, faster data speeds and the need for quality infrastructure. Currently just two per cent of the UK has fibre to their premises."

Proud Camden has been connected to Venus' London fibre network for five years. Proud Galleries and Proud Camden founder, Alex Proud commented: "Upgrading to Gigabit connectivity throughout our Camden venue is one of the best business decisions I have made.

"Our venue is always full of tech savvy customers online 24/7 while enjoying drinks in our terrace bar, stables or cabaret room. The additional bandwidth has improved the day-to-day performance of our Internet based services such as WiFi and internal booking systems, through to cloud telephony."

Venus worked with its partner Correct Group to provide a one stop shop solution for Proud Camden. Nick Brennan, Technical Director said: "Correct Group manage the IT solutions for Proud helping to deliver real business benefits, from efficient business operation to an excellent customer experience. We need to be confident that our client's IT systems are supported by reliable ultra-fast connectivity, so we partner with Venus who have a strong track record and local support engineers.

"The consequences of interruptions or slow connections can be damaging to productivity and the bottom line. More businesses are turning to fibre to premises to take advantage of reliable ultra-fast connectivity. Proud Camden is leading the way in the London Club scene and we anticipate others will follow, generating significant business opportunities to better engage with their customers."

Over 50 ShoreTel channel partners plus 90 other delegates converged on The Leadenhall building in London (also known as the Cheese Grater) fopr ShoreTel's annual UK&I Partner Forum.

The event's overriding theme, 'Driving Differentiation in UC', provided a backdrop to ShoreTel's ramped up ambition to to recruit new cloud-ready partners.

Gary Gould, EMEA Marketing Director, said: "This event showcased ShoreTel's commitment to partnership and the channel, as well as its focus on innovation in UC, both in the cloud and in the contact centre.

"More importantly, partners and attendees were highly satisfied with the event and voted 98 per cent good to excellent in terms of experience, which means we're engaging well with partners and helping them to drive differentiation in UC."

Event speakers included Darren Pattie, UK&I Sales Director; Adrian Hipkiss, VP & MD EMEA, who discussed how ShoreTel's global strategy supports growth in EMEA, highlighting ShoreTel Connect.

Gould offered insights into how the ICT sector can differentiate in a digital environment; while Spencer Bradshaw, Head of Solution Architects, also revealed the latest insights into the ShoreTel UC portfolio.

Pattie closed the Partner Forum by awarding Response Data Communications a recognition award for Cloud Business Excellence 2016.

A prize draw took place for an Apple Watch which raised £530 from on-the-day partner donations for the Jack Raine Foundation - ShoreTel's EMEA Charity of the Year.

London-based Telecoms World has joined the Cycle to Work Scheme which encourages exercise and minimises carbon footprints.

The scheme is a HMRC approved employee benefit designed to give employees the opportunity to purchase new bicycles and equipment worth up to £1,000.

Neil Barrall, MD, said: "The majority of our staff live within a few miles of the office and generally commute by car or bus.

"As well as promoting exercise and reducing carbon footprints, this scheme also helps us to reduce congestion and parking issues in our local area.

"Not only will supplying employees with new bicycles and equipment benefit our staff, employees make tax and National Insurance savings as well as saving up to 50% on new bicycles and equipment.

"Our employees have already said how they feel more alert, more productive and more energetic when they arrive at the office which is really great news to hear.

"Anything that makes our staff fitter and feel more motivated is a real win for me, so I hope that encourages even more employers to introduce a Cycle to Work Scheme and get their workforce moving."

Robert Kitchen, Marketing Manager, added: "We've had a number of staff already join the scheme who love the fact they can now use their bike at the weekends and leave their car at home. The scheme offers some great health benefits as well as the opportunity to save a considerable amount of money."

Pictured: Emily Kangar, Provisioning Agent

Metronet (UK) has extended its services with the addition of Purple analytics.

Using Cisco Meraki Access Point software, Purple's analytics enables Metronet (UK) to provide customers with access to useful data enabling them to engage with customers seamlessly.

One of Metronet's (UK) main routes to market is via its landlord and agent property channel, giving customers access to high speed Internet connectivity and Wi-fi for their tenants in communal areas and connectivity for intelligent buildings and BMS.

Bill Williams, Sales Director UK & Africa at Purple, said: "We're able to provide analytics services across Metronet's retail, leisure and hospitality sectors, and its landlord and property channel, creating a seamless Wi-fi and analytics package."

Sabio collected a brace of awards at Verint's EMEA Partner Summit staged in Portugal, picking up the Partner of the Year and Support Partner of the Year 2016 gongs.

"Winning Verint's two major EMEA partner awards is a great accolade for Sabio, reflecting not only our business performance over the last 12 months but also the services wrap that Sabio is able to provide to support Verint's customer engagement optimisation solutions," said Craig Pumfrey, Head of Marketing at Sabio.

"Having worked with Verint's EMEA operation and its technology solutions for over 16 years now, Sabio operates as a trusted business partner. We look forward to building on our strong partnership, further investing in our Verint skills and capabilities, and continuing to provide our customers with an end-to-end resource for all their customer engagement optimisation requirements."

Pictured: Ken Hitchin (Director) and Daniel Stimpson (Head of WFO) from Sabio receive the 2016 Partner of the Year award from Nick Nonini, Managing Director EMEA at Verint.

Avaya has appointed Fadi Moubarak as Channel Leader for Avaya International which covers Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

This role will see Moubarak spearhead a new channel strategy focused on driving digital transformation in the enterprise and mid-market sectors.

Moubarak has been with Avaya since 2013 overseeing the channel engagement strategy for the AMEA region, while keeping it aligned with sales execution and coverage to drive incremental business.

Moubarak has been in the technology sector since 1990 and holds a Bachelors in Electrical Engineering from the American University of Beirut, and an MBA from the Edinburgh Business School. Based in Dubai, Fadi is also a board member of the American-Lebanese Chamber of Commerce.

Nidal Abou-Ltaif, President, Avaya International, said: "Fadi's deep understanding of the channel community priorities and the regional business environment has been a strong driver of Avaya's success in the MENA region. I am confident that he will continue to help drive our go-to-market strategy and achieve equal and greater success in this new role covering a wider and more diverse region."

Midland Networks has rolled out a new free Pro-Active Broadband Support service on all business broadband packages.

The service is designed to increase transparency and improve the quality of service that broadband customers receive.

With proactive monitoring, Midland Networks is able to detect any connectivity issues early, inform the customer and take immediate action to resolve the issue.

Broadband connections are monitored 24/7 and customers are contacted straight away if any issues are detected, such as a drop in connection.

This means that resolution begins immediately, regardless of the time of day or night, in order to ensure that disruption and downtime is kept to an absolute minimum.

Customers also receive regular reports with their connectivity stats including uptime, downtime and response times.

This forms part of a drive to improve customer satisfaction following disappointing results in the national surveys of business broadband customers.

Midland Networks is also offering its Pro-Active Broadband Support Service as a white labelled service to other resellers on a per-connection basis.

Radius Communications will make its inaugural appearance at the third annual Central and Eastern European (CEE) 2016 Global Carrier Community Meeting (GCCM) as a silver sponsor.

The two-day GCCM event will take place at the Adlon-Kempinski Hotel in Berlin on the 28th and 29th June, bringing together over 450 members of the Global Carrier Community, including hundreds of telecoms operators and tier 1 network providers, as well as a range of enterprise clients from SMEs through to large multinational corporations.

The Carrier Community is an exclusive global telecom club and industry networking platform for wholesale telecom service providers.

It was founded to enhance business opportunities across the industry's various sectors through contact and the exchange of information within a central and transparent environment.

Every year, the Carrier Community hosts a range of annual networking meetings in locations across the globe, from London and Berlin to Dubai, Cape Town and Rio de Janeiro.

Radius Communications is a member of the Redwood Technologies Group. The company will sponsor the event's opening coffee reception as well as the first evening's networking event, with VPs, Directors and Senior Managers from over 50 countries expected to attend.

Martin Taylor, CMO of Radius Communications, will also deliver a keynote address within the Enterprise Connect Lounge of the event, where a range of panel sessions and presentations will be held over the course of the two days.

Taylor's speech on 'Multi-channel PBX and Contact Centres: A Burrito in Berlin,' will take a look at how the diverse layers of multi-channel cloud communications infrastructure, such as the storm® platform, can seamlessly interoperate and reap benefits for German city carriers, other network operators and consumers alike.

Taylor commented: "Our Group has been involved with German city carriers since the late nineties, when their in-network services platforms presaged today's cloud offerings.

"Now, with analysts such as BITKOM predicting that the German cloud market will grow by an annual average of a third in the coming years, we're excited to re-engage with this growing market as we continue to build our cloud presence in Germany, across Europe and beyond."

The industry can expect a short and medium-term impact on enterprise IT investment following today's Brexit vote, but the regulatory impact will be minimal, according to Ovum analysts.

"Senior executives will want to prepare their core systems for any implications of revised trading and legislative agreements, and may postpone investment in non-mandatory IT projects such as digital transformation until the needs of the business-as-usual environment become clearer," said Tim Jennings, Chief Research Officer, Enterprise IT Management.

"Ovum's conversations with enterprise IT leaders suggest that few have planned or prepared for the changes that might be required as a consequence of Brexit.

"This is understandable given the unprecedented situation in which the UK now finds itself, but is likely to increase the level of caution that is applied to ongoing investments in business improvement and more speculative innovation projects, and may also play out against a potential downturn in the macroeconomic environment.

"This IT budget uncertainty will persist for at least the two-year EU withdrawal process, but beyond that time frame the level of uncertainty will be dependent on the clarity of the UK's future trading arrangements with Europe and other global partners."

Brexit will have minimal impact on the UK's regulatory environment, believes Luca Schiavoni, Senior Analyst, Regulation, at Ovum.

"It is highly likely that the UK will continue to be part of the European Economic Area (EEA) and the European approach to regulation borrows a great deal from the UK's experience of privatisation and market liberalisation.

"It is unlikely that the UK will adopt a radically different regulatory approach, which will still be characterised by regular market reviews."