Comms Dealer

Gamma is promising further developments to its Horizon hosted telephony platform in the next year including Skype for Business integration, more CRM options, call recording and an upgrade to the latest version of Broadsoft's UC service.

"We have made it a priority to ensure Horizon integrates with customer businesses, especially those utilising Skype for Business," said Gamma Product Manager Alan Mackie.

The call centre version of Gamma's Horizon hosted platform launched last autumn has given Gamma resellers the chance to target larger organisations, according to Product Director Alan Mackie.

Speaking at Gamma's London partner roadshow event this month he said: "With the solution customer agents can log in and log out and select their call status and supervisors can monitor and determine agent status and barge into calls. We have created administrator functions for each site which is useful for larger deployments or multi-site organisations."

Gamma is set to rollout a new Ethernet metro network in London this June giving resellers the opportunity to sell converged Fibre to the Cabinet (FTTC) services to businesses in the capital from the summer.

This comes hot on the heels of last year's launch of Gamma's Converged Private Networks portfolio built around the company's MPLS core network, which empowers its Horizon and SIP Trunk hosted applications.

At Gamma's London partner roadshow event James Bushell, Head of Product Lines, said: "By becoming an Ethernet carrier we can now offer a robust high bandwidth service. London is just the start of a complete UK rollout which will give our partners much better prices to take to market."

Gamma also pledged connectivity with Virgin's data network by May and TalkTalk's by June/July.

Gamma has unveiled its new SIP Trunk Call Manager software solution which will give end user inbound customers the opportunity to manage their own numbers via an intuitive portal and app.

Available from May, the product is aimed at giving Gamma partners an edge when persuading customers to move to SIP trunks from ISDN, which will become obsolete by 2020.

Speaking at the Gamma partner roadshow VAR Head of Channel Matt Worboys said: "The SIP trunking market is continuing to grow at 25% per annum and the market is looking for more than just cost savings."

Gamma claims the new SIP Call Manager solution, which can be provisioned by a 'Point and Click' set up on the Gamma portal, will provide instant inbound call control and business agility by converging 01, 02, 03 and 08 number estates into a single management platform.

The company says it will also free up partner helpdesk resources and give partners improved margins via DDI rentals.

"SIP Trunk manager is a business continuity package that's easy to provision and gives our partners a margin rich up-sell opportunity. Any prospects partners had before that were cautious about SIP can be sold the business continuity advantages," added Worboys.

Gamma's just-launched MultiNet mobile business service will give its MVNO partners the edge when competing with the big four carriers, claims the company.

Using MultiNet, connections made on Gamma's new 4G service will now 'hop' seamlessly from one carrier network to the next strongest one, wherever there is a signal in the UK.

Announcing the 'bolt on' solution at the London leg of Gamma's 2016 partner roadshow Rob Davis, Head of Converged Products, told partners: "Better coverage is needed in 21% of the UK where there are partial 'not spots' which includes 10% of A roads and 16% of B roads.

"This can be sold to any customer seeking premium reliable coverage such as multi-site companies or those who live or work in rural areas."

Gamma also promised no more CDR delays for MVNO partners because all UK and roaming data will route through Gamma's mobile core which supports multiple networks.

A business grade voicemail has been added to the mobile service too, offering different greetings inside and outside office hours, different greetings for different calls and longer message storage.

Gamma CEO Bob Falconer said: "It is our strategy to stay ahead of the game with disruptive products and services and our new mobile offerings will enable our partners to compete successfully with the likes of Vodafone and O2."

A new study from Juniper Research predicts that at least 1 in 3 home routers will be used as public Wi-Fi hotspots by 2017, and that the total installed base of such dual-use routers will reach 366 million globally by the end of 2020.

The new research - Wi-Fi Hotspots: Deployment Strategies & Forecasts 2016-2020 - noted that these so-called 'homespot' routers essentially create two wireless networks separated by a firewall: one network is for private use whilst the other is offered as a public Wi-Fi hotspot by the broadband operators.

Major broadband operators such as BT, UPC, and Virgin Media in Europe and several of the biggest cable TV operators in the US such as Comcast and Cablevision, have adopted the homespot model as a low-cost way of rapidly expanding their domestic Wi-Fi coverage.

The research pointed out that the rapid expansion of Wi-Fi in this way is also giving rise to a number of global Wi-Fi aggregators such as iPass, which leases its network on a wholesale basis to such as telcos, cable operators, and corporate customers.

The research argued that broadband services were not necessarily making it clear to consumers that their home routers were in effect supporting public Wi-Fi initiatives. It cautioned that when consumers become aware of this dual-use, there was the real possibility of a backlash.

"While most operators now allow consumers to opt-out, if they so wish, most consumers simply have no idea that their routers are being used in this way," said research author, Gareth Owen. "Given the current concerns around privacy and data security, the realisation that home routers can be accessed by complete strangers is unlikely to be viewed in a positive light."

Nevertheless, the research highlighted the consumer benefits that the policy offers, such as free or reduced-fee access to the operator's homespot network.

Vodafone has established a global unit targeting digital security for its enterprise customers. Vodafone Enterprise Security Services (VESS) will roll up the company's existing security products under new area CEO Simon Church, previously CEO at NTT Security.

The group will cooperate with a number of strategic security partners and target areas such as cloud-based protection, network perimeter management, threat detection and response, and an assessment/advisory practice dealing with policy development, risk management and compliance.

Equinix has revamped its training and certification programme to offer two levels of certification targeted at managed service providers, network service providers, system integrators and solution providers.

Equinix added more than 350 partners in 2015 and the new changes to its channel engagement operation aim to build on this momentum.

Notable partners that have joined the global programme since its launch include Avant, Dimension Data, Hanu, KBQuest and VMtech.

Equinix has strategic partnerships with cloud service providers including AWS, Cisco, Google Cloud Platform, IBM SoftLayer, Microsoft Azure, NetApp, and Oracle.

Imago ScanSource's policy of nurturing home grown talent has again come to fruition with the appointment of Maryam Arbabi (pictured) as Head of Products and Marketing UK and Nick Waldeck as Head of Southern UK Sales

Arbabi joined the company over seven years ago as an Internal Account Manager on the sales team and worked her way up to Sales Manager for the south west region. 

Part of her remit was to implement marketing and sales promotion programmes for vendors and to run business growth campaigns in association with resellers.

Waldeck came to Imago ScanSource in 2005 working in the marketing department and has since held a number of roles including product management with responsibility for developing key manufacturers.

He later moved into a sales role and was named Top Sales Person of The Year before becoming Sales Manager for the south east area.

James Vickerage, VP for UK&I, said: "Maryam and Nick are two of the company's rising stars. Our strategy is to develop our best talent and to promote from within wherever possible."

The CBI is to make the economic case to remain in the EU having reaffirmed a strong member mandate in an independent survey by polling company ComRes.

The majority of CBI member companies, which together employ nearly 7 million people (about one third of private sector employees) believe that it would be in the best interests of their business and the wider UK economy to remain inside the EU.

The survey revealed 80% of CBI members believe that the UK remaining a member of the EU would be best for their business. Overall, 5% say it is in their firms' best interests for the UK to leave the EU, with 15% unsure.

Carolyn Fairbairn, CBI Director-General, said: "The message from our members is resounding, most want the UK to stay in the EU because it is better for their business, jobs and prosperity.

"Walking away makes little economic sense and risks throwing away the many benefits we gain from being part of the EU.

"Our members tell us that having guaranteed access to a tariff-free market of 500 million people, and to more than 30 global trade deals covering 50 countries, are significant advantages that outweigh the frustrations.

"A minority of members want to leave the EU. We will continue to respect and reflect their views and campaign for EU reform to get a better deal for all businesses.

"However, most CBI members are unconvinced that alternatives to full membership would offer the same opportunities. We have yet to see those who seek to leave the EU present a compelling vision of what this would mean for jobs and growth.

"We will not align ourselves with any campaign. Though prosperity, jobs and future living standards matter to many people, we recognise there will be other considerations. It is not our place to tell people how to vote, but the CBI will play its role in making the economic case for remaining in the EU."