Comms Dealer

Converged systems are now established as go-to platforms for customers' mission-critical workloads.

According to the Technology Business Research (TBR) Converged Systems Market Landscape, converged systems continue to displace traditional, stand-alone infrastructure, establishing the market as critical to the future longevity of data centre hardware OEMs.

Market maturity and saturation will result in a more well-informed customer base, with decisions extending outside the IT department to include line-of-business executives. For vendors, working alongside partners to deliver messaging balancing technology-driven workload expertise and improved business outcomes is critical to maximising adoption, it says

"The evolution of converged systems represents a landmark in the history of data centre infrastructure," said Christian Perry, a TBR principal analyst and practice manager. "Customers are overcoming internal resistance to IT change and deploying these systems rapidly at the expense of traditional servers and storage arrays."

Converged systems are in a period of mainstream adoption, rendering the market crowded and competitive. Differentiation is becoming challenging as capabilities across competing systems increasingly overlap. In this climate, vendors are beginning to balance their portfolios between comprehensively serving general-purpose workload needs and accommodating specific workloads such as analytics requiring high performance and reliability with purpose-built systems.

"Converged systems vendors continue to drill down into customers' most resource-intensive and mission-critical workloads," said Krista Macomber, a TBR data centre analyst. "This creates opportunity not only for increased converged systems sales, but also for consulting, add-on software and add-on hardware sales."

Rackspace' Q3 saw net revenue for the third quarter of 2015 of $509m, up 10.7% from the third quarter of 2014, adversely affected by shifts in currency exchange rates.

On a constant currency basis, net revenue grew 12.9% from the third quarter of 2014.

Adjusted EBITDA for the third quarter of 2015 was $177m, for a margin of 34.9%, up 11.9% from the third quarter of 2014. For the full year, Rackspace continues to expect revenue to grow between 12% and 14% year-over-year, on a constant-currency basis, and expects adjusted EBITDA margins to be between 33% and 34%.

Taylor Rhodes, president and CEO of Rackspace, said: "We're excited about the new products and partnerships that we've launched in recent months with Amazon Web Services, Intel and Microsoft. These initiatives will make us more competitive and will drive our growth for the future."

The business is consolidating, he says, as telcos and other smaller dedicated or managed hosting providers are exiting because of the pressure from AWS primarily and Azure etc.

Cloud hosting provider Cobweb Solutions (a Microsoft 'cloud distributor') has introduced a new way for partners to sell services from a range of cloud vendors.

Cobweb's new concept of the 'cloud reseller in a box', now available to partners, packages services from a range of vendors including Microsoft, while enablement provides a solution for end-to-end customer lifecycle management.

These programmes work with the Cobweb, an ecosystem of integrated services resellers can integrate into their portfolio, including billing-as-a-service and bundled services.

Cobweb is building upon its participation in the Microsoft Cloud Solution Provider Program as a 2-Tier provider. This extension allows Cobweb to sell services to resellers and expands cloud sales opportunities for partners by enabling them to provide direct billing, sell combined offers and services, as well as directly provision, manage and support Microsoft cloud services.

The set-up in terms of choices and costs have been simplified and defined, it says and the cloud reseller in a box ability combined with Cobweb's billing service has simplified the process of administrating delivery and customer services so that customers and resellers have a straightforward billing relationship built around Direct Debit.

At the core of the deal is Microsoft Office 365, Microsoft Azure and the rest of the Microsoft cloud solution provider services, plus a portfolio of additional vendor cloud services and the Cobweb London cloud for business applications requiring UK data residency.

It is getting harder to read the values of tech companies. It will mean that European tech start-ups and any technology firm not making a profit are going to have to prove their worth to their investors much sooner than some of them hoped, says Brett Cole, M&A analyst at ansarada.

ansarada is a global provider of data rooms for merger and acquisition (M&A) due diligence. Its data rooms enable the hosting, exchange and management of confidential information between bidders and sellers during the M&A process through its Software as a Service (SaaS) solutions.

Founded in Sydney, ansarada has offices in Australia, Europe, USA, Hong Kong and South Africa.

Looking at recent events: Square, trading on the NYSE, and Match Group on NASDAQ started trading this week. After slashing its offering price to $9 a share, Square soared 45% to $13.07, showing that investors still crave new tech investments - at the right price. Match Group, the owner of dating services such as Tinder, OkCupid and Match.com, climbed 23% to $14.74, after being valued at the bottom of its expected range.

So what to make of the latest news out of Silicon Valley for European tech firms? Bay Area valuations are souring, according to some. Snapchat has been discounted by one of its investors, mutual fund giant Fidelity. Dropbox's valuation too has been sheared by the world's largest asset manager, BlackRock.

Is this the pricking of the Silicon Valley bubble? Undoubtedly yes, especially when it done by some of the world's best known asset managers, says Brett Cole.

In June there were an estimated 40,000 digital businesses in London, up from 28,000 in 2010, according to a report in the Financial Times. A new start-up up is launched every 20 minutes in Berlin, says an advisory agency for new companies Gruenden. There are 22,000 tech companies in Stockholm and the most common job in Swedish capital is that of programmer, according to the Stockholm IT Region website

These thousands of businesses are surely in the midst of revisiting their business plans, assumptions and burn rate just as Europe literally heads into winter, he says.

If the tech bubble is slowly or rapidly deflating then expect a more than a wave of mergers and acquisitions among tech companies. A virtual M&A tech tsunami will occur, Brett Cole predicts. Start-ups working on similar or the same field may look for partners prompted by much harder to access finance to fund their nascent businesses. More established companies that have won loyal customers and reported rising EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation) may have to give up more of their equity to large tech rivals from the US or China, an Alibaba or a Yahoo perhaps.

Large tech companies like Yahoo, Alibaba, Google and Microsoft don't care where the technology that can bolster their businesses originates, they just want to get it before a rival sees it and snaps it up.

The question is whether European companies will play a role in any such tech consolidation or will they be trumped by non-European acquirers willing to pay more than they for some of Europe's most exciting technology. Andrus Ansip, the European Commission's vice president in charge of creating a single digital market, says European's venture capital firms want large markets and legal certainty across the EU.

But different rules in different countries within the EU is limiting cross-border financing, venture capital deals and M&A in the tech sector; rather a contradiction to the notion the EU is a single market. European venture-backed tech companies raised $7.43bn in the first three quarters of 2015, just 19% of the $39.54bn US tech firms got in such financing in the same period this year.

If the EU can't agree on uniform standards then its budding tech sector faces artificial ceilings on its growth, funding and deal activity in the former of mergers or acquisitions, Brett Cole concludes.

ALSO and Westcoast have joined forces to create what they claim is the largest Microsoft Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) in Europe, offering numerous open services such as Microsoft Office 365, Azure and Dynamics CRM.

Joe Hemani, CEO of Westcoast, said: "Westcoast has enjoyed a good start to the cloud journey and we are seeing an increasing demand for our offers.

"The cloud market is growing fast and requires the highest level of automation and ease of use for the customer. Together we will continue to grow and and bring added value for our customers."

Gustavo Möller-Hergt, CEO of ALSO Holding AG, added: "This cooperation is a great milestone for the ALSO Group, allowing our customers who are multinational companies in Europe to operate and expand the cloud business."

Ingram Micro Europe has gained certification as a Cisco Advanced Technology Distributor for Cisco Unified Computing System (ATD-UCS) in the EMEAR region, aiming to build its data centre business with Cisco.

With this new certification, Ingram Micro is now authorised to submit UCS B exception deal requests on behalf of non-certified two-tier partners as well as deploy and implement on-site installation services for these deals. It also means exception requests coming from Cisco Advanced Technology Partners can now be processed faster.

"We are now able to offer broader support and greater opportunities to the channel," said Mark Chlebek, Senior Director, Advanced Solutions EMEA, Ingram Micro.

Since earning the Build-To-Order certification, Ingram Micro says it has been able to help channels to cost-effectively increase the speed of delivery to end users and the ATD-UCS certification takes this one step further.

Philip Wright, Senior Director, EMEAR Distribution, Cisco, added: "ATD enables our distributors to differentiate, add competitive advantage and provide a more bespoke service to our Partners and their customers."

Ingram Micro's flyHigher program complements the ATD award by giving partners a structured path to acquiring the necessary skills for data centre opportunities.

Simon Fletcher has joined Real Wireless as CTO, moving from NEC Telecom Modus.

Fletcher brings a network of contacts to Real Wireless alongside a proven ability to lead teams in delivering technical projects while identifying and meeting new strategic goals for the wider business.

Her is a regular speaker at industry events and currently acts as Chairman of the Cambridge Wireless Future of Wireless Conference Organising Committee and Small Cell SIG Champion.

His long standing association with the UK Innovation ecosystem as a director of mVCE and the Innovate-UK ICT-KTN brings knowledge on the application of strategic research through open innovation to accelerate product and services delivery.

In recent times his focus has been on future cities and the application of 5G and IoT in industry verticals.

"Simon is a talented and knowledgeable professional and a perfect fit for the company," said Real Wireless CEO Mark Keenan.

"In addition to assuming technical responsibility across the company, he will join as a member of Real Wireless's newly strengthened management team. Here his leadership skills, detailed knowledge of sustainability strategy, and emerging technology insights will come together to help further build on the strength of the business, identify new potential value areas, and drive forward future growth."

Fletcher commented: "It's a great time to be joining Real Wireless as demand for wireless products and services continues to see massive growth with 4G rollout, 5G development and the Internet of Things to mention but a few areas."

A new study commissioned by Colt reveals continued insularity in the IT department, with 68% of CIOs basing pressured decisions on instinct and experience above any other factor.

Over three-quarters (76%) admit that their intuition is sometimes at odds with other sources, such as data or advice from third parties.

More than three-quarters (76%) of senior IT leaders felt more individual risk when making decisions since IT has acquired a more strategic role in a business.

The study also found that the majority (71%) of senior IT leaders feel that intuition and personal experience is, on balance, more effective than data intelligence when making decisions.

Asked to list four scenarios in order of importance when making decisions, the areas where professional experience trumped hard data included:

• When managing external events, more CIOs rated professional experience (69% ranked this as the top two most important) as being most important to making decisions, higher than using data and intelligence (66%)

• More IT leaders felt that when responding to emerging customer requirements, professional experience (67%) informed effective decisions, rather than relying on data and intelligence (61%)

• Significantly, professional experience was considered of higher importance (63%) than data and intelligence (56%) when dealing with changing compliance regulations

Carl Grivner, EVP at Colt said: "IT leaders need to embrace their growing strategic role and work collaboratively with other business partners to drive innovation and create a competitive advantage.

"The research indicates the IT department is often too insulated. When the stakes are high and a CIO is feeling the pressure to make the right decision that will result in business and career success - the natural reaction is to draw on instinct and professional judgement.

"Other sources of expertise have limited influence - in particular input from peers in other parts of the business. In today's digital world there must be a greater engagement with other business areas and external resources to drive success."

Excalibur has increased its turnover from £7.03m to £7.67m for the year ending 2014.

Profit before tax was £649,000 (compared to £911,000 the previous year), but according to CEO James Phipps the results (audited by Deloitte) are a clear signpost of sustained growth built on its managed service.

"In a year when we've raised the bar to enhance our customer's experience, the figures are encouraging indeed," he said. 

"We've invested heavily in the move to a new building and end-to-end sales-force development.

"This year we've already spent more on training than we have in the past decade. In this first phase of a solid three-year investment programme, we've launched the Excalibur Business School and gained Investors in People at the first time of asking with flying colours.

"We have recorded our best ever Net Promoter Scores (NPS) and are now in a great place to build further in 2016 with some exciting and innovative new developments, including the launch of our new Purple Me service."

Excalibur supports a number of good causes in Swindon and the South West. In its largest ever year of charitable contributions, one single donation included £50,000 for the teenage cancer ward at Bath's Royal United Hospital.

Content Guru capped a strong year with a Cloud Provider of the Year award win at the UK IT Industry Awards.

The event took place at London's Battersea Park Events Arena on 18th November and was attended by over 1,300 professionals from across the IT industry.

Sean Taylor, CEO of Content Guru, commented: "Ten years ago we took the decision to invest heavily in cloud services. The first 6-7 years were a hard journey but now the investment is really paying off. 2015 has been our best year ever and 2016 is shaping up to be tremendous."