Comms Dealer

The growing popularity of dog ownership among Invosys workers prompted the Manchester-based firm to adopt animal organisation the PDSA as its charity for 2017.

The charity treats the pets of those experiencing economic and social hardship at 50-plus pet hospitals and over 380 practices.

Dan Fish, HR Director for Invosys and co-ordinator of the charity efforts, said: "It's a key part of our ethos to give something back to the wider community, so we pledge to support a charity each year with staff dedicating their own time to raise funds. PDSA seemed fitting for 2017 with many of the team being big animal lovers.

"The PDSA is a fantastic charity which helps people and pets stay together, even when they are facing financial difficulties."

Pictured: Invosys staffers Ellie Hazelwood with Hugo the dog and Dan Fish with Harley

Vodafone's virtualised security capabilities have been boosted following the formation of a global relationship with Fortinet that enables the operator to launch security services as a network feature without the need for additional hardware, software or licensing.

Vodafone Secure Network Gateway includes network-based firewalling along with intrusion protection and detection.

The second service, Secure Remote User Access, enables remote workers to connect to the corporate network securely.

Both services are delivered from within the Vodafone Global IP-VPN network and are purchased as part of the connectivity tariff.

Vodafone Enterprise Security Services Chief Executive Simon Church said: "Businesses are becoming more and more cloud-based, and the virtualisation of security capabilities such as these is going to be the foundation of a new generation of managed security services."

Dublin-based IT services firm EMIT has acquired the manage services business and customer base of local rival Softech for an undisclosed sum.

This acquisition boosts EMIT's customer base to over 3,500 end users across enterprise, SMB and public sector organisations.

The deal is expected to add a further €2m in revenue over the next three years.

EMIT founder and MD Eamon Moore said: "We have been looking closely at several acquisition opportunities for some time and believe that Softech is the perfect fit, particularly with its pedigree in delivering IT services and solutions.

"EMIT has very ambitious business development goals and will actively seek further growth, both organically and through further acquisitions."

EMIT is a Dell and Microsoft partner and last year won Microsoft's Global Small and Mid-market Cloud Solutions Partner of the Year award, as well as Microsoft Ireland SMB Cloud Partner of the Year.

The company began its commercial life in 2003 and provides customers with IT solutions and managed IT as a Service in four main business areas - cloud computing, business productivity, IT security and infrastructure.

Softech has been operating in Dublin since 1978 and provides, in the main, IT products and services to Irish business and educational organisations. The company also diversified into managed services, document management and the development of business process applications.

Distributor Nimans has witnessed a 15% spike in demand for Bluetooth enabled devices since tougher mobile phones laws while driving came into force in March, hitting offenders with six penalty points and a £200 fine.

Headset Business Manager, Jason Welsh, said: "Many of today's Bluetooth headsets offer much more than just standard voice functionality as they are an inherent part of the overall UC mix.

"For example, they can provide presence capabilities via Skype for Business thanks to inbuilt sensors. So a colleague in the office knows instantly if the wearer is available to take a call. It's about being safe and working productively and intuitively."

Nuvias has embarked on the next phase of its growth strategy with the EMEA launch of a UC practice following the acquisition of Siphon Networks in October 2016.

The practice builds on Siphon's existing strongholds in the UK and Benelux and will be rolled out over the coming months through Nuvias regional branches kicking off with Germany.

As part of the move Nuvias will add more staff across the region to support vendor and reseller partners.
 
Existing UC vendors and new vendors are expected to take advantage of Nuvias' growing UC capability across EMEA to increase sales in the region. Likewise, it is anticipated that both existing and new Nuvias reseller/integrator channel partners across EMEA will take up the opportunity to enter this thriving market or expand their UC business.
 
Paul Eccleston, CEO of Nuvias, said: "Siphon's technical and solution engineering expertise has enabled it to work closely with vendors and resellers on the development of UC solutions.

"This factor, together with the provision of service and solutions capabilities from Siphon has been instrumental in its success." 
 
Steve Harris, EVP Unified Communications, Nuvias (and MD of Siphon), commented: "A major reason for joining Nuvias was the chance it gave us to grow and expand both in the UK and internationally. The UC EMEA launch of Nuvias lays the foundations for achieving that ambition.
 
"This is an exciting time in UC across EMEA with opportunities for the IT channel to move into the UC market and conquer the legacy competition. As part of Nuvias, and as a solutions and technology enabler, we can provide the service, support and technical know-how our channel partners need to help them make the most of this market opportunity."
 
Siphon was ranked 24th in Deloitte's UK Technology Fast 50 rankings last year, notching up 723% growth in the four years leading up to the award.

Luminet channel partner G3 Comms has doubled connectivity orders since reselling the MSP's wireless 1gb Fibre-Air clear channel business Internet service which can be up and running in 10 working days.

G3 Comms is also the first partner to use Luminet's new online portal which automates all sales processes.

James Jeffs, Director at G3 Comms, said: "There are always a lot of ifs, buts and maybes around ordering fibre leased lines which makes it hard to manage customer expectations.

"Customers have their own timescales for moving and provisioning delays make hitting them a nightmare. Luminet's Fibre-Air has short lead times and offers resilience."

Luminet CEO Sasha Williamson added: "Our Fibre-Air proposition has gone down a storm in the channel market. It is solving a real issue that is a regular frustration for business leaders who have been previously hampered with office moves because of the times it takes arranging the connectivity..

"However, Fibre-Air is not just a temporary fix but as an essential primary or backup connection."

ShoreTel has recruited 21 UK reseller partners to sell its new Connect Cloud and Connect Contact Centre platforms within eight weeks of launch.

Speaking at the company's partner forum held at the Shard in London, UK Regional Vice President Adrian Hipkiss told delegates that resellers have already sold Connect solutions from three users up to 500 and underlined the power of the video capabilities they bring.

"After just eight weeks we know customers like it and will make fast decisions," he said. "And we have learnt that video calling is a game changer. Reducing travel is powerful."

Within the Connect Cloud environment users will now be able to collaborate on desktop and a range of mobile platforms via HD multi-party video initiated in a web browser using WebRTC.

"This is all integrated and included for free, which is disruptive when people are paying for services like Go to Meeting," added Hipkiss.

Hipkiss also stressed the growing value to the channel of open APIs available on ShoreTel's new Mobility Client which will enable resellers to offer applications such as translation services for larger clients.

"Creating propriety applications will keep customers sticky, but they want open applications," he said. "We are delivering to the workplace the expectations users get from the application players like Amazon are providing at home."

As an example, he said, the ShoreTel Teamwork app will enable people to work collaboratively on projects tightly integrated with other ShoreTel applications.

"The ability to share files is built into the application," explained Hipkiss. "People can see who has the ball, they can allocate tasks, manage personal tasks and share dashboards."

Alongside this, ShoreTel has introduced a new Digital Assistant which combines Connect Cloud with the Summit Communications Platform as a Service (CPaaS), VoiceBase and Teamwork apps.

"This will, for instance, enable users to record a conference call, translate the speech to text and deliver the transcript to everyone in a group," added Hipkiss.

Glasgow-based Exchange Communication has won further work in Europe from global toy giant Hasbro after the successful completion of an earlier contract.

Hasbro, the third largest toy manufacturer in the world, previously engaged Exchange to upgrade the communications systems at sites in Germany, Spain and France.

Exchange Communications connected 700 users at these sites by extending Hasbro's existing Avaya Aura Communication Manager Solution, and having this fully operational by December last year. It has also carried out similar work for Hasbro in Moscow.

Now the company has been rewarded with the job of extending the network into further Hasbro sites in Italy (Milan), Greece (Athens) and Turkey (Istanbul).

Exchange Communications MD Tom Sime said: "There was a challenging deadline of connecting the German, Italian and French sites by the end of last year without disrupting the day-to-day operation of a busy global company, but we knew we could deliver on time."

UKCloud has launched Disaster Recovery to the Cloud, a self-service replication and recovery solution underpinned by software provider Zerto.

The service mitigates a range of failure scenarios that can affect a local data centre - including power cuts and natural disasters - as well as providing protection against application failures, including unsuccessful software updates, and malicious cyber attacks.

"It is crucial for our public sector customers to ensure that in the event of a disaster their essential public services would face little or no disruption," said Simon Hansford, CEO of UKCloud.

"Having a disaster recovery plan in place is mandated by the Civil Contingencies Act, but traditional disaster recovery solutions are expensive and inefficient.

"Disaster Recovery to the Cloud has been specifically designed with our public sector customers in mind to protect sensitive data and services that are depended on by UK citizens, patients and public sector workers."

Distributor Exertis has sealed a distribution agreement with CipherCloud, a specialist in cloud security and visibility.

Its security platform integrates with awide range of business cloud applications to scan content, monitor user behaviour, analyse risk, and protect sensitive data, delivering a solution to combat data loss and compliance violations through the cloud and mobile devices.

Jason Hill, Exertis, Sales Director for Security, said: "Organisations increasingly want a hybrid deployment of cloud-based and on-premises security from a unified platform that provides activity monitoring, automated anomaly detection, and data loss protection through strong encryption or tokenisation.

"CipherCloud solutions enable customers to adopt the cloud and provide protection from data loss on mobile devices. As more cloud adoption occurs through implementation of SaaS and mobiles proliferate the workplace, more opportunities open up for resellers to help companies maintain compliance and secure data for their customers, even more pertinent with GDPR looming."