Comms Dealer

Choose-Your-Own-Device (CYOD) is widely regarded as the most appropriate strategy for meeting organisations' communications needs in both practice and reality, according to an independent study of ICT decision makers conducted by Shape the Future and commissioned by Azzurri Communications.

Commissioned as a follow up to an equivalent 2012 study, Azzurri set out to learn how the perception and deployment of different device-ownership strategies were evolving within UK organisations. In particular the research investigated changing attitudes towards the three core policies for employees using a single mobile device for personal and business use:

Organisation-owned or Don't Bring Your Own Device (DBYOD): Whereby device choice and ownership is strictly controlled by the employer (the traditional corporate set up)

BYOD or Bring Your Own Device: A mobile device policy that allows employees to connect their personal smartphones and/or tablets to the organisation's network

CYOD: Where the organisation owns the SIM/contract, but lets employees choose their own device

While BYOD has garnered a lot of hype and column inches in recent years, Azzurri has found that significant adoption is yet to take place. While token adoption of BYOD, where fewer than 10% of employees can connect their private devices to the network, has increased considerably in popularity in the last year (growing from 43% to 58%), companywide adoption of BYOD (where 75% or more of employees are included) is faring rather poorly. Deployment of companywide BYOD has grown at half the rate of CYOD (BYOD increased by 6% while CYOD grew by 12%).

Significant CYOD policies are now in operation in under one third (31%) of UK organisations as compared to BYOD in only 17.2%.

Organisations are however warming to the idea of employees using a single mobile/work device, yet opinion still remains in favour of corporate provision.

When asked to rate out of 5 whether they support the idea of employees using a single mobile device under a range of different scenarios (with 5 being 'Completely Supported' and 0 being 'strongly Opposed'), organisations still favoured policies in which they owned the device and/or contract. For example, support for a single device 'If the business owns the device' has risen from 3.7 to 4.3.

However support has grown in all scenarios since 2012, including those of a BYOD nature, suggesting that firms are shifting their views in favour of shared ownership. For example, support for a single device 'If the employee owns the device' has risen from 2.8 to 3.3 since last year.

"Despite all the puff and promise of BYOD, the evidence shows that adoption is far lower than the hype would lead us to believe. BYOD promises the world, but in reality most organisations are left paralysed and confused by what BYOD can really offer, so in the end they stick to what they know and avoid large-scale, companywide BYOD deployments," Rufus Grig, CTO, Azzurri Communications.

"While we have found BYOD to be best policy in certain, specific situations (such as in hospitals where consultants usually own their own devices), overwhelmingly our customers find that the hybrid 'Choose Your Own Device' or CYOD approach is the best fit for their needs as it offers the right balance of choice and control.

"CYOD is therefore the best of both worlds; a controlled network environment that still offers employees the benefit of a single work/home device of their choice.

"CYOD is also less of a cultural leap for the organisation, since maintaining ownership of the contract is much closer to the status quo of corporate provision. So aside from the security and monetary risks, BYOD is often a leap too far for many, so it is only natural that they prefer to stick to what they know."

Westcon Convergence and Microsoft have hosted a Lync Recruitment event for channel partners at Microsoft's HQ in Thames Valley Park, Reading.

According to Westcon Lync experienced growth of 140% in the last calendar year.

Dawn Fenton, Sales Director, Unified Communications, Westcon Convergence, said: "It is vital that partners recognise the Lync opportunity and incorporate it into their portfolio.

"If they don't then they will miss on out on revenue to the competition.

"Some channel partners are wary of the solution because it requires multiple hardware products to be deployed and integrated across a network to deliver the true UC experience of the solution.

"This is where Westcon comes into play as the Lync hardware distribution partner of choice who simplifies the design, implementation and support of a multivendor Lync deployment."

Networks First has been awarded the Western European Services Partner of the Year by Huawei at the Huawei Channel Conference on the 19th-20th September in Amsterdam.

The awards are recognised internationally with winners selected in 5 regional categories and 20 local awards.

Leon He, President of Huawei Western Europe Enterprise Business Unit, said: "The Huawei Western European Services Partner of the Year award rewards Huawei's outstanding Services partner for 2013 and acknowledges the initiatives and efforts devoted by the partner to their alliance with Huawei Enterprise.

"The winner of this award must deliver innovative and cost-effective services to Enterprise customers by enabling services as valuable features of Huawei's solutions. Networks First is such a role model and strongly deserves this recognition."

TFM Networks is one of four founding members of a new industry body set up to to provide enterprises with single source solutions for network security, risk management and compliance retention.

Also making up the Continuous Compliance Alliance (CCA) are software specialist Cryptic Solutions, security consultants Razor Thorn and cloud infrastructure firm Vissensa.

FM's MD David Heyes said: "Security is invariably the primary concern for businesses across their IT systems and telecommunications.

"As a founding member of the CCA, TFM is focused on ensuring better security at less cost. No single organisation can specialise in everything and point solutions only take you so far. The CCA is all about specialists working together to deliver practical service-lead solutions that are flexible, highly effective and commercially attractive."

Heyes also noted that membership of the group is open to businesses with the expertise to further strengthen the CCA.

Sweeping changes to the dynamics of doing business in the channel will render most salespeople ineffective in a world of ICT industry transformation, cloud proliferation and new routes to market, according to the key messages delivered to the Managed Services and Hosting Summit (organised jointly by IT Europa and Angel Business Communications) by Tiffani Bova, Gartner Distinguished Analyst. On a mission to unsettle the gathered delegates, she said: "The more uncomfortable you feel, the more successful I have been."

Not everything has to change rapidly, or completely. Steve Pearce of distributor Arrow ECS confirmed that there was still a huge traditional distribution business, but warned that the channel needed to invest ahead of change.

"There is not a rush to managed services but change is happening. It's not about cloud, it's all about what the end-user needs and wants," he said.

The disruptive nature or the managed service model requires that the MSP embraces the use of technology in their own organisation to be able to deliver, manage and bill services correctly.

Even as a successful managed services specialist itself, Tim Walker, MD, Taylor Made Computer Solutions, told the summit that its own managed services provision had been held back because they had failed to acknowledge the level of investment needed in technology and processes.

Tiffani Bova highlighted the new routes to market and channels competing with traditional IT sales. IT departments are losing control of IT buying, she noted. "Those outside IT are now capturing more of the spending budget," said Bova. "Marketing, sales, supply chain, finance and HR functions are buying more IT, not just as a service, but also software and infrastructure. They prefer to buy as a service."

This is a major break from the traditional IT department role which had had a controlling function. Now, other departments will implement solutions, and the IT department has to secure it after the event. And channels, which have traditionally been selling technology to IT departments have been resisting change.

Vendors can't reach these smaller customers without channels. The traditional channel is saying it is not going to introduce this, but customers are most challenged, not by technology, but with management and operations, so this is the opportunity. Bova added: "If you can work out how to help them with the management of managed services, you have an opportunity to capitalise on where the customer feels they have gaps.

"The change is being driven by a nexus of forces: "Social, mobile, cloud, information - those four are colliding in the organisation and are what is driving the managed services business."

New channels are emerging, including those 'born in the cloud'. These new channels are agile, effective and focused on services, not with reselling. They don't get caught up in 'who bills the customer? And who owns the customer?' and they don't talk about MDF, deal registration schemes, rules of engagement, using vendor marketing tools. They say all they need is a stable environment they can build on, and a predictable market so they can manage it going forward.

An example of a business born in the cloud is Cloud Direct. Its Chief Business Officer, Eliza Rawlings, told the conference that cloud services brokerage means aggregation, integration and customisation. Because the model relies on customer word of mouth, Cloud Direct has a policy of making customers their advocates to help reduce churn.

Cloud brokering means very different P&L numbers, and demands extremely flexible billing systems because of changing special offers from suppliers, which means the company has to be master of all its processes.

And even established IT businesses cannot reply on reputation in this new market: Even IBM has to prove it can deliver compliances - that's the legal bit. "And SLAs with exclusions are ripped apart by client lawyers," warned Jerry Crossfield, IBM UK & Ireland MSP Leader. The mid-sized companies rely on channels for advice on technology, he agreed, so it was vital for them to offer managed services.

"The mid-sized firms use local trusted business advisors so cloud could be even more right for them than enterprises," he suggested.

Throughout the whole of the event there were three key messages that kept surfacing from the different speakers, Process, Automation and Partnerships.

The secret of success appears to be about focusing on your processes from sales lead generation and acquisition through to service delivery and billing. Without the right processes in place profitability and customer retention are impossible.

Automating those processes so that you get them right every time is also key and that means investment in technology. The final message that came through loud and clear is that without partnerships the MSP will struggle to keep up with customer demands.

Partnerships with vendors, service providers, distributors and Cloud Service Brokerages will not only enable the MSP to get to market more quickly with their service offerings but will remove much of the financial and technology risk of trying to do everything oneself.

EE has launched a series of initiatives in the north east to boost the online skills of communities and small businesses across the region. 

The initiatives support the kick off of Go ON North East, a programme that aims to 'super charge' digital skills activity across the region, led by Go ON UK,  the cross-sector charity established by Baroness Lane-Fox.

Research has revealed that 500,000 adults in the North East lack basic online skills. Go ON UK and its founder partners, including EE, are aiming to reduce this figure by 25 per cent in the next 12 months.

EE CEO Olaf Swantee said: "Digital exclusion is a serious issue. Research shows that being online has significant benefits for people; from improving educational outcomes of young people to countering social isolation and depression among the elderly. By improving the UK's digital infrastructure and sharing the magic of technology, we can help people get more from the digital world."

ClearOne's CONVERGE USB, a recent addition to RGB Communications' pro AV distribution portfolio, has been designed to more easily bring high-quality audio from UC applications running on desktops or laptops into a ClearOne pro audio environment.
 
"It may be a small box but, the CONVERGE USB is a pro audio solution that provides secure plug and play USB connectivity for UC applications such as Microsoft Lync, Skype, Google+ Hangouts, IBM Sametime and Cisco WebEx, running on both Microsoft and Apple desktops and laptops," said Gordon Innocent, RGB's Chairman.
 
Following a simple upgrade the CONVERGE USB can be retro-fitted to any installed CONVERGE system and also connects with ClearOne's range of COLLABORATE desktop and room video conferencing solutions.
 
The CONVERGE USB can also serve as an E-bus extender as each unit can relay the signal for another 60 metres without degradation.
 
"The CONVERGE USB means that when you want to share audio, from a desktop or laptop, in a conference room you no longer have to resort to the rather clunky method of using your headset ports and then having to fiddle with audio levels," added Innocent.

"Now you can simply plug in the CONVERGE USB and because the audio stays in the digital domain you have access to the highest quality pro AV audio."

Open ports continue to be the gateway to riches for unscrupulous fraudsters, warned Paul Taylor, Sales Director, Voiceflex.

"Fraud accounts for 2% of calls worldwide or $20 billion a year, but the main issue is that its always someone else's fault," he said. "The end user blames the telecoms reseller for not securing the telephony system and the telecoms reseller blames the IT company for not securing the network."

Aiming to blow the final whistle on this 'blame game' Voiceflex has launched an additional fraud prevention tool.

"Voiceflex fraud application is already immense," said Taylor. "From a platform perspective we check a myriad of combinations between IP address, destinations dialled, length of calls, frequency of calls and more, and in most instances we close down fraud at the onset before a successful call is made.

"We back this up with our fraud alerting and fraud suspension for any compromised systems that slip through the net."

He also noted that just because the SIP trunks are closed down due to fraudulent activity doesn't always mean the fraud stops. "If you have ISDN circuits connected calls can still be made if the router and/or telephony system has been comprised," warned Taylor.

"For every new SIP or hosted connection to our network we carry out an open port analysis test, if ports have been left open we advise the channel partner of the risk of the leaving the ports open, this service is free of charge.

"If our channel partner is not in charge of the IT network they can then advise their customer of the potential risk and the blame game is over before it has begun."

Plantronics' Voyager Legend CS, the latest addition to the Voyager headset line, has been launched through the channel.
 
"With the CS we are addressing office workers who spend an increasing amount of time collaborating on conference calls on their desk phone or mobile phone and need better mobility by being hands free," said Richard Rogers, Head of Europe & Africa B2B Marketing, Plantronics.

"Today's workforce needs a modern communications solution that moves throughout the day with them, from the office to the coffee shop to the car with the kids."
 
The Voyager Legend CS comes with Plantronics' Bluetooth headset as well as a charging dock that connects to the desk phone.

The optional HL10 Lifter or EHS cable (sold separately) allows for remote call control with the desk phone at the push of a button. It can also be customised to match any work style using accessories like a portable charging case and USB adapter for PC connectivity.
 

The stage is set for Chess CEO David Pollock to perform a long-awaited stand-up comedy routine in aid of The Christie and Prostate Cancer UK charities on 2nd October 2013 at The Comedy Store on Deansgate Locks.

Critically acclaimed comedian Justin Moorhouse has been confirmed as the headline act for Funny Business North West, the stand up comedy event that will see eight business heavyweights swap board reports for banter as they battle it out on stage to see who will be crowned the funniest.

Judging the acts will be Don Ward, founder of The Comedy Store, Alistair McGeorge CEO of headline sponsor New Look and Jason Cooke, funnyman behind hit BBC sitcom, Hebburn.

Taking part in the gruelling challenge are Deloitte UK executive member Sharon Thorne, Christie CEO Caroline Shaw, Elaine Birchall of PZ Cussons, Urban Splash Chairman Tom Bloxham, DX Group CEO Petar Cvetkovic, Richard Duerr of Duerr's Jam and senior independent director of Fenner Plc, Vanda Murray.

With under one week to go, nerves are clearly building up. Pollock said: "When I agreed to this challenge, I was nervous but thought that would ease with practice and help from my comedy mentor. How wrong I was, even with a couple of warm up gigs behind me I still terrified. I'm passionate about fundraising and have done some crazy things in my time but the comedy store Wednesday night has got me real twitchy."

The local business community has so far been extremely supportive and there are now just 50 tickets left for the show. All remaining tickets for the event plus sponsorship packages can be bought via the Funny Business website or reserved by contacting MC2 on 0161 236 1352.