Opinion

Opinion

• Lack of imagination STEMs any enthusiasm for science

  There's a massive shortage of UK children studying the core STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) subjects; not great news for our industry, says Nick Booth  Continue Reading

• Should the channel embrace cloud formations?

  Melvyn Wray at Allied Telesis discusses the main considerations of the channel community with regards to the evolving world of cloud formations.  Continue Reading

• SCH sells distribution business – what took it so long?

  In the wake of SCH's decision to sell its distribution business, Billy MacInnes asks, why now?  Continue Reading

• Data – it's not big and it's not clever

  No matter how you feel about journalists, we know how to deal with big data, writes Nick Booth.  Continue Reading

• For Samsung's boss, bad news is no news

  Did Samsung really wait four days to brief its chairman after losing its patent case against Apple in California? Billy MacInnes investigates.  Continue Reading

• The cloud is all about perception

  Nick Booth comes up with an environmentally sound way to address end-user concerns over cloud computing.  Continue Reading

• Big data management is big business for resellers with the right expertise

  To optimise the potential benefits of big data, organisations need help to manage it effectively, writes Andrew Carr.  Continue Reading

• Where does HP go from here?

  With more hard times still ahead for HP, Billy MacInnes wonders where the firm's turnaround will come from.  Continue Reading

• Selling storage to the SME sector

  Comms-care's Darren Briscoe looks at some SME storage scenarios and explores how resellers can leverage this market.  Continue Reading

• The hunt is on for Team GB's IT stars

  After Team GB’s success at the London 2012 Olympics, David Cameron and Boris Johnson have called for more compulsory sport in British schools. But what about compulsory competitive IT?  Continue Reading

• Will the cloud suffocate the ERP salesman?

  Nick Booth considers the future of ERP software in the cloud environment.  Continue Reading

• Does anyone really believe IT departments are leading the charge for mobile and tablet adoption?

  People in IT departments might like using tablets but that does not mean they are leading the charge to have consumerisation roll out across the rest of their organisations, writes Billy MacInnes.  Continue Reading

• The case of BYOD versus CIO

  If you love court room dramas, the trend for bringing your own device through the company firewall offers rich potential, says Nick Booth.  Continue Reading

• How cloud and VoIP are a perfect combination for small businesses

  The economics of internet-based IT must be made clear for small businesses.  Continue Reading

• When rubbish execution spoils brilliant systems

  Nick Booth paid a visit to the Samsung stand at the Olympic Park in London to test-drive the latest mobile wizardry.  Continue Reading

• Microsoft's Metro mystery

  Microsoft may have to rename its Metro UI after a trademark dispute with a mystery European company. Billy MacInnes is on the trail.  Continue Reading

• NHS Finance Management isn't the envy of the world

  There were some complaints about the depiction of the NHS in the Opening Ceremony of the Olympics. Maybe people were upset that the dancers were all dressed up as nurses and patients.  Continue Reading

• Five Minute Interview: Neil Crockett, Cisco

  Neil Crockett, managing director 2012 at Cisco UK & Ireland, takes the hotseat for our Five Minute Interview.  Continue Reading

• Fujitsu bucks the trend but can it buck the economy?

  At a time when everyone else seems to be cutting Billy MacInnes ponders over Fujitsu's decision to keep spending  Continue Reading

• Most IT contractors have their heads in the clouds

  There appears to be a fair amount of bluff and bending of the truth going on among those that claim they can offer customers cloud support, discovers Nick Booth  Continue Reading

• Wandisco shows how flotations can be done

  The tech industry has a mixed track record with flotations. Facebook anyone? But as Nick Booth finds out there are some vendors doing it well  Continue Reading

• Would you credit it? The banks are given yet another chance to do their job

  The banks have been given another chance to offer credit to cash-strapped SMEs but Billy MacInnes wonders if this will be any better than the other schemes already offered  Continue Reading

• Ingram shows its ambition

  Ingram Micro has showed ambition for growth with its $840m purchase of wireless device solutions and services specialist BrightPoint.  Continue Reading

• Dedicated followers of fashion

  It’s hard for a CIO to say no to users who’ve been whipped into a frenzy by the style magazines. When all the other CEOs got iPad 3s for Christmas, how do you explain why they can't have one?  Continue Reading

• Is the skills shortage the IT industry’s own fault?

  If the channel put more effort into training staff rather than looking for the finished article would the skills crisis in the IT world be as bad as it is now?  Continue Reading

• Teenage developer knows what the bankers are doing

  Nick Booth spends some time surfing Weknowwhatyouredoing.com, a new site exposing the wall posts that Facebook users should really have kept quiet about.  Continue Reading

• Five Minute Interview: Dan Cunliffe, O2 Wholesale

  Dan Cunliffe from channel comms provider O2 Wholesale takes the hot-seat for another Five Minute Interview.  Continue Reading

• So how did you spend your Sunday?

  Second blog post from Epson about the team of riders that undertook the London to Brighton bike ride.  Continue Reading

• Column: Crisp's good for kids, compared to Habbo Hotel

  Following the problems experienced by Habbo Hotels web security is a pressing issue and one the channel can start to address  Continue Reading

• Is it a broadliner? Is it a VAD? No, it's a SuperVAD!!!

  Resellers no longer think the phrase VAD has any meaning so perhaps those wanting to prove they can offer greater support and value to the channel now need to call themselves SuperVADs.  Continue Reading

• Save money with an automated Leveson Inquiry

  When all the tents have been packed up and the Leveson Inquiry circus finally quits town, the British taxpayer will have been stung for £5.6 million, it was revealed in Parliament yesterday.  Continue Reading

• Banks won't help us; we need a security superhero!

  Old fashioned bank robbery, according to a recent study by the Royal Statistical Society and the American Statistical Association, brings very little return on investment.  Continue Reading

• Column: How hard can it be for Dell's premier partners to double their money?

  I have to admit to being fascinated by Dell's decision to make premier partners double the amount of business they do with the vendor if they wish to retain their status after 31 January 2013, writes Billy MacInnes.  Continue Reading

• IP theft is not a topic that is done and dusted

  What makes a company unique and gives it its competitive edge is its intellectual property (IP). And that IP, whether you're the UK Space Agency, a pharmaceutical research lab or a start-up with a revolutionary new idea, is something you want to ...  Continue Reading

• Video: as simple as a phone call?

  Video continues to rise in popularity, but will it ever achieve the ubiquity of the traditional voice call?  Continue Reading

• Q: How can software vendors raise licensing prices?

  A: Because they can... There's a story on MicroScope.co.uk about Microsoft and the increases it intends to make to its volume licensing programmes from 1 July, writes Billy MacInnes.  Continue Reading

• Is cycling the channel's sport?

  It's not often you find yourself cheering 'Come on Node4' but pop along to a cycling race and you find those words forming in your mouth.  Continue Reading

• Credit will have to flow if SME growth ambitions come to fruition

  The question of credit has always been a contentious one in the channel and in recent years so many small firms have despaired of ever getting money they have not even bothered to apply to the banks.  Continue Reading

• The downside of a long weekend off

  The looming jubilee weekend might get many excited but for businesses there is inevitably lost revenue to worry about.  Continue Reading

• Column: When it comes to IT security, we're all in this together

  I have to admit to smiling when I read the story in MicroScope concerning a survey by Cryptzone which found 42% of directors and senior managers admitted to regularly ignoring security policies and procedures, writes Billy MacInnes.  Continue Reading

• The software pirates have changed so now must the response

  The decision by FAST to educate Trading Standards and police in London about software piracy is a welcome move but one that is much harder now than it was in the past.  Continue Reading

• Team Epson UK's London to Brighton charity bike ride

  In the first of an occasional series of guest blog posts in the run up to the London to Brighton bike ride we hear how training is going for the Epson team planning to ride to the South Coast.  Continue Reading

• Will you be sleeping under the stars in October?

  Raising money for charity is something that the channel does rather well so it's great to see that Byte Night has launched its 2012 campaign to spur thoughts about its annual sleep-out event.  Continue Reading

• Column: Thwarting the time thieves

  Thieves are operating in the IT industry, stealing the most precious asset in existence - your time. Many of them work in various forms of marketing. Some public relations companies are known to waste time.  Continue Reading

• Vendors who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones

  That Avaya IPO has been rumbling on for a while, hasn't it? First tabled about 12 months ago, the plans were made official last June and it was thought, for a few minutes back in February, that it might happen in April. Well, it didn't, but there is...  Continue Reading

• Column: Why all the fuss over a leaked roadmap?

  Much brouhaha about the leaking of Microsoft's product roadmap for the next two years or so but does it really matter all that much?  Continue Reading

• The midmarket cliche

  As EMC took the wraps off its cloud infrastructure product range it's calling Vspex, it was interesting to see just where the vendor is pitching the product.  Continue Reading

• Meet John Chambers, Huawei's new marketing star

  MicroScope has long been a fan of Cisco CEO John Chambers. We admire him for, among other things, his easy-going manner, his old school Southern charm and his willingness to be outspoken and candid when it comes to the big issues of the day.  Continue Reading

• Column: Cash in the Static

  Dead Social allows you to keep posting up messages after you're dead. Technically speaking, you must load them onto the system before you start flatlining, but these postings can be timed to appear whenever is apposite.  Continue Reading

• Booze-fuelled BlackBerry stabbing caps off rotten week at RIM

  As if it wasn't bad enough that ill-considered comments from CEO Thorsten Heims led last week to panicked headlines about RIM being on the verge of quitting the consumer business, a violent incident at a vendor event in London has covered the cake ...  Continue Reading

• The three Cs of cloud computing

  Ian Moyse, recently appointed UK sales director at web-based CRM vendorWorkbooks.com, shares his perspective on the cloud. Cloud is the big 'C' word in the channel right now, posing 'C'onflict, 'C'onfusion and ‘C'hallenges to the status quo.  Continue Reading

• The return of the payphone

  So often neglected and easily ignored in this mobile-driven age, could the humble payphone be set for a resurgence? Comms disite Nimans is counting on it, and has signed an exclusive agreement with payphone vendor Solitaire to offer the UK's first ...  Continue Reading

• Opinion: The reluctance of the channel to move to cloud-based backup

  There are several reasons why the channel should be encouraging customers using old technology to move to cloud-based backup.  Continue Reading

• Five minute interview: Chris Baldock, intY

  This week, MicroScope puts its questions to Chris Baldock at enterprise cloud solutions specialist intY tell us what you do for a living Managing director, intY. Why are you the right person for this job?  Continue Reading

• Careful what you say there Thorsten

  Any business leader will know the importance of being clear in their language. Say something wrong and it can seriously damage the share price. So perhaps the Blackberry maker RIM's new CEO is getting a lesson in the value of being careful fairly ...  Continue Reading

• Column: How will you celebrate world backup day?

  Some cynics said it would never take off, but World Backup Day has really caught the public's imagination.  Continue Reading

• Column: Wi-Fi makes cities more dangerous - great news for security resellers!

  London is lagging behind Manchester, Amsterdam, Paris and Stockholm in mobile cybercrime, according to a new risk analysis report commissioned by Norton.  Continue Reading

• Column: Has Whitman found the PSG answer?

  It's an intriguing story about plans by HP to combine its PC and imaging and print divisions, writes Billy MacInnes.  Continue Reading

• Column: Welcome to the IT shop of the future

  Worrying about the future of the channel is enough to drive anyone to drink. There's a pub full of serious drinkers that I drop into once a week. It's a place where nobody judges you because everyone has a sad story to tell.  Continue Reading

• Column: Why should your social media profiles affect your job prospects?

  I'm sure that quite a few people are now only too aware that what they write on social media or the company they keep on Facebook could cost them their job. But there are a lot of people who aren't.  Continue Reading

• Apple sparks the queues again

  The words 'iPad' and 'queues' seem to go hand in hand whenever there is a major product launch and sure enough it's happened again. Apple fans down under queued up to get their mitts on the latest iPad giving the vendor the sort of exposure that ...  Continue Reading

• An audit is the first step to a better service

  The decision by Check Point to offer resellers up to £600 of incentives for every 10 security assessments they carry out is an interesting one.  Continue Reading

• Column: It's in the public interest

  In the public interest, this column spear phished Piers Morgan, so we could help put the record straight and prove his innocence of all the disgraceful charges of phone hacking.  Continue Reading

• When I think about cloud, I think about dirt and the rule of 78

  For dramatic effect, when presenting on stage to reseller audiences, I often open with the line, "When I think about Cloud, I think about dirt"; Dirt? Yes, piles of dirt, filling the same hole each month, writes Jason Beal.  Continue Reading

• Application-layer DDoS - a new threat vector

  Stewart, international president at Corero Network Security, explores the growing threat of application DDoS attacks and offers some timely advice for security resellers.  Continue Reading

• Start-up offers Cisco $1 for WebEx

  Private equity-backed meeting platform software specialist SalesCrunch has made an apparently genuine offer to Cisco to buy its WebEx web-conferencing service for a single dollar (63p), plus 15% equity in the business.  Continue Reading

• The appeal of apps

  Jan Lawford, senior director of EMEA Channels at Avaya explores how the channel can deliver a frictionless customer experience in the app driven world. The customer experience is everything in today's world. In fact, many say we are now firmly ...  Continue Reading

• Security the VAR's answer to service provider cloud dominance?

  CRYPTOCard CEO Neil Hollister responds to our recent column, 'Being rational about resellers in the cloud' and suggests that security services could be the means by which resellers can take on the big service provider players.  Continue Reading

• Column: Is it all a game to you? Well, it should be!

  In Paris I witnessed the signing of a mega-publishing partnership between Gameloft, Ubisoft and Gree - a Japanese game developer.  Continue Reading

• Column: McNally showed the value of varied experience

  Very sad news about Joe McNally's death after a three year battle with cancer, writes Billy MacInnes. He was there in the Wild West days of the PC industry, starting Compaq UK in 1984 with $40,000.  Continue Reading

• Five minute interview: Tim Marston, 10gen

  This week, Tim Marston, EMEA channel manager at open source database software specialist 10gen, answers our probing questions Tell us what you do for a living. As the EMEA channel manager for 10gen, I am responsible for building and managing our ...  Continue Reading

• Choosing the right security vendor

  As a security reseller, there probably is not a day goes by when you don't receive an email or a call from a vendor who is hawking the next latest and greatest technology that will make you rich, and solve the problems of every end user organisation.  Continue Reading

• Column: Business meetings can reduce intelligence

  Finally, a piece of research I find all too believable. According to a study by Virginia Tech's Carilion School of Medicine and Research Institute, business meetings can diminish intelligence. Well, there's a surprise, writes Billy MacInnes.  Continue Reading

• Keeping the efficient efficient

  Mike Heumann, senior vice president of worldwide sales and marketing at virtualised input/output specialists NextIO, considers where the surge in server virtualisation leaves data centre managers (DCMs) and how they can address the challenges ...  Continue Reading

• Column: Fatal Assumptions. The cloud meets science fiction

  Imagine if all these terrible global warming projections come true, and we're forced to up sticks and move to another planet. Naturally, the locals won't be happy, so we'll have to string them along for a while until it's too late for them to get ...  Continue Reading

• Column: Survival skills the key in a managed services world

  I found little to argue about with the story in MicroScope suggesting that resellers should consider making the shift to managed services in the face of declining hardware sales and fierce competition, writes Billy MacInnes.  Continue Reading

• Where the rubber meets the road for your cloud transformation

  In the last year or two, the industry has spent ample time investigating, pondering, and debating the impact that the cloud and IT-as-a-Service would have on the channel and the reseller business model, writes Jason Beal.  Continue Reading

• Welsh businesses could get .Cymru domain names

  Businesses based in Wales could soon be able to end their URLs with .Wales or .Cymru after.uk guardian Nominet unveiled plans to set up a top level domain (TLD) for the Principality.  Continue Reading

• A barometer of concern

  The phrase barometer is one that is bound to be used in the context of Dell's results and the state of the PC market but there is also something else happening here with financial results again becoming an important indication of the health of the ...  Continue Reading

• Reseller remakes Snakes on a Plane

  One reseller-turned-amateur pilot on the Czech Republic has come up with a novel idea for a spot of cross channel marketing activity.  Continue Reading

• Column: We should run the public sector like a Hadron Collider

  The Large Hadron Collider is a bit like our Connecting for Health programme. CERN fired billions of protons in a circuit in an attempt to catch a glimpse of the elusive Higgs Boson particle.  Continue Reading

• Want it straight, then go to the top

  Sitting down with a senior management figure at a vendor is always an interesting experience. They take your questions and respond directly and with a complete absence of waffle.  Continue Reading

• Column: Cisco's mobile predictions don't entirely add up

  Billy MacInnes takes a closer look at Cisco's latest mobility statistics that appear to suggest mobile devices will soon outnumber people.  Continue Reading

• An advantage for the channel: people do business with people

  We've all heard the adage that "people do business with people they know, like, and trust." It's not something taught in textbooks of university business classes, but anybody who has been in the business world for more than a few years certainly can...  Continue Reading

• What gets IT pros in the mood for love?

  With Valentine's Day literally just around the corner, one's thoughts naturally turn to overpriced meals served by harassed staff in crowded restaurants or, depending on circumstance, a bottle of wine and a Richard Curtis DVD.  Continue Reading

• Five minute interview: Pete Hill, C4L

  This week, Pete Hill, channel partner manager at colocation and hosting specialist C4L takes the hot seat for our Five Minute Interview.  Continue Reading

• Column: Get ready for the Big IPV6 Society

  Have you ever fallen victim to short keys? You know the type of thing. With one movement you highlight everything. With the next you delete it all.  Continue Reading

• Column: The positive experience driving BYOD

  BYOD is a very hot topic right now. Why shouldn't it be? After all, what company is going to turn down the chance of encouraging and supporting employees to buy their own devices for work rather than having to buy them itself?  Continue Reading

• Your role in the cloud: The virtual CIO

  Another article in a series from the Channel Transformation Alliance by Jason Beal, senior director, advanced solutions and cloud services, Ingram Micro EMEA  Continue Reading

• Column: Being rational about resellers in the cloud

  It's good to see some positive stories coming out over the role resellers and the channel will play in a cloud-based future, writes Billy MacInnes.  Continue Reading

• Column: Talking the language of the datacentre sale

  Firehost, Quantum, RiT and RSVP all illustrate the different approaches you can take to selling to tough customers like datacentre buyers. At the recent Cloud Expo show, it was impossible to avoid Firehost, whose branding was all over the place ...  Continue Reading

• The debate is over: Cloud comes through the channel

  I won't even entertain the question or participate in the debate any longer about, "Does the distribution and reseller channel have a role in cloud computing?"  Continue Reading

• Meet the author: Jason Beal

  Jason Beal, Senior Director, Advanced Solutions and Cloud Services, Ingram Micro EMEA Jason Beal has over a dozen years of experience in the IT channel in sales leadership, operations management, and services roles, along with a proven track record ...  Continue Reading

• Column: Is Britain cheapwalking into oblivion?

  British industry seems to have an almost suicidal short term fixation with being cheap. Our book publishers, for example, always gave Amazon better discounts, because it could sell more books by undercutting the book shops.  Continue Reading

• Column: Does Facebook really contribute £2.2bn to UK GDP?

  What a bizarre story doing the rounds this week concerning a study by Deloitte which suggests Facebook has contributed £2.2bn to UK GDP and supports as many as 35,000 jobs, writes Billy MacInnes.  Continue Reading

• Remembering David Hurley

  It was with great sadness that we heard about the death of David Hurley, who passed away after a short illness at the weekend.  Continue Reading

• Cars rather than computers getting the ad money

  Where it was once computer adverts that grabbed the attention in the breaks in Super Bowl coverage this time around it looks set to be cars that are being plugged in the moments between the action.  Continue Reading

• Column: 2012 forecast is boils, wailing, teeth gnashing, Ethernet

  Does anyone still believe you get a bargain in the sales? Everyone knows BOGOF is a RIP-OFF. When the supermarket says you can Buy One and Get One Free, we all know they've Re-priced One to Pretend One's Free. Well thank God the January sales are ...  Continue Reading

• Super branding as all eyes focus on the last four

  There are two contests which are currently dominating the television talk shows and radio phone-ins in America. The first is the race for the Republican nomination in the race to be the candidate to run against the President in the next election.  Continue Reading

• For Kodak the struggle is to stay relevant

  Kodak is all too well aware of the changes that have happened in its natural markets that have left it now seeking bankruptcy protection. The digital revolution has not just touched its film operations but also had an impact on its printing ...  Continue Reading