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Business applications

• November 12, 2013 12 Nov'13

  CIOs put jobs on the line by outsourcing software testing and development

  Some 31% of CIOs are putting their jobs at risk by outsourcing software testing and development because a quarter of projects fail to deliver their objectives.

• November 11, 2013 11 Nov'13

  Midcounties Co-op increases return on service desk investment

  The Midcounties Co-operative has increased the uses for its IT service management software since initially buying a system back in 2004

• November 08, 2013 08 Nov'13

  CIO Interview: Michael Ibbitson, Gatwick Airport

  Gatwick Airport is replacing in-house IT with cloud services in a multimillion-pound modernisation programme

• November 08, 2013 08 Nov'13

  Demand for big data specialists to soar over the next five years

  As one-third of large UK businesses plan to implement big data analytics programmes, demand for staff is set to rise to 69,000 jobs

• November 07, 2013 07 Nov'13

  RBS Markets deploys IBM Rational for virtual testing

  Royal Bank of Scotland is investigating how it could extend a virtual test environment to support future development projects

• November 06, 2013 06 Nov'13

  IT spending up as companies invest in digital technology

  Businesses are stepping up their spending on IT as they invest in strategic digital technologies, a CIO survey by Deloitte reveals

• November 06, 2013 06 Nov'13

  Passengers navigate Gatwick airport using Google Street View

  Gatwick Airport is using Google Street view to help passengers find their way around the airport and into the duty frees

• November 06, 2013 06 Nov'13

  Canonical backs Cloud Foundry for OpenStack PaaS

  Ubuntu Linux creator Canonical has thrown its weight behind Pivotal's Cloud Foundry platform as a service offering for OpenStack

• November 06, 2013 06 Nov'13

  Amazon CTO urges businesses to open up to ideas

  At the FT Innovate conference in London, Amazon CTO Werner Vogels argued that companies should be more open to ideas

• November 06, 2013 06 Nov'13

  CIO interview: Angela Morrison, chief information officer, Direct Line

  Migrating IT away from former parent company Royal Bank of Scotland is the main priority for Angela Morrison, CIO at Direct Line Insurance

• November 06, 2013 06 Nov'13

  BlackBerry prepares for software-only future

  John Chen, the man who turned Sybase around, is now at the helm of ailing mobile device company BlackBerry. Can he do it again?

• November 05, 2013 05 Nov'13

  Business-defined storage will help reconnect businesses with IT, says Forrester

  Business-defined storage and datacentres will make IT more business-centric, according to Forrester

• November 05, 2013 05 Nov'13

  Nationwide to carry out mortgage consultations by video

  Nationwide Building Society will enable mortgage consultants to meet customers via high-definition video links using Cisco technology

• November 05, 2013 05 Nov'13

  University cuts software installation time from days to hours

  The University of Dundee claims to have reduced the time its central IT department takes to install software to over 1,300 academics from days to hours, after investing in privilege management software

• November 04, 2013 04 Nov'13

  CIO Interview: Mike Wright, CIO, McKinsey & Company

  CIOs are finding it difficult to find innovative technology solutions from the big established suppliers, and are having to search elsewhere

• November 04, 2013 04 Nov'13

  Zurich Insurance Group to streamline finance IT

  Zurich Insurance Group has signed a five-year deal with Accenture to develop, implement and manage finance and business intelligence applications in multiple countries including the UK.

• November 01, 2013 01 Nov'13

  Apps and APIs -- how enterprise software development needs to change

  The popularity of mobile apps is changing user expectations of software. How should IT managers respond when considering software development plans?

• October 31, 2013 31 Oct'13

  Companies are not taking advantage of data analytics, research says

  Research by Bersin by Deloitte shows that 86% of businesses have yet to progress beyond using their HR data to generate basic reports

• October 31, 2013 31 Oct'13

  Companies need to think about user experience as HR technology takes off

  Companies are replacing 10-year old, on-premise HR systems, with cloud based alternatives, says consultant Jason Averbrook,

• October 31, 2013 31 Oct'13

  Explosive IT outsourcing figures mask industry realignment

  The latest figures on global IT outsourcing sales from ISG reflect a realignment in IT services as they are bought in different ways

• October 30, 2013 30 Oct'13

  UK needs open data champions, says Martha Lane Fox

  UK digital champion Martha Lane Fox calls for government, businesses and charities to promote innovative use of open data

• October 30, 2013 30 Oct'13

  Teradata goes cost neutral in the cloud

  Teradata has announced that its database, analytics platform and applications will also be available in the cloud, initially in the US

• October 28, 2013 28 Oct'13

  US and Canada follow UK initiative on Open Data

  The US and Canada are planning to emulate the work of the UK’s Open Data Institute (ODI), created by Tim Berners Lee

• October 28, 2013 28 Oct'13

  Aerospace company turns to cloud in $4m HR IT project

  Problems finding skilled engineers has prompted BE Aerospace to sign deal with SuccessFactors for cloud HR technology.

• October 28, 2013 28 Oct'13

  Loughborough University implements 400 virtual desktops

  Loughborough University has cut maintenance costs and enabled a bring-your-own-device (BYOD) scheme for academics with virtual desktops.

• October 28, 2013 28 Oct'13

  End in sight for sub-postmaster claims against Post Office's Horizon accounting system

  Sub-postmasters' claims of errors made by the Horizon accounting system could be completed in three months

• October 25, 2013 25 Oct'13

  HP and Diageo take different paths to cloud-based HR

  HP and Diageo took very different approaches when they deployed cloud-based human resources (HR) software from Workday

• October 24, 2013 24 Oct'13

  European Central Bank warns against last-minute Sepa migrations

  The European Central Bank warns firms that have left migration to the Single European Payments Area (Sepa) they could face problems

• October 24, 2013 24 Oct'13

  Cutting-edge startups battle to transform HR into a powerful corporate tool

  Companies at the cutting edge of HR technology battle in a Dragon's Den-type challenge to convince a panel of experts of their commercial potential

• October 23, 2013 23 Oct'13

  Seven day account switching-service fuels modest increase in activity

  The seven day account switching service launched last month has led to an 11% increase in the number of consumers switching accounts in the last month compared to last year.

• October 22, 2013 22 Oct'13

  BT signs multimillion HR technology contract with Oracle

  The project, one of the largest contracts signed so far for Oracle’s Fusion technology, is strategically important both to Oracle and BT

• October 22, 2013 22 Oct'13

  Case study: Pumps maker Hayward Tyler’s restructure sharpened ERP business focus

  When a restructure arrives half way through an ERP upgrade, it could be a threat to the IT programme. But Hayward Tyler saw it as a chance to ensure business goals were at the heart of its Epicor project.

• October 22, 2013 22 Oct'13

  Browsium throws lifeline to XP users

  Browsium Ion, which provides legacy Internet Explorer emulation, now supports multiple Java releases and IE8

• October 21, 2013 21 Oct'13

  SAP reports in-memory Hana boost in Q3 2013 results

  SAP has posted double-digit growth for Q3 2013, partly due to a boost in Hana sales

• October 17, 2013 17 Oct'13

  IBM's hardware and services businesses decline as overall business drops 4%

  IBM has reported revenues of $23.7bn for the third quarter of 2013, down 4% from the same quarter last year

• October 17, 2013 17 Oct'13

  Air France offers mobile alerts to passengers

  Air France is developing mobile apps that will allow passengers to receive real-time travel alerts and book flights on their mobile devices

• October 17, 2013 17 Oct'13

  Swiss train drivers equipped with iPads to save millions in energy costs

  Switzerland’s rail network is equipping train drivers with iPads that will advise them on the optimum speed to save millions in energy costs

• October 17, 2013 17 Oct'13

  US railway integrates applications in drive to use train network more efficiently

  US rail transport company Norfolk Southern Railway has begun an ambitious project to integrate 400 software applications it uses to control and monitor its rolling stock, trains and freight containers

• October 16, 2013 16 Oct'13

  Case study: Yellow Pages digitises records for the web

  Canada's Yellow Pages is investing in a digitisation programme to compete with online information providers, such as Google, Facebook and Yell

• October 16, 2013 16 Oct'13

  Huawei confirms UK R&D centre

  Huawei says it will build an R&D centre as part of its £1.3bn UK investment after the firm's CEO met Chancellor George Osborne

• October 15, 2013 15 Oct'13

  Siemens Enterprise Communications rebrands as Unify

  The communications company will rebrand in time to launch its latest unified communications solution, code-named Project Ansible

• October 14, 2013 14 Oct'13

  Scottish Government pilots Windows 8 tablets to improve services

  The Scottish government is piloting how Windows 8 could be used to improve citizen relationship

• October 14, 2013 14 Oct'13

  Case study: South Staffordshire College leads technology revolution in education

  South Staffordshire College is to open a digital campus, where students will be encouraged to immerse themselves in education through tech

• October 11, 2013 11 Oct'13

  Nuance demos virtual healthcare assistant

  Speech software company Nuance has demonstrated how a voice-based user interface could streamline medical consultation

• October 11, 2013 11 Oct'13

  Toyota e-learning upgrade aims to cut mechanics' training time by up to a year

  Car distributor Toyota Motor Europe is using e-learning to manage the training and certification of motor technicians and engineers

• October 09, 2013 09 Oct'13

  Engineering firm aims to automate HR system for 150,000 employees

  Power and automation company, ABB is to automate and simplify its HR processes in a project that aims to make HR technology as easy to use as Google. The project, dubbed the Google-isation of HR, will allow employees and managers to look for HR ...

• October 09, 2013 09 Oct'13

  Tesco.com uses agile development offshore to roll out internationally

  Tesco used agile methodology, co-ordinating a team of 100 offshore developers, to roll out the Tesco.com website internationally

• October 09, 2013 09 Oct'13

  Misys expects payback in 12 months from talent management in the cloud

  Financial software company Misys has opted for a cloud based talent management system, after SAP proved wanting.

• October 08, 2013 08 Oct'13

  Rugby Football Union uses analytics to educate and engage with users

  The RFU is introducing data analytics technologies for public use to encourage engagement with existing fans and education of the sport

• October 04, 2013 04 Oct'13

  CIO interview: Carlos Morgado, CTO, Just Eat

  Carlos Morgado, group CTO of online takeaway service Just Eat, discusses the company's move to public cloud

• October 04, 2013 04 Oct'13

  Adobe security chief Brad Arkin apologises for credit card theft

  Adobe's chief security officer (CSO) Brad Arkin has posted a blog on the company’s website apologising for a major security breach

• October 02, 2013 02 Oct'13

  Belfast Health Trust virtualises its way to the cloud

  The Belfast Health and Social Care Trust is implementing virtualisation technology across the trust, with hopes to become a cloud provider in the near future

• October 01, 2013 01 Oct'13

  Ministry of Defence upgrades Oracle HR and payroll system

  The Service Personnel and Veterans Agency of the Ministry of Defence (MoD) has upgraded its Oracle HP and payroll system

• September 30, 2013 30 Sep'13

  Charity uses cloud HR system to keep track of staff working in danger zones

  It took a disaster in Haiti to demonstrate to charity World Vision why it needed better HR systems

• September 27, 2013 27 Sep'13

  Executive interview: The significance of GPU accelerated Java

  Sumit Gupta general manager, Tesla GPU Accelerated Computing at Nvidia discusses general purpose GPU applications

• September 27, 2013 27 Sep'13

  Software acquisition is risk acquisition, says industry panel

  New software often means new security vulnerabilities, panel tells the (ISC)2 Security Congress 2013

• September 26, 2013 26 Sep'13

  Oracle OpenWorld 2013: Tesco takes a multi-channel approach to customer experience

  Tesco has been using an array of Oracle technology, including its customer experience (CX) portfolio to turn the company in a multi-channel retailer

• September 25, 2013 25 Sep'13

  Gmail outage: CIOs must be prepared for the unexpected

  Even class-leading cloud services can and will fail. How can IT departments build in resilience to cloud computing outages?

• September 25, 2013 25 Sep'13

  Google to rethink resilient networking following dual failure

  In spite of running a dual redundant network, Google's Gmail system has had a major failure.

• September 25, 2013 25 Sep'13

  Oracle OpenWorld 2013: Oracle customers continue to invest in big data

  Airbus, Thomson Reuters and the New York Stock Exchange have all implemented Oracle's big data products to improve their businesses

• September 24, 2013 24 Sep'13

  Oracle OpenWorld 2013: Oracle launches database as a service

  Oracle continues to extend its cloud offering at OpenWorld 2013 by launching its database as a service (DaaS) offering

• September 24, 2013 24 Sep'13

  Oracle OpenWorld 2013: Oracle is serious about the cloud as it launches ten services

  Oracle launches 10 cloud services, as well as a cloud marketplace, to prove its commitment to the cloud

• September 24, 2013 24 Sep'13

  IBM demos 48x speed boost in Java using Nvidia GPUs

  Nvidia’s Cuda graphics processors have been used to speed up a Java-based sorting program by up to 48 times

• September 23, 2013 23 Sep'13

  Poor connectivity and battery life hamper mobile working

  A study conducted by Vanson Bourne for HP finds almost two-thirds of mobile workers are unable to work effectively due to connectivity issues

• September 23, 2013 23 Sep'13

  Oracle Open World 2013: Oracle launches in-memory database search

  Oracle has launched an in-memory version of its database which promises 100-times faster query processing.

• September 23, 2013 23 Sep'13

  DECC names IT suppliers for smart meter project

  The Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) has announced the IT suppliers that will provide the technology to underpin smart meters

• September 23, 2013 23 Sep'13

  Oracle OpenWorld 2013 European update: Oracle extends cloud

  Oracle is continuing to drive forward its cloud operations in Europe

• September 23, 2013 23 Sep'13

  Two-thirds of CIOs have big data on agenda

  Big data has not gone beyond the planning stage for over 92% of CIOs according to research from Gartner

• September 20, 2013 20 Sep'13

  Skandia chooses Pitney Bowes for event-driven customer communications

  Skandia Bank is seeking to advance its digital strategy using customer communication software from Pitney Bowes

• September 20, 2013 20 Sep'13

  Case study: Law firm Sills & Betteridge revamps telephony with Intercity

  Law firm Sills & Betteridge overhauls its telephony system to bring employees an easy-to-use, consolidated solution

• September 19, 2013 19 Sep'13

  Software licences drive Oracle revenue, but hardware takes a hit

  A drop in hardware sales dragged down Oracle’s revenue in its Q1 financial results, but software revenue increased

• September 19, 2013 19 Sep'13

  Mobile app downloads worth $26bn in 2013

  The number of mobile app downloads in 2013 will reach 102 billion, with a total value of $26bn, according to Gartner

• September 18, 2013 18 Sep'13

  Most businesses suffer major technology failure over 12 months

  79% of businesses had a technology failure in the past year, costing £6.9m, according to a survey of IT professionals and business line heads

• September 18, 2013 18 Sep'13

  BMW gears up IT resilience with private cloud infrastructure

  After testing and validating its own private cloud services, BMW's IT team is ready to use it in production

• September 18, 2013 18 Sep'13

  MPs brand NHS National Programme for IT a 'fiasco' as posthumous costs rise

  The now-axed NHS National Programme for IT (NPfIT) is still incurring significant costs following the failure of the government IT project

• September 16, 2013 16 Sep'13

  British Army’s manpower planning saves £770m through SAS BI

  The British Army's headquarters is using SAS to analyse and more efficiently allocate manpower and resources

• September 13, 2013 13 Sep'13

  After virtualising IT estate, Jaguar Land Rover now eyes cloud computing

  Jaguar Land Rover's IT team takes its newly virtualised infrastructure to the next stage of IT evolution by adopting cloud-based services

• September 13, 2013 13 Sep'13

  Can Dell boost its enterprise credibility?

  Michael Dell remains committed to the PC business.But where will the company go next now that it is private?

• September 13, 2013 13 Sep'13

  Bank takes outsourcing to extreme with appstore

  French banking giant Credit Agricole has created an app store to provide banking apps to customers and get ideas for new apps

• September 13, 2013 13 Sep'13

  Businesses hit digital roadblock due to paper processes

  A survey of business and IT leaders has found that paper-based processes are creating inefficiencies

• September 11, 2013 11 Sep'13

  £480bn of government revenue depends on "risky" legacy IT

  Almost £480bn of the UK government’s revenues are dependent on legacy IT systems that “could present a very significant risk”

• September 10, 2013 10 Sep'13

  Barclays reception IT system falls over globally

  Barclays' reception administration system has been down for almost two days, with no sign of when it is set to get fixed

• September 09, 2013 09 Sep'13

  Centrica awards SAP service and maintenance contract to Capgemini

  Centrica has awarded a five-year contract to Capgemini UK for the management and support of its corporate global SAP service

• September 09, 2013 09 Sep'13

  Executive interview: Andrew Brem, Connected Homes, British Gas

  British Gas is digitising energy. Andrew Brem speaks to Computer Weekly about the internet connected home

• September 04, 2013 04 Sep'13

  Diageo to change how it manages APIs to support digital strategy

  Diageo is contemplating introducing a lightweight middleware layer to better manage the APIs that govern the software services it uses

• September 03, 2013 03 Sep'13

  Rubber and plastics converter Miers chooses Business One on Hana

  LJA Miers, a family-run company that turns rubber and plastic into gaskets and seals, has chosen SAP’s Business One, running on the supplier’s in-memory database Hana, to re-cast its business

• September 02, 2013 02 Sep'13

  Social collaboration tools gain ground as organisations refresh IT

  Social collaboration tools are gaining some ground in enterprise IT in the face of senior management resistance

• September 02, 2013 02 Sep'13

  Co-operative Bank ditches core banking migration

  The Cooperative Bank has ditched its plan to migrate its core banking system to an off-the-shelf system from Infosys, amid huge losses

• August 30, 2013 30 Aug'13

  How networks and data win Formula One races for Mercedes AMG Petronas

  Tata Communications joins the Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One team to bring speedy connectivity worthy of its cars

• August 30, 2013 30 Aug'13

  Construction company Aggregate Industries sees data value in QlikView

  Aggregate Industries, a company that produces construction materials, such as aggregates, asphalt, ready-mixed concrete and precast concrete products, is using QlikView to render its data an asset

• August 28, 2013 28 Aug'13

  Why you need to think about BPM in a different way

  Look at business process management (BPM) in the right way and it has the potential to transform businesses

• August 28, 2013 28 Aug'13

  eHarmony finds MongoDB the perfect match for data store

  Online dating site eHarmony has used open source NoSQL database MongoDB for its data store, to speed up delivery of matches between users

• August 28, 2013 28 Aug'13

  Translation software is breaking down business language barriers

  Machine translation is becoming critical to businesses faced with the challenge of providing information to customers, staff and partners in multiple languages and in near real time

• August 27, 2013 27 Aug'13

  Case study: Seadrill migrates in-house datacentre to virtual private cloud in six months

  Offshore drilling company Seadrill moved its in-house datacentre in Norway to HP's virtual private cloud infrastructure in the UK in six months

• August 27, 2013 27 Aug'13

  VMware strengthens cloud and software-defined datacentre portfolio at VMworld 2013

  At VMworld 2013, VMware launched products and services to accelerate enterprise adoption of software-defined datacentre architecture

• August 23, 2013 23 Aug'13

  SAP user groups welcome 'partial termination' licensing changes

  SAP customers can now partially terminate licenses and will not be required to pay maintenance on unused licenses

• August 21, 2013 21 Aug'13

  VMware must demonstrate it is a ‘serious IaaS provider’ at VMworld: Gartner

  As VMworld 2013 is about to kickoff, Gartner analyst explains what users can expect at the event and VMware’s future in the mobile and cloud era

• August 20, 2013 20 Aug'13

  Fleet management firm LeasePlan embraces private cloud for BYOD

  LeasePlan is implementing private cloud services for flexible IT infrastructure and a centralised virtual desktop to support BYOD

• August 19, 2013 19 Aug'13

  Hempsons Solicitors cuts costs with Enterasys network

  Legal health specialist Hempsons Solicitors rips out its existing Cisco infrastructure for increased functionality and cost savings

• August 16, 2013 16 Aug'13

  UCAS adopts public cloud to process university admissions

  Ten days before the A-level results, UCAS adopted a public cloud infrastructure to scale up its IT and to make admission process efficient