MicroScope articles from November 2006

MicroScope archives from November 2006

Catching the big fish means getting tough.
November 6, 2006... One of the biggest challenges for any type of vendor, both software and hardware, is the problem they have stemming the flow of legitimate and fraudulent products on the internet auction sites. A market has grown up for users who are not...

Sun?s tough attitude to grey market is not all good news.
November 6, 2006... Sun Microsystems may have been very quiet this year as it continues to bed down the acquisition of StorageTek and adjust to the replacement of founder and former CEO Scott McNealy with one time ?evangelist-in-chief? Jonathan Schwartz, but its...

Warning by Fujitsu after PC sparks.
November 6, 2006... A month after implementing a voluntary battery recall on notebooks following the problems with Sony? lithium ion cells, Fujitsu has revealed that it has received a report from a Sony customer in Japan that one of its notebooks PC with a battery...

RoHS statute hits PCs.
November 6, 2006... There could be sShortages in PC components ascould be a direct result of the introduction of the Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) directive in July. Last month MicroScope reported that there were issues of constraint of 17in TFTs...

Software-assisted success.
November 6, 2006... ?I want to cut the infant mortality rate of small businesses in this country.? As a mission statement for a software company, you can? get much clearer than that. But then Stefan T?pfer, founder and CEO of Winweb, is not one to mince his words....

Countdown to deadline.
November 6, 2006... In a move that will define how Cisco is sold and serviced by the channel over the next five months, the vendor has outlined final plans for the migration of kit from old service model SIS98 to shared support. As the 31 March 2007 deadline...

HP signs up former grey importer as registered partner.
November 6, 2006... Despite talking up its fight against the grey market, Hewlett-Packard has made eXpansys a registered partner months after the Manchester-based e-tailer admitted importing iPaqs from outside the European Economic Area. (EEA). As exclusively...

AMD accused of favouring Dell with chips.
November 6, 2006... The crown the channel placed on AMD? head may be slipping with system builders accusing the chip manufacturer of prioritising the supply of dual core Athlon 64 amid acute shortages to its burgeoning partnership with Dell. In September,...

Microsoft gets tough on online counterfeit.
November 6, 2006... Microsoft has stepped up its fight against online sellers of counterfeit software as it initiates legal proceedings against five UK dealers, and revealed there were a futher 16 cases in the pipeline. The vendor last week launched legal...

Nortel aims to plug a service gap.
November 6, 2006... Nortel has laid out plans to increase contract renewals and attach rates of SME-focused assurance service packs with the development of a partner assurance contract (PAC) targeted at plugging gaps in reseller service offerings. The vendor...

Lispin chosen to be CA?s new channel head.
November 6, 2006... CA has opted for Bill Lispin as its new channel head with growth of indirect business the top priority for the software vendor. Despite calls from the channel for CA? temporary channel head George Kafkarkou to be given the role, Lispin, who...

Oracle has smaller firms in sight.
November 6, 2006... Oracle is looking for developers to step forward and take advantage of its free Database XE software aimed at the SME community. The vendor has been pointing to the example of RedSky IT of what could be achieved by ISVs; RedSky IT has...

Techologies slug it out for the prime living room slot.
November 6, 2006... The subject of what technology will succeed in dominating the living room from a storage media point of view is not a debate that can be encapsulated in a single article. Following last week? feature on Blu-ray and HD DVD, responses have...

Virtual consultancy.(Company overview)
November 13, 2006... Hosted software, which is on demand over the internet, means geography is no longer a limitation on sales. New VARs will be born while others are being created from existing ones, harnessing on-demand to become the mid-market software...

Agenda.
November 13, 2006... November 20-21 November Data Center Summit 2006 Royal Lancaster Hotel London Web: www.gartner.com 22-23 November Enterprise Planning & Architecture Strategies Seminar Radisson SAS Hotel Amsterdam Web: www.gartner.com 28 November...

Central line ride.(centralization of information technology departments)
November 13, 2006... Systems centralisation has been an ongoing trend for a decade or more, but one of the best examples of its benefits won? be found in a large financial institution, or in a highly resourced retail giant. It? in the small town of Penticton,...

Inside OutMutually beneficial.(vendors, resellers, vendor relationships)
November 13, 2006... Maximising vendor relationships - how to access hidden funds Vendors are increasingly tightening their marketing budgets, and as this happens, they are looking for new ways to maximise return on their spend. For many this means forgoing...

Unjust rewards.(Survey)
November 13, 2006... There has been much talk recently in the media about directors? pay, both in the private sector and in the public sector. It is coming under ever increasing scrutiny The Institute of Directors annual Directors R?wards survey, carried out by...

Nevis targets security.
November 13, 2006... Joining the list of networking vendors attempting to break into the UK market, Nevis Networks is focusing on the next generation of LAN switch infrastructure, and incorporating security functionality in order to do it. By introducing...

EMC channels its efforts into data mountaineering.
November 13, 2006... The Chinese used to say ?may you live in interesting times? and at the moment this comment rings true in the storage industry. Speaking exclusively to MicroScope, Adrian Mcdonald, vice-president and general manager for the UK and Ireland at...

Tenders.
November 13, 2006... 203183, Tender Invitation UK-Brierley Hill: choice-based lettings information system A choice-based lettings information system. 203077, Tender Invitation UK-Solihull: desktop computers Supply, delivery and maintenance of computer base...

Five Minute Interview.(Interview)
November 20, 2006... What is the best/worst advice you have received and from whom? Best advice (from my Grandma) ? for the first two years of marriage, put a penny in a jar every time you have sex. From year three onwards, take a penny out every time you have sex?...

Deal or no deal.
November 20, 2006... It? not often you get two significant announcements concerning Linux and open source software within the space of a week, especially from software giants such as Oracle and Microsoft, particularly the latter. Yet in the last week of October and...

Agenda.
November 20, 2006... November 20-21 November Data Center Summit 2006 Royal Lancaster Hotel London Web: www.gartner.com 22-23 November Enterprise Planning & Architecture Strategies Seminar Radisson SAS Hotel Amsterdam Web: www.gartner.com 28 November...

Stop counterfeit, not second-hand trading.(Brief article)
November 20, 2006... There are broadly two options for companies that cannot afford to go out and purchase new kit: pay as you go and get someone else to host it; or turn to the second-hand market and pick up something that is still able to perform a service for...

Inside OutSporting chance.
November 20, 2006... Sporting Chance A summer of major international sporting events being streamed over the internet was greeted with a resounding cheer from desk-jockeys up and down the country, though the response from business managers was considerably...

Ringing the changes in the market for mobiles.
November 20, 2006... In recent years the mobile telecommunications industry has experienced phenomenal growth with more highly evolved mobile phones being sold on the market. However, this year we have seen the mobile phone market show a slight decline. Why is...

Telindus and Logicalis set out European growth plans.
November 20, 2006... Two of the networking channel? largest systems integrators ? Telindus and Datatec division Logicalis ? are targeting continental Europe as the key location for growth in 2007. Now under the full control of service provider Belgacom, the...

IT problems cost UK business ?1.7bn a day.
November 20, 2006... UK businesses are collectively wasting ?1.7bn a day due to problems with IT and using products incorrectly. Results from Samsung? UseIT Survey found that employees waste an average of 79 minutes a day trying to solve IT problems, and this...

Costly delay.
November 20, 2006... HM Revenue & Customs has announced that the proposal for the introduction of the new measures to combat carousel fraud will not now come into force on 1 December. The measure was designed to combat carousel fraud which is generating enormous...

Dell wades forward with the kiss of death to back?up tape.
November 20, 2006... Dell purses its lips Delivers a kiss of death to tape That? gone and done it. Low-end tape devices could survive the presence of Iomega with its REV removable hard drive back-up disks. They could even ignore Tandberg? RDX removable...

RSA Security distribution line-up to be revealed in coming weeks.(Brief article)
November 20, 2006... RSA Security has drawn up a shortlist of EMEA distributors, with a new line-up expected to be unveiled next week. The vendor has been reviewing its distribution tier across the EMEA region following its acquisition by storage giant EMC. ...

Deep roots help Sage stand firm.
November 20, 2006... Sage is still a consolidator in a market that is becoming increasingly congested and continues to add to its business process portfolio and improve integration. The UK accounting software giant last week forked out ?20m in cash on SME online...

Rewarding the best for channel success.
November 20, 2006... Event details The date Thursday 17 May 2007 The venue: Park Lane Hilton, London Award categories Reseller ? SME reseller of the year ? Storage reseller of the year ? AV reseller of the year ? Networking/comms reseller of the...

UTM debate continues.(unified threat management )(Discussion)
November 20, 2006... Apanel of security channel players assembled at the recent Wick Hill round table established what a unified threat management (UTM) product should contain, and this week turn to the question of what products exist that fulfill the criteria, and...

Digital snap in the sack.
November 20, 2006... Those vendors and channel players promoting digital cameras this winter should be aware that the opportunity to gain sales from both upgrades and traditional film users remains strong. Products have increased to a 4?megapixel entry point...

Cutting UTM confusion with Prodigy.(Unified Threat Management, Global Security One )
November 20, 2006... There is so much confusion around the whole area of unified threat management (UTM) that it could be a very wise decision to come to the market with a product that roughly fits into that category but without using the UTM label to describe it....

Action has to be taken now to save the future.
November 27, 2006... At an Intel energy efficiency debate last week there was a moment when members of the panel were asked if they really believed the planet was dying and that action had to be taken. One respondent said it was a personal question and he was...

Time for metrics to control energy costs.
November 27, 2006... Without standards and metrics for measuring the energy efficiency of products, IT managers are left relying on electricity bills until the industry develops a method of quantifying the power demanded by products. Agreement that there needs...

Agenda.
November 27, 2006... November 28 November Butler Group Strategy Briefing: Remote Access Security Crowne Plaza, London Email: conferences@butlergroup.com Tel: 01482 608 388 28-30 November Information Management Solutions (IMS) 2006 Grand Hall, Olympia...

A hot read this Christmas.
November 27, 2006... As Christmas approaches there are going to be plenty of resellers that pop into a bookshop to choose something to give as a present and the choices are either the latest trashy celebrity biography or something that could persuade a relative or...

Green PC aims for EU Eco-Label mark.
November 27, 2006... The Irish manufacturer of what is claimed to be a zero waste environmentally-friendly PC is on the lookout for distributors in the UK and other European countries. Paul Maher, managing director of MicroPro Computers, which launched the...

Five Minute Interview.
November 27, 2006... What is the best/worst advice you have received? Best advice: ?Always be yourself? from Adam Crozier. Worst advice: ?Try the raw squid, it? delicious? from my researcher, Hannah Ludbrook. What is the best book you?ve ever read? The Magus...

The ups and downs of mobile handset sales.
November 27, 2006... The mobile phone market (including the direct channel) suffered a volume decline of seven per cent this September, compared with the same month last year, writes Greg Allen of GfK. This decline is being heavily influenced by the non-prepay...

Outside InAct now to reduce carbon emissions.
November 27, 2006... Having now emerged from the debate over whether or not anthropogenic CO2 emissions are driving climate change our next challenge is to rapidly develop and implement effective responses to this urgent global problem. The scientific consensus...

Partners urge Intel to subsidise VBI pricing.
November 27, 2006... Verified By Intel (VBI) bare bones notebook programme has failed to alight the UK volume mobile market and partners want the chip maker to subsidise the initiative to improve pricing versus tier one vendors. Local PC builders have been...

The emerald road to recycling.
November 27, 2006... On the face of it, Ireland? introduction of the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment directive has been relatively trouble-free. Admittedly, there were a couple of minor hitches when it was implemented on 13 August 2005, most notably when...

Counting the cost of carbon.
November 27, 2006... It is not just politicians who are split on the subject of climate change; while many in the channel are truly concerned about the future of our planet, plenty of others are happy to bury their head in the sand and ignore the issue. ...

Power firmly on the agenda.
November 27, 2006... Power is surging up the corporate agenda as customers face larger bills and constraints on data centre performance and capacity. According to the results of an Intel survey of IT managers, power has become a top three concern behind skills...

IT moves to clean up its act.(impact of IT on environment)
November 27, 2006... The IT industry is coming under the same social pressure the oil and car sectors faced to become better corporate citizens. But increases in energy prices and EU legislation that aims to curtail wasteful technology will be the real drivers that...

Phoenix struggles to fulfil service contract.
November 27, 2006... Resellers have complained that customers are experiencing problems with the support provided by Phoenix IT Services on Hewlett-Packard maintenance contracts. The Northampton-based services specialist secured a deal with HP earlier this...

DNS adds strings to Arrow bow.
November 27, 2006... The long mooted takeover of InTechnology? UK distribution operation is drawing nearer, with German distribution outfit DNS expected to acquire it as part of parent Arrow Electronics? European expansion plans. After months of speculation...

Kelway?s new backer plans UK acquisitions.
November 27, 2006... Venture capitalist Core Capital LLP has bought a 25 per cent stake in mid-market reseller Kelway for ?5m and taken a seat on the board to work with senior management on potential acquisitions. Talking to MicroScope, Phil Doye, managing...

eBuyer credit insurance increased.
November 27, 2006... Credit insurer Euler Hermes has kept its promise to start upping limits for eBuyer after the e-tailer shared up-to-date trading figures. During the summer, Euler Hermes halved credit insurance to eBuyer? suppliers following reports of late...

Sales staff shortage.
November 27, 2006... Following warnings from the British Computer Society (BCS) that there is an imminent shortage of technical skills in the IT sector, the channel is lamenting a similar shortfall in technical sales people. BCS president Professor Nigel...

Channel urged to exploit finance.
November 27, 2006... Only a third of all sales through the channel are made using finance and as a result resellers are missing out on a huge revenues opportunity. According to research by Siemens Financial Services, the channel is unsure about finance and so...

EDS disposes of third-party services subsidiary.
November 27, 2006... Services giant EDS has sold its third-party services subsidiary Global Field Services to German services specialist a&o group for an undisclosed sum. In a surprise move, EDS will incur a $50m (?26.1m) charge from the sale, while a&o will...

Right result for VMware.
November 27, 2006... VMware has claimed success in its channel fine-tuning a year after introducing changes to its partner programme and now talks of how the virtualisation opportunity has altered. The EMC-owned software vendor started life as a direct selling...

Where our money is going.(MiscroScope's funding for timber project)
November 27, 2006... MicroScope has decided that it will be spending the money it costs to offset the carbon produced by the production and distribution of this issue on the The Platest Plan Vivo project is based in south-western Uganda, which and aims to work...

Safe compliance.(Restriction of Hazardous Substances)
November 27, 2006... When the Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) directive came into force on 1 July, the channel was awash with horror stories about old stock being dumped forcing resellers to sell non-compliant product at cut down prices. The EU...

In hyperspace everyone lies.
November 27, 2006... There are two types of people in this world and the way to tell them apart is to give them a subscription form to fill in. Type A, a breed who will cheerfully lie to their boss and spouses, will nonetheless dutifully fill in their age, DOB,...

Home and away.
November 27, 2006... Wiewed from this side of the Irish Sea, the UK? continuing failure to complPICS: Chris Jagusz, Nigel Jones, Cath Knight With the environment increasingly hitting the headlines and the political agenda, businesses may well find they have to...

Tenders.
November 27, 2006... 218609, Tender Invitation UK-Northallerton: computer cabling Supply and installation of data cabling services. IE001M41605, Tender Invitation IRL-Waterford: ICT equipment 20 desktop PCs, 10 laptops and 3 servers. 216325, Tender...

WatchGuard box proves its worth.
November 27, 2006... There is a shift happening in the business world as people start to realise that caring for the planet is not just about being corporately responsible. Unless it is taken seriously there might not be much of a customer base left in the future....