INDUSTRY NEWS COMMENT: TALKING HOSTED Andy Hollingworth
A STUDY we conducted recently among small business owners has revealed that companies, as much as households, can feel out in the cold if they’re based outside of London. The study revealed that around 60 per cent of SME owners believe that the Government offers more funding and investment to initiatives within London and the south east. More
than three quarters believe the north-south divide is in full force and is, effectively, stunting their business growth. Interestingly though, almost half agreed that the high speed next generation network (NGN) creates a level playing field between businesses competing both inside and outside of the home counties. Nearly a quarter of SMEs claim it provides enhanced e-commerce and sales opportunities, 23 per cent believe it enables remote working and 16 per cent feel the NGN enables their firm to be more agile. Savvy resellers are playing the perceived geographic bias to their advantage by using their locality to highlight the strength of the network in their region as an opportunity to support business infrastructure where others have not. Having received an investment of more than £600 million to date, the number of exchanges delivering superfast broadband, Ethernet and EFM services to the regions continues to grow, providing more access to business grade connectivity than ever before. We would encourage partners to actively seek case
studies from their portfolio where hosted products and business grade connectivity has given one or more of their regional clients a competitive edge. The ability to reference success stories from a client base and suggest an offering which negates the advantages of being based in a high investment government hotspot could secure true market standout for a reseller.
Andy Hollingworth, Director of Wholesale, TalkTalk Business
CWW launch gains kudos
Pictured: Abzorb Media Director Tim Mercer (far right) found the winning formula when he scooped an iPad in CWW’s lucky draw.
SCORES of delegates ral- lied behind Cable&Wireless Worldwide as it unveiled a con- vincing channel campaign at two events last month. Key developments include a restructured and dedicated chan- nel business unit, a leadership team with the bit between their teeth and a cloud voice proposi- tion called NGWare developed in partnership with cloud spe- cialists Content Guru.
“Our launch was received
positively with high levels of interaction and interest, proving that what we have to say is rel- evant to the market,” enthused Edward Winfield, Director of SaaS Alliances at CWW. “Requests for follow-up meetings are being actioned
across ten new logos as a result of the two events.” Tim Mercer,
Director at
Abzorb Media, also found the winning formula when he scooped an iPad in one of CWW’s lucky draws. Abzorb Media is an early
adopter of the NGWare plat- form and is currently working with CWW’s wholesale team to deliver through its own Layer 2 Interconnect. “NGWare offers a multitude of products and services to our end clients,” said Mercer. “And being partner agnostic enables a more compelling offering for our resellers and direct custom- ers who are looking for a change in provider and technology.” See page 18 for the full story
SHORT CALLS
VMware is to acquire Nicira – a specialist in software-defined networking (SDN) and a lead player in network virtualisation for open source initiatives – in a $1.26bn deal. “VMware has been at the forefront of the server virtualisation revolution, and we have the opportunity to do the same in datacentre and cloud networking,” commented Paul Maritz, CEO, VMware.
Avaya has been positioned as a Leader in the 2012 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Contact Centre Infrastructure, Worldwide. In the annual report Avaya was cited as a contact centre infrastructure leader based on two key criteria, the ability to execute and its completeness of vision.
Daisy Group’s Phil Honeyman, an IT Support Engineer, has been selected to be an official ‘London 2012 Games Maker’ working with the IT Service Desk team at Manchester United’s Old Trafford football ground, one of the six venues for the Olympic Football Tournament. Honeyman said: “I am delighted to be involved in such a once in a lifetime event.”
ROI (return on infrastructure) you have to measure it, to maximise it.
ccapps combines life cycle management of managed service assets and contracts with valuable business intelligence to generate profitable and sustainable business relationships from your customer and partner communities.
A unique software-as-a-service (SaaS) solution for technology companies who use leasing and other service contract programs to drive growth and create opportunity.
ccapps.cc 6 COMMS DEALER AUGUST 2012
www.comms-dealer.com
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