Good news for our readers this week; firstly it’s Friday (it comes every week but is always a joy) and secondly the best weather is yet to come – yes more sun is forecast for the UK this weekend! Those based elsewhere we wish you good weather too!

But before we continue into the sun-soaked weekend and lazy disposition that such days inspire, its time for our very important and ever informative weekly news round-up.

News that Steria and the Belgian Police have united to introduce a new fingerprint identification system will please those worried about the UK’s Big Brother society - at least we’re not alone in our government’s surveillance exploits.

Orwellian complaints aside the new system does sound pretty good and is likely to make catching the bad guys a whole lot easier. According to a statement the system will provide “more precise results with a shorter response time and be prepared for future additional functionality. It will also offer increased search precision, significantly improved response times and a palm print search option.”

Steria’s Benelux division has joined hands with the Belgian Police Department’s Legal Identification Division to implement the system. Steria will apply the technology required for the capture and transmission of finger and palm prints and traces, and will also be in charge of all necessary integration services.

Now onto other news; WNS, a global BPO provider, has appointed Rick Sturge as Deputy Managing Director, Europe. If this isn’t a sign of WNS growth intentions in the UK and rest of Europe I don’t know what is.

Before this move Rick was Head of Strategic Development for the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA). He has over 25 years experience in ‘business development, finance and transformation, outsourcing and finance and accounting’ [sic] – wow that is a mouthful. Not to blow his trumpet too much, he has also previously held progressively responsible executive roles with Serco, PricewaterhouseCoopers and Accenture.

Rick will have the small task of driving WNS’s business development efforts, particularly in the travel and leisure and finance and accounting sectors, leveraging his cross-industry experience.

News from our neighbours across the pond reports that Air Canada has extended two outsourcing contracts with Unisys Corporation for hosting & integration (HIS) and cargo portal services (CPS).

The contracts will last until 2015 and Unisys will continue to host Air Canada on its Logistics Management System at its data center in Minneapolis. The CPS cargo system, which Air Canada will use until 2011, is an Internet portal for the air cargo industry.

The system brings together a range of carriers and forwarders in a neutral portal reducing transaction costs and allowing cross-market competition. Seems logical to us.

The final big story of the week comes from our beloved Orange UK. It’s decided to outsource the operation of its entire mobile network in the UK. Nokia Siemens Networks will take up the reigns for Orange UK’s 15.9 million mobile subscribers and responsibility for 230 of its staff.

Few details of Orange’s business reasons were released. But with UK mobile saturation at an all time high perhaps it’s prudent to slash overheads when new revenue streams are few and far between. Only time will tell the fates of the nation’s canniest mobile operators – watch with interest.

On that note, I bid you farewell for another week. Now feel free to commence that lazy disposition and more importantly for those in the UK - enjoy the sun this weekend.