Industry news

While 2013 was the year that the term ‘big data’ made it into public consciousness, some are picking 2014 as the year that it will actually go mainstream. An IDG report found that 74 per cent of the enterprises they surveyed predicted that big data will be in mainstream use in at least one business unit or department this year. Interestingly, the same survey found that the most critical success factor for working with big data is identifying the business areas and processes where it can have the biggest impact. This very much chimes with our experience of working with big data with our clients.

Big data can be overwhelming; by its very nature it involves huge data sets and trying to find patterns in information that is increasing exponentially all the time. However, this is where many businesses fall into the first trap. Rather than looking at all the information at the source and then trying to find out what it is saying, people should be identifying the business objectives that they are trying to achieve and analysing the data to help them achieve these outcomes. Whether that is increased customer satisfaction or profits, working back through the data to find the relevant information is a far more effective approach. By looking at what the business is trying to achieve and then identifying the levers which impact on these objectives, businesses can save wasting time and effort.

Naturally, before analysing big data a business will have been collecting it for a period of time, sometimes for many years. When they finally look to analyse it the data sets may be in no fit state and require huge amounts of cleaning first. But again, if a business has defined what objectives they want to achieve then it can concentrate on cleaning the information that will be the most useful.

And finally, attention needs to be paid to how data gets into the system in the first place. Wherever possible data should be pulled from the source, not several steps up the chain when it may have been altered by employees. This minimises the chance of human error distorting the data and therefore the results.

Big data can be the source of incredible insights for a business, however it’s essential to start with the business objectives and work downwards. This will yield the greatest rewards and is the smart way to manage big data.

How to stop the value leakage

MooD international recognised for MOD success

Air France has reported that it has achieved improved automation and reliability from the employment of a private cloud.

The cloud service, which is based on HP’s Service Automation (CSA) software, has seen improvements across 1,500 Linux servers employed by the aerospace firm, with automated standardisation helping to reduce costs and allowing for the ease of use of analytic services.

The private cloud service also will provide increased flexibility and faster deployment times of new services and applications.

The costs of the private cloud service are expected to be covered by savings achieved from efficiencies within the year.

Patrick Bourel, head of open systems at Air France, said: “This scalable platform will allow Air France to put in place monitoring and audit tools in order to achieve better quality of service”.

Airbus announce record 2013 sales

EADS begins restructuring programme

65 police force innovation bids have been given approval by the Home Office, allowing the successful bids access to a £20 million fund for innovation stimulation.

The fund is designed to incentivise police forces to increase the efficiency of services, with £20 million being available to successful bidders as a precursor to the official launch of the innovation fund later this year.

Funding will be used to provide a range of services including camera technology, mobile data services and public information services.

New police procurement strategy recommended

The approval of 65 bids represents over half of the 115 bids received by the Home Office, with the remaining bids still being assessed.

Policing minister Damian Green, said: “Unfortunately we could not approve (all the bids). In a number of cases there were positive ideas with potential to bring about transformation. But further work was needed to understand and articulate the impact of those changes.”

Capgemini awarded seven year police contract

The Bank of England has revealed that despite positive UK economic predictions and a fall in unemployment rates, the bank has no intentions to raise interest rates.

Paul Fisher, Bank of England's Executive Director for Markets, revealed that despite unemployment rates failing to 7.1 per cent, just 0.1 per cent off the required number necessary for a rise in interest, the bank had no plans to implement a sudden raise.

Bank of England reports improving economic forecast

Minutes from a recent policy meeting revealed that: “Members therefore saw no immediate need to raise Bank Rate even if the 7 percent unemployment threshold were to be reached in the near future”.

The reluctance to raise interest rates follows advice from the IMF, which urges banks to avoid raising interest rates in fear cutting off economic growth.

Bank of England expands financial services watchdog

The education secretary Michael Gove has called for increased speed in adopting technology and be made part of future curriculums in order to improve current teaching methods.

The education secretary said that schools could take advantage of emerging new services such as massive open online courses (MOOCs) and 3D printers and the multiple companies which have already begun educational support programs, including Google and Salesforce.

Michael Grove said: “In our lifetimes, traditional industries, markets and workplaces have been totally transformed; new products, new technologies and new applications - like Instagram, Tumblr, Spotify and Snapchat - develop and become mainstream parts of our lives with breath-taking rapidity".

A group of 14 IT suppliers have written an open letter calling for the need for improvements within the governments G-Cloud.

Signatories of the open letter included Skyscape, Azeus UK, Bird and Bird, Informed Soltuions, Konetic and Lockheed Martin, as well as public sector customers Westminster Council.

The calls for changes come shortly before the release of the fifth iteration of the G-Cloud in February.

The letter addressed to Government Digital Service (GDS) COO, Tony Singleton, made a series of recommendations for improvements in the procurement service.

Improvements included the simplification of the G-Cloud in order to make the interface more user-friendly, by including features found in modern online retailers, including buyer feedback to create user generated due diligence.

The letter recommended that the GDS take a more active hand in vetting suppliers to ensure that the services advertised are accurate.

Maude lauds UK as a ‘World-leader’ in digital by default

Former G-Cloud director calls for more risk taking in order to drive public savings

Luton & Dunstable NHS trust have employed a new communications system to drive increased savings and collaboration between 2,000 staff employed by the trust.

The trust awarded a five-year contract to Unify, (formerly Siemens Enterprise Communications) to provide communication services including mobile services and applications, location services and rapid-response alarm services.

The service once deployed will allow staff admins to work remotely rather than being tied to one location as required currently.

NHS moves forward with GP data collection

The communications contract will also consolidate devices and provide staff with one point of contact number, removing the current situation where individuals have multiple devices and communication points.

Mark England, director of IM&T at the Luton & Dunstable Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, said: "Using unified communications and IP telephony technologies, we expect to lower our operating costs and increase the overall efficiency of the trust."

South Tees NHS saves with accounts management system

Despite UK government efforts to increase competition in the banking sector, the Metro Bank’s president has said that limited ITO support is preventing emerging banks from challenging large incumbent banks.

The lack of IT outsourcing in the UK compared to established suppliers in the U.S. has helped to limit the growth of emerging start-ups.

UK banks struggle to upgrade old IT systems

Metro Bank President Vernon Hill, said in an interview with City A.M: “There are 7,000 separate banks in the US and they have a tradition of outsourcing IT. It is very efficient for a new bank to buy a packaged IT programme which is cheap to install and the provider keeps it up to date.”

“That is just not here in the UK; no banks ever outsource IT. British banks build their own systems and you can see how far that has got them.”

Metro Bank represents one of the start-up firms that the government backed to improve overall competition and reduce the dominance of the four main high street firms.

NatWest hit by further IT failings

Visa Europe has exceeded expected targets for adoption of NFC services by its customers.

The finance giant has posted increased revenues from the rapid adoption of NFC services including digital wallet applications and contactless payments, driven by uptake of smartphone technology.

Visa has recorded that contactless transaction payments has grown from £96.7 million in 2012 to to £461.6 million.

The higher than expected NFC adoption rates have led Visa to predict that mobile devices will account for 50 per cent of transactions by 2020.

The high street is currently moving to adopt the technology with Marks & Spencer and Starbucks rolling out NFC payment technology.

Visa and Samsung join forces to push NFC

TfL NFC payments prepare to go live

The UK government’s digital agenda has been cast as a centrepiece of the public sectors cost savings initiatives, designed to tackle the national deficit, with 2014 positioned to become a breakout year for the strategy.

The digital agenda initially undertaken back in 2012, is set to come into its own this year as services make the transition from trial periods to live iterations. The move to transform UK public services into becoming ‘Digital by Default’ represents one of the largest changes over the last two centuries, in how government services are delivered to the public.

With the changing ways in which people access information, with increasing expectations for 24-hour online access point for public services, the digital agenda is aimed at bringing public services into the digital age and help the government to meet increasing public expectations for a 24-hour online access point for public services.

The strategy has attempted to push the uptake of open source services and move away from proprietary enterprise systems employed in the past, such as Microsoft, Oracle and SAP. While the move to open source is expected to generate significant savings and provide increased flexibility, currently the public sector still relies heavily on these legacy systems.

The potential of the digital strategy has yet to be seen, with full utilisation of digitals services and the realisation of potential benefits having yet to be seen. Big data is one such example, with the digital strategy encouraging the sharing of data between departments, allowing for the employment of advanced analytics across department data that could never be employed without the shift to digital.

In total the government has revealed that it expects to create £500 million in savings from its digital-by-default agenda in 2014, eventually achieving savings of between £1.7 and £1.8 billion each year. The strategy, in the government’s own terms, is to: “redesign its digital services so well that people prefer to use them” is a fairly simplistic notion but covers a huge range of departments and services. Currently of the 25 services selected for digitalisation in 2013, one is already live, 15 are currently in beta, and six are currently in alpha while three remain in discovery, with further services set for digitalisation over the coming year.

Technology is also being used to drive the government policy of promoting increased transparency and proving the UK public with increasing oversight into the workings of governments.

Current government schemes in progress include Universal Credit, which replaces multiple welfare payment programmes, and the transition of public services to the GOV.UK domain, the new location for services and information replacing Directgov and Business Link, while offering a cleaner interface for users with faster service speeds.

Digital strategies including the movement from paper based sources to digital services have helped to reduce costs and meet government green targets, while increasing efficiencies and ease of access, while helping the government to meet environmental targets.

The implementation of electronic invoices in the NHS has already helped to drive savings and efficiency targets, while the cloud based public procurement network known as the G-cloud has helped to promote the use of SMEs by departments.The former director of the G-Cloud has urged public sector departments to have confidence to take increased risks in order to drive savings.

Francis Maude, Minister for the Cabinet Office, said. “we need to make more savings so the country can live within its means. Our digital-by-default agenda is part of our long-term economic plan to tackle the deficit we inherited. I’m pleased to announce today that we expect to save at least £500 million from IT spend this year, on top of the £500 million we saved from government’s IT spend last year and £250 million the year before”.