Industry news

Research carried out by Virgin Media Business has revealed that a majority of UK CIOs predict that work landlines will, in the next five years, be made superfluous to requirements by the rise of smartphone technology.

The research polled 500 UK CIOs, and revealed that 65 percent predicted that landlines, would no longer be a common tool at work.

Tony Grace, chief operating officer of Virgin Media Business, reported on the findings, saying that “businesses have recognised the importance of the mini-computers that smartphones have essentially become. This is leading us to rely increasingly on our smartphones and less on our landlines.”

Mobile giant Everything Everywhere has signed a five-year partnership agreement with Mastercard, to deliver mobile payment services.

The partnership will include the delivery of Near Field Communications (NFC) payment accessibility to customers.

Marion King, President of MasterCard UK, said: “As the use of cash continues to decline, we will be able to provide Everything Everywhere’s 27 million customers with an attractive range of new payment services backed by the processing power and security of MasterCard”.

The delivery of free Wi-Fi throughout the London Underground has been labelled as a ‘great service’ with mass uptake.

The service was used by 443,000 users during the Olympic Games with the busiest day being the 1st of August with the success of Team GB.

Gareth Powell, London's underground director of strategy and service development, said: “"WIFI at Tube stations helped keep everyone moving and entertained throughout the Games with up-to-the-minute travel information and journey planners at their fingertips. It's proving to be a great service and we expect it to be very popular during the Paralympics too".

Virgin Trains have moved forward with court action against the decision by the government to award the West Coast Main Line contract to FirstGroup.

The legal action is aimed at forcing a judicial review of the procurement process.

Pressure has also been placed on the government from Labour, who want a delay on the decision, so that MPs can review the contact.

Founder of Virgin Group, Sir Richard Branson, commented: "In the bid process the one thing we do know is our bid was voted far more deliverable than FirstGroup's.” and “we're absolutely convinced they've got their maths wrong with FirstGroup.”

Global security contractor G4S has lost £50 million and seen a 60 percent dip in first-half profits after the Olympic failure.

The loss comes from payments for troop deployments, which has been partly responsible for a £151 million drop in revenue from the same time last year.

Nick Buckles, G4S chief executive, commented: “We were deeply disappointed that we had significant issues with the London 2012 Olympics contract and are very grateful to the military and the police for their support in helping us to deliver a safe and secure Games".

Ask.com, owned by InterActiveCorp, has bought About Group from the New York Times for $300 million.

About.com specialises in providing content and reference libraries on 90,000 topics.

The IAC secured the deal after outbidding a $270 million offer from Answers, and the company will become part of IAC’s Search and Applications offering, joining the likes of Ask.com and Dictionary.com.

IAC CEO Greg Blatt, said “The complementary nature of these two businesses will provide significant synergies going forward, and thus we expect that About.com will generate more profit as a part of Ask.com and IAC than it has been able to over the last few years.”

IBM has offered $46 per share for Kenexa who specialise in Cloud based HR applications.

The move comes as IBM looks to increase its social enterprise offerings against its competitors, with Oracle buying Taleo and SAP acquiring SuccessFactors. The share payments will reach a total of £824 million for the acquisition of the Fortune 500 company.

Alistair Rennie, general manager of IBM social business, said: “I expect us to move quickly post-closing to bring all of this value together"

Samsung shareholders reacted rapidly to the news of Samsung’s court defeat and a $1 billion US imposed fine, with $12 billion wiped off the market value, as shares fall by 7.5 percent in South Korea.

The court ruled that Samsung had copied key elements of the Apple iPhone and the ruling may see Apple now move to target other Android phone companies.

Samsung commented: “We trust that the consumers and the market will side with those who prioritise innovation over litigation, and we will prove this beyond doubt.”

Reliance Secure Task Management (RSTM), has been purchased by Capita for £20 million.

The company which provides medical assessments and criminal support services, currently provides services to the Ministry of Justice, the NHS, and police forces.

Andy Parker, Capita’s joint chief operating officer, said: “The acquisition of RSTM will provide further scale and depth to the range of solutions we offer the health and emergency services, criminal justice system and wider public and private sector clients.”

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