Industry news

BT has won a contract to provide super-fast broadband throughout Wales.

The contract will see BT provide broadband speeds of up to 80Mbps with even faster speeds of 330Mbs in certain areas by 2015.

The tendering for super-fast broad comes as the government seeks to create the best broadband in Europe within three years.

The contract will be funded by £58 million from the Welsh government combined with £90 million from the European Regional Development Fund and£57 million of funding from the UK’s government Broadband Delivery Scheme.

Hampshire Country Council and Cambridgeshire Country Councils have viewed single suppliers as being preferable to offering multiple services contracts up for tender through the Public Services Network (PSN).

The single vendor choices made by the councils through the PSN appears to have taken the Cabinet Office by surprise.

A Cabinet Office Spokesman said: “We would encourage customers to use individual lots as far as possible, as these have a broader representation of specialist providers. However, procurement strategy is a matter for individual customers, taking into account their service requirements and the level of transformation involved.”

Research covering 630 contracts by KPMG has shown that cost is decreasing as a factor for the outsourcing of IT by businesses.

The research has shown that 70 percent of businesses are influenced by cost when looking at outsourcing IT services, compared with 83 percent from two years ago.

Other reasons for outsourcing services included the need for better quality services at 46 percent and 51 percent citied the lack of in-house skills for the cause for outsourcing.

Lee Ayling, partner in KPMG’s Shared Services and Outsourcing unit, commented: “Companies are now looking at how outsourcing helps improve the quality of service they can offer to customers".

Research from IT finance provider Syscap and research from investment and research body Nesta has shown that investment has fallen along with IT innovation and funding.

Syscap reported that IT investment fell by 10 percent while Nesta reported business innovation investment dropped £24 billion.

Geoff Mulgan, Nesta's CEO, said: "Everyone agrees that innovation is the only route to long term growth” and that “Other countries are making investment in innovation a top priority and the UK cannot afford not to do the same.”

Syscap’s CEO Philip White, commented: ““This trend in under investment in IT is not seen, for example, in Germany- quite the opposite”.

FirstGroup may receive an extension on its Great Western contract after the government has reportedly delayed issuing tender contracts.

FirstGroup has already served notice on its contract with the company set to terminate services on the 1st August, however the delays in issuing tender contracts by the Department of Transport may see the company carry on services into the summer.

FirstGroup used a clause in there contract to end services three years early. In continuing to provide services, FirstGroup will likely receive subsides for the extension.

After already being seen to be as the favourites, iCity have now been confirmed as the preferred bidder media centre developer.

Olympics media center to turn into cloud centre

The tech firm produced a bidding programme to development the Olympic media centre site into a datacentre. The tendering process had seen a runner-up pull out of the process, citing a process skewed towards iCity.

The iCity contract would see the creation of a datacentre, digital educational facilities and media studios, with a expected 6,500 jobs created.

Gavin Poole, CEO of iCity, said: “iCity will provide a sustainable legacy for the local community through the creation of thousands of jobs, apprenticeships and training opportunities".

Mobile payments via smart phones and tablets increased by 356 percent from the same time last year, according to a IMRG Capgemini report.

The report detailed a total spend of £34.9 billion by British shoppers during the first six months of 2012.

Richard Lym, economist at the British Retail Consortium, said, “Most retailers would agree the pace of technology is moving at a frightening pace, and they are having trouble keeping up as we move forward".

The head of retail consulting and technology at Capgemini, Chris Webster, said: “Mobile commerce is still the big story here, with average order values comparable to the full website”.

BP has selected ICT provider T-Systems to migrate existing Microsoft Exchange servers onto a private cloud service.

T-Systems will also be involved in upgrading the servers in there new location in a German based data centre. The transition will see the movement of over 100,000 mailboxes while providing smart phone access.

The new cloud based system will provide services to over 83,000 employees and the contract will cover a 5 year period.

Intel has completed the purchase of Whamcloud, a supplier of Lustre, an open source file system, in order to increase its high-performance-computing offering.

Lustre is used by many of the fastest supercomputers in the world, an area which Intel dominates, with 74 percent of 500 of the world’s supercomputers currently employing Intel processors.

Intel is currently focusing on increasing computing power by three times as much as current supercomputing powers.

In other news Intel has reported that it expects to see lower than anticipated growth for 2012, as mobile devices drew sales away from computer and laptop sales.

Procserve has received a award from the Department for Work and Pension (DWP) marking innovation in eMarketplace's improved access to contracts for small businesses while providing efficiency savings.

Working with the Department, Procserve’s development of its “Low Value Procurement (LVP)” solution allowed to shorten the time it takes to deliver vital training to DWP’s customers, significantly boosting the opportunity for a swift return to work and reducing the number of benefit claims.

The solution is designed especially to lower the barriers for small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) to bid for the business of delivering this training provision and therefore represents an important “Win-Win” in two crucial areas.

The cloud-based platform allows the department to buy goods and services from a pre-approved group of suppliers through a centralised eMarketplace, which makes it easier and more efficient for both buyers and suppliers, supporting Government’s drive towards 25% of the value of public sector contracts being fulfilled by SMEs.

Nigel Clifford, CEO of Procserve, commented: “By embracing eEnablement in the approach to its business, DWP is leading the way and reaping major benefits."