Industry news

Microsoft has created an investment and support service for online and mobile start-up businesses.

The service will provide companies with access to Microsoft’s resources and expertise including access to technology developed by the computer giant and to Microsoft’s partners.

The service would be provided in exchange for the opportunity to build a strong relationships with start-ups, with Microsoft focusing on gaining contacts and opportunities with other businesses.

Virgin and FirstGroup have emerged as the two most preferred operators for tending the multibillion-pound contract for providing services over west coast rail.

The train service carried 30 million passengers last year and the contract has seen the two favourites carry out strong cost-cutting measures with reports of the removal of catering and shop services in carriages.

A successful bid by FirstGroup would make the company the dominant rail operator in the UK, operating Scotrail, First TransPennine, and First Capital Connect as well as shortlisted for other rail services.

This news comes as the Government sets to carry out the largest investment in UK rail infrastructure since the Victorian era with £9billion laid out for projects from 2014 to 2019.

The US cloud strategy named Cloud First has enjoyed success in many US departments despite initial misgivings.

A report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) has revealed that departments including Homeland Security, State and Treasury and Agriculture, Health and Human Services have all met Cloud First requirements.

The Cloud First policy required that departments moved three of their technology services onto a Cloud platform by June 2012 despite widespread misgivings surrounding the project. The success of the policy allows for the creation of best practices surrounding common challenges identified during migration.

Bristol City Council have employed open source software in order to reduce annual costs by £70 million.

The council is employing Alfresco to develop document and record management, with the service allowing document access on the move through mobile devices and includes the ability for uses to collaborate and share information over the software.

Gavin Beckett, chief enterprise architect at Bristol City Council, said: “Alfresco offers a rich set of features in a user-friendly package with the additional bonus of being an open source platform, which means we can use it right across the board without having to spend large sums on licences.”

Scottish and Irish governments have renewed contracts with procurement service provide Millstream to provide national e-procurement databases to the two governments.

The extended contracts are worth around £250,000 and come just weeks after the Aberdeen-based company won a £4.8million deal to run a similar portal in Norway for the next seven years.

A number of European governments and public authorities now handle procurement electronically in order to save money and time and to comply with the latest EU legislation. John Swinney MSP, Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth, has praised the portal as “one of the finest innovations that Government has brought forward, making it easier for SMEs to access Government contracts”.

Cloud service provider On Direct, is launching the search for new resellers and white-label partners as it seeks to go to market with its new Cloud Direct offering.

The new recruitment initiative sees the company aiming to double its partner numbers over the next three years, as part of its wider growth strategy. Companies that become partners will gain access to marketing resources, On Direct products and support services.

Eliza Rawlings, director at On Direct said, “We are searching for IT partners or those with a broad customer base who are looking to extend their offering to drive greater service revenues.

SAP software enjoyed a revenue growth of 26 percent in its second quarter with an increase to €1.06 billion (£837 million).

SAP also announced that software related services saw an increase of 21 percent with overall profits rising by nearly 1 billion Euros.

CEOs Bill McDermott and Jim Hagemann Snabe said in a statement: "Our record performance speaks for itself. We delivered double-digit growth in all regions driven by strong momentum from the core as well as SAP HANA, mobile and the cloud".

Surrey police have declared that it will suspend involvement in a privatisation contract with West Midlands police.

The announcement came as campaigns for the role of Surrey’s police commissioner attacked the move. The difficulties that have affected G4S in providing security for the Olympics has been cited as a key factor.

Police authority chairman, Peter Williams said:"Members agreed today that it is right that we should suspend our involvement at this time and that we should look to withdraw altogether".

Eurotunnel Le Shuttle who provides transport services on the Eurotunnel has deployed a new business intelligence system.

The new systems is designed to provide greater focus on the understanding of data collected and replaces the use of Excel spread sheets to collect and analyse data.

Paul Lymath, strategic planning and analysis manager at Eurotunnel, said: "We used to spend 75 percent of our time collecting data and only 25 percent of the time analysing it. It’s now the other way around."

The Metropolitan Police is looking at employing specialist software companies to provide a digital media evidence system.

Talks have already begun with suppliers as the force looks at how it can take advantage at digital data available and collect content from the likes of smartphones and social media platfroms.

A Met spokeswoman said: “As part of ongoing contingency reviews and planning we have explored a number of technical options to enhance our ability to capture high volumes of data sent to the MPS from external sources,” she said.