US government adopts ‘cloud-first’ policy - SmartPlanet

By Joe McKendrick
Nov 30, 2010

The Washington Post’s Marjorie Censer reports that US federal agencies are now required to adopt a “cloud-first” policy when considering new information technology purchases. The policy is the result of an overhaul of the government’s IT procurement process:

“Jeffrey Zients, the federal government’s first chief performance officer, announced… that the Office of Management and Budget will now require federal agencies to default to cloud-based solutions ‘whenever a secure, reliable, cost-effective cloud option exists.’”

This is a dramatic sea-change in acceptance of the cloud technology approach, which was fairly new and radical just a couple of years ago — and still is fraught with misgivings about information security.

Still, the financial benefits are too compelling to pass up, espcially for an $80-billion-a-year IT operation such as that of the US federal government. The cloud-first initiative may help the government in its efforts to reduce and consolidate its stable of 2,100 data centers. The government is moving to reduce that total by at least 40% by 2015.

There are other “smarter” IT approaches already in place. The General Services Administration maintains a government “app store,” Apps.Gov, which provides agencies with access to various cloud platforms and applications.

Federal CIO Kundra Vivek has vowed to reign in and streamline the government’s IT budget by at least by five percent a year through aggressive and pro-active actions such as cloud computing, virtualization and data center consolidation. And, as a result, enable agencies across the board to better streamline their own programs.

8ta readies BlackBerry offering

By Leigh-Ann Francis
Johannesburg, 26 Nov 2010

Fourth mobile operator 8ta is testing BlackBerry smartphones on its network and will likely be ready with an offering early next year.

The operator is also in discussions with Apple to offer its iPhone smartphone range, but was unable to give any details at this point as it is bound by a strict non-disclosure agreement.

The BlackBerry play will be a significant one for the newcomer, as it has been recognised as a fast-growing cellular brand in SA.

BlackBerry smartphones were rated as the second “most popular cellphone” in the annual Sunday Times Generation Next Survey 2010. In 2009, BlackBerry smartphones were ranked fifth, and in 2008, the brand was ranked seventh.

8ta has already come to market with a strong smartphone play, including an extensive range of Nokia, HTC, Samsung, Motorola and Sony handsets.

The operator has not given any details around how it will structure its BlackBerry deals. However, on 8ta's highest-end contract deal, customers receive 500 free on-net minute calls, 200 free minutes to other networks and 50MB free data.

Vodacom, MTN and Cell C already offer the BlackBerry smartphones. However, only Vodacom and MTN offer Apple's iPhones.

Vox to take on telcos

By Nicola Mawson, ITWeb senior journalist.
Johannesburg, 26 Nov 2010

Vox is transitioning into a fully-fledged telecoms company, says MD Douglas Reed.

Vox Telecom is moving towards becoming a full-fledged telecoms company, taking on the giants in the industry.

The company's move towards providing the entire range of telecoms offerings comes on the back of its migrating of least-cost routing (LCR) customers onto its own network, Cristal Vox.

Cristal Vox allows the listed telco to offer a range of voice communications services instead of only competing on outbound calls, which accounts for a third of all voice traffic. MD Douglas Reed explains that the recent regulated interconnect cuts gives the company clarity and allows it to build its model for the future.

Vox wrote down its LCR business Orion by R809 million during the year to August, on the back of future lower mobile termination rates. The write-down hampered earnings, which came in at a R678 million loss. Adding back impairments, the company reported headline earnings up to R71.7 million.

The Independent Communications Authority of SA last month announced a termination glide path that will see mobile interconnect rates settle at 40c a minute from March 2013. Fixed rates for local calls will end up at 12c, while interconnect for national calls will be 19c a minute.

Reed says the clarity gives the company the opportunity to grow, and Cristal will provide Vox with a network backbone from which it can turn LCR business Orion into a complete telecoms company. Vox spent R48 million on the network during the year.

Vox would have preferred a slower glide path, says Reed, as this would have given the company a year or two more to get its network up to speed. However, being forced to migrate LCR customers will open up the opportunity to grow margins, as it can now offer its own services and not just on sell those of its new competitors, says Reed.

Cell C leapfrogs into fast lane - Times LIVE

Nov 21, 2010 10:58 PM | By Toby Shapshak

Lars Reichelt was a happy man last week. The CEO launched CellC's new data network in Gauteng on the ninth birthday of the cellular network.

A week earlier, Cell C, Internet Solutions and Convergence Partners had agreed to build a 12000km national fibre-optic network that will cost R5-billion. As they like to say in the internet industry, you can never have too much fibre.

From a new cellphone data network to a new fibre company, the last two weeks brought good news for telecoms in South Africa.

Cell C has aggressively built its new data network and offered some aggressive launch prices (though the final prices haven't emerged yet).

Because it previously focused on voice and neglected expensive 3G services, it has been able to leapfrog directly to new, faster technology called HSPA+. Theoretically, this can achieve data speeds of up to 21.6megabytes a second.

"I don't think there is a third operator in the world that has, in 10 or 11 weeks, leaped to the front of the leagues in a very big country," Reichelt said proudly.

"There are not many countries in the world with this kind of population coverage, at that kind of speed. South Africa has become a world leader. There are not many European countries, or [places in] the US, where you get the kind of speeds you are getting here."

Reichelt added: "By the end of 2011 we aim for 97% population coverage with HSPA+. By mid-2011, we want to cover 67%."

Right now, he said, 32% was covered, reaching 34% by the end of the year.

These are bold pronouncements, and Cell C has been able to build its next-generation network for two reasons.

First, you can build anything, and build it quickly, if you throw enough money at it.

Second, because Cell C has previously gone after only voice minutes at the bottom-end, pay-as-you-go market, it had no 3G network. This meant it did not have to sweat its expensive assets, as the other operators have.

Reichelt is a clever CEO who has re-engineered the third network operator as much as its data network. He converted crippling debt to equity. He sold off its cellular towers and refinanced the company.

Along the way, he changed focus from voice minutes to data, the big growth area for networks around the world as data-hungry smartphones become increasingly popular, as do their data-loving apps.

Cleverly, Cell C has gone after the small towns and rolled out its new network in coastal cities such as Port Elizabeth, Durban and Cape Town, before moving inland to Bloemfontein and Gauteng.

Like every geek and tech journo, I have been testing Cell C's network and am impressed with the speeds.

Reichelt showed off connection speeds from the major speed tester to demonstrate how CellC has leapfrogged to the top. In part, this is because it has unfettered access to the 900GHz spectrum, which is better suited to providing data services, requires fewer base stations to provide coverage, and transmits through walls more efficiently, giving a stronger signal indoors.

The test will come when it has more users.

Cell C might be the underdog in the cellphone industry, but, as Arthur Goldstuck, MD of World Wide Worx points out, they are the third-largest customer-carrying company in South Africa, with 7million customers - or 14.5% market share - behind Vodacom (23million, 49.5%) and MTN (17million, 36%).

The good news for consumers is that more competition generally translates into greater choice and better prices.

•Shapshak is editor of Stuff magazine

The fastest, cheapest broadband now in Gauteng

Hilton Tarrant Moneyweb | 19 November, 2010

The launch of Cell C's super-fast network in Gauteng should force prices down.

The past ten weeks have been an anomaly. It's not often that service companies, especially mobile operators, launch a new service outside of the economic hub of South Africa.

Cell C did though. The choice of Port Elizabeth as its launch city for its new 4Gs high-speed 21.6Mbps HSPA+ network was somewhat unexpected, but it gave Cell C a fairly controlled test environment. Rumours of network rollout hurdles in Gauteng meant Bloemfontein, Durban, Pietermaritzburg, Cape Town, George, Nelspruit, Polokwane, Richards Bay and Emalahleni (Witbank) followed.

Finally, the operator has gone live in the market where it's really going to make a difference. For one, Vodacom, MTN and newcomer 8ta will notice.

The launch pricing is staggering. Cell C boss Lars P Reichelt won't say how long its launch offer will remain in place, but given its aggressive pricing, we may yet see more aggressive moves in the next 12 months.

You will simply not find pricing even remotely comparable to this in the market, even on DSL services if you calculate the total cost of ownership:

Click on the link above to read the whole article to get the tables and pricing.......

Mobile data: out of bundle rates compared

by Christo van Gemert, ITWeb journalist
Johannesburg, 18 Nov 2010

Cell C has the cheapest, all-inclusive data bundles in SA, available on its new high-speed HSPA+ network. However, consumers looking to use more data than their bundle allows will pay the highest rates in the country.

While its bundled prices are extremely competitive, the out-of-bundle rate – charges for each megabyte transferred outside the stipulated cap – are the highest. Cell C charges a flat rate of 39c per megabyte out of bundle.

Out of bundle rates

Vodacom has a tiered system for its out-of-bundle charges. Customers on the Vodacom Broadband package will be charged R1.20 per megabyte when on the MyGig 2.3GB bundle, and 50c for those on the MyGig 5GB bundle.

Alternatively, Vodacom's Broadband Advanced offers the same in-bundle and out-of-bundle rates. In this case, the MyGig 2 and MyGig 5 bundles have rates of 19c and 18c respectively.

MTN's 2GB bundle boasts the same out-of-bundle rates as Vodacom: 19c per megabyte. It lacks a 5GB product, instead offering an “Uncapped Lite” bundle with a fair use policy of 3GB. This costs R749 a month, and has no out-of-bundle rate.

Telkom's 8ta also boasts lower rates than Cell C. Both its Internet 2 (1.5GB) and Internet 3 (3.2GB) packages have a flat rate of 30c per megabyte, out of bundle.

Brian Neilson, director of telecommunications research at BMI-TechKnowledge, says the importance of an out-of-bundle rate depends on the type of customer and how much they want to use.

“If they're low-end users, it's not going to matter at all because they'll almost never go out of bundle,” he says, citing research that shows most South Africans don't even use up 3GB of data.

For more demanding users, Neilson adds, that they should be fine “as long as they get fair warning before they go out of bundle, and are able to take advantage of larger bundles”.

Cell C does not offer any bolt-on package to top up a data bundle before the end of the month. The same is true for 8ta. Users have no option but to pay the high out-of-bundle rate, or to purchase an additional SIM card with the cheaper data.

MTN and Vodacom allow customers to top up when their data quota has been met or exceeded.

Microsoft OCS update promises to replace PBX

By Denise Dubie, Network World
March 24

Microsoft unveiled its updated unified communications software that the company says will help customers move off PBX systems, but industry watchers wonder if the previewed Communications Server "14" will integrate with more than just Microsoft-approved software and hardware.

"Obviously this release has been much-anticipated. The industry was waiting for the release when OCS became a full PBX replacement," says Zeus Kerravala, an analyst at Yankee Group. "Microsoft has a good vision of where they want to take this industry, and it is similar to other vendors like Cisco, except Microsoft will argue they don't make the hardware. Yet the company does dictate with which hardware the unified communications software will work, and it's only a handful like Polycom."

Microsoft Wednesday introduced its updated Office Communications Server – code-named Communications Server "14" -- at VoiceCon Orlando 2010, and company executives demonstrated during a keynote presentation there how the next version of Microsoft Office Communication Server integrates with applications such as SharePoint, Exchange and Office. Gurdeep Singh Pall, corporate vice president of Microsoft's Unified Communications Group said during the keynote address that the company's updated unified communications software, Communications Server "14," will provide IT organizations with the next-generation platform on which to collaborate with voice and video applications as well as a simple, cost-effective alternative to aging PBX systems.

"This system works with the communications systems you have in place, and it will sit next to it and work well with it, because you may not want to throw away the PBX," Pall said. "But this product, when ready to move, will be ready to carry the entire load that your PBX is carrying."

According to Pall, in the next three years more than 75% of new business applications will include embedded unified communications and standard business calls today will become outdated with more than 50% of VoIP calls incorporating more than just voice. Industry watchers agree companies and consumers are moving away from traditional voice systems and embracing collaboration tools that are tied to social media and other technologies. But the transition might not be as quick.

"People are using other forms of communications, that's true, but the move away from voice won't happen as quickly as Microsoft thinks it will, but then Microsoft doesn't make money on phones," Kerravala says.

Microsoft's demonstration at VoiceCon lacked a few things for Kerravala. The company didn't go into great detail about branch office survivability solutions or 911 services, for instance, but Microsoft also didn't explain how it would work with third-party systems. Polycom, HP and NET, and several others, announced earlier in the week that they would separately be expanding relationships with Microsoft to better integrate with OCS and the company's UC products.

Competing with Cisco, Avaya, Siemens and IBM, Microsoft will need to differentiate itself, Kerravala suggests, with customer examples of how the Communications Server "14" changed the way they worked and helped them to cut costs in the process.
"Cisco and Microsoft will compete most directly because they are both trying to do everything, going after the whole suite, they both have e-mail packages, but Microsoft will say it doesn't do hardware, it just dictates the hardware specifications," Kerravala says. "If Microsoft is going to win in this market, it will have to depend on developers, they are what makes the company successful."

SMEs ignorant about IT

Johannesburg, 9 Nov 2010

Although almost all small and medium enterprises (SMEs) consider IT to be crucial to business success, over a quarter admit they do not know enough about IT and how to make it work for their business, according to HP research, writes CIO.

HP commissioned a survey among 1 000 UK companies employing between one and 50 employees to find out how small firms are using technology to grow their business.

The research found that only just over 36% of SMEs are deploying e-commerce strategies.

SMEs to seek corporate mobility

The SME market could experience an increased need for corporate mobility management solutions in the near future as large computing companies predict growth of enterprise mobility use in the market, says Visage Mobile.

Representatives from Cisco and Dell forecast growth for enterprise mobility among SMEs at the recent FasTech conference.

According to a Wall Street Journal report, the biggest roadblock for SMEs when it comes to going mobile has been the lack of capital. But that may change with the worst of the global economic recession passed and companies starting to focus their attention back to revenue growth.

McAfee to focus on SME segment

Security software vendor McAfee plans to put the focus on the SME segment in 2011 with a number of new channel initiatives designed to help partners drive business, reports IT Business.

At its recent Focus 2010 conference, McAfee revealed a number of new channel programmes and resources that will come online in 2011 as part of this SME focus.

Johanna Fry, worldwide channels communications manager for McAfee, said the core announcements include an SME partner acceleration initiative designed to increase partners' sales of McAfee security solutions in conjunction with increased services attach rates.

Making the connection | ITWeb

Andy Robb, Technology specialist at Duxbury Networking.
3 Nov 2010

The market is flooded with Internet connectivity choices. For example, there are many flavours of ADSL available, linked to a variety of speeds with capped or uncapped, shaped or unshaped, network bandwidth alternatives. ADSL services are available over fibre or copper media with prices ranging from around R39 to over R4 000 a month.

The consumer is further confused by the constant evolution of 3G and 4G technologies, delivering ever-increasing speeds via a plethora of service platforms.

What's more, the 'traditional' TDM-based options – Diginet, Frame Relay and ATM – remain in the marketplace, seemingly to add complexity to the WAN 'mix'.

What is the right choice? In days gone by, connecting to the Internet was a simple task. The first choice was a dial-up connection for key people in the organisation. As more personnel needed to be online, so the corporate network evolved to include them.

Growing up

As companies grew, so the options of either Frame Relay or a 64K Diginet line appeared on the horizon. The progression to a 128K Diginet connection was obvious as demands increased. As more services were needed, the upgrade to a 256K Diginet connection became necessary. The progression was natural and seamless.

At the turn of the century, with the increase in sophistication of available services, so businesses opted for MPLS-based networks from a growing band of service providers.

But since then there has been no logical 'next step' forward. Despite a plethora of vastly improved connectivity solutions on offer, featuring new-age technologies, the way forward has been blocked by a minefield of indecision. There is little indication of what option is appropriate for a business of a definite size or an organisation with specific service requirements.


Decisions, decisions

The way forward has been blocked by a minefield of indecision. The marketplace today is characterised by confusion. For example, for most small to medium-sized businesses, the traditional leased line solutions are far too expensive. What about the new technologies? Should they opt for a 4Mb ADSL connection?

The answers are not obvious. There are issues with continuity of service as the copper cabling associated with ADSL services is subject to theft on a regular basis. What's more, no watertight service level agreements are linked to this option.

Educated guessing

In this vein – and no matter what ADSL solution companies choose – it is difficult for them to predict the reliability of the service. Today, bandwidth seems to be throttled at the most inconvenient times. Reasons are seldom given.

The same is true of the 3G solutions on the market. Even though their perceived throughput is significant compared to other technologies – for example, 21Mbps will soon be available from Cell C – the reality is that data rates often vary from hour to hour depending on the number of active subscribers addressing a particular base station, and depending on what kind of data they are pulling from the Internet.

Another drawback with 3G technologies is that they were originally designed for ad hoc use on mobile and smartphones and not as primary connectivity mechanisms capable of meeting the capacity demands of today's corporate customer.

Instead, WiMax was supposed to fill this role and represent the next step in the evolution of the WAN for the corporate market. But the technology has failed to achieve general acceptance, perhaps because networks weren't deployed fast enough, and the speeds and throughputs on offer from WiMax service providers have proven to be lower and less competitively priced.

The question on most financial directors' lips today is: “Am I getting the best bang for my buck?”

Other often-asked questions include: “Are Internet service providers giving me the best advice? Are they analysing my business requirements correctly? Are they proposing the correct solutions to my board?”

Encouraged by the service providers who seem able to conveniently side-step these key questions, companies often simply install as much connectivity as they can afford and hope for the best.

As a result, corporates tend to gain very little visibility of the services they are paying for. They need to know about the difficulties facing ADSL service providers who can't guarantee service levels because they're most likely making use of a Telkom infrastructure. They need to be aware of the challenges facing 3G service providers who are equally hamstrung by inexplicable network congestion issues.

If there is no clear best fit, it's most likely because there isn't one. Business is in the unfortunate position of having to install multiple connectivity solutions – an ADSL primary service with a 3G backup, for instance. Or a leased line with ADSL backup... or fixed point-to-point wireless backup. Or multiple ADSL services addressing various departments and remote sites...

Against this backdrop, it behoves all consumers to make the effort to come to terms with SA's connectivity vagaries – to ford the treacherous waters of WAN connectivity and try to emerge more knowledgeable and 'street-wise' as a result.

Gartner identifies 2011 tech trends | ITWeb

Johannesburg, 29 Oct 2010
By Nikita Ramkissoon

The analysts presented their findings during Gartner Symposium/ITxpo 2010 where they defined a 'strategic technology' as “one with the potential for significant impact on the organisation in the next three years”.

Factors that denote significant impact include a high potential for disruption to IT or the business, the need for a major dollar investment, or the risk of being late to adopt, Gartner says.

The top 10 strategic technologies for 2011 include cloud computing, mobile applications and media tablets, and social communications and collaboration.

Also included are; video, next-generation analytics, social analytics, fabric-based infrastructure and computers, ubiquitous computing, storage class memory, and context-aware computing.

A strategic technology may be an existing technology that has matured and/or become suitable for a wider range of uses, the research firm says. “It may also be an emerging technology that offers an opportunity for strategic business advantage for early adopters or with potential for significant market disruption in the next five years.”

“Companies should factor these top 10 technologies in their strategic planning process by asking key questions and making deliberate decisions about them during the next two years,” David Cearley, vice-president and analyst at Gartner said at the Symposium.

Cloud to social

According to Gartner, the next three years will see the delivery of a range of cloud service approaches that fall between these two extremes.

“Vendors will offer packaged private cloud implementations that deliver the vendor's public cloud service technologies (software and/or hardware) and methodologies (ie, best practices to build and run the service) in a form that can be implemented inside the consumer's organisation.”

In terms of mobile applications and media tablets, Gartner estimates that by the end of 2010, 1.2 billion people will carry handsets capable of rich, mobile commerce providing an ideal environment for the convergence of mobility and the Web.

“Mobile devices are becoming computers in their own right, with an astounding amount of processing ability and bandwidth,” says Gartner. “There are already hundreds of thousands of applications for platforms like the Apple iPhone, in spite of the limited market (only for the one platform) and need for unique coding.”

Social communications and collaboration also has a role to play, according to Gartner analysts.

The umbrella of social communications consists of social networking, social networking analysis technologies – which employ algorithms to understand and utilise human relationships for the discovery of people and expertise, social collaboration such as wikis, blogs, instant messaging, collaborative office, and crowdsourcing, social publishing and social feedback.

Gartner predicts that by 2016, social technologies will be integrated with most business applications. Companies should bring together their social customer relationship management, internal communications and collaboration, and public social site initiatives into a coordinated strategy.

Viral video and analytics

Video is not a new media form, but Gartner reckons its use as a standard media type used in non-media companies is expanding rapidly, says the firm.

“Technology trends in digital photography, consumer electronics, the Web, social software, unified communications, digital and Internet-based television, and mobile computing are all reaching critical tipping points that bring video into the mainstream.”

Over the next three years, Gartner says, video will become a commonplace content type and interaction model for most users, and by 2013, more than 25% of the content that workers see in a day will be dominated by pictures, video or audio.

Companies must embrace next-generation analytics, Gartner says, which has the potential to increase compute capabilities of computers including mobile devices along with improving connectivity are enabling a shift in how businesses support operational decisions.

“It is becoming possible to run simulations or models to predict the future outcome, rather than to simply provide backward looking data about past interactions, and to do these predictions in real-time to support each individual business action,” Gartner says.

However, the analysts also point out that while this may require significant changes to existing operational and business intelligence infrastructure, the potential exists to unlock significant improvements in business results and other success rates.

Gartner says social network analysis tools are useful for examining social structure and interdependencies as well as the work patterns of individuals, groups or organisations, and involves collecting data from multiple sources, identifying relationships, and evaluating the impact, quality or effectiveness of a relationship.

Smart computing

Context-aware computing features in the to 10, based on the concept of using information about an end user or object's environment, activities connections and preferences to improve the quality of interaction with that end user.

“A contextually aware system anticipates the user's needs and proactively serves up the most appropriate and customised content, product or service,” the firm says.

Gartner predicts that by 2013, more than half of Fortune 500 companies will have context-aware computing initiatives and by 2016, one-third of worldwide mobile consumer marketing will be context-awareness-based.

Also featuring is storage class memory, in which Gartner sees huge use of flash memory in consumer devices, entertainment equipment and other embedded IT systems.

It also offers a new layer of the storage hierarchy in servers and client computers that has key advantages — space, heat, performance and ruggedness among them.”

Gartner stresses the need for ubiquitous computing, which requires imbuing computing systems into operational technology, whether done as calming technology or explicitly managed and integrated with IT.

Rounding up the top 10, the firm notes fabric-based infrastructure and computers; a modular form of computing where a system can be aggregated from separate building-block modules connected over a fabric or switched backplane.