December 2014

DE LL: DE LL I NTRODUCES FUTU R E-R EADY SOLUTIONS; R ETH I N KS TH E BOX /06

PA G E S 4 8 VOLUME 02 | ISSUE 05 DECEMBER 2014 WWW.ENTERPRISECHANNELSMEA.COM

GEC OPEN 2015 IS GOING GLOBAL SEE DETAILS ON PAGE 17

ENTERPRISE APPLICATIONS:

TIME TO UPDATE LEGACY

INDIAECM122014

Recent reports have shown that majority of the enterprises in the Middle East are positive about increasing their budgets across the core areas of ICT infrastructure. /30

DE LL: “YOU CALL IT CHAOS, I CALL IT OPPORTU N ITY” /28

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EDITORIAL

2015 and Complexities

S A N J AY M O H A PAT R A S A N J AY @ A C C E N T I N F O M E D I A . C O M

We are almost at the fag-end of the year - 2014 and waiting eagerly to welcome 2015 but before the year arrives we should have a clear idea of the factors which are going to drive the market so that we can have our preparation accordingly.

IDC’s predictions are on the industry’s accelerating transition to the 3rd Platform for innovation and growth, built on the technology pillars of mobile computing, cloud services, big data and analytics, and social networking.

This trend of course remained in the entire 2014 - although a little shallow but the year 2015 would be the year of mobility and analytics for sure.

The industries in MEA are of cognisance that they have to enhance their operational efficiency in order to keep their numbers growing faster than the other regions. There was never a paucity of technology or mind set of the vendors to offer these technologies only thing was that the customers were taking the steps cautiously reason being they had to make changes in many places in order to adopt the technologies and they did not know what would be the outcome, what would be the impact on the employees and their work process. However, in bits and pieces organisations have done the implementation and that can be starting point or cases to prove the efficacy of the success of third platform. Many organisations will be encouraged by the positive outcome of the implementation. Of course there is no respite for the industry; each of the organisations has to go through that cycle. Only thing is some will start immediately some will start late.

The biggest factor is that the partners and the distributors are talking in the same languages. Even some of the distributors and partners have started investing heavily on enabling their own resources in order to service the customers’ requirements from the new technology perspective.

Some of the facts IDC is bringing out to the market that by 2017, 80% of the CIO’s time will be focused on analytics, cybersecurity, and creating new revenue streams through digital services. Similarly, by 2016, 65% of global competitive strategies will require real-time 3rd Platform IT-as-a–Service (ITaaS). By 2016, security will be one of the top 3 business priority for 70% of CEOs of global enterprises. By 2020, 60% of CIOs in global organizations will be supplanted by the Chief Digital Officers (CDO) for the delivery of IT-enabled products and digital services. Last but not the least by 2016, 80% of CIOs will accelerate 3rd Platform migration to counter premature obsolescence of current IT assets.

So, with the above predictions from the analyst, the market will have a different preparation next year. As a responsive media, we will adapt to the changes in the market; what about you? ë

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2014 CONTENTS

VOLUME 02 ISSUE 05 DECEMBER 2014 W W W. E N T E R P R I S E C H A N N E L S M E A . C O M

COVER STORY

ENTERPRISE APPLICATIONS:

TIME TO UPDATE LEGACY

Recent reports have shown that majority of the enterprises in the Middle East are positive about increasing their budgets across the core areas of ICT infrastructure. /30

MY VIEWS /37

“Securing your present, caring about your future”

FLORIAN MALECKI INTERNATIONAL PRODUCT MARKETING DIRECTORNETWORK SECURITY, DELL

MY OPINION /43

IoT to Become a Business Issue in 2015 YAROB SAKHNINI REGIONAL DIRECTOR MEMA AT BROCADE

INNOVATIONS /45

NEC DISPLAY SOLUTIONS PX602UL AND PX602WL

With advanced installation, the projectors have free orientation at any angle for any application and have almost no limit, with the most flexible geometric control function.

FEATURE Server market: Rethinking the Boxes /22

The year 2014 begun with the prediction that public clouds and virtualization will cause a major shift in the server market. Virtualization indeed has been a crucial game changer, affecting the purchasing of servers and adoption of cloud technologies.

MY VIEWS /44

Cloud Computing: Connecting our Future Cities TAMER SALEH DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS, EHOSTING DATFORT

EDITORIAL::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: 05 CHANNEL STREET:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: 06 MY VIEWS ::::::: 28, 29, 36, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42 INNOVATIONS : ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: 45

ADVERTISER INDEX: ESET 02, BROCADE 03, BULWARK 07, EMT 09, PROLOGIX 11, ARUBA 13, GISEC 15, GEC OPEN 17, WEBSENSE 19, COMGUARD 21, ENTERPRISE ADVISER 27, GLOBAL 47, DELL 48

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CHANNEL

STREET CANON ME CONSOLIDATES SCANNING SOLUTIONS BUSINESS

Canon ME has further strengthened its lineup of document scanning solutions to cater to the growing demand present in vertical industries such as education, banking and healthcare. The company showcased its new range of products and also encouraged partners to enhance their current channel distribution network to consolidate its Document Imaging Management System (DIMS) business at its annual regional reseller seminar held recently.

Hendrik Verbrugghe, Marketing Director, Canon Middle East said, “Over the years, we have built a solid foundation with our partners. We want to further engage with the robust reseller community in the region in a way that existing and potential channel partners will experience and understand the immense profitable business opportunities that lies ahead with Canon’s DIMS category.”

COMMVAULT AUTOMATES DATA PROTECTION ON CLOUD CommVault has added data management and protection support for Amazon Web Services (AWS) that includes robust cloud reporting as well as self-service virtual machine provisioning, recovery and resource management with snapshot-based data protection.

“CommVault recognized the trend toward cloud computing very early on and made significant investments over the past several years. As a result, we support a very broad set of cloud storage options within our software platform,” said CommVault chief operating officer, Al Bunte. “Our automation and optimization features for AWS allow customers, resellers and service providers to further take advantage of the flexible, scalable, pay-as-you-go AWS Cloud to reduce their costs, complexity and risks.”

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MARIUS HAAS, CHIEF COMMERCIAL OFFICER AND PRESIDENT, ENTERPRISE SOLUTIONS DELL

Dell Introduces Future-Ready Solutions; Rethinks the Box At Dell World held in Austin Texas, Dell introduced new products and solutions to help global custom-ers on their paths toward software-defined data centres by bridging the IT gap between traditional and new application requirements. Dell is helping to address this continuum with futureready IT solutions, including new converged infrastructure architecture, storage solutions, and workload-specific appliances to help customers transform their data centres, capture cost savings, and ensure their businesses are competitive.

“Dell is placing customers first and delivering IT solutions which allow them to transform and future-proof their data centres without having to sacrifice the past,” said Marius Haas, chief commercial officer and president of enterprise solutions group, Dell.

Dell’s new future-ready IT solutions include the new Dell PowerEdge FX converged architecture

that provides optimal modularity and scalability; a new Dell Storage SC4020 Entry-Level All-Flash configuration that offers compelling features and performance in an all-flash storage array for £15,000/€20,000; the new Dell Storage PS4210 Series for substantially improved application performance and connectivity options for small and mid-size deployments; and, the Dell XC Series of Web-scale Converged Appliances for integrated compute and enterprise storage.

“Despite claims to the contrary, mostly by vendors of proprietary servers, Dell’s new FX architecture clearly shows that x 86 system innovations are alive and well,” said Charles King, Dell Watcher and Principal Analyst, Pund-IT. “The company’s efforts also prove how being a disruptive force doesn’t require ‘thinking outside of the box.’ In the case of the FX architecture, Dell has succeeded by rethinking the box itself.”

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CHANNEL STREET

Prologix Wins Global Avaya Award at Partner Connect 2015 Prologix has been awarded today lies in our ability to Avaya Partner of the year GGM engage in business discussions, (Global Growth Market) 2014 identify communication for the mid-market catsolutions that drive business egory. Prologix has witnessed growth and overcome chalenormous growth in 2014 with lenges, and measure outcomes $103 million (USD) business and continue the engagement annually, and is forecasting cycle; This value-based services an expansion to $150 million model has helped us deliver (USD) in 2015. growth and most importantly, ADITYA SAHAYA, DIRECTOR “Having achieved 50% YOY AT PROLOGIX DISTRIBUTION gain trust and business contigrowth, 2014 was an outstand- RECEIVING THE AWARD nuity of an amazing client base ing year for Prologix. With our key customers in in the country.” said Mr. Sarwan Singh, Managing the banking, telecom, education and hospitality Director at Prologix. sectors, our differentiation and key to success

TP-LINK UNVEILS PARTNER REBATE PROGRAMME TP-LINK Technologies has launched a channel partner rebate programme aimed incentivising and rewarding partners in UAE for the business they do with the company. “We want to encourage the partners and draw them closer to us through initiatives that recognise the good work they are doing with TP-LINK. This rebate programme has been designed to achieve that,” said Denny Liang, General Manager, TP-LINK Middle East. Liang added that the company is also running a similar programme in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and Iraq. Liang explained that aside from the rebate programme that TP-LINK is running this quarter, the company is also planning to roll out training on its Outdoor Series and EAP this quarter.

INFOR CLOUD SUITE FOR BUSINESS MANAGEMENT “Strategic decision-making is essential for any business. Next-generation companies thrive when agility and visibility combine with global operations capabilities and analytics that maximize all portions of the balance sheet,” said Lee Miles, regional director for the Middle East, Infor. “Infor Cloud Suite Business combines the flexible, secure, and reliable infrastructure of Infor’s cloud technology with robust business management functionality that allows companies to see the impact of business transactions in real-time, as well as the trends that may affect the business tomorrow.”

RESOLUTION1 SECURITY LAUNCHES NEW GLOBAL PARTNER PROGRAM

NEIL BATSTONE, VP GLOBAL ALLIANCES AND CHANNELS AT RESOLUTION1 SECURITY

Resolution1 Security has launched a global partner program called Resolution1 Connect. The new program will offer enhanced support to Resolution1 reseller, systems integrator (SI) and managed service provider (MSP) partners to increase revenue opportunities and fast track technical enablement to meet customers’ incident response (IR) needs with the market’s only incident resolution technology. The program’s goal is to collaborate more closely with partners, speed up sales cycles and advance IR technologies and environments.

“Resolution1 Connect answers the industry’s call for advanced IR expertise to rapidly resolve any cyberattack,” said Neil Batstone, VP Global Alliances and Channels at Resolution1 Security. “We are empowering our partners with integrated tools and IR programs so they can sell effectively and help their customers respond to security incidents immediately and continuously to avoid risk and major damage to their business now into the future.”

SMART DATA FOR SMART CITY Governments in the Middle East need to ‘smartify’ data to enhance their Smart City value, SAP announced at the Arab Future Cities Summit Dubai 2014.

Throughout the Middle East, sensors embedded in everyday objects and mobile devices are generating unprecedented amounts of data. By using innovative Big Data mobile and business applications, public and private sector organizations are

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driving the data generated region’s hyperby the growing connected number of coneconomy, nected devices providing new in the “Internet processes and of Things” era. insights, and By analysing delivering new data, governkinds of value ments can gain to stakeholders. SAM ALKHARRAT, PRESIDENT, SAP new insights, “The Middle MENA provide unique East’s Smart Cities need to ‘smartify’ experiences, and create novel sources

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of value to make citizens and tourists happier, and the businesses more successful,” said Sam Alkharrat, SAP MENA. SAP is a Platinum Sponsor of the Arab Future Cities Summit Dubai.

Michael Pittelkow, Vice President, SAP, presented on the topic of “Capitalizing on the ‘Internet of Things’ Data-Explosion to Grow the Happiness of Citizens and the Success of Business”.

CHANNEL STREET IN PUBLIC

“CIOs can’t transform their old IT organization into a digital startup, but they can turn it into a bi-modal IT organization ,” PETER SONDERGAARD, SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT AT GARTNER AND GLOBAL HEAD OF RESEARCH

6

SECONDS

ETISALAT PARTNERS WITH HUAWEI TO ENHANCE USER EXPERIENCE

KSA to Be Manufacturing Power house of MEA

Etisalat and Huawei have signed their first Smart-

IT spending in Saudi Arabia is increasing at the fastest rate across all countries in Central Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (CEMA) region, according to the latest insights released by International Data Corporation (IDC).

In the manufacturing sector specifically, IT spending is expected to increase at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 7.5% over the 2013–2018 period. Continuous GDP growth has resulted in ambitious development plans in the country, and there is an apparent push for improvements in the business environment to attract more foreign direct investment (FDI) to a number of different manufacturing sub-sectors.

EPICOR SHOWCASES NEXT-GENERA-

“The Saudi manufacturing sector is poised for significant growth and has the potential to become a technology-intensive industry, not only on an advanced regional level but also on a par with global competition in most areas,” says Martin Kuban, lead research analyst at IDC Manufacturing Insights, CEMA. “The diversification of the country’s oil-based economy is progressing steadily, supported by a positive economic environment and favorable investment attitudes. And IT innovation spirits are rather high, as many of the new businesses are not saddled with extensive client-based solutions.”

Care Service Operations Centre (SOC) contract.

Under the contract Huawei’s ‘Per-Service-PerUser’ approach will be used to ensure optimum quality and superior experience for Etisalat’s customers.

TION ERP AT ADIPEC 2014 Epicor showcased the latest version of its award-winning enterprise resource planning (ERP) solution Epicor ERP version 10, at the Abu Dhabi International Petroleum Exhibition and Conference (ADIPEC).

RED HAT AND WIPRO EXTEND PARTNERSHIP They will work together to develop and deliver enterprise-grade cloud solutions to the market, and will also jointly deliver next-generation DevOps solutions for continuous integration and testing.

ESET UNVEILS REENGINEERED PRODUCT RANGE

ADNOC SELECTS SAP SOLUTIONS

ESET’s new suite of security products for business will be available in North America during December 2014 followed up by global availability in Q1 2015. Supporting Mac, Windows and Android, the all-new ESET endpoint solutions provide comprehensive security to companies of all sizes. “The reengineering of our products has been a revolution rather than an evolution. We have engaged extensively with existing and potential customers to NEO NEOPHYTOU, MANAGING DIRECTOR, ESET MIDDLE EAST understand the most pressing security needs. From this we have created a suite of products that cater to businesses of all sizes.

ESET’s new business products can handle simple and complex network configurations, and local or global operations, including multi-lingual environments, while delivering the highest performance and effectiveness,” said Neo Neophytou, Managing Director, ESET Middle East

partnership agreement for the transformation of

Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) and SAP have signed a long-term strategic ADNOC’s Information Technology services and business processes.

DEWA WINS UAE IDEAS AWARD Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) has won the UAE Ideas Award 2014 for promoting e-Government. A team from DEWA’s Generation division won the award for its One-Way Data Device that was custom-designed for DEWA. The device ensures safe transmission of data from power stations to a shared platform. This builds a knowledge base for decision-makers, enabling them to access data through smart devices.

LENOVO|EMC VNX5150 STORAGE ARRAY FOR SMBS IN UAE

TRAVELEX SELECTS A10 NETWORKS FOR MAJOR EXPANSION Travelex is using A10 Networks’ Thunder Series

Lenovo has launched in UAE the Lenovo|EMC VNX5150 Storage Array, a storage area network solution that offers SMBs value with an affordable price.

“This move is part of a previously announced, multi-tier agreement between Lenovo and EMC to drive innovation in the server and storage market”, said Mohammad Al Mufleh, Regional Sales Manager – Storage, Lenovo MEA. “The Lenovo|EMC VNX5150 is a key solution element for enterprises, enabling Lenovo to provide server and storage solutions to our customers. VNX5150 platform is a unique offering, based on EMC’s industry-leading midrange storage capabilities, tailored to the needs of Lenovo’s customers”

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ADCs to power online services and deliver access to mission critical applications across the globe.“It was clear from the three week POC project we ran with the A10 equipment, that the interface and core features matched our expectations, and the flexibility of both hardware and software versions met our deployment strategy,” says Terry Johnson, security and ecommerce specialist for Travelex.

CHANNEL STREET

Huawei Among Top 100 Global Innovators of 2014 Huawei has entered the Thomson Reuters’ “Top 100 Global Innovators of 2014” list. Starting in 2011, the Innovator ranking focuses on global leadership in innovation across industries, assessing factors including a company’s overall patent volume, patent grant success rate, global reach of patent portfolio and patent influence as evidenced by

ASHRAF FAWAKHERJI, VICE PRESIDENT, HUAWEI CONSUMER BUSINESS GROUP, MIDDLE EAST.

citations by other companies.

“At Huawei, one of our key success drivers in expanding globally has been a dedicated commitment to R&D and ongoing patent innovation. This recognition from Thomson Reuters is testament to that commitment,” said Ashraf Fawakherji, Vice President, Huawei Consumer Business Group, Middle East.

KODAK ALARIS AND NVSSOFT TEAM UP FOR INFORMATION MANAGEMENT Kodak Alaris has signed an agreement to extend its existing partnership with NVSSoft to provide best-in-class intelligent information management, capture and document solutions primarily for the healthcare and government sectors. Martin Birch, Kodak Alaris’ EAMER managing director for document Imaging, says, ”The combination of Kodak Alaris technologies and NVSSoft software provides our customers with comprehensive market driven solutions covering applications such as digital medical records, CRM and eForms. They improve and streamline business processes, maximise efficiency and improve performance.”

SAFENET OFFERS ENCRYPTION-AS-A-SERVICE SafeNet has launched ProtectV-an encryp­tion solution. “ProtectV for Cloud Service Providers will help cloud infrastructure vendors drive adoption of their services by assuring customers that their critical data will remain under their control, even in shared environments,” said David Etue, vice president, corporate development strategy, SafeNet. “Organizations that were once wary of moving sensitive workloads to the cloud, particularly in highly regulated industries, can now do so more confidently.

That makes this a win both for the customers and for service providers.”

DAVID ETUE, VICE PRESIDENT, CORPORATE DEVELOPMENT STRATEGY, SAFENET

FORTIGUARD DISCOVERS NEW SOPHISTICATED POINT-OF-SALE THREAT

According to Fortinet, FortiGuard researchers have discovered an even newer variant of the “Backoff ” Point-of-Sale malware family, “211G1,” leveraging sophisticated techniques to hinder the analysis process and evade detection.

The malware hides itself in the user’s application data folder but, unlike the previous version, randomly selects a name from a predefined list. It is designed to steal credit card numbers off Point of Sale terminals, which could potentially result in millions of stolen cards if a major retailer is hit.

On November 3rd, FortiGuard researchers detected an updated ver­ sion of “Backoff,” dubbed ROM, which performed many of the same functions as its predecessor, but leveraged a slew of new techniques that made the threat more difficult to detect and analyze. This version circumvented security controls by disguising itself as a media player with the file name mplayer.exe and dropping a file in the user’s Application Data folder.

AL-FUTTAIM TECHNOLOGIES QATAR WINS GLOBAL AVAYA AWARD Al Futtaim Technologies has won The Networking Partner Of the Year award across India, China, Russia, Middle East and Africa from Avaya.

The award represents Al Futtaim’s success in 2014 in delivering outstanding communications consultancy and services to leading public and private sector businesses in the country, and driving the building the key vertical sectors on one of the most advanced network-

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ing technologies technology in the world. providers and Venkat vendors engage Raghavan, Gento achieve eral Manager, greater value out Al Futtaim of investments in Technologies, technology.” He NADEEM AHMED, SALES MANAGER commented continued: “This AL FUTTAIM TECHNOLOGIES ACCEPTS THE AWARD FROM AVAYA saying: “The 360 degrees shift technology market in Qatar in in the technology adoption model undergoing an enormous transis based on value, in comparison formation in the way businesses, to the traditional price-based

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and fragmented services model.

Businesses in Qatar are keen engage with technology partners who can lead business discussions, innovate out-of-the box solutions, and deliver measured business outcomes. It is this value-based model that enabled us to deliver an incredibly successful year in 2014, achieving 130% of our growth targets, including a 30% build up on our Avaya total communications solutions business.”

CHANNEL STREET

Riverbed Simplifies Hybrid Enterprise

WEB CLIPS LEXMARK IN GARTNER’S LEADERS QUADRANT Lexmark International has been positioned in the

Riverbed Technology has launched the next-generation of two flagship products – SteelHead 9.0 and SteelCentral AppResponse 9.5 – to deliver the most complete visibility, control, and optimization solution to accelerate performance of on-premises, cloud, and SaaS applications.The new solution provides optimization for any app, unmatched visibility from the data center to the cloud, and simplified control across hybrid networks with network

policies.

Taj ElKhayat, Managing Director, Middle East, Turkey, North, West, and Central Africa at Riverbed Technology says, “With SteelHead 9.0 and SteelCentral AppResponse 9.5, Riverbed is providing TAJ ELKHAYAT, MANAGING DIRECTOR, MIDDLE EAST, TURKEY, NORTH, WEST, visibility and control for AND CENTRAL AFRICA AT RIVERBED applications to end users TECHNOLOGY anywhere they’re located, path selection capabilities enabling CIOs to fully enjoy that make it easy to group all the business benefits of the applications via business-intent hybrid enterprise.”

Leaders quadrant by industry analyst firm Gartner, Inc. in its Magic Quadrant for Managed Print and Content Services. For four consecutive years, Lexmark has been positioned as a Leader in the firm’s Magic Quadrant report .

DIMENSION DATA RETAINS LEADERSHIP IN MAGIC QUADRANT Dimension Data is one of six organizations worldwide that has been positioned by Gartner in the Leaders Quadrant of the Magic Quadrant for Communications Outsourcing and Professional Services (COPS) 2014 for the fourth consecutive year.

COMMVAULT IN MAGIC QUADRANT FOR ENTERPRISE INFORMATION ARCHIVING CommVault has been positioned by Gartner, Inc. in the “Leaders” quadrant of the “Magic Quadrant

BROCADE EXPANDS THE EFFORTLESS NETWORK STRATEGY

for Enterprise Information Archiving” for the

Brocade has advanced The Effortless Network strategy, enabled by Brocade HyperEdge Architecture, including scale-out networking with the Brocade ICX7750-based distributed chassis solution, the new Brocade ICX 7450 enterprise campus stackable switch, and the availability of OpenFlow 1.3 support for emerging campus Software-Defined Networking (SDN) applications.

These new enhancements allow customers to transform their edge networks to support mobility, social, and cloud data traffic as they transition to the New IP.

archived data as an active and ‘nearline’ data

second consecutive year. Gartner states that by 2019, 75 percent of organizations will treat source, and not simply as a separate repository to be viewed or searched periodically, up from less than 10 percent today.

ALPHA DATA BAGS ‘BEST ENTERPRISE PARTNER’ AWARD Alpha Data has received the ‘Best Enterprise

MOVEMENTS BROCADE has hired KEVIN SHATZKAMER, as Distinguished Engineer and CTO Mobile Networking.

INTERACTIVE INTELLIGENCE has hired JEFF PLATÓN as its chief marketing officer.

SEAN MASON has joined the executive leadership team of RESOLUTION1 SECURITY as Vice President of Global Customer Success.

JESPER ANDERSEN is the new President and CEO of INFOBLOX..

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67.7 NUMBER GAME

percent

UAE leads the MENA Market in FTTH/B penetration.

Partner’ award from Veeam Software. The company was recognized for its outstanding delivery of cutting-edge enterprise IT solutions integrating Veeam’s proven technologies.

QLIK AND INTUIT PARTNER TO DELIVER ROBUST ACCOUNTING ANALYTICS Intuit Inc. has integrated QlikView into QuickBooks Enterprise, to provide advanced analytics for its subscribers. As part of the companies’ strategic partnership, Intuit has plans to integrate QlikSense into future versions of the product.

BENTLEY AND SIEMENS INTEGRATE FOR DIGITAL FACTORY AUTOMATION Bentley Systems and Siemens PLM Software have integrated Bentley’s point-cloud building information modeling (BIM) advancement with the state-of-the art process simulation tools in Siemens’ Tecno matix software for 3D digital factory automation.

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MEA Banking and Securities to spend more on Software Banking and securities companies in the Middle East and North Africa are on pace to spend approximately $13.1billion USD on IT products and services in 2014, an increase of 2.4percent over 2013 revenue of nearly $12.8billionUSD, according to Gartner.

Telecom services will be the largest segment in overall IT spending in the banking and securities market at $5.7 billion USD in 2014.This segment

is forecast to increase 0.8 percent compared to 2013.Software and IT services are the fastest growing segments with 9.7 and 8.4 percent increases in 2014, largely due to the expansion strategies of banks across the region and to modernization and replacement projects of the back-office that require much consulting and system integration. Outsourcing is also picking up, as it’s one of the fastest growing segments within IT services.

17TH WATER, ENERGY, TECHNOLOGY AND ENVIRONMENT EXHIBITION (WETEX) IN APRIL 2015 Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) is organizing the 17thWater, Energy, Technology, and Environment Exhibition (WETEX) 2015. WETEX 2015’s theme will be ‘At the Forefront of Sustainability’ and will take place on 21–23 April 2015 at the Dubai International Convention and Exhibition Centre, where it will show the latest technologies in water, electricity, energy, environment, oil and gas, environment, and green development. International experts from across the world will discuss a wide range of technologies, and ideas.

BELDEN INTRODUCES NEW SIGNAL TRANSMISSION PRODUCTS Belden has introduced its three new innovative products for applications and networks specifically used in building management systems and oil and gas industries.

Nemanja Mijic, General Manager – Industrial Cable EMEA, Belden, said: “Our high-end solutions aim to address all the needs and requirements of various regional industries. These highly reliable products can operate in extreme environmental conditions with minimal power consumption, making them cost-efficient and ideal for special industries such as oil and gas.

Rest assured that we will continue delivering on our commitment to successfully establish our presence in the region.”

USERS BULLISH ABOUT ERP’S POTENTIAL IN MOBILE, SOCIAL AND CLOUD The latest global survey from Epicor Software Corporation reveals several ERP deficiencies causing organizational drag. It also indicates ERP users are bullish on new ERP capabilities, including mobile, social and cloud, believing they offer new and exciting opportunities for improved organizational responsiveness.

Nearly 30 percent surveyed agreed that “responsiveness providing faster time to value with enhanced performance, scalability and ease of deployment to promote business agility and growth,” was the No. 1 desired outcome for ERP investments.

The next biggest driver for ERP investments was a desire for ERP to be “simpler to use for everyone in the organization.

While a full 65 percent of respondents perceive mobility as “important” to enable access to information and support communication for virtual workers, only 1 in 2 have any form of remote access to their ERP, and only 25 percent can access their ERP via smartphone or tablet PC. Only 20 percent of respondents surveyed indicated a desire to continue to invest in legacy on-premises.

However, 64 percent surveyed favor a cloud deployment, or the ability to mix and match cloud, on-premises or remote servers.

“GLOBAL” EXPANDS PORTFOLIO WITH ZYXEL SOLUTIONS Global Distribution has signed a Master-Distribution Agreement with ZyXEL Communications Corporation (Taiwan). Global will distribute ZyXEL’s comprehensive range of networking and connectivity products in the Middle East, as well as Pakistan & Afghanistan.

Global’s Solutions Portfolio for the MENA Region now covers the key

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IT Infrastructure pillars, such as Enterprise Storage, High PerformanceComputing, IT Infrastructure & Physical Security and Software.

“Global Distribution FZE has extensive experience in Solutions Distribution and an excellent reputation in Channel Development and Enablement,” said Muhammad Arsalan, VP Sales at ZyXEL

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Middle East FZE. “We are pleased to have them join our network of Distributors and added us to their comprehensive Solutions Portfolio.

Together, we will expand the footprint in the Middle East.”

“Our Vision is to enable the Reseller Community to embrace Solution Selling. ZyXEL’s comprehensive line of networking solutions

allows us to offer a ‘one stop’ shop and brings us another step closer to accomplish our Vision,” added Mario M. Veljovic, VP Solutions MENA at Global Distribution.

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CHANNEL STREET

Infoblox Introduces Free Evaluation Product to Detect Malware Infoblox has introduced a detect and report on suspiciousacfree DNS-based evaluation tivity within a network. product to help find malware “DNS is too valuable to be carefully hidden by cybervulnerable,” said David Gee, execucriminals inside enterprise tive vice president of marketing networks.The Infoblox DNS at Infoblox. “It’s easy for security Firewall Virtual Evaluation vendors to spread doom and can receive updates of new gloom, but it’s often hard for them and emerging malicious to prove their point. We’re confident DAVID GEE, EXECUTIVE VICE domains every two hoursto the Infoblox DNS Firewall Virtual PRESIDENT OF MARKETING AT help networks stay current on INFOBLOX Evaluation will find malware on identified malware sources most enterprise networks—with in the evolving threat landscape. The evaluation minimal effort by network administrators—at no product can use the updated information to cost and with no obligation.

HID GLOBAL RECEIVES FROST & SULLIVAN AWARD HID Global has earned the 2014 Frost & Sullivan Global New Product Innovation Leadership Award for consumer authentication in online financial services. “We are honored to receive this recognition and validation from Frost & Sullivan,” said Christy Serrato, senior solutions marketing manager, financial services with HID Global. “Advanced fraud prevention and intelligence-based authentication that are easy to deploy and use are a key element of our ActivID integrated versatile authentication platform.”

“HID Global is among the innovative companies leading the market with layered security solutions that deliver advanced, frictionless authentication for consumer-facing applications,” said Frank Dickson, network security industry principal with Frost & Sullivan. “A combination of foresight and execution has earned HID Global the 2014 Frost & Sullivan Global New Product Innovation Leadership Award.”

NEXANS INTRODUCES TIGHT BUFFER UNIVERSAL CABLES Nexans has launched its new LANmark-OF Tight Buffer Universal Cable, which harmonizes its Tight Buffer Indoor and Universal cable portfolio with an installer-friendly and more cost effective Tight Buffer Universal cable for indoor and outdoor use.

“The LANmark-OF Tight Buffer Universal cable is a fibre cable that can be used indoor and outdoor in a duct. It complies with the indoor fire requirements and can be installed indoor both vertically and horizontally. It can also be used for outdoor installation in a duct as the water tight glass yarns make the cables fully waterproof and rodent retardant,” says Mr. Tarek Helmy, Regional Director Gulf and Middle East, South & East Africa of Nexans Cabling Solutions.

A10 THUNDER TPS WITH ADVANCED DDOS MITIGATION CAPABILITIES

A10 Networks launched its Thunder TPS Release 3.1. Thunder TPS 3.1 offers customers a fully programmable policy engine via the regex or enhanced aFleX commands, extends new advanced DDoS mitigation capabilities to block additional attacks such as the recent POODLE attack, and provides advanced rate-limiting for granular Layer 4-7 control to enable best-in-class mitigation.

Another benefit of Thunder TPS 3.1 includes comprehensive detection capabilities with access to over 400 global, destination-specific and behavioral counters, to eliminate false positives.

“Network and security staff will greatly benefit from the new mitigation and visibility options provided by Thunder TPS 3.1. More detailed threat analysis and updated tools help to combat the impact of DDoS attacks by preventing damage to critical online resources and the bottom line,” said Raj Jalan, CTO of A10 Networks.

“With these enhancements, A10 Networks sets the stage to provide additional correlated analytics and ease of administration, including centralized management and automatic traffic baselining features in the near future.”

FACEBOOK ONLINE MALWARE SCANNER POWERED BY ESET ESET joins Facebook’s anti-malware initiative and offers ESET Online Scanner for all Facebook users for free. ESET’s solution will help users to scan and identify malware that was posted to their Facebook account after logging onto an infected computer and safely remove it. ESET Online Scanner for Facebook is going live today and will

18

be availand better protect able for all their devices. ESET Facebook Online Scanner for users.

Facebook will sig“Our nificantly decrease goal is the number of to offer malicious links FB SCANNER POWERED BY ESET our users from among the the right technology to improve trillions of clicks that take place their experience of our services every day on Facebook,” said Chetan

D E C E M B E R 2014

MEA

Gowda at Facebook.

“ESET is pleased to offer its services to Facebook users all over the world. Signature low system footprint and ESET’s top rated detection technology used in ESET Online Scanner guarantee effective and easy detection for free,” said Ignacio Sbampato, Chief Sales and Marketing Officer at ESET.

TRADITIONAL SECURITY SOLUTIONS ARE EASILY BYPASSED. DATA THEFT OFTEN GOES UNNOTICED. Imaging a determined hacker breaks into your network to steal your intellectual property. He’s an expert, so he encrypts the data before removing it from your network. Would that trigger an alarm in your defences?

Could your security solution distinguish between this attack and an employee banking online? It’s a tough call. And one that Websense can help you make.

CONTACT WEBSENSE For more information email: me@websense.com Meet with the Websense team, visit our distributors at Gitex.

Hall 1, Stand A1-12

Hall 1, Stand B2-3

Hall 2, Stand A2-2

TRITON STOPS MORE THREATS. WE CAN PROVE IT. © 2014 Websense, Inc. All rights reserved. Websense and the Websense logo are registered trademarks of Websense, Inc. in the United States and various countries. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owner.

CHANNEL STREET

SNB IT Distribution Partners with Fluke Networks SNB IT Distribution has partnered proven in some of the largest with Fluke Networks to promote its and most challenging network entire network testing equipment environments globally. This portfolio in Saudi Arabia. “Saudi alliance will help SNB and Arabia’s IT investment is burgeoning Fluke Networks to increase as organizations face new challenges their business opportunities and embrace new technologies. and revenue growth in the KSA FAISAL QURESHI, REGIONAL It is a strategic market and the market, and to build a strong DIRECTOR, KSA, SNB IT current appetite for technology relationship with enterprise DISTRIBUTION presents tremendous opportunity partners and customers by for SNB. Fluke Networks is known and respected providing end-to-end innovative solutions across worldwide, and whose commitment to delivering all verticals,” says Faisal Qureshi, Regional Direcquality and price-competitive products has been tor, KSA, SNB IT Distribution.

SEAGATE DELIVERS ENTERPRISE-CLASS STORAGE TO SMBS Seagate has extended its offerings to small and medium-sized businesses seeking to optimize their computing for performance and reliability using Network Attached Storage (NAS) systems. The new Enterprise NAS HDD is a high-capacity drive available in capacities up to an industry-leading 6TB and is designed to perform at high levels even under demanding workloads and in environments that call for global availability and 24x7 accessibility.

LOGICOM NAMED BEST HP DISTRIBUTOR IN PPS Logicom was named ‘Best HP PPS Distribution Partner’ in the Middle East, Mediterranean and Africa region, during the annual HP Distribution Partner Conference held in Athens on 25 November 2014.

Logicom’s Director of Distribution, Michael Papaeracleous, said “This award is a great honor for Logicom, and a recognition of the hard work and effort our teams have made HP PPS AWARD NOV 2014 this year. We are particularly happy that we are building on the success of last year when Logicom was named Best Distribution Partner for the Middle East. We would like to thank HP and all our business partners for this validation of our strategic investments in the region in the last few years.”

DELL AND INTEL STUDY UNCOVERS TRUTH BEHIND TECHNOLOGY AND THE WORKFORCE According to Steve Lalla, vice president and general manager of Cloud Client Computing, Dell. “As the research shows, now more than ever, the “office” isn’t defined by a desk within an employer’s walls.”

Wherever and whenever they are working, employees are using multiple devices. However,the office still is the primary place of work. Perceptions of at-home workers are shifting as 52 percent of people believe that those working from home are just as productive as or more productive than those in the office.

“The challenge many IT departments face is how to manage and secure the increasing number of devices coming in and out of an organisation” said Bob O’Donnell, founder and chief analyst TECHnalysis Research. “That’s forcing many organisations to rethink the way they manage devices.”

Employees in emerging countries, specifically UAE, India, and Turkey are more willing to rely on technology, while those in UK, US and Japan are looking for a more human touch in their work lives.In order to better understand their employees’ diverse needs and provide the right environments and technol­ogy, business leaders, IT managers and HR professionals should focus on activity-based work, seamless access, security and diverse environments.

HUAWEI RECOMMENDS LIST OF CYBER SECURITY REQUIREMENTS In its latest cyber security white paper, Cyber Security Perspec¬tives–100 Requirements When Considering End-to-End Cyber Security with Your Technology Vendors, Huawei outlines the industry’s first list of end-to-end requirements buyers must consider when assessing vendor cyber security capabilities. Huawei’s white paper recommends 100 require-

20

ments for buyers across 11 key areas including: strategy governance and control; standards and processes; laws and regulations; human resources; research and development; verification; third-party supplier management; manufacturing; delivering services securely; issue, defect and vulnerability resolution; and finally audit. (ADD IF REQUIRED)

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Bruce McConnell, Senior Vice President of leading international think tank EastWest Institute, remarked, “Huawei’s report provides much needed support for addressing one of the most vexing problems in cyber security today. The list of questions across 11 categories provides a strong founda¬tion for valuable dialogue between customers and their

vendors and suppliers.”

John Suffolk, Huawei’s Global Cyber Security Officer, said, “In almost every walk of life Govern¬ments, regulators, industry and consumers have worked together to improve product quality and safety, yet in the security safety of ICT this has not really happened.

We hope our white paper will go some way to start this process”

R

FEATURE

SERVER MARKET

Rethinking the Boxes

The year 2014 begun with the prediction that public clouds and virtualization will cause a major shift in the server market.

Virtualization indeed has been a crucial game changer, affecting the purchasing of servers and adoption of cloud technologies.

The expectations of businesses from data centres has grown massively. In such a scenario, it would be interesting to see the “survival of the fittest”; it’s time to rethink the boxes. n W O R D S : S O U M YA < S O U M YA @ A C C E N T I N F O M E D I A . C O M > n P H O T O : S H U T T E R S T O C K

W

hile vendors and partners might hold different opinions on the growth trajectory of the server market in the MEA region, it’s needless to say that as MEA national agendas and businesses embrace the digital business era, they are also looking to take advantage of not being tied down as heavily as other regions are with legacy architecture. IT Leaders with established data centers look to modernization, and others look to build new data centers. As Mario M. Veljovic, VP Solutions MENA, Global Distribution FZE puts it across, “with new technologies emerging, the market is hungry for “Out of the Box” Solutions and Appliances to address specific requirements”.

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TRENDS IN THE SERVERS MARKET IN THE MEA

Software Defined Enterprise (SDE): Servers are seeing a fresh awakening as a critical component. SDE makes networking and/or storage more agile by moving their functionality to software and adding automation. Software would run through servers in this scenario, so servers that offer standards-based platforms with openecosystems, adopt an open approach to design and development, and are modular and flexible. l Converged Infrastructure: Recent evolutions and business demands such as platform standardization, an accelerated adoption of virtualization, requirements for improved TCO and reduced footprints, improved automation, and the need for agility all make the converged l

infrastructure value-proposition significantly more appealing today. l Improved Systems Management: Rapid IT consumerization and data explosion are wreaking havoc in data centers, and IT Leaders are keen to reign in the “burden of management.”

Today, the improvements are in the management capabilities (deployment, updates, monitoring, and maintaining) of servers, and they are as important as the tangible evolutions and innovations in the data center. l Purpose-built Appliances: There are also interests in which significantly reduce the complete procurement to implementation cycle.

Some of the Purpose-built Appliances interests are in the area of Virtualization, SAP HANA, Data Warehousing, Big Data etc.

FEATURE

Moreover, there are major trends towards Cloud Systems, primarily to setup private clouds.

Additionally, Hosted Desktop Interface (HDI)/ Virtual Desktop Interface (VDI) Platforms are also in great demand

SOLUTION POOL- SPOILT FOR CHOICE? The past few months saw the roll out of a series of new Dell offerings for enterprise, data centers, and businesses looking to the cloud. “Dell recently unveiled its 13G Power Edge servers, the Dell XC Series of Web-Scale Converged Appliances, and the Dell PowerEdge FX converged architecture – these new solutions are designed to help customers move toward SDE by bridging the IT gap between traditional and new application

requirements” says Shams Hasan, Enterprise Product Manager, Dell Middle East.

Dell PowerEdge FX is designed as a modular and scalable platform with integrated servers, storage and networking, featuring a 2U enclosure with six PowerEdge server, storage, and network IOA sleds to help customers more easily configure, manage, and add capacity to complete workload-specific blocks of IT resources. This converged infrastructure approach affords efficiencies of shared power, I/O and management, integrated switching, and unsurpassed overall density capabilities at up to 40 2-socket servers in 10U. In addition to the efficiencies from new Intel chips, the Dell PowerEdge 13G servers bring several major design and software enhancements

to boost application performance and enable software-defined storage. Dell XC Web-Scale Converged Appliance is an addition to Dell’s strong portfolio of SDS offerings. The XC appliance installs quickly, integrates easily into any data center, and is able to deploy multiple virtualized, business-critical workloads.

WHO’S THE BEST? Shams Hasan, Enterprise Product Manager, Dell Middle East remarks, “More so today than ever before, the new privatized Dell is setting the stage for evolution and innovation in the IT market as it moves towards the wide-spread adoption of virtualization, distributed everything, SDE, and infrastructure that grows naturally with the business. With a complete and undistracted

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FEATURE

SHAMS HASAN

ENTERPRISE PRODUCT MANAGER, DELL MIDDLE EAST

“Dell provides compute blocks for Customers looking for evolutionary products, to Customers looking for revolutionary products, and also those in transition between the two”

MOHIT PAL

DATA CENTRE SPECIALIST, FUJITSU.

“At Fujitsu, we are passionate about delivering technologies crucial to people and society, while harnessing ICT to help create value for our customers.”

WITH THE ADVENT OF BYOD (BRING YOUR OWN DEVICE), THE BOUNDARIES WILL BLUR, NOT ONLY BETWEEN IT EQUIPMENT THAT IS USED PRIVATELY AND PROFESSIONALLY, BUT ALSO BETWEEN THE WORK WORLD AND PRIVATE LIFE. commitment to Customers and the Channel, Dell today provides an unparalleled line of compute blocks to meet a wide array of enterprise needs – for Customers looking for evolutionary products, to Customers looking for revolutionary products, and also the majority who are carefully looking at strategies to transition between the two!”

Fujitsu brings to the table a comprehensive product portfolio with specific focus on business based industry solutions. Its solutions come with business proven quality with continuous operation with almost no unplanned downtimes.

Mohit Pal, Data Centre Specialist, Fujitsu says, “At Fujitsu, we are passionate about delivering technologies crucial to people and society, while harnessing ICT to help create value for our customers. Fujitsu works with a solutions driven

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methodology with business centric approach”.

EES strongly believes that the HDI / VDI applications are driving innovations in server technology. The emphasis is here on compute density, Energy utilization (Power, cooling etc.) and DataCenterspace savings. EES is well positioned to provide solutions in all these key areas. The latest from their kitty is the TaaS platform as a cloud offering for testing environments. They are also ramping up their Managed Services portfolio.

According to Mohan Sundaram - Manager - Enterprise Servers & Storage, Enterprise Infrastructure, Emitac Enterprise Solutions(EES), “The advantages are defined by our Server Vendor partnership. EES has partnered with the Global leader in Enterprise Server markets. The

MARIO M VELJOVIC

VP SOLUTIONS MENA, GLOBAL DISTRIBUTION FZE

“We help and bridge the gap for the Partner. Today, Global has developed a Product Portfolio that allows you to build your entire Data Centre”.

customer advantages of such partnerships are Leading innovation, Global presence, Support resources worldwide and Fully optimized solutions for Cloud, Convergence, Big Data etc.”

X86 STORY With IBM out of the x 86 market, this has created an opportunity for the different vendors. Their partner and customer ecosystem has become shaky about depending on their enterprise solutions on a non-enterprise brand.

Dell continues to maintain its number two share position in the global x86 server market in two out of the last three quarters. The convergence of server, storage, and networking solutions, as well as key software elements, provides Dell a competitive advantage over suppliers simply offering a server. The x86 server business already is competitive. Dell’s experience is that customers choose the most comprehensive and technologically advanced solutions, a key factor in their significant share gains worldwide over the past few years.

The purpose-built appliances for Virtualization, Big Data and SAP HANA are the trends specific to x 86 platforms. While the Mission

FEATURE

HEARING IT FROM THE END-USERS DIRECTLY CHOOSING THE SERVER Since enterprises and IT service providers depend on servers heavily for offering services to their customers and users, selection of the right platform and servers is important and the evaluation criteria to choose the right ones are critical. These criteria include Service availability and business impact, Scalability, Technology refresh cycle/ The server average age, reliability, total cost of ownership, Adaptation, Integration, Manageability and manpower cost .

DR.JASSIM HAJI, DIRECTOR, IT, GULF AIR COMMENTS ON THE TRENDS IN SERVERS AND VIRTUALIZATION FOR ENTERPRISES

SOLUTION PROVIDER Gulf Air has a partnership with HP for supplying and supporting the innovative enterprise IT infrastructure, with a special focus on security and performance. This partnership has helped Gulf Air during the last 5 years to standardize the architecture and building our own private cloud.Moreover, it has helped Gulf Air introduce several improvements in its IT operations, including the introduction of private cloud computing for quicker and more efficient business operations, resulting in enhanced customer service.

VIRTUALIZATION With the increased adaptation of server virtualisation which is not bound to specific hardware platform, enterprises will be looking for more virtualisation utilizing more cost effective infrastructure and providing better services. Moreover, virtualization will expand to touch more technological areas and will adopt open source technologies,freeing up enterprises from being locked up with specific vendor or technology.

X86 Gulf Air’s IT infrastructure completely relies on x86 platform so they can have a complete integration between the resources. Gulf Air’s virtualization infrastructure is based on x86 platforms where having only x86 virtual servers made it possible to complete building the private cloud infrastructure. Moreover, the TCO of x86 based hardware is much lower than non x86 hardware.The complexity of installing, configuring and recovering non x86 platforms is so much higher than x86 platforms.

SERVER MIGRATION Everything is different when you migrate from one technology to another in terms of efforts, adjusting processes, up scaling technical resources …etc. In addition, all customization requires to be redeveloped which requires resources, time and long UAT cycles.

critical environments are still preferring non-x86 server architecture like the Itanium platform due to their best-in-class RAS features.

VIRTUALIZATION –THE WET BLANKET? “Virtualization has impact on number of physical servers; but also has a positive impact on the average selling price per server. This is good for companies like Fujitsu that are driven by solutions. Product-centric approach will feel the pinch of this much more” says Mohit Pal, Data Centre Specialist, Fujitsu.

Mohan Sundaram - Manager - Enterprise Servers & Storage, Enterprise Infrastructure, Emitac Enterprise Solutions(EES), believes, as the market is already tuned towards Virtualization there are large opportunities opening for

Datacenter Consolidation and as a logical next step many Business Continuity opportunities are gaining momentum. The cloud opportunities provide a lot of potential in the coming months as Enterprises are feeling more confident to test waters with Private clouds.

VERTICALS DRIVING THE SERVER MARKET Utilization of servers is in all arenas; Public Sector, Retail, Oil & Gas, Telecom, Hospitality, Healthcare and Education being the key ones.

PARTNERS RUN THE GAME Dell has a strong partner ecosystem. Apart from regular channel motivations and business practices, they engage very closely – often in

tandem – with Partners in Customer engagements. Dell also understands the importance of proof-of-concept to Customers and shares a wide variety of demo products with Partners in Customer engagements and events.

Fujitsu has several partner initiatives that include partner programs with rebates, Partner sales and pre-sales trainings, Presales support, Fujitsu Technical Community, Opportunity specific deal registration with partners as well as Ongoing sales incentives for partners.

According to Fujitsu’s leading distributor in the region, Global, they look at Solutions from Application Level and understand the various elements that are needed to deploy them successfully. “We help and bridge the gap for the Partner. Today, Global has developed a Product Portfolio that allows you to build your

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FEATURE

MOHAN SUNDARAM

MANAGER - ENTERPRISE SERVERS & STORAGE, ENTERPRISE INFRASTRUCTURE, EMITAC ENTERPRISE SOLUTIONS(EES)

“EES has partnered with the Global leader in Enterprise Server markets for Leading innovation, Global presence, Support resources worldwide and Fully optimized solutions”

DR.JASSIM HAJI

DIRECTOR, IT, GULF AIR

“With the increased adaptation of server virtualisation , enterprises will be looking for more virtualisation utilizing more cost effective infrastructure and providing better services. ”

COMPUTER SERVER FORECAST TOTAL SERVER SALES ($BILLION) UNIT SHIPMENTS (MILLION)

58.7

57.5

9.8 8.7

8.2

11.8

56.7

9.0

53.4 53.0

2010

2011

2012

2013E

Source: IC Insights

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2014F

TOP CONCERNS OF CIOS As the adoption of technology and enterprise in businesses mature globally, CIOs grapple with rising demands of digitization. The velocity of change today makes the juggling act of yesterday difficult to maintain – regulation, innovation, prioritization. CIOs are keen to see servers as a technology become an easier choice to make, and as a tool become an easier function to manage.

The prime concerns are l Time to deployment l Lack of staff and skills l Rapid data growth l Server Virtualization l Delivering business solutions l Reducing cost of IT l Developing or managing a flexible infrastructure l Expanding use of information / analytics l Ease of management

CUSTOMER SUCCESS STORIES Dubai Culture and King Fahd Armed Forces Hospital (KFAFH) located in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia feature among several of Dell’s successes in the ME, while NBAD, ADPC, Abu Dhabi Municipality, Pacific Controls, Tatweer, EMKE Group, Modern Bakery are few of the success stories of Fujitsu in this region.

FINALLY

54.6 54.0 52.6

entire Data Centre.Other than that, we do offer Pre-Sales, Consultancy, Project Management and Professional Services to our Partner Community.

A part of that, we do give strong financial support for special Projects”, adds Mario M. Veljovic, VP Solutions MENA, Global Distribution FZE. EES has strategic partnerships with leading vendors in various datacenter technologies. HP is the vendor for Server Solutions in EES Portfolio.

The partnership goes back to the inception of Emitac, and still going strong. Apart from Servers Portfolio EES continues to have partnerships with various Business Units of HP – Storage, Networking, Software etc.

2015F

2016F

2017F

The computing is central to any new applications being developed. The advent of non-traditional applications is pushing vendors to make more demanding compute needs met within shorter turnaround time. The energy efficiency, Compute density and mixed workload needs have made vendors come up with new Server technologies to meet such demands. With such continued innovation in the Server technologies it should only get brighter and better in the immediate future and times to come. ë

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MY VIEWS

its own proprietary software; is that a threat to you?

Our competitors try different strategies, however, Dell, from day one has been about open, capable and affordable solutions. We don’t believe in proprietary; all the hardware that we sell, all the software we work with is always multi-vendor, open standards. We believe in open technology.

If a customer wants to use Dell for all his IT needs, we are more than happy to have him. But if a customer wants the best of breed approach and wants to work with Dell on a very specific solution and wants that solution to be compatible with what he has installed, trained and invested in already, even if that’s a competitor product, we’re happy to do that as well. We offer choice; we don’t force any customer along any certain stack or proprietary technologies. We don’t believe in lock-in. Lock-in has been successful for few vendors over a short period of time but in the long run, it always fails. Think about Super DVD and Blue Ray; Blue Ray prevailed. Think about iOS and Android, Android has prevailed. Dell believes in open standards and we will prevail in competition.

BASIL AYASS,

MARKETING DIRECTOR, DELL MIDDLE EAST

“You call it chaos, I call it opportunity” SINCE THE NEWS OF HP SPLIT, MARKET HAS BEEN WITNESS TO SEVERAL INTERESTING REMARKS FROM THOSE IN COMPETITION, DELL BEING ONE OF THEM. CLEVERLY PLAYING WITH HIS WORDS, BASIL AYASS, MARKETING DIRECTOR, DELL MIDDLE EAST TALKED TO ENTERPRISE CHANNELS MEA TEAM ABOUT THE MEA OPPORTUNITY AND DELL STRATEGY AND HOW DELL SEES OPPORTUNITY EVEN IN CHAOS. EXCERPTS.

How is the market growing and how is Dell growing in this?

We at Dell understand the importance of the Middle East; it’s growing and is part of an emerging market. We are seeing double-digit growth across our enterprise portfolio end-to-end.

There has been some chaos in the market related to your competitors; so is Dell planning to take advantage of the troubled waters?

You call it chaos, I call it opportunity. With change, there is opportunity. Some customers,

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some countries are going through political instabilities whereas other companies, our competitors are going through mergers and acquisitions and splits. Dell is steadfast in its strategy. We are not moving away from the focus; we are here to offer customers end-to-end solutions, to simplify their lives and give them the power to do more. We see opportunity as things are juggled and changed around, and will help customers to overcome the change and find better solutions.

One of your competitors has been trying to recapture the market with

Dell has invested a lot in this market and got returns as well; how has the business been so far and what are the next strategies in place?

At Dell, we always look for Return on Investment when we are doing an investment. In the Middle East, we have expanded our offices, built solution centres. From the marketing perspective, we participated in GITEX since three years. We launched new solutions. Our investments and acquisitions have yielded a lot of results and now we have an end-to-end software portfolio and we are tracking the returns there. We are seeing very fast growth in our software portfolio in the ME. And we shall continue to invest in that, hire new people, and focus on software, to take Dell to the new era of IT- the Software Defined Data centre.

What are your new plans?

Recently we announced that our software arm has a new office in Dubai, the Dell Software.

They will have their own hiring and finance team, and can grow at a much faster trajectory than the traditional Dell. Dell is happily growing; but at the end of the day, market dynamics do come into play. With PCs, servers and storage, being such a matured offering, you can’t really grow them like 100% or 200%. That’s why we spawned off Dell Software, so that they can grow even faster. That will be our focus next year ensuring that Dell Software is an extremely successful company in enterprise sector. ë

MY VIEWS

“In the future, the investors and stakeholders will be able to go through the history of the transactions as well as the current transactions and also the ratios, that will enable them to make better decisions.”

RASHED AL BALOUSHI,

CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, ABU DHABI SECURITIES

“Aspiring to be the Exchange of Choice” TECHNOLOGY HAS BECOME SYNONYMOUS WITH THE VISION OF THE GOVERNMENTS IN THE MIDDLE EAST. ABU DHABI SECURITIES EXCHANGE

and the brokers as well to consider their future decisions based on analysis. In other words, we would translate the financial statement plus the important ratios would be inserted into this application. In the future, the investors and stakeholders will be able to go through the history of the transactions also also the current transactions and as well as the ratios, that will enable them to make better decisions.

We are dealing with a large amount of data, the security of which is very crucial. As a result, we have ensured that our hardware, software and the entire infrastructure is protected. We have layers of protection to make sure that the information doesn’t reach unauthorized people.

We ensure that all of the features are up-to-date.

We have a certificate of ISO 27009 that shows that everything has been protected.

HAS BEEN TECHNOLOGICALLY TRANSFORMING ITSELF IN ALIGNMENT WITH THE STRATEGY OF THE GOVERNMENT. HON. RASHED AL BALOUSHI, CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, ABU DHABI SECURITIES EXCHANGE SPOKE TO ENTERPRISE CHANNELS MEA ABOUT THE MODERNISATION OF THE EXCHANGE DEPLOYING ICT. EXCERPTS.

What’s your connect with the technological revolution?

As a stock market, the accessibility to the stock market and the information therein is very important for success and improvement. As a result, we have adopted technology in a big way.

We have around 46 electronic and smart services and about 38 services targeting the stakeholders.

Have you brought in new solutions and services recently?

At GITEX 2014, we launched a new system as a

part of the iPad; it’s a device that can be accessed by the investors, brokers and listed companies at the same time. The features of this system enable the investors at the end of the day to look at the full and detailed transactions of the day, the index, the sectors and they can even manage their portfolio and this is what we have achieved so far.

What are your future plans in this regard?

When it comes to the technology, our future plan is to put the ratios which would help the investors

What are your expectations?

When it comes to expectations of the customers, definitely the market is approaching all the stakeholders and we are trying to attract all the investors and suppliers. Many more development plans are in the pipeline that will be achieved with the technology providers.

It’s been seen that some departments are developing their own patented applications and giving that to be utilized by other departments.

Are you doing likewise?

We are trying to leverage on the other entities and we are learning from them too trying to get the best practices. These other entities could be local as well as international. Our final motive is to provide the best services to our stakeholders. ë

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COVER STORY

ENTERPRISE APPLICATION MARKET

Time to update legacy Recent reports have shown that majority of the enterprises in the Middle East are positive about increasing their budgets across the core areas of ICT infrastructure. Enterprise applications will be entitled to a good proportion of the software budgets. As Gartner predicts a renewed and revitalized enterprise software marketplace by 2016, the time is ripe for enterprise applications market. n B Y: S O U M YA < S O U M YA @ A C C E N T I N F O M E D I A . C O M > â&#x20AC;&#x192; n P H O T O : S H U T T E R S T O C K

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he MEA region has seen tremendous maturity when it comes to enterprise application business systems over the last 12 months. With the recent resurgence of economic stability, the regional sentiment of the Expo 2020 announcement, and the general trend of cash flows moving in a healthier direction, the stage is set for more complex business scenarios to come.

As such, enterprise applications will become an essential ingredient in the business governance processes of tomorrow. Entrepreneurial outfits and corporate businesses alike are wise to the requirements and are aggressively seeking out

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enterprise solutions that fit their current needs and are future proof to their growth aspirations of tomorrow.

TRENDS IN THE ENTERPRISE APPLICATION BUSINESS According to Megha Kumar, Research Manager â&#x20AC;&#x201C; Software, IDC MEA, a major driver for the uptake of enterprise applications is modernization of apps workloads. Many parts of the Middle East are investing in apps to update legacy systems and streamline business operations. In parts of Africa, it is new investments around modernizing

the business overall, digitizing the way things are done and achieving process efficiencies. Standardization of processes is another major trend in the region, where organizations are investing in applications so that different parts of the business work on similar systems; a major drive for consolidation of not such the infrastructure layer but also the applications layer. Cloud and enterprise mobility are also changing the enterprise applications landscape. Many companies are considering SaaS versions for certain non-critical workloads to simplify management, allow for faster deployment while remaining cost effective.

With increased device proliferations, companies

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ANISH KANARAN, CHANNEL DIRECTOR FOR EPICOR IN THE MIDDLE EAST, AFRICA & INDIA

“With Epicor ERP 10 we’ve created a visionary blend of rich global functionality built on agile technology to make it easier to use, powerfully responsive and with more collaborative power.” especially enterprises are looking into the mobile enablement of applications so that users can gain access to corporate systems especially those within the sales and CRM domains.

OPPORTUNITIES FOR ENTERPRISE SOLUTIONS Businesses are growing more and more complex, and the definition of small enterprises is changing rapidly. As such, enterprise solutions need to be scalable, agile, flexible yet rigid, portable, real-time, cloud enabled, and mobile enabled.

They need to cater to different users in different environments, hierarchies and profiles differently, and yet be unified and provide consolidated governance capabilities across the board. The basic necessity of running a business, in the era gone by, was an accounts management solution.

The era has now come where enterprise solutions are the core essential for business governance. As such the opportunity for the enterprise solutions industry is a thrilling one. The market scenarios are changing; demands are changing, and if the enterprise solution fits the description, it already has a foot in the door of the client organization.

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ROHAN TEJURA, ASST. VICE PRESIDENT, FOCUS SOFTNET

“Focus maintains control of the entire ecosystem from product creation and development, right down to product implementation in the client environment.”

ROLE OF BIG DATA IN THE CHANGES AND INNOVATIONS IN ENTERPRISE APPLICATION SOLUTIONS Big data can bring with it complexity but the rights tools can help you to organize, priorities and extract critical information. This makes justifying the expense of implementing a solution simple, as the benefits it offers directly impacts the bottom line. Leveraging technology and data makes it possible to organize data based on facts and focus areas so that you can make the most of resources and maximize profitability.

DIFFERENT ENTERPRISE APPLICATION SOLUTIONS There are several providers for enterprise application solutions like Epicor, SAP, Focus Softnet, Oracle, etc. So, needless to say, there continues a constant competition to outdo one another in terms of technology and support.

In the Middle East, Epicor offers nextgeneration ERP solution. The newest release, Epicor ERP version 10, became available in May 2014 and gives companies a technology platform

that can inspire them as they conduct business today and in the future --on any device, anytime, anywhere in the world.

Focus recently launched its new, state-ofthe-art flagship ERP solution – Focus 8. It is a completely new system designed from the ground up, and is not simply an evolution of previous versions or editions of Focus’ ERP systems. This new system has been built by keeping all the legacy features and capabilities that Focus has been traditionally famous for, but has also enhanced them to a great extent, and has provided a whole pack of new capabilities aimed specifically at c-suite users such as CEOs, CFOs, board members, etc.

In addition, Focus Softnet has a range of ERP solutions, each aimed at a different segment and customer size, thereby ensuring an ERP solution for each scale, size and type of customer. Further they have a plethora of vertical or industryspecific solutions ranging from Real Estate Management, to retail, restaurants and hospitality, manufacturing, warehousing and logistics, healthcare, academia, services, sales and support, to name a few.

MAKING THE RIGHT CHOICE OF SOLUTIONS Anish Kanaran, Channel Director for Epicor in the Middle East, Africa & India says, “With Epicor ERP 10 we’ve created a visionary blend of rich global functionality built on agile technology to make it easier to use, powerfully responsive and with more collaborative power. The innovation doesn’t stop there. We’ve also made the software streamlined and fully accessible on multiple devices. Combined with a choice of deployment, it is a robust ERP solution that will drive growth and enable teams to collaborate throughout every sector of your business for the best results.” He adds that Epicor ERP 10 is an enterprise solution that supports growth and expansion into new markets, encouraging companies to connect with their customers, partners, employees and products in new and innovative ways. “Compared with other major ERP solutions, Epicor ERP 10 provides low total cost of ownership (TCO), shorter time for implementation and ease of use” he comments.

Rohan Tejura, Asst. Vice President, Focus Softnet believes that the best distinctive feature of Focus is that Focus maintains control of the entire ecosystem from product creation and development, right down to product implementation in the client environment. “This provides us the edge of the highest rate of successful implementations of the entire industry.” he adds. With a direct presence in 17 countries, and servicing

COVER STORY

success of the implementation is imperative. This is one of the biggest concerns. Other concerns include scalability, agility, seamless integration, and compliance regulations.

MAIN CHALLENGES IN AWARENESS AND ADOPTION OF LATEST ENTERPRISE APPLICATION SOLUTIONS l

DR JASSIM HAJI, DIRECTOR INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY, GULF AIR

“Enterprise solutions are costly and the ROI return and payback results will be over 3 o 5 years which is too long period in IT evaluation industry”

Lack of ownership and commitment from senior executives l Ineffective communication between users and the management team. l Without experiencing the solution in itself, it becomes difficult for clients to validate the claims of one solution over another. l Choosing the right solution for the organization remains a core challenge, and often times these decisions are made for the wrong reasons

CHALLENGES IN DEPLOYMENT, MANAGEABILITY, TIME TAKEN AND SCALABILITY OF ENTERPRISE APPLICATION SOLUTIONS Data migration from legacy application Integration of enterprise application solution with other software applications, third party products, etc. l Allocation and utilization of human resources.

These factors, of course, can easily be mitigated with having well defined processes in place on the part of the application provider, and the acceptance and adoption of these implementation methodologies and processes on the part of the clients.

TOP CONCERNS OF CIOS WHEN IT COMES TO ENTERPRISE APPLICATION SOLUTIONS With the challenges faced by companies, especially those in the manufacturing industry and their dependence on increasingly sophisticated systems and technologies, CIOs now have greater influence over how quickly a company can expand and adapt to change. That’s the focus of their role as Transformer.

Adopting an Enterprise Application or Solution is a big decision with significant repercussions. The costs involved, and more importantly, the time invested in purchasing and implementing these complex systems means that the CIO has already reached a virtual point of no return when making the decision to go ahead with a particular solution. Now, no matter what, the

STRAIGHT FROM THE HORSE’S MOUTH

According to Dr Jassim Haji, Director Information Technology, Gulf Air, some of the the main concerns with regard to enterprise applications are delivery time of enterprise applications- there are many instances of project overrun, which affects the resources and planning of the enterprises. Then there are issues when the required spending exceeds the allocated IT budgets. To top that, user acceptance of the applications remains an area of concern, wherein technological awareness needs to be built. Not to forget, the task of maintaining, building or acquiring enterprise application knowledge and expertise is no easy game either. Business process re-engineering is often required to align business processes with the solution industry best practices. Every investment is done with an eye on RoI, in case of enterprise application solutions, as Dr. Haji puts it across, “enterprise solutions are costly and the ROI return and payback results will be over 3 to 5 years which is too long period in IT evaluation industry”.

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most business verticals, he thinks that the organizational knowledge and experience in successful implementations certainly makes Focus stand out from the crowd. Further, the modular nature of Focus’ solutions allows customers flexibility in choosing and purchasing licenses to exactly what they require and nothing more.

THE END-USER PERSPECTIVE:

CHALLENGES OF ENTERPRISE APPLICATION SOLUTIONS VIA CLOUD Security is always a concern raised when considering moving your enterprise applications to the cloud. Cloud computing is a relatively new concept to the region from an enterprise applications perspective, and it might take some time to convince companies to invest in cloud solutions.

One of the other key challenges is the rigidity of the systems available. Enterprise solutions deployed on cloud environments can only be used or implemented in the format that they’ve been designed and customization to suit each user’s personal specifications is very restrictive.

Additionally, when integration with other solutions in use at customer organizations comes

into play, the cloud nature of the solution again becomes incredibly restrictive. There is also the factor of cost; there is a threshold value below which the adoption of cloud systems makes sense, but once a critical mass of number of users and number of modules is reached, it is still cost effective to make the capital investment for an enterprise solution as opposed to a cloud based solution.

FACILITATION BY VENDORS FOR LOCALIZATION OF ENTERPRISE APPLICATION SOLUTIONS At Epicor in Dubai they have a large team of consultants and solutions engineers who work closely with thenproduct development team to make sure that all solutions are localized.

Focus develops its own applications, sells them through direct sales teams and also through franchise or channel partners, but implements the solutions ourselves through its own implementation teams worldwide. Present in 17 countries, they have the unique advantage of knowing first-hand what the specific requirements of each geo-specific market are, and designing and developing our systems to cater to those needs directly.

There is virtually no “lost-in-translation” when it comes to product development, implementation, support, and upgrades across all the geographies.

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ANALYTICS –THE NEW PLAYER ON FIELD

MEGHA KUMAR, RESEARCH MANAGER –SOFTWARE, IDC MEA

“With increased device proliferations, companies especially enterprises are looking into the mobile enablement of applications so that users can gain access to corporate systems especially those within the sales and CRM domains.”

Business analytics is starting to play a major role in enterprise application solutions. More organizations are now looking out for enterprise application solutions that have in-built capabilities for advance reporting and business analytics.

For example, Epicor has a dedicated built-in module within Epicor ERP that is known as Enterprise Performance Management (EPM).

Epicor EPM is an end-to-end solution that removes the barriers to better business insight through a combination of intuitive user experiences, user driven key performance indicators (KPI), and pre-packaged analytics that have real meaning to the business. Epicor EPM leverages the advanced analytic capabilities of the Microsoft platform and incorporates modern web application concepts for unprecedented ease of use and ultimately business results.

At Focus, they provide their own state-ofthe-art Business Intelligence module combined with role and user specific multiple dashboard capabilities with KPI definitions, which allows their system to generate real-time reports through integrated online synchronization. These functions, coupled with our mobility and cloud compliance provide users with access to up-tothe-minute information at all times, and gain access to unique data analysis capabilities.

ONE SIZE FITS ALL –MYTH OR REALITY At Epicor, they practice one solution for the entire organization. They believe that multiple systems often create issues when integrating with

each other and can affect operational efficiency within the company.

Focus Softnet on the other hand has 4 generic ERP solutions which are industry agnostic as well as business or vertical specific applications for various industries. They recommend the modular assembly of specific applications for specific purposes keeping a generic base layer common across all clients. This provides client organizations with the flexibility of purchasing specifically what they require and no more.

PARTNERS – THE REAL PLAYERS Epicor’s partner network in the region includes companies such as KnowledgeWeb, Index infotech, Resolve IT, and O2Gen in UAE; Aquantima in UAE & KSA, Business Consult in KSA & Jordan, ICTUS Projects in Qatar, Zawawi Business Machines in Oman, Fakhroo IT in Bahrain, Zenith Business Solutions in Kuwait and Global Business Solutions in Egypt.

In the words of Anish Kanaran, “Partnering with Epicor as a reseller means entering a mutually beneficial agreement to actively cultivate the market for Epicor solutions and work to implement those solutions quickly, and cost effectively. Epicor resellers are an extension of our direct employees and work closely with every department within Epicor”. He adds that Epicor works very closely with the regional manufacturing, CIO and IT decision makers, and invests in marketing campaigns such as events and exhibitions to make sure that they and theiur regional partners, can work pro-actively with those decision makers.

KEY VERTICALS

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Manufacturing

Services industries

Warehousing and logistics

Distribution

Real estate

Academia

Retail

Healthcare

Entertainment

Oil & Gas

Hospitality

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COVER STORY

ERIK JOHNSON,

VICE-PRESIDENT, TECHNOLOGY STRATEGY, EPICOR SOFTWARE CORPORATION

Putting the ERP in Customer Experience Initiatives When it comes to the customer experience, ERP would not even be mentioned if you ask a business leader what in their business contributes to a great experience. Most would point to their sales teams, support staff or the quality of their products. And yet, newly published research indicates ERP systems can be a powerful enabler of customer experience initiatives that are so essential to support

BIGGEST ENTERPRISE APPLICATION MARKETS The biggest enterprise applications markets in the Middle East are UAE and KSA, followed by Qatar, Oman, Bahrain and Kuwait. Egypt and Jordan have recently also seen some growth in the ERP market.

FUTURE OF ENTERPRISE APPLICATION SOLUTIONS Enterprise Application Solutions are rapidly adopting agile methodologies by moving onto cloud environments and becoming mobiledevice-friendly. “The next wave will see seamless data integration across domains, sectors, verticals, technologies, and bring real-time information right into the pocket of the user. Mobility and lean infrastructure is the way forward, and this trend is expected to drive the next change in the solution markets” comments Rohan Tejura, Asst VP, Focus Softnet. .

customer retention and product differentiation.

ERP as Customer Experience Enabler Most people equate CRM systems with customer experience initiatives, but ERP? ERP is widely recognised as the “backbone” that manages the vital data and processes that drives the business, and now it seems it’s finally getting its due as a key enabler of customer experience.

IDC Manufacturing Insights' survey respondents ranked ERP among the top three most critical IT applications that can affect customer experience, and drew a correlation between manufacturers’ customer experience practice adoption/maturity and use of ERP systems as a catalyst.

As stated in the IDC Manufacturing Insights report: Get Customers Inspired: How Modern ERP Can Support Greater Customer Experience, “The role of ERP appears crucial to improving customer experience. Companies on higher levels in the customer experience maturity model have a higher consideration of their ERP as a key tool in delivering a good customer experience.

“The research indicates that an improved customer experience can be gained through investments in modern, fully integrated, flexible and easy to use ERP systems that streamline all operational processes and connect back office with front office by offering integrated CRM,

Megha Kumar, IDC believes that companies and even organizations in the public sector are looking heavily into SaaS versions of on premise applications to provide standardized access to application workloads, while scaling access to technologies and improving overall productivity.

Also modules within enterprise applications will come embedded with business analytics allowing companies to gain access to analysis as and when the data is generated. BA will be a core part of most applications. Enterprise applications especially those that are customer facing or HR related will also come embedded with social capabilities for improved customer engagement.

FINALLY… Cloud and business analytics are major game changers. Most of the regional companies are yet to benefit from the power of enterprise application software so the market is wide open here in the Middle East for ERP vendors with modern, flexible solutions. ë

warranty and aftermarket functionalities. Flexible ERP systems that include or easily integrate those applications will add the most value to manufacturers in relation to creating a superior customer experience.”

Key Constraints to Customer Experience Excellence The size of your company (and your budget) should not impede your ability to deliver a superior customer experience. This is where a software as a service (SaaS) ERP solution fits in: it gives companies the ERP “goods” to support improved customer experience at a price point that’s ideal for small manufacturers.

Today’s SaaS ERP solutions provide end-toend operational visibility across the organisation, from customer, to production, to financial management, that so affordable the tab is often less than their electric bill each month. SaaS also minimizes the upfront costs normally associated with software, and eliminates the onus and cost of having to manage the IT behind the system.

ERP systems have been a fixture in manufacturing sector for years now, and have helped support lean, green and quality initiatives.

Now your ERP system can help you with what is potentially the most important initiative of all – evolving your business processes quickly to meet ever-changing customer expectations and help you win your customers respect and their continued business. ë

SUGGESTIONS FOR SUCCESSFUL IMPLEMENTATION OF ENTERPRISE APPLICATION SOLUTIONS

l Strong executive sponsorship l Software Requirement Study (SRS) l Engagement of key users and end users in the project l Effective communication through multiple channels to promote the project culture and awareness l Identifying a core team from the client organization as “project owners” who would be responsible for liaising with the solution providers and work with them to ensure that the systems are in line with client organization expectations l Monitoring every single detail pre-, during and post-implementation to ensure successful execution

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Niksun, Nexthink, Lumeta, Toshiba, Lenovo, Dell, etc. Some of the brands will give us large numbers while some will help us to reach out niche groups of customers. Some will offer volumes, but even in those, we prefer those which have something new to offer in terms of technology.

The market mostly looks at Comguard as one dealing with mostly niche products. Now, you seem to be entering into the volume game?

As a group, we have been doing a lot of activity from the “value” perspective, along with nice kind of profitability too. But we feel, that doesn’t get us the right kind of turnover which we deserve.

We do need to supply some volume products.

And again, even though we are entering into the volume end, it’s not at the consumer end but we are trying to target high end business to business solutions.

AJAY SINGH CHAUHAN,

CEO, COMGUARD

“Eyeing big volumes with great value” TALK OF MARKET DYNAMICS-ONCE SEEN AS A NICHE PLAYER, COMGUARD HAS

Lots of additions in workforce, partner strength, brands and so forth; it mustn’t have been a easy ride?

We are targeting a large turnover so we do need a workforce that’s aligned with the thought process of the group.

Training has been your base; so any new developments on that front?

We have added Dell. We are a very big partner of Microsoft, especially in KSA where we are doing really well. For Juniper, we have expanded the territorial coverage to Australia and New Zealand and more. In India, we have added Citrix. So, we are definitely expanding the training portfolio, which has been the core strength of the company.

BEEN MAKING RAPID STRIDES INTO THE VOLUMES RACE AS WELL. AJAY SINGH CHAUHAN, CEO, COMGUARD SPOKE TO ENTERPRISE CHANNELS MEA ABOUT THE COMPANY’S OPERATIONAL EXCELLENCE AND RICH PORTFOLIO. EXCERPTS.

How has Comguard changed within the last year?

Within Comguard, we are trying to make sure that the company is better aligned to the newer strategies in the market. We have been reorganizing ourselves too to ensure we have the right skill sets, and right headcount-to-turnover ratio. We have a dream of going public in the next couple of years.

Different solutions seem to be blurring. How do you decide your portfolio?

We look into the current needs of the customers, and the kind of solutions they are asking for. We

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keep an eye on the products newly entering into Gartner space, be it in security, storage, networking or whichever it might be. We watch out for the agile and capable players from the technology perspective. Secondly, we go to our Fortune 500 customers and ask them about the kind of projects they are planning for the year and which are the kind of solutions that would fit in to address those needs. This combined exercise allows us to literally decide as to what kind of product line and solutions we should have.

Which are the new additions to your portfolio?

Some of the new brands we have added are

What message do you wish to give to the partner and end user community?

Both partners and end users should look at our portfolio very carefully. There are immense opportunities for partners to make good margins and also offer very good solutions to their customers. From end-user perspective, we are solving real problems; we have great POC labs and have received multiple awards in the recent times, not just for our numbers but also for our quality. That should be a big encouragement for the end-user community.

With too many brands, don’t you end up ignoring a few in favour of others?

While planning for a new addition, we make sure we go for complementing brands in favour of competing brands. But yeah, when vendor is more active, it definitely makes our task easier. ë

MY VIEWS

of HP, Symantec, etc; how do you view the situation?

We can’t comment on the decisions of our competitors, but yeah Dell is strategically positioned from end-user computing aspect to the networking technology, network security expertise to the cloud. Dell is actually very active in the Open Stack Initiative as well. So, Dell is really focussing on the strength in all the divisions including end users, enterprises and software. It’s uniquely positioned as a true end-to-end solution provider to the market and is definitely at a stronger position than its competitors.

FLORIAN MALECKI,

INTERNATIONAL PRODUCT MARKETING DIRECTORNETWORK SECURITY, DELL

“Securing your present, caring about your future” ENTERPRISES OFTEN ARE FORCED HAVE A TRADE-OFF BETWEEN NETWORK PERFORMANCE AND SECURITY WHILE CHOOSING A NEXT-GEN FIREWALL; THERE IS NEED FOR A COMPREHENSIVE NGFW THAT PROTECTS AGAINST EVER-EVOLVING THREATS WITHOUT JEOPARDIZING NETWORK PERFORMANCE. DELL SONICWALL HAS BROUGHT IN SUPER MASSIVE 9800 FOR A DEEPER LEVEL OF NETWORK SECURITY. FLORIAN MALECKI, INTERNATIONAL PRODUCT MARKETING DIRECTOR- NETWORK SECURITY, DELL SPOKE TO ENTERPRISE CHANNELS MEA TEAM ABOUT THE COMPANY’S GROWTH STRATEGY. EXCERPTS

What was the reason behind changing the name from Dell SonicWALL to Dell Security?

Dell acquired SonicWALL back in May 2012.

Dell SonicWALL is part of Dell overall security product offering that includes next generation firewall from SonicWALL, identity and access management, systems management, data protec-

tion and encryption as well as managed services.

From product perspective, we have still retained “SonicWALL” because especially in the ME, the brand equity of SonicWALL is very strong among our partners as well as our end-user customers.

The market has been a witness to several big changes with the splitting

How have you revamped your product line over the recent times?

2014 has been a very busy year. Mobility has been a really hot topic for both the reseller and the end user community. We have introduced new capabilities within our secure mobile access products. The task is to secure remote connectivity from mobile device back to the network. We have added new features like per application VPN to better manage your bandwidth without compromising with your network. At GITEX 2014, we introduced a new next-generation firewall- Super Massive 9800 to bring higher level of network security to the customers, at the price point that is between the existing Super Massive 9000 Series and our three years old Super Massive 10,000 series. This will do really well in the ME because the level of adoption of our Super Massive product range here has been really high.

How have you planned your channel engagement initiatives to go with the new product?

Today, if you look at the Dell Software business, 60% of the revenues are fulfilled from the channel and that revenue has grown 15% year-over-year in Q2. So, channel is very important for Dell Software and forms the core of our strategy. We always had a two tier channel model- valueadded distributors and resellers. On a regular basis, we do regular technical training updates, technical training certifications; we also conduct fast track sales training events for our VADs about the changing customer requirements, their key concerns. For our Super Massive 9800, we will be hosting a range of webinars, conduct hands-on workshops and sales training as well.

What are your investment plans for the coming days?

When it comes to investments, we shall put that into our partner programs, taking time to train our partners, and do transfer-of-knowledge. ë

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threat. We make paper and other documents useful, integrating them in a business process.

Scanning is the first step of the chain.

How has been the business growth over the years?

The business has been growing pretty consistently for over a decade. Since last few years, the growth has been very good and we are very optimistic about the opportunities ahead.

The market has been witnessing lots of built in apps with products from your competitors; how are you positioned?

It’s all about adding value; as I said, our mission is to make papers and other documents useful; the scanner itself is just an enabler for that. We have a lot of software available to make them more useful. We provide lots of functionalities straight out of the box like our image enhancement, capture solutions, check reading capabilities and lots of bundled software from leading providers, hence really making it a solution in a box. Beyond that, there is a huge range of specialist software available in the market and one of our missions is to reach out to the vendors of that software for product integration, so that users can get the best out of our scanners.

MIKE NELSON,

VICE PRESIDENT, EMEA, PFU IMAGING SOLUTIONS EUROPE LTD

“Solution in a box” PAPERLESS OFFICE IS YET TO BE ATTAINED; AND THOUGH A LOT HAS BEEN SAID ABOUT DIGITIZATION, PAPER VOLUMES HAVEN’T REALLY DECREASED THAT SIGNIFICANTLY. SCANNING SOLUTIONS RETAIN THEIR IMPORTANCE

Geographically speaking, which regions seem to be showing the maximum growth?

The markets are all different and they all go through different phases. The biggest market globally of course is the North American market and the EMEA market is a close second. There has been tremendous growth in the Middle East market, for which we have been also investing a lot here. There are big opportunities in this market for us and for our channel partners.

AND PENTRATION IN ENTERPRISES AND HOMES ALIKE. MIKE NELSON, VICE PRESIDENT, EMEA, PFU IMAGING SOLUTIONS EUROPE LTD. SPOKE TO ENTERPRISE CHANNELS MEA ABOUT THE NEW IMAGING SOLUTIONS FROM FUJITSU AND THEIR MEA STRATEGY.EXCERPTS.

Could you shed some light on the name change to PFU? PFU has always been a Fujitsu company. In Fujitsu organization, there are many companies; PFU is dedicated to the design, manufacture and global marketing of the Fujitsu branded scanners.

So, we are Fujitsu.

What are the new solutions from PFU? We launched the brand new ScanSnap iX100

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mobile scanner- the first truly mobile scanner; it’s very small, light, fast in operation and has built in battery and WiFi. So, it truly brings professional document scanning abilities for the first time to mobile workers.

With the growing trends of digitization, cloud and virtualization, do you think imaging solutions are being affected?

Cloud is yet another opportunity for us, not a

What are your market strategies for this region?

We are not new to the ME; we have been working in this market for several years. We are wellintegrated with the large corporate organizations and Government departments, who know and trust our scanner products. We want to build on that and extend our reach out to more resellers and partners, and hence more end-users.

What are your next plans?

We are growing in this market and shall continue to invest here. We plan to invest in more people, and in our interactions with channel partners. Our partner conferences and interactions help partners to do better business and grow with us. ë

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here. We are a 100% channel driven company so we would like to ensure that we have the right set of partners in order to build this enterprise business and go ahead.

How has your perception of the market changed over the last few years?

We have clear focus in terms of where we want to go in this market. The way in which we look at the market has also changed over the years. It’s a fairly mature market and people are aware about upcoming technologies but at the same time, we realise that this market can definitely benefit from the product-service combination which we typically offer. When it comes to services like awareness, pre-sales, post-sales, hand-holding, we are much more capable than a lot of other vendors. The main reason for this might be due to our long experience in operating along these lines. We strive to provide end-users and channel partners with a great experience of working with us and using our security products.

ABHIJIT JORVEKAR,

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR AND HEAD OF GLOBAL SALES AND MARKETING, QUICK HEAL

Simplifying Security, Enhancing Experience QUICK HEAL TECHNOLOGIES IS A LEADING IT SECURITY SOLUTIONS COMPANY. THEY ARE MAKING A STRONG COMEBACK INTO THE SECURITY MARKET IN THE MIDDLE EAST WITH THEIR BROAD RANGE OF SECURITY OFFERINGS AND EXPERIENCE. THEIR SOLUTIONS HAVE THE ABILITY TO STOP THE THREAT BEFORE IT STRIKES, HENCE SAVING ON TIME AND OTHER RESOURCES. ABHIJIT JORVEKAR, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR AND HEAD OF GLOBAL SALES AND MARKETING, QUICK HEAL SPOKE TO ENTERPRISE CHANNELS MEA ABOUT QUICK HEAL MEA STRATEGY. EXCERPTS.

What are your plans for this region?

Our retail products are already available in the Middle East through some channel partners. Our business plan is to focus more on the enterprise.

We participated in GITEX 2014 to reach out to end-users and partners and spread awareness

about our product range. We have a broad range of products for the enterprise but not all people in this region are aware of the same. We cover everything from the gateway to the endpoint and then there are add-ons like DLP, mobile device management. So, a host of such solutions are available and we wish to scale up our business

Do you think you shall be able to garner support from the partner community?

We believe partners shall be interested, because the value proposition from us is definitely very good. Unlike earlier, now we are directly present over here and hence believe the connect we can establish with our partners shall be much better now. We also have a broader range of product offerings.

The VADs and channel partners in the region are already working with several top security providers; in such a scenario, what’s the RoI for the partners in associating with you?

We can definitely assure a much better experience as far as the partners are concerned. Moreover, we can assure that the partners shall be benefitted by large margins, which I believe is very important for the partner ecosystem. We might have come little late but then we are definitely ready to go the extra mile to fulfil our commitment to our partners and end-users.

And then, most importantly, as they say, there’s always space for a player. Undoubtedly, there are several security vendors in the market now but there are several shortcomings as well associated with them, be it in terms of the product offerings or the user experiences. For example, we offer a comprehensive DLP on Mac, along with Windows platform which lots of competitors don’t have. Likewise, there are several add-ons that we bring to the table in terms of features. ë

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“In KSA, Cloud services are the latest trend. The Government wishes to stay up-to-date with the technologies; so we are open to technology providers who provide ERP solutions over the cloud and even whole of cloud services.”

and misrepresentations, and it fast tracks client selection.

MAJID ALARIFI,

PLANS OF EXPANDING TO NEWER MARKETS We are concentrating in the KSA; but that doesn’t mean we are not open to new opportunities. We are looking for new opportunities in the other countries of the GCC as well.

MARKETING MANAGER, AL-ELM

Enabling a digital Kingdom ELM IS A SAUDI COMPANY THAT OFFERS MULTIPLE SOLUTIONS AND

VALUE PROPOSITIONS BROUGHT

BY ELM TO THE TABLE We have a very long experience with the Government and the processes inside the Government.

We are not just an application provider; rather we provide A-Z solutions, process engineering, consulting and many more services. We believe competition is an opportunity to understand the needs of the customers even more and enhance our services to the next level.

SERVICES THAT HELPS THE GOVERNMENT TO KEEP UP WITH THE LATEST TECHNOLOGICAL TRENDS. MAJID ALARIFI, MARKETING MANAGER, ELM SPOKE TO ENTERPRISE CHANNELS MEA ABOUT THE TECHNOLOGY SERVICES THAT THE COMPANY IS OFFERING IN SAUDI.EXCERPTS.

FEW SERVICES OF ELMNatheer is designed to help organizations in the process of updating the data of who associated with working relationship such as customers, employees. Natheer will inform those organizations for updates that occur on those people.

Kashif service directly checks vehicles’ security status by electronically reading vehicle plat

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through digital cameras. Yakeen Electronic Portal is designed to support the financial and trade sectors in the Kingdom. It is directly linked to the General Passports Department to allow private and public establishments access to the official databases of their clients, and verify identities, backgrounds, and history. This benefits the companies as it reduces the risks of fraud

CURRENT TECHNOLOGY MARKET POTENTIAL IN THE KSA Cloud services are the latest trend. The Government wishes to stay up-to-date with the technologies; so we are open to technology providers who provide ERP solutions over the cloud and even whole of cloud services.

FINALLY...

Elm is the technology enabler arm of the government and is trying to implement e-services and smart services in the kingdom maintaining pace with the technology changes. ë

MY VIEWS

How have you grown over recent times?

We have evolved tremendously over the recent times; the company has grown rapidly in terms of resources, vendors in the portfolio, geographical presence, and partner landscape. We have been known in the market for many years as a trusted security adviser, and being in that position, one of the key things was to maintain the consultative selling approach. We have expanded our portfolio to include Infoblox, WebSense, and many others. Our team has also grown to 150 people across 14 countries that we do business.

We have offices in 10 of those 14 countries. Our channel has grown to 250 partners across those 14 countries and we are really focussing on enabling them.

AVINASH ADVANI,

VP, BUSINESS STRATEGY, STARLINK MIDDLE EAST

“Autonomy to Channel Partners” STAR LINK HAS BEEN A TRUSTED SECURITY ADVISER FOR ENTERPRISES ACROSS THE MIDDLE EAST, HELPING TO SECURE CRITICAL ASSETS AND SAFEGUARD ACCESS TO SENSITIVE DATA IN THE MOST DEMANDING DATACENTRE ENVIRONMENTS. AVINASH ADVANI, VP, BUSINESS STRATEGY, STARLINK SPOKE TO ENTERPRISE CHANNELS MEA TEAM ABOUT THE

So, what are your partner enablement strategies?

2014 was the Year of Channel and we launched the Star Link Choice Program for partners across the MEA region. The objective of the program is to support Strategic Partners to facilitate growth, differentiate services, secure investment, challenge competition, diversify product offerings, expand market share, maintain consistency in business growth and strengthen customer relationships.

The real program in the big picture for our channel partners is called the Path to Channel Autonomy, meaning when partners align with us on one or more technologies, we want to support, help and train them to become 100% autonomous to the level where they can go and deliver end-to-end services on their own, hence giving them an edge to make more profits and retain their unique differentiability in the market. We know that the only way we can scale our business up is with our partners.

DIFFERENT VALUE PROPOSITIONS THAT STARLINK IS BRINGING TO THE TABLE IN THE REGION. EXCERPTS .

What novelty is Star Link bringing into the market?

At GITEX 2014, we launched the Star Link Solutions Lifecycle and the Star Link Security Framework. The latter is really a vendor-agnostic, technology-centric layered approach to give customers the ability to get a visual aid for identifying their IT security risks and being able to prioritize where to spend their IT security budgets in the coming year.

Last year, we had rebranded our portfolio; it was called Best Practices for Securing Access to Sensitive Data and this was made up of four

individual solutions- access control, vulnerability management, advanced threat protection and secure mobility. That continues today. We have expanded each of those solutions and rebranded as Star Link Solutions Lifecycle because in a way, each of these solutions feed into each other. So, now we offer a lifecycle of integrated solutions allowing customers to not only get a framework to map their priorities and risks but also to know where to begin, and how those priorities feed into each other from a vendor and technology perspective.

So, are you looking to tap new markets now?

We have expanded in a big way across Middle East, Turkey and Africa this year. Our US operation was launched in February 2014, we’ll be expanding in a big way in North America in 2015. We also have a new region on board, SENA, i.e. Southern Europe and North Africa, starting with the French speaking countries. All these are part of our global expansion plan to become the largest pure play IT security VAD globally.

What’s your customer base?

We have more than 1000 enterprise customers across the Middle East, Turkey and Africa that are using one or more of Star Link technologies through our channel partners. ë

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MY VIEWS

target?

Information security market has seen a tremendous growth in the recent years. Looking at Help AG, well, starting from 2004, we have witnessed 80% year-on-year growth in our business; this is very much driven by our services and solutions business. We are targeting KSA markets as well with a focused and selective approach.

The tides are turning towards Managed Security Services; where is Help AG in the race?

The growth strategy in Help AG is based on four pillars- the first is strengthening of our position in UAE and Qatar, the second is moving into new markets like Saudi Arabia and the third peak investment is going into Managed Security Services. Our main objective is to become the leading organization for managed security services and serve the enterprise and Government organizations within the UAE market.

STEPHAN BERNER,

MANAGING DIRECTOR AT HELP AG

Managing Security with Transparency RECOGNIZED TIME AND AGAIN AS A LEADING CHANNEL PARTNER IN THE MIDDLE EAST, HELP AG HAS BEEN MAKING QUICK STRIDES TOWARDS BECOMING THE TOP MANAGED SECURITY SERVICES PROVIDER IN THE UAE. STEPHAN BERNER, MANAGING DIRECTOR AT HELP AG SPOKE TO THE ENTERPRISE CHANNELS MEA TEAM ABOUT THE MIDDLE EAST IT MARKET, THE VALUE PROPOSITION BEING BROUGHT HERE BY HELP AG AND THE EXPANSION PLANS OF THE COMPANY. EXCERPTS.

What’s your view on the security landscape in the ME and how does Help AG fit in the puzzle?

Help AG as an organization focuses on information security solutions and services. Having started in this region in 2004, we are currently present in Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Doha. IT information security was a nice topic until three-four years from now and has now become a “must-have” technology. Businesses have begun to understand the importance of investing in security for securing their businesses on the whole.

From an organisational point of view, we address

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information security as a whole. It really starts from information security services; we help our customers in strategic security consulting, looking into international as well as local frameworks. We conduct business impact analysis; provide risk assessment services trying to identify the security gaps within an organization- that really helps our customers in the Government and Enterprise sector to look into policies, processes and procedures as well as the technical security controls.

What kind of growth have you achieved and where next lays your

As we all know, cyberspace is a battlefield these days; what’s the latest weapon from Help AG? In order to address the growing cyber threat posed by politically motivated hactivism, Help AG has unveiled the new anti-defacement feature of its Co-ordinated Threat Mitigation (CTM) service. With groups such as Anonymous and the Syrian Electronic Army taking the fight to the cyber battlefield, it is time for organizations to take affirmative action. For many Middle East customers today, a company’s website is their first and primary association with the brand. Defacement of the portal can therefore have significant negative impact on their perception of the brand. Understanding this, Help AG has created a solution which mitigates defacement and leaves our customer’s image untarnished even if they do fall victim to such an attack. This service is part of Help AG’s broader CTM offering which is cloud-based.

The company has made sure to address two of the primary cloud-related security concerns i.e. sharing of information with a third-party provider and data storage at an external location.

We carry out all the processing at the customer’s site and only extract generic data that does not contain any sensitive information. Furthermore, the service is hosted in a data center within the Middle East itself and is therefore not subject to any other nations’ laws that could potentially jeopardize the security of the information.

We have been completely transparent in our approach which is why even government customers with the greatest security demands have not hesitated to sign up for the service. ë

MY OPINION

IOT

IoT to Become a Business Issue in 2015 As 2014 draws to a close, the question is: What can we expect in 2015? Yarob Sakhnini, regional director, MEMA at Brocade outlines his predictions on the technology trends to watch out for in 2015 n W O R D S : YA R O B S A K H N I N I , R E G I O N A L D I R E C T O R M E M A AT B R O C A D E n P H O T O : S H U T T E R S T O C K

THE RISE OF THE NEW IP We are at the forefront of a new model for networking: Historically, compute transitions have always driven network evolution. It is no secret that the future lies in new compute models – such as mobile, cloud computing and the Internet of Things – and this will in turn lead to a major shift in networking. Legacy networks, built on closed proprietary protocols and designed for nonmission critical applications, will have to adapt if they are to support these new technology trends.

In 2015, we will see this begin in earnest, with the rise of the New IP, a new networking paradigm that is better aligned with the evolution of the rest of IT – and increasingly open, software-driven, and user-centric.

OPENNESS HELPS SDN AND NFV TAKE BIG LEAPS FORWARD Over the past year we’ve seen Software-Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) become firmly established as the future of network infrastructures. We have already seen some early adopters taking advantage of these technologies but, in 2015, we’re expecting to see SDN and NFV really take hold.

This will be aided by growing momentum around open standards, as the industry recognizes that in order to truly align an enterprise’s infrastructure strategy with its business requirements, custom-

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ers must be free to choose the solutions that best meet their specific needs, regardless of vendor.

Truly open, interoperable standards are likely to rise in popularity throughout 2015, as customers opt for greater choice and flexibility.

THE INTERNET OF THINGS WILL START TO IMPACT BUSINESS In 2014, we saw the Internet of Things begin to truly take shape and, in 2015, this trend is set to rapidly gain momentum. With Gartner predicting that 26 billion connected units – from watches to refrigerators and treadmills to cars – are expected to be installed by 2020, businesses will need to cope with an ever-growing network of connected devices generating and accessing data. Many of these connected technologies will be brought on to existing corporate or public networks, making investment in the underlying infrastructure that supports these advancements absolutely essential.

THE VIRTUAL WORKSPACE WILL BECOME A NECESSITY Employees are demanding and, with budgets set to remain tight for the foreseeable future, companies are looking for ways to meet user demands and boost productivity. 2015 is therefore likely to see virtual working becoming increasingly mainstream as companies look to meet this conflicting pressure by introducing virtualized

workspaces. IDC has predicted that 1.3 billion people will work remotely using mobile technology in 2015, equivalent to 37.2 percent of the entire global workforce. Virtualized workspaces offer an opportunity for employees to have the same working experience regardless of their location or device, giving them greater freedom that, in turn, improves productivity for the business.

However, this added flexibility will inevitably put greater strain on core IT infrastructure, and companies will need to make sure they have the right network in place in order to deliver this level of user flexibility and freedom.

A NEW APPROACH TO PRIVACY 2014 has exposed many concerns around data privacy and, with “privacy-first” services such as Snapchat, Whisper, and Ello growing in popularity, it is clear that this trend is here to stay. With public awareness of data security and privacy increasingly, every organization will need to sharpen its privacy and data security initiatives. Data breaches or leaks are no longer simply security issues; they are potentially hugely damaging to a company’s brand and reputation. As a result, organizations will need to pay much closer attention to how and where they store sensitive commercial or customer data. Investment in education for employees and customers will be particularly critical as access to, and use of, data becomes a fundamental issue for every business. ë

FROM DRIVERLESS CAR INDUSTRY TO WEARABLE TECHNOLOGY, 2014 HAS SEEN TECHNOLOGIES FIRST CONCEPTUALIZED IN SCIENCE FICTION START TO BECOME REALITY.

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GUEST TALK

CLOUD COMPUTING

Connecting our Future Cities According to HVS, a hospitality consultancy, the UAE is projected to spend US$300 billion on infrastructure development by 2030.

n W O R D S : TA M E R S A L E H , D I R E C T O R O F O P E R AT I O N S , E H O S TI N G D AT F O R T, H E C A N B E R E A C H E D AT TA M E R . S A L E H @ E H D F. C O M n PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK

A city is a web of interconnected systems, similar to the human body. Its overall health is only as good as the individual components. Any city’s ecosystem is knit together by infrastructure, public services, educational and health institutions, technological capacity, natural resources and government bodies. Today, mostly all cities are facing tremendous challenges in catering to the dynamic needs of their citizens and residents, while remaining cautious about emerging environmental issues, economics and resource usage.

The UAE’s population is growing consistently, and is expected to reach 7.9 million by 2020, by which time Dubai is projected to welcome 25 million visitors. These developments are certain to put enormous pressure on the infrastructure, tourism and hospitality industries to make services and solutions more efficient. As the UAE prepares to advance its infrastructure to cater to these growing demands, the ICT industry will need to pave the way towards a smarter economy, workforce and environment.

We already know how cloud computing makes companies smarter, but can it also work its magic in making cities smarter? Let’s explore three examples that illustrate how urban spaces can become more efficient by embracing the cloud.

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INFRASTRUCTURE NETWORKS According to HVS, a hospitality consultancy, the

UAE is projected to spend US$300 billion on infrastructure development by 2030.

Cloud technology can thus strengthen the physical infrastructure of cities via IaaS (infrastructure as a service), PaaS (platform as a service) and SaaS (software as a service) for efficiency, quality of service on demand and green infrastructure.

Cloud computing can help track mismanaged or broken traffic lights, road blocks or public transport inefficiencies. Cloud analytics systems provide data on street conditions, repairs, traffic patterns and potential solutions in real-time, enabling quick, coordinated responses based on environmental factors. This solution will reduce citizens’ travel time, road congestion, and CO2 emissions - paving the way for not only a smarter, but a greener city.

GOVERNMENT-CITIZEN COMMUNICATION Government bodies can leverage cloud platforms across various agencies, keeping them interconnected and facilitating communication.

Cloud can also help government officials create awareness on various issues through regular dialogue - encouraging education and e-learning methodologies among the youth. ë

RECENTLY, BOSTON UNIVERSITY ANNOUNCED A PLAN TO LAUNCH A SMART-CITY CLOUD PLATFORM THAT CAN FACILITATE THE WORK OF GOVERNMENT AGENCIES AND MUNICIPAL BODIES THAT MANAGE UTILITIES.

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ENERGY Due to expanding population growth and urban density, cities will experience an unparalleled demand for energy and water.

The UAE consumed about 1.8bMWh of energy in 2013 alone.

Municipal bodies can better monitor the utilization of energy sources through smart grids, which electronically control data flow and manage information within any central power grid. This system enables asset utilization and operating efficiency while anticipating potential system needs and disruptions. Governments can implement a private cloud across their power grids, which offer real-time visibility and minimal downtime on generated data, as well as analytics and forecasts for the energy industry and its verticals.

Data gathered from such a system helps citizens and organizations to use resources sustainably. In the long run, such data can help reduce greenhouse gas emissions and the national carbon footprint. Building Management Systems (BMS) and home energy meters are also powered by cloud platforms today.

INNOVATIONS

KEY CAPABILITIES n Lifespan of 20,000 hours n Have free orientation at any angle for any application and have almost no limit, with the most flexible geometric control function. n Offer multiscreen picture options with multiple PiP/ PoP functions thus improving productivity within a spectrum of sectors n The 4K signal interface with signal distribution and tiling function and support for OPS modules to be added

NEC Display Solutions PX602UL and PX602WL NEC Display Solutions Europeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s PX602UL and PX602WL projectors with Laser Light Source technology provides the projectors with an effective, high quality image, boasting no lamp exchange and energy saving benefits that simplify management.

The features of the new projectors are tailored for large meeting rooms and conference rooms as well as creative theatre, leisure and museum spaces or signage.

The outstanding image quality of the projectors is down to the unique NEC NV1301 Scaler Chip and high bandwidth 4K picture processing, providing the highest quality of

picture. The projectors not only boast super crisp picture with unique NEC patented picture enhancement but also portrait mode. With capabilities for signal daisy chaining (HDMI out), edge blending and a tiling function without any additional device, the projectors provide an inbuilt superior service. The Laser Light Source technology delivers more constant light output and a typical lifespan of 20,000 hours, resulting in a durable and long lasting image and a lower total cost of ownership. This combination of remarkable technology unites to create an ultimate performance fit for a range of sectors.

With advanced installation, the projectors have free orientation at any angle for any application and have almost no limit, with the most flexible geometric control function.

The projectors offer multiscreen picture options with multiple PiP/PoP functions thus improving productivity within a spectrum of sectors including rental/staging, higher education, museums and large corporates.

Similarly, the 4K signal interface with signal distribution and tiling function and support for OPS modules to be added, provide a wide range of installation options to suit any professional environment.

PLEASE SEND YOUR FEEDBACK AT INFO@ ACCENTINFOMEDIA.COM

A10 THUNDER TPS WITH ADVANCED DDOS MITIGATION CAPABILITIES A10 Networksâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Thunder TPS 3.1 offers customers a fully programmable policy engine via the regex or enhanced aFleX commands, extends new advanced DDoS mitigation capabilities to block additional attacks such as the recent POODLE attack, and provides advanced rate-limiting for granular Layer 4-7 control to enable best-in-class mitigation.

Another benefit of Thunder TPS 3.1 includes comprehensive detection capabilities with access to over 400 global, destination-specific and behavioral counters, to eliminate false positives. Organizations depend on the Internet to operate their business, with service interruptions resulting in significant loss of revenue, brand damage, and liability. DDoS attacks are constantly evolving, growing in scale and sophistication, and can inflict severe damage to application and networking infrastructure. With Thunder TPS Series, security professionals can now defend against growing and sophisticated attacks. Early success of the Thunder TPS Series includes new customer deployments within several key market verticals, including gaming, cloud and Internet providers.

KEY CAPABILITIES n Programmability n Regular Expressions (regex) n Berkeley Packet Filter (BPF) n Mitigation n Detection n Visibility n Enhanced GUI

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INNOVATIONS

Nexans Costeffective Installerfriendly Tight Buffer Universal Cables

Nexansâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; LANmark-OF Tight Buffer Universal Cable harmonizes its Tight Buffer Indoor and Universal cable portfolio with an installer-friendly and more cost effective Tight Buffer Universal cable for indoor and outdoor use. Nexans developed the new cable using a new type of glass yarn that combines rodent protection with installer friendliness and avoids skin-irritation when compared to similar products of other vendors.

The LANmark-OF Tight Buffer Universal cable is developed for horizontal and vertical installations, indoor and outdoor in a duct. It is dielectric and fully dry and has 900 um buffered fibres.

This second coating till 900 um provides additional protection of the fibres and facilitates the handling when terminating the fibres in a patch panel. The easy strip tight buffer design allows stripping the fibre over 10 cm in one action. It is a cost effective solution for short and medium distances.

The LANmark-OF Tight Buffer Universal is most suitable for direct termination by either anaerobic or hot melt connectors as well as with splicing of pigtails.

KEY CAPABILITIES n It is a fibre cable which can be used indoor and outdoor in a duct. n It complies with the indoor fire requirements and can be installed indoor both vertically and horizontally. n It can also be used for outdoor installation in a duct as the water tight glass yarns make the cables fully waterproof and rodent retardant

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Brocade ICX 7450

The new Brocade ICX 7450 enterprise campus stackable switch with the availability of OpenFlow 1.3 support for emerging campus Software-Defined Networking (SDN) applications allow customers to transform their edge networks to support mobility, social, and cloud data traffic as they transition to the New IP. Campus network requirements are evolving rapidly, driven by the mainstream adoption of modern business applications such as video conferencing and virtual desktop infrastructure. Unfortunately, legacy networks are not equipped to handle the increased performance demands and advanced requirements, including the ability to deliver power to high-definition displays directly from the switch that these new applications impose. The Brocade ICX 7450 is purpose-built to support these modern environments with industryleading scalability, premium enterprise capabilities, and simplified management.

Brocadeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s enhancements to its campus portfolio show great promise with regard to its differentiated scale-out architecture, simplified management and evolutionary path to SDN. This should enable IT to easily and cost-effectively expand the network, while improving agility and performance to support ever-increasing user expectations.

KEY CAPABILITIES n Delivers market-leading stacking scalability with up to 12 switches per stack, 160 Gbps of stacking bandwidth, and long-distance stacking using open-standards QSFP+ ports to enable single-point management across the campus n Provides a unique modular design with three expansion slots for a choice of 1, 10, or 40 GbE uplinks, offering ultimate flexibility and pay-as-you-grow scalability n Offers Power over HDBaseT (PoH), to power video surveillance and video conferencing equipment, VDI terminals, and HD displays directly from the switch

Imran Khalid Batoaq Mobile: +971-50-9529782 | E-mail : mobotix@globalfze.com

Global Distribution FZE | P.O. Box 126963 | Office 310/508/509 | The Business Centre Tel. : +971-4-3548770 | Fax : +971-4-3547074 | Website : www.globalfze.com | Dubai | UAE

*Based on internal Dell analysis in July 2013 based on Dell Compellent flash-optimised vs.spinning disk arrays and an internal test performed by Dell in March 2013 with Storage v6.310 on dual SC8000 controllers running OLIP type workloads using IOmeter with a 100% random, 70/30 read/wirte mix and 8K sector transfer size achieved this IOPS performance.

Actual performance/latency will vary based on configuration, usage and manufacturing variability **Based on internal Dell analysis performed in May 2013, comparing similar Dell Compellent offerings to EMC VNX Family, HP 3PAR StoreServ, HP EVA, IMB V7000, IBM XIV, Hitachi Data Systems HUS 100 Family,and Oracle Sun ZFS Storage Family and competitive US list pricing from Gartner Inc, Cp Storage, as of June 2013. Š 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.