www.printitreseller.uk PRINT, MFP, SOFTWARE, SERVICES, DOCUMENT & CLOUD NEWS & INFORMATION FOR VARS, CONVERGED RESELLERS & MFP DEALERS PRINTIT AWARDS WORKPLACE A night to remember PAGE 18 PAGE 22 PAGE 36 TRENDS Quocirca insight Max Levenger, Henley Executive Epson boosts its sustainable inkjet offering page 28 10 YEARS · I0I ISSUES IN PRINT & ONLINE 2023
The PrintIT Reseller and Technology Reseller Golf Society is open to everyone; Resellers, Dealers, VARs, System Integrators and Vendors – the maximum number of players being 72 at each event. The cost per event is £107 per player or £428 per four ball + VAT. Includes breakfast and dinner. At each event there will be a prize for Overall Highest Score for the Day, Longest Drive and Nearest the Pin. Not sure about running your own golf day? No problem, bring customers along to this friendly industry relevant event. This year’s events: & The Golf Society is open to everyone no matter what your handicap is... so don’t be shy. Come and join us. 2023 2 0 2 3 The First round will take place at Carden Park on the 11th May The Second round will take place at Luton Hoo on the 8th June The Third round will take place at Olton Golf Club on the 13th July The Final round will take place at Robin Hood on the 28th September Sponsors Merchandise Sponsor If you would like to join us at any of the events please email [email protected] or call Paul on 07887 944433 SPONSORSHIP If you would like to discuss the opportunities available, please call Paul on 07887 944433, email [email protected] www.binfo.co.uk/ golf-society.php
Happy New Year and welcome to the first issue of 2023. Award wins have enormous value and can help businesses stand out from the competition. Following on from the big reveal of the 2022 PrintIT Award winners last issue, we asked the recipients what being recognised with a PrintIT Award means to them – you can find out on page 39. There’s also a recap of the PrintIT Awards event which took place on December 6 at the Royal Lancaster, London – page 22. It truly was a night to remember and I for one, am already counting down until the 2023 edition! Also in this issue, Max Levenger, Managing Director, Henley Executive, picks the work tools he uses every day and couldn’t do his job without (page 18). This month’s Q&A is with Justin Willis, Sales & Business Development Director, ASL and PITR spent 60 seconds with Eugene Young, Country Director IRE/UK, DocuWare. If you’ve got any news about your business to share, would like to be included on our monthly VOX POP panel, have a compelling business success story or simply wish to comment on any industry issues, please get in touch with us at: [email protected] Michelle Ryder, Editor PRINT.IT Reseller is published by Kingswood Media Ltd., 10 Amherst House, 22 London Road, Sevenoaks TN13 2BT • Tel: 01732 759725 Email: [email protected] www.printitreseller.uk No part of PRINT.IT Reseller can be reproduced without prior written permission of the publisher. ©2023 Kingswood Media Ltd. Design: Sandtiger Media www.sandtiger.co.uk 04 Bulletin What’s new in printers and printing 16 People A round-up of new hires 18 I couldn’t do my job without... Max Levenger picks his favourite work tools 20 A decade in print Phil Jones shares his print experiences over the past decade 22 PrintIT Awards A recap of the 2022 event 26 Focus on: What’s New A round-up of recent product launches 30 Opinion Two signs a customer needs MPS 33 Professional displays New display possibilities with Westcoast 34 Sustainability Epson fully invested in sustainable future 36 Trends Quocirca insight 39 VOX POP PrintIT Awards Find out what winning means from the 2022 winners 48 View from the Channel Justin Willis, Sales & Business Development Director, ASL 50 60 seconds with... Eugene Young, Country Director IRE/UK, DocuWare 2023 printitreseller.uk Comment Register online To receive your regular FREE printed copy of PrintIT Reseller Magazine simply fill in our online registration form at www.printitreseller.uk/register If you no longer wish to receive PrintIT Reseller magazine please email your details to [email protected] Read PrintIT Reseller online at: www.printitreseller.uk Join us : Follow us @PrintITReseller Issue 101 ISSN 2055-3110 (Print) ISSN 2055-3129 (Online) Group Editor: James Goulding 07803 087228 · [email protected] Editor: Michelle Ryder 01732 759725 · [email protected] Publishing Director, Social Media and Web Editor: Neil Trim 01732 759725 · [email protected] Advertising Director: Ethan White 01732 759725 · [email protected] Account Manager: Jeff Root 07976 950285 · [email protected] Art Director: Nick Pledge 07767 615983 · [email protected] COMMENT 10 YEARS · I0I ISSUES IN PRINT & ONLINE
BULLETIN 01732 759725 4 The hybrid working gap New research from Canon Europe shows there is a disconnect between IT managers’ and end-users’ technology experiences when it comes to hybrid working. 78% of IT decisionmakers (ITDMs) believe their company provides the right technology to enable people to work from home, but one in five end-users are still having to provide their own equipment and are struggling to get remote IT support. Equipping new workspaces has been a major challenge for IT teams. Accessibility, collaboration and integration are among the biggest pain points when transitioning to a hybrid model, with 71% of ITDMs claiming that solutions to support hybrid practices are incompatible with their legacy infrastructure. Employees’ top issues with hybrid working concern business processes. Two in five are facing difficulties with approval processes, signing documents digitally and escalating admin, while 41% are struggling to access physical or digital documents when working out of the office. As a result, 37% of respondents report having to visit the office to print, pick up, or sign documents in person. The research revealed that most regular help desk calls from remote workers are about issues accessing files remotely (43%) and having trouble sharing and collaborating with others (36%). On top of these software demands, IT teams are also experiencing high demand for remote hardware assistance, with over half (56%) receiving requests for printer/ scanner support in the home and 33% for personal devices. Responding to these issues, sourcing, and implementing the right technology for this new environment is proving to be difficult for IT teams. Just over three quarters (76%) of IT teams say they have found sourcing technologies from multiple vendors challenging. In the event of an issue, 71% must contact multiple vendors for a solution, which means problems can take significantly longer to resolve in a hybrid setting. With this in mind, the appeal of a single vendor solution for print and document management is significant for companies embracing hybrid working. The majority of ITDMs (81%) agree their organisation would benefit from technologies provided by a single vendor that are compatible with each other and open to integration. www.canon-europe.com Print features heavily in organisations’ overall cloud strategy The Digital Workspace Ecosystem Alliance (DWEA), a consortium of technology leaders dedicated to helping organisations enable secure productivity for all of their people, has released the results of its 2023 ‘State of the Digital Workspace’ survey. The study, which surveyed 2,660 digital workspace professionals globally, found that the benefits of moving print to the cloud are now clearer than ever in IT leaders' minds. The findings clearly show that the cloudification of print is an integral part of organisations’ digital workspace strategies. An overwhelming majority (93.1%), of respondents said that their cloud strategy involved cloud printing. David Jenkins, CEO at directprint.io, a founding member of the Digital Workspace Ecosystem Alliance (DWEA) said: “It’s clear that print remains an indispensable part of many workflows. 97% of the organisations surveyed said they manage printing/scanning in-house. So, it’s reassuring to see that moving print to the cloud now features heavily in organisations’ overall cloud strategies.” Hybrid working is here to stay for 58% of organisations, which brings the issue of how best to support a hybrid and remote workforce to the fore. In remote and hybrid environments, the complexity of network printing increases exponentially so it’s not surprising that managing printing/scanning at remote locations because of a hybrid workforce was cited as the top challenge for over half (53.5%), of respondents. “People want to print wherever they are - and from multiple devices - and that’s where cloud print management comes into its own,” Jenkins said. “With features such as Edge Print, end-users can print on their phone, tablet, Chromebook, PC and any other web-connected device – whether they’re at home, on a guest network, or even between offices.” Driver management (31.1%) and supporting end-users’ (22.1%) printing and scanning needs in the digital workspace are two further challenges survey participants ranked highly. “Cloud print management platforms such as directprint.io combine a unique universal driver and cloud administration platform to provide granular print access control to administrators, simplify printer provisioning and ongoing management,” Jenkins explained. The commitment to long-term hybrid work has accelerated the need to move print management to the cloud and it’s clear that organisations are reaping the reward. After making the switch to cloud print management, 54.6% of survey respondents said their IT teams were either spending less time on print-related support or enjoying a combination of a superior print experience, lower costs and less time investment. Jenkins continued: “The business case for migrating print management to the cloud is compelling. IT teams spend less time supporting print; end-users benefit from a better print experience; and organisations save money on print-related costs. “Cloud services are billed and consumed as-a-service - freeing up CapEx budgets to be allocated elsewhere. Plus, a subscriptionbased pricing model is predictable and flexible, allowing organisations to scale up or down in line with their business needs,” he concluded. www.directprint.io David Jenkins
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BULLETIN New win for CMYK CMYK has been selected as Opencast’s IT and business support partner. With headquarters in Newcastle, Opencast, one of the region’s largest and most-admired tech consultancy firms was recently recognised by Newsweek as one of the UK’s top 20 Most Loved Workplace in 2022. CMYK will now look after Opencast’s IT support, procurement and team on-boarding. The shift means that any IT issues faced by Opencast people will be handled by CMYK. CMYK will also configure and distribute new hardware, including laptops, to Opencast’s people across the UK. It will also dispatch merchandise and publishing material. Craig Pratt, Regional Sales Director at CMYK Digital Solutions said: “I’ve personally been a huge admirer of Opencast. They have been for many years a ‘must-watch’ tech firm in the region. Having tracked their success and growth, and the ethical way they operate, this makes our new partnership all the more special. We are extremely proud to have been selected as Opencast’s trusted IT partner and are looking forward to a long and lasting relationship as we help support the business on its ambitious growth strategy.” www.cmyk-digital.co.uk 01732 759725 6 Multi-million pound investment Managed services and IT solutions provider Auxilion has announced a £15m investment package for the north of England as part of a three-year expansion strategy. The Irelandbased company which already operates in Sheffield, Telford and Warrington, is investing further to strengthen its presence in the UK, expand its partner ecosystem and meet rising demand for managed services, modern and hybrid workplace solutions, digital transformation strategies, ICT development, business process optimisation solutions, resourcing and project governance services. The UK expansion plan includes an increase in its existing UK workforce by 60 people over the next two years, a 60% increase in floor space at its services centre of excellence in Sheffield, and the acquisition of a mid-tier IT service provider within the next three years. CEO Philip Maguire said: “Our acquisition plans and this significant investment show how committed we are to expanding our presence in the UK market, where we have operated for more than 20 years. By taking advantage of the talent pool in the north of England and acquiring a like-minded, similarly aligned company we can lead digital change and make a real impact.” www.auxilion.com It’s all in the name IT company Switch My Server has changed its company name to Balliante to better reflect the services it provides to clients. When the business first started, it was primarily a web hosting and server company, but as it has grown its offering has evolved to incorporate a much wider range of services including IT support, website design and development, CRMs and IT consultancy, in addition to hosting and servers. The rebrand follows the opening of an office in Middlesbrough in 2022 to drive expansion in the northeast. Managing Directors Craig Boddy and Louis Marcus said: ‘’Although it’s always an anxious and nerve-wracking time for a big change, we are super excited by the new brand and feel the new name is a true reflection of our values and beliefs.” www.balliante.com Set to power growth IT solutions and services business Academia Technology Group (ATG) is aiming to build on a successful 2022 and power growth in 2023 by targeting the private sector and adding new services through acquisitions. The company enjoyed 34% year-on-year revenue growth to £114m in 2022 and a 29% increase in its headcount from 140 to 180 to support the delivery of its service portfolio from a new HQ in Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire. https://academia.co.uk XBM acquires Apex Workflows Yorkshire-based XBM has acquired East Midlands-based Apex Workflows Limited, a managed print business representing partners including Epson, HP, Ricoh, and beyond the box products from PaperCut and DocuWare. Apex Workflows’ outgoing Managing Director, Frazer Seel said: “We are happy to have agreed the sale of the business to XBM, who we know have existing relationships with our key partners, Epson and Ricoh, and the national infrastructure to continue to provide excellent support to our existing customers.” Apex Workflow customers will now have access to XBM’s sales, admin and service teams spread across the country, working from offices in Newcastle, Leeds, Manchester, Birmingham and London, and its nationwide team of fieldbased engineers. XBM Managing Director Richard Taylor, said: “Our purchase of Apex Workflows from Frazer is one more step on our journey towards being the UK’s largest managed print supplier. I’d like to thank Frazer for the excellent work he has done building Apex and making the transition so seamless for his customers, whom we welcome into the XBM family and promise to continue to provide with excellent products and services.” XBM rebranded in 2021 and announced plans to expand rapidly through acquisitions and new business at its Q3 Launch in July 2022. It acquired iDoc Services Limited in August 2022, making this the second deal completed in just four months. www.xbmltd.com www.trawards.co.uk
BULLETIN Optimise IT event Espria recently hosted industry experts along with key strategic partners, showcasing the latest developments and services designed to empower the digital workspace at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London. The focus of the new look Optimise IT event was ‘empowering your digital workspace’ and covered a range of valuable topics for business leaders from some of the biggest innovators in the industry including Microsoft, Dynabook, Sophos, Xerox, Five 9, Bytes and Lenovo. Alex Tupman, CEO said: “Espria is a futurethinking brand and our event, Optimise IT is designed to inform, educate and provide a first-class networking opportunity. In addition to listening to thought provoking keynote speeches, delegates were able to visit the exhibition area and speak directly with many industry-leading technology specialists who were on hand to showcase the latest innovations.” He continued: "The key theme this year, empowering digital workspace, brought together the concepts of systems, people, and content within an organisation. It focused on the means to equip employees with the tools they need to collaborate and communicate effectively in a single digital space.” www.espria.com Furniture donation TD SYNNEX’s Bracknell office refurbishment has resulted in furniture with a fair market value of more than £25,000 being donated – via redistribution specialist charity, the Waste to Wonder Trust – to the You Are Not Alone Foundation in Ghana. . Cycling back desks, chairs and other items prevents 10,000 kilograms of material from going to landfill and avoids the emission of 18,000 kilograms of carbon in virgin materials, harvesting and manufacturing. TD SYNNEX has worked with Waste to Wonder to remove the furniture as part of a strategic plan to reduce its carbon impact and move towards net zero carbon (NZC). Kevin Wragg, Director of Environment and Quality Compliance at TD SYNNEX, UK, said: “When refurbishing the Bracknell site, as part of our commitment to sustainability, we wanted to reduce and reuse or recycle as much waste as possible. We’re pleased to say that this has been a resounding success with the added benefit that we have also been able to make a charitable contribution, with 100% of desks, chairs and other furniture being passed by Waste for Wonder to the You Are Not Alone Foundation in Ghana, where we are certain they will be put to good and productive use.” Earlier this year, TD SYNNEX worked with specialist consultancy, Arete Zero Carbon to conduct a full assessment of its carbon emissions and develop a strategy and action plan to achieve net zero in the UK and Ireland operation. It has since launched a net zero carbon (NZC) consultancy service that partners can use to measure their own emissions and develop a NZC plan. www.TDSYNNEX.com PRINTITRESELLER.UK 7 Office Oracle acquires Office Oracle has acquired the customer base of Graphic Office Supplies. The agreement will see the Graphic Office Supplies customer base transfer to Office Oracle who are already enjoying good levels of organic growth, are well funded and are set to accelerate growth in the coming years through a buy and build growth strategy. Matthew Charles Phauré, founder of Office Oracle, said: “Everybody at Office Oracle welcomes the staff and customers of Graphic Office supplies. We entered discussion with Simon [Connolly] and his staff, realising the benefits of bringing our businesses together. Following a challenging time during the pandemic and permanent changes in the business supplies market, I see further consolidation will arise. We are always open to discuss mutually beneficial opportunities for forward looking dealers and salespeople.” Simon Connolly, director of Graphic Office Supplies, added: “I am delighted to reach agreement with Matthew and his excellent team at Office Oracle. We at Graphic Office Supplies have always strived to do the very best for our valued customers. With an ever-changing market moving our business to a likeminded business will ensure continued and indeed enhanced support for the continued growth of our business.” www.office-oracle.com Accreditation for Ensono Managed service provider Ensono has achieved Amazon Web Services (AWS) Mainframe Modernization Competency status, one of just a few providers globally to hold this status. This designation recognises that Ensono has demonstrated technical proficiency and proven customer success automating and accelerating customer mainframe application migration and modernisation journeys. Ensono is an AWS Advanced Tier Services Partner in the AWS Partner Network (APN) and previously achieved an AWS Migration Consulting Competency. With its December 2021 acquisition of ExperSolve, Ensono obtained ExperThink, a proprietary AI software toolchain that converts Common Business Oriented Language (COBOL) and over 25 other legacy programming languages to modern languages such as Java and C#. Combined with Universal Data Converter, a toolset that transforms flat file, non-relational and legacy relational data to modern relational databases, the software complements Ensono’s existing mainframe capabilities and allows applications to be modernised and migrated on AWS. www.ensono.com Investing for growth Mid-market private equity firm Bowmark Capital has invested in IT services provider Xperience to facilitate its organic and acquisitive growth and to accelerate the expansion of its services in high demand areas such as cyber security. www.xperience-group.com Alex Tupman Kevin Wragg 2 0 2 3 2 0 2 3 For more information please email [email protected] or call Paul on 07887 944433
BULLETIN 01732 759725 8 Integra renews UFP agreement Integra has renewed its partnership with UFP for a further three years. This agreement gives members access to a wide portfolio that incorporates print supplies, data storage, office hardware, mobile and networking and IT peripherals. Members will also benefit from UFP’s status as a first-tier Pan European distributor for leading brands such as HP, Lexmark, Canon, Epson, Samsung, Verbatim, and XP-PEN. Integra CEO Aidan McDonough said: “UFP fits perfectly into our diversification programme, providing members with additional sales opportunities within the print and IT category. We look forward to working with the team at UFP to ensure dealers can take full advantage of what is on offer.” Ali Malik, UFP (UK) Sales Manager, added: “We have had the pleasure of working with Integra and its members for the last four years, and we are delighted to have renewed our partnership with the buying group for a further three years.” www.integra-business.co.uk • www.ufpuk.com TD SYNNEX recognised TD SYNNEX has been voted Distributor of the Year in the CONTEXT ChannelWatch 2022 awards, based on the votes of thousands of channel partners across Europe. The company also came out on top in the European categories for innovation, retail and cloud as well as winning in a number country awards, including Distributor of the Year in Spain. Patrick Zammit, President, Europe & APJ, TD SYNNEX, said: “We are humbled that our partners have voted us as CONTEXT European Distributor of the Year for the third year running and we thank them all for their trust and support. Our whole organisation is united by a passion for partner success, and we are constantly working to deliver specialisation in solutions and services that help them to evolve, grow and transform their businesses.” Amazon Web Services (AWS) also named TD SYNNEX as its EMEA Distributor Partner of the Year 2022 as part of its regional and global AWS Partner Awards. Jason Boxall, Senior Vice President, Advanced Solutions at TD SYNNEX said: “AWS is a key strategic partner for TD SYNNEX and so we are delighted to receive this recognition. We are united in our passion for partner success, and we thank AWS for the commitment and trust they place in TD SYNNEX to take their offerings to market.” www.TDSYNNEX.com Antalis range evolution Antalis has acquired a worldwide portfolio of brands, amongst them the well-known Conqueror, Curious Collection, Keaykolour, Pop’Set and Rives ranges from its former historical supplier Arjowiggins Scotland Limited, which was placed into administration in September 2022. Together with the Olin brand, this acquisition demonstrates Antalis’ commitment to continue to offer an attractive premium fine papers range of text & cover, letterheads, textured boards, premium coloured offset, labels and envelopes to its customers, printers, brand owners and creative agencies. “We are happy to provide a long-term future for these iconic brands,” said Xavier Jouvet, Antalis Group Papers Director. “We are already working on relaunching these brands with the support of best-inclass suppliers for a renewed assortment with a focus on quality and service levels.” www.antalis.co.uk SYNAXON pioneers Master MSP concept SYNAXON is on the road to becoming a leading Master MSP for managed services providers. The company offers a range of out-ofthe-box services - Managed RMM, Managed Endpoint Security, Managed Backup, and the recently launched Managed Workplace – a complete managed desktop provided via monthly service subscription - to help any company within the IT channel looking to boost their managed services or expand their portfolio to meet the full range of their customers’ needs. The MSP partner always remains the first point of contact and retains full ownership and responsibility for their customers, with SYNAXON’s technical team carrying out the setup, management and monitoring of all products in the background. Furthermore, no initial upfront investment or long-term commitment is required. SYNAXON is pioneering the concept of the Master MSP in the UK and Europe, said Markus Rex, Head of SYNAXON Managed Services. “While the idea is already well established in the US, it’s quite new here. As a Master MSP, SYNAXON can help businesses move into managed services or offer additional services in areas where they lack expertise, broadening their capability and extending their growth potential. They can benefit from our experience, automation and standardisation, and compete for and win new contracts without having to make up-front investments. “Using SYNAXON as a Master MSP means that partners only pay for the services being used, reducing risk and safeguarding profitability,” he added. As well as the four services currently on offer, SYNAXON provides pre-written templates for services descriptions and contracts. Partners can use these as the basis for their own documentation, meaning they spend less time on paperwork and more time on growing their businesses. https://synaxon-services.com Markus Rex Patrick Zammit Aidan McDonough, Integra Ali Malik, UFP
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01732 759725 BULLETIN 10 Maverick partners with ATEN TD SYNNEX’s smart spaces technology specialist business Maverick, has formed a partnership with connectivity and management solution specialists, ATEN, in a move designed to strengthen its portfolio of AV/IT connectivity and management solutions. The new partnership sees Maverick providing Pro AV solutions across UK and Ireland with access to ATEN's entire line of accessories to its partner ecosystem. Anup Rai, Development Manager, UK, Maverick, said: “We’re excited to have the ATEN brand on board. With its complete line of professional AV products and solutions, we’re confident that ATEN will quickly become a key supplier, partnering with us to deliver the latest and smartest AV and USB technology.” https://uk.tdsynnex.com/portfolios/ maverick-av-solutions Exertis Enterprise accredited Exertis Enterprise has become certified to offer Dell co-delivery installation services in the UK – working alongside Dell to both sell and deliver installation. The service is provided through Exertis Enterprise’s professional services installation team, or in combination with Dell specialists, and the engineers have undertaken the same rigorous training as Dell’s own installers in order to be certified to deploy the relevant Dell solutions for customers. Paul Hickingbotham, Technical Director of Exertis Enterprise, said: “It’s our aim to provide services and solutions to our customers which give them real business agility, enabling them to drive improved cost efficiencies and gain a competitive edge. With this new capability, we are enhancing our Dell value-add to customers, strengthening our longstanding vendor/distributor relationship with Dell, and also bolstering the skills and services to help customers maintain their significance and value.” www.exertis.co.uk Flexible end of contract finance options TD SYNNEX has launched Flexscription – a new finance offer that enables partners to offer customers a flexible way to fund investment in new technology solutions without having to find up-front capital and with a flexible set of options at the end of the agreement period. Customers can either return the equipment, roll it on at the same rate, extend for 12 or 24 months, or make a one-off final fee and have indefinite use of the equipment. All options are embedded into the agreement and are set out clearly at the start. The Flexscription service has been developed in collaboration with CF Corporate Finance and is available through TD SYNNEX’s Tech-as-a-Service platform. Alix Clements, Business Manager – B2B value added services, TD SYNNEX, said: “With the tightening economic situation and some uncertain months ahead, Flexscription is arriving at just the right time. A lot of end-user customers are looking for new and costefficient ways to fund the purchase of new IT solutions. With Flexscription it’s really easy for partners to give them the kind of open flexibility they are seeking. It’s really easy to quote for a Flexscription and to process the order via TaaS.” www.TDSYNNEX.com Integra and Antalis extend agreement Integra Business Solutions has secured a further three-year contract with Antalis. This extended agreement will provide Integra members with continuity of supply on an expanding range of office papers and packaging solutions together with the group’s own brand, Initiative. Aidan McDonough, Integra’s CEO, said: “The team at Antalis has done an amazing job supporting us through COVID and managing an incredibly difficult supply chain. We are delighted to be working with them over the coming years to support members and to grow the Initiative brand in key categories.” Stuart Colley, Channel Sales Manager at Antalis, added: “We are delighted to sign an extended contract which further strengthens our valued partnership with Integra. Despite a challenging few years, our objective has always been to have a clear understanding of what the dealer needs and responding with support and innovative solutions to help them diversify and grow their businesses. We look forward to supporting Integra and its membership over the next three years.” www.integra-business.co.uk Developing new channels Seceon and Exertis have partnered to develop new channels for the Seceon Open Threat Management (OTM) platform and the solutions – aiSIEM, aiMSSP and aiXDR – built on the platform. The solution uses machine learning to develop an understanding of future threats rather than simply relying upon the threats already noticed, and can then immediately quarantine and fix, or notify a human being for attention. Dominic Ryles, Director of Sales and Commercial – Security, Exertis Enterprise, said: “I’m excited to have Seceon join the Exertis Enterprise – Security solution stack as it gives our channel partners the tools they need to better equip themselves for visibility and actionable insights into the types of malicious threats that are targeting organisations today. “Seceon’s aiSIEM, aiMSSP, and aiXDR solutions are run on their Open Threat Management Platform, which means channel partners don’t have to have a huge amount of expertise in this field, as they are guided by machine learning-based behavioural analytics and AI-based decision making – to raise and eliminate only the qualified cyber security threats, proactively and confidently.” www.exertis.co.uk Business Design Centre · London · 12 September 2023 23 ICT · MANAGED IT · MOBILE · PRINT tech-live.co.uk Paul Hickingbotham Dominic Ryles
01732 759725 12 BULLETIN Inclusive employers Canon UK & Ireland has been ranked 42 in The Inclusive Top 50 UK Employers List 2022/23. Compiled by Inclusive Companies, the list acknowledges and ranks businesses which are most consistent throughout the whole tenure of their organisations and encompass all types of diversity. Now in its seventh year, it has become the definitive cross-industry index harnessing both best practice and innovation with the goal of driving inclusion for all. Debbie Brown, HR Director at Canon UK & Ireland said: “We prioritise inclusivity and diversity, striving to achieve our philosophy of Kyosei – ‘living and working together for the common good’. We would like to thank all our employees, including the BAME Steering Group and Inclusion Network Leads, for their dedication to our people vision to be a diverse organisation that not only reflects our customers’ diversity but ensures we’re an inclusive place to work. We’re delighted to be recognised in The Inclusive Top 50 UK Employers List and hope to expand our inclusive efforts even further in the years to come.” www.canon.co.uk New partnership Konica Minolta has named Focus Label Machinery as an Accredited Industrial Print Partner. Partnering with Focus Label Machinery as a supplier of the AccurioLabel 230, is a key component in bringing its new wave of digital label technology to the market, which is designed to help print service providers seize growth opportunities in a buoyant but demanding market. Focus Label Machinery Company Director David Lee said: “There are significant opportunities for our customers in the market for short run, high quality labels. Whilst we have always been at the cutting edge of technology, we felt there was something missing from our portfolio that specifically caters for customers that are entering the label market or are embracing digital. The Konica Minolta AccurioLabel 230 provides the perfect balance, allowing smaller label printers to service the market and enabling businesses that may have outsourced these requirements before to bring production in-house.” www.konicaminolta.co.uk SaaS adoption skyrockets Cohesity is seeing exceptional growth and uptake in the adoption of its cloud services, a portfolio of data management and security software as a service products, managed by Cohesity and run on AWS. It has seen a significant increase in the number of customers that have deployed Cohesity SaaS offerings, catapulting from under 60 customers at the end of Q4 FY21 (July 2021) to over 500 customers at the end of Q1 FY23 (October 2022). The company also announced support for new business-critical workloads, including Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3), that can be protected and secured via Cohesity SaaS offerings. And, in an era of escalating cyber threats, it is offering customers access to more Amazon S3 storage options for its cyber vaulting security SaaS offering, Cohesity FortKnox, that can help customers lower costs. www.cohesity.com Lifecycle Software increases customer base Lifecycle Software has announced its billing customer base has grown by over a third (36%) in just eight months whilst also increasing its headcount by almost a quarter (21%) to support the sharp rise in the demand for 5G enabling services, cloud-based platforms and flexible contracts resulting from consumer demands and the impact of the cost of living crisis. www.lifecycle-software.com Thales collaborates with AWS Thales has launched its CipherTrust Cloud Key Manager integration with the AWS External Key Store. Developed with Thales since its inception, the AWS External Key Store combined with CipherTrust Cloud Key Manager offers organisations looking to move critical workloads to the cloud a way to maintain sovereign control of sensitive data throughout their digital transformation journey. “We’ve had a strong technical collaboration with Thales on the development of the AWS External Key Store specification from the very beginning, in part due to their long history of expertise developing hardware security modules and key management services,” said Ken Beer, General Manager, Key Management Service at AWS. “The cloud has become a critical point of operation across businesses, and our combined expertise provides a way of helping organisations address specific needs and know they’re getting industry-best security controls in the process.” www.thalesgroup.com Nutanix rewards partners Nutanix has introduced a new referral program, designed to reward partners across the entire lifecycle of any project. Part of its Elevate Partner Program, the referral program changes the traditional partner-vendor relationship model and recognises the entire partner ecosystem, rather than just the ones that transact the deal. Adam Tarbox, Vice President of EMEA Channel Sales said: “Analysts talk about how customers engage with at least seven partners across the lifecycle of any project and there are multiple touchpoints. Despite this, vendors have traditionally tended to only concern themselves with and reward the partners involved in actual transactions, forgetting the whole ecosystem around each deal and how it comes to life. We’re changing that, and our new referral program is intended to reward more of our partners who are involved across the process – especially those who help customers to shape their strategies in the early stages of any project and support them through the buying process.” www.nutanix.com Adam Tarbox David Lee A night to remember SEE PAGE 22
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01732 759725 14 BULLETIN Recycling milestone Brother has recycled 40 million toner cartridges globally since the launch of its programme in Europe in 2004 – enough to reach from the business’s global recycling technology centre in Ruabon, Wales, to its headquarters in Nagoya, Japan. Each cartridge the business receives goes through a stringent checking process, with components either reused or replaced, meaning the majority of cartridges can be remanufactured to restore them to their original condition. Any parts that can’t be reused are recycled by Brother, ensuring that nothing goes to landfill. Brother’s recycling and environment technology centre in North Wales uses 100% green-certified electricity to power the plant and a fleet of electric vehicles and was recently certified as carbon neutral by The Carbon Trust. The business also donates to the rainforest charity, CoolEarth, for every used cartridge it receives. Craig McCubbin, Managing Director of Brother Industries UK and Brother Industries Slovakia said: “To say we’re proud of this achievement is an understatement. Of the 40 million cartridges our customers have returned, 86% have been remanufactured using our market leading process, which is unique across the printing landscape. “Our waste hierarchy is simple. We want to reuse as much as we can. In 2021 our remanufactured toner cartridges had a 33% lower carbon footprint than new ones. And by remanufacturing in the way we do, we save approximately 5,300 tonnes of CO2 globally every year – which is equivalent to taking 1,150 cars off the road. “We’ve had great feedback from customers on our recycling and remanufacturing scheme, but we’re not content on stopping there. In the next three years we plan to grow the number of cartridges we remanufacture. We are also looking at our ink and hardware returns and have ambitious plans to ensure customers can return all Brother products,” he concluded. www.brother.co.uk Canon increases focus on information security Canon has launched a global Canon PSIRT (Product Security Incident Response Team) site for reporting product vulnerabilities in its consumer and B2B products, directly to its cyber security team. Canon’s PSIRT site acts as a central hub where product/service vulnerabilities can be submitted by third parties, to then be reviewed by the Canon PSIRT team. To ensure the highest level of product security, the team will follow industry best practices to continuously improve product security levels, particularly to those using its B2B products and services. “The launch of our Canon PSIRT global site is the next step in Canon working with the industry and its customers to showcase leadership in information security,” said Quentyn Taylor, Senior Director of Information Security at Canon EMEA, who is a member of Canon PSIRT. “We’re investing in our team and working to deliver the highest level of product security by further immersing ourselves in the industry and addressing vulnerabilities in a more responsive manner.” https://psirt.canon A greener future Kyocera is pushing towards a greener future by offering its whole printer and MFP portfolio as carbon neutral for transactional and managed print service customers. The company says it is the first UK vendor to include every printing product in its range in the carbon neutral offer. The two new offerings include: n Carbon Neutral Printers & MFPs (CNP). CNP will carbon offset every device plus the consumables it uses over the lifetime of the product via a simple bolt-on to the device purchase. This covers all elements of production, packaging, transportation, consumables, plus toner and device recycling. n Carbon Neutral MPS (CN-MPS). CN-MPS extends CNP to include engineer mileage for customers taking a Kyocera service and is targeted to channel partners. To close the loop both solutions include Kyocera’s Toner Take Back and Device Recycling services. A certificate of authenticity is available for all customer to demonstrate their investment and commitment to climate action. Martin Fairman, Group Sales & Marketing Director said: “A huge amount of work has gone into making this possible. We see it as the strongest indicator yet of Kyocera’s commitment to sustainability and our carbonneutral company status.” www.kyoceradocumentsolutions.co.uk Double award win Keypoint Intelligence has awarded Kodak Alaris a Buyers Lab (BLI) 2023 Pick Award for the Kodak S3140 Max Scanner. The company also scooped the BLI 2023 Scanner Line of the Year Award. This is the seventh time in eight years that Kodak Alaris has earned this coveted accolade. Each year, the award recognises the product line deemed best overall, based on rigorous lab evaluations of several vendors. Launched in May 2022, the S3140 Max Scanner combines high-volume capacity with the simplicity and compact size of a desktop unit. Ideal for document-heavy processes, this production scanner delivers exceptional image quality, superior paper protection, versatile media handling capabilities, and fast capture speeds - up to 140 pages per minute (ppm), to ensure maximum productivity. “When it comes to document scanning, Kodak Alaris is king,” said Lee Davis, Senior Analyst in Keypoint Intelligence’s Office Group. “Our testing revealed that scanners from Kodak Alaris provide superior media handling, image quality, OCR accuracy, file compression, and workflow automation capabilities compared to the competition.” www.alarisworld.com Martin Fairman
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01732 759725 16 BULLETIN : PEOPLE Double promotion at Zen Zen Internet has made two key internal promotions with the appointment of David Barber as Director of Strategy and Amanda Rogers as its new Head of Marketing. Barber, who has over two decades of experience at Zen, will be responsible for the strategic development of Zen’s portfolio and the overarching marketing strategy for the business. Reporting directly into Barber, Rogers will be responsible for creating and implementing Zen’s marketing strategies targeted at new customer acquisition and at the growing installed base of existing customers. Rogers, through her team, will support the consumer, partner and business operating divisions with marketing communications and campaign activity to build brand awareness and grow market share. www.zen.co.uk PPC Solutions announces two appointments PPC Solutions Ltd, a well-established supplier of toners and parts for copiers and printers has announced the appointment of two new Regional Sales Managers. Georgina Mullins, with over 15 years’ experience in the channel, is responsible for Southern England and Wales. Justina Sutkaityte has been promoted from OEM sales and she covers Scotland, Northern England, and Ireland. www.ppcsolutions.com New MD at Infinigate UK Infinigate has appointed Justin Griffiths as Managing Director of its team in the UK. This includes the recently acquired Nuvias UK team but not the Vuzion team, which will continue to be led by Michael Frisby. Griffiths said: “The Nuvias acquisition strengthens our position as a market leading cybersecurity VAD and positions us as a leading specialist in the MSP space. The benefits for Nuvias customers are increased access to more security vendors, more support and increased expertise and specialisation.” www.infinigate.com EVO names new CEO Andrew Gale is taking on the role of CEO of business supplies distributor EVO following the departure of Steve Haworth after six years in the post. Gale’s first action as CEO has been to free Adrian Butler from any responsibility for EVO’s Banner business so that, as VOW Managing Director, he can focus fully on VOW Wholesale customers. Gale said: “Ade is VOW and is at his best working with our VOW customers. I want him and the VOW Sales team to focus 100% on helping our VOW Wholesale customers grow and win in the marketplace. The Banner sales leads will report into me directly moving forward.” EVO Head of Finance Jon Maxted has also been promoted to Group Finance Director. www.evo-group.co.uk Westcon-Comstor boosts ESG team Westcon-Comstor has reinforced its commitment to net zero and sustainability best practice in the channel by hiring Sarah-Jane McGaw as ESG Lead EMEA. Her appointment, following the promotion of Mark McLardie to Head of ESG, raises the distributor’s ESG team headcount to seven. www.WestconComstor.com Cohesity expands Security Advisory Council Cohesity has announced the addition of Kelly Bissell, CVP of Microsoft Security Services, to the Cohesity Security Advisory Council. As the council’s seventh member, Bissell brings nearly 30 years of experience in IT and cybersecurity with former security leadership roles at Accenture and Deloitte. The Cohesity Security Advisory Council, led by Mandiant CEO, Kevin Mandia, brings together industry leading visionaries with deep security and IT expertise from a host of enterprise and government agencies — including Mandiant, Netflix, Facebook, and the National Security Agency (NSA) - and now Microsoft, Accenture, and Deloitte. Bissell’s addition is a testament to the high priority Cohesity places on helping customers and partners advance data security and cyber resiliency within their environments while addressing emerging and ongoing cyberattacks, including ransomware. www.cohesity.com Leadership changes at Lexmark Melanie Hudson has been named Senior Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer at Lexmark. She will join the Lexmark executive team, reporting to President and CEO Allen Waugerman. Hudson has been with Lexmark since 1994 and has extensive experience across the business and across the globe. In this leadership role, she will be responsible for Lexmark's global commercial organisation, ensuring Lexmark is best positioned to meet the needs of customers and partners worldwide and creating effective go-to-market strategies. Thomas Valjak will succeed Hudson as Lexmark Vice President and General Manager, EMEA. Valjak currently serves on the EMEA leadership team as Vice President of Sales for Germany, Austria and Switzerland, and prior to that he was Lexmark’s Vice President for Channel EMEA. He joined Lexmark in 2019 with more than 20 years of experience in the printing industry. www.lexmark.co.uk Andrew Gale Melanie Hudson Thomas Valjak
BUSINESS BRIEFING PRINTITRESELLER.UK 17
01732 759725 18 WORKPLACE Max Levenger, Managing Director, Henley Executive, picks the tools he uses every day and couldn’t do his job without I couldn’t do my job without... 3 Hubspot A great way to track important business emails that have been sent, what has been opened and when. This has been especially good when sending important documentation to clients, to allow you to swiftly follow up and move the conversation forward. 4 MS your phone companion Saves time typing out phone numbers into your phone – just a click of the mouse and you are instantly dialling. You can also send texts from your PC making things that much speedier to contact people or follow up on a call. 5 Vokey 52 degree wedge Where else would you have the opportunity to spend a four-hour informal meeting with your client, or four hours networking and connecting with other businesses? The informal setting of a golf course enables you to really build relationships with clients and future clients and allows you to get to know their business without the pressure of being locked down in a meeting room. If that isn’t enough 1 Samsung Fold The latest tech is a must for anyone in business. Having had this for nearly six months, it’s a real step up from the previous six Samsungs I’ve had. The fold element is probably the best feature, allowing the screen size to double for those more text-driven items that need attention. Connectivity is now a given, so being able to communicate in as many different forms is vital. 2 Lusha Lusha is a very useful tool to get B2B business contact details for people. If you are looking to connect with a business or service but struggling to track down a phone number or email address to connect with. Where it gets its info from is a mystery, but the accuracy is high, and it saves a lot of time. to convince you – maybe the exercise, fresh air and 19th hole will instead! 7 Grammarly An essential business tool, auto-correct cannot always be trusted, and not many people are experts typing on the keyboard without a few typos slipping in here or there – so Grammarly will not only correct those errors but make useful suggestions to help improve your writing – a significant step up from spell check. https://henleyexecutive.co.uk Max Levenger 6 Mouse without borders One of those moments when you realise that you’ve missed a trick. Mouse without borders allows you to seamlessly move from tablet to PC opening and reviewing documents – without having to connect them to each other with wire – meaning I can grab my tablet and carry on if I need to be out and about on the move.
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