Technology Reseller - v25

NEWS : RESELLERS 01732 759725 14 OCF, the high performance computing, storage and analytics integrator, has successfully completed a management buy-out, with Russell Slack, Andrew Dean and Laurence Horrocks-Barlow acquiring 100% of the share capital from former owners Julian Fielden and Steve Reynolds. OCF Chairman Julian Fielden said: “I am excited to announce that OCF will enter a new phase of ownership following this management buy-out. I have taken the position of Chairman on a part-time basis and Steve Reynolds will continue as Sales Director, so it should be very much business as usual, with the added benefit of a younger, exciting management team with a more thorough understanding of today’s technologies.” Following the buy-out, OCF plc has become OCF Limited, with Russell Slack as Managing Director and Laurence Horrocks- Barlow as Technical Director. Management buy-out at OCF Onecom recruits for growth After securing £100 million of additional funding and announcing plans to grow threefold over the next 3-5 years, independent business telecommunications provider Onecom is taking on 125 new employees, increasing its headcount by 30%. Two thirds of the new recruits will work in sales in Onecom’s eight locations, with a particular focus on its offices in Whiteley, Telford, Shoeburyness and Cardiff. Onecom CEO Ben Dowd said: “We currently have 100,000 business customers and are exceptionally well placed to take advantage of the new opportunities in front of us, including the roll-out of 5G, adoption of fibre connectivity and the growing expenditure on telecommunications from SMEs. Increasing our headcount is key to us achieving this. This represents a significant moment of organic growth for Onecom, and we are also finalising plans for acquisitive growth in the coming months.” Newman raises funds for CRPS Guests from businesses across Kent, Sussex and Surrey braved the wind and rain to raise funds for Burning Nights at this year’s Newman Charity Golf Day held at the Nevill. The Crowborough-based IT and business equipment provider presented a cheque for £3,000 to Victoria Abbott-Fleming, founder of Burning Nights, which supports people suffering from Chronic Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS). Each week 300 people in the UK are diagnosed with this debilitating but little known condition. Abbott-Fleming said: “As a small charity, every penny donated counts. Some of the money raised will go towards the UK’s first CRPS Information Centre, where patients and their families can come and speak to other patients and get help and advice about living with the condition. We will also be bringing in a psychologist once a month for patients to access free of charge.” www.newmanbs.co.uk www.burningnightscrps.co.uk Three out of three for Commercial Business services group Commercial is celebrating after winning a trio of Planet Mark Awards for Employee Engagement, Best Newcomer and Personal Achievement. Commercial Co-founder and Managing Director Simone Hindmarch said: “We are bowled over to have won in all three award categories we entered. We are particularly pleased given the calibre and range of the other businesses in the Planet Mark family, all of which are keen to positively affect climate change.” Planet Mark certification, gained by Commercial in 2018, includes a commitment to reduce carbon emissions by a minimum of 2.5% each year. www.commercial.co.uk CCS success for Softcat IT infrastructure provider Softcat has won a place on seven Lots of the Network Services 2 framework (RM3808). Created by the Crown Commercial Service (CCS) for the UK public sector, the framework covers networking, local area connectivity, data access, conferencing, telephony and unified communications services. Glasgow service centre for Lanshore Sales performance, HR and automation consultancy Lanshore LLC is opening a new operations centre in Glasgow so that it can provide clients with 24-hour customer support. Since it was founded in 2012, the Houston-headquartered HR automation specialist has had a Robotic Operations Centre (ROC) in Costa Rica, with local support in EMEA and North America. The additional service centre in Scotland is necessary to support growing demand for robotic, intelligent and AI-based automation, as well as traditional Sales Performance and HR Business Process Outsourcing. CEO Doug Erb said: “The Glasgow centre allows us to offer a seamless support function, switching from Costa Rica to Scotland.” Hat-trick of deals for BOOST&Co Cloud-based IT consultancy Xalient is focusing on growth after freeing up working capital in a deal with venture- debt firm BOOST&Co Manchester. Xalient specialises in moving clients, like Kellogg’s and Keurig Dr Pepper, from a traditional IT infrastructure to a virtual WAN architecture, with everything hosted in the cloud. This is the third deal BOOST&Co has completed since opening its doors in Manchester in February and its second with an IT company, following a £4 million investment in inTec Business Solutions, the Altrincham-based telecoms and digital solutions provider. boostandco.com Quadient extends Espire relationship Customer Communications Management specialist Quadient (previously Neopost) has extended its relationship with Espire to allow the customer experience expert to resell and support Quadient solutions to clients in the banking, insurance, travel, education, telecoms and utilities sectors in the UK, Ireland, Nordics and Benelux. Espire already has more than 30 certified staff working on implementation and expansion projects with Quadient, helping organisations to shift from print to digital and from one-way to interactive communications. www.quadient.com/connections