Channel EMEA

Plextor launches new SSD with Stunning True Speed Performance

anonymous — 2013-05-21T12:31:53Z

Plextor (www.plextor.com), a leading developer of high-performance digital storage equipment today announced the launch of M5 Pro Xtreme, its high-performance 2.5' solid-state drive (SSD) with professional read-and-write efficiency in the Middle East region.

Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme is a professional SSD designed for business and advanced users who demand high performance, reliability, and true data integrity which come in three different capacities like 128GB, 256GB and 512GB.

The drive is powered by True Speed technology that efficiently clean up the dirty blocks by constantly operating in the background to pick up blocks, erase the unwanted pages and move data to deliver a constant speed with high performance.

It uses the combination of the latest Marvell 88SS9187 controller and the best quality Japanese Toshiba Toggle NAND flash creates M5Pro with enterprise-class performance. It has the ability to consistently deliver random read / write speeds up to 100,000/88,000 IOPS and sequential read / write speeds up to 540 / 470 MB/s. This makes the M5Pro Xtreme suitable for use in a heavy workstation, server role, or Raid 0 configuration.

The M5 Pro Xtreme retains the features that define it as a true professional SSD; this includes a calculated mean time between failures of 2.4 million hours. This level of reliability has been achieved through extensive development, strict quality control, and a stringent pre-production testing requirement of 400 drives passing 500 hours of intensive tests with zero errors.

Bill Liu, Regional Manager-Channel Marketing & Sales Div., Plextor said, “M5 Pro Xtreme redefines professional standards for mean time between failures and data protection. This new 2.5” SATA SSD powered with new Plextor firmware makes the drive extremely fast, reliable and stable enhances performance to newer levels.”

The M5 Pro Xtreme also features Plextor True Protect unique enterprise-grade double-data protection technology. True Protect is a multi-layer system to ensure the highest level of data integrity, combining the latest 128-bit error correction built into the Marvell controller with Plextor's exclusive firmware-based Robust Data Hold-out algorithm. True Protect's other element is protection against data theft using 256-bit AES full-drive encryption for maximum confidentiality.

Price, Warranty and Availability: M5 Pro Xtreme SSD comes with a three-year warranty for all the three variants 64 GB, 128 GB, and 256 GB capacities. The price for M5 Pro Xtreme SSD 128GB is USD 142, while 256GB is priced at USD 268 and 512GB for USD 464. Channel partners across the Middle East region including UAE, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar and Kuwait among others can avail M5M SSD drives from FDC International, the authorised distributor for Plextor in the region.

About Plextor Plextor is a world-leading developer of solid-state drives, Blu-ray optical disc drives, and other high-performance digital storage devices for professionals, consumers, and enterprises. Since the company launched its first CD-ROM drive in 1989, Plextor's prestigious multi–award-winning products have set the standard for quality and high performance. Plextor will continue to deliver new generations of products based on our core values of market-leading innovation, unequalled quality, complete service, and our belief that users should have full confidence in the performance and stability of the equipment we supply. The Plextor brand of storage and multimedia products is owned by Shinano Kenshi of Japan.

Sourcefire Delivers Unprecedented Visibility And Tracking Of Malware

anonymous — 2013-05-21T12:31:40Z

Dubai, UAE – May 21, 2013 — Sourcefire, Inc. (Nasdaq: FIRE), a leader in intelligent cybersecurity solutions, today introduced innovative malware trajectory capabilities across its Advanced Malware Protection portfolio, giving customers detailed visibility into malware attack activity and enabling them to detect, remediate and control malware outbreaks. With these additions, Sourcefire Advanced Malware Protection solutions are the only offerings that add a continuous capability to its malware blocking, going beyond point-in-time detection to confirm an infection, trace its path, analyze its behavior, remediate its targets and report on its impact regardless of when a file is determined to be malware.

“Even organizations which are diligent in their security measures realize that breaches are entirely too likely in the face of modern threats and they need solutions that help them deal with malware before, during and after an attack,” said Martin Roesch, Sourcefire founder and CTO. “The enhanced trajectory features in our Advanced Malware Protection portfolio provide customers with decisive insight when a breach occurs and extend Sourcefire's innovative Retrospective Security with the ability to immediately locate and eradicate malicious files everywhere they surface.”

With Sourcefire's new Network File Trajectory and Device Trajectory capabilities, customers can quickly determine the scope of an outbreak and track malware or suspicious files across the network and at the system level. These new features enable security personnel to quickly locate malware point-of-entry, propagation and behavior. This is an innovative component of Sourcefire's revolutionary Retrospective Security, which allows organizations to quickly identify, scope, track, investigate and remediate malware, even when malicious files are originally deemed “safe” or “unknown.”

Network File Trajectory delivers the ability to track malware across the network, providing detailed information on point of entry, propagation, protocols used, and which users or endpoints are involved. This is available as part of Sourcefire's Advanced Malware Protection for FirePOWER™ software license, a subscription that can be added to a Next-Generation Intrusion Prevention Systems (NGIPS) or Next-Generation Firewall (NGFW), or as a dedicated appliance, both of which provide advanced malware protection for networks.

Device Trajectory builds upon existing endpoint File Trajectory capabilities to deliver critical analysis of system level activities, file origination and file relationships for root cause and forensic analysis to track and pinpoint behaviors indicating a compromise has happened and a breach has most likely occurred. Device Trajectory is available as part of the FireAMP™ host-based protection available for endpoints and virtual networks.

Sourcefire is further enhancing FireAMP with new Indicators of Compromise and Device Flow Correlation capabilities, which enable users to correlate seemingly benign and unrelated events, while also monitoring device activity and communications to uncover potential malware.

Indicators of Compromise (IoC) – Correlates malware intelligence and even seemingly benign events to determine whether a system may have been compromised – providing users with a prioritized list of potentially compromised devices.

Device Flow Correlation – Correlation of activities on an endpoint with traffic on the network, providing integrated intelligence and automation across the advanced malware protection security infrastructure. This provides distinct advantages in controlling malware proliferation on endpoints outside the protections of a corporate network, like remote or mobile workers.

In addition, the trajectory and IoC features leverage the captured network activity to accelerate investigation and compromise prioritization.

Visit the Advanced Malware Protection section on Sourcefire.com for more information.

About Sourcefire Sourcefire, Inc. (Nasdaq:FIRE), a world leader in intelligent cybersecurity solutions, is transforming the way global large- to mid-size organizations and government agencies manage and minimize security risks to their dynamic networks, endpoints, mobile devices and virtual environments. With solutions from a next-generation network security platform to advanced malware protection, Sourcefire's threat-centric approach provides customers with Agile Security® that delivers protection before, during and after an attack. Trusted for more than 10 years, Sourcefire has earned a reputation for innovation, consistent security effectiveness and world-class research all focused on detecting, understanding and stopping threats. For more information about Sourcefire, please visit www.sourcefire.com.

Sourcefire, the Sourcefire logo, Snort, the Snort and Pig logo, Agile Security and the Agile Security logo, ClamAV, FireAMP, FirePOWER, FireSIGHT and certain other trademarks and logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of Sourcefire, Inc. in the United States and other countries. Other company, product and service names may be trademarks or service marks of others.

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Exclusive Networks Group announces MEE Tour 2013

anonymous — 2013-05-21T12:31:23Z

Trucks set to roll as SuperVAD takes Mobile Enterprise Eco-system (MEE) to the people

PARIS, May 2013 - Exclusive Networks Group will be taking its Mobile Enterprise Eco-System (MEE) initiative on the road for a series of live events across Europe. Thirteen dates are being planned throughout May, June and July across France, Italy, Netherlands, Belgium, Nordics, Germany, UK, and Iberia. The tour, which will target end-user organisations, will feature ‘special guest' support from Palo Alto Networks, Aerohive Networks, FireEye, LogRhythm, Imperva, MobileIron and Fortinet, with Nutanix joining the line-up in Belgium.

“We've been doing a couple of warm-up gigs to test the set and the response has been great,” explains Barrie Desmond, Director of Marketing & Global Accounts, Exclusive Networks Group. “We've already taken the MEE concept to the people at Infosec in London and in Madrid and the feedback from the audience in both countries was that the idea of a comprehensive portfolio of technologies for securing and optimising enterprise mobility is long overdue. Visitors to Infosec complimented us on how well we had communicated the BYOD issue and how we had made sense of this complicated enterprise problem, so we are confident that the Tour, which aims to reach over 1,000 end-user businesses and organisations, will give heart to our reseller and VAR partners to do likewise with a full package of support available from ourselves.”

The Mobile Enterprise Eco-System represents the most coherent enterprise-grade approach to solving the challenges of ‘consumerised' business user devices and behaviour. It brings together and integrates technologies and vendors with distinct best-of-breed capabilities and delivers end-to-end solutions to give IT teams the visibility, control, management, and compliance of devices, apps and access methods to assure the user mobile experience in a secure environment.

“We surveyed visitors to our stand at Infosec to measure their preparedness for the onslaught of consumerised IT. An astonishing 53% had either serious deficiencies or were at risk of failure with multiple areas of improvement required in order to maximise their productivity benefits while mitigating security risks, cost overruns and management complexity. This figure isn't just worrying, it illustrates how pressing the issue is, and how well-timed the MEE campaign is.”

For more information on the MEE Tour 2013 visit http://www.exclusive-networks.com/resources/mobile-ecosystem/

Easynet scores industry first with EtherStream V

anonymous — 2013-05-21T12:31:10Z

Easynet is first to market as it launches new bonded fibre access product

London, 21 May 2013 – Easynet scores an industry-first today with the release of EtherStream V, which bonds ‘fibre to the cabinet' (FTTC) to give businesses bandwidth of up to 160Mbps. Download speeds of up to 320Mbps will be available within a few months. With a history of pioneering technology in the UK, Easynet was the first to begin Local Loop Unbundling, the first to offer 8Mbps over copper, the first to launch Ethernet in the First Mile (EFM) service and the first to launch a 40Mbps version of EFM. EtherStream V fills a gap in the market for high-bandwidth fibre access, backed up with stringent SLAs, at a competitive price.

Bandwidth requirements are growing dramatically year on year due to business drivers such as business-critical applications, the switch to the cloud, the increasing adoption of unified communications, data centralisation and the constant requirement for pushing real-time content to multiple devices. Combining the need for bandwidth growth and increased network performance with a reduction in IT spend is a major challenge. Easynet has developed EtherStream V specifically to help businesses overcome this challenge, delivering cost-effective bandwidth up to 320Mbps downstream and up to 80Mbps upstream.

EtherStream V is being rolled out across the UK over the next 12 months and will be available to around 70% of UK businesses by March 2014. The service is one of a range of access options supported by Easynet's exclusive service level guarantees.

Simon Hartog of Virtual IT, an Easynet partner, said: “Our customers are asking us for more bandwidth and want the SLAs associated with fibre, but don't have the budget for it. Etherstream V gives them a great solution. It is bang-on for customers using Virtual IT's hybrid cloud services and hosted telephony/video conferencing”.

Justin Fielder, Easynet's CTO, said: “EtherStream V has a well-deserved place in the Easynet hall of fame for industry firsts, and reinforces our reputation as an industry pioneer. It demonstrates the time we take to listen to our partners and customers, to understand their businesses challenges and to quickly deliver products which address these challenges head-on”. He continues, “This is a fantastic opportunity for partners to add to their portfolio a unique, exclusive product, and combine it with their own service wrap, consultancy services and in-depth knowledge of their customers”.

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KEMP adds new security features to load balancers

anonymous — 2013-05-21T12:31:01Z

London, UK - May 21st, 2013. Following Microsoft's decision to discontinue its Forefront Threat Management Gateway (TMG) last year, KEMP Technologies has announced the availability of its new Edge Security Pack for the KEMP LoadMaster range of load balancer and application delivery controllers. The Edge Security Pack (ESP) provides additional security features to fill the gap left by TMG and to help companies protect business-critical, web-facing applications from unauthorised access. ESP integrates the most-widely used features found in TMG into the load balancer, including end-point Pre-Authorisation, Single Sign-On across multiple virtual services and Persistent Logging to track who is accessing virtual services and when. As companies increase their deployment of web-facing applications, there is an increasing need for load balancers to provide high availability and minimize application security threats. “Microsoft may have withdrawn its Forefront TMG from the market, but businesses still need to protect applications such as Exchange and SharePoint from unauthorized use,” said Peter Melerud, EVP of product management at KEMP Technologies. “The addition of the Edge Security Pack will deliver superior protection alongside high-performance, reliable and scalable load balancing for the increasing number of hardware or virtual servers used to support the growth in Internet-facing applications.” The new security capabilities build on existing core technologies in the KEMP LoadMaster range such as the reverse proxy function and include: • End Point Authentication for Pre-Authorisation To access virtual services on the LoadMaster, clients must provide authentication information to validate the client's right to access workload servers using Active Directory. When successfully authenticated, the client can access the service or will be blocked until valid credentials are provided. • Persistent Logging and Reporting for User Logging Improved logging and reporting capabilities will monitor and track who is accessing virtual services and determine any unusual activities, including failed log-ins. • Single Sign-On across Virtual Services KEMP LoadMasters are designed to handle multiple virtual services supporting unique workloads, joined together into Single Sign-On groups. The ESP will enable clients to only enter authentication information for the first virtual service in order to access all other services in the Single Sign-On group. Therefore, a client accessing Exchange will also be able to access SharePoint and other workloads in the same group. For 13 years KEMP has led the development of load balancers and ADCs and is ideally positioned to extend its security features to address the increased need for edge security. “For organisations facing life without TMG, the addition of security features into their load balancers will continue to deliver protection along with scalability and high reliability,” said Leigh Bradford, UK & Ireland Sales Manager for KEMP. “And with these features launched at no additional cost, this option will be highly attractive to our channel partners and their customers.” KEMP is offering the ESP feature pack at no additional cost until August 30th, 2013. To order or for more information please visit: www.kemptechnologies.com. About KEMP Technologies: KEMP Technologies is the #1 price/performance load balancer and application delivery controller, used by thousands of enterprises who consider IT, e-commerce, web and business applications as mission-critical to their long-term success. KEMP helps companies rapidly grow their business by providing 24/7 infrastructure availability, better web performance and secure operations – while streamlining IT costs. KEMP's LoadMaster products include Layers 4-7 load balancing, content switching, server persistence, SSL offload/acceleration, and application front-end capabilities (caching, compression, intrusion prevention system), plus one full year of product support – delivering industry leading price/performance.

Packed day one agenda at DISTREE Middle East

Stuart Wilson — 2013-05-21T07:49:34Z

DISTREE Middle East 2013 gets underway today with a packed agenda for hundreds of vendor, distributor and retailer executives gathered in Abu Dhabi. In addition to pre-scheduled one-on-one meetings, delegates will also have the chance to attend a series of Retail Academy workshop sessions, hear a keynote speech from GfK, and get up to speed on the channel strategies of Intel, Dell, Norton and Linksys.

The first day of DISTREE Middle East includes three Retail Academy sessions, led by industry experts, offering deep insight into a variety of retail topics. All sessions take place in breakout room Al Reem A. The full line-up of sessions available today to delegates is as follows:

14:30 > 15:00 Changes Rocking the Retail Landscape – Ryan Mackey, Consultant

Ryan Mackey leads this interactive session. 2013-2014 promises to be another turbulent year in retail. What can Middle East retailers learn from the trends upending the digital retail markets in North America and Europe? And what lessons can we draw from the successful players in those markets?

15:50 > 16:20 Generation Y: Catalyst for Change – K.S. Vasudevan, Navo

This session looks at how organisations directly or indirectly involved in retail business must move beyond simply meeting their profit and growth goals to delivering more completely on the customer experience. The session will focus on: understanding 'Gen Y' needs; identifying emerging and profitable customer segments and creating strategies to attract them.

17:10 > 17:40 Building Retail Brand Equity & Sustainability – Kevin Lalonde, Accelerate International

In this session Kevin continues to emphasise the importance of building retail brand equity through omni-channel retailing and multiple store formats, with a focus on consumer insights and a holistic approach. As many recent retail failures have proven, sales revenues in themselves do not ensure a retailer's sustainable longevity.

Conference programme

The main conference programme gets underway at 18:00 with GfK's Dr. Rudi Aunkofer delivering a keynote speech entitled ‘The Dawn of a New Demand Cycle'. This is followed by a Live@DISTREE session where regional executives from Intel, Dell, Norton and Linksys will outline their channel plans for the year ahead and discuss their retail strategy.

The day one conference programme concludes with the exciting '60 Seconds to Convice' awards programme, with dozens of vendors delivering one minute elevator pitches to promote their latest product offerings. Hundreds of retailers will vote live on the presentations as they cast a critical eye over new technologies set to enter the market.

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DISTREE Middle East 2013

DISTREE Middle East is the ultimate professional networking event for senior executives from the consumer electronics, digital device and ICT products retail channel in the Middle East region. DISTREE Middle East is a focused event for retail executives based on the successful concept of bringing high-level buyers from emerging markets into productive contact with vendors.

Not only is DISTREE Middle East a powerful business platform, it is also an annual networking function allowing vendors to meet face-to-face with both existing and potential new retail partners from across the Middle East, plus North Africa and the CIS region. DISTREE Middle East 2013 is taking place on May 21-23rd at Fairmont Bab Al Bahr Hotel, Abu Dhabi, UAE.

For retail executives, attending DISTREE Middle East is time well spent. In just three days you can hold dozens of face-to-face meetings with existing and potential new vendors, meet with your peers from across the region, find out more about the latest industry trends and market data. All this at one exclusive event: DISTREE Middle East - the ‘must-attend' event for vendors and retailers associated with the region's consumer electronics, digital device and ICT products channel. www.distree-me.com

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Happy days for Fonz in Kuwait

Stuart Wilson — 2013-05-21T07:31:31Z

Kuwait-based mobile phone and accessories retailer Fonz is one of hundreds of retail chains participating at DISTREE Middle East this week. The retailer, which has 60 retail outlets across Kuwait, will use this year's channel event to meet and evaluate potential new suppliers. Adel Hashem, operations director at Fonz, said: “We have a team of 580 employees fully trained to provide the best possible service to customers [in Kuwait].”

In addition to mobile phones and related accessories, Fonz also offers customers international calling cards, internet services, e-payment services, pay TV services and wholesale services. Attending DISTREE Middle East will also give Fonz the chance to stay up to date with products, services and trends shaping the regional retail channel.

“Mobile phone accessories are proving to be such a promising category in our local market,” explained Hashem. “The competition is very fierce, but the demand is high. I would definitely say this category will be growing rapidly in the years to come.”

Fonz offers professional marketing and technical support and is always looking at ways to evolve its business to keep pace with market developments.

“E-commerce has been growing rapidly over the past couple of years. Most retail companies here in Kuwait are using e-commerce to expand their reach in the market,” said Hashem. “Fonz adapted to this trend by creating an e-commerce website that provides customers with a broad list of services similar to those available in its retail outlets.”

“In addition, Fonz currently generates a significant amount of sales through its social media accounts while aiming to increase reach and exposure in the ever expanding world of social media,” Hashem continued.

Hashem believes that consumers are becoming more price aware in the market. Like many other retailers, the challenge for Fonz is getting the quality-price balance correct while ensuring that reasonable profit margins are maintained.

Retailers attending DISTREE Middle East are able to pre-schedule one-on-one meetings with ICT and consumer electronics (CE) product suppliers looking to launch, build or manage retail routes-to-market across the region.

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INTERVIEW: Pearce Clune, Dell

Stuart Wilson — 2013-05-21T06:43:00Z

With hundreds of retail channel executives gathering in Abu Dhabi this week for DISTREE Middle East 2013, hardware vendor Dell will look to demonstrate its consumer credentials as a Platinum Sponsor of the annual event. Pearce Clune, director of marketing, merchandising and programmes for retail and distribution at Dell, gave Channel EMEA the inside track on the vendor's plans in the region.

Channel EMEA (CE): Why should retailers consider making Dell a major part of their product mix?

Pearce Clune (PC): Dell offers a wide range of cutting edge, innovative solutions, many of which are brand new to the market. Dell is operating from a position of strength in the Middle East due to the quality of our computing hardware and solutions, plus our solid relationships with partners and retailers in the region.

This year Dell introduced new products to its leading line of consumer machines, the XPS computer family. The XPS 10 tablet, XPS 12 Convertible, XPS 18 and XPS 27 are some of the best consumer computing machines we've ever designed, with a lot of features that our customers and retailers are going to be excited about. For example, the XPS 27 has a Quad HD resolution with full-function touch screen, including high-quality visuals and storage capabilities.

CE: What are Dell's main reasons for attending DISTREE Middle East? What do you hope to achieve at the event?

PC: The Middle East is a primary market for Dell, a foundation for the developing consumer economy globally, and one of the key areas of focus for our growth as a company. By participating in DISTREE Middle East, Dell will have an opportunity to network with our key partners and customer throughout the wider region.

In addition, DISTREE Middle East will provide Dell with an opportunity to meet and collaborate with key retailers selling high-quality tech products in the Middle East; address and understand the consumer market in the region; and highlight Dell products to current and prospective customers.

CE: Which countries, customer types and retail channels represent the greatest opportunity for growth for Dell in the Middle East?

PC: Dell is invested in the Middle East, with operations in the UAE and Saudi Arabia in particular experiencing a great deal of success developing the technology product market and capitalising on growth opportunities. In addition, the incorporation of Africa and Turkey into DISTREE Middle East this year are an example of the evolving business and consumer landscape in the region.

CE: Why should retailers stock your products? What makes Dell's channel proposition better than competitors in the market?

PC: Dell is a leading brand worldwide, with a first and second market share position across most of the region.

CE: Does Dell have a structured retail channel programme? Do you offer a strong margin proposition to your retail partners?

PC: Dell PartnerDirect is Dell's overarching channel programme, comprised of three categories: Authorised Distribution programme; Registered Partner programme and Preferred Partner programme.

The Preferred Partner programme is available to a select group of strategic partners, and offers incremental value in terms of additional sales support, a richer rebate programme than the other partner categories, a reimbursed training programme as well as joint investment on strategic sales. Benefits such as deal registration, lead generation, quarterly achievement rewards, online and classroom learning centre are designed to help these channel partners grow and maintain business and deliver additional value to their customers.

The second category, the Registered Partner Programme, is a broad reaching programme, engaging with a broad set of registered partners across the region, and has practical incentive programs in place, and an appropriate sales support model. The final category, the Authorised Distribution programme, covers consumer and commercial distribution and provides a rebate system that is appropriate to consumer and commercial products. The programme is based on weeks of stock, sales-out as well as revenue achievements.

The key differentiators of Dell's channel programme are dedicated sales and pre-sales support, instructor led training and aspects such as the smart price list with volume discounts and order entry functionality, and the ability to align the three programmes. In addition we have specific competency based programmes for solutions and niche areas such as the storage programme, which provides partners with one of the richest rebate programmes in the industry.

Retailer support

CE: What sort of support do you offer retailers in terms of marketing, promotions and POS activities?

PC: Dell has an incentive-based partner programme, called PartnerAdvantage, which provides partners with the tools to make the most of the incentives that Dell runs. Rebates vary in effectiveness depending on how they are set up. Applied in the right manner, with the right market conditions, and targeted at a small group of partners, rebates can be incredibly powerful.

CE: What have been the major developments for Dell in the Middle East in the last year? What do you have planned for full year 2013?

PC: In September 2012, Dell announced the rollout of a Preferred Partner programme and a storage competency in Dubai to help emerging markets customers in Europe, the Middle East and Africa gain faster returns on their solutions and commercial technology investments.

This programme provides partners with a compelling and highly rewarding set of benefits including financial incentives, online and instructor lead training, marketing support, deal registration, field-based technical support, and other enablement tools. It also helps partners expand market reach and offers increased access to Dell's commercial sales and marketing organisation.

In February this year, Dell announced a new tool to further enhance PartnerDirect, the Dell online solutions configurator, which provides partners the resources to close deals more easily and quickly than in the past by allowing them to price complex enterprise solutions. The online solutions configurator is currently being trialled in the UK and Ireland, and will be rolled out to the rest of the EMEA region in the coming months.

CE: How quickly is Dell's business growing in the Middle East region? What market trends have you identified that are impacting your product segment?

PC: The consumer market in the Middle East is robust, especially when compared with the challenges the global economy has faced in Europe and North America. In many ways consumers in the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and across the region are representative of the optimism and future opportunity Dell sees in the developing world. It is an exciting time to be building on our relationships around the GCC, and to be integrating leadership in the Middle East into the global strategies for Dell's customers in Asia, South America, and Africa.

CE: Is Dell a channel-friendly company? How would you describe your overall go-to market approach in the Middle East market?

PC: Dell's approach in the Middle East is partner-driven, by focusing on building retailer and channel partnerships. It is important for Dell to interact and work together with retailers to develop a strategy and goals that result in mutual success. This model provides Dell with the opportunity to show appreciation for and collaborate with local partners.

Dell is positioned for growth and is looking to develop new partnerships, and relationships from DISTREE Middle East. The event is a great opportunity for everyone involved to witness and take part in the flourishing business practice in this part of the world.

Dell encourages retailers and the consumer-focused to take a look at the products currently available. Dell offers a number of fantastic devices, with substantial improvements on the market standard in terms of functionality and performance.

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Record numbers registered for DISTREE Middle East 2013

Stuart Wilson — 2013-05-21T03:38:04Z

More than 2,000 one-on-one pre-scheduled meetings have already been booked between the 600-plus delegates attending DISTREE Middle East 2013 in Abu Dhabi this week. Thousands more will be arranged on site as ICT and consumer electronics (CE) vendors, distributors and retailers from across the region unite for the three-day channel event.

The 9th annual DISTREE Middle East conference opens its doors today, with delegates attending from across the Middle East, Turkey, Africa & CIS (METACIS). The delegates represent the leading consumer electronics (CE) and ICT retailers in the region, including a growing number of e-tailers. More than 50% of the brands participating at DISTREE Middle East this year are doing so for the first time, creating a wealth of new business opportunities for the retail channel.

“The Middle East is one of the most tech-savvy regions and continues to be one of the fastest growing markets for vendors across the globe,” said Farouk Hemraj, CEO and co-founder at DISTREE Events. “Our combination of well-known and sought after international speakers, panel discussions and focused one-on-one pre-scheduled meetings creates an opportunity for deeper insight into the regional market, providing much needed information that helps vendors, distributors and retailers make informed business decisions.”

This year's event features a powerful line-up of workshops covering topics such as pricing, competition, product mix and market potential in emerging markets including Africa. A panel discussion on current issues facing the retail channel will offer a lively discussion platform. GfK, official event partner and content provider for DISTREE Middle East 2013, will start the main conference programme with a keynote speech providing in-depth METACIS market data and analysis.

DISTREE Middle East will run from May 21st to 23rd at the Fairmont Bab Al Bahr in Abu Dhabi, UAE. This year's event is supported by Intel, Dell and Norton by Symantec as Platinum Sponsors; CAT, Modecom, Max Electronics, Huawei and ME Tablet from HCL as Gold Sponsors; with additional support from Asus, Targus, Genius, Eros Group, Linksys, Energy Sistem and Asbis as Silver Sponsors.

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Timico develops new dedicated server solution for businesses

anonymous — 2013-05-20T12:11:19Z

Timico, the business internet, hosting and communications service provider, has launched a new dedicated server solution to help support businesses with a need for always-on hosting and connectivity.

With server downtime the number one IT issue affecting small to mid-sized businesses in the UK , dedicated and managed servers are fast becoming the go-to solution for companies that demand consistent and reliable connectivity.

Timico's guaranteed uptime figure of 99.99 per cent beats off stiff competition from its competitors, with rival uptime projections usually only guaranteed at 99.9 per cent – equating to nearly nine hours of lost business in a year.

Trefor Davies, Timico's CTO, said: “Businesses are getting accustomed to working in an ‘always on' environment but it's imperative to have the connectivity to back this up. We live in a digital age and the cost of extended downtime can be colossal – especially for SMEs.

“Take pay-per-click advertising for example. If cash is being pumped into this form of advertising only for it to route to an offline website, all of that investment is wasted. Our 99.99% uptime guarantee, which equates to just 52 minutes of downtime per year, allows your business to stay up, running and making money. Connectivity and website availability are essential throughout a business, so it pays to invest in the best and most reliable server available.”

The dedicated servers are securely housed in Timico's Tier 3+ data centre which is actively monitored 24 hours a day by staff in the on-site Network Operations Centre. This means the server itself, data centre infrastructure and network are all monitored by one team, allowing any issues to be resolved before serious downtime can occur.

To find out more about Timico's dedicated servers, which come with self-managed and fully-managed service options, please click here.

ME Tablets making waves in retail channel

Stuart Wilson — 2013-05-20T10:50:07Z

ME Tablets from HCL are making waves in the Middle East retail channel. The company claims that its Android-based products have become one of the most successful value-for-money tablet brands in the region. ME Tablet is a Gold Sponsor at this week's DISTREE Middle East event in Abu Dhabi, giving the vendor the opportunity to build and deepen relationships with the most influential volume retailers and e-tailers from across the region.

Srinath Nagarajan, business head EMEA mobility business unit at HCL, said: “We have a range of android based tablets ranging from AED399 (US$108) to AED899 (US$245). Our portfolio comprises of both 7” and 9.7” form factors. We also focus on having both SIM and non-SIM based tablets to cater to the needs to the consumer.”

“We believe that in addition to selling hardware, our focus on connecting with consumers, building a brand and after sales service, are some of the reasons why retailers should consider our products as part of their mix,” he added.

The ME Tablet team will use DISTREE Middle East to showcase its range of tablets and engage with buyers from the retailer community. In addition to meeting with existing retailer partners, the vendor will also look to add new retailers. Target markets for ME Tablet in the Middle East include the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Bahrain, Qatar and Kuwait.

ME Tablet's products are primarily targeted at consumers between the ages of 15 and 30. Hypermarkets, power retailers and independent stores are all potential sales channels for the brand.

“We believe in the philosophy of demand generation for our products,” explained Nagarajan. “Our extensive focus on marketing is testimony to this fact. We believe that our products will provide retailers with an opportunity to increase their volumes on tablets as a category.”

“We have a very structured retail programme and our margin proposition is on par with market expectations,” he added. “We believe in complete enablement of the retailers. We focus on all aspects including enabling the outlets with trained promoters, ensuring consistency in communication to customers and also focus extensively on in-store display. We also regularly participate with our retailers in all their promotions and catalogues.”

Since the launch of ME Tablet products in the Middle East in 2012, the brand has already carved out a strong reputation in the retail channel. During the course of 2013, ME Tablet plans to expand its product portfolio in line with technology changes and consumer preferences.

“We launched in 2012 and our growth has been exponential. The tablet market is growing fast and this contributed to the success that we had in the last year. ME Tablet has emerged as one of the strong players in the value category of tablets in the last year,” said Nagarajan.

ME Tablet believes in driving value for its retail partners and the business is completely oriented to drive sellout from retailers, according to the company.

“Our focus on advertising, combined with efforts on in-store presence and participation in all our retailers' promotions, ensures a growing and profitable business for our retail partners,” concluded Nagarajan.

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DISTREE Middle East 2013

DISTREE Middle East 2012 attracted more than 580 senior executives from the region's consumer electronics, digital device and ICT products retail channel. These included the powerful buyers and decision makers responsible for product selection for the retailers they represent.

DISTREE Middle East 2013 will take place on May 21-23rd at Fairmont Bab Al Bahr Hotel, Abu Dhabi, UAE. For more information and to secure your place at the region's number one retail channel event, contact fhemraj@distreevents.com quoting code DME13.

DISTREE_Events

ManageEngine Expands NoSQL Support with Redis Monitoring

anonymous — 2013-05-20T10:46:43Z

Dubai, UAE,— May 20, 2013 — ManageEngine, the real-time IT management company, today announced support for the Redis key-value store in its on-premise application performance monitoring solution, Applications Manager. The move provides operational intelligence to Applications Manager users who are also running Redis, helping them ensure high availability and performance for business applications that rely on Redis. Redis is enjoying rapid growth in businesses that want to leverage its speed and durability. Monitoring the open source, high performance key-value store, however, can be intimidating for IT departments. When Redis is partitioned into multiple instances, optimizing the performance of all the available instances can be a challenge. Likewise, when multiple slave copies of the Redis server are configured via master-slave replication, ensuring data synchronization between master and slave instances is a burden. The performance analytics from Applications Manager help IT devops staff understand and optimize the usage of Redis and Redis-powered apps. “More organizations are investing in NoSQL technologies to help solve new business problems involving web, mobile and cloud environments,” said Sridhar Iyengar, vice president of product management at ManageEngine. “Today's Redis announcement demonstrates that Applications Manager is committed to meeting the NoSQL challenge that we undertook earlier this year when we added support for Cassandra and MongoDB. Going forward, we will continue to provide meaningful performance stats for IT operations and application development teams seeking to better manage their NoSQL technologies.” Redis Performance Monitoring with Applications Manager Applications Manager enables comprehensive Redis performance monitoring to minimize downtime and optimize the performance of cloud apps powered by the Redis store. The key performance metrics of Redis monitored by Applications Manager include used memory, data size, replication, slow queries, and persistence of Redis dataset. Among its many benefits, Applications Manager's Redis monitoring helps IT personnel to: • Monitor the data size of the Redis store and take preventive actions before the memory size grows out of proportion. • Track the number of available and blocked connections between the database and the client as well as the connections rejected. • Keep tabs on the operations affecting the Redis data space and provide stats on the number of keys that are found to be expired or evicted due to memory limits. • Monitor the persistence of the Redis dataset and get notified during critical persistence states. The support for Redis is complementary to the existing out-of-the-box support for 50+ apps such as Cassandra, MongoDB, memcached, Tomcat, JBoss and VMware. Pricing and Availability Applications Manager is available immediately with prices for the Professional Edition starting at $795 for up to 25 servers or applications. A free, fully functional, 30-day trial version is available at http://ow.ly/7evOs.

For more information on ManageEngine Applications Manager, please visit http://manageengine.com/apm. For more information on ManageEngine, please visithttp://www.manageengine.com/; follow the company blog at http://blogs.manageengine.com/ on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/ManageEngine and on Twitter at Yoo ManageEngine. Related ManageEngine Applications Manager Resources • Customer testimonials: http://ow.ly/64PJJ • Online demo: http://ow.ly/7evVt • Support FAQs and User Forum: http://ow.ly/64PLc Related ManageEngine Applications Manager News • ManageEngine Monitors Application Performance for Big Data and NoSQL; http://ow.ly/jXF8Z • ManageEngine Monitors Websites from Users' Locations with Applications Manager; http://ow.ly/eRIMt • ManageEngine Monitors Windows Azure with Applications Manager; http://ow.ly/dwiGV About ManageEngine Applications Manager ManageEngine Applications Manager is application performance monitoring software that helps businesses guarantee high availability and performance for their business applications by ensuring servers and applications have high uptime. It comes with out-of-the-box support for 50+ application servers, servers, databases and transactions spanning physical, virtual and cloud infrastructures. For more information on ManageEngine Applications Manager, please visit http://www.manageengine.com/apm. About ManageEngine

ManageEngine delivers the real-time IT management tools that empower an IT team to meet an organization's need for real-time services and support. Worldwide, more than 72,000 established and emerging enterprises — including more than 60 percent of the Fortune 500 — rely on ManageEngine products to ensure the optimal performance of their critical IT infrastructure, including networks, servers, applications, desktops and more. ManageEngine is a division of Zoho Corp. with offices worldwide, including the United States, India, Japan and China. For more information, please visit http://www.manageengine.com/; follow the company blog athttp://blogs.manageengine.com/, on Facebook athttp://www.facebook.com/ManageEngine and on Twitter at Yoo ManageEngine.

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ManageEngine is a trademark of Zoho Corp. All other brand names and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.

Final nominations revealed for ‘MERA: 2013 Awards'

Stuart Wilson — 2013-05-20T06:12:19Z

The final live voting nominations have been revealed for the ‘Middle East Retail Academy (MERA): 2013 Awards', which take place at the Fairmont Bab Al Bahr in Abu Dhabi on May 22nd in conjunction with DISTREE Middle East 2013 – the region's leading annual ICT and consumer electronics (CE) retail channel event. The VIP Jury has confirmed the shortlist of nominated companies for special achievement awards. The nominees for this year's distributor awards have also been announced.

Two distributor award categories have been included in the ‘MERA: 2013 Awards': Volume Distributor of the Year and Specialist Distributor of the Year. The shortlist of nominations for these awards were decided based on continuous feedback collected from retailers during the last 12 months as part of MERA's monthly report service. The nominated distributors (in alphabetical order by category) are:

Volume Distributor of the Year: BDL, FDC, Jumbo, Metra, Redington

Specialist Distributor of the Year: Eros, ITE, MAS Egypt, National Stores, Redington Lifestyle

In addition, a VIP Jury of independent channel experts and analysts were asked to select companies across five categories, recognising outstanding retail channel achievements during the last 12 months. The nominated companies for the five special achievement awards (in alphabetical order by category) are:

Outstanding Retailer Performance: Alghanim, Dubai Duty Free, Emax, Lulu, Virgin

Retailer Growth & Development: Emax, Extra, Leaders, Lulu, Sharaf DG

Pure Play E-tailer of the Year: Alshop.com, Gridz, JadoPado, Souq.com, Spendwisor

Outstanding Vendor Performance: Canon, Dell, Seagate, Sony, Toshiba

New Vendor of the Year: Energy Sistem, Hama, HCL (ME Tablet), Huawei, Modecom

Farouk Hemraj, CEO and co-founder at DISTREE Events, said: “It is important that the ‘MERA: 2013 Awards' identify vendors and retailers that have excelled in the last 12 months. Whether it is a vendor that is new to the market, a brand that has dominated a product category, an emerging e-tailer, or a retailer that has expanded their business, these achievements deserve recognition.”

“The MERA Awards are designed to recognise sustained excellence in the regional retail channel. All nominated companies should feel proud of their achievement and we look forward to celebrating with them at the Gala Dinner and awards ceremony on May 22nd,” he added.

DISTREE Middle East will take place from May 21st to 23rd at the Fairmont Bab Al Bahr in Abu Dhabi, UAE. The region's leading annual ICT and consumer electronics (CE) retail event will play host to 600 senior channel executives.

Companies nominated for a ‘MERA: 2013 Award' that are not yet confirmed participants at DISTREEE Middle East 2013 can request a separate invitation for the Gala Dinner and awards ceremony by contacting fhemraj@distree.com

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DISTREE Middle East 2013

DISTREE_Events

GCT focuses on new product offerings

Stuart Wilson — 2013-05-20T05:39:55Z

Leading retail distributor GCT will demonstrate new product offering from vendors in its portfolio at DISTREE Middle East this week. GCT carries products across the IT peripherals, mobility accessories and networking categories. Top retail buyers from across the region have scheduled meetings with GCT at DISTREE Middle East and will learn more about new products from Genius, Edimax, Divoom and Lafeada.

GCT will launch a new Divoom mobile speaker with NFC technology at the event. The distributor will also showcase new Genius GX gaming and mobility products including headsets, mice and speakers. The latest Lafaeda mobile and tablet accessories will also be displayed, plus Edimax's latest dual band wireless router and a USB 3.0 network adapter.

Milad N Jabbour, CEO at GCT, said: “We support retail partners and aim to provide a full range of stylish and high quality IT products that satisfy their customers. Although the market has getting tougher during the last few years, GCT's full product portfolio and clear price structure mean our retail partners still enjoy healthy margins and incremental revenues.”

“DISTREE Middle East is a major exhibition that provides the perfect platform for both vendors and retailers. During the event, we can sit down together and discuss new products, new technologies, share retail knowledge and talk to each other about relevant issues and concerns,” he added.

“GCT works closely and directly with power retailers. Each channel customer has its own unique structure and management. In some countries, we provide direct services including logistics, marketing and sales to the retailers. In other countries, we have dedicated distributors in the retail channel,” explained Jabbour.

GCC markets continue to expand while the Levant and North Africa have the potential for further demand growth, according to GCT. The distributor has also seen an improvement in the retail market in the CIS recently. In addition to the Middle East, top retailers from both Africa and the CIS have also been invited to attend DISTREE Middle East this year.

“GCT aims to offer a product portfolio that optimises stock movement,” added Jabbour. “We want retailers to achieve strong stock turnover. We have our own in-store sales team and demonstrate our products to end users.”

“We are ready to offer the best all-in-one service to our retail partners. The more space retailers can offer, the more margin they can earn,” he continued.

GCT offers a range of retailer support including point-of-sales (POS) sign boards, light boxes and promotional materials. The company also works with retail partners to deliver special offers during special promotional periods. GCT will also provide in-store merchandisers to drive sellout.

During 2013, GCT plans to launch a full series of Genius mobility accessories and introduce the concept of smart accessories to the market. With more retail outlets opening across the region and the growth of e-tail as a viable consumer channel, GCT is upbeat about future prospects. GCT prides itself on its after-sales service offering, claiming that it is the only distributor to offer a toll free support line for consumers.

“With organised retail management and direct after-service to end users, GCT can successfully provide stylish, high quality and timely products for retailers and end users,” said Jabbour.

“DISTREE Middle East is an important event to us. GCT is a complete solution provider for retailers and one of the leaders in IT and mobility accessories. We deliver attractive and in-demand products for retailers and ensure they can enjoy decent profits,” he concluded.

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DISTREE Middle East 2013

DISTREE_Events

FDC showcases regional reach

Stuart Wilson — 2013-05-20T05:34:23Z

Regional distributor FDC International plans to show the strength of its portfolio and service offering to top retailers from across the Middle East this week. FDC is one of dozens of top retail distributors participating at DISTREE Middle East in Abu Dhabi. Alan Pourmirza, infrastructure manager at FDC, said: “Retailers should consider working with FDC because of our flexibility, value-added service and the range we offer in different product segment. FDC also has significant presence across the region with in-country operations in major markets.”

FDC's product portfolio includes Lenovo, Acer, Asus, WD, Seagate, Kingston, Apacer and Tech21. With senior retail buyers from across the region in one place at one time, DISTREE Middle East is the perfect opportunity for FDC to meet existing retail partners and also make contact with potential new partners.

“Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Egypt and Iraq are real growth countries for us and a major focus area for business development,” he added. “We will also look to increase our retail market share further in Oman and Bahrain. We plan to focus on relationships with power retailers and hypermarkets in all these countries.”

Pourmirza continued: “We are aggressive in our offering and have a good base of retail product lines to offer, complemented by FDC's value-added services. Our relationships with retailers are based on flexibility, convenience and our personal relationships with each and every one of them. We want to be a consultant with the retailers and move away from just fulfilment to become a preferred supplier in the region.”

FDC offers a structured retailer channel programme and aims to offer competitive prices and margins to them. The distributor offers support on product bundles and special offers, working closely with vendor partners to deliver these into the channel.

FDC continues to invest in its staff resources and distribution infrastructure across the Gulf region.

Pourmirza concluded: “We are a channel friendly, approachable and flexible company. This is our strength and our go-to-market offering is that of a broadline distributor with a focus on brands that deliver healthy bottom lines [for retailers].”

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DISTREE Middle East 2013

DISTREE_Events

Nuance to recruit new channel partners

Stuart Wilson — 2013-05-20T05:20:25Z

Nuance Communications plans to boost its Middle East channel reach in 2013. The vendor, which offers a range of innovative products for the imaging and dictation categories, is participating at DISTREE Middle East to learn more about the regional market and its distribution landscape. Nuance's Giles Shepherd said: “We want to meet new contacts from across the region and we look forward to exchanging information and engaging with potential new channel partners [at DISTREE Middle East].”

Following the event, Nuance will evaluate potential partners and invite preferred distributors and resellers to attend development and accreditation workshops.

“Many of our OEM embedded products are well used across the Middle East by copier makers, car manufacturers and such like,” explained Shepherd. “We are now seeking distributors and resellers to offer our product range direct to a range of business sectors and help us build on our success around the globe to date.”

Nuance has more than 6,000 staff globally spread across 35 offices with sales representation in 70 countries. In fiscal year 2011 the company recorded sales of US$1.4 billion. There are more than 22 million registered users of Nuance desktop solutions and millions of mobile consumers have downloaded the company's Dragon Mobile Apps.

“The core products of Dragon, PDF converter, Omnipage and Paper Port have applications spanning consumer markets, small to medium businesses and enterprise level deployment solutions,” explained Shepherd. “Our range is available in all formats; boxed CD, electronic download or as licensing agreements.”

“Within the Nuance desktop division, retailers and e-tailers across Europe consider our product range a vital part of their software sale mix to consumers and small businesses,” he added.

Nuance is interested in meeting potential channel partners from across the Middle East. The company claims to offer a set of products that represent a unique market proposition. This includes Dragon - a suite of products that turn voice dictation into on screen text in documents and allow voice commands to control your computer.

The Nuance offering also includes PDF Converter - a simple-to-use PDF solution that lets users improve the way they create, convert, securely share PDF files and collaborate. Nuance PDF Converter allows users to make changes to PDF files with the fluidity, flexibility and interactivity of real word processing. OmniPage is an OCR solution that provides a precise way to convert documents into editable digital content that looks and acts just like an original digital document complete with columns, colours, pictures and graphics.

“We have a structured channel programme for all our partners and distributors, whether they address the retail consumer sector, small business solutions or large corporate accounts,” added Shepherd. “We have a compelling and profitable story to tell that can profitably enhance a channel partner's business.”

“Marketing support is tailored to the needs each partner. Multi-language marketing support for our existing customer base is available and ready to be activated. We are looking to increase our Middle East reseller base over the course of the next six to 12 months. We are seeing significant year-on-year growth in our desktop software business,” he added.

Nuance is fully committed to a channel model in the Middle East with a partner-centric strategy and local support. Channel partners interested in learning more about Nuance's channel proposition can request one-on-one meeting with the company at DISTREE Middle East this week.

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DISTREE Middle East 2013

DISTREE_Events

Touchmate launches smartphones

Stuart Wilson — 2013-05-20T05:16:26Z

Technology brand Touchmate is using its participation at this week's DISTREE Middle East 2013 event to launch a range of smartphone devices. With hundreds of senior buyers from the region's top e-tailers and retailers attending the event, Touchmate hopes to open up significant routes-to-market for its latest product offering.

Vasant Menghani, CEO and founder at Touchmate, said: “Touchmate has already created a name for itself in the tablet market and our customers are now asking for smartphones from us. We already have the skills in place to manufacture smartphones from our activities in the tablet space.”

Touchmate will launch a range of smartphones from 4” to 6” in size and plans to push the products in the UAE retail channel and across the wider GCC market.

“We will launch a 6” smartphone targeted at business and gaming users who need a bigger screen for their activities. It is a two-in-one device combining the best features of a smartphone and a tablet. The device will be suited for e-mail, web browsing and audio and video applications,” he added.

The Android-based smartphone range will consist of five different models and will be available in different colour options. Each model will support dual SIM cards. Prices will range from AED499 (US$135) to AED1299 (US$354).

Touchmate plans a number of consumer incentives to build sales for the smartphone range, with travel vouchers to put towards holidays in a number of international destinations.

“Retail partners are welcome to visit us at DISTREE Middle East to touch and feel the new range and find out more about what we can offer them in the smartphone category,” concluded Menghani.

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DISTREE Middle East 2013

DISTREE_Events

Sophos Unified Threat Management Connected Makes Web Surfing Secure Everywhere

anonymous — 2013-05-20T05:09:10Z

Dubai, UAE – May 19, 2013 – Sophos today announced the availability of Sophos UTM Connected, the latest version of its award-winning UTM (unified threat management solution). This release introduces expanded UTM managed endpoint protection with unique Web in Endpoint functionality, broader wireless coverage for large scale wireless deployments and higher performance networking.

As the complexities of securing all networks have grown, so have the struggles for businesses to fully optimize the many point security solutions they have purchased. A UTM is the proven solution to address this problem, however most simply put layers of protection on a single appliance. The introduction of Web in Endpoint functionality lets Sophos UTM go a stage further and make security layers communicate and combine to deliver more effective protection. This approach simplifies user experience and delivers a higher level of overall protection on which customers can rely.

“Small businesses face many of the same security challenges as do large enterprises— a distributed workforce and doing more with fewer resources,” said Charles Kolodgy, research vice president, IDC. “With Sophos UTM Connected, these businesses have a single consolidated security solution, one that allows them to deploy an endpoint client that synchronizes with their gateway web policy. Web security becomes easier to configure and stronger as a result.”

Through a unique integration of gateway, endpoint and cloud technology, the Sophos UTM now provides administrators with full web protection and control for endpoints roaming outside of the corporate network. As systems roam the globe, this integration enables complete oversight and security for endpoints as though they are in the office. Policies can be updated and reporting data accessed in near real-time for every protected endpoint.

Sophos web protection is backed by SophosLabs, the company's global network of threat intelligence centers that identifies and protects against tens of thousands of infected URLs and hundreds of thousands of new variants of malicious code daily. Web in Endpoint is available at no extra cost to UTM Endpoint and Web Protection customers.

New UTM wireless capabilities enable businesses to extend wireless and accelerate VPN access faster and more securely. With wireless bridging and repeating support, Sophos access points reach further – capable of extending wireless range without the need for Ethernet cables. Sophos VPN functionality now makes load balancing and failover of traffic between IPsec VPN tunnels simple to set-up.

“We're excited about this latest release from Sophos and feel it will provide considerable benefit to customers, in particular, businesses with distributed workforces,” said Sam Heard, president, Data Integrity Services. “Businesses need to ensure their employees are protected against web-based threats, and employees want ultra-fast wired and wireless connectivity; this makes Sophos UTM Connected a win/win for the entire organization.”

“Customers and partners shape our UTM roadmap, ensuring that we deliver innovative technology that is practical to use in a business environment,” said Chris Kraft, vice president, product management, Sophos. “Web in Endpoint is a great example of solving a complex problem with a simple solution. Because we have proven endpoint protection and secure web gateway expertise, we are uniquely positioned to help IT administrators secure their roaming workforces – and having a single solution like this makes life easier for our channel partners to deploy security too.”

Additional information on all of the additional features in Sophos UTM Connected can be found here. For additional information on Sophos' unified solutions, please visit www.sophos.com/networksecurity.

About Sophos More than 100 million users in 150 countries rely on Sophos' complete security solutions as the best protection against complex threats and data loss. Simple to deploy, manage, and use, Sophos' award-winning network security, encryption, endpoint security, Web, email, and mobile solutions are backed by SophosLabs - a global network of threat intelligence centers.

Sophos is headquartered in Boston, US and Oxford, UK. More information is available at www.sophos.com.

Axtrom To Showcase Its Axpad Range At DISTREE Middle East

anonymous — 2013-05-20T05:08:51Z

Dubai, UAE, May 19, 2013: Axtrom, the leading developer of tablets, peripherals and accessories, today announced that it is participating in DISTREE Middle East, which is being held from May 21st to 23rd at the Fairmont Bab Al Bahr in Abu Dhabi, UAE. Axtrom will place the spotlight on its latest tablet PC – the AXPAD 10P01 built on Intel chipset and showcase its entire range of AXPAD models at the region's leading annual ICT and consumer electronics (CE) retail event. The company will also look to meet and sign new distributors, resellers and power retailers from across the Middle East and Africa. “DISTREE Middle East is a focused business-to-business event, which gives vendors and distributors an opportunity to meet and interact with resellers, retailers and e-tailers from across the region at one single venue. Hence, it is a perfect platform for us to introduce our exciting range of tablet PCs, better known as AXPAD and demonstrate their features and USPs to the regional channel community. We will also be looking for reputed distributors in countries, where we don't have a strong presence and sign on new resellers and power retailers as well. We are looking to expand our network in the retail sector across the Middle East, North Africa and CIS countries,” said Mohamed Samy, Business Development Manager, Axtrom. Axtrom's AXPAD range of tablet PCs has been receiving great response from the regional market, where customers looking for high performance quality tablets at affordable prices have shown tremendous interest. Currently, Axtrom has 6 models of AXPAD PCs and plans to expand its range by adding several new models to its portfolio. “Axtrom has been growing quite rapidly in the Middle East over the last one year. Our major focus from 2012 has been the tablet PC market as we saw this as one of the major market trends in this region. We offer retailers a wide range of products at competitive prices and we only offer the best quality products, which are specially designed keeping the customers' preferences in mind. All our products have special packaging with ergonomic design. We also offer them RMA services at 10 service centers across the region. At DISTREE, we look forward to highlighting this with delegates and also discussing our channel and incentives program with them,” Samy added.

Through their participation at DISTREE Middle East, Axtrom hopes to increase its brand exposure, expand its channel and retail network, demonstrate its products and highlight their specialty and difference from other competitive brands.

Ends-

About Axtrom AXTROM™ was founded in 2006 by a team of talented and industry experienced professionals who anticipated the market needs and demands and steered the company toward long-term success. Axtrom is committed to delivering innovative and superior quality products which exceeds the customer's demands. Axtrom's dedication to quality extends beyond manufacturing to every aspect of its operation, including service. Operating in an ethical way is the foundation of our business and our core values are deeply rooted in every aspect of our business. Axtrom is driven by its profound passion for excellence and commitment to develop the best products and services on the market. We continuously create long-term value for our customers and partners by being responsive to their needs and requirements.

Axtrom's product basket encompasses a lineup of tablet PCs, peripherals, computer and tablet PC accessories and many other devices. Axtrom is based out of Hong Kong with a subsidiary office in Dubai-UAE.

KODAK SCANMATE i940 Scanner for MACINTOSH Computers Brings Award-Winning Product

anonymous — 2013-05-18T18:03:37Z

May 17—Kodak's Document Imaging business announces a powerful new document management solution for users of APPLE MACINTOSH Computers that makes it easy to organise, manage, and share digital files and scanned documents. The KODAK SCANMATE i940 Scanner for MACINTOSH Computers features precision capture for increased image accuracy, robust paper handling for greater process efficiency, and bundled software applications that enable greater user productivity.

“The award-winning i940 has a proven track record of pushing the performance limits for a portable document scanner,” said Hauke Fast, EAMER Product Marketing Manager for Kodak Document Imaging. “Kodak's new scanner's advanced imaging capabilities help APPLE Product Users to enhance document management for personal or business tasks,” said Fast.

Kodak worked with NewSoft to specially integrate Kodak's Perfect Page technology and NEWSOFT PRESTO! PAGEMANAGER 9 Software for the SCANMATE i940 for MAC. This combination results in high-quality images that users can easily and quickly locate, access, edit, annotate, organise and share from the software's easy-to-navigate interface. It also provides optical character recognition (OCR) and an all-in-one PageViewer. Another timesaving function of the application is the document pallet, which allows a user to rapidly convert files to searchable PDF, email the document or send it to a printer.

The integration delivers productive functionality from Kodak including the simultaneous creation of colour and black-and-white versions of documents in duplex. Other advanced imaging features help to correct and improve document quality including auto-cropping, de-skew, image rotation, and automatic adjustment of brightness and contrast. Sharing documents scanned with the SCANMATE i940 for MAC is made easy with connectivity via PAGEMANAGER 9 Software to networked folders and cloud systems GOOGLE Docs and EVERNOTE.

User productivity is maximized with customizable scan buttons within the PAGEMANAGER Application that provide shortcuts to favourite files and applications.

The SCANMATE i940 for MAC also includes NEWSOFT PRESTO! BIZCARD XPRESS Software for managing contact information scanned from business cards.

With a recommended daily volume of up to 500 pages per day, the SCANMATE i940 for MAC can hold up to 20 documents at a time from its automatic document feeder (ADF). The scanner, when AC-powered, captures images from documents at 20 pages per minute (ppm) or 40 images per minute (ipm) in double sided scanning at 200 dots per inch (dpi) in black and white or grayscale and up to 15 ppm or 30 ipm at 200 dpi in colour. Its USB-power option enables imaging at up to 8 ppm at 200 dpi. The ADF can also handle a variety of small documents from DIN-A4 to business cards, as well as identification cards, insurance cards and embossed hard cards.

The SCANMATE i940 Scanner for MAC is available immediately and has a list price of 440 Euros including a limited warranty, which includes advanced unit replacement coverage for three years, in selected countries. KODAK Service and Support delivers a replacement scanner on the next business day and provides both packing materials and pre-paid return shipping.

Kodak is a global advisor and provider of integrated services to help companies transform and optimize their businesses. Through a network of service professionals in more than 120 countries, Kodak provides technical, professional, consulting and managed services to enable customers to focus on growing their businesses, maximizing productivity, and more effectively managing risks. All KODAK Products and Software are backed by KODAK Service and Support.

To learn more about the KODAK SCANMATE i940 Scanner for MAC, please visit www.kodak.com/go/i940forMac.

Proximity Plays a Blinder with Avaya Aura® UC and Contact Centre Capabilities

anonymous — 2013-05-18T18:03:28Z

Hillarys Blinds Chooses Proximity Communications for Upgrade & Support

Proximity Communications plc, a fast growth unified communications and managed service provider based in the Thames Valley, has today announced it is upgrading the existing voice communications and contact centre systems at Hillarys Blinds, the leading UK manufacturer of made-to-measure blinds and window coverings. The project will enable Hillarys to extend its established reputation for superior customer experience and high quality service, by utilising the many technical and business advantages of Avaya Aura UC and Contact Center platforms. The agreement also includes advanced support for the next three years.

Each week, Hillarys takes around 6,000 orders and produces nearly 30,000 individually tailored blinds, placing a critical importance on the performance, uptime and flexibility of its communications systems and the people who use them.

“With this upgrade we'll have a more resilient, high availability contact centre operation and be ready to introduce UC and expand Multimedia services both internally and externally,” commented Julian Bond, Head of Information, Communication, and Technology at Hillarys. “We believe Proximity has the expertise we've been looking for to make this a very successful investment in greater productivity, business continuity and customer satisfaction.”

“Hillarys is excellently placed to take full advantage of Avaya Aura, enabling faster and easier deployment of voice, video, messaging and presence services,” said Darren Boyce, CEO at Proximity Communications. “By enhancing its existing Avaya systems, Hillarys avoids disrupting existing workflows among the customer advice team, and keeps its costs under control.”

As the UK's number one supplier of made-to-measure blinds, shutters and curtains, Hillarys has recently celebrated manufacturing its 25 millionth blind. They attend 850,000 customer visits a year and fit 21,000 blinds, shutters and curtains each week.

Ends

About Proximity Communications, www.proximitycomms.com Proximity Communications, an award winning unified communications and managed service provider, helps organisations to integrate and evolve their ICT infrastructure to achieve the commercial and collaborative benefits of unifying business communications. Using a combination of skills and expertise, Proximity creates bespoke, intelligent and dynamic communications solutions and services that optimise a company's ICT assets, and marries technology with business strategy.

Regarded as a trusted advisor to its customers, Proximity has long-term partnerships with organisations such as Associated Press and Telegraph Media Group.

Media/analyst enquiries: Proximity Communications – Charlotte Fletcher M: 07796 330301 or Mark Waite, M: 07774 265444 or T: 01291 626200, E: proximity gWU cohesive.uk.com.