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15-21 January 2013 ComputerWeekly.comHomeNewskeep softwarelicensing understrict controlBig data adoptiongathers pacein US and europeRBS takes cloudcomputing tipsfrom amazonMet Police ITdirector shareshigh-tech planseditor’scommentOpinionBuyer’s Guideto softwareas a serviceAerospace relieson cloud-basedsupply chain hubDowntimeBig data isbig businessUK rides wave of analytics technology adoptioncomputerweekly.com 15-21 January 2013 1Danil Melekhin/istockphotosupport byodwithout maxingout the network
the week in itNewskeep softwarelicensing understrict controlBig data adoptiongathers pacein US and europeRBS takes cloudcomputing tipsfrom amazonMet Police ITdirector shareshigh-tech planseditor’scommentOpinionBuyer’s Guideto softwareas a servicesupport byodwithout maxingout the networkAerospace relieson cloud-basedsupply chain hubDowntimeGovernment & public sectorTechnical skillsSoftware development problems havebeen named as a key reason for forecastoverspend of 468m at the Ministry ofDefence over the past year, according toa National Audit Office (NAO) report. Itgives a progress review of the 16 largestdefence projects, showing a total forecast slippage of 139 months and a 468mincrease in costs in the past year.About 1.7 million cloud computing-relatedjob roles globally could not be filled in2012 because applicantsaccess the latestlacked training, certifiit news via rss feedcation and experience,according to a study byIDC. The demand for cloud-savvy IT professionals will grow by 26% annually until2015, predicted the analyst.Software development key reason for 468m MoD overspend, says NAOCloud computing skills gap widening,warns IDC researchMobile apps & softwareBroadband communicationsFlash storage is now used by most organisations, with 60% reporting a flash solidstate drive (SSD) tier in their storageinfrastructures, according to an exclusiveTechTarget survey. The survey found that53% of the respondents had tiered storage in place, 60% of which used flash asan SSD tier 0. That figure has more thantripled from 17% in 2009.Telecoms firms should look to mobilebroadband to boost revenues, accordingto a report from analyst Ovum, whichclaimed mobile broadband offered “thesingle largest opportunity for telcos toclaw back revenue”. It predicted thetake-up of the service would grow by19.2% annually, generating an extra 122.9bn revenue to 2016.Flash storage deployed in mostorganisations as 60% run SSD tierMobile broadband best bet for telecomsrevenues, claims OvumRisk managementTelecoms & internet organisationsUK military reliance on technology couldleave it fatally compromised by a sustained cyber attack, say members of theparliamentary defence select committee.The committee claims there are worryinggaps in the Ministry of Defence’s cyberstrategy and has called for urgent ministerial intervention.Huawei has published a New Years’message to celebrate strong results for2012 and tackle accusations around thesecurity of its products from the pastfew months. Guo Ping, acting CEO of theChinese firm, said it expected revenuesfor 2012 to exceed 35bn, resulting in anet profit of 2.4bn.UK military at risk of cyber attack,warns defence select committeeStrong Huawei revenues set to exceed 35bn for 2012Barclays’ Linux programmeno snub to suppliersBarclays says it is not snubbing any supplier bydeveloping a private cloud infrastructure and usingLinux to cut its software development costs by 90%.Newspaper reports claimed Barclays will savebillions on IT through the strategy, but the banktold Computer Weekly that the 90% savings are insoftware development, not overall IT spending. UsingLinux reduces the reliance on operating systemsfrom suppliers such as Microsoft and Oracle and thelicence fees required for their use.Flickr/Leo ReynoldsHomecomputerweekly.com 15-21 January 2013 2
the week in itHomeNewskeep softwarelicensing understrict controlBig data adoptiongathers pacein US and europeRBS takes cloudcomputing tipsfrom amazonMet Police ITdirector shareshigh-tech planseditor’scommentOpinionBuyer’s Guideto softwareas a servicesupport byodwithout maxingout the networkAerospace relieson cloud-basedsupply chain hubDowntimeMicrosoft Windows softwareJobs & recruitmentTesco has signed a deal to roll outMicrosoft Office 365 across its Europeand Asian operations. Mike McNamara,Tesco CIO, said the deal would encouragea culture shift to more flexible working.“We want to put technology in the handsof all our colleagues, whether in the store,distribution centre or office, so they cancreate value for our customers,” he said.IT contractors are increasingly confidentabout job opportunities in the public sector due to reductions in the civil serviceheadcount, research has found. Accordingto a poll conducted by contractor agencyGiant, nearly three times more IT contractors expect the public sector to be thesource of most new jobs over the next 12months than did in 2010.Tesco rolls out Microsoft Office 365 inmove to flexible workingIT contractors seek to fill skills gap leftby public sector cutsOutsourcingE-commerce technologyMPs have slammed the award of largegovernment IT contracts to tax-avoidingcompanies such as Accenture, which isalleged to have used revenue from itsIT deal with HM Revenue & Customs(HMRC) to reduce its tax bill. Capgeminialso has an HMRC contract and has beensingled out by MPs as a tax-avoider.Supermarket chain Morrisons posted“disappointing” sales over the Christmasperiod, due to the retailer’s lack ofonline presence. In the six weeks to 30December total sales were down by 0.9%,while like-for-like sales declined by 2.5%.“Our sales performance in the period wasdisappointing,” said Morrisons.MPs slam tax-dodging IT companies’government contract awardsMorrisons posts poor Christmas salesdue to lack of online presenceJobs & recruitmentBusiness applicationsOne hundred new roles are up for grabsat Amazon’s Digital Media DevelopmentCentre in London. Based near TheBarbican, the Digital Media DevelopmentCentre is recruiting for software development engineers, user-interface expertsand graphic designers.Spending on business intelligence (BI)software and services willaccess the latestreach 143.3bn in 2016,it news via rss feedwith two-thirds in services. In 2012, the globalBI sector was worth 79bn, according toanalyst firm Pringle & Company. nAmazon seeks recruits for LondonDigital Media CentreGlobal business intelligence spendingto double in four yearsSoftware licensing compliance auditHow many times do you expect one of your software suppliers to conduct a licence complianceaudit on your company in the next 12 months? (From a sample poll of 92 IT decision-makers)Five ormore times5%Three tofour times18%Twice40%Once25%We will notbe audited12%Source: CA Technologiescomputerweekly.com 15-21 January 2013 3
analysisNewskeep softwarelicensing understrict controlBig data adoptiongathers pacein US and europeRBS takes cloudcomputing tipsfrom amazonMet Police ITdirector shareshigh-tech planseditor’scommentOpinionBuyer’s Guideto softwareas a servicesupport byodwithout maxingout the networkAerospace relieson cloud-basedsupply chain hubDowntimeHow tomanage yourassets andcontrolbusiness costsManageyour assets tocut costs andplan capacityThe business case for taking controlof your company’s software licencesThe threat of whistle-blowing is constant and can prove costly to a business’sfinances and reputation, so CIOs must take control of licensing, says Cliff SaranTThinkstockHomehe Business Software Alliance’s (BSA)claim that 90% of all audit letters sentin 2012 resulted from whistle-blowers’tip-offs should be a wake-up call to CIOs.IT chiefs may well ponder how to progresswhen the boss refuses to budget for the rightnumber of legitimate software licences andneed to consider the possibility that disgruntled IT staff or contractors are tipping offsuppliers or the BSA, rather than speakingdirectly to senior IT management about theirsoftware licensing concerns.Whistle-blowers can earn up to 20,000based on the value of the software licensingfees recouped. For the BSA, whistle-blowersprovide a route into organisations hidingsoftware licensing discrepancies.Building and construction design consultants Kyson Design paid 3,000 in damagesfor using unlicensed software following aninvestigation by the BSA. The case came tothe BSA’s attention following informationreported by a whistle-blower. The companywas required to conduct a self-audit, whichrevealed unlicensed Adobe, Autodesk andMicrosoft software.Quocirca analyst Clive Longbottom, said:“Unless the BSA has sufficient information itcannot push doors and conduct an audit, soit needs information from whistle-blowers.”The informant could be the CIO or head ofIT; but it could equally be a junior member ofReasons for whistle-blowingthe IT team.The BSA’s online form for reporting software“If you are a company director and you arepiracy anonymously is relatively straightfor- aware of software licensing problems, thenward: along with name, address, size ofyou are personally liable,” Longbottom said.company, industry sector, name of CEO andSo if a CIO is being pressurised by heads ofcontact email address of the informant, the business to infringe the licensing terms forBSA only needs information on the namestheir software, they should feel they areof software, selected from a drop-down listpersonally at risk, according to Longbottom.from the 39 companies it represents. TheIn small businesses, the IT manager mayBSA assures whistle-blowers their identities often feel they cannot simply go to thewill never be revealed.owner/manager because there is a risk ofThe BSA’s website hosts an audio podcastbeing fired, which is why the BSA’s whistlewhere an anonymous IT contractor discusses blowing scheme exists.how he reported a licensing issue. “I felt veryIf caught, a business found underlicensedcomfortable reporting it on the [BSA] webwill be fined; it will have to pay for the legitisite,” the informer said.mate licences and will be named andcomputerweekly.com 15-21 January 2013 4
analysisHomeshamed by the BSA. The BSA is also likely toundertake a full audit of all software, whichmay result in further fines and licence fees topay should more discrepancies be identified.hope it will go away. In fact, the reversenormally happens and you risk the auditingNewsvendor becoming increasingly aggressive andhostile the longer you delay in responding tokeep softwarean audit request.”licensing underBenefits of auditingAccording to Gartner, IBM, Oracle, Adobe,strict controlSo what is the answer? In any size of organi- Microsoft and SAP are the leading supplierssation, auditing is the CIO’s friend and canmost likely to ask a company to audit itsBig data adoptionsave costs. “If you get control of the softsoftware. Barber warns that it is not only thegathers paceware licence, six to 12 months down thedesktop that IT managers need to be conin US and europeline, you will be cash-positive. We can savecerned about. The desktop is relatively easyan organisation 20% of their overall ITto audit, since it is likely to run Windows andRBS takes cloudspend ,” said Matt Fisher, business develop- so Windows-based software asset managecomputing tipsment director at License Dashboard, whichment tools can determine the software offrom amazonproduces software auditing tools.PCs connected to the corporate network.There is significant potential to improve theMet Police ITlicenceposition and amend terms anddirector sharesconditions during audit closure, but this ishigh-tech plansou need to identify ifrarely exploited, according to analyst Gartner.Gartner research director Victoria Barberthe product is installededitor’ssaid:“People deal with it as a fire-fighting,commentin your datacentredamage-limitation exercise. It is not an idealsituation doing an audit, especially if you areOpinionVictoria Barber, Gartnernot compliant, but the audit will enable youto see what licences you have, what valueBuyer’s Guidethey have and whether there is room forto softwareBut CIOs must also measure the complexnegotiations with the supplier.”as a servicelicensing metrics in datacentres. BarberLarger organisations may find they areadded: “You need to identify if the product istargeted directly by the large softwaresupport byodproviders, while the BSA will go after smaller installed in your datacentre. You need to lookwithout maxingat metrics like processor value units orbusinesses. “Enterprises are more profitableout the networknumber of cores. With SAP we found onefor larger suppliers, so they need to be morecustomer’s licence was based on the numbertactful. The BSA can take an aggressiveAerospace reliesof bank accounts/clients in the system.”stance with SMEs,” said Fisher.on cloud-basedSoftware auditing can be an expensive andErnst & Young’s Software Compliancesupply chain hubtime-consuming task for an already overWithout Tears report from 2011 warns thatstretched IT department. It requires department collaboration and a lawyer withsingle biggest reason for such activity is toexpertise in software licensing. Softwaregenerateasset management tools can help, but theyrevenue,› Software licensing and subscriptiononly provide some of the answers needed forsoftware› License Dashboard warns of virtualisationa full software audit.suppliers also› Tame software licensing with automationStephen Mann, an analyst from Forresterwant to proResearch, said software asset managementtect theirtools only provide information on what isintellectual property rights. In addition,being used. Arguments with suppliers canthey’re often looking beyond the immediatearise over entitlement, where a businessaudit,” said the report.believes it is entitled to a discount because itBusinesses should not ignore auditruns a previous version of the product. Herequests from suppliers. In its Why SoftwareVendors Audit Customers whitepaper, License said: “Large organisations may have switchedDashboard notes: “It may sound obvious, but from central to distributed procurement, so ita common mistake made by many organisa- may be difficult to understand what has beentions is to ignore an audit request in the vain spent on software over the years.” n“Y”computerweekly.com 15-21 January 2013 5
analysisNewskeep softwarelicensing understrict controlBig data adoptiongathers pacein US and europeRBS takes cloudcomputing tipsfrom amazonMet Police ITdirector shareshigh-tech planseditor’scommentOpinionBuyer’s Guideto softwareas a servicesupport byodwithout maxingout the networkAerospace relieson cloud-basedsupply chain hubDowntimeUnderstandbig dataanalytics anddatawarehousingUnderstandbig datasecurity issuesUS big data companies look east associal networks pioneer innovationBig data adoption is gathering pace in the US and database firms are looking toplug into Europe as the technology proves its benefits, reports Brian McKennaFour leading executives from US big dataand analytics companies told similarstories of increasing big data analyticsadoption in the UK in a series of interviewswith Computer Weekly. Senior executivesfrom MapR, Cloudera, ParAccel, and Pentahotraced out the likely growth patterns in 2013.Corporate users of IT got their hands dirtywith big data technologies – such as Hadoop– in 2012. Apache Hadoop is the open sourceinstance of the parallel programming framework MapReduce, developed at Google.Hadoop simplifies data processing acrosshuge datasets distributed across commodityhardware. It is one technology associatedwith big data, which includes social mediadata, machine-generated data and datatypes that do not fit neatly into the rows andcolumns of relational database technologies.European expansion in big dataTeradata CTO Stephen Brobst predicted atthe start of 2012 that big data would “crossthe chasm”. He said the technology wasstill in the post-innovator and early-adopterphase, but moving from interactive digital companies such as Google, Facebook,Twitter and LinkedIn through financial services into telecoms; and from the US westcoast to the east, from there to the UK.MapR, a customised Hadoop distributioncompany, launched its European operation inDecember 2012, with its headquarters inLondon. Jack Norris, vice-president of marketing at the company, said customer andpartner demand had driven the timing of thecompany’s European launch.Norris said UK organisations were goingstraight to production and there had beenmore experimentation among US customers.He said he saw a range of emerging applications where Hadoop is being used creatively. “There are, firstly, the Web 2.0ThinkstockHomeproperties in digital. I liked last summer’sstory that Rubicon had passed Google in thereach of their advertising network, based onthe ComScore measurement. Rubicon is aMapR customer, and so is ComScore, andGoogle is a partner,” said Norris.“At the other end of the spectrum is amajor US credit card issuer that rolled out anew service based on Hadoop in one quarter.We also have a UK financial services company doing something similar.“But we’ve also seen Hadoop used tounderstand sensor information on a globalbasis to schedule preventative maintenance.Examples are a semiconductor company anda server manufacturer. And it is being used ingovernment intelligence and at an internetsecurity company. There, instead of doingsample data analysis for fraud detection, youare looking at all the data and looking forprecursors to predict fraud – preventionrather than just detection.”Cloudera is another Silicon Valley Hadoopdistributor, though it wraps its servicesaround the open source version. It is steppingcomputerweekly.com 15-21 January 2013 6
analysisHomeNewskeep softwarelicensing understrict controlBig data adoptiongathers pacein US and europeRBS takes cloudcomputing tipsfrom amazonMet Police ITdirector shareshigh-tech planseditor’scommentOpinionBuyer’s Guideto softwareas a servicesupport byodwithout maxingout the networkAerospace relieson cloud-basedsupply chain hubDowntimeup its European operation, confirmed COOKirk Dunn, who said: “With a lot of technology the early phase is about evangelism”.But with Hadoop, big data analytics companies are “already feeling pain” in data sizeand speed. He said the traditional adoptioncurve was less applicable, that adoption wasproving faster and more in parallel acrosssectors such as digital, financial services,telecoms and government, than in sequence.“Once you have thistechnology, you cansee other possibilities”Kirk Dunn, Cloudera“Once you have this technology, you cansee other possibilities and the open sourcenature of Hadoop is a wrinkle here. Thatmeans adoption is organic, bottom-up aswell as top-down from CIO level,” said Dunn.His advice for those beyond pilot-stageexperimentation was plain. “Don’t go tryingto solve any new business problems. Look atyour top two or three business imperativesand apply customer-generated big datacapability to those. Trying to find someesoteric result from an esoteric technology isnot to be recommended. Don’t do that.“The social network firms have taught usthere is a level of intimacy we can get withwho we are connected to. Enterprises canconnect their products and services withcustomers in a more intimate way, which islike the social networking entities.“Guy Chiarello, CIO at JPMorgan Chase,said the bank wants to understand customers so itgets more› Big data analytics: architectures and skillsshare of› Download: the big returns from big datatheir› What is big data management?wallets in away whichbenefits those customers. It’s the degree ofcustomer insight that big data analyticsmakes possible that enables that. We arenow able to do things that we were notpreviously able to do because of storagelimitations and lack of compute power.”ParAccel, an advanced analytics databasecompany, is increasing its activity in the UK.Vice-president of marketing Rich Ghiossistressed that big data is only part of itspicture, which affiliates more with whatGartner calls the logical data warehouse,spanning data stores large and small, nonrelational and relational from the locus on“an analytical hub”.ParAccel was founded in 2005 by BarryZane, founder of data warehouse appliancevendor Netezza, sold to IBM in 2010.UK big data skills gapIn relation to big data analytics adoption,Ghiossi said: “The coasts of the US seemto be ahead of London, but only by a fewmonths.” There is a sticking point, however.“For you to adopt Hadoop, you need a slewof expensive programmers. So, the government and the new dot com, digital companies have those: other sectors, less so.”Like Norris, Ghiossi identified sensor dataas an emerging area for user organisations,as well as social networking data. “Firmsusing control systems are leveraging log datain new ways. Small variations in sensor datafrom air conditioning or electrical systemsshow where preventative maintenance isneeded. And we are also seeing, in California,where energy smart metering generates datathat can change consumer behaviour in waysthat could be phenomenal.”Pentaho’s CEO Quentin Gallivan said thebig data phenomenon is fuelling growth forthe open source data integration and business intelligence supplier, founded in 2004,and based in Florida. It helps customersquickly ingest big data into their Hadoop,NoSQL or analytical platform and enablesthem to visualise and analyse that data.Gallivan was the CEO of AsterData whenTeradata bought the company in 2010.Customers tend to come to Pentaho oncethey have deployed Hadoop, he confirmed.“Tthe US is ahead, but we are seeing lots ofuse cases in the UK. And the industry analysts we’ve talked to in the UK are bullish. Mysense is that if you are not an interactivecompany, in digital or government, you aremore likely to be trialing big data technologyin an experimental phase,” he said. ncomputerweekly.com 15-21 January 2013 7
analysisNewskeep softwarelicensing understrict controlBig data adoptiongathers pacein US and europeRoyal Bank of Scotland emulatesAmazon model with private cloudRBS is using a private cloud to support application development, allowing it todetermine IT running costs and offer service-based pricing. Cliff Saran reportsell brown/flickrHomeRBS takes cloudcomputing tipsfrom amazonMet Police ITdirector shareshigh-tech planseditor’scommentOpinionBuyer’s Guideto softwareas a servicesupport byodwithout maxingout the networkAerospace relieson cloud-basedsupply chain hubRoyal Bank of Scotland (RBS) hasdeveloped a private cloud to supportits application development process,using Amazon best practices.The project has enabled RBS to determinerunning costs of its IT infrastructure and provide servicebased pricing.› FSA demands review of RBS software failureThe self› RBS spends 80m to link multiple mainframesservice› RBS unveils iPhone case for NFC paymentscloud, whichis availablethrough a portal, allows developers to provision Red Hat Linux, SQL Server 2008 R2 andWindows Server 2008 to deploy servers fortheir applications.The service is being used by more than 100Downtimeteams. Adoption within RBS is being spreadby word of mouth.Weighing up cloud costsSpeaking at the Gartner Symposium inBarcelona last year, Rhys Jones, headof engineering, RBS market technologydivision, said the project was startedbecause the bank wanted to determine thecost of cloud computing.Adoption of RBS’sprivate cloud is beingspread by word of mouthcomputerweekly.com 15-21 January 2013 8
analysisHomeNewskeep softwarelicensing understrict controlBig data adoptiongathers pacein US and europeRBS takes cloudcomputing tipsfrom amazonMet Police ITdirector shareshigh-tech planseditor’scommentOpinionBuyer’s Guideto softwareas a servicesupport byodwithout maxingout the network“From day one, developers wanted to knowhow much it would cost,” said Jones. “Onceyou know how much it will cost, then youalign incentives to ensure teams adopt theservice. We will never know whether a publiccloud provider is cheaper, unless we do itourselves.”His team worked with the infrastructureteam to determine the unit cost of a server.He found that there was less appetite forvirtualisation from the infrastructure team,“We find it easy toemulate Amazon,because it is five yearsahead of everyoneelse. Amazon does notcharge for its platformas a service. If you puta cost on this, peoplewill build their own”Rhys Jones, RBSas it worked out more expensive thandeploying physical servers. It would take sixweeks for the infrastructure team to provision those servers, however, and Jones hadto support developer teams that needed toDowntimedeploy servers rapidly.“Our customers are developers, whoexpect IaaS [infrastructure as a service].We have 1,300 applications in-house thatcan’t take› Understanding cloud computing networksadvantage of› Managing Amazon EC2 in the enterprisenew hardware,”› Building a private cloudhe said.Aerospace relieson cloud-basedsupply chain hubTaking an agile approachRBS has emulated Amazon’s approachto cloud computing, he said. Rather thanbuild the whole private cloud, the bank hastaken an agile approach. “Amazon goes livewith something and adds to it iteratively,”said Jones.RBS has also taken Amazon’s concept ofgiving away services for free to encourageadoption. “We find it easy to emulateAmazon, because it is five years ahead ofeveryone else. Amazon does not charge forits platform as a service [PaaS]. If you puta cost on this, people will build their own,”he said.Outsourcing to the cloudOn cloud projects such as outsourcing,Jones said: “You fix processes before yououtsource. So we had to understand ourcurrent processes.”In terms of IT infrastructure, he found thatmany of the teams worked in silos. Eventhe simple of task of naming a server was abarrier to preventing the application development team from self-provisioning servers.“We found server names allocation wasmanaged using a spreadsheet, which workswhen server provisioning took six weeks, butdoesn’t work when application teams needto self-provision,” said Jones.He said one of the challenges to adoptinga private cloud internally is the users – inthis case the application development teams– in terms of their technology usage. Forinstance, advanced features of the privatecloud, such as self-service provisioning ofelastic computing, where processing powercan be ramped up and down on-demand,may be required by the business.Continuing the cloud journeyThe bank started the journey to cloudcomputing in 2009 by running a fewpilots to look at the benefits. It now has300 virtual servers to support applicationdevelopers. This will be expanded to 1,200during 2013.The project has enabled the bank to understand how to run a private cloud and thebarriers to adoption. “We know internal costsand understand processes, security andoperating models,” said Jones.With this knowledge Royal Bank ofScotland can now assess where public cloudcan be used instead of its own private cloud,and this knowledge is allowing the bank tolook at whether a service provider couldmanage its private cloud and operate it as anon-demand service. ncomputerweekly.com 15-21 January 2013 9
InterviewHomeNewskeep softwarelicensing understrict controlBig data adoptiongathers pacein US and europeRBS takes cloudcomputing tipsfrom amazonMet Police ITdirector shareshigh-tech planseditor’scommentOpinionBuyer’s Guideto softwareas a servicesupport byodwithout maxingout the networkAerospace relieson cloud-basedsupply chain hubDowntimeCIOinterview:Gerry Pennell,CIO, London2012 OlympicGamesCIOinterview:Ailsa Beaton,director ofinformation atthe MetTaking mobile devices on the beatThe Metropolitan Police Service’s IT director talks to Kathleen Hall about thechallenges facing IT transformation now the London 2012 Games are pastCW500Steve Whatson,director of ICT forthe Olympics andMajor Change at theMetropolitan Police Service, has his work cut out, with the Met beingtasked with plugging a 550m budget gap.It is his job to use part of the Directorate ofInformation’s (DoI) 202m budget this yearto drive out some of those costs with IT.This move comes as the Met’s directorof information, Ailsa Beaton, is due to stepdown later this year.“We are a support service, the Met needs tofocus on frontline policing,” says Whatson. “IThas a large role to play – it can’t plug the gapalone, but it can maximise what we can do,”interviewNew models of ITOne major procurement and implementation exercise pending is a new commandand control system, which coordinatespublic calls with police response.“We deliberately took the decision to delayprocurement of the command and controluntil after the Olympics,” says Whatson. “Itwas due to be upgraded in 2011. Instead,we did a mid-life upgrade and refreshed thehardware and software – that allowed us toplan the replacement for 2014.”As the Met is one of the largest forces inthe world, the system is expected to receiveheavy use. “We want something that runson an up-to-date platform and is flexible andeasy to enhance and maintain,” he says.The Met plans to deliver messaging asa service (MaaS) and replace its in-houseemail system with one externally hosted byCapgemini, due to be live next year.“We’re also in the process of replacing ourback-office system with Operational PolicingSystems Futures, which is moving towardsa cloud-based approach to delivering systems,” says Whatson.The business case for the procurementis expected to be ready for next year. Theorganisation will consider the government’sCloudStore procurement framework asone possible option, but Capgemini will beresponsible for the network for the timebeing, he says.The full renewal will happen in 2015, whenthe contract with Capgemini expires.Mobile computing for police officersThere are also plans to get the front-facingpolice counters to do more. One solution isto create a video-conferencing translationservice. “London is very diverse, with manydifferent nationalities. We are looking atthe method of deali
software licensing concerns. Whistle-blowers can earn up to 20,000 based on the value of the software licensing fees recouped. For the Bsa, whistle-blowers provide a route into organisations hiding software licensing discrepancies. Building and constructio
