Industry news

The Bank of England (BoE) has announced plans to improve software services and the collection of data from UK insurance firms, with a £1.2 million investment.

The investment will be spent on tendering for two systems, delivered over a three-year contract worth between£800,000 and £1.2 million. One system will provide data collection services, gathering compliance data, the other system will process and validate data for use in other systems.

In a notice to tender the BoE specified that the contract should cover: “a variety of data from external entities securely, via a user interface and a business to business interface, and secure user management capabilities”.

Both systems will have to be capable of handling large amounts of data, with expectations of large data amounts of between 10GB and 200GB each month, from the 500 insurance firms that the BoE currently services.

BoE announces efficiency drive

Bank of England reports improving economic forecast

Small hi-tech specialists Buddi has criticised the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) after the government has announced that it will restart the procurement process for a GPS tagging scheme.

Buddi had been selected as the preferred bidder by the MoJ, but the department has move to restart the procurement process, claiming that Buddi had failed to show that it could supply the technology within the necessary time-frame.

Sara Murray, co-founder of Buddi said that the relationship with the MoJ has been a: “unproductive and frustrating relationship" and that the government has asked for a product that” does not yet exist”.

The tender will now be offered again under a accelerated process to original bidders 3M and Steatite.

The MoJ released a statement saying: "We have been unable to agree on certain technical and commercial aspects of the contract with Buddi to provide tags. We have therefore decided to re-compete this element of the contract to ensure we deliver an efficient service that represents best value for hardworking taxpayers while protecting the public.

While the MoJ claimed that the move would not result in new delays, which is currently 14 months behind schedule, Ms Murray said that the move would ensure that the project would not be delivered by the end of the year.

MoJ signs data centre deal with Ark

Move to digital-by-default for legal aid delayed

The Government has outlined plans for a move to select a private sector partner to provide debt management services to public sector departments.

The tender notice calls for a supplier with a proven track record in “reliable, high quality and innovative retail debt management services at scale”.

The private sector partner would assist the government in creating a new company, known as the 'Debt Market Integrator' (DMI). The DMI would start out as a public sector organisation before becoming a company which has a private sector majority ownership with a minority public sector stake.

The initial department customers of DMI will be HMRC, DWP, SLC, LAA, DVLA and the Home Office, with debt services being extended to other public sector services at a later point.

HMRC announces specialist recruitment drive

HMRC tenders for supplier for fraud prevention and credit check role

Workers at an IBM factory in China, Shenzhen, have gone on strike over the planned purchase of the site by Lenovo.

The strike action has resulted in the suspension of work at the factory which makes IBM x86 servers, with around 1,000 staff involved in the protest.

The protest action is in response to the fear of job losses at the factory under new ownership.

The deal should it go ahead, will see workers being given the option of a severance package or continued employment with a comparable wage.

Tech Mahindra has partnered with Microsoft to deliver Microsoft Dynamics CRM. The Indian based outsourcing group has partnered with Microsoft to support and update Microsoft Dynamics CRM.

The support will include browser, mobile device and enhanced user experience support.

With the changing ways in which people access information, with increasing expectations for a 24-hour online access point for public services, the digital agenda looks to bring public services into the digital age.

Tech Mahindra has worked with Microsoft on past product releases from Dynamics CRM including Polaris and Orion.

Jujhar Singh, General Manager, MS CRM Program Management, said: “Tech Mahindra’s practice capabilities will enable its customers to experience cutting edge solutions on Dynamics CRM for competitive advantage”.

Venkat Paturi, Head of Technology, Media and Entertainment at Tech Mahindra said: “It is a proud moment for us to partner with Microsoft. Our large global expert base enabling build, deploy and automate coupled with Microsoft’s global exposure on products helped us come up with a cutting edge version of Dynamics CRM.”

Torben Majgaard, CEO & Founder, Ciklum, one of the outsourcing companies which has helped Ukraine to establish itself as an outsourcing destination, has written an open letter to Pavlo Sheremeta, Minister of Economic Development and Trade of Ukraine, following the fighting in Ukraine, regarding the future of the country's industry.

Mr Majgaard wrote that Ukraine should move to enforce a list of actions in order to bolster the country’s economy and ensure that investors are not dissuaded by recent events and are aware of the country's expertise.

Specific actions included:

• The government join with our industry in sending a message to the world, a strong message, that Parliament is strongly committed to the growth and further advancement of the IT industry in Ukraine

• Commit to working together with the IT Industry to raise funds for investing into the Ukrainian education system, especially universities

• Assign permanent responsibility for enacting this vision to a specific department or ministry within the government in order to ensure this engine for economic growth in the new Ukraine is given due attention

• Make sure that every single person qualifying as a software development professional gets a job

• Invest further in sales and marketing to attract customers

• Invest further in buying, building, renting offices, in state of the art IT infrastructure, office environments and professional administrative staff to ensure we are the best employers in the market

• Expand our internal training and education programs to further enhance the skills and expertise of product managers, project managers and business leaders

Mr Majgaard described how services were being delivered at the height of the troubles: “we should recognise that despite everything that was thrown at us during the last month, services were delivered as scheduled”, he added “employees in the IT industry did not miss a day of work.”

All Change On The Eastern Front?

Substantial flooding in the UK has cost small firm £831 million in business after the weather disrupted transport and services, affecting employees and customers.

A Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) survey of firms revealed that businesses in affected flooded areas lost an average of £1,531, with 29 per cent of businesses in flooded areas seeing transport being disrupted, while a third of firms saw reduced demand from their services.

The flooding has also affected the ability of small businesses to afford insurance, with insurance companies moving to raise prices in response to large pay-outs.

John Allan, national chairman at the FSB, said: “small businesses are worried they will find it increasingly difficult and considerably more expensive to insure their businesses. Certainly the evidence we have from our members points to small businesses' exclusion from the Flood Re scheme being unhelpful. We want the government and the insurance industry to look again at the support they have in place for small businesses in flood hit areas and see whether there is more help they can provide to ensure they have access to adequate and affordable insurance."

Francis Maude announces SME purchasing plan

European SMEs buoyant about growth

A new report from Experian has sought to reveal the best UK locations for business success.

The report listed which towns and cities in the UK provide the best environment for business success, based on how businesses in these areas have performed throughout 2013.

The report listed Northampton in the top spot, with East London performing well with start-ups, with 24.5 per cent of firms in the area having started in the past two years, more than double the national average.

South England also performed well, with Redhill in Surrey recording companies in strong financial positions while Aberdeen in Scotland came in at the top for havings the lowest numbers of insolvencies.

Max Firth, Managing Director, Experian Business Information Services, UK&I said: “It is encouraging to see signs of positivity from areas like Northampton, Bristol and Aberdeen with a strong upward trend in the creation of locally formed businesses and the success of those companies. Growing businesses have a positive effect on the wider economy starting with increased employment prospects.”

UK economic output speeds up as housing and job markets grow

Top UK locations revealed for business success

Probation Officers in England and Wales are set to strike following plans to outsource 70 per cent of probation services.

The outsourcing plan will see probation work involving low-risk and medium-risk offenders transferred to private firms in order to help meet government savings targets.

Officers who are part of The National Association of Probation Officers (Napo) union will strike for 24 hours on March 31st and will mark the second time the Union has taken action, following a strike in November.

Ian Lawrence, Napo general secretary, said: “The coalition's plans to sell off the management of offenders to private providers so that they can make a profit from the justice system is a recklessly dangerous social experiment that presents massive risks to the safety of communities."

Trade unions challenge planned privatisation of procurement services

High-risk criminals not to be supervised by private sector

Aviva is planning to invest savings made from business efficiency drives in developing analytics services and digital systems.

The investment will come from £360 million in savings made in 2013 from various cost reduction schemes.

The investment is designed to fuel long term growth with big data being employed to deliver predictive analytics.

Aviva Group CEO Mark Wilson, said: “Part of what we want to do is reallocate some of future expense reductions; we want to reallocate that to other initiatives. nitiatives like digital, initiatives like automation, initiatives like investment in our predictive analytics of our underwriting, which will improve our business long term.”