Industry news

Gas giant Centrica has ended plans for a major UK gas storage expansion after the government stated that subsidies would not be available.

Plans by the energy to construct two gas storage facilities, will no longer go ahead Centrica has announced, after energy minister Michael Fallon, confirmed that there will be no government subsidies offered for gas storage expansion.

The cancellation of the gas storage project means that hundreds of construction and maintenance jobs will no longer be created, as well as limiting the UK’s gas supplies to 21 days, far behind European contemporaries such as Germany and France, according to the gas giant.

The pull-out from UK infrastructure investment by Centrica, comes after the company turned down the opportunity to invest in the UK’s nuclear energy program.

Centrica reports increased profits from protracted winter

Centrica expected to write off £200 million after nuclear pull-out

The NHS has selected three firms to deliver a dentistry recruitment system across the UK.

The five-year contract was placed out for tender by Health Education England (HEE), with Hicom, Deloitte and Konetic selected to provide the recruitment system for training services to over 20,000 postgraduate students.

The new system is designed to reduce application and administration times, with Deloitte managing the delivery of the overall project.

The five-year contract will have the option to extend for a further two years, with the program being rolled out in stages across 2014.

NHS Shared Business Services secures supplier framework contract

Coinciding with strong performance indicators from the UK IT industry, the Welsh government have announced £1.4 million in investment for IT skills programs.

The Department for Education and Skills alongside the Department for the Economy, Science and Transport, have joined together to provide funding for two pilot training programmes, designed to develop IT skills for local industry.

The IT sector in Wales is currently experiencing a skills deficient, with limited numbers of employees failing to meet the high demand. 550 people are expected to be taken on between the two programmes, which seek to address the skill shortages.

UK economy being driven by IT despite existing skill gaps remaining

Growth spurt for technology start-ups

Sitel have issued its ‘‘Five Step guide to converting Christmas shoppers with Customer Service’ in preparation for a strong Christmas in retail.

The latest 2013 figures show online retail sales grew 20% year on year, with UK consumers spending an estimated 375m hours shopping online last December, 17m of those on Boxing Day.

With December 2013 set to be even busier, retailers prepare to focus on developing online platforms, in order to take advantage of the customer move away from the high street.

Joe Doyle, Marketing Director at Sitel UK, comments: “The challenge for high street retailers is to differentiate in the online space. The new role of the contact centre is connecting the dots to deliver an exceptional customer experience that stands out from all the others, by being there when consumers need you and available in the channel of their choosing. Web, social media and mobile are all now vital components in a successful omni-channel strategy.”

Sitel provides online customer support for a number of high street retailers including John Lewis. Sitel and John Lewis were recently awarded the prestigious European Outsourcing Association award for “Outsourcing Works” – Delivering Business Value in a Single European Outsourcing Project.

These kinds of success have led to Sitel issuing its “Five Step guide to converting Christmas shoppers with Customer Service”, which covers advice on adopting an omni-channel strategy, forecasting, recruitment, training and capacity planning.

Sitel named as global leader in social media services market

European Outsourcing Association Awards Winners

Lexmark’s Perceptive Software has been positioned in the Leaders Quadrant by analyst giants Gartner, for enterprise content management (ECM) solutions.

Perceptive Software’s technology platform spans content management, process management, intelligent capture and enterprise search.

The positioning comes as the company continues to enjoy double-digit market growth after a series of acquisitions.

Gartner, in positioning Perceptive Software as a Leader, said: “Perceptive has continued growing its international presence, particularly in Brazil where Lexmark is strong, and in the Asia/Pacific region. It has continued to attract channel partners, such as Deloitte and Jenzabar.

BT has had communications union CWU come to its defence after being accused of creating a rural broadband contract monopoly.

Criticism has come from multiple sources including the media and the Public Account s Committee (PAC), who last week published a damming report.

The union said that the telecoms giant was being unfairly blamed for its success in winning all of the available rural broadband contracts as part of the government’s scheme to deliver super-fast broadband throughout the UK.

The union said that BT was the only company who was willing to make the necessary investment in the project and that the size of the investment made the project high risk, as any return would not be seen for years.

Commons public accounts committee criticises BT broadband monopoly

UK broadband speeds increase rapidly as government spending sees strong results

Procurement reform is being stimulated by the Namibian government through a new bill, as the country seeks to streamline large public sector procurement, help SMEs and reduce loopholes.

The Public Procurement Bill which has been introduced into the National Assembly, would see the creation of a central procurement board.

Minister of finance Saara Kuugongelwa-Amadhila, who introduced the bill, said: “The intention is to provide for the speedy resolution of such complaints, which will minimise the frequency of bidders’ recourse to court actions.”

The bill would see the procurement board made up of nine members who would be industry experts.

Ghana creates government procurement group

South African watchdog attacks public sector procurement process

The CESG, the information security arm of GCHQ, have advised the government against employing BYOD policies within the public sector.

While the group said that while BYOD polices are possible, issuing security guidance for a range of devices, a range of technical and non-technical issues meant the security group did not recommend the practice.

The CESG said that if such a policy was pursued, systems administrators should establish a helpdesk to deal with lost or stolen devices, with functionality for remote lock and wiping functions. The CESG said: “Different devices will expose organisations to different risks and in different ways”.

UK industries to receive cybersecurity advice from GCHQ

Former UK spy centre CIO joins CSC

Financial institutions including the Bank of America and insurance giant Aviva, have attacked George Osborne, for removing a key green clause from the new Energy Bill.

The clause, which promoted decarbonisation targets, would have promoted green energy within the UK’s energy network, ensuring near blanket coverage of all electrical needs by green sources by 2030.

Opponents to the removal of the clause, said that its inclusion in the energy bill, was vital to stimulating an overhaul of the UK’s energy framework, valued at up to £110 billion.

The removal of the clause has led energy firm s to hold back on moving forward with green energy investments in the lead up to the release of the UK government’s energy policy.

Ben Warren, a partner at EY, said: “The UK has the potential to offer a safe harbour for renewable energy investors in Europe, but the delay in delivering a stable policy framework is weakening our prospects and holding back investment.”

Centrica pulls out of energy infrastructure expansion

UK plans for fracking are unsustainable warns a new report

HCL have been awarded a £19 million contract to provide SAP management services to two London borough councils.

The London Boroughs of Haringey and Waltham Forest selected Indian based HCL to deliver new SAP modules as well as upgrading existing SAP infrastructure. HCL replaces incumbent CGI (formally Logica) who had been providing SAP services over the last ten years to the two boroughs.

HCL will also deliver cloud computing services and IaaS capabilities over the six year contract, with the option to extend for a further four years.

The SAP contract expands on HCL’s existing arrangements to provide public services to Buckinghamshire, Manchester and Sunderland councils.

Barnet Council saved by Capita

Centrica award £18.9 million contract to Capgemini