Industry news

UK employment has fallen by 2.49 million between September and November 2012, reaching an 18 month record low.

Figures released by the ONS also showed that people in work rose to 29.7 million.

The positive figures were offset by increase in unemployment in younger working generations, with unemployment in18-24 year olds increasing.

Employment Minister Mark Hoban commented on the release of the figures, saying: “These are very positive figures showing employment rising for 15 months and despite difficult economic circumstances”.

Shadow work and pensions secretary Liam Byrne, welcomed the results but cautioned the “shaky foundations” of the UK job sector.

Businesses are potentially wasting significant resources in storing unnecessary data.

Gartner warned that businesses are spending 20 percent more than necessary on backing up unnecessary data, with more than $10 billion being wasted worldwide.

The research pointed to a failure by many businesses, to effectively update their backup policies, resulting in worthless data being retained.

Dave Russell, research vice-president of Gartner, said: “Often, the problem is that companies mistake backup technology for data archiving,” adding, “Backup is largely for operational recovery, not for long-term retention.”

BT has been selected by Westminster Council to overhaul the departments HR and finance system.

The delivery of the contract is expected to create savings of around £30 million and will involve a complete overhaul over an eight year period.

The overhaul will focus on shared services and integration across London boroughs and will provide a system with increased flexibility.

A further 17 boroughs have expressed interest in pursuing similar contracts with BT.

The Student Loans Company is looking to tender a huge 11-year contract worth up to £100 million to redesign the company’s core business systems.

The contract will include the complete overhaul of security, software, development, programming and consultancy services.

The contract is expected to be awarded by September this year, with bidders needing to apply by 22nd February to have the chance to be included in the supplier shortlist.

Members of the European Commission have come out against the European Union Cloud Computing strategy.

The strategy has met opposition from EC committee members who have warned against the risk of stemming competition.

Both the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) have promoted alternative strategies, with a focus on local European businesses and the creation of an online dispute resolution scheme. The Cloud strategy has already faced opposition from America for red tape.

The development of the Affordable Care Act by President Barack Obama has created a rich market for outsourcing firms.

One company to take advantage has been Infosys, India’s second largest exporter of software.

Infosys has acquired four multimillion state contracts and is competing for four more contracts as Obama seeks to include a additional 30 million Americans under national health care coverage.

Healthcare is expected to become a major market for outsourcing firms, with the market having the potential to grow beyond defence and social security spend.

Figures released by the Information Services Group (ISG) have revealed a decline in ITO, reaching a five year low while the BPO market continues to expand.

The ISG TPI Index revealed that BPO has risen significantly, up 35 percent in 2012, as businesses shift from a ITO focus.

The annual value of contracts fell by 12 percent from 2011, with a 21 percent decrease in the numbers of contracts awarded, however overall contracts in Europe, the Middle East and Africa have doubled since 2007.

While global outsourcing fell, the UK remained a buoyant market despite a reduction in the numbers of contracts up for tender, with the annual value of contracts rising by 20 percent to €3.7 billion. The UK’s success was helped by several large financial services contracts.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) has been selected by National Rail to host the organisations primarily website.

The dominion nationalrail.co.uk is heavily subscribed by users for planning journeys and for updates regarding service conditions, receiving an average of 19 million visitors a month.

The AWS cloud will also support National Rail applications including the organisations real-time service feed.

Spanish banking giant Santander are considering the acquisition of Clydesdale and Yorkshire banks for £2 billion.

The acquisitions would allow Santander to increase its share of banking in the SME markets where both banks specialise.

Both Clydesdale and Yorkshire banks are owned by the National Bank of Australia, which is looking to sell on the banks as loss making organisations.

In the interview with the Independent, Santander UK's chief executive Ana Botin said: "We are currently working on plans to grow our retail business, our SME business, we are building a team for large corporates in the UK which we didn't have before."

Delhi will play host to the world’s largest IT offshore training centre this month as IT training giant Koenig Solutions opens the new institute.

The new centre contains over 50 classrooms and over 30 testing stations.

Koenig Solutions which specialises in offshore training provides training software including; Oracle, Cisco, Microsoft, Red Hat, Linux and Java. Koenig enjoys a strong market within the UK and over 400 UK individuals travel to India with the training organisation every year.