Industry news

Essex County Council has just embarked on the first phase of implementing a new speech recognition solution.

Eckoh Plc, a provider of speech recognition and payment solutions, and Azzurri Communications, a provider of managed communications services won the contract with Essex County Council, with Eckoh developing and implementing the solution.

Essex County Council has switched to speech recognition technology in a bid to reduce call waiting times, free up contact centre agents and achieve cost savings for the Council which services 1.4 million people.

“What is paramount to Essex Council is the delivery of first class customer service to all our residents in the most cost efficient manner,” said Robert Overall, deputy chief, Essex County Council.

Tech Mahindra and Mahindra Satyam yesterday announced that they have signed a Global Framework Agreement with CA Technologies, a global IT management and security software and solutions company.

The new partnership is aimed at building a business model where shared and managed services can be provided to new and existing customers through a joint and strategic approach, and has been in the pipeline since 2012.

“It is a moment of pride for me as two majors of the IT industry partner to offer superior service offerings for our joint customers. This relationship will provide a platform to co-invest in creating business solutions together to meet next generation needs of global CxOs. This arrangement is closely aligned with our strategy of building an ecosystem of like-minded partners”, said CP.Gurnani, CEO, Mahindra Satyam.

Tech Mahindra and Mahindra Satyam, together with CA Technologies, provide turnkey cloud computing services based on CA Technologies tools. This agreement further creates a growth engine that will make a viable business model to respond to the needs of the market at competitive prices.

Ten outsourcing businesses have been shortlisted to deliver the government’s new Personal Independence Payments (PIP) scheme. PIP is a new benefit that will replace the Disability Living Allowance (DLA) in April 2013, with a target of delivering 20% cost reductions in efficiency.

The government are taking a multisourcing approach, as there will be four regional contracts as well as one national lot up for grabs.

Controversially, French firm Atos have been shortlisted, despite the previous criticism over the deliverance of the Work Capability Assessment (WCA) project. Other shortlisted companies include outsourcing specialists Serco and Capita, global security company G4S and Ingeus Deloitte,

Conversely, A4e, the back to work training agency, have not been shortlisted, pending an investigation by the Department for Work and Pensions for fraud.

The total net worth of the contracts is expected to be around £300 million to £1 billion. The shortlist will be officially confirmed on 30th April, subject to a ten day cooling off period.

Indian IT services provider, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) has reported a 24% increase in sales and over 20% increase in staff in the last financial year.

Becaming the first Indian IT firm to post over $10 billion in annaual sales revenue, TCS posted a profit of $2.2 billion. The firm also increased their workforce by 39,969, taking their toal to 238,583 employees.

Aj oy Mukherjee, head of global human resources said: “With business demand continuing to be robust, we have made 43,600 offers on campuses for trainees to join us from the second quarter of this fiscal year.”

“Our efforts to increase retention by engaging with our employees and offering them a progressive career path are paying dividends with attrition rates falling further.”

A survey has revealed that most UK consumers would cease business with or leave an organisation that lost personal data.

The survey by Canon looked at customers in the UK, France and Germany and, on average, 76% of 4,000 customers would leave. The UK had the highest with 80%.

Respondents would be most likely to leave if their bank details were lost, followed by other personal data such as passwords and personal records.

The survey follows reports that 87% of UK businesses admitted they would be unable to identify data breaches within the 24 hour timeframe proposed in new EU legislation.

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has suspended funding for a training programme for offshore Filipino nationals. The trainees were educated to work in English speaking call centres.

The scheme has drawn heavy criticism since it was reported last week, as it was seen as a threat to American call centre workers.

After several congressmen expressed their outrage at the scheme, the funding has been pulled.

“In response to the concerns you have raised, the Agency is suspending its participation in the English language training project in Mindanao pending further review of the facts,” said USAID deputy assistant administrator Barbara Feinstein, in a letter Monday to Congressman Tim Bishop.

The letter continued: “Furthermore, the Agency has established a high-level taskforce to review these matters.”

The US government have removed IT giant Oracle from a list of approved public-sector vendors. Oracle will no longer receive invitations to tender for public sector contracts. The news follows a legal dispute in which Oracle has been accused of overcharging.

The news will come as a blow to Oracle, as the General Services Administration have now cancelled the GSA IT Schedule 70 programme, which provided the IT firm with $388 million of business in 2011.

The move follows a high profile legal battle between Oracle and the US government in which Oracle agreed to pay a settlement of $199.5 million in compensation.

The bar will come in to effect from May this year, although Oracle will continue to receive upkeep fees for the public sector infrastructure they have already provided.

The GSA has issued a statement in which it said that working with Oracle "was not in the best interests of the government".

Fujitsu has announced it will release a new set of software tools designed for the analaysis and processing of big data.

The IT giant announced on Monday that the server software will be developed with the aims of being able to handle large, varied file systems, quickly scanning huge amounts of data, and quickly storing and reading information from databases. Fujitsu will also be developing dedicated hardware for the software and will launch at the end of next March.

At a press conference Kazuo Iamad said: "We're just starting from scratch, but eventually we'd like to achieve ¥100 billion (US$1.23 billion) in annual sales in this business."

Capita has announced plans to raise £290 million for new acquisitions and will place 40 million new shares on the stock exchange.

The outsourcers have already spent £90 million this year purchasing smaller rivals, hoping that the acquisitions will offer new opportunities abroad, as budget cuts in the UK continue to take their toll.

Capita said: “The board had expected acquisition activity to reduce during 2012. However, in assessing the pipeline of potential opportunities since the preliminary results, the board has concluded that the acquisition environment continues to offer a rare opportunity to broaden the business.”

Capita currently administer council tax for around a third of Britain’s homes, and achieved a 14% return on investments over the past four years.

Vodafone will purchase Cable & Wireless Plc for 38 pence a share in a deal that has been promoted by the directors of Cable & Wireless.

The acquisition of Cable & Wireless will provide Vodafone with an additional mobile fixed-line network as well as increasing Vodafone’s business users. At present the main shareholder, Orbis Holdings Ltd, have yet to agree on the terms of the purchase.

The agreement came about as Tata Communications (TCOM) pulled out of the bidding for Cable & Wireless after failing to settle on a price. Vodafone Chief Executive Officer Vittorio Colao, said “The acquisition of Cable & Wireless Worldwide creates a leading integrated player in the enterprise segment of the U.K.”