eur december 2012 15pp
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Home
european news
editor’s comment
mitiGate tHe security risks of
Virtualisation
German freiGHt firm Virtualises
data storaGe
How to cut a deal for your outsourcinG
datacentre enerGy metrics
GuauGe Green it
tHe cios in europe driVinG biG data
analytics
soutHern europe mobile reVenues
plummet
CWThe DIGITAL mAGAzIne for europeAn IT LeADers from CompuTer WeekLy DeCember 2012
Thin
ksTo
ck
Realise the benefits of virtualisation
in safetyhoW To CuT rIsk WhILe you CuT your
hArDWAre AnD enerGy CosTs
CW Europe December 2012 2
Home
european news
editor’s comment
mitiGate tHe security risks of
Virtualisation
German freiGHt firm Virtualises
data storaGe
How to cut a deal for your outsourcinG
datacentre enerGy metrics
GuauGe Green it
tHe cios in europe driVinG biG data
analytics
soutHern europe mobile reVenues
plummet
EuropEan nEws
Google pushes infrastructure as a service into Europe
Google has expanded its infrastructure-as-a-service (iaas) cloud-computing platform into Europe and reduced the price of its cloud-based storage by 20%. From 1 December 2012, the price for up to 1TB of storage was reduced by $0.025 per month, to $0.095.
German retailer Otto invests in neural software
German retail giant otto invested capital for a start-up analytics software sup-plier and achieved 40% improvement in demand forecasting from the technology. The company chose Blue Yonder to help it improve on overstocking items and failing to meet customer demand.
Telecity buys Finnish datacentre operator
Telecity Group has bought Finland-based datacentre operator Academica for €28m (£22.4m). The Academica acquisition provides Telecity with a capacity of 3MW in helsinki.
EU gives green light to £530m superfast broadband plans
The EU has given the green light to the Uk government to roll out £530m in broadband funding. The move is intended to bring superfast broadband to 90% of homes, and a minimum speed of 2Mbps.
Russian internet blacklist law comes into effect
Russia has introduced a new law osten-sibly aimed at sites with images of child abuse and other illegal material, but the law has raised fears of censorship.
SAP Teched MAdrid: SAP chiefS urge buSineSSeS To go digiTAl
sAp urged businesses to rethink core business values to become more consumer-centric using mobile, social, cloud and business intelligence (bI) during sAp Teched.
During the event in madrid, bill mcDermott, co-Ceo of sAp, addressed delegates via a video link at the opening by saying: “There will be another two billion consumers by 2030, and they want to purchase in the digital world.”
UK citizens back pre-emptive cyber strikes, poll shows
nearly two-thirds of Uk citizens back pre-emptive cyber strikes on states that pose a credible threat to national security, a survey has revealed. A total of 1,000 people were polled by onePoll for secu-rity information event management firm LogRhythm, which compiled the report.
Dublin Airport turns to virtualisation for CCTV data
The Dublin Airport Authority (DAA) has announced plans to use virtualised serv-ers. The organisation will use them to store ccTV data for easy retrieval and improved management.
European Parliament opposes UN control of the internet
European MPs are the latest grouping to voice concerns that the international Telecommunication Union (iTU) could get control of the internet through its coming revision of telecoms rules. n
AddiTionAl reSourceS
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› scenes from emc momentum 2012
› computer weekly supplier directory
› snw europe 2012 coVeraGe
› citrix synerGy barcelona 2012
CW Europe December 2012 3
Home
european news
editor’s comment
mitiGate tHe security risks of
Virtualisation
German freiGHt firm Virtualises
data storaGe
How to cut a deal for your outsourcinG
datacentre enerGy metrics
GuauGe Green it
tHe cios in europe driVinG biG data
analytics
soutHern europe mobile reVenues
plummet
Editor’s commEnt
Virtualisation: In pursuit of efficiency
Despite having gone through several phases over the past few years, virtualisation is still very much a word of the moment. it has ena-
bled many users to reduce their hardware assets and make iT more efficient, with multiple virtual machines running on the same hardware.
Moving beyond the mainframe, the term virtuali-sation is now often used to refer to a wide range of technologies, including products for platform, desk-top, server, storage, application and network.
Many benefits come with virtualisation; however, as it spreads into a variety of technology areas it is important iT professionals keep up with the skills and expertise required of them to ensure their busi-ness remains safe and efficient.
The rise of cloud computing and budget con-straints means more businesses are opting for virtual environments on premise and in the cloud. however, a lack of expertise in these areas may be exposing businesses to unnecessary security risks.
in this issue of cW Europe, read about why researchers and other members of the security industry believe virtualisation security is often either overlooked or tagged on. Find out what the information security Forum (isF) recommends for those considering virtualisation and top tips to sup-port you in your decision.
A case study involving German Federal office for Freight Transport – Bundesamt für Güterverkehr (BAG) – reveals how it used storage virtualisation to overcome data management issues.
BAG is responsible for controlling and monitor-ing freight transport services in Germany. Due to tight budget constraints, the organisation’s iT team needed to find a way of “doing more with less” and turned to storage virtualisation to solve its data storage challenges.
in this issue you will also find a selection of Euro-pean news and additional resources about virtuali-sation and other hot topics throughout Europe. n
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CW Europe December 2012 4
Home
european news
editor’s comment
mitiGate tHe security risks of
Virtualisation
German freiGHt firm Virtualises
data storaGe
How to cut a deal for your outsourcinG
datacentre enerGy metrics
GuauGe Green it
tHe cios in europe driVinG biG data
analytics
soutHern europe mobile reVenues
plummet
Virtualisation sEcurity
Researchers and other members of the security industry believe that, in addition to a general lack of under-
standing about how virtual environments work, the business focus on performance and cost often means security is either over-looked or tagged on only at the end.
According to Forrester security and risk analyst Andrew Rose, many iT professionals think a virtual server is the same as a physi-cal one, even though the risks are different.
As organisations seek the economic ben-efits of virtualising their iT environments, servers are no longer individual pieces of
equipment hard-wired into carefully con-trolled physical networks. instead, they are complex software instances running on top of virtual networks and connecting to increasingly virtualised storage layers, and data protection must change accordingly.
so what should information security pro-fessionals do to ensure their organisations’ virtual environments are secure as well as cost efficient? The information security Forum (isF) has worked with its members to identify key responses that have been included in a standard of good practice for securing virtual environments.
Thin
ksTo
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Cost pressures and the rise of cloud computing have led many businesses to turn to lower-cost virtual environments on the premises and in the cloud, but a lack of expertise and experience may be exposing these organisations to unnecessary security risks. Warwick Ashford reports
Seeking Nirvana: In search of virtualisation without security risk
CW Europe December 2012 5
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european news
editor’s comment
mitiGate tHe security risks of
Virtualisation
German freiGHt firm Virtualises
data storaGe
How to cut a deal for your outsourcinG
datacentre enerGy metrics
GuauGe Green it
tHe cios in europe driVinG biG data
analytics
soutHern europe mobile reVenues
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suppliers adhere to the same good practices.Lee newcombe, managing consultant at
capgemini, says he supports the view that security professionals must consider new strategies and technologies to apply the most appropriate security controls in such virtualised environments.
“We should not simply be replicating the familiar deployment models from the physi-cal world in the virtual world,” he says.
Traditional n-tier architecture – which separates out the presentation, application and data tiers via physical firewalls – is not as effective in the virtual world, he says, where there may be two or more of these tiers hosted on the same physical hardware.
Consider compliancein designing security for virtualised environ-ments, newcombe advises that information security professionals consider compliance
The isF believes these key responses should include:n Establishing a policy for the use of
virtual servers;n Limiting the number of virtual servers that
can run on a single physical server;n controlling the number of critical business
applications run on a single server.Virtual servers should be protected by
applying standard security management practices to hypervisors, which are the key points of protection, says Adrian Davis, principal research analyst at the isF.
These practices include: applying a strict change management; monitoring, reporting and reviewing super-user activities; restrict-ing access to the virtual server management console; and monitoring network traffic between different virtual servers and between virtual servers and physical servers to detect malicious or unexpected behaviour.
“Each virtual server should be protected by applying similar security management practices to those applied to physical servers, including restricting physical access, system hardening, applying change management and malware protection, monitoring and performing regular reviews, and applying network-based security controls such as firewalls, intrusion detection and data leak-age protection,” says Davis.
he also believes that security professionals should not consider only virtualised environ-ments in their own organisation, but should also focus on virtualised environments in their suppliers, and demand that those
Virtualisation sEcurity
TiPS for virTuAl SecuriTy deSign
n Consider compliance requirements. Are there any requirements that enforce a degree of physical separation? such requirements may necessitate multiple virtualised environments with physical firewall (or air-gapped) separation.n Identify the resources that the service requires to function. Think in terms of network access, compute resource and storage rather than servers and network segments.n Identify the different types of users that require access to the service, for example external users, internal users or trusted partners.n Group the identified resources into zones (security domains) based on the characteristics of the data, user communities and access requirements.n Conduct a risk assessment. Identify the risks that need to be managed per zone.n base the security controls around these zones; controlling and monitoring the activities within each zone and, more importantly, controlling and monitoring the interactions across each zone.
“Each virtual sErvEr should bE protEctEd by applying similar sEcurity managEmEnt practicEs to thosE appliEd to physical sErvErs”adrian davis, isF
CW Europe December 2012 6
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Virtualisation sEcurity
Security standards for virtualisationBut securing a virtual environment is not just about focusing on technology; you also need to look at standards, processes, con-trols, monitoring and logging, says kevin Wharram of the London chapter isAcA security Advisory Group.
in securing virtual environments, informa-tion professionals first have to identify what virtualisation technology their organisation has in-house. “it is then advisable to find various online resources for securing that technology, such as VMware security advi-sories,” says Wharram. n
requirements, identify resources required, identify types of users who will access data, conduct a risk assessment, group resources into zones or security domains, and base security controls around these zones.
Gartner researcher Trent henry says that by providing virtual switches that allow communication between guests on a physi-cal host, virtualisation hides a considerable amount of traffic from traditional physical network protection, including intrusion detection and intrusion prevention systems.
“Zoning and network visibility not only help with defence in depth, but also answer compliance obligations and limit infrastruc-ture scope for audits,” says henry. Gartner clients take three approaches: routing virtual traffic to physical choke points (routers/firewalls); increasing protection in guests via system firewalls; and using hypervisor- integrated protection like virtual firewalls. While controlling and monitoring the activi-ties within, and interactions between, secu-rity zones is important, this often raises concerns, says capgemini’s newcombe.
“in a virtualised server environment you are limited to the firewalling and monitoring tools that the virtualised management infrastructure can support unless you can afford the expense of physical firewalls and multiple virtualised server farms,” he says.
“Furthermore, the hypervisor itself repre-sents a single point of separation failure that is not present in the physical world, albeit one that may have undergone formal secu-rity evaluation.” newcombe believes security professionals need to be pragmatic, adapting to the capabilities of virtualised environ-ments and making the best use of these new capabilities, rather than seeking to simply “lift and shift” designs from the physical world to the virtual world. Warwick Ashford is the security editor of Computer Weekly
iSf recoMMendATionS
n segregate virtual servers according to the confidentiality requirements of data they process.n separate virtual servers to prevent data being transferred between discrete environments.n restrict access to a limited number of authorised individuals (eg hypervisor administrators)
capable of creating virtual servers and making changes to them correctly and securely.n encrypt communications between virtual servers (eg using secure sockets Layer or Ipsec).n segregate the roles of hypervisor administrators (for multiple virtual servers).
“in a virtualisEd sErvEr EnvironmEnt you arE limitEd to thE FirEwalling and monitoring tools that thE virtualisEd managEmEnt inFrastructurE can support unlEss you can aFFord thE ExpEnsE oF physical FirEwalls and multiplE virtualisEd sErvEr Farms”lEE nEwcombE, capgEmini
CW Europe December 2012 7
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Virtualisation
German freiGHt firm Virtualises
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casE study
German public sector firm beats storage woes with virtualisation
Data management was becoming a big problem for the German Federal office for Freight Transport, Bunde-
samt für Güterverkehr (BAG). As a limited budget forced the iT team to
do more with less, it turned to storage virtualisation to beat data challenges in a cost-effective way.
BAG is responsible for multiple tasks relating to the control and monitoring of transport services in Germany.
The functions and responsibilities of its 1,700 employees ranges from the central data system that coordinates deferred toll calculation to driver registration and trans-port law, from truck tolls to the overseeing of multiple aspects of the transport market.
one of the biggest challenges facing the office is the growth of data, says colja steinmetzler, systems administrator at BAG. The data at BAG stemmed from various sources; from email programmes to the
UMTs-connected mobile client.“The abundance of tasks does not make
the job of the planning iT resources any easier,” he says.
Strict standards in GermanyAs with all public bodies in Germany, BAG is required to abide by strict standards of cost-efficiency in planning and operating its iT facilities.
These standards include the total cost, but also the consideration of the effective life-span. Any purchase must be economically sustainable, with an operational duration of at least three to five years, says steinmetzler.
For the iT team at BAG, it was important to develop a storage system that was flexible and scalable in every sense.
“Performance should not be put at risk at any cost. This is a challenge in the fast moving world of iT, and one that is even more specific to storage systems in the
German transport organisation BAG turned to virtualisation when its data storage burden looked set to overwhelm capacity, writes Antony Adshead
As with all German public sector organisations, bAG is obliged to observe strict
standards of efficiency
CW Europe December 2012 8
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backdrop of exponential data growth,” steinmetzler says.
“We could be assigned new tasks and responsibilities at any time. With a planned system life-span of five years, we need a high degree of flexibility,” he adds.
Storage from Hitachi Data Systemssteinmetzler is responsible for the challenge of dealing with all things storage-related.
For a number of years now, the iT team has been using storage products from hitachi Data systems (hDs).
it was using hDs’s Universal storage Platform (UsP V) to store around 140 appli-cations serving the 12 field offices and their employees. For its files, it used hDs’s net-work attached storage (nAs) product.
The nAs system was integrated in the environment via common internet file sys-tem (ciFs) and network file system (nsF), says steinmetzler.
But as data continued to explode and as data retention regulations became stricter, the iT team realised that an increase in storage capacity was necessary.
The organisation had already virtualised its servers using VMware’s sphere platform and was reaping the benefits. hence, it decided to add storage virtualisation as the next step. it selected Virtual storage Platform (VsP) from hDs for storage virtualisation.
Cost recovery instead of simply increasing storage from 60TB to 120TB, the team decided to change to a higher performing virtualised storage system which would be more economical, efficient and easily scalable.
“Because of its modular nature, it can be easily expanded, with an upgrade of storage and cPU power being both quick and inex-pensive,” he says.
The project would not just bring flexibility and scalability, but it also helped BAG cut the electricity and cooling costs used by its old non-virtualised storage hardware.
But the results were better than expected, says steinmetzler. The cost savings with the new virtualised systems were about 52% every year.
such savings mean that the initial set-up cost of the project would be gained back within the first three years of the project’s five-year lifespan, he says.
As part of the migration, the team con-ducted a test run that showed the viability of the planned migration process. it also used hitachi Truecopy Licence – a replication technology – which made the process less stressful, says steinmetzler. n
casE study
dublin AirPorT overhAulS iT wiTh virTuAliSATion
As workloads expanded at Dublin Airport Authority, it launched a major IT infrastructure over-haul in 2012 with hp’s converged infrastructure and Vmware vsphere platform. In under a year, the virtualisation project has given the IT team cost savings, standardised IT, highly available infrastructure and a centrally managed environment.
The virtualisation project at Dublin Airport Authority (DAA) is a five-year IT plan worth about €2m (£1.6m) and will drive IT efficiency across its airports and bring cost savings.
It all started when the IT team started developing a virtualisation test environment in 2010 on microsoft’s hyper-V platform.
“We used hyper-V for testing and found out that virtualisation brought a lot of IT efficiency, improved our speed to delivery and helped us save costs,” said martin Clohessy, server and stor-age manager at DAA.
but for the actual production environment, it chose Vmware’s vsphere platform for a more stable and high-performance infrastructure.
While the IT team found the hyper-V platform-based test environment efficient and cost-effective, when systems failed, it took too long to failover the system to another server, said David mcCabe, technology solutions manager at DAA.
Antony Adshead is the storage editor of Computer Weekly
This an edited excerpt. Click here to read the full article online
CW Europe December 2012 9
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outsourcing
Organisations in many sectors are seeking to renew the terms of their contractual agreements as they attempt to weather the
economic climate. iT outsourcing is going through substantial change as the result of an economic downturn of extreme propor-tions and major advances in technology.
Tight budgets and increased service options resulting from new technologies – such as the cloud – mean many iT out-sourcing contracts are no longer fit for pur-pose or present the best option available.
For example, a bank might have signed a 10-year agreement to outsource its data-centres in 2006; but a lot has changed since then. The financial services crash of 2008 might mean the bank has fewer customers, processes a smaller number of transactions and has less money. At the same time, cloud computing has matured, meaning the bank does not require as much datacentre space and does not need to pay for equipment up front. Retail, manufacturing and travel sectors are all examples of markets hit hard by recession and targeting new technologies to help them recover.
Downturn drives renegotiationsteve Tuppen, director at sourcing advisory isG, says the company’s tax and price index (TPi) shows that renegotiations across all types of outsourcing contracts are on the rise.
“As a proportion of total outsourcing contracts awarded, they are at a 10-year high, at 33%, and the first quarter of 2012 revealed an even higher figure of 44%,” says Tuppen.
in the first half of 2012, restructured contracts worth €20m or more made up 15% of total iT outsourcing contracts, he adds: “iT outsourcing contracts are simply a projection of future requirements and renegotiations are now seen as a normal adjustment to changing business conditions.”
Many businesses today find themselves in ineffective iT outsourcing agreements and need to change. kit Burden, head of technology sourcing at law firm DLA Piper, says the number of contract renegotiations has been high over the past year.
“We were doing almost as many renegotiations as new deals last year. it has eased off, but there are still a lot,” says Burden.
he says that, while some of the negotiations are attempts by the client to reduce costs further, many are driven by a desire to restructure deals that were hurriedly agreed.
“The first wave of deals, done in haste during the first stages of the recession, are in trouble and need to be reworked,” says Burden.
“As a customer’s business has constricted during the recession, the pricing regime hasn’t flexed as much as intended and so the deal has become uneconomic.”
How to renegotiate your outsourcing agreementsAs European firms boost services budgets to weather the economic climate, many are finding their existing deals are unfit for purpose, reports Karl Flinders
The events of recent years may mean banks’ outsourcing deals are no
longer fit for purpose
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outsourcing
Reasons to rethink your contractTuppen at isG says reasons for renegotiating can be broken down into internal or external factors. The main internal factor is low satisfaction, he says. he cites an isG survey that found, on average, companies reported receiving only 72% of the value they anticipated from outsourcing contracts. Tuppen says deals that lack clearly defined objectives and structures are most likely to have lower levels of satisfaction.
“This is not always the supplier’s fault – unrealistic client expectations and low cli-ent investment in managing the relationship can also lead to contract renegotiation,” he adds. Tuppen also says that contracts are not always renegotiated for negative reasons: “it can also be to increase scope within a successful relationship and can be triggered by the service provider – which has identified an opportunity to introduce innovative prac-tices or technologies that add increased value.”
he says external factors that trigger a desire to renegotiate might be a change in busi-ness conditions; mergers and acquisitions; new service offers or channels; and the desire to embrace technologies and processes.
Peter schumacher, cEo at management consultancy Value Leadership Group, says in the current economic conditions buyers are primarily aiming to cut costs and improve the performance of services suppliers. “A typical problem is that incumbent suppli-ers – offshore and traditional – become complacent over the years. contracts are often renegotiated or a second supplier introduced to keep the prime supplier on its toes and create a wake-up call,” he says. schumacher adds that there is often a problem when iT services providers interpret agreements differently to customers: “over time, companies find that these contracts do not properly reflect operational realities and actual capabili-ties of the business/supplier.”
Robert Morgan, director at sourcing consultancy Burnt oak Partners, says the number of renegotiations he is dealing with has increased by 50% over the past year. he says businesses are in a strong negotiating position: “it is open season from clients which are approaching a break or merely because they feel that they can extract a better price from the market – and they can.”
Factors driving renegotiations include competitors to the incumbent supplier offering price cuts which the customer can use to get a better price on the existing deal, says Morgan. This combined with pressure on procurement teams to reduce costs is even leading to recently signed contracts being renegotiated. n
Karl Flinders is the services editor for Computer Weekly
euroPeAn ouTSourcing budgeTS uP 14% in Three MonThS
megadeals are driving increased total spending on outsourcing in europe, which had the highest total spend of all global regions in the third quarter of this year.
european businesses increased outsourcing investments by 14% in the third quarter of 2012, compared with the previous three months, but spent 12% less than the same period a year ago, according to the latest TpI index.
research from Information services Group (IsG) also revealed that megadeals fuelled the rise in europe, with over half of global megadeals worth over £80m signed in the region.
Globally, the number of megadeals signed in 2012 is up 60% and has already surpassed the full-year total of 2011.
monitoring deals worth over €4m a year, the research found that a total of €2bn was spent in europe on outsourcing in the quarter.
This is an edited excerpt. Click here to read the full article online
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datacEntrE hardwarE
Aglobal taskforce, comprising government authorities and industry body The Green Grid, have selected three new metrics to improve a datacentre’s energy efficiency. The metrics are Green Energy coefficient (GEc), Energy Re-use Fac-tor (ERF) and carbon Usage Effectiveness (cUE).
GEc, ERF and cUE will now join the metric Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE), currently used by datacentre managers globally. PUE was developed by The Green Grid in 2011.
PUE is determined by dividing the amount of power entering a datacentre by the power used to run the computer infrastructure in it. Although used widely, experts have pointed out datacentre cases where PUE does not work.
The new performance metrics by the global taskforce aim to help datacentre operators understand their facilities’ energy performance quickly and easily.
The taskforce included the Us Department of Energy’s Advanced Manufacturing office and Federal Energy Management Programs; the Us Environmental Protection Agency’s Energy star programme; the European commission Joint Research center (JRc) Data centers code of conduct; Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and industry; Japan’s Green iT Promotion council; and The Green Grid.
“We want to make it as easy as possible for the datacentre community to understand and embrace these metrics, and how they can work together,” says Joyce Dickerson, board member of The Green Grid. “When implemented correctly, they can save organi-sations a lot of time, money, and additional resources.”
The first new metric - GEc - will quantify the portion of a datacentre facility’s energy
Energy taskforce adopts datacentre efficiency metricsDatacentre operators have new metrics to calculate how much energy comes from green sources and is exported for re-use. Archana Venkatraman reports
CW Europe December 2012 12
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datacEntrE hardwarE
that comes from green sources. The metric can be calculated on the basis of the green energy consumed by the datacentre (in kWh – kilowatt-hour) divided by total energy consumed by the datacentre (in kWh).
The second metric – ERF – will identify the portion of energy that is exported for re-use outside of the datacentre infrastructure. ERF can be computed as re-use energy divided by total energy consumed by the datacentre.
The third datacentre energy efficiency metric – cUE – aims to enable an assessment of the total greenhouse gas emissions of a datacentre relative to its iT energy consumption.
it can be calculated as the total carbon dioxide emission equivalents (co2eq) from the energy consumption of the facility divided by the total iT energy consumption.
“Although there is more work to do, we think the new metrics will bring us one step closer to a universally adopted set of metrics, indices and measurement protocols that will have a positive effect on the industry,” says Dickerson.
The three new metrics were selected through discussion, exercise and trial among the taskforce participants.
The datacentre efficiency taskforce has also launched a memo which provides a frame-work for users to approach the metrics holistically, ensuring datacentre owners and operators can assess and improve the performance of their mission-critical facilities.
“Taking an environmentally intelligent approach to energy efficiency will be critical to satisfy the demands of the regulatory authorities,” says Dominic Philips, managing direc-tor of Datum.
“Datacentres cannot easily claim to be green, but what they can do is ensure that energy is used efficiently and intelligently,” he adds.
The taskforce aims to harmonise metrics and measurement protocols for key energy-efficiency metrics.
The taskforce will continue collaboration as an ongoing effort to improve datacentre energy and greenhouse gas emission efficiencies, according to The Green Grid. n
“datacEntrEs can EnsurE EnErgy is usEd EFFiciEntly and intElligEntly”dominic philips
datum
Archana Venkatraman is the datacentre editor for Computer Weekly
hAlf of enTerPriSe dATA STored ouTSide The dATAcenTre
Globally, almost half (46%) of enterprise information is being stored outside of its own data-centre, with 23% stored in the cloud as mobile computing and cloud services go mainstream, according to the State of Information Report 2012 from symantec.
The report, launched at symantec Vision 2012 in barcelona, highlights the significant effect of cloud computing and mobility on businesses today.
“With mobile devices and cloud giving employees access to information from nearly any-where, we’re also seeing more sensitive information living beyond the traditional IT boundaries,” says francis desouza, group president of enterprise products and services at symantec.
“This is creating concern about how to best protect this information.”The study shows 12% of business data resides on private or hybrid clouds and 11% of data on
the public cloud. The advantages in cost and agility presented by cloud computing are leading to significant use of the cloud to store business information, according to symantec.
CW Europe December 2012 13
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Gaining a better understanding of cus-tomers is the main motivation for big data programmes. This is one finding from a computer Weekly/TechTarget
survey of 184 Uk and continental European iT and business professionals who are primarily engaged with data matters.
The survey, carried out from July to september 2012, indicates the state of big data technology adoption, but also brings out the business drivers for big data programmes.
The survey ranged beyond big data and revealed that organisations are investing signifi-cantly in data management and business intel-ligence (Bi) more widely.
Customer understanding drives big data analyticsA pan-European survey reveals the motivations behind big data analyses lie in business growth and gaining competitive advantage. Brian McKenna reports
Thin
ksTo
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businEss growth, organic or by acquisition, EmErgEd as thE main drivEr in thE growth oF data volumEs
CW Europe December 2012 14
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some 56% of survey respondents expect to spend more on Bi and analytics over the next year. The survey found 43% are keen to spend more on data warehousing and ana-lytical databases.
nevertheless, a 27% planned increase in big data technologies is noteworthy, given these are still in the early days of adoption. some 23% of respondents already have big data programmes at various stages of development.
Business growth, organic or by acquisition, emerged as the main driver in the growth of data volumes. Gaining better customer understanding is expressed as the main moti-vation for big data programmes (50%), and organisations see big data as a way to gain competitive advantage (48%).
social media data – much discussed in big data circles – is important, say respondents. some 33% said they were looking to track sentiment towards their organisations on social networks.
But more important still is machine data, with 38% seeking to make better use of sensor and log data to improve operations.
Although the survey shows that big data is for real, advanced technologies that pre-date the big data hype – such as data mining and predictive analytics – are still ahead in adoption.
currently 63% of respondents carry out data mining, 62% use predictive analytics, and 48% use big data analytics.
Moreover, the days of relational database tech-nologies are far from over.
only 20% of respondents said they find existing relational databases and data warehousing to be inadequate for dealing with new forms of data, such as video, images and social media data.
structured data emerges as critical still. its importance has not been eclipsed by unstruc-tured data, commonly said to comprise 80% of any organisation’s data. n
social mEdia data – much discussEd in big data circlEs – is important, according to rEspondEnts. somE 33% said thEy wErE looking to track sEntimEnt towards thEir organisations on social nEtworks
Brian McKenna is the business applications editor for Computer Weekly
SwiSScoM reMoveS buSineSS inTelligence froM iT To SuPPorT buSineSS TrAnSforMATionDuring the integration of three separate groups of swiss telecoms provider swissCom, the busi-ness intelligence (bI) function was the only place to get a view of the whole organisation.
following its decision in 2008 to converge groups dedicated to fixed line, mobile and busi-ness services into a single company – with divisions serving consumers, smes and corporations – swissCom’s IT team was locked into protracted integration of enterprise resource planning (erp), customer relationship management (Crm) and billing systems, says Jean-marie fiechter, swissCom’s head of bI governance.
business intelligence was the only team to get a good view of the whole business at the time. “We helped the company survive,” fiechter says. “In the first year we were convergent, bI was more or less the only place where we could get data and do some of the reporting for control and management in a more or less convergent way.”
CW Europe December 2012 15
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Vodafone has reported a significant downturn in revenues for the first six months of fiscal year 2012, blaming markets in southern European countries. Revenues for the Vodafone group were down 7.4% year-on-year to just under £21.8bn. But in southern Europe, revenues for the period dropped 17.5% to
slightly shy of £5.4bn.Vodafone did not break down all of the countries in this section, but revealed that spain
and italy were the worst offenders when it came to service revenues, dropping 19.3% and 18.1% respectively, compared with 2011.
“We have continued to make progress on our strategic priorities over the last six months, with good growth in data and emerging markets in particular,” says Vittorio colao, cEo of the Vodafone Group.
“in the short term, however, our results reflect tougher market conditions, mainly in southern Europe. We remain very positive about the longer-term opportunities and our Vodafone 2015 strategy reflects our confidence in the future.”
key aspects of the Vodafone 2015 plan include a focus on unified communications in enterprise and growing exposure to emerging markets.
Revenues in northern and central Europe were not so badly affected, but still reported an overall fall in revenues of 1.5% year-on-year.
When it came to service revenues, the Uk tumbled by 2.6%, but Germany reported an even worse figure, falling 6.5% compared with 2011.
The one positive report Vodafone could celebrate was a £2.4bn dividend from Verizon Wireless, the Us mobile company it holds a 45% stake in. This is due to be paid by the end of 2012. n
uK beATS frAnce And gerMAny for SuPerfAST broAdbAnd, SAyS STAKeholder grouPThe uk is embracing superfast broadband at one of the fastest rates in europe.
figures released by the broadband stakeholder Group (bsG) show uk superfast broadband uptake remains below sweden, Denmark, portugal and the netherlands in the percentage of households with superfast broadband installed, at 6%.
both spain and Germany are below this number at 5%, with france coming in with 3%. Italy does not register on the chart.
The report shows the uk is one of the fastest growing areas, reaching current bandwidth in three years compared with nine for sweden and seven for Denmark.
only the netherlands and portugal have stronger growth rates. but as bsG points out, the netherlands has a much larger cable network, meaning more people could sign up.
The bsG report says there are a number of factors that could affect growth, including the qual-ity of the network and the price of superfast connections.
Jennifer Scott is the networking editor of Computer Weekly
Vodafone blames southern Europe as revenues plummetMobile operator reports substantial drop in revenues as the Eurozone crisis takes its toll on southern European network markets. Jennifer Scott reports
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