EMC, IBM dominate NetApp in Storage Market for Middle East and Africa

The Nigerian market has continued to drive the resurgence of the external storage market in the Middle East and Africa region, with impressive results that has seen EMC and IBM dominating in that market. The external storage market in the Middle East and Africa  (MEA) region suffered a year-on-year decline in the last quarter of 2012,  according  to  the  latest  data from International Data Corporation (IDC),  the  premier  global  provider  of  market  intelligence,  advisory services,  and events for the information technology, telecom, and consumer technology  markets.  Referencing its EMEA Quarterly Disk Storage Systems

Tracker, the research firm today announced that external storage revenue in the MEA region plummeted year on year in Q4 2012 to total $272 million, with terabyte capacity rising slightly by a modest 8% over the same period.

''The  decline  can be attributed to a considerable reduction in the number of  projects  in  the  MEA  region  involving  large-scale deployments when compared to previous years," says Swapna Subramani, senior research analyst at  IDC Middle East, Africa, and Turkey. "However, we remain bullish on the external  storage  trend  moving forward owing to the overall resilience of the  market,  which  will  be  bolstered  by  new  projects  and government initiatives in the health and education sectors."

In the Middle East, Saudi Arabia was the only country to register strong year-on-year growth, expanding 60% in Q4 2012. "This growth was driven by several projects in the Kingdom’s telecommunications and education sectors," says Subramani.

The UAE external storage market experienced a 3% year-on-year decline in revenue during Q4 2012, while in contrast Qatar posted modest growth of 9%, fueled by demand from the government and education sectors. "IDC expects to see further growth within the government, automotive, financial services, and petrochemicals sectors, among others in the region," says Subramani.

The   North   Africa  region  (including  Morocco,  Algeria,  and  Tunisia) experienced  a  continued  slump in Q4 2012 as a result of political unrest and  spiraling  inflation.  South Africa also faced a decline in Q4 2012 owing to the seasonal/cyclical trend of infrastructure uptake in the country.  Nigeria  was  the  bright spot within the African market, posting healthy  double-digit  growth  that  can  be  attributed  to  deals  in the financial   and  telecommunications  sectors.  ‘‘Enterprise deals in key verticals will continue  to  play a pivotal role in shaping trends in the African storage market,'' says Subramani.

From  a  protocol perspective, Infiniband once again experienced tremendous year-on-year growth. Telecom-industry investments helped drive double-digit growth for NAS and DAS protocols, while RAID dominated redundancy with over 99% share  of  all shipped models. Mid-range devices dominated the storage class with over 58% share of external storage devices.

From a vendor perspective, EMC retained its top spot in the market with over 48% share on the back of sizeable projects in Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, and Nigeria.  IBM secured second place with just over 14% share, although the vendor suffered a decline in revenue year on year. Netapp placed third with just over 10% share, while HP followed closely behind with just under 10% share of the MEA market. Dell witnessed a stark decline in revenue with 4% share in the last quarter of 2012.

IDC’s EMEA Quarterly Disk Storage Systems Tracker provides timely market information on the disk storage systems market in Western Europe, Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), and the Middle East and Africa. Markets can be measured in terms of new storage capacity shipped, factory value, and end-user value of shipments. The tracker provides insight into the impact of market changes, key trends, and the results of vendors' new product, marketing, and channel activities.

IDC predicts Tablets to Overtake PC Market by 2016 in Middle East and Africa

The Middle East and Africa (MEA) tablet market posted a much better than anticipated year-on-year growth rate – reaching a total of 1.36 million units for the fourth quarter of 2012. This is according to the latest results released by International Data Corporation (IDC), the premier global market intelligence and advisory firm for the information technology and telecommunications markets.

The overall MEA tablet market in 2012 grew by 90% year-on-year. This surge is the result of a number of factors, including cheaper tablet entrants,reduced prices by vendors, and overall rising consumer demand for these devices. Increasing interest in tablets as an educational tool will ensure further strong growth throughout the MEA region.

"Currently, tablets are used predominantly as entertainment devices" says Victoria Mendes, a research analyst with Personal Computing, Systems and Infrastructure Solutions at IDC. "However, we expect to see bigger demand for tablets in the corporate segment. In particular, we expect OEMs to use the enhanced features and capabilities of the Windows 8 platform to lure their existing corporate clients into adopting tablets for their organizations. This will, however, have to be coupled with lowered prices, as tablets running on the Windows 8 operating system are much more expensive than those running on Android OS, especially in light of the tough economic situation," she added.

From an operating systems perspective, the share of iOS in the MEA region is expected to decline, while Android and Windows will continue to grow throughout the forecast period. "Low-cost models are expected to be one of the key contributors towards the growth of the tablet market, boosting the share of Android as well," says Fouad Charakla, research manager at IDC.

"However, these low-cost tablets will not be considered as primary computing devices by most end-users." "International vendors are trying to keep up with the exploding number of low-cost tablets through the introduction of smaller screen sizes and slightly lower-end models, to cater to cash-strapped consumers", notes Mendes. "This could mean that any advancement in terms of new features and higher end processing may be compromised in order to gain market share in the short term."

At a country level, Turkey and Saudi Arabia are expected to continue to contribute the most to the growth of the MEA region. The Saudi market in particular is very price sensitive and, as such, the market volume share of low-cost tablets is expected to increase heavily.

Tablets are ideal for easy connectivity and portability. They represent a category in between traditional notebooks and mini notebooks, as they are more portable than the former and more powerful than the latter. This is expected to be a major driver of the tablet market's growth in the MEA region throughout the forecast period.

Since the first tablet was introduced, this category has quickly gained market share and is expected to capture further share of the overall market. IDC expects tablet shipments to exceed portable PC shipments in the MEA region by 2016.

Chromebook Pixel: How Google hopes to play in the premium space

Even with the current low market penetration predictions for laptops and desktops in the coming years, Google has introduced a Google-branded high-resolution Chrome OS portable computer with a touchscreen, a shift that blurs the boundaries between keyboard-oriented laptops and touch-oriented tablets and between the company's mobile Android operating system and its Web-centric Chrome OS.

Fulfilling a prediction made late last year, Sundar Pichai, SVP of Chrome and apps, demonstrated the Chromebook Pixel, the first Chrome OS device aimed at power users, at a media event in San Francisco.

Pichai described the Pixel as both as a fully engineered product and a reference device to show Google's hardware partners how a Chrome OS touchscreen device can work. The Pixel is by far the most premium Chromebook that we've seen to date: it has a Retina-like high resolution touchscreen display, a powerful Core i5 processor, and an upscale metal chassis. It also has a similarly upscale price of $1,299.

But hardware and price aren't the only unique aspects of the Pixel — where earlier Chromebooks have been made by a variety of manufacturers, including Samsung, Lenovo, Acer, and even HP, the Pixel is the first model to be designed entirely in-house by Google and carry just a Google logoPichai said the screen was "the highest resolution screen that's ever been shipped on a laptop." For the sake of comparison, the Apple MacBook Pro with Retina display has a pixel density of 220 ppi.

The Pixel is different, however. The Chromebook's $1,299 price is more than Apple asks for a 13-inch MacBook Air, and significantly more than what you pay for your average Windows 8 Ultrabook, even when considering a model with a touchscreen. Apart from the high resolution display, the Chromebook doesn't really do anything more than those computers — and many would argue that since it's little more than a juiced-up web browser, it can do significantly less. Additionally, it doesn't offer a significantly faster processor, it isn't thinner or lighter than other laptops, and its five hours of expected battery life is little more than average for an ultraportable laptop.

Pichai also highlighted the device's speed. "It's an incredibly fast experience," he said. "In my personal experience, this is the fastest laptop I've used." At 3.35 pounds, the Chromebook Pixel is about a pound heavier than Apple's MacBook Air, which appears to be the Pixel's primary competition, at least in terms of price. Despite its heft, the Pixel is a beautifully designed device, one that includes several custom-designed components. Pichai insists the Pixel compares favorably with Apple's ultraportable notebook.

"I think it will stand up very, very well against a Macbook Air," said Pichai. "... What you're getting from our hardware is in many ways far superior."

Google has partnered with Verizon to provide an LTE wireless connectivity option. It is providing Pixel buyers with 1 TB of Google Drive storage at no cost for three years. That much storage normally would cost about $600 annually.

The Wi-Fi version (32 GB) of the Chromebook Pixel is available for $1,299. It can be ordered through the Google Play store, with shipping scheduled in about one week. The LTE version (64 GB) costs $1,499. It is also available for order through Google Play, with shipping planned for April. On Friday, Best Buy will begin taking Chromebook Pixel orders.

To make the prospect of living in the cloud more appealing, Google is planning in three months to integrate Quickoffice (acquired by Google last year) into a future version of its Chrome browser and Chrome OS using its Native Client technology. This will allow Word and Excel documents to be opened and edited natively in Google Apps rather than converted to the Google Apps format. As a result, the Pixel should appeal to businesses that rely on Microsoft Office.

Google is also planning to release in its Chrome Web Store a Google+ Photos app that supports automatic photo uploading from SD cards. Armed with a touchscreen, Chromebooks may be ready to transition from the role of understudy to star.

In October, Pichai described Chromebooks as a complement to existing PCs. And Google supported that sidekick role through its Chrome Remote Desktop software, a Chrome browser extension that lets Chrome OS users access and administer OS X or Windows computers from afar.

But the touch-oriented Pixel presents a challenge to personal computers running OS X, Linux or Windows, as well as tablets running Android. It aspires to be a primary computing device for those who want to "live in the cloud," as Pichai puts it.

Google first launched Chrome OS laptops with partners Acer and Samsung in mid-2011. Rather than trying to offer devices that were more powerful than leading PCs at the time, Google and its partners offered devices that were more affordable, more manageable and more secure. Initially, Chromebooks sold poorly, but following the launch of second-generation devices in May 2012 and third-generation devices in October 2012, including an ARM-based Chromebook from Samsung, demand appeared to rise. Pichai noted that Samsung's recent model Chromebook has remained atop Amazon.com's laptop bestseller list for the entire 125-day period it has been available.

Some of the credit for rising Chromebook demand should go to Google for expanding the number of Chromebook kiosks at Best Buy stores. But Acer and Samsung played a part too by making Chromebook laptops more appealing.

Signal Alliance concludes Customer Week 2013

As part of the activities marking their annual customer appreciation week, Nigeria’s leading enterprise solutions and systems specialists Signal Alliance has embarked on various activities meant to show appreciation and commitment to their existing customer base. With visitations scheduled for her plethora of clients drawn from banking, insurance, manufacturing, aviation, energy and public sectors of the economy, the company once again has demonstrated its customer relationship abilities.

These activities, which started with visitations to some key customers of Signal Alliance has seen the company visiting the likes of Union Bank Plc., Mansard Insurance, Pan Ocean, Dangote group, Nigerian Breweries, Aero Contractors, etc, within the period of the Customer week.

Justifying the importance of this annual exercise, the managing director of Signal Alliance Collins Onuegbu explained that though information technology activities tends to eliminate the personal touch needed in business relationships, Signal Alliance devised this scheme to bring back the age long means of interacting with customers. “We can’t let machines rule everything in our life and that’s why we take out time to physically visit our esteemed customers and show them, as humans, that we appreciate doing business with them as well as reward them for sticking with us as preferred service provider” he said.

In addition to using these visits to appreciate their customers, which has taken a better part of the week, the company is also using the visitation to reward their customers by offering free services via Gift Vouchers to their customers. According to Desmond Omovie, the company’s head of branding and marketing communications, the Gift vouchers contain four specialized offers from Signal Alliance each worth at least US$3000.

He said: “We are offering them free services in either of Infrastructure Network Assessment, Unified Communications Pilot Assessment, Enterprise Cloud Readiness Assessment or SharePoint Deployment Planning Services”. Even though these services represent a profitable aspect of the business, Mr. Omovie believes that offering them free to their customers as part of the benefits of the customer week is another way Signal Alliance shows that retaining the goodwill and productivity of their customers far outweighs the financial gains in the business.

Reacting to the gesture on behalf of some of the customers of Signal Alliance, the Group Head IT of Union Bank PlcMr. Peter Iwegbu, thanked the management and staff of Signal Alliance for the visit and reiterated his appreciation of the professional relationship that exists between both companies.

Activities for the Customer Week rounded up with a visit to the Little Saints Orphanage in Lagos as well as a Breakfast Meeting with industry experts and customers of Signal Alliance in Lagos.

Aviat Networks gets $10 Million Microwave Backhaul Contract For U.S. Metropolitan Area

Aviat Networks, Inc., the leading expert in microwave networking solutions, today announced that it received orders worth over $10 million for a combination of microwave backhaul equipment and services to support the public safety network of one of the largest city municipalities in the United States. This win reinforces Aviat’s position as the most trusted supplier for first responder microwave systems. A large proportion of the revenue was recorded in the company’s second fiscal quarter with the balance to be spread over the next two to three quarters.

The network supports the city’s police, firefighters and other first responders on a multi-agency wireless system. Aviat is installing Eclipse IRU 600 and Eclipse ODU 600 radios to provide seamless migration to IP/MPLS and LTE while supporting the mission-critical requirements of existing TDM traffic, which will fully enable interagency communications critical in addressing challenges during natural disasters, terrorist attacks and other large-scale first-responder challenges.

In addition to improving interagency communications, the network will provide infrastructure capable of supporting the state’s future LTE network and associated high-bandwidth applications such as video. According to a November 2012 public safety LTE and broadband market report by research firm Signals and Systems Telecom (SNS Telecom), mobile video surveillance has a compounded annual growth rate of 20 percent over the next five years, amounting to an estimated $2.5 billion of global revenues in 2016.

“The public safety LTE infrastructure will need to support the next wave of in-field crime-fighting tools, such as mobile surveillance video,” say Tony Ljubicich, vice president of sales, the Americas, Aviat Networks. “This upgrade of the city’s wireless voice and data microwave backhaul will deliver LTE-proven bandwidth for video as well as other real-time applications such as fingerprint matching and identity checks. Moreover, it is set to be leveraged for integration into the statewide radio system when the time comes.”

RIM Rebrands finally to BlackBerry

This was a massive week for Research In Motion, which announced its long-anticipated BlackBerry 10 OS, two new smartphones and a major corporate rebranding.

Keen to draw a line under a frustrating period marred by delayed product launches and share losses, RIM changed its company name to BlackBerry on Wednesday. The Waterloo, Ontario-based company will trade under the ticker symbol "BBRY" from Feb. 4.

The Canadian handset maker unveiled its new BlackBerry 10 operating system and two new smartphones: the Z10 and Q10. The Z10 is a touchscreen device with a 4.2-inch display, while the Q10 comes with a physical QWERTY keyboard.

Clearly intent on injecting some youthful vitality into the company's image, BlackBerry also appointed Alicia Keys as the company's new global creative director. Investors, however, were unmoved by the flurry of announcements, and the company's shares fell sharply in the hours following Wednesday's news.

BlackBerry also offered a brief glimpse of the company's Super Bowl ad on Friday while the company's shares ended the week down nearly 26% at $13.02. Chief Executive Thorsten Heins has announced that RIM was abandoning the name it has used since its inception in 1985 to take the name of its signature product, signaling his hopes for a fresh start for the company that pioneered on-your-hip email.

"From this point forward, RIM becomes BlackBerry," Heins said at the New York launch. "It is one brand; it is one promise." RIM, which is already starting to call itself BlackBerry, had initially planned to launch the new BlackBerry 10 smartphones in 2011. But it pushed the date back twice as it struggled to work with a new operating system.

"The biggest disappointment was the delay in the U.S., that it will take so long before the devices get going there," said Eric Jackson, founder and managing Partner at Ironfire Capital LLC in New York. Heins said the delays reflected the need for U.S. carrier testing, although carrier AT&T offered few clues on what that meant.

"We are very enthusiastic about the devices. We will announce pricing, availability, and other information at a later date. Beyond that, nothing to add," said spokesman Mark Siegel. RIM launched its first BlackBerry back in 1999 as a way for busy executives to stay in touch with their clients and their offices, and the Canadian company quickly cornered the market for secure corporate and government email.

But its star faded as competition rose. The BlackBerry is now a far-behind also-ran in the race for market share, with a 3.4 percent global showing in the fourth quarter, down from 20 percent three years before. Its North American market share is even worse: a mere 2 percent in the fourth quarter.

RIM shares tumbled along with the company's market share, and the stock is down 90 percent from its 2008 peak. The shares fell as much as 8 percent on Wednesday, although they are still more than twice the level of their September 2012 low, reflecting ever-louder buzz about the new devices.

Etisalat and Pacific Controls to Offer M2M Technology for Middle East, Africa and Asia

Etisalat Group and Pacific Controls, the leading global automation company, has announced an agreement to jointly offer unique Machine-to-Machine based (M2M Technology) Sustainable Development applications and support to clients across Etisalat's footprint. This is meant to bring environmentally beneficial, green IT to the Middle East, Africa and Asia covering fifteen countries in total.

The new agreement was signed at a press conference in Dubai by Khalifa Al Shamsi , Chief Digital Services Officer, Etisalat Group and Dilip Rahulan , Executive Chairman of Pacific Controls.

The event was organised to coincide with a visit from the President of the GSM Association (GSMA) Mobile for Development Program, Mr Lawrence Yanovitch and the program's Managing Director Chris Locke . Sougata Nandi , Chief Executive Officer at Pacific Controls, Ahmed bin Ali , Senior Vice President Corporate Communications - Etisalat Group, Abdulla Hashim , Senior Vice President Business Solutions - Etisalat UAE, Dr Shane Rooney , Vice President Machine-to-Machine, Zakarya Alashek Ag. Senior Manager/PM-Mobility Solutions and M2M and other senior management representatives were present for the signing.

"This partnership brings a unique offering that utilizes ICT to deliver sustainable development. It leverages M2M technology to deliver managed energy services and business intelligence in real time, which helps to reduce a company's carbon footprint. We are delighted to be working with Pacific Controls on such a positive goal which shows how mobile and ICT can tangibly benefit the communities in which we live, work and play," said Khalifa Al Shamsi , Chief Digital Services Officer at Etisalat Group.

He continued: "Energy consumption today is at an all-time high, leading to increased ecological and environmental pressure to reduce energy consumption and carbon emissions. As a leader in the telecommunications industry, Etisalat is well positioned to spearhead this initiative in alliance with Pacific Controls, leveraging technologies like M2M to effectively reduce the carbon footprint of the UAE. With this agreement, we are now also able to expand our carbon reduction efforts across our 15 markets."

Dilip Rahulan , Executive Chairman of Pacific Controls, said, "Mankind is facing unprecedented challenge of Climate Change. Pacific Controls' Enterprise City Management Platform, coupled with Etisalat's extensive mobile network coverage, has already manifested that ICT can save the climate at the speed of light. Facilities are reducing their energy costs and carbon footprint by up to 30% through the Energy Star programme that requires only a few days to implement. With real time profiling of energy consumptions, participating organizations are now able to report on their carbon footprint online."

The agreement aims to reduce the carbon footprint of companies across the Middle East, Asia and Africa, and was launched in the UAE in December 2011 as the "Emirates Energy Star".  Since its launch, the programme has eliminated more than 5,000 tons of CO2 emissions in the UAE, achieved purely through active 24X7 Monitoring and Control of the heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) equipment across 50 participating facilities, constituting an overall built-up space in excess of 9 million sq. ft.

The overall goal of the Emirates Energy Star programme is to reduce the carbon emissions of the UAE by 20% by 2020. The programme combines the strength of Galaxy software platform, Global Command Control Centre, Subject Matter Experts and Mobile Network to reduce operating costs of facilities.          

Some of the additional benefits offered via the programme is creating business intelligence through data collected and analysed from thousands of devices connected across buildings.

Pacific Control Systems (PCS) provides ICT enabled managed services and converged engineering solutions for buildings and infrastructure projects globally. PCS has pioneered the technology for Smart Cities in which buildings and infrastructure are managed centrally to increase sustainability, leveraging the ICT infrastructure of telecom operators around the world.