THE RE-EMERGENCE OF RANSOMWARE
POWERQUOTE
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The new year has brought a more targeted attack on big businesses.
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MAY 2020 BUSINESS ISSUE 19
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CONTENTS Page 05 WELCOME FROM EXERTIS Phil Brown introduces the latest issue of Future Business
Page 18 HAS SSD WON THE TECHNOLOGY BATTLE? Is SSD or HDD the right choice for organisations? We look at the merits of both.
Page 06 NEWS IN BRIEF A quick look at what’s happening in the technology market.
Page 32 AT YOUR SERVICE Services are a key part of our business and we provide a comprehensive range covering a variety of technologies that can be used by resellers to support their business.
Page 38 2020 – THE YEAR OF THE FOLDABLE? With more vendors bringing out foldable devices could this feature boost mobile and TV?
Page 22 HOW TO MAKE THE MOST OF THE COLLABORATION OPPORTUNITY (AV) Our suite of bundle options caters for three sizes of meeting room. Page 10 MARKET STATS UPDATE We look at the current technology trends you should be aware of.
Page 12 THE RE-EMERGENCE OF RANSOMWARE Any size or type of company can fall victim and robust security needs to be implemented.
Page 25 MORE POWER TO YOUR DELL TECHNOLOGIES SERVER QUOTES Our step by step guide to build and manage Dell EMC server opportunities.
Page 42 INTELLIGENT DATA MANAGEMENT Could AI be the answer for better data management in many vertical markets?
Page 28 HOT PICKS A range of best-selling products designed to make you more margin.
Page 48 MUST HAVE ACCESSORIES Our top 10 recommended accessory products for business.
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WELCOME FROM EXERTIS Enjoy the spring edition of Future Business We remain fully operational, a vital link in the UK’s supply chain, helping to keep people safe and the economy moving, whilst fully complying with government initiatives and regulation. Clearly the last few months have been difficult for businesses. The uncertainty over Brexit is now behind us, although there is still some way to go with the final trade negotiations. However, no-one was expecting that to be followed by the emergence of the Coronavirus pandemic which has seen major IT events like ISE and MWC being curtailed or cancelled and the requirement for employees to work from home. Inevitably, supply chains and manufacturing have also been affected with shortages or delays for some components and products. Travel is another casualty and coupled with the growing emphasis to do more on climate change, it’s perhaps an opportunity for businesses to consider remote working as a long term strategy and take advantage of the collaboration tools that are available. Exertis is in a strong position to offer resellers solutions for your customers in this area with our expertise in IT, AV and UC. Our article on page 22 has some excellent suggestions. Security should always be high on the agenda for organisations of all sizes. Cybercriminals have many and varied methods at their disposal but the reemergence of ransomware in a more targeted approach, as shown in the recent, high-profile Travelex breach, is a reminder to companies and employees to be vigilant. Security isn’t a one-time effort as we emphasise on page 12. On the subject of trends, there has been much discussion on whether SSDs or HDDs are the right choice as a storage solution. There are advantages and disadvantages for both as we highlight on pages 18. Indeed, storage is becoming increasingly important
as we accumulate ever increasing amounts of data. Artificial Intelligence (see page 42) could well be the answer as enterprises try to better access and manage their data in a cost effective and efficient manner. Our enterprise division has the products and expertise on hand to help you with the best solutions in this area. Don’t forget that on top of the great range of technology products and solutions that we offer, we also have a comprehensive range of services that can support your business and enable you to keep that on-going engagement with your customers.
Publisher Exertis Editors Hannah Middleton Alice Mitchell Copywriter Nigel Judd Design Alice Himfen Amber-sky Glasscock Basingstoke Sales: 01256 707 070
Our lead article on page 32 provides everything you need to know about the pre and post-sales support that is available as a white label service which you can choose to deploy in a modular fashion to suit your requirements.
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NEWS IN BRIEF A summary of the latest news in business 1. UK IT APPOINTMENT Liz Greenwood has joined Exertis as UK IT director, reporting to Richard Hinds, Exertis UK&I, chief operating officer. She will have responsibility to continue to drive the overall service and performance improvements associated with the UK IT function. In addition, she will play a lead role in defining the company’s future SAP roadmap and critically how the solution is used to deliver value across all areas of the business. Liz joins from Royal Mail Group, having spent almost eight years with the company most recently as business IT director for Parcelforce Worldwide. Prior to that, she worked at Fujitsu Services for seven years in a variety of senior IT and business roles and at Siemens for five years.
devices more accessible to consumers. The project is built around a shared belief that smart home devices should be secure, reliable, and seamless to use. By building upon Internet Protocol (IP), the project aims to enable communication across smart home devices, mobile apps, and cloud services and to define a specific set of IP-based networking technologies for device certification. In addition, it hopes to make it easier for device manufacturers to build devices that are compatible with smart home and voice services such as Amazon’s Alexa, Apple’s Siri, Google’s Assistant, and others. The Project aims to improve the consumer experience of trying to use smart home products that aren’t compatible with each other, so customers can be confident that their device of choice will work in their home and that they will be able to setup and control it with their preferred system. Amazon, Apple, Google, and the Zigbee Alliance have joined together to promote the formation of the Working Group which also includes a number of member companies. https://www.connectedhomeip.com/
2. PROJECT CHIP Project Connected Home over IP (CHIP) is a new Working Group that plans to develop and promote the adoption of a new, royalty-free connectivity standard to increase compatibility among smart home products, with security as a fundamental design tenet. CHIP has two goals. First, it wants to make manufacturing secure and cross-compatible smart devices easier. Second, it wants to make smart
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Exertis from Electrocomponents (known as RS Components) where he was instrumental in successfully leading their digital transformation strategy across the globe, resulting in £1bn being traded online p.a. Vish will report to Tim Griffin, our Exertis Group MD and also dotted line to Paul Bryan, MD for Exertis UK&I. He will be responsible for devising and implementing our digital strategy focussing on customer experience, marketing, digital services and operational efficiencies to drive frictionless trade and expansion of digital technologies across our organisation.
3. CDO APPOINTMENT The transformation of our business continues with the key appointment of our first Chief Digital Officer enabling us to take advantage of the potential of digital and e-commerce channels that can enable us to handle low value transactional work whilst focusing on high value advisory solutions. Welcome to Vishal Chhatralia, who has joined
4. BETTER NEWS FOR PC MARKET BUT WINDOWS 7 STILL AN ISSUE Following years of quarterly declines, a mixed 2018 with negative, flat and positive quarters, 2019 was a better year for the global PC market with the last three quarters showing a positive trend. Gartner and IDC put the overall growth between 0.6 and 2.7 per cent over the previous year. IDC reported that worldwide PC shipments grew 2.7% from 259.6 million to 266.7 million in 2019 whilst Gartner estimated that worldwide PC shipments had grown 0.6% from 259.8 million to 261.2 million in 2019. For the full year, Lenovo extended its lead over other manufacturers. End of support for Windows 7 has helped to
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refresh the market but there are still plenty of computers out there still yet to make the move. Indeed, Windows 7 popularity can be seen in the fact that it took Windows 10 nearly four years to pass it in market share. There are conflicting estimates as to the numbers of PCs still running Windows 7: according to Netmarketshare a massive 26 per cent, Computer World estimates it to be over 29 per cent or 446 million and ZDnet puts it at around 200 million. Irrespective of which number is the most accurate, there are still hundreds of millions of unsupported PCs which present a massive target for cybercriminals to exploit.
5. CONSUMERS GETTING SMARTER In Europe, 58% of consumers carry just one smart device when they are on the go, according to a recent survey from Canalys. But this is set to change. According to their research, 84% of these consumers say they are likely to buy a new smart device, above and beyond a smartphone. This might be a wearable band, a smart personal audio device, a smart speaker, a tablet or a notebook PC. Technology companies old and new are rushing to create an ecosystem of connected smart devices to target this opportunity say Canalys. Not surprisingly, smartphones, tablets and notebook PCs are the three devices most commonly owned by European consumers. Of the other, newer smart device categories, 29% claim to own wireless earphones, 27% own a smart speaker, 23% own
a smartwatch, 22% own wireless headphones, 18% own a fitness band and 16% own truly wireless earbuds.
6. NEW RULES ON CONTRACTS Phone, broadband and pay-TV customers must be warned when their current contract is ending, and what they could save by signing up to a new deal, under Ofcom rules that have come into force on 15 February this year. Customers must be advised between 10 and 40 days before their contract comes to an end. Alerts can be sent by text, email or letter, and they must include: - when your contract is up; - what you’ve been paying until now, and what you’ll pay when your contract is up; - any notice period for leaving your provider; and - your provider’s best deals, including any prices only available to new customers.
7. INSIDER BREACH IS MAJOR CONCERN FOR COMPANIES Conducted by independent research organisation, Opinion Matters in January 2020, more than 500 IT leaders and 5000 employees were surveyed across the UK, US and Benelux regions to look at the causes, frequency and implications of internal security breach incidents and the perspectives of IT leaders and employees about data risk, responsibility and ownership. Misdirected and phishing emails were the top cause of accidental insider data breaches with 41 per cent of employees, who had accidentally leaked data, stating they had done so because of a phishing email. Simply sending information to the wrong person was a cause for a breach by 31 per cent of respondents. The study found that a staggering 97 per cent of IT leaders say insider breach risk is
a significant concern with 78 per cent believing employees have put data at risk accidentally in the past 12 months and 75 per cent have put data at risk intentionally. When asked about the implications of these breaches, 41 per cent say financial damage would be the area of greatest impact. https:// www.egress.com/en-us/news/insiderdata-breach-survey-2020
9. PEOPLE ARE USING MORE DATA According to Ofcom, the volume of data used on fixed and mobile connections both grew by around a quarter, with 240GB being used on average each month per fixed broadband connection and 2.9GB in an average month being used on each mobile data connection. Much of the growth in data use is driven by online video. Fifty-eight per cent of people watched on-demand video services, up from 53 per cent according to the industry watch dog. This is driven by increased use of subscription video-on demand services such as Netflix and Amazon Prime Video. The volume of minutes originating from fixed-line connections fell again in 2019 (by 17 per cent), while the volume of minutes originating from mobiles went up by 5%. The volume of traditional text messages continues to fall. More than 5 billion fewer traditional SMS and MMS messages were sent in 2018, as people switched to messaging services such as WhatsApp. Indeed, it’s been reported that WhatsApp has become the most popular mobile application in the world, reaching the milestone of two billion users. This will also have contributed to the increased data volumes on mobile connections.
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CONSUMER TRENDS Driving Demands
33% of businesses
now use secure communications platforms
to enable encrypted
messaging channels SPICEWORKS
according to cbre, online sales will grow another 14%
FORBES
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in 2020, the global games
with the largest number of online users – over 2 bn
$160 bn, increasing
asia was the region
market will generate revenues of more than
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travel app usage 7online gamers 10 in the has grown 90% uk and u.s. feel part
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since 2015 GLOBAL WEB INDEX
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THE RE-EMERGENCE OF RANSOMWARE Whilst the opportunistic ransomware attacks exploiting small sums of cryptocurrency may have dwindled, the new year suddenly saw a much more targeted attack on big business Travelex, the currency exchange provider, was hit with a Sodinokibi ransomware attack that demanded a ransom to restore operations but also threatened to expose sensitive customer data that could have major implications under GDPR. Reports put the ransom demand at around £4.6m, heavy enough in itself, but a sum that almost certainly will be surpassed by the knock-on effect. The company’s cashiers were reportedly resorted to going back to using pen and paper to maintain operations at their bureau de changes facilities in high streets and airports with online orders suspended. As a result, major banks such as Barclays, Lloyds, Royal Bank of Scotland and Sainsbury’s Bank were unable to offer online currency services provided by the company. Reports in the media suggested that Travelex was still working on restoring full services more than a month after the attack. Reputational damage to the company is difficult to predict but this attack is a clear indication
that cyber criminals are focusing on large organisations rather than small sums from individuals, although undoubtedly smaller ransomware-as-a-service variants will continue to hit SMBs. A COSTLY EXERCISE In addition, in the Travelex case, the criminals could also leverage the threat of leaking personal, financial, customer information on top of simply restoring business operations. Whilst data can be restored, restoring public trust, particularly for loss of financial data isn’t such an easy fix. Travelex has maintained that there is no evidence that customer data has been compromised but transparency in disclosure is also important. Originally, the issue was reported as “planned maintenance” and an admission of a cyberattack only came a week after the breach. The Travelex example is also indicative of the fact that the amount of downtime from ransomware for organisations is also on the increase. According to the Ransomware Marketplace report₁, the average number of days a ransomware incident lasts has increased to 16.2 days. Larger organisations with more complex networks take longer to restore data via backups or to action decryption. Calculating the actual cost of downtime can be challenging as it has different effects on different businesses and organisations. Business interruption costs are estimated to be often five to ten times higher than direct costs. Estimates on ransomware demands are difficult to establish particularly if companies decide to pay and not disclose the issue but it’s estimated that there were nearly half a million ransomware infections reported globally last year, costing
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organisations at least £4.3bn ($6.3bn). The average demand is estimated to be around £ 64,450 ($84,000₂). Downtime costs are even more difficult to calculate. Many observers state that companies should avoid paying the ransom at all costs. Firstly, there is no guarantee that access to files or systems will be returned and secondly that payment only perpetuates the issue further. Recently, it was discovered that the data recovery mechanism used by Ryuk, a popular ransomware virus, didn’t actually provide a complete recovery of some types of files which resulted in data loss even if the payment had been made. There are of course many variants.
Reports put the ransom demand at around £4.6m To encourage companies to make the payment a ransomware known as Maze has a different tactic. It simply places the company name on a website. If a payment is not forthcoming immediately, it then places a small amount of the stolen data on the site as proof that it has access to the data. Payment is usually in bitcoin or another hard-to-trace cryptocurrency. ANY SIZE OR TYPE OF COMPANY CAN FALL VICTIM Whilst companies like Travelex are exposed because of their scale and public awareness, almost any size or type of company can fall victim. In the UK alone, there was a massive 195 per cent increase in reported incidents according
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According to the Ransomware Marketplace report₁, the average number of days a ransomware incident lasts has increased to 16.2 days. to SonicWall reflected in an estimated 6.4 million ransomware attacks in the first half of 2019. The growth, following a drop in the previous year, has been largely attributed to the growing preference of criminals for ransomware as a service (RaaS), as well as open-source malware kits becoming cheaper and more readily available. GrandCrab is the most popular example of this, enabling criminals with only limited malware knowledge to use an online tool to undertake an attack and pay for the service on a sliding scale. Spread through
phishing emails and containing malicious JavaScript, it infects the system when downloaded. Ransomware constantly evolves and there is no reason to think that it won’t remain a serious threat to companies. Criminal ransomware gangs employ increasingly sophisticated tactics and they look for a backdoor entry into corporate networks and then wait until they are ready to cause the maximum disruption by encrypting as many devices as possible. Reports suggest that Travelex may have been breached some six months before the
ransomware was finally unleashed – 206 is the average number of days to detect a breach according to Cybercrowd₃. These attacks typically occur during the night or early morning hours when oversight from security admin staff is limited. Travelex was said to be hit on New Year’s Eve which supports this theory. ROBUST SECURITY Whilst there’s no complete solution to protect a business from ransomware or any other form of malware, resellers can help their customers to minimise the attack surface. The best defence is to have a robust security suite in place. An obvious but sometimes forgotten step is to make sure that the antivirus software is up-to-date. Nowadays, most have some form of feature to spot any suspicious behaviour that’s associated with ransomware. It’s important to know what’s happening on the network by deploying intrusion prevention and
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detection systems that can spot any traffic anomalies and suspicious activity. With more remote working and non-corporate devices being brought into the workplace combined with the growth of IoT, it’s key to understand what’s connected to the office network. Hackers will look for the easiest point of entry. Making it harder by segmenting networks and by limiting the number of administrator accounts is also good practice. If a computer becomes infected it’s important to immediately disconnect it from the network.
avoid using it when working on sensitive, company information. A secure VPN is recommended. However, nearly a third of ransomware can be attributed to brute force attacks where hackers try to access servers and other devices by trying as many passwords as possible in the hope that passwords are too weak or worse still set to default.
93 per cent of data breaches start with a phishing campaign
Companies need to ensure passwords are strong and changed regularly. Using two factor authentication also adds an extra layer of security. On the basis that a ransomware attack is inevitable, it’s vital to have secure and up-to-date backup of all business-critical information. The ability to restore data and become operational again quickly minimises the impact. To do that requires a well-rehearsed and tested recovery plan both from a technical standpoint as well keeping customers, suppliers and possibly regulators informed.
Whilst, it’s important for employees to be trained to be alert for phishing or scams by never opening an email from an untrusted source, content scanning and email filtering provide the best way to prevent someone from clicking on a potential ransomware link by stopping it reaching the mail box in the first place. Cybercrowd₃ estimate that 71 per cent of cyber-attacks start with phishing e-mails. In addition, remote workers should be cautious with public wi-fi and
Last but certainly not least, ensure software patches are up-to-date. This was highlighted in the 2017 WannaCry attack which caused massive disruption to the NHS, yet it appears from reports that Travelex was breached for the same reason. Whilst patching software flaws can be timeconsuming and tedious, it’s vital for security reasons. It’s perhaps another opportunity for resellers to keep engaged with their customers by providing that service either themselves or as a white label service through Exertis.
SECURITY ISN’T A ONE-TIME EFFORT Ransomware is just one of the many ruses that are used by cybercriminals and no-one is immune from the possibility of attack. Exertis has an expert team of specialist, security experts and a great portfolio of security vendors that can help you to keep your customers secure. We can provide security audits and pen testing, in partnership with CyberCrowd, where we can undertake a simulated cyber-attack against a computer system, network or web application to check for exploitable vulnerabilities. These insights can help your customers fine tune their security and patch any detected issues before they occur, as well as measuring the compliance of an organisation’s security policy. Security isn’t a one-time effort and larger companies should regularly undertake pen testing. The cost is minimal in comparison to the cost of a breach – estimated to be £2.7million for a large UK organisation by Cybercrowd₃. In addition, companies should be deploying the latest firewalls from trusted vendors like SonicWall. These can detect and prevent cyber-attacks from denial of service attempts to phishing scams and ransomware. For Office 365 or G Suite, SonicWall Cloud App Security provides best-in-class advanced threat protection to stop targeted phishing attacks, zero-day threats and email fraud, such as business email compromise and account takeovers. It also ensures consistent security policies across all SaaS applications, including email, file storage and file sharing. Exertis can also offer resellers solutions from Aquilai, a vendor that specialises in anti-phishing technology using machine learning and AI. According to the vendor, 93 per cent of data breaches start with a phishing campaign and unfortunately almost a third of employees are sucked into opening the email. In just 82 seconds, the employee and the company become a victim. As mentioned earlier, a multilayered protection approach is best practice. Kaspersky Lab security solutions enable companies to detect, block and stop ransomware from spreading. Their Endpoint Security for Windows solution combines multi-layered, next-generation threat protection with additional proactive
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technologies such as Application, Web and Device controls, vulnerability and patch management and data encryption into an EDR-ready endpoint agent with an extensive systems management toolkit. The vendor also delivers automated security awareness training to help organisations and their employees change behaviours with regards to security – more than 80 per cent of all cyber-incidents are caused by human error, claims Kaspersky. Don’t let your customers become the next victim to a cyber-attack, call your Exertis Enterprise account manager for more details. THE 2020 SONICWALL CYBER THREAT REPORT SonicWall recently announced its annual threat report findings, which highlight the evasive tactics cybercriminals leverage to target businesses and consumers. The 2020 SonicWall Cyber Threat Report is the result of threat intelligence collected over the course of 2019 by over 1.1 million sensors strategically placed in over 215 countries and territories. SonicWall Capture Labs threat researchers collected and analysed over 140,000 daily malware samples, blocked over 20 million daily malware attacks and recorded 9.9 billion malware attacks.
FILELESS MALWARE Cybercriminals used new code obfuscation, sandbox detection and bypass techniques, resulting in a multitude of variants and the development of newer and more sophisticated exploit kits using fileless attacks instead of traditional payloads to a disk. While malware decreased 6% globally, SonicWall observed that most new threats masked their exploits within today’s most trusted files. In fact, Office (20.3%) and PDFs (17.4%) represent 38% of new threats detected by Capture ATP. RANSOMWARE FOUND A NEW TARGET Ransomware is being used to surgically target victims that are more likely to pay given the sensitive data they possess or funds at their disposal (or both). In 2019, this meant that many of the 187.9 million ransomware attacks were against state, provincial and local governments, as well as education systems. ENCRYPTED THREATS CONTINUE STEADY RISE Savvy cybercriminals continue to use TLS/ SSL encryption to mask their attacks from inspection by traditional security controls. In 2019, SonicWall Capture Labs threat
researchers recorded a 27.3% year-overyear increase of malware sent over TLS/SSL traffic. Almost 4 million encrypted threats were identified. IOT ATTACK VOLUME RISING In 2019, SonicWall discovered a 5% increase in IoT malware, with total volume reaching 34.3 million attacks. But with a deluge of new IoT devices connecting each day, increases in IoT malware attacks should not only be expected, but planned for. Criminals continue to deploy ransomware on ordinary devices, such as smart TVs, electric scooters and smart speakers, to daily necessities like toothbrushes, refrigerators and doorbells. WEB APP ATTACKS Sonicwall reported over 40 million web app attacks detected, 52% year-over-year increase. ₂To download the complete report, please visit www.sonicwall.com/ThreatReport. Exertis Enterprise provides resellers with the full suite of SonicWall security solutions. Ask your account manager for details.
SonicWall Capture Labs spotlights attack trends to help organisations and users stay ahead of cyber threats as attackers become more targeted and move into businesscritical systems. 2019 GLOBAL CYBERATTACK TRENDS₂ 9.9 Billion Malware attacks 187.9 Million ransomware attacks 4 Trillion Intrusion attempts + 27% Encrypted threats 34.3 Million IoT malware attacks + 52% Web App attacks MALWARE DOWN, BUT MORE TARGETED & EVASIVE 9.9 malware attacks were logged by SonicWall in 2019, a 6% dip from the record-breaking 10.52 billion recorded in 2018.
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₁ https://www.coveware.com/blog/2020/1/22/ransomware-costs-double-in-q4-as-ryuk-sodinokibi-proliferate ₂ https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/ransomware-costs-may-have-hit-170/ ₃ https://www.cybercrowd.co.uk/
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HAS SSD WON THE TECHNOLOGY BATTLE?
Over the last few years storage technology has made the choice between a Solid State Drive (SSD) and a Hard Disk Drive (HDD) a matter of considerable debate for experts and consumers. Both essentially do the same job but in very different ways. They boot your computer system, store applications and files but the choice may come down to a number of different factors with advantages and disadvantages of both. SPEED In terms of speed, SSDs have always been much faster than hard disc drives. A PC with SSD will boot in less than a minute and often in just seconds, launch and run apps faster and files will transfer quicker. They deliver faster load times for games and movies. A hard drive requires time to speed up to operating specs, and it will
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continue to be slower than an SSD during normal use. With HDDs, the speed of the drive is dependent on the revolutions per minute. Most of the latest drives can achieve speeds of 7,200 RPM, although some can extend up to 10,000 RPM but are more expensive as a result. Speeds are measured in MB/s (megabytes per second) for both data read and write. For HDDs, the speed at which the platters spin help to determine the read/
write times. Dependent on the optimisation of the SSD, speeds can be anywhere between 4 to 10 times faster. Indeed, HDDs can also suffer from fragmentation where the disc becomes crowded with data and files are stored in different locations rather than in a contiguous space. This can occur through creating, deleting and modifying files frequently and although invisible to the user, it can slow down the speed at which data is accessed. When fragmentation occurs, the OS needs to consolidate stored
Most of the latest drives can achieve speeds of 7,200 RPM, although some can extend up to 10,000 RPM.
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files to enhance processing efficiency. Fragmentation is not an issue for SSDs because the lack of a physical read head means data can be stored anywhere
In an attempt to maximise the benefits of both, SSHDs have been brought to market. they come with an extra cache of SSD NAND memory. without penalty. Thus, SSDs are inherently faster, although it’s said to be possible that they may ware out over time and have a limited life span. However, most opinions seem to indicate that for the vast majority of users this has no significance. Obsolescence in terms of storage space is more likely.
Whilst it’s now possible to get SSDs with terrabytes of storage, they come with a hefty price tag. Of course, it’s good practice to maybe store data on several different drives, so that if one does fail, the user isn’t faced with a complete loss of data. ROBUSTNESS, NOISE, POWER AND FORM FACTOR HDDs are more prone to physical damage that SSDs due to their mechanical parts. As the name suggests SSDs have no moving parts and are more likely to withstand the robustness expected from a mobile device. If noise is a consideration, then SSDs are silent whist even the quietest of hard drives will emit some noise when in use. SSDs are also more efficient when it comes to power usage – lower electricity costs for desktops and servers and even longer battery life for laptops. Because HDDs rely on spinning platters, there is a limitation on their size. SSDs aren’t restricted to a 3.5 or 2.5 inch form factor and can come in a variety of shapes and sizes. For instance, they can also be installed in a PCI Express expansion slot or in the case of a NVMe (non-Volatile Memory) SSD can be plugged directly into the motherboard – a form factor known as M2 and a configuration that’s now common in high end laptops and all-in-ones. Smaller SSDs built for M.2 or PCIe are becoming more commonplace.
Moreover, NVMe SSDs are the new trend in PC storage, and they’re a great option to maximize power and speed. HYBRID In an attempt to maximise the benefits of both, SSHDs have been brought to market. Available as 2.5 or 3.5 inch HDD options, they come with an extra cache of SSD NAND memory. These drives are simply traditional hard drives, adding a small capacity solid state drive to the drive’s controller that behaves like an additional cache for frequently used files. This enables files to be accessed more quickly because they are stored in the solid-state drive rather than the physical hard drive. Performance may depend on how the computer is used but these are generally a little more expensive than a traditional HHD but less so than a SSD. Whether SSDs have won the technology battle remains to be seen. If your customers want lots of storage capacity, at a lower cost and speed isn’t the essence than an HDD is probably the solution. On the other hand, for the extra performance, a diminishing price difference and an increasing storage capacity for an SSD may well be the deciding factor. The good news is that Exertis can satisfy either requirement. Speak to an expert today to find out more.
CAPACITY AND PRICE One of the major advantages of an HDD is that it can store lots more data and more cheaply. SSDs are more expensive than hard drives in terms of pound per gigabyte. However, over time, SSDs have come down in price and this trend is likely to continue. Even for a laptop hard drive 1 TeraByte of storage is not unusual. So, if storage and back up of data is more important than speed, HDDs still have much to offer for storing large amounts of files, photos, video or games. Gamers for instance or users with large amounts of content require a lot of storage, although an external hard drive is always an option. HDD capacities can range from 40GB up to 12TB for commercial use or for servers and NAS devices where a lot of space is required.
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Lenovo powers Ducati MotoGP on the racetrack and the roadway To spectators, Andrea Dovizioso’s bike looks like a red blur skimming across the track. It’s March 2019, and Dovizioso — one of the stars of the Ducati team that races in MotoGP — is just seconds from the finish line. He’s in first, but barely. After drifting across the only straightaway — a mere kilometer — of the Qatar Grand Prix course, Dovizioso and his fellow riders face 16 fastflowing turns spread across just 5.3 kilometers. To maneuver around these corners without falling or spinning out, riders must rely on the centrifugal force created when vehicle meets turn, leaning into each corner and just barely touching kneepad to asphalt. The slightest miscalculation can push a rider from the top of the pack to the bottom — or worse. After 42 minutes and 36 seconds of racing, Dovizioso zooms past the finish line, winning by a mere .023 seconds. In MotoGP, it’s not just a racer’s talent, courage or training that gets him the top spot on the podium these days. If he wants to win, he’s going to need to think beyond the rubber of his tires and the asphalt of the track. He needs 21st century technology.
Ducati, a 93-year-old Italian motorcycle company, knows this well. In April of 2018, the Ducati team, that races in MotoGP, signed Lenovo as its premier technology partner. Now, Lenovo’s award-winning PCs, tablets and high-performance servers are fueling world champion motorbike racers and preserving a decades-old legacy of Italian speed, sweat and racing success. Data matters in this game of speed and metal. It all starts with sensors — upwards of 50 tiny processors embedded in the motorbike that track everything from the speed of a spinning wheel to the engine’s ease of acceleration. During a race, data is stored in the bike then downloaded via cable to the Ducati team’s arsenal of Lenovo ThinkPad P1s during each pit stop. The workstations quickly analyze the information, then the team modifies the motorcycle’s specs for the next session. “The faster the computing power, the faster the motorbikes,” says Stefano Rendina, Ducati Corse IT Manager, of the importance of high performance computing. But technology is no substitute for a rider’s skill and training -- it’s a complement. “The
bike is always completely under the control of the rider,” says Barana. Electronics, like traction control, are meant to serve as aids, not invasive distractions. Because of Lenovo’s high-performance computing capabilities, Ducati can adapt its racing technology to the road with unprecedented speed and security. After all, “racing activity is the test bench for new technology before it enters into mass production and becomes implemented in large numbers,” according to Rendina. Adapting technology from the track to the road is a complex endeavor, as Ducati’s headquarters are located in Bologna and the team’s races are spread around the globe. One week, the Ducati team could be burning rubber in Catalunya. The next, it might be tearing up the Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas. Lenovo is the link between the traveling team and the folks back home, and speed gives the racing team advantages in more ways than one. “Lenovo technology helps us have a shorter time from designing the motorbikes to beginning production.” According to Kostenerov, “Lenovo technology helps us have a shorter time from designing the motorbikes to beginning production” and onto the showroom. The high computing power of Lenovo solutions enables Ducati designers to quickly adapt their algorithms and racing bike technology to consumer-friendly models. An example: In 2018 Ducati introduced winglets to its racing bikes—a feature adapted from airplane technology to enhance the vehicle’s aerodynamics. In November of last year, at the Milan Motorcycle Show (EICMA),
the company unveiled a road bike with winglets inspired by the racers. From the racetrack to the road — in no time flat. Ducati Corse is one of the primary influences on the brand’s identity and the customer’s experience, Kostenerov says, and consumers expect the same technology that enables MotoGP bikes to fly through the finish line to be available at Ducati showrooms. “We have more power, more security, more possibilities to use the technology,” he says. All of this means Ducati is “quicker to implement new parts… and design new products.”
Lenovo is with Ducati nearly every step of the way, from security and performance to product sophistication. “We are looking for a partner that respects our main values, like performance, sophistication, and security,” Kostenarov says. “In the solutions of Lenovo, we found the bestin-class to accomplish this goal.” MotoGP is at “the top level” of technological innovation, says Ducati electronics engineer Gabriele Conti, but at the same time, “it’s still a sport where you can see a hand-to-hand combat.” On the one hand, “you have the technology,” he continued. On the other, “you have the fight of the riders until the last corner.”
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HOW TO... Make the most of the collaboration opportunity Over the past two issues of Future Business, we have looked at the changes in the dynamic of the modern office brought about by the convergence of AV, UC and networking. division, which boasts experts in both AV and UC, also offers technical support for design, implementation and maintenance that resellers can choose to add to their own services.
Meeting room requirements are changing with companies needing to provide more collaborative opportunities for their employees in the workplace, in addition to ensuring that, with more flexible working practices, remote workers and branch offices can also contribute more effectively. To make it easier for our resellers to take advantage of this growing market, we’ve put together a suite of bundle options that cater for three sizes of meeting room options: • Exertis Huddle for meeting spaces up to 6 people • Exertis Meet for rooms for 6 to 12 occupants • Exertis Board for large meeting room areas.
Each option comprises of up to six alternative propositions featuring products from our market leading vendors, providing a complete solution with a choice of cloud based video platforms from either Microsoft Rooms, Zoom or Google Hangouts that enable even remote workers to easily collaborate. Exertis’ dedicated Pro AV
In addition, our new AV showrooms in Reading and Elland will also be kitted out with ready-made examples of the propositions where resellers can invite their customers to ascertain which meeting room solutions are best suited to fit their requirements. If you want to learn more about any of the bundles referenced or other bundles we can offer, speak to your account manager today.
Exertis Huddle
EXERTIS HUDDLE 2 • Philips BDL4330Q 43” Display • Poly Studio • Peerless Fixed Wall Bracket SF640P • Lenovo Smart Hub 500 (Zoom or Teams Ready)
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EXERTIS HUDDLE 3 • NEC 43” E437Q Display • Konftel Cam 20 Ego Bundle • ScreenBeam 1100 • Peerless Fixed Wall Bracket SF640P • Lenovo Smart Hub 500 (Zoom or Teams Ready)
EXERTIS HUDDLE 5 • LG 43SE3KE 43” Display • Logitech MeetUp w/Wall Bracket • ScreenBeam 1100 • Peerless Fixed Wall Bracket SF640P • Lenovo Smart Hub 500 (Zoom or Teams Ready)
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Exertis Meet
EXERTIS MEET 1 • LG 65UL3E 65” Display • Aver CAM 520+ • ScreenBeam 1100 • Chief Universal Wall Bracket MSA1U • Lenovo Smart Hub 500 (Zoom or Teams Ready)
EXERTIS MEET 2 • NEC E657Q 65” Display • Konftel Cam 50, 300 Hybrid • ScreenBeam 1100 • Chief Universal Wall Bracket MSA1U • Lenovo Smart Hub 500 (Zoom or Teams Ready)
EXERTIS MEET 3 • Philips 65BDL3050Q 65” Display • Logitech Rally Series • ScreenBeam 1100 • Chief Universal Wall Bracket MSA1U • Lenovo Smart Hub 500 (Zoom or Teams Ready)
EXERTIS BOARD 2 • Dual Samsung QM55R 55” Displays • Aver CAM 540 • ScreenBeam 1100 • 2x Chief Universal Wall Bracket MSA1U • Lenovo Smart Hub 500 (Zoom or Teams Ready)
EXERTIS BOARD 3 • Dual Philips 55BDL3010Q 55” Displays • Poly Trio 8800 • Poly Eagle Eye Director II • 2x Chief Universal Wall Bracket MSA1U • Lenovo Smart Hub 500 (Zoom or Teams Ready)
Exertis Board
EXERTIS BOARD 1 • Dual LG 55SE3KE 55” Displays • Logitech Rally Plus Series w/Mount • ScreenBeam 1100 • 2x Chief Universal Wall Bracket MSA1U • Lenovo Smart Hub 500 (Zoom or T eams Ready)
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Tempo™ Flat Panel Floor Support System Eliminate the need for wall inspections and supporting works by safely taking the load of heavy displays to the floor. As well as being quick and easy to install, the stand is optimised for use in meeting spaces where a high quality finish is essential. Please get in touch with your Exertis account manager for more information.
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More Power to your Dell Technologies server quotes Exertis is pleased to provide our resellers with access to PowerQuote, a web-based configuration tool for Dell Technologies servers. This is great news for customers who can build fast, accurate and entirely relevant quotations on-line with real-time visibility of bespoke pricing including promotional discounts, up-to-date stock, recommended add-ons and support services. Automating the process not only speeds up the transaction, it ensures no mandatory parts are missing from the configuration.
PowerQuote is a really useful tool for customers who want to configure servers to order with the advantages of accelerated lead times and a significantly enhanced user experience. It includes the full Dell Technologies PowerEdge Now portfolio of servers and options. Simple to use, resellers can search by product SKU or by product description. Useful functions include filtering searches by product categories, recently viewed searches and saved searches. Our customers will be able to access the Powerquote tool in our reseller zone. Here’s our quick, step by step guide to the tool.
1. LOG INTO YOUR EXERTIS ACCOUNT
2. CLICK ON POWERQUOTE
3. WITHIN POWERQUOTE CHOOSE YOUR BASE SERVER
4. CONFIGURE YOUR SERVER – POWERQUOTE WILL HIGHLIGHT OFFERS, STOCK LEVELS AND BUILD ISSUES
5. ONCE THE BUILD IS CORRECT YOU CAN EITHER SAVE YOUR QUOTE, SEND IT TO EXCEL OR SUBMIT IT TO YOUR EXERTIS ACCOUNT MANAGER
6. YOUR QUOTE WILL NOW BE PROCESSED BY YOUR EXERTIS ACCOUNT MANAGER, YOUR QUOTE WILL BE SAVED IN YOUR POWERQUOTE ACCOUNT
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Modernise the datacentre
Dell VXRail
Accelerate the path to hybrid cloud
Enable cloud native applications
Speak to your account manager for more information
Achieve IT transformation
Dell PowerEdge R740
Optimised for workload acceleration
Fortify your data centre
Dell VXRail
Dell PowerEdge R740
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EXERTIS ENTERTAINMENT
HOT
PICKS Top 5 Mobility Products
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Top Pick 1. SAMSUNG GALAXY S20 The latest Samsung Galaxy S20 is the most business-ready premium Galaxy phone. And it’s always ready to work, with the intelligent battery giving you the power to work between multiple apps.
2. NOKIA 7.2 Enjoy a super sharp viewing experience with PureDisplay, available only on Nokia smartphones. All videos you watch are transformed – in real-time – to high dynamic range (HDR) for clarity. Part Code: S10260922 3. MOTOROLA G8 POWER Say hello to moto g8 power. With its 5000 mAh battery, you can go more than 2 days on a single charge and what you want without worrying about recharging.
Top 5 New Products 1
Top Pick 1. KONFTEL 800 Discover the award-winning hybrid conference phone with intuitive interface. OmniSound® audio technology brings a natural sense of presence to the dialog.
2. APC ECOSTRUXURE Ecostruxure™ IT revolutionises how IT and DC professionals monitor and manage their critical IT infrastructure onpremise, in the cloud, and at the edge.
Part Code: S10269196 Bundles available up to 1500 devices
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3. THINKVISION M14 Ultraportable mobile display for on-the-go productivity. Whether you’re presenting to clients or just want to get things done on the road, the ThinkVision M14 helps you make your good work, better. Part Code: S10268009
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For more information on all our Hot Picks, don’t hesitate to get in touch: store.exertis.co.uk Basingstoke 01256 707 070 Harlow 01279 822 822
Top 5 Best-Selling Business Products
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Top Pick 1. LENOVO THINKPAD X1 CARBON A sleeker and lighter version, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon device delivers high performance— while the 18.3-hour battery life enables easy productivity on the fly. Part Code: S10274028
2. SAMSUNG SPACE SAVING MONITOR The Space-Saving Design gives you maximised desk space, providing up to 40 percent more usable surface area than a conventional monitor of equivalent size.
4. SY MFT-31V The MFT-31V wall mount transmitter combines elegance with functionality, suitable for education and corporate installations, where a wall mount multiformat extender is required.
Part Code: S10249179
Part Code: S10231250 5. ASUSPRO P5440FA-BM0385R Unrivaled mobility with flexible highperformance dual storage options to supercharge your productivity. Part Code: S10265421
3. FUJITSU SERVER PRIMERGY PRIMERGY systems powered by latest Intel® Xeon® technology deliver all the key components to accelerate innovation. Part Code: FTX25401SC050GB
4. LG 43UD79 43” MONITOR Multi-task with many windows without compromising readability of each window despite its wide viewing range. 4. POLY STUDIO X SERIES Deliver radical simplicity in a single sleek device. Leave your PC or Mac at your desk. Then huddle in smaller rooms and connect easily in conference rooms—with nearly any video collaboration software, including Zoom.
5. DYNABOOK SATELLITE PRO L50 Boasting a 10th generation Intel© Core™ Processor, a combination of SSD and HDD storage, alongside a USB Type-C port and powerful WiFI 6.
Part Code: S10178935
5. FUJITSU LIFEBOOK U758 combines legacy interfaces like full-size VGA and easy upgradeability with a thin and durable housing Part Code: S10185820
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APC Ecostruxure
™
Instantly Grow Your Business by Expanding Services Get Predictable Revenue with APC by Schneider Electric’s EcoStruxure IT for Partners APC by Schneider Electric’s new cloud-based monitoring software enables you to expand services and increase revenue potential. EcoStruxure IT for Partners provides realtime, multi-tenant monitoring, allowing you to add power and cooling solutions to service contracts for predictable recurring revenue. Increase customer intimacy by providing asset visibility, realtime monitoring and data-driven recommendations to your customers. Not looking to provide new services? Simply resell this Software as a Service to customers who monitor their own devices. That’s Certainty in a Connected World.
To find out more contact your Exertis account manager today!
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AT YOUR SERVICE Services are a key enabler of technology deployment and maintenance. Exertis has a range of services outside of our normal support, including but not limited to training, design and deployment. These services enable you to strengthen your customer service offerings and increase your ability to either create new sources or increase your current annuity revenue streams, without the need for in-house knowledge or expensive infrastructure investment. Our aim is to fully support and equip you to confidently recommend, sell and service the leading enterprise networking, unified communications, security and software and wireless solutions. Furthermore, we’ve added even more to our enterprise services portfolio in the areas of cyber security, Audio Visual, managed print, Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM), Mobile Threat Defence (MTD), recycling and refurbishment. So, here’s a quick rundown on the services you could be using to win new business or increase opportunities with your existing customers. Many of our services can be white labelled, with or without your company logo, either as entire solutions or on a modular basis depending on your
1. Small resellers can use our services to enable them to operate in technology spaces where they wouldn’t normally have the expertise or infrastructure to support. 2. Mid-size resellers who have a level of expertise and infrastructure can look to outsource elements of this, so they can focus their more expensive, skilled resources on other priorities to create better value for the business. 3. Large resellers who have strong expertise and infrastructure can engage our services on a “tap in – tap out” basis, as needed only. Often deployment of new technology can reveal gaps in in-house skills or resources. Exertis can plug that gap so that there is no delay to the deployment and ongoing support of your solution.
professional services, on-site demonstrations, wireless site surveys, POC evaluations and a scope of works, all provided at competitive rates to ensure you maximise margin potential with your customers.
We provide 24/7/365 remote monitoring and advanced failure notification to a range of solutions to enable both you and your customers protection from potential issues all year round, providing peace of mind and true value add to your customers.
Once scoping requirements are agreed, Exertis Deploy services can accelerate implementation and deployment on a range of technologies to get your customers operational in the optimal time and with minimal disruption, whether in the UK or Europe.
Remote monitoring and advanced failure notification enable both you and your customers. needs. That could mean simply adding some extra resource or support staff to your existing teams, as and when you need them, or engaging an entire project team. Exertis offer our “white label” support services to three main categories of resellers.
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PRE-SALES AND STAGING Our distribution pre-sales services are there to help you scope your customers’ requirements and deliver a proof of concept that secures the opportunity to win the business. If you require more in-depth technical support we can work with you to deliver the best solution providing
Increasingly, your customers expect their solution to just work. That’s why we recommend everything is assembled, devices are configured, and software or policies installed before installation. Staging is a vital step in any new deployment and is the process of building and preparing solutions that are ready for delivery and installation. There are many good reasons for this. Staging eliminates any surprises and provides an opportunity to resolve any unforeseen issues, thereby eliminating the risk of problems occurring once solutions are deployed on premise or to end users. Whilst resellers can stage and prepare equipment
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help your customers realise the best value whilst improving your ability to retain their business at the end of the term. MSP’s can manage both on-premise and cloud-based infrastructure for end customers, thereby providing services typically associated with Cloud Service Providers (CSP) such as software as a service (SaaS), platform as a service (PaaS) and infrastructure as a service (IaaS). With cloud marketplaces, distributors can play a key role in helping resellers move to this model by assessing and deploying SaaS and PaaS solutions. Exertis Manage allows you to deliver a comprehensive managed service to your customers without you incurring the time, costs, staff and risk involved in setting this up in-house. Modular based, Exertis Manage covers: firewall; switching, routing, wired and wireless networking and unified communications. themselves, it uses up their valuable time and resources. Although, it might be seen as an extra cost to outsource, it can actually save time and money by ensuring everything is ready, with the onus on Exertis to ensure deployment runs smoothly. In addition, it can help eliminate costly engineer visits to resolve any issues. Furthermore, Staging ensures a much fuller evaluation and testing of the solution to ensure it meets the business objectives. For overworked IT teams, it can free up their time for more critical tasks. Exertis provides a full range of Staging services that resellers can take advantage of and white label to support their customers. Exertis provide staging services across a range of technologies including builds, imaging, asset tagging, configuration and testing, making the complex simple. EXERTIS MANAGED SERVICES For most companies, the need for robust IT solutions is paramount. That means reliance on just a break-fix option is no longer sufficient and the monitoring of networks, and endpoint devices (e.g. servers, laptops, tablets, mobiles etc), optimising the infrastructure and protecting the overall
solution from security threats is now critical. Network and solution monitoring can be time-consuming for the end user and is one of the common areas of managed services. Equally, some resellers who don’t have the facility to provide a 24/7/365 support service, either on-site or remotely, outsource this part of the business themselves. Nowadays, a managed support service is something that even small businesses can’t afford to be without. As more companies look to outsource their IT operations to third parties, resellers are having to look at providing a range of services to satisfy that need. Some resellers can provide that function themselves and have become Managed Service Providers (MSP) whilst others have chosen to use the resources available from Exertis. The MSP takes full responsibility and the risk of managing the service but equally maintains an on-going relationship with the customer which can lead to future business. Exertis can provide a range of end to end managed services including finance options and, in some cases residual value-based affordability offerings, to
MANAGED PRINT SERVICES (MPS) Managed print services from vendors like Epson provide a pre-determined amount of printing supplies with a three-year contract at a fixed monthly fee. Resellers get the advantage of the GP upfront with the vendor taking the risk. Importantly, the reseller keeps the engagement with their customer and an opportunity to upsell at the end of the contract. For resellers that have traditionally just sold the hardware this provides a simple to manage, on-going revenue opportunity, particularly with SMBs who may have previously been put off by the cost. Exertis recently announced the availability of the Epson Print365 managed print solution for our UK and Ireland resellers. Each Epson Print365 package includes a productive, low energy Workforce Pro business inkjet printer, automated supply delivery, and full on-site service and support. WHAT IS THE EXERTIS FIREWALL AS A SERVICE (FWAAS)? For example, built around the SonicWALL security platform - a Gartner Magic Quadrant leader for Unified Threat
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FUJITSU LIFEBOOK U7 Series now available with a Reliability Promise
FUJITSU Notebook LIFEBOOK U7 Series >> For more information please contact your Account Manager today
Fujitsu recommends Windows 10 Pro for business
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Malware, Phishing and network attacks such as “Man in the Middle” attacks. We provide 24/7/365 monitoring and technical support within our managed services offerings, whether it’s IT to IT or direct to end users. This includes 3rd party app support, VIP handholding, out of hours lock, trace & wipe service and a complete end to end managed service. We make the complex simple for our resellers by providing professional services, consultancy and training across all of our solutions.
Management (UTM) - FWaaS includes the firewall appliance, security and management software, plus related support and subscription services, neatly bundled together into a monthly subscription.
systems. This is known as Zero Touch Provisioning (ZTP) and allows us to deploy devices en masse directly to end-users throughout Europe without the need for IT to unbox and manually configure devices.
With no upfront cost or investment, you can instantly increase your service offering without incurring any risk from setup and operational costs. The FWaaS programme aligns service providers recurring revenue with a recurring expense model, allowing you to grow your business more effectively. As with all Exertis Manage services, FWaaS is available as a white label offering, allowing you to brand and deliver FWaaS in your own name whilst utilising our 24/7 /365 Centre of Excellence (CoE) team.
Macro Mobility can support you on all of the market leading EMM platforms, including VMWare Workspace One (Formerly Airwatch), MobileIron, Microsoft Intune and Samsung Knox amongst others. We leverage all of the recognised
ENTERPRISE MOBILITY MANAGEMENT (EMM) Exertis have added a new technology arm to its already extensive fleet, branded; ”Macro Mobility” and focuses directly on enabling, securing, managing and deploying mobile devices including handset, tablet, Mi-Fi and Laptops. Our mobility teams are solutions specialists who enable us to work with any Android, iOS, MacOS or Windows10 devices and provide them pre-configured, out of the box. When they arrive with your end users, they are already secure, encrypted and configured to your customers’ specific requirements, pre-loaded with business apps, business email, data protection (GDPR) policies and access to back-end
End customers expect you to do more to protect their investment. industry platforms including Apple Business Manager (formerly DEP), Samsung Knox Mobile Enrolment KME, Google’s Android Enterprise & Microsoft’s Autopilot. We also work with all the leading Mobile Threat Defense (MTD) platforms including CheckPoint, Zimperium, Wandera & Asavie. MTD works in conjunction with EMM and is an advanced platform that allows us to detect known and unknown threats in real-time on mobile based devices. Furthermore, we can analyse them and provide real-time reporting and control. It addresses the growing wave of
EXERTIS MONITOR Nowadays, it’s simply not enough just to have engineers on call with specific SLAs. End customers expect you to do more to protect their investment. Remote monitoring provides a proactive maintenance approach that can deliver advanced notification of failures or issues allowing you to get ahead of the problem. Your customers will notice the results in reduced downtime. Equipment uptime is invaluable and remote monitoring provides benefits for engineers with improved visibility of systems that can enable preventative measures to be taken. Exertis Monitor provides an additional post sales service that offers a basic level of monitoring on any vendor solution across the entire IT infrastructure. Resellers can take advantage of device monitoring on switches, servers, virtual hosts, storage and UPS. Outside of these core areas, any other IP enabled device can be monitored to provide, at a minimum, availability reports. Exertis Monitor provides availability monitoring and reporting with a notification process on outages or performance issues. Exertis can provide that support as a white label service from our own Centre of Excellence (CoE) available 24/7/365 from vendor endorsed qualified engineers that work to best-in-class processes and service levels. All of the systems and infrastructure that power our CoE are built in a fully redundant capacity eliminating any single point of failure, improving performance and strengthening internal security. Exertis CoE runs on the vendor hardware, software and technologies which Exertis maintain and manage for our customers.
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VISIT US AT: STORE.EXERTIS.CO.UK
EXERTIS EDUCATE We have trained thousands of engineers on vendor accredited training courses. Our real-life and hands-on approach to training is delivered by Exertis trainers, recognised worldwide as being experts in their fields – all active technical consultants with real-world experience of deployment, configuration and support. Exertis Educate training is delivered throughout the year across the UK at Exertis Educate centres in Burnley, Stoke and Basingstoke, or on-site at your premises. Exertis Educate delivers immediate, real-world benefits including: • Reduced cost of network design, management and maintenance • Strengthens customer relationships through certified staff and being part of the vendor community • Reinforcement of class-based learning with post-course access to 24x7 support • With Exertis Educate, training is available for you and your customers. In addition to vendor accredited course ware, bespoke courses can be designed. BREAK-FIX EXERTIS MAINTAIN Whilst we recommend a proactive approach to services, we also provide through our Exertis Maintain offering ‘break-fix’ support contracts which cover different levels of requirements from
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support access to hardware replacement and more. The speed and quality of response when help is needed is critical to avoid potentially expensive downtime. For those times when requirements are new and outside a request-for-change of an existing Exertis Maintain and Exertis Manage service, Exertis Assist provides for the purchase of additional service credits. Purchased by the hour, Exertis Assist can cover all of your customer change requirements.
customers. IASME is recognised as the best cyber security standard for small companies by the UK government. In addition to the vast range of technologies we support, we are also a Mitel Authorised Service Centre and a Huawei Certified Services Partner. REPAIR, REFURBISHMENT AND TRADE-IN Exertis can offer repair and refurbishment of smartphones, wearables and tablets. In addition, we have launched an innovative, corporate trade-in programme for those devices.
ACCREDITATION BREEDS CONFIDENCE Our Centre of Excellence and professional services are ISO27001 accredited and we have Cyber Essentials PLUS certification and IASME governance. The five technical security controls under the Cyber Essentials scheme cover: firewalls, secure configuration, user access control, malware protection and patch management.
Trade-in programmes have become increasingly popular driven by the higher initial cost of top of the range devices, the residual value that premium products retain, the desire for consumers and business to be using the latest technology, and the recognition that sustainability is an important issue for everyone. Call us for further details.
Cyber Essentials PLUS, a higher level of assurance, requires a qualified and independent assessor to examine the same five controls, testing that they work in practice by simulating basic hacking and phishing attacks. Cyber Essentials is a government-backed, industry supported scheme to help organisations protect themselves against common cyber-attacks.
AT YOUR SERVICE Services are the future and at Exertis we provide true value-added services as a key part of our business to enable you to strengthen your relationship even further with your customer. Many of our services are available as a white label service and furthermore, as your distribution partner, you are safe in the knowledge that we aren’t a competitor to your business. Our services offerings help to make the complex simple.
Exertis is proud to be an IASME Governance and Cyber Essentials certification body and is able to offer a cyber security auditing service that resellers can offer to their
For more information on our range of services, contact your account manager.
Service Level
Coverage
Hardware Replacement
Engineer to Site
Maintain Basic
8x5
-
-
Maintain Basic HW
8x5
Next Business Day
-
Maintain Advanced
24x7
-
-
Maintain Advanced HW
24x7
Next Business Day
-
Maintain Advanced HW Plus
24x7
4 Hours
-
Maintain Premium
24x7
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Enter a new dimension of multitasking with the Dell Ultrasharp 34 Curved Ultrawide monitor. An immersive, panoramic screen that surrounds your senses.
Speak to your account manager for more details
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2020 – THE YEAR OF THE FOLDABLE? More and more foldable devices are appearing on the market. Last year didn’t quite go to plan for the introduction of foldable devices but could this year see that change as manufacturers get to grips with hinges, creases and screen scratches? Technology moves fast so it shouldn’t be surprising to find that some of the issues encountered in earlier launches will have been fixed. Clearly the market could do with innovation to stimulate demand. Smartphone technology has reached the point where feature changes are minimal and changing to the latest model doesn’t necessarily warrant an upgrade so quickly. Consumers and businesses are holding onto their phones for longer. It is estimated that the majority of people are now keeping their smartphone for more than three years – even five for those in their fifties or older. With saturation reached in many countries, forecasts for this decade are still gloomy. 5G might stimulate some users to upgrade and IDC forecasts that by 2023, 5G enabled phones will grow to 28 per cent of handset sales. BETTER PORTABILITY AND A BIGGER SCREEN So, could the innovation and stimulus that’s needed come from foldables? Two of the biggest manufacturers in Samsung and Huawei are fully embracing the foldable future. Indeed, last April, Huawei was reported as saying that it expected that half of its flagship phones could be foldable in next two years. Even before MWC was cancelled, two new foldable devices were announced one from Samsung with the Galaxy Z Flip and the
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other from Motorola with the reinvention of the Razr. The new form factor promises the convenience of better portability alongside a bigger screen.
It is estimated that the majority of people are now keeping their smartphone for more than three years.
Whilst recognised for their innovation, the first foldable handsets didn’t meet durability standards but that is hopefully changing with the latest wave. Reports indicate that the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip is a big improvement on its Galaxy Fold predecessor, although that also has a new improved version. However, it uses a very different form factor as well, folding in half like a clamshell flip phone and opening up to provide a 6.7 inch display. When folded shut, the screen is hidden but it has a small secondary display for key notifications. The hinge, a crucial element in these devices, is also reported to be much more resilient and the gap in both halves of the phone is said to be
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barely noticeable.In addition, the OLED panel features a ultra-thin panel of glass instead of a plastic one which is prone to scratching. It has a Snapdragon 855 Plus chipset, 8GB of RAM, a 3,300mAh battery and a dual lens 12MP camera.
It’s expected that half of its flagship phones could be foldable in next two years. The Motorola Razr bears resemblance to its iconic predecessor of the same name folding down to an almost square shape with a main plastic OLED screen of 6.2 inches. It also has a secondary 2.7-inch external display for notifications and can also take selfies without opening the device. The Razr, which is sub 14mm thickness when folded, features a 16MP camera, a Snapdragon 710 processor and a fingerprint scanner. The Huawei Mate X, like the Samsung Fold, has two screens. Unfolded, it provides an 8-inch tablet like screen. Unfolded it has two screens – a front facing 6.6-inch screen and a 6.4-inch on the back. The Mate X also has a pair of batteries offering 4,500mAh with fast charging, a triple-
lens camera, a high-end Kirin 980 chipset (990on the Xs), 8GB of RAM, 512GB of storage, and it supports 5G. Most importantly, it has an improved hinge and a tougher screen. PCS AND TVS ENTER THE FOLD However, it’s not just smartphones that have caught the foldable bug. Lenovo announced the world’s first foldable PC at CES – the ThinkPad X1. Described as the first fully functional PC with a folding OLED display, it provides a ground-breaking new form factor as it morphs through multiple modes, from a small footprint device into a fully flat 13.3-inch display. X1 Fold is designed to deliver laptop efficiency with smartphone portability. Lenovo has developed, specifically for Windows 10, clever mode switching to adapt to multiple use cases. The company calls it “dynamic and responsive,” meaning that what you see on the screen can change with how the screen is folded or oriented.
On a similar theme, LG has announced a rollable TV – a 4K Ultra HD, 65-inch OLED television that’s so flexible, the screen can roll down and disappear into its cabinet. A simple click on the remote brings the TV back to full-size. In addition, it can be viewed in “line view” where a quarter of the screen is visible allowing it to display a clock, the weather, photos or moving ambient designs. Even when the display is all the way closed, the soundbar built into the base can be used as a speaker. It can also be commanded by voice with its built-in Amazon Alexa assistant. Perhaps the one thing that is common to all these devices is their high price. Some have yet to be released of course but the foldable trend shouldn’t be regarded as a novelty factor. There are some great benefits for users and as time goes by and more foldable devices enter the market, costs will undoubtedly come down.
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Call your Exertis Account Manager today Basingstoke: 01256 707 070 | Burnley: 01282 776 776
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INTELLIGENT DATA MANAGEMENT The future of data management is getting exciting and very… intelligent. The time has come when the IT world is re-examining big data analytics with Artificial Intelligence (AI), and it’s just the beginning. According to Gartner’s 2019 CIO agenda survey, 14% of global CIOs have already deployed AI and 48% will deploy it by 2020. More organisations are adopting Artificial Intelligence, however, whilst adoption is increasing, some enterprises are still questioning the business impact and benefits, claims Gartner. So what does an AI for data management actually mean? What does it do and why does a business need it? To answer that question, we need to look back at the past.
Over the last two decades, data storage costs have significantly changed and, as a result, the data content stored has shifted too; from carefully selected information needing a back-up stored locally at a higher cost to very affordable storage alternatives, allowing all kinds of data being backed up and easily accessible at all times, guaranteed by cloud technologies. Recently, however, things have gone through a change yet again. The cost of back-up and disaster recovery is increasing
This is led by the simple fact that we constantly back-up everything. In other words, it is not the costs of disks or a cloud that helped boost up the price of storage, it is the amount of data we keep. With all that data being now stored, how do we distinguish what we want to keep and where? Is it going to be kept on premise, or in a cloud, or perhaps in one of the datacentres? How do we filter and prioritise the information essential to run a business smoothly and at the lowest cost possible? ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE FOR DATA MANAGEMENT Here is where things get really interesting – Artificial Intelligence for data management. The software opportunities in this area seem to be endless and invaluable when it comes to keeping your business organised and cost effective. “The idea is to keep the right data on the right drive (or in a cloud) at the right time”, says Jason Daly, Software Defined Storage Business Development Manager for Exertis Hammer. With the right AI software, enterprises can easily control their data management budget by having visibility of how the data is distributed across the storage tiers. Ideally, a business wants to keep the hot data easily available in a faster storage and the cold data stored somewhere cheaper, like a cloud, for example. Software can be programmed in so many different ways in helping a company distinguish its most essential data from the secondary information. Search rules can be applied by using the metadata properties, like the last time the data was accessed, amended, created, by whom, how big the data is, where it is stored, the type of compression etc. Setting the search criteria, saving them and allowing them to be run live, or periodically, saves a business time and keeps the data organised, but most importantly it allows an organisation to prioritise data protection. Intelligent data management also enables businesses to control the information stored from being unnecessarily duplicated, saving
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valuable space, and therefore gaining more control over their budget. VERTICAL MARKET APPLICATIONS Possibilities of merging AI with data management are endless. They help enterprises not only with their budget planning, and deliver cost savings, but also they allow larger non-profitable organisations manage their vast data for an effective storage usage. AI and data management can play crucial roles in various vertical markets ranging from medical research, autonomous car development, media and entertainment and gaming to name but a few. IT managers, working for research centres or hospitals, with the help of intelligent software, can create projects where the results of medical research are stored safely and protected. The software will be programmed to recognise that the data saved is important (as researches cannot be repeated) and, for safety, it will be kept in a various locations like a cloud, a local disk, a datacentre or a disaster recovery site. In case of an emergency, this will allow IT managers to retrieve the incidental loss of the valuable data in no time.
“The idea is to keep the right data on the right drive (or in a cloud) at the right time” In the automotive industry, Artificial Intelligence has many applications; not only does it drive autonomous vehicles but helps them being built - robots drive optimisation and the rethinking of processes and production in innovative new ways. AI software can be programmed to detect drivers’ behaviour, to control vehicles’
predictive maintenance, or even assist with automotive insurance purposes. In order to carry out all of the above and many more actions, data management is a crucial part of AI application. Data must not only be easily accessible and well organised, it has to be safely stored and protected at all times. Introduction of a data managing software allows important data storage monitoring, its flow and security. SOLUTIONS FROM EXERTIS ENTERPRISE Exertis Enterprise vendors, StrongBox Data Solution and InfiniteIO, are market leaders in the field of Artificial Intelligence for data management. StrongBox’s product, StrongLink, provides a business with
autonomous data management where all the important information is stored safely and protected at all times. StrongBox has been chosen as a data management tool in the world’s largest enterprises across 17 industries. InfiniteIO, powered by the world’s fastest metadata engine, delivers the lowest possible latency to enable applications to run faster, reduce development cycles and increase data productivity. If you want to know more about the intelligent data management and how it can benefit your customers speak to your Exertis Enterprise account manager.
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DISCOVER THE ADVANTAGES OF AN ON-PREMISES CLOUD Accelerate IT modernization and simplify your cloud strategy with Intel® Data Center Blocks for Cloud – Microsoft Azure Stack HCI. Outdated infrastructure results in 6x slower product innovation and time to market1.
ACCELERATE ON-PREMISES CLOUD DEPLOYMENT
Hardware Validated
DRIVING BUSINESS TRANSFORMATION AND ADVANTAGE Increase Agility
Develop and deploy game-changing applications faster with advanced cloud orchestration and automation features.
On-Demand Scalability
Easily and seamlessly migrate and scale applications from your on-premises cloud to the Microsoft Azure cloud.
PERFORMANCE OPTIMIZED FOR THE LATEST INTEL® TECHNOLOGIES 2nd Generation Intel® Xeon® Scalable Processors
Outstanding performance across a widely diverse set of workloads.
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Extend system memory capacity for data-centric workloads and increase VM density.
1 IDC whitepaper: “Why Upgrade Your Server Now”, July 2016. Intel® technologies’ features and benefits depend on system configuration and may require enabled hardware, software or service activation. Performance varies depending on system configuration. No product or component can be absolutely secure. Check with your system manufacturer or retailer or learn more at intel.com. Intel, the Intel logo, and other Intel marks are trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries. Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others. © Intel Corporation.
Software Certified
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Intel® Optane™ SSDs
Intel® Ethernet Solutions
Built-in features better protect your data and servers, while improving infrastructure resiliency.
Breakthrough storage performance to move data faster to and from the processor.
Windows Admin Center provides an easy, holistic management interface for visibility and control across your cloud infrastructure.
High-throughput, low latency I/O across the infrastructure.
Learn more on the web: intel.com/dcb Talk to our specialist datacentre team for more information
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MUST HAVE
TEN OF THE BEST Accessories 1. KRAMER VIA CONNECT PLUS VIA Connect PLUS provides simultaneous wired and wireless presentation and collaboration for a variety of spaces with no need for any additional hardware.
2. CHERRY MW 8 ERGO Comfort and uncompromising quality for right-handed users
Part Code: S10263779
3. LENOVO THINKPAD USB-C DOCK GEN 2 Unleash your creativity with Next-Gen USB-C docking; Why settle when the right tools can take you to the next level?
4. BUFFALO TECHNOLOGY MINISTATION EXTREME (1TB) Offers high performance USB3.0 portable storage in a compact and sophisticated design.
5. ZAGG TRI-FOLD BLUETOOTH KEYBOARD Optimise your productivity when travelling – fully universal keyboard with Bluetooth connectivity.
6. TARGUS USB 3.0 DOCKING STATION “One Touch” USB connection from laptop to work space peripherals at USB 3.0 Superspeed. Delivering superb picture quality for up to two external screens without any picture distortion or delay.
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7. FELLOWES PRIVACY FILTERS Security is your number one priority, so keep your work protected from prying eyes with privacy screens for monitors and computer screen filters from Fellowes.
8. TECHAIR ECO FRIENDLY 15.6” BACKPACK Your essential kit needs protection when you’re on the move. The Lateral Protection via foam cushions keeps your laptop more than happy.
Part Code: S10202288 Part Code: TAECB001
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9. RDX The RDX QuikStor media-based removable storage system offers rugged, reliable and convenient storage for backup, archive, data interchange and disaster recovery.
10. DK30C2DPPDUE- USB-C DOCKING STATION This universal laptop docking station connects Dell XPS, Chromebook or other laptops to two DP or HDMI monitors.
Part Code: TAN8782RDX
Part Code: S10272247
Samsung Fl!p 2 An interactive display that simplifies teamwork without any hassle
The new and intuitive Samsung Fl!p 2 is an easy-to-use digital flip chart for any meeting environment, offering enhanced collaboration capabilities in an easy user interface with a host of features, including brush mode, annotation on any background, merge to roll, and other collaboration tools. Available in two sizes, 55 and 65 inches, both models offer great collaborative features supported by unique designs but no matter the size, the Samsung Fl!p 2 allows teams to work smarter, faster and better
For more information on Samsung Fl!p 2 or to book a demo contact your exertis account manager today
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