Smarter communications with Neopost output management software

THE WORKPLACE & TECHNOLOGY MAGAZINE FOR SMES

WWW.BUSINESSINFOMAG.UK ISSUE127SamsungCommunication Manager Series

MAJOR FUNCTIONS & BENEFITS

SPECIFICATIONS

FUNCTION Benefit

Straightforward Architecture

• Single server architecture• SCMC accommodates up to 512 users• SCME accommodates up to 3000 users• Entire voice ecosystems consolidated into one interface

Resiliency and High Availability

SCMC• Dual PSU (optional)• Dual gig network ports

SCME• High availability modes: active-standby,

active-active• Switchover cases: LAN cable down,

SCM down or process down• Data synchronisation:

Real-time, total sync or by command

Integration• Integrated voicemail, auto attendant, email and access manager• Seamless integration for mobile phones into your voice network

Call evaluation, feedback, results and audit reports

• Unified messaging • Conferencing • Mobile Extension (MOBEX)• Call move• System monitoring• Call trace• WE VoIP • Supports SIP features (300+) and multiple interfaces for 3rd party application connectivity

DESCRIPTION CategorySamsung Communication Manager Compact

Samsung Communication Manager Express

Capacity

Users 512 3,000

Gateways 32 256

CPS 5 50

Concurrent Calls 150 1,000

MOH Channels 6 256

UMS Channels/Conference Channels 32/32 64/64

SIP Trunks/Total Trunks 128/256 512/512

Redundancy

Network Y Y

Power Optional N/A

System N/A Active-Standby, Active-Active

Dimensions Dimensions 1u (441.5 x 352 x 44mm WxDxH) 1u (431 X 393.7 X 42.6 mm WxDxH)

www.samsung.com/business

Samsung Communication Manager Compact

M P S • S C A N N E R S • D I S P L A Y S • L I G H T I N G

Smarter communications with Neopost output

management software

Bus Info Ad June 16.pdf 1 29/06/2016 12:36:02

01732 759725

IN THIS ISSUE05 Agenda

Businesses waste billions on admin

11 Mailing New services for Mailmark franking machines

12 Cover Story Maximise benefits of Neopost folder- inserters with output management software

14 App Update New apps for business and leisure

15 Scanners Fujitsu adopts new approach to scanning

19 Managed Print Services Epson introduces MPS for WorkForce Pro business inkjets

24 Displays Tayla Ansell picks her highlights from NEC Showcase 2016

26 Interview James Goulding talks to Nigel Steljes about his new venture

30 Innovations The month’s best new products and services

32 Mobile Tablet-based tills bring flexibility to small retailers

34 Catering Why every office needs a coffee machine. Plus greener coffee choices

36 Communications Tayla Ansell looks at trends in business telephony

37 Hosted telephony Dominic Norton outlines the pros and cons of hosted and on-premise communications

38 Lighting Why office lighting matters for employee well-being

41 Drones New applications of drone technology

42 The Month in Numbers The world of work in numbers

Editor: James Goulding 0780 308 7228 · [email protected]

Advertising Director: Ethan White 01732 759725 · [email protected]

Publishing Director: Neil Trim 01732 759725 · [email protected]

Group Sales Manager: Martin Jenner-Hall 07824 552116 · [email protected]

Social Media Manager: John Peters 07711 204011 · [email protected]

Art Director: Nick Pledge 07767 615983 · [email protected]

Editorial Assistant: Tayla Ansell 01962 843434 · [email protected]

Advertising Sales Excutive: James Trim 01732 759725 · [email protected]

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The opinions expressed by contributors are not necessarily those of the publishers

who cannot accept responsibility for any errors or omissions.

No part of Business Info magazine can be reproduced without the prior permission of the publisher. © Copyright 2016 Kingswood Media Ltd. ISSN 1464-8814

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“ ”Who saw that coming? And I’m not just talking about the

Iceland result. As the consequences of Cameron’s ill judged

gamble become clear, the spectre of 2008 is stalking the land.

Confronted by the real possibility of a return to recession, it

is vital that businesses continue to invest in ICT and push on

with their digitisation strategies. Survey after survey show that

organisations still have a long way to go in this regard. Too

many workflows remain slow, labour-intensive and paper-based,

and where processes are digitised, they are often done so in a

piecemeal fashion that prevents organisations from reaping the

full benefits of their investment. On page 15 we explain what

Fujitsu is doing to encourage more organisations, especially small

and medium-sized businesses, to implement enterprise-wide

digitisation strategies.

Another trend that emerged from the last recession is managed

print services (MPS). The promise of lower costs, a smaller carbon

footprint and improved efficiency struck a chord with businesses

desperate to economise without laying off workers or damaging

their competitiveness. MPS proved particularly popular with

enterprises and medium-sized businesses. New offerings from

Epson and Samsung (see page 19) extend the benefits to smaller

businesses. With three and five year contracts on the table, it is

important to consider the effects of your digitisation strategies

on future print volumes. Otherwise, your MPS could turn out to

be a false economy.

The advantage of investing in IT to improve efficiency and

cut costs is that savings achieved may give forward-thinking

organisations more scope to continue to support employees

by creating more comfortable working environments (see page

38). It is possible to devise cost justifications for investment in

furniture, lighting, catering etc., but they are inexact and easy

to ignore when hard investment choices need to be made.

Businesses should avoid this temptation. As the workforce ages,

the quality of the working environment is likely to become

an increasingly important factor in addressing the UK’s poor

productivity levels.

James Goulding, Editor, [email protected]

Comment

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Tel: 01732 759725 • Email: [email protected]

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Applegate Marketplace is encouraging UK SMEs to learn from consumers and shop around for the best deals.

It claims that UK firms could cut millions from their cost base by seeking out the best deals for everyday items, from low-cost supplies, such as tea bags, staples and lightbulbs, to larger items like printers and printer supplies.

Its survey of 726 SME senior decision-makers reveals that the nation’s smallest businesses are the savviest shoppers, being 50% to100% more likely to shop around and compare prices on office staples than larger counterparts.

Stuart Brocklehurst, CEO of Applegate Marketplace, said: “It is a concern that small businesses seem to be growing out of savvy buying as their business grows – rather than growing into it. As these businesses grow, patience to obtain the best value deteriorates and maverick

spend can increase.”To simplify procurement for small and

medium-sized businesses, Applegate Marketplace has introduced a new online buying tool that streamlines the sourcing of multiple quotes for products and services. Applegate PRO reduces time spent on request for quotation and purchase order processes from hours to just minutes. www.applegatepro.com

New campaign addresses challenges of ageing workforce

The European Agency for Safety and Health at Work (EU-OSHA) has launched a new campaign to promote occupational health and safety in the context of an ageing workforce.

The Healthy Workplaces for All Ages campaign is supported by The British Safety Council, which is urging employers to take part.

Chief executive Mike Robinson said: “In the next two decades, a large proportion of employees over 50 will leave work for ever, taking their market expertise, professional experience and skills with them. Meanwhile, the demographic data suggests that there is unlikely to be a sufficient supply of younger people in Britain to replace

retiring workers.”He said that for this reason the retention of

older workers will become an economic as well as a social necessity. However, it will also mean greater exposure to a variety of health-related risks that organisations will need to manage.

He said: “The management of issues such as disability prevention, rehabilitation and return to work will increase in importance. The introduction of specific measures to ensure work safety and the efficiency of older employees, as well as age-sensitive risk assessments, will have to become a key part of occupational health and safety policies.”www.britsafe.org

agendaSmall businesses are savviest shoppers

Businesses waste billions on admin Unneccesary admin and inadequate technology are costing UK organisations £60 billion a year in lost productivity warns The Workforce Institute at Kronos.

Its new report, The £60bn Question, reveals that employees spend 7% of their working week on unnecessary administrative tasks, at a cost of £1,932 per year, per employee.

Kronos claims that reducing wasted time by one hour per week per employee would save £690 per employee or £21.4 billion per year.

The report also reveals that 82% of respondents are struggling to complete daily tasks due to inefficiencies caused by lack of staff availability, poor technology support, internal politics and unrealistic workloads.

Three quarters (77%) of HR and Line of Business managers cited out-dated systems and technology as their biggest workforce management challenge; 72% cited lost productivity caused by manual systems.www.kronos.co.uk

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A record-breaking throw distance of just 11.7cm allows the projector to be placed just inches from the wall, ensuring that nothing comes between you and your message: no shadows; no noise; no glare.

For more information call us on 01256 707070 or email [email protected]

www.exertis.co.uk

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agenda

There has been a positive shift in civil servants’ attitudes towards tech over the last 12 months. However, they still don’t buy from a wide enough range of suppliers, warns techUK, the voice of the UK tech industry.

In a survey of 1,500 civil servants by Dods Research, 84% agreed or strongly agreed that tech is critical to delivering their department’s business plan.

The proportion who view tech as an ‘enabler’ rather than merely a ‘necessity’ increased to 31%, from 22% last year. The number who view it as a necessity fell from 76% in 2015 to 67%.

Despite this progress, civil servants have not changed their views on the benefits of broadening their supply base. Only 21% of respondents agree or strongly agree that there is an appetite in their department to procure a

higher percentage of technology services from SMEs – the same proportion as in 2015.

Julian David, CEO of techUK, said: “The last twelve months have seen a positive shift in how civil servants see tech. This gives us hope for the future. However, the findings clearly demonstrate a lack of understanding of the benefits of a broad supply base and the potential for innovative technologies to revolutionise public services, putting the Government’s target to procure 33% of tech from SMEs in jeopardy. We must take a new approach to show, not tell, civil servants how new tech can transform both their working environment and the services they provide.”www.techuk.org

Civil Servants love tech – but not from SMEs

ICT could combat climate change The ICT sector could play a central role in combating climate change and promoting economic growth across the EU, claims BT in a new report.

In The role of ICT in reducing carbon emissions in the EU, BT claims that ICT-enabled solutions could reduce EU carbon emissions by 1.5 Gt CO2e in 2030, equal to 37% of the EU’s total emissions in 2012. Smart manufacturing, smart buildings and smart energy account for 74% of the potential carbon savings identified by the report.

Larry Stone, BT President of Government & Public Affairs, said: “Increased use of ICT solutions could help ensure the European Union meets its carbon emissions reduction targets. They are also an important enabler for the circular economy.” www.bt.com

Google most popular For the second year in a row, undergraduates have voted Google the most popular graduate employer. The full list of the UK’s 300 most popular graduate employers based on a poll of 52,000 undergraduates by international research firm trendence is available online. gtimedia.co.uk

Security worries keep IT pros awake at night Security is the issue most likely to keep IT professionals awake at night, according to the 2016 Digital Leaders survey produced by BCS, The Chartered Insitute for IT.

When asked which IT trends were most likely to give them sleepless nights over the next 12 months, security came out on top, cited by 59%, followed by cloud computing (48%) and mobile computing, including BYOD (34%).

Adam Thilthorpe, BCS Director for Professionalism, said: “Year-on-year, we’re seeing that organisations feel they do not have the necessary skills in-house to help them face the IT trends that they know they need to address to help their organisations remain competitive. This continues to be a serious issue not just for individual organisations but for the UK as a whole.” www.bcs.org

Julian David

IT struggles to keep up with changing business models Almost half (46%) of European IT decision-makers find supporting fast changing business models a key challenge, up from 35% in 2015, according to research by managed services provider Claranet. In the UK, the number is even higher at 54%.

Michel Robert, Claranet’s UK managing director, said the results highlight the growing imperative for IT departments to be more dynamic.

He said: “If IT departments are to empower their organisations and keep pace with the desired rate of change, they need to adopt more progressive approaches to IT management, focusing on practices which will boost their applications, such as public cloud and DevOps. The flexibility and agility brought by public cloud services enable IT departments to spin up new services which scale on demand, without heavy investments in additional infrastructure. DevOps, meanwhile, can increase the frequency of updates and speed to market, ensuring the application estate can support changing business conditions.” www.claranet.co.uk

businessinfomag.ukmagazine08

Simulated cyber-attack practice IT training company QA has invested over £150,000 in a Cyber Lab where organisations can learn how to defend themseves against a simulated cyber-attack. The 20-seat facility in London allows staff to react to a real life threat in a secure physical environment. Teams can rehearse incident response, conduct digital forensic investigations, create ‘offensive defenses’ and undertake security operations, as well as practice crisis media management. www.qa.com/cyberlab

Businesses willing to sabotage competitionMost businesss people would happily use illegal tactics to sabotage their competition online. When SEO agency Reboot Online asked businesses if they would like to hire a service to sabotage a competitor’s website and guarantee its removal from Google search results, 78% either accepted the offer outright or gave it serious consideration, even though so called Negative SEO is illegal.www.rebootonline.com

Employers fear social media in the workplaceEmployers are wary of using social media to communicate in the workplace because they are afraid it will be misused by their employees.

A new study by Acas shows that while many employers are keen to exploit social media to promote their business, far fewer use it to engage with their staff because they fear that online conversations will get out of hand and employees will not use social media for work purposes.

They are also concerned that they will have to act on employee suggestions made on social media.

The research paper Going Digital? Harnessing Social Media for Employee Voice offers tips on using social media within the workplace, including advice to develop a supportive culture of employee voice; trust staff and accept that they cannot control everything; ensure that senior leaders champion the positive use of social media; and develop a robust social media policy outlining acceptable and unacceptable behaviour. www.acas.org.uk

Cloud customers too trusting of technology Nearly half (47%) of security personnel ‘simply trust’ that their cloud providers will meet security agreements without demanding any verification, claims new research from enterprise cloud hosting provider iland.

A survey by Enterprise Management Associates (EMA) reveals that companies now consider cloud security to be superior to on-premises security and often expose themselves to risk by relying too heavily on technology.

David Monahan, EMA research director, security and risk management, said: “Companies can no longer combat security threats simply by throwing technology at perceived vulnerabilities. Though teams are using more security tools in the cloud than on-premises, they still face major risks as they struggle with staffing and skills shortages that make it extremely difficult to adequately evaluate, integrate and manage solutions.” www.iland.com

How clean is your desk? In an attempt to promote cleaner workplaces, Sanondaf is challenging UK businesses to take a free swab test to see what’s lurking around their desk or keyboard. Interested companies can take a swab with a free test kit, which Sanondaf will analyse and write up in a report. The disinfection and decontamination specialist is also providing all UK businesses with free hand washing and infection control posters and information booklets. For more information, contact Stuart White on 01236 702028 or [email protected]

Online energy marketplace A new online marketplace, Energy-Scanner, has launched in the UK to empower small business owners to take back control of their energy contracts. The service enables SMEs to choose from a list of contracts provided by a range of energy companies. www.energy-scanner.com

New food delivery serviceAward winning British food business Benugo has launched a new delivery service in Central London. Ideal for meetings and conferences, the delivery menu includes sharing boxes and platters. Founder Ben Warner said: “Whether catering for a morning breakfast meeting or an informal lunch, the new delivery service provides great food, quickly, and will feature the same delicious produce that can be found in our shops, including freshly made wraps, delicious salads, snack pots and even our handmade cakes.” www.benugo.com

The number of apps and mobile websites leaking credit card data from enterprise mobile devices is on the rise, according to a new report by Wandera, a leader in mobile data security and management.

The latest quarterly Mobile Data Report shows that from Q4 2015 to Q1 2016 there was a 17% increase in the number of apps and websites identified as leaking sensitive data. Q1 2016 also saw a 200% monthly rise in the number of malicious domains visited by users.

Wandera notes that while education is helping users avoid malicious websites through typical routes (e.g. phishing attacks or unwise browser use), they are increasingly being exposed to malware from compromised adverts in the apps they use.

Another key trend is greater browser and app encryption, with 70% of data from apps now encrypted, an increase of 21% over the last 12 months. Encryption of data within browsers has risen more slowly to 52%, an increase of 13%. www.wandera.com

Rise in apps leaking sensitive data

TOP TENBusiness JargonTaken from Amba Hotels’ Bacon Wrap: The little book of business nonsense speak, a compendium of corporate jargon old and new compiled by Amba Hotels and Adam Jacot de Boinod.

1. Bacon wrap; when you take something good and elevate it to excellence by changing it or adding value to it.2. Buffling; speaking at length and off the point in a business context.3. Derp; a simple, undefined reply when an ignorant comment or action is made.4. Dumbwalking; walking slowly, without paying attention to the world around you because you are on a smartphone.5. Humblebrag; the practice of saying something apparently modest which is really intended to boast – “Just stepped in gum. Who spits gum on a red carpet”.6. Nomophobia; fear of being without your mobile phone.7. Power paunch; a large stomach worn proudly as a badge of status.8. Qwerty nosedive; falling asleep at the keyboard.9. Sunlighting; doing a very different job on one day of the working week.10. Underbrag; a boast which consists of openly admitting to failings to prove you are confident enough not to care what others think of you.www.amba-hotel.com

Meteorologists at the University of Birmingham have been developing internet-connected temperature sensors that could cut millions from road-gritting costs and help local authorities prepare for bad weather.

Fitted on the street side of lampposts near ground level, the hand-sized sensors collect and transmit data on road-surface temperatures, enabling local authorities, highways agencies and other organisations to target precisely where gritting is needed and where it isn’t. Temperature data is transmitted via Wifi every ten minutes, providing a non-stop stream of data.

Sensors funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) in conjunction with Amey plc have already been successfully trialled in Birmingham, London and other parts of the country.

Each one costs £200, compared to £10,000 or so needed to maintain a weather forecasting station like the ones currently relied on by local authorities. Because no cabling is required, the sensors can be rolled out rapidly.

Project leader Dr Lee Chapman said: “Generally, a local authority may have just two or three of these weather stations, which means

the decisions they make are based more on forecasts than actual information. But because our new sensors are so inexpensive, local authorities could afford to deploy scores or even hundreds of them and make very localised decisions about the need to grit on a route by route basis. That’s extremely useful in view of the fact that there can be a 10°C to 15°C difference in road temperatures across a county on a given winter’s night.”

He added: “The UK typically uses 2 million tonnes of salt in an average winter. Our estimates demonstrate that by eliminating unnecessary gritting, this new technology could easily enable savings of between 20% and 50%, which would be equivalent to over £100 million per year in salt across the country as a whole.”

Real-time decision-making has the potential to be extended even further, with individual gritting lorries switching their gritters on and off as they move along in response to data generated by sensor networks.

The next step is to work with industry partners towards full commercialisation and eventual mass production of the sensors. www.epsrc.ac.uk

IoT Watch: Real World Internet of Things

Intelligent winter road maintenance

agenda

Photo credit: Simon Bell


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01732 759725 magazine 11

Mailmark is Royal Mail’s newest franking mark. Introduced in 2014, the 2D barcode takes the place of a stamp or existing frank mark and contains data which makes it easier for Royal Mail to process mail.

Royal Mail has invested heavily in this new technology and customer migration to the Mailmark option is growing. One of the biggest reasons to upgrade is cheaper franking – Mailmark users make a saving of at least 2p per letter compared to the standard franking tariff.

Another attraction has always been the promise of useful new services for customers. But have these actually materialised?

The short answer is ‘Yes. But in a trickle’.

Pre-Pay ReplyWhen Mailmark was introduced, Royal Mail also launched a Pre-Pay Reply service not previously available to the franking channel. This gives users the option to include a franked pre-paid reply envelope in a mailing to encourage customers and prospects to respond. End users can post the reply paid envelope in any post box.

David Beirne, Neopost’s Royal Mail Products and Services Manager, says a number of sectors have found this service particularly useful, including estate agents, solicitors, financial advisors and councils.

Streamlining BMAThis July, Royal Mail is introducing improvements to the Business Mail Advance (BMA) process, which it says will save franking customers even more time in the mailroom.

BMA offers additional postal discounts for high volume users. Organisations that send 500 or more letters in one batch and meet certain requirements for the preparation and presentation of mail can obtain a discount from the franking tariff. Discounts are based on volume so the more letters sent in one transaction, the bigger the discount.

David Beirne says the re-worked product will improve the user experience and that customers who have trialled the service have recorded high levels of satisfaction.

“There will be no need to log your order on an Online Business Account, no need to create a sales order or count the mail,” he said. “The pricing and rebate process will be managed through the franking account held with your franking supplier so there will be no back office handling or banking of cheques. It also offers improved transparent invoicing.”

This month Royal Mail is introducing its second Mailmark-enabled postal service.

Worth the wait?

Mailing

Supplier solutionsIn addition to Royal Mail derived solutions, franking machine

manufacturers are developing their own services compatible with Mailmark franking machines.

For example, Pitney Bowes provides an additional cloud-based solution, INVIEW, which captures information from the franking machine and shares it back to clients. This enables businesses to review data to help them improve their postal efficiencies and maximise their postal budgets.

Colin Forrest, Director, Demand Generation, SMB Mailing Solutions Europe at Pitney Bowes, says that other Mailmark services will be developed in the future. “Pitney Bowes continues to work with Royal Mail on potential solutions for the MailMark franking channel and is confident new products and services will continue to evolve, which will harness the MailMark technology Royal Mail has deployed,” he said.

The futureFranking machine users who made the switch to Mailmark expecting to be able to enjoy a raft of new mailing services on top of reduced postal tariffs might have been disappointed with the results so far.

The good news is that more products are in the pipeline. The bad news is that neither Royal Mail nor franking machine manufacturers are currently able to comment on what they might be or when users can expect to see them.www.royalmail.comwww.neopost.co.ukwww.pitneybowes.com

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Cover Story

The perfect combination Neopost folder-inserters are a much used, but arguably under-appreciated, business tool to be found wherever there is a requirement to produce professional looking, multi-page or multi-insert mailings at high speed and with dependable accuracy.

They do exactly what their name suggests, folding letters and inserting them items into envelopes at speeds of up to 12,000 items per hour. Even the smallest entry-level machine can do this at least 13 times faster than by hand, saving businesses time and effort.

Inserters don’t just put letters into envelopes. They can also insert other items such as flyers, postcards, reply paid envelopes, even booklets and CDs. The more feed stations a folder-inserter has, the greater the range of items that can be sent out in the same envelope.

Of course, you don’t have to take an insert from every station. Easy job programming lets you specify which station inserts should be taken from.

Some customers will only ever use their folder-inserter in this fairly basic way, and this is fine as far as it goes. It will alllow you to save money by folding letters and avoiding Large Letter postal charges; speed up mail processing; present a more professional image with crsip folds and perfectly aligned mailings; and use transactional mail for marketing purposes, for example by sending out special offer flyers with bills or statements.

However, this only scratches the

surface of what you can do. The addition of output management software specially developed for use with folder-inserters significantly expands their capabilities. In particular, it lets you apply machine readable optical marks to printed pages, containing folding-insertion instructions, such as which stations to take inserts from and how many pages should go to each recipient.

In this way you can customise insertions for each and every customer, automatically and on-the-fly. A shirt-maker, for example, could specify different inserts for male and female customers or vary insertions based on customers’ buying histories. This brings huge productivity benefits. More importantly, it lets you meet growing customer demand for personalisation, leading to stronger customer relationships, better response rates and less waste.

Neopost offers two output management solutions for its folder-inserters:1 OMS-200, an entry-level solution designed exclusively for folding-inserting to ensure that you always send the right document with the right insert to the right customer; and2 OMS-500, a much more powerful solution, covering the whole multi-channel communications process, including document design, production and distribution via digital and postal channels, including automated, intelligent folding-inserting.

Do more with OMSInstead of producing a list of all OMS functions, here are ten reasons why you should expand the capabilities of your folder-inserter by buying output management software at the same time.

1 Contact customers via their choice of channel.Today, more than ever, consumers

expect to be contacted via their choice of communications channel. This could

be the post, fax, telephone, email, social media, web-link or SMS – and it could change depending on the subject matter or even the time of day. Output management software simplifies the implementation of multi-channel communications by automatically distributing documents via each customer’s preferred communication channel, with significant benefits for customer satisfaction and loyalty.

2 Digitise your business – at your customers’ pace. Digitisation is the Number One priority for businesses today. Everyone wants to be paper-free, but getting there can be difficult. In a new study by Xerox1, IT decision-makers confidently predict that within two years only 9% of key business processes will run on paper. However, more than half admit that their processes are still largely, or entirely, paper-based. About one in three says they still use paper, not email, to communicate with customers. This might not be in line with customer wishes and opportunities for cost saving could be missed. Output management software that supports multiple communication channels lets you make the transition from printed to digital communications seamlessly and at a pace that suits you and your customers.

3 Maintain visibility & control. One of the difficulties in adopting multi-channel communications is keeping track of what was sent to whom, when and how. With integrated archiving, OMS software provides a consolidated view and record of all communications, irrespective of whether they were distributed electronically or printed and posted. Employees can see at a glance when and how something was sent, without having to switch between applications and/or filing systems.

4 Consult audit trails for proof of delivery. Instead of having to rely on someone’s word, output management systems provide an audit trail of communications

Fill envelopes quickly and accurately with intelligent folding and inserting

They do exactly what their name suggests, folding letters and inserting them items into envelopes at speeds of up to 12,000 items per hour.

magazine 1301732 759725

Enjoy economies of scale and simpler management by centralising document production and despatch.

activity so that you can confirm and, if necessary, prove that something has been sent. Some systems provide digital certification of electronic documents to prove authenticity and proof of receipt. The result? Better customer service and faster dispute resolution. In the case of invoices, proof of receipt can even help you get paid faster.

5 Ensure Compliance. Audit trails are just one example of how output management software aids compliance. By automating the preparation, production and despatch of customer communications generally, OMS software makes it easier to stick to relevant rules, regulations and standards, from the pre-sorting of mail to maximise Royal Mail discounts (see below) to the archiving of invoices to HMRC standards.

6 Personalise customer communications.Increase response rates and build stronger customer relationships by personalising transactional and marketing communications. OMS software lets you do this in a number of ways, from changing greetings on letters to varying the offers, promotions and marketing material sent to each customer. One of the key functions of almost all OMS solutions is the generation of barcodes and/or optical marks containing processing instructions for folder-inserters. These are read by the folder-inserter, which modifies envelope insertions accordingly. In a recent survey by Ricoh Europe3, almost two thirds (64%) of consumers said brands could do more to tailor their communications to their needs – and 80% said they would be willing to share data to enable this. Automating insertions eliminates human error and ensures that each person receives the documents they are

meant to. This is particularly beneficial for organisations that handle sensitive customer data, especially those in healthcare, social services, education and financial services. Figures from the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO)2 show that sending sensitive data to the wrong recipient is one of the three most common causes of data security breaches.

7 Boost productivity. The above is just one example of how OMS (and folder-inserters) can increase productivity by reducing manual processing. In fact, output management software has a massive effect on staff productivity by automating almost every aspect of the communications process, from the use of templates for document creation to the automatic pre-sorting of mail. Neopost estimates that automatic mail processing saves 30-60 seconds per item. Claims management company Claim Eazy has reduced the amount of time it takes to process outbound mail by 80% since installing an intelligent Neopost DS-200 folder-inserter and output management software.

8 Save money. Hand-in-hand with productivity enhancements are big cost savings. These come not just from increased efficiency, but also from the substitution of printed communications with digital messaging (where desired). Within a month of introducing output management software and giving customers a choice of receiving invoices in the post or by email, bakery products supplier Ransons had cut its postage and paper costs by 20%. Further cost savings come from a reduction in costly errors associated with manual processes; improved data accuracy (certified address management software is included with Neopost output management software); and

sophisticated mail processing. For example, OMS can save postage costs by combining multiple letters to an individual in one envelope and by grouping and pre-sorting mail to maximise Royal Mail volume discounts.

9 Make better use of resources. Enjoy economies of scale and simpler management by centralising document production and despatch. Organisations with multiple branch offices don’t have to install printing and mailing equipment in every office or put up with slower, less productive devices in satellite offices. With optional plug ins documents can be processed and despatched centrally. As well as reducing support requirements in branch offices and enabling organisations to make productive use of larger, more economical devices in the corporate print/mail-room, centralisation maximises possible Royal Mail volume discounts.

10 Maintain a consistent corporate identity. The document design features included in many output management solutions let you centralise the creation of transactional and marketing communications for a more professional corporate image. Templates for invoices, sales orders, statements, forms and other documents let you apply a consistent design across your business, from typefaces, fonts and graphics to output choices, such as single- or double-sided printing. A multi-channel solution like GMC Inspire provides a single design platform for print, email, mobile and web.

Folder-inserters have been an office and mailroom staple for many years. New generation output management software bring them into the twenty-first century, making them a core part of organisations’ multi-channel customer communication and digitisation strategies.www.neopost.co.uk/oms1

1 Digitisation at Work, Xerox, 2016 www.xerox.com2 Data Security Incident Trends Report, July-September 2015, Information Commissioner’s Office, 2016 www.ico.org.uk3 Communication Crackdown, Ricoh Europe, 2016 www.ricoh-europe.com


Track your travel Originally built for Judas Priest guitarist Richie Faulkner, Travel Tracker is a quick and easy way to keep a record of your international travel. Just select the country you visited and tap the dates you were away. A report screen provides an overview of time spent in each location, including international allowance status. Reports can be exported in PDF or CSV formats for saving, emailing or printing.www.internationaltraveltracker.com

Secure communicationKeep team communications private with the free Sid messaging app. End-to-end encryption ensures that only those with permission to do so can access data and messages, while synchronisation between all your connected devices means that you can start a chat on your smartphone, say, and finish it on your desktop computer. Sid is available for iPhone, Android, Mac and Windows. https://sid.co/

Find a venueInfotel Solutions, the company behind event finding service Findmeaconference.com, has released the FMAC Venue Finder app to streamline venue selection. Available for both iOS and Android users, it includes an image gallery for each venue with information on its facilities, room layouts, rates etc. to help organisers make informed decisions. Users can create shortlists and ‘favourite’ venues.www.infotelsolutions.co.uk

Make your city saferThe See.Sense ICON bicycle light is the latest in a growing range of intelligent cycling aids. As well as improving safety by automatically flashing more strongly at roundabouts and junctions, it uses built-in sensors to collect data about road surfaces, light levels, crashes and near misses. See Sense says that by sharing this information with authorities users can help make city cycling safer, for example by identifying accident hotspots or pinpointing potholes before they’re fully formed. ICON comes with a free app that lets you check the battery level and customise brightness levels and other settings. A crash alert feature detects if you’re involved in a collision and can text a contact with your GPS location. seesense.cc

Engaging contentAdobe Spark is a free web and mobile solution that lets people with no design experience create and share visually engaging flyers, announcements, blog posts, presentations and other content. Ideal for small businesses, bloggers, marketers and students, it offers a choice of three formats – social graphics (Adobe Spark Post); web stories (Adobe Spark Page); and animated videos (Adobe Spark Video) – with preset themes and colour palettes. A ‘find photos’ feature lets you search through free photos with Creative Commons licensing. Adobe Spark is curently available on iPhone, iPad and the web. An Android version and a paid app with more features will be available in the future. spark.adobe.com

Compliance alertsSafeShop makes it easier for independent shops and small businesses to comply with health and safety maintenance laws. Guiding businesses through the actions they need to take to ensure their premises stay compliant, it provides a personalised risk rating and health and safety maintenance schedule, including automatic alerts for mandatory electrical safety, gas check or fire safety equipment tests. SafeShop is available free from the Google and Apple app stores.www.safeshopowner.com

Live accountingSage, the market leader for integrated accounting, payroll and payment systems, has introduced a new release of Sage Live for iPhone, iPad and Apple Watch. Built on the Salesforce platform, the business management tool provides instant access to colleagues and information, making real-time collaboration easier and empowering companies to run their businesses from their phones. www.sage.com

Seamless integrationXero has teamed up with Google to integrate its accounting app with Gmail and Google Apps, providing a seamless way to connect third party apps for a more collaborative and productive workflow. For example, the integration enables small businesses to export content seamlessly from Xero to Google Sheets to share with customers, suppliers and financial advisors. www.xero.com

App Update APP UPDATE

14 magazine

New apps for business and leisure

Customer feedbackVirgin Trains can now analyse feedback from its customers in real time using an app developed by eCRM specialist ITG Creator. The Awesometer gathers real-time customer survey information and generates reports that can be accessed instantly by more than 600 Virgin Trains staff. Mark Brennan, CEO of ITG Creator, said: “By analysing survey results in real time and presenting them in an easy-to-understand form, the same technology could be used by any company to improve its relationship with customers by analysing their feedback and sentiment and taking immediate action.” www.creator.co.uk

Give backChariTable Bookings is a restaurant booking app that combines dinner reservations with charitable donations. When a restaurant receives a booking through the app, it donates £1 per diner to charity – at no cost to the customer. The app is used by thousands of restaurants and UK registered charities. charitablebookings.org

Smart controlGideon AI, the new app from Alfred Smart Home, one of Europe’s leading IoT start-ups, allows users to control multiple smart devices from a variety of brands. With an advanced level of artificial intelligence, the app learns about users’ preferences, predicts their needs and can act on their behalf. Suitable for controlling security cameras, lighting, heating, electrical appliances, windows and gates, amongst other things, Gideon is compatible with devices from a number of major manufacturers including Panasonic, Sonos, Philips, Nest, Sony, Insteon, Wifiplug, Motorola, Honeywell, Belkin, Lifx and MyFox. Gideon.ai

FMAC Venue Finder

SafeShop

Sage Live

Awesometer

See.Sense

Adobe Spark

magazine 1501732 759725

Scanners

Continued...

Data capture made easyFujitsu fi-7030 entry-level professional scanner heralds new approach for scanner market leader.

With the launch of its new entry-level document scanner, the fi-7030, Fujitsu subsidiary PFU (EMEA) Ltd is lowering the entry point for professional information capture and helping businesses of all sizes accelerate their digital transformation.

The 27 pages per minute (54 ipm duplex) scanner is being supplied with a full PaperStream Capture 1.5 licence, which Fujitsu expects to become the main interface for defining processes and routines for capturing information to feed into workflows, repositories or enterprise content management systems.

The combination of PaperStream Capture 1.5 and the PaperStream IP driver brings new capabilities to smaller businesses by simplifying the creation of digital processes that mimic existing analogue workflows. It also presents optimised scanned images on-screen at the rated speed, thanks in part to a new ‘browse view’ showing thumbnails and previews on one screen for rapid validation of images during scanning.

New approachKlaus Schulz, Senior Manager Product Marketing EMEA at PFU (EMEA), told Business Info that making PaperStream Capture 1.5, rather than the scanner hardware itself, the most important point of interaction with users is a new approach for Fujitsu.

“We are moving away from looking at the hardware first and the paper as the object that needs to be digitised to focus on capturing information. This means not just sticking to a digital resemblance of the document, but scanning and being able to verify that the scanned content and presented digital content is actually what

you had wanted to scan. Then, within that seamless capture process, being able to extract some

information automatically or semi automatically and present it as indexing data, as metadata describing the document,

and validating the digital copy of that document by releasing it into pre-

defined process routines or productive sub-systems,” he said.

Fujitsu : fi-7030

ISSUE 127


Introducing the new fully loaded pocket projector that packs a punch and comes packed with functions perfect for the mobile executive or impromptu meetings on the road or in the office

This small and light pocket projector can easily be connected to various devices like smartphones, notebooks and tablets to access and present your digital content.

The included Wi-Fi dongle connects your iOS 8 and iOS 9 devices (iPhone 4s and iPad 2 upwards) to the PicoPix ScreenPlay function. It is also Miracast compatible and works with most Android devices (4.2 upwards), laptops/PCs (Windows 8.1 & 10) and Windows phones (8.1) that support Miracast.

The addition of an integrated mediaplayer and embedded office viewer makes this PicoPix independent of other mobile devices.

With the internal battery you can project and share pictures and videos wherever you want.

Project your life The all new PicoPix PPX3417 pocket projector

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PicoPix PPX3417

ISSUE 127

Scanners

End-to-end capture out of the boxSchulz argues that as the market leader in scanning, Fujitsu has a responsibility to help businesses on their digital transformation journey.

“Fujitsu comes from a history of scanning and placing something into a static archive. There’s so much more value to documents if you are able to present that information and make it retrievable for more than just one single process or one single person. Companies are becoming more and more aware of the requirement to digitise and capture information, partially because the legal and socio-economic framework is imposing a requirement to move forward with digital transformation. We have always talked about transforming paper and the information it holds into a digital state. What we are doing now is promoting a complete end-to-end capture solution ‘out of the box’ to help organisations move onward with their digital trasnformation.”

Standard across the rangeThe other significant announcement is that henceforth all Fujitsu fi scanners will be supplied with PaperStream Capture 1.5 as standard, providing a consistent software experience across the range, from the entry-level 7030 up to the company’s production devices.

“With PaperStream Capture 1.5, you can roll out exactly the same pre-defined routines across different fi Series models. That adds value, because you only have to learn a single interface or process routine; you can ensure the quality of the digitised document across different seats, across different individuals; you can plan what will be provided to your productive information systems; and you can start to look at streamlining processes,” explained Schulz.

He added: “If a business’s

requirements change – like page volume, format or workload – it is easy to introduce additional fi Series models without having to alter capture processes or software routines. It is also possible to roll out company-wide standards for capture processes across different workloads and format requirements, from a small remote office to a central mailroom.”

SME digitisationSchulz says that by offering a full licence of PaperStream Capture 1.5 on an entry-level document scanner and extending it across the range, Fujitsu is enabling SMEs to go further with digitisation than they have been able to in the past.

“We know from our studies that a maximum of 30-35% of mid-sized companies have started to embrace digitisation and roll digital document management right out across the company and across multiple departments instead of looking at just one single line of business application or one single isolated solution, for example, accounts payable. In companies that have a systematic approach to roll out scanning, 40% of employees are involved in digital document management or

Companies are becoming more and more aware of the requirement to digitise and capture information

magazine 1701732 759725

have access to digitised documents in a systematic way. With globalisation, the pressure on smaller mid-size companies from global competition has increased massively. Part of meeting that pressure is to look at your own processes and routines and try to increase efficiency by transforming them into a digital state or a digitally accelerated state,” he said.

Out of the boxSchulz added: “With the introduction of the fi-7030, we are saying that for £500 you get an ‘out of the box’ end-to-end solution for the complete capture routine. You can start looking at your own processes; mimic them in an electronic state; roll that out; get experience of what it means to capture information from paper documents and feed that into your processes. As time goes by and you gain experience and start to understand what the value of that is and how you could roll that out across multiple seats, across multiple departments, you can start scaling up and picking from the fi Series and right sizing depending on what speed requirement you have. The fi 7030 is 27ppm but you could go all the way up to 100ppm or 130ppm; you could move from a distributed capture environment at the desktop of the information worker to the production side of document capture, e.g. back office mailroom applications; and you could stick to exactly the same routines, procedures and capture processes that you have become acquainted with.”

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...continued


Navigator advert

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Printers

Business inkjets offering high speed, low cost, energy-efficient printing have been making significant inroads into the office printing market. Already 25% of business printer installations are business inkjet. With the launch of its new Print 365 managed print service, Epson is making them even more attractive for small and medium-sized businesses, as well as resellers that previously might not have had the expertise to deliver MPS. James Goulding finds out more from Daniel Wogan, Epson Europe’s Product Manager for Market Development.

Business Info (BI): What is Print 365?

Daniel Wogan: It’s like a mobile phone contract wrapped around a printer, giving the end customer a very easy, manageable print fleet (or single machine) with one single monthly payment. We see it as an ideal proposition for SMBs or any organisation that could be considered to be a small business, like a GP practice, a school or potentially even a home office, as a way of supporting a managed print service for a dispersed workforce. It wraps everything into a single monthly payment: hardware, consumables, service, delivery – all are covered by that single monthly payment. There’s no capital cost, no upfront payment – just an operational cost.

BI: What products can be acquired under the Print 365 scheme?

Wogan: It applies to all Epson Workforce Pro business inkjet products, starting with the Workforce 5, which incorporates mono and colour, single function and multi-function desktop products, including a RIPS variant [with extra large ink tanks that last for the lifetime of the machine]; then the Workforce 6, our heavier duty, A4 product, available in desktop or freestanding versions configured with multiple trays and a cabinet; up to the Workforce 8, which is our A3 product with single function and MFP, desktop and floorstanding versions, and a RIPS variant.

BI: When would you use a RIPS variant?

Wogan: When you have heavier print volumes. On the higher end A3 packages, we offer an ‘an all you can eat’ bundle, subject to a Fair Use policy to make sure everything is kept within the parameters of what the engine is capable of. For £155 per month, this lets you print up to 300,000 pages over the lifetime of the

Epson has launched a basic managed print service (MPS) for its business inkjet devices that wraps hardware, consumables and servicing costs into an all-inclusive monthly payment.

A big step for business inkjets

device. Broken down across a 36 month contract, this works out at 8,300 pages a month, which can be split any way between colour and mono, A4 and A3.

BI: How do you work out which package you should be on?

Wogan: There are a couple of different ways. There’s a very simple iframe on Epson’s website, also available for resellers to embed on their own websites, which gives a break-down of the range, letting you choose a print

volume and a page size. We also have a print assessment tool that can sit on a customer’s network for 1-3 months and analyse their printer activity, showing the cost of running their fleet and its electricity consumption and carbon emissions. From this, the Print 365 portal can create a 12-page assessment, giving a full breakdown of what they are currently doing and how much money and electricity they can save by switching to Epson business inkjets under a Print 365 contract.

BI: Are there any penalties to pay if you exceed the monthly page allowance for your chosen package?

Wogan: There are over-printing costs, but they are ridiculously competitive. For example, with a big A3 RIPS device, the £119 per month package buys 4,000 mono pages and 2,000 colour pages per month. If you exceed that volume you pay only one third of a

continued....

Epson : Print365

ISSUE 127

20 magazine20 magazine businessinfomag.ukmagazine20

Mitigate price changes with a MailMark™ Franking SystemOn Thursday 31st March 2016 the price of postage changed once again as Royal Mail announced their annualprices changes. Amongst other services, the coreproducts will see an increase of 1p on First class letters to 64p and second class letters also increasing by 1p to 55p.Under the updated Royal Mail tariff, franking machines will continue to provide custom-ers with significant discounts over the price of stamp usage, in some cases the saving can be as much as 18p for a second class letter and 13p for first class. Large letters will also offer savings of 11p and 17p respectively.With this level of dis-count, savings can be seen for both high and low quantities users alike. A companysending just 20 items of mail per day can make immediatesavings of up to £66 per month. The good news does not stop here however. Manybusinesses already using a franking system can also make additional savings by upgrading to a MailMark™ compatible machine.

Royal Mail has invested £70m in the development and introduction of the new MailMark™ technology into the UK postal market in 2013, replacing the original town die with a digital 2D barcode which makes tracking mail items through the Royal Mail sorting system more efficient. This new system has allowed Royal Mail to pass cost savings on to its franking customers.MailMark is guaranteed to always be the best value

option forfranking custom-ers. Royal Mail has cemented this promise by

increasing the level of saving to an additional 3p per item versus standard franking for a second class letter increasing savings up to £79 per month based on 20 items per day.

In addition to the savings that can be made against postal charges, a franking system can provideadditional benefits your

business including more efficient mail processing, a more profe sional look-ing mail piece and greater transparency andcontrol over mailroom costs.Add to this automatic tariff updates, ensuring your business always has the latest prices avoiding costly

surcharges and access to all Royal Mail SMART products including Prepay Business Reply.Frama is the fastest growing Royal Mail approved franking

machine manufacturer and service provider in the UK. A subsidiary of parentcompany Frama AG, the company draws upon 40 years of industry experience. Customers have access to an extensive range of Swiss manufactured products, produced to exacting quality standards. We also have a UK-based team of highly trained customer service pro-fessionals who are committed to delivering the Frama CareS customer service promise.

Frama mailroom professionals are always looking to talk to businesses directly and

discuss the challenges they encounter within the mailroom. Frama will provide a free audit of current work-flows, equipment and consumable usage and offer advice on how to improve efficiency and

save both time and money.Frama have been awarded the Editor’s Choice award from Business Info magazine for their full range of MailMark ready products as well as the Pen2Paper award. So if you are a stamp user looking to save money and improve ef-ficiency or a SMART franking machine user who would like to save more with MailMark, contact Frama today and make theSMARTER choice!

Lenny Wood,Marketing Manager Frama UKT: 01992 451 125W: www.frama.co.uk

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magazine01732 759725 magazine 21

Printers

penny per mono page and 2.26p per colour page colour. That pricing is published and transparent – nothing is hidden from the customer. Moreover, the print volume is aggregrated across each calendar quarter. So, if a school, say, overprints in July and September but prints nothing in August, they will pay nothing extra if their print volume balances out across the three months.

BI: Can you roll software into the monthly payment?

Wogan: No. Deploying software like Papercut, which can be emebedded in our hardware, is an additional service that an Epson partner can add on. Print 365 itself is just about the printer package.

BI: Didn’t you have something similar to Print 365 before?

Wogan: We have a couple of other propositions in our portfolio. We have Print & Save and EPP, which stands for Epson Print Performance.

The analogy I use is of a car that has been broken down into its constituent parts, with all the pieces laid out on the ground. That is what a copier dealer’s managed print proposition looks like. The copier dealer takes those individual elements and builds them into something that looks and drives like a car. That takes an awful lot of investment, knowledge and a specific type of experience – and that’s what a copier dealer has.

There is also a kit-car proposition – a partially built MPS that enables a reseller to tag on bits and pieces. Print & Save is similar to Print 365, but more complex – more like one of those kit cars. For example, a reseller could include or exclude servicing depending on a customer’s requirements.

EPP is very much based around

charging a capital cost for the hardware and then a cost per page to cover the consumables alone or the consumables plus service. In that respect, it is suitable for people who are au fait with the cost per copy world.

For many VARS and IT resellers, Print&Save and EPP are still too complicated, requiring too much investment and knowledge that they don’t have. What we have created with Print 365 is a Tesla that is ready to drive right off the forecourt. A cloud-based portal drives the whole process right through to the creation of the final 36-month contract.

I use the Tesla analogy because it links back to our messaging around the differences between inkjet and laser printers in terms of energy consumption and carbon emissions – not just from printing but also the supply chain, from consumables deliveries and packaging.

BI: Is Print 365, then, also a good way for buyers who have doubts about inkjet technology in the workplace to try it out on a smaller scale?

Wogan: Potentially, yes. What we see happening a lot in larger organisations is that they will have a centralised print fleet, which they control very tightly with quotas and rules. Then, what tends to happen is that people decide they can’t be bothered to walk all the way down the hall to a centralised device so smaller desktop devices start appearing.

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...continued

New Samsung MPSSamsung, too, has enhanced its MPS proposition, in its case with the launch of the Samsung Print+ MPS.

The all-in-one channel MPS programme will make it quicker and easier for Samsung partners to provide small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) with a comprehensive MPS encompassing leasing, printer monitoring, supplies fulfilment and servicing.

The service is optimised for fleets of up to 50 devices but can support larger engagements.

Samsung Print+ MPS is put together and managed via an online portal, which streamlines every aspect of the process. For Samsung resellers, this includes deal configuration, pricing, proposal creation, contract generation, equipment order, contract activation, supplies automation, maintenance management, billing and contract management.

For end users, the portal provides access to fleet data and reporting, as well as a means of reporting problems or ordering toners, although these tasks are typically done automatically via a Data Collection Agent embedded on Samsung devices. www.samsung.com

Quite often, they don’t have a service wrap around them and are looked after on a local level, which means street pricing on consumables and difficulties when something goes wrong. Print 365 gives even small desktop A4 inkjet devices a service wrap. www.epson.co.uk

Find out more in the next issue of Print IT www.printitmag.co.uk


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Here at Misco we understand that you want to get the upmost out of your hardware, and thats why for the whole of July Misco and our partners will be providing you with some of the latest products.

We work with the leading brands in the IT industry who can provide you and your company with the latest accessories to best compliment your chosen hardware and to ensure you’re using it to it’s full potential.

Freefone: 08000 038 8880Email: [email protected]

Price displayed after cashback. Cashback amount illustrated includes VAT. Terms & conditions apply.Advertised product price excludes VAT & excludes delivery cost. Terms & conditions apply. For full details visit www.misco.co.uk/terms. Prices are correct at time of publication but are subject to change. Misco is a registered trademark of Systemax Inc. All other trademarks mentioned herein are the property of their respective owners. Copyright©2016 Misco UK Limited. All rights reserved.

magazine 2301732 759725

1. PLANTRONICS BLACKWIRE C325.1 BIN 3.5MM USB

· Simple USB connectivity· Outstanding audio· Ideal for UC deployments· 2 year warranty

2. STARTECH.COM ACCESSORY KIT FOR SURFACE PRO 4/3

· Enhance the capabilities of your Surface Pro 4 or Pro 3, with an accessory kit that enables you to connect to any wired network and the most common video displays and projectors

· Kit includes: 1x USB 3.0 NIC with USB pass through port 1 x Mini DisplayPort to HDMI and VGA adapter

3. TARGUS USB 3.0 SUPERSPEED DUAL VIDEO DOCK WITH POWER

· 8 power tips for compatibility with most 90W PC laptops

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4. C2G 2M DISPLAY-PORT M TO DVI M BLACK

· 1 x 18 pin digital DVI (Single-Link) - male / 1 x 20 pin DisplayPort - male· Shielded technology· 1920 x 1200 resolution support· Carries a digital video signal· Lifetime warranty


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2. HP 410X HIGH YIELD BLACK ORIGINAL LASERJET TONER CARTRIDGE

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1. FUJITSU SCANNER CLEANING KIT

· infused with a specially formulated cleaning fluid that effectively removes dirt, toner, carbon, chemicals from treated papers and other debris from the parts of the scanner that are in continuous contact with paper.

DELL VOSTRO 3558 INTEL® CORE™i3-5005U LAPTOP · Intel® Core™ i3-5005U · 4GB RAM / 500GB HDD · 15.6” HD Display · DVD RW · Windows 7 Professional / Windows 10 Pro license

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· Searchable PDF· Editable Word and Excel documents· iOS or Android mobile devices or tablets· Scan documents from business cards to A4 & even A3

HP COLOUR LASERJET PRO M452DN PRINTER

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6. KENSINGTON SD4000 UNIVERSAL USB DOCKING STATION

· Gigabit Ethernet port for wired connectivity to the Internet

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· Kensington Security Slot· 4K Ultra HD resolution (3840x2160) to one monitor via an HDMI cable or DisplayPort connection

5. ISTORAGE DISKASHUR 1TB USB 3.0 PORTABLE HARD DRIVE + AES 256-BIT HARDWARE ENCRYPTION

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LENOVO THINKPAD T450 14” HD+ LAPTOP · Intel® Core™ i3-5010U· 14” HD+ LED AG display· 1 x 4GB RAM / 500GB Hybrid SSHD 2.5” 8GB cache · Fingerprint reader· Windows 7 Professional/ Windows 10 Pro flyer· 3 year onsite NBD warranty

Misco No.: 2555506

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Here at Misco we understand that you want to get the upmost out of your hardware, and thats why for the whole of July Misco and our partners will be providing you with some of the latest products.

We work with the leading brands in the IT industry who can provide you and your company with the latest accessories to best compliment your chosen hardware and to ensure you’re using it to it’s full potential.

Freefone: 08000 038 8880Email: [email protected]

Price displayed after cashback. Cashback amount illustrated includes VAT. Terms & conditions apply.Advertised product price excludes VAT & excludes delivery cost. Terms & conditions apply. For full details visit www.misco.co.uk/terms. Prices are correct at time of publication but are subject to change. Misco is a registered trademark of Systemax Inc. All other trademarks mentioned herein are the property of their respective owners. Copyright©2016 Misco UK Limited. All rights reserved.

Displays


More than just an exhibition, the showcase is an opportunity for NEC and its partners to demonstrate integrated solutions in a variety of real-life scenarios designed to resonate with end users.

Neil Hartigan, general manager UK and Ireland, NEC Display Solutions, said: “NEC is fortunate to be part of a highly dynamic industry which is constantly evolving. The annual NEC Showcase offers visitors an opportunity to experience these evolutions first hand and to view the solutions which may form part of their decision-making in the future.”

The event opened with ‘The NEC Experience’, a three-minute audio-visual experience, combining laser projection, projection mapping, fine pitch LED and LCD large format displays and powerful surround sound provided by Harman.

After this brief introduction to NEC technology and capabilities, visitors were invited to experience display products and applications at first hand in an exhibition spread across the 28th and 29th floors of the building, with impressive 360-degree views of London.

The exhibition was divided into six zones featuring integrated solutions for the following industry sectors:

Retail. The Retail zone featured a variety of solutions designed to enhance the customer journey, promote brand loyalty and increase revenue, among them Instoremedia’s ‘lift and learn’ solution, linking physical sale items to digital content. To demonstrate the technology, NEC used the example of a shoe store, in which picking up a shoe caused product details to be shown on-screen. Pick up two different products simultaneously and information on both was automatically displayed side-by-side for easy comparison.

The eighth NEC Showcase took place on May 18-19 at Millbank Tower in Westminster, London, attracting over 1,500 visitors from across Europe. Tayla Ansell picks out her highlights

NEC Showcase 2016Education. The Education zone highlighted the benefits of interactive technology for collaboration and pupil engagement in primary schools, secondary schools and further education. In the secondary school scenario, an expansive interactive learning wall, created with dual edge blended projection and DisplayNote collaboration software, offered unlimited finger and pen touch response for multi-user collaboration.

Corporate. Collaboration was the main theme in the Corporate zone, too, where Oblong Industries was showing its immersive visual collaboration solution, Mezzanine, on a number of NEC displays in both landscape and portrait orientation. Making its European debut at the NEC Showcase, Mezz-In seamlessly integrates video-conferencing into the Mezzanine web client, giving remote participants full visibility of the Mezzanine workspace and the ability to upload content and control presentations, with easy screen-sharing capabilities via Chrome.

Corporate: Oblong – Mezzanine display wall

Retail: Instoremedia – lift and learn

Retail: Car showroom displays

Education

Corporate

Corporate: video-conferencing

magazine01732 759725 magazine 25

High brightness displayNEC has expanded its portfolio of high brightness displays with the 75-inch X754HB. The large format display offers a reliable solution for environments where lighting conditions are changeable but information must always be visible, such as retail outlets, airports and restaurants. An integrated ambient light sensor enables the 75-inch display to adapt to changing light conditions and ensure maximum readability night and day.

Fine pitch LEDThe LED LiFT (LED intelligent Front Technology) range is another new offering from NEC. The modular high resolution signage solution has front access and interchangeable, magnetic pixel cards for easy upgrades and servicing. The fine pitch LEDs are available in modules in a range of sizes from 1.5 to 3.8mm.

Install and forgetOn show in both a boardroom and university lecture setting, the new PX803UL laser projector is ideal for large venues, university lecture theatres, museums, large corporates and digital signage applications. Quick and easy to install, the 8000 lumens Solid State Light source (SSL) projector has a lifetime of around 20,000 hours. With no need for lamp replacement or time-consuming maintenance, the PX803UL combines ‘install and forget’ convenience with a low total cost of ownership.

Huddle space softwareIn addition to its latest hardware, NEC was showing new Reactive STAGE interactive presentation software used with a 4K UHD whiteboard display (X651UHD) and an InGlass Touch Table. The combinations create ideal huddle spaces where teams can work together on projects, editing and sharing documents in a collaborative environment.www.nec-display-solutions.com

Transport. In the Transport zone, the focus was on airports and improving the passenger experience, with visitors being shown how NEC displays can be used for both marketing and information purposes. Highlighted solutions included advertising totems from Peerless-AV and a wayfinding solution from Inurface Media. For airport control centres, multiple displays and video walls can facilitate the visualisation of Big Data and help improve airline performance.

Command and Control. The advantages of multi-screen arrangements were highlighted in the dedicated Command and Control zone, featuring an impressive 18-screen video-wall installation running Hiperwall video-wall processor software. A complex control room scenario depicted how a control room operator could manage the visualisation of a number of data sources.

Broadcast and Media. In the Broadcast & Media zone, production company Jaegerfilm gave visitors the chance to experience a live 4K ‘green screen’ workflow, with editing of footage carried out on NEC desktop displays.

Commenting on the success of the event, Hartigan said: “Yet again attendance reached levels higher than expected, which proves that the concept of demonstrating practical solutions is exactly what our clients want to see.”

Transport

Fine pitch LED

Command and Control

New products from NECAs well as promoting NEC’s strengths as a total solutions provider, the NEC Showcase provided a platform to publicise new product launches.


James Goulding talks to Nigel Steljes about his new company and interactive flat panel displays

Avocor is a new name to reckon with in the AV industry. A specialist manufacturer of interactive touch screens for the education and corporate sectors, the company is the latest venture of Nigel Steljes who set up and ran AV distributor Steljes for 28 years.

Steljes went into administration in May after falling out with SMART Technologies, which accounted for 60-70% of the distributor’s turnover.

Avocor was officially launched on June 14, but its interactive touch screens – the world’s first to run on the Windows 10 operating system – were originally unveiled at January’s BETT show under the Vividtouch brand. The 65, 75 and 84in flat panels cost around £3,000 to £5,000 and are sold through a network of value-added resellers.

On June 17, Avocor announced an agreement with Nureva Inc. to distribute its Span ideation and classroom collaboration systems.

James Goulding spoke to Avocor managing director Nigel Steljes about the new company, its products and its plans for the future.

Business Info: What does Avocor manufacture and where?

Nigel Steljes: We build an interactive panel, currently branded Vividtouch but it will transfer across to the Avocor name. We have designed this product very, very carefully to give teachers exactly what they want at the front of the class. Most manufacturers say the same, but this product has significant differences relating to touch, functionality, connectability. All of those things are really key. And the operating system is Windows 10, which is pretty much ubiquitous.

We use an OEM manufacturer called Agile Displays based in Taiwan. They are a quality manufacturer. They make displays for a number of high profile vendors and have been doing so for a long time. The general view is that they

make a very high quality product. We are on our third generation of product built by them, and in our experience product reliability is very good.

BI: The Windows 10 Vividtouch VTF series was unveiled at the BETT education show. Are you also targeting corporate customers?

Steljes: This panel was designed with an education user in mind. So, on the front it has a freeze frame function, which enables a teacher to freeze an image on the screen so that pupils can refer to it while they are doing coursework or while the teacher is loading something else on their computer. Then, as soon as they want to go live again, they can bring it back. It also has a blank screen feature, so if the teacher wants to be the focus of attention they can press a button and the screen will go blank. These things were designed for education. But the amazing thing is we

Q&Ahave had a phenomenal response from the enterprise market. One major bank is about to deploy nearly 250 panels in meeting rooms around the globe. The tick box for them was the Windows 10 platform. All their people have Windows 10 loaded on their notebooks, so it offers a completely familiar experience; there is no bespoke software to learn.

BI: Is there much demand for interactive displays in the corporate market?

Steljes: My track record has always been bringing in new technologies. I launched LCD panels in the ‘80s – they sat on overhead projectors and gave very simplistic data projection. That morphed into the self-contained LCD projector, and I was the largest distributors of those – the largest in the world for a period in the ‘90s. Then, we launched plasma televsions at £12,000 a pop. The point is that we have always spotted the next thing. In education sales of interactive flat panels (IFPs) are very robust, but it is a replacement market – IFPs are going in and interactive whiteboards are being taken out. The excitement and the potential, especially when you build something on the Windows 10 platform, is in the enterprise market.

When you try to sell something that operates on a bespoke platform, that requires a training programme and is unintuitive, it’s very difficult to get buy-in from organisations. But we are offering a tool that is familiar and simple to use. The consultants who negotiated the deal with the bank sat in a room with three of its stakeholders – one from HR, one from IT and one from Facilities. HR said: ‘We have no issues with training in HR, because it’s a Windows platform.’ IT said: ‘It’s a Windows 10 front end, so there are no issues with integration with our systems.’ And Facilities said: ‘It’s a big telly on the wall, we’ve got no problem with that’. People have never had that simplicity before; AV was always a bit quirky.

Nigel Steljes, Managing Director, Avocor

Interview

...continued

We have designed this product very, very carefully to give teachers exactly what they want

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Nureva’s first customer was NASA; it has big problems and needed an effective means of solving them and sharing output from meetings digitally.

BI: So the bank was willing to invest even at a time of political and economic uncertainty.

Steljes: Of course. If a bunch of managers in a room write stuff down on a flip chart or use dozens of Post-It notes, somebody has to take responsibility for capturing and photographing that information. That’s how most meetings still happen in enterprises, and it is such an inefficient way of doing things. You need to use a digital whiteboard, an interactive device, a collaborative device; write things down; save the pages; and then, at the end of the meeting, hit ‘email all’ so that every attendee gets the notes straight away. That’s efficiency and it saves organisations money. There is an upfront cost, but over the five years you have the technology you will save thousands of pounds.

BI: In addition to Windows 10, your product literature highlights InGlass technology. Please could you tell me more about that.

Steljes: This is probably the most important thing. It comes from a Swedish company called Flat Frog and is completely unique. Most touch displays are run on an infra-red basis; they scan the surface of the screen – the top one or two inches. Very often, if you are wearing a suit and your cuff touches

the screen as you write, you will see a blemish underneath as the panel thinks you are double-touching. Also, with infra-red it is impossible to draw a line, stop, leave a gap of a pixel and then continue the line in exactly the same place. Because infrared hovers above it is not that accurate. With InGlass technology, the sensor is inside the glass, so when you touch the screen the response is pixel perfect; you can draw a line, leave a gap of a pixel and start again. Ours is the only device currently on the market that can do that.

BI: What plans do you have for Avocor? Will you manufacture other products and/or distribute products from other manufacturers? I see that you have a distribution agreement with Nureva.

Steljes: In essence, Avocor is going to be our brand. We will move away from the Vivitouch name and rebrand everything under the Avocor label. Nureva is a legacy thing and over the course of this year we will probably form another company to handle them. I’ve known the founders of SMART Technologies for a very long time – Dave Martin invented the interactive whiteboard. He and his wife left SMART Technologies some three or four years ago to work on new projects. It’s natural for me to get involved with Nureva as I helped build the interactive whiteboard brand for

SMART. It’s very exciting technology.

BI: What exactly is Nureva’s ideation technology?

Steljes: Ideation is a projector-based solution that you really have to see to understand. Effectively, you have a screen 10 foot wide and no more than 3 foot deep that gives you an incredibly wide canvas to work on. In addition to the screen, there is an extra 10 foot you can scroll either way, so you actually have 20 feet of canvas to work on. If you put two screens side-by-side you have got a 20 foot wall of information and thoughts, with a 40 foot scroll. To try and achieve such a canvas with interactive flat panels would be prohibitely expensive, but doing it with a projector is relatively cost-effective. In North America, Nureva’s first customer was NASA; it has big problems and needed an effective means of solving them and sharing output from meetings digitally.

BI: Is Avocor considering any other product areas?

Steljes: We are focusing purely on interactive devices. The name trust will be on screens; that is what we do. We are currently working on our fourth generation product which we will launch at BETT next January.www.avocor.com

...continued

Interview

Charterhouse Holdings has produced an eye-catching display in its corporate headquarters and distribution centre using an Optoma EH504 projector and rear projection vinyl to display footage of its key brands on glass partition walls.

Founded in 1970, Charterhouse Holdings plc has two successful brands – Kustom Kit, a range of corporate, promotional and sportswear; and Xpres digital transfer systems for decorating and personalising clothing,

promotional products and business gifts.It wanted a way to promote these

products in its corporate headquarters that would grab the attention but not compromise the light and airy feel of the interior.

The solution Charterhouse Holdings hit upon was to install transparent rear projection vinyl onto the glass partition walls, turning them into a projection surface. Using a material with a transparency of 88% helps to maintain a light interior, but it does make it more difficult to achieve the desired image quality.

Daniel Bruckshaw, IT Infrastructure Manager for Charterhouse Holdings, said: “We looked at using vinyl film with 50% transparency but we didn’t want to cover the glass partition wall too much and ruin the overall look of the room, but this did represent a real challenge for the projector in terms of the image quality and clarity.”

The model the company chose was an

Optoma EH504 projector, featuring Full HD image quality and 5,000 lumens brightness. Bruckshaw is delighted with the results, praising the projector for its brightness and colour reproduction.

He said: “Expecting an 88% transparent surface to work well with any projector is a tough task, but the Optoma does the job perfectly. Colours aren’t washed out like other projectors. I don’t know of many products that would be able to give as good a result as this when there’s not much to ‘catch’ the image and prevent bleed-through.”

Visual showstopper for Charterhouse HQ

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Innovations

Secure storage roomModulprim security rooms from Securikey can now be specified in lighter materials, giving customers even more choice and flexibility. A cost-effective method of adding a high-security strong-room to a new or existing building, Modulprim is modular, bespoke and adaptable to most building specifications. www.securikey.co.uk

Blue-light protection InToro has launched a range of Anti-Bluelight smartphone accessories that it claims can block out 60% of harmful blue light. The range includes iPhone screen protectors made from tempered glass and glasses with blue-light protected glass lenses for users of tablets or a different brand of smartphone. www.intorobluelight.co.uk

Cheaper data roamingNew from travel management company Business Travel Direct, the Majesti-Fi provides secure worldwide data connectivity for the business traveller at 4G speeds and local rates. The Wi-Fi hotspot can connect up to 20 devices simultaneously and comes with an embedded app to manage and monitor usage. It doubles as a portable power bank with enough power to charge a smartphone three times. www.majestifi.com

Precise Bluetooth stylusThe Pixel is Adonit’s most advanced stylus to date, featuring a 1.9mm Pixelpoint tip, expanded compatibility and a sensor that activates the stylus when it is picked up. The Pixel, in black or bronze, is available from Amazon for £89.99. www.adonit.net

Smart power revolutionPowervault has taken its first steps towards a cheaper, greener electricity system with the launch of new storage products that enable users to access cheap, off-peak electricity and store it for use at peak times. As well as targeting domestic users, including those with solar PV panels who will be able to store and use more of their own solar energy, Powervault has teamed up with Tempus Energy to bring its units to small commercial premises. Storing energy will enable businesses to benefit from smart energy tariffs and an emergency power supply during power cuts. www.powervault.co.uk

Tangle-free cablesSay goodbye to tangles, with Spooly’s collection of magnetic charging and data transfer cables. The convenient Mag-System quickly and effortlessly winds the magnetic cable around the connector to form a perfect and secure coil. www.spoolycable.com

Successful fundraising for flash drive Adam Elements has returned to Indiegogo to finance its latest product. It first used the crowd-funding site last year to raise funds for its iKlips flash drive. Then, in March, it used it again, this time for an enhanced model featuring a new design, high-speed MLC flash memory and an intuitive app, iKlips 2.0, for easier operation. The new iKlips DUO raised more than five times its initial goal of $50,000. www.adamelements.com

Protect your eyesThe NEC MultiSync E245WMi ergonomic desktop display is claimed to protect users’ eyes by filtering out blue light and eliminating flickering. Other ergonomic features include adjustable settings for height, tilt, swivel and orientation. www.nec-display-solutions.com

A touch of natureWith solid oak legs and oak laminate edge detail on worktops, KI’s EC4 collection brings a touch of nature into the workplace. The collection is designed and manufactured in the UK and can be configured to suit open plan areas, meeting rooms and third spaces. Wire management and sliding tops are available at no extra cost. www.kieurope.com

01732 759725 31magazine

Smart backpackSolar Smartpacks by Finnish start-up Tespack have detachable solar panels and built-in battery banks for charging laptops, phones or tablets on the go. The modular system allows you to use the same solar panel with different bag designs. www.tespack.com

Impact absorbing phone caseNew D3O cases from GEAR4 Black are the first to use injection mouldable D30 for added protection. D30 molecules flow freely under normal conditions but on shock lock together to absorb and disperse energy. The greater the force of the impact, the more the molecules lock together. The cases are available for a number of iPhone and Samsung models from Carphone Warehouse. www.gear4.com

Tablet mountErgotron, a provider of ergonomic work and lifestyle products, has introduced new mini mounts ideal for displaying an additional monitor or tablet alongside a main display. The MX Mini Desk Arm and MX Mini Wall Mount Arm are suitable for monitors and devices weighing up to 3.6kg. www.ergotron.com

Smart air systemAmid rising concern about the effects of indoor air pollution, Emerald Air is seeking crowd-funding for a new smart air system for offices and homes. The Emerald Air consists of two devices that can operate together or independently of each

other: an Emerald air sensor that monitors pollutant, temperature and humidity levels, displaying the results on a smartphone app; and an Airadicate smart air purifier that filters out allergens, carcinogens and other pollutants and uses UV LED disinfection technology to kill viruses and bacteria. www.emeraldair.eu

Mini data centreThe Minkels MatrixCube is a mini data centre for small and medium-sized companies that prefer to keep their IT infrastructure in-house. MatrixCube is available now in Belgium and the Netherlands, with launches in the UK and other European countries to follow. www.minkels.com

Wake up and smell the coffeeThe Barisieur – a sort of hipster Teasmaid – is described as the world’s first coffee-making alarm clock. Before going to sleep, just add water, milk and coffee or tea, set your alarm and the brew time for your drink and wake up to an invigorating coffee or cuppa. Find out more on Kickstarter.www.barisieur.com

Breakout seatingKolbak is a stylish new range of seating for reception areas and breakout spaces. Rhubarb Solutions is offering a number of different styles and sizes to choose from, including single and double-seater units, high and low backed seating, stools and corner units. www.rhubarbsolutions.co.uk

Cloud searchingNew from SearchYourCloud, SYC360 delivers search results across desktop, mobile and cloud repositories. An SYC search bar within Office 365 lets users search multiple databases and fields simultaneously, without having to leave the Office 365 interface The SYC360 costs from $24.99 per month/per user. www.searchyourcloud.com


A new generation of tablet-based tills are giving small retailers greater insight into customer transactions

Small retailers are being invited by the likes of Worldpay, The Good Till and EE to replace clunky old tills with smarter, tablet-based solutions that offer greater business insight and more flexibility.

Payment processor Worldpay has launched My Business Hub to help small businesses level the playing field with larger businesses. The all-in-one till integrates a tablet, receipt printer, card payment device and app to process payments securely.

The tablet and card machine can be detached from the base unit and carried around the store, enabling small businesses to take advantage of assisted selling.

Integration with the My Business Dashboard tool, which can be accessed online and and from the Hub itself, gives owners a complete overview of their business, helping them to reduce the admin burden and operate more efficiently. According to research by Worldpay, small business owners typically spend one day a week on paperwork.

James Frost, Chief Marketing Officer, said: “The big retailers have all got very powerful insight teams and analytics teams that pore over all of their transaction data and provide really helpful insights. The small business owner hasn’t traditionally had the benefit of that. My Business Dashboard takes all the payments that we processed and makes all of that data available the next day in a really user-friendly, intuitive interface that allows the small business owner to look at trends over time.”

Worldpay is offering two subscription models for My Business Hub: a monthly payment of £50, plus a £250 upfront payment; or a monthly payment of £65 with no upfront payment.

Customisable and convenientThe Good Till is another tablet-based till solution aimed at small businesses. Utilising user-friendly flexible software and cloud technology, it, too, claims to give small retailers access to the intelligence that big businesses enjoy, but at a fraction of the cost.

Its solution is completely customisable, integrates seamlessly with applications like Xero and Exact, and allows businesses to provide customers with email receipts, which as well as being more convenient and eco-friendly help with data capture.

The Good Till is available as a software-only solution for £25 per month or as an integrated hardware and software package.

Pop-up shop solutionEE has been meeting the needs of stores and pop-up retailers for a number of years with 4G-based payment solutions.

Its Connected Retail package is a fully integrated retail solution comprising a superfast 4G data connection; Shopwave POS software; an iPad Air 2, plus stand;

Smarter retailingan iZettle wireless card reader; a cash drawer; and a receipt printer.

Shopwave replaces the traditional till with an app that manages stock, payment transactions and product catalogues through a single interface. Prices for the Connected Retail package begin at £59 per month.

For pop-up businesses, EE provides a range of flexible pop-up bundles with short term internet plans.

Rewarding shoppersTaking a different approach, the global data insights and mobile payment platform Zapper has adapted its Pay-at-Counter solution to give customers in convenience retail outlets a fast payment option.

To pay, shoppers simply open the app and scan a unique QR code at the

till point. If they choose to do so, they can then leave a starred rating and feedback for the retailer. Zapper also helps businesses to engage with

shoppers, as its Z-Beacon technology can send offers and alerts directly to the app to attract shoppers. www.worldpay.com/ukwww.thegoodtill.comwww.ee.co.uk/connectedretailwww.zapper.com

James Frost, Chief Marketing Officer, WorldPay

Mobile

UNSHACKLED.com is a UK start-up that plans to overhaul the mobile phone industry by allowing consumers to buy their handset and SIM separately and switch networks any time, without being tied into costly 24 month contracts.

According to a report by Which?, the average UK consumer currently overpays by an average of £159 per year.

Established by three mobile phone industry experts, the independent and impartial service aims to transform the way consumers buy mobile phones by offering every phone and SIM on the market and letting customers choose a device and tariff separately.

A consumer will also be able to change their phone and/or SIM whenever they choose to. The MobileWatch service will even notify consumers if a better deal comes along and, with flexible financing provided by Zopa, customers will be able to make additional payments and pay off handsets early at no extra cost.

CEO John Whittle said: “Separating the phone

and SIM purchase is the best option for the vast majority of consumers. Major networks and mobile phone retailers know this but actively choose not to explain it to their customers as they’re focused on profit not people. UNSHACKLED.com scans the market and does all the research leaving customers with a bespoke shortlist of options that will save them both money and time.”

UNSHACKLED.com estimates that it can save the average consumer £330. www.UNSHACKLED.com

Cut your mobile bill

01732 759725 35magazine

School Bell Class Change System

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n Use any .mp3 sound file as a notification

n System is zoned to allow building flow control

n Can play back music across the complete school or specific zones

n Full voice paging to whole of school or chosen zones

n School Radio systems can be connected

n System can mute zones during exact

n Theme your school sound by term or event

n Record, schedule and broadcast messages and important announcements

n The ability to reach every part of the school in seconds

n Does not interfere with your school IT network

n Wired solution that avoids drop out problem with wireless devices

n Panic alarm options – fixed or remote

Tel: 01743 241997Web: www.soundinnovations.ukEmail: [email protected]

For your free no obligation quotation and site survey contact us today.

Featured on BBC News

Alarms and tones are for emergencies – not class change

Has your school stopped desensitising children to alarm and emergency bells yet?


Catering

Flavour of the decade

Quality and convenience

There is an increased focus of late to provide the best possible working environment for employees, with businesses trying out many different tactics to increase happiness and productivity in the workplace. One of the simplest is to give staff access to high quality hot drinks through an onsite brewing machine.

It’s no secret that coffee acts as a pick-me-up to revive flagging employees, or that a quick nip to the brewer is a good way to stretch one’s legs and improve circulation. In this way, a brewer can make employees more alert, motivated and productive.

Offering work benefits is also a great way to maintain staff loyalty. Providing employees with free coffee shows that a business is dedicated to the wellbeing of their staff and determined to create a more comfortable working environment.

Because modern day brewing machines provide coffee shop quality, coffee-loving employees no longer need waste time going to a café, queuing, being served, then returning to the office. They can use that time more productively in the office instead.

Once you’ve established that acquiring a coffee machine is the right move for your office, you must decide what type to get.

The number of people in the office and how often they plan to use the coffee machine should be the main factors in your decision. Choosing a brewer that is too small or too slow is far from ideal and could even be detrimental to productivity levels.

Ease of use is important – to save time and ensure employees don’t revert to going outside for their coffee. The brewer must also be robust and able to

In the last decade, the number of coffee shops in the UK has more than doubled. The public’s taste for barista coffee has been felt in homes and offices, too. So much so that coffee pods are now included in the basket of goods used to measure the Retail Price Index. Below, Alex Jones explains why businesses should take note of this trend; opposite Tayla Ansell considers the case for more sustainable choices.

Alex Jones from the UK marketing team of Keurig, a provider of brewing systems for commercial use and the Number One single-cup brand in North America1, explains why you need an office brewing machine and how to choose the right one

stand the test of time. Smaller offices could benefit from a

high-quality, water refillable, domestic machine with one-touch operation. A brewer like the Keurig K140 Brewing System brews a high quality cup of coffee, tea or chocolate in under a minute at the touch of a button. Larger offices will require a machine that can brew drinks much more quickly, such as a filter coffee machine.

Coffee pods are an increasingly attractive option for their quality and convenience. This is reflected in the decision by The Office for National Statistics to add them to the basket of goods it uses to calculate the Consumer Price Index and inflation – clear evidence that the British public has a taste for the flavour of real coffee.

When it comes to hot drinks, people want the perfect combination of convenience, variety and low cost. Providing an office brewing machine means they won’t have to leave the office to find it. www.keurig.co.uk

1. Source: The NPD Group/Retail Tracking Service, Single Serve Brewing Systems, 52 week period ended 9/15/2015.

It’s no secret that coffee acts as a pick-me-up to revive flagging employees

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More than half (53%) of office workers admit to leaving the office during the working day to purchase a hot drink

Grounds for optimism

The UK is no longer just a nation of tea drinkers, with consumer demand driving a 20-fold increase in the number of coffee shops in the last 17 years, according to analysis from CBRE. The coffee chain revolution has had an impact in offices, too, creating demand for more choice and higher quality drinks. But have changing tastes had a detrimental effect on the environment?

In-house or take-out?A recent survey by the Office Coffee Company suggests that office workers are increasingly heading to the high street for their hot drinks. More than half (53%) of office workers admit to leaving the office during the working day to purchase a hot drink (up from 40% in the 2015 survey). Four out ten say they are unable to have their preferred hot drink at work.

In addition to time wasted away from the office (see article opposite), the use of High Street chains has an environmental cost. In satisfying the huge demand for take-away coffee, major coffee shops hand out billions of disposable coffee cups each year, very few of which end up being recycled. Carbon Clear, a provider of carbon and energy management and sustainability services, has examined the environmental impact of paper, polystyrene and ceramic cups through their lifetime, including manufacture, use, re-use and disposal, and concludes that ceramic cups are the environmentally responsible choice – and the better choice financially.

Making sure the office kitchen is stocked with a choice of good quality hot drinks and plenty of ceramic mugs could encourage more employees to make their coffee at work.

Bean vs. podCoffee-pod machines are increasingly popular in the UK, but brewing coffee using single use coffee pods or capsules is environmentally problematic. The German city of Hamburg has even gone so far as to ban coffee pods from state-run buildings.

Honest Coffees, a company that provides coffee machines and Fairtrade coffee for offices, is a strong proponent of using bean-to-cup machines rather

than single serve pod solutions, primarily for reasons of sustainability.

In a series of blog posts, the company highlights the environmental impact of plastic and aluminium pods, which, being made from a mix of materials, aren’t easy to recycle and are piling up in UK landfill sites. It points out that bean-to-cup machines are just as convenient as pods and, with no capsule to insert and remove, just as quick to use. It also argues that the taste and quality of freshly ground coffee is superior to that of coffee from a pod.

Honest Coffees managing director and co-founder Wyatt Cavalier said: “The best advice we can give is to ditch the nespresso machines and go for a bean-to-cup option. You can pick your own (Fairtrade and organic) coffee; it’s easier to use and clean; and it’s massively better for the environment. Really, the only thing pods have going for them is George Clooney!”

Waste not want notThe Office Coffee Company is encouraging businesses to go a step further and start recycling waste coffee grounds in the interests of corporate social responsibility (CSR).

In its latest how green is your office survey, over 65% of respondents said their office ‘could do more’ to be environmentally friendly. The research found that recycling of food waste, particularly coffee grounds, is low in offices.

Bucking this trend, the Office Coffee

Tayla Ansell looks at three companies offering sustainable choices for coffee drinkers.

Company recently launched a coffee grounds recycling service for clients in Greater London. The service is being delivered in partnership with bio-bean, an award-winning clean technology company that has industrialised the process of recycling waste coffee grounds into advanced biofuels.

Arthur Kay, founder and CEO of bio-bean, said: “I came up with the idea for bio-bean whilst studying architecture at The Bartlett, UCL. Set the task of designing a coffee shop, I realised that coffee was being wasted everywhere and set out to address the problem.”

Today, the company works with coffee shops, office blocks, transport hubs and instant coffee factories, collecting their waste coffee grounds and converting them into useful biofuels that it then supplies back to the producers of the waste.

In addition, bio-bean recently launched a new product for the general public. Coffee Logs are biomass briquettes that can be used as a clean and sustainable alternative to wood and coal in appliances such as wood burning ovens, stoves, BBQs, chinemeas and open fires at home. Recently, the company has been raising funds through a crowdfunding campaign to help them produce the briquettes on a larger scale.

There’s a lot to consider in making your coffee habit greener – where the coffee is from, how you make it, what you drink it from, how you dispose of waste. Encouraging sustainable and ethical habits in the office, where a lot of coffee is consumed, is a great place to start making a difference.www.honestcoffees.comwww.office-coffee.co.ukwww.bio-bean.com

Arthur Kay, founder and CEO, bio-bean


Hosted telephony

Are SMEs taking to the cloud?

More and more, businesses are opting for hosted telephony – having their telephone system based in the cloud rather than on premise.

The European hosted IP telephony and UCC services market earned revenues of $3.32 billion in 2014 and is estimated to reach $17.93 billion in 2021, according to Frost & Sullivan’s Analysis of the European Hosted IP Telephony and UCC Services Market.

Moreover, service providers and industry leaders surveyed by BroadSoft Inc said they expected the UCaaS/Hosted PBX market penetration to grow by a factor of almost 6 across the enterprise, midmarket and the small business segment.

UK telecoms providers have definitely noticed a shift to the cloud. Steve Haworth, CEO of TeleWare, estimates that over 80% of new deployments in the market are hosted or cloud. This is also the experience of business telecoms specialists Spitfire, which offers both on-site systems and hosted solutions.

Spitfire Direct Sales Manager Dominic Norton said: “Over the last 12 months, the proportion is now significantly in favour of cloud-based deployments, with 88% hosted versus 12% on premise.”

For unified communications vendor Swyx, the lion’s share is still on-premise, with cloud telephony sold on a pay-as-you-go basis representing around 20% of the company’s sales. Although Mark Russell, Swyx’s Director of Operations UK & Ireland, does make an important distinction between delivery models.

“Our resellers are also offering hosted unified communications to organisations, on a capex model. This is accessed via a private cloud, but the customer will ultimately own the solution at the end of

the agreed term and the only additional on-going costs will be for software updates and support. At the moment, the split between CPE (customer premises equipment) and cloud-based telephony is around 50/50,” he said.

Business boostThe shift to cloud-based telephony has given a big boost to some suppliers. Commsworld, Scotland’s largest independent telecommunications and digital services provider, has achieved a record number of new telephone connections for businesses and organisations this year. By May, the firm had already deployed circa 13,000 connections, more than six times as many as at the same stage in previous years. This is also the first time it has exceeded 13,000 connections in a single year in over 21 years of business.

Chief Executive Ricky Nichol attributes the company’s recent success to growth in sales of its Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services. “When VoIP first appeared on the scene over a decade ago it was certainly exciting, but it struggled against the resilience, speed and practicality of landline systems,” he said. “Now, it suddenly makes a huge amount of sense and it is especially exciting that smaller Scottish firms can now benefit. Thanks to the advancement of networks and cloud services, they no longer need rooms full of expensive hardware.”

There are many reasons why SMEs might want to make the switch to a hosted solution, from lower short-term costs, flexibility and scalability to always using the most up-to-date version and not having to worry about maintenance and upgrades (see Norton’s assessment of the pros and cons opposite).

However, it is true also that there will still be businesses that prefer an on-site solution.“Despite the rise in hosted solutions, there remains demand for on-premises communications from those

Hosted or on-premise or a mixture of the two? Tayla Ansell looks at trends in business communications

SMEs that wish to retain total control over their systems and administer upgrades themselves as and when they choose,” said John Whitty, CEO of Solar Comms.

Swyx’s Mark Russell says that security and control are also factors. “An on-premise solution is likely to be favoured by organisations that are concerned about security, location of their data or have sufficient IT resource in-house to manage a solution themselves. Banks, for instance, will want to protect their data so will shy away from a public cloud solution in favour on-site or hosted within their own data centre based in the UK. There are also arguments that if you have other on-premise technology then it may be easier to get different systems to talk to each other and undertake higher levels of customisation,” he said.

Best of both worldsAnother option, says Whitty, is to adopt a hybrid approach that lets you switch between solutions depending on your circumstances. “For Solar, offering choice is critical, enabling our customers to select the deployment model that is right for them, but always allowing the flexibility to easily migrate to hybrid or pure cloud solutions when the time is considered correct,” he said.

Whitty adds that growth in unified communications is also having an influence on people’s choices.“Employees are becoming increasingly accustomed to using applications like live chat, web conferencing (both voice and video) and social collaboration alongside more established communications channels, so organisations can no longer consider telephony in isolation.”

With a range of options to choose from and the ability to make a case both for hosted and on premise solutions, businesses should look carefully at their specific requirements before making a choice.

Mark Russell, Director of Operations UK & Ireland, Swyx

Ricky Nichol, Chief Executive, Commsworld

John Whitty, CEO, Solar Comms

Steve Haworth, CEO, Teleware

01732 759725 37magazine

The benefits of hostedToday, hosted telephony provides a far more cost-effective solution with huge benefits for flexible working and business continuity for all sizes of business. Hosted telephony offers significant financial advantages because it requires minimal capital expenditure as billing is based on a monthly service charge, which is tax deductible, whereas capital expenditure on a PBX system is only partially tax allowable. Consequently costs are estimated to be about 50% less than a conventional on-premise phone system.

All businesses benefit from the disaster recovery potential of hosted telephony. If it is not possible to operate from their normal premises, staff still have access to a hosted telephony service from another location.

In operation, hosted IP phone services offer all the features and functionality of a conventional phone system, such as extension dialling, plus a number of additional benefits. The system can be controlled via an on-line administration portal, allowing change of feature set-ups as required, without incurring any engineering charges.

For organisations with remote workers, hosted IP phone systems provide a means of presenting a professional face to the outside world without the need for dedicated or

additional business premises. Staff working remotely from home have full access to phone system functionality, just as if they were in the office, and can join in office meetings using the audio and video conferencing facilities of the systems.

Hosted IP is also ideal for multisite operations because colleagues can call each other using abbreviated extension numbers and without incurring public network charges. External calls in to the business can be distributed easily to users over multiple sites, who can also transfer and forward calls to other extensions as a part of a centralised hosted system.

The benefits of on-premiseWhile there is a clear shift towards hosted telephony, there are still circumstances where the more traditional on-premises deployment of a phone system is the best option. Even though there is usually a higher capital expenditure with this route, as the system is usually purchased outright, the ongoing costs of this sort of solution are often much lower than a hosted system, and there is always the option of leasing on-premises systems to avoid any upfront cost.

Despite the multiple benefits a hosted phone system can provide companies operating out of multiple sites, many companies still only have a single site.

Dominic Norton, Direct Sales Manager for Spitfire, outlines the pros and cons of hosted and on-premise business communication systems.

Your place or mine?

Hosted telephony

All businesses benefit from the disaster recovery potential of hosted telephony

A company with high staff numbers in a single site can still be served well from an on-site deployment, as the new phone systems available today can provide the same level of functionality, whether deployed on site or in a hosted set-up. New IP-based phone systems, such as leading IP system 3CX, can also be deployed in a virtualised environment. This means they can easily be incorporated into existing virtual environments without the historical limitations of a traditional analogue or digital phone system.

Systems such as this can also be backed up to other locations, such as a data centre, to overcome problems caused by loss of functionality at the premises where the phone system is located.

One of the main drivers for a new phone system in the current climate is to move away from traditional analogue and digital (ISDN) lines for the purposes of cost saving and flexibility. Companies that have invested in phone systems connecting to these lines do not necessarily have to change their system to benefit from Voice over IP (VoIP), such as Spitfire SIP Trunks, as many phone systems can be upgraded to handle this new technology.

Alternatively, a gateway can be deployed in combination with an existing on-site system to make the transition even easier. This approach can also get around the limitation of older style cabling as new IP systems, both hosted and on-site, will need CAT5e or CAT6 cabling in place.

Another important factor to consider is connectivity to the site in question. The performance of hosted systems is dependent on the quality of the internet connection they are connected over. If the connectivity options at a particular location are limited or of low quality, then a traditional on-site phone system with analogue or digital lines may still be the best choice.

magazine businessinfomag.uk38

Lighting

Buildings, lighting and wellbeingEnvironmental factors are known to have an impact on health, well-being and productivity in the workplace, from air quality and temperature to the type of seating provided. Light is another important consideration – and it does more than just help you see.

A report by the World Green Building Council, Health Wellbeing and Productivity in Offices: The Next Chapter for Green Building, references a number of studies that show a link between lighting and the health and satisfaction of office workers.

One, published in the Journal of Sleep and Sleep Disorders Research, demonstrates a strong relationship between workplace daylight exposure and the sleep, activity and quality of life of office workers. Those with windows received 173% more white light exposure and slept an average of 46 minutes longer per night, while those without windows achieved lower scores on key quality of life metrics.

Architects and designers are

increasingly taking account of such research and designing office buildings in accordance with a variety of standards developed to promote sustainability and wellbeing.

One such is the the WELL Building Standard introduced in 2013 by the International Well Building Institute (IWBI), a public benefit corporation that believes people’s health and wellness should be central to building design.

As the first professionals accredited to the programme start to influence design in their organisations (see box), Business Info spoke to Nathan

Stodola, IWBI’s Vice President of Product Development, to find out more about the WELL standard and, more specifically, about how light affects the performance and happiness of office workers.

Business Info (BI): Please could you tell me more about the WELL Building Standard and what you hope to achieve with its development?

Nathan Stodola (NS): People spend more than 90% of their time indoors – in homes and offices, schools, retail stores, fitness centres, healthcare facilities and more – which means that buildings, and everything in them, can have a profound effect on human health and well-being.

The WELL Building Standard (WELL) is the first building standard to focus exclusively on the health and wellness of the people in buildings. It marries best practices in design and construction with evidence-based medical and scientific research, harnessing the built environment as a vehicle to support human health and wellbeing. WELL sets performance requirements in seven categories relevant to occupant health and wellbeing: air, water, nourishment, light, fitness, comfort and mind. WELL Certified spaces can help create a built environment that improves the nutrition, fitness, mood, sleep patterns and performance of its occupants. Through

The effect of light on office workers is a key consideration in a new building standard that prioritises the health and wellbeing of occupants

In addition to the WELL standard, IWBI has developed the WELL Accredited Professional (WELL AP) program for professionals who are dedicated to supporting human health and wellbeing in the built environment. To become a WELL AP, candidates must pass an exam on the WELL Building Standard.

One of the first people in the UK to become a WELL AP is Michael Dariane, Senior Sustainability Consultant at multi-disciplinary engineering consultancy Hilson Moran.

He said: “We spend much of our day in the office so it’s important to work in an environment that is conducive

to our health and wellbeing. It’s great to have a performance-based, industry-recognised system that measures, certifies and monitors the impact of our built environment. I’m proud to be one of the first in the UK to attain the WELL AP credential and look forward to applying this into future projects.”

After studying the principles, practices and applications of the WELL Building Standard, Dariane is in no doubt about the effect that lighting has on employee wellbeing and productivity.

“Light influences the body’s circadian rhythm, as well as its physiological processes,” he said. “As it keeps the body

synchronised, it also affects energy levels and sleep patterns. An excessive amount of light in the evenings, for example, can cause the body’s daily cycle to shift and delay. Adequate lighting design can reduce these effects and disruptions in order to improve workers’ productivity and alertness.”

He added: “The WELL standard takes into account design inclusions, such as the positioning of workstations in relation to windows for access to daylight and shading and dimming controls to reduce solar glare. Other best practice lighting designs include low-glare workstations, walls and ceilings

and ensuring a minimum lux level is maintained throughout work areas. These can all contribute to employee wellbeing and comfort.”www.hilsonmoran.com/WELL

WELL progressive

Michael Dariane, Senior Sustainability Consultant, Hilson Moran

Nathan Stodola, Vice President, Product Development, IWBI

magazine 3901732 759725

Poor lighting is a major source of disastisfaction in UK offices, according to a study of more than 12,000 workers in 17 countries commissioned by Steelcase.

The Ipsos survey found that workers in the UK are least satisfied with their working environment, with 45% complaining about the temperature in offices and 32% expressing unhappiness with the light intensity.

Overall, one third of office workers say they don’t like their working environment.

Significantly, fewer than four out of 10 UK respondents (39%) are able to adjust their office temperature and only one in five (21%) can modify ther lighting.

The situation in the UK reflects the popularity of open plan offices, which have cost-saving benefits but can limit people’s ability to control their environment. Almost half (49%) of UK workers are based in open plan offices.

Steelcase warns that a lack of control over the physical environment can seriously affect workers’ concentration, productivity and engagement levels, pointing out that the most highly engaged employees are those with the greatest flexibility over how and where they work.

Christine Congdon, Steelcase’s Director of Global Research Communication, said: “Everybody is different and personal preference will depend on an individual’s natural physiology, their mood on a particular day and the task they are working on. To cater to these constantly changing needs, employers should pay more attention to providing a range of working environments, including the ability to adjust workspace basics as required.”www.steelcase.com

this, WELL Certified spaces can generate a meaningful return on investment to the tenant and building owner.

BI: How does it differ to other certification schemes such as LEED or BREEAM?

NS: When we look at LEED, BREEAM, Global Sustainability Assessment System (GSAS) and the other green rating systems out there and compare them to the WELL, there is some overlap. Green building begins the conversation about people, but primarily focuses on environmental impact. WELL really advances it; WELL involves entirely new protocols in and around human health, with very limited overlap between LEED and WELL measures. LEED and WELL are therefore very complementary to address both environmental and human health.

BI: How does light impact the health of building occupants?

NS: Light serves three primary functions for the human body. Most importantly, and obviously, we need light to see. Lamps providing light with poor colour quality can make it difficult to differentiate shades and colours. Proper designs must also distribute the light correctly to avoid causing glare.

Light is also the primary driver aligning our body’s biological clock, our circadian rhythm, with the sun’s 24-hour day. During the day, brighter white lights can inform our body that it is daytime, while at night, warm lamps with a lower blue component can provide illumination for visual purposes while minimising

Low control, low morale

disruption to our circadian rhythm.Finally, light has direct effects on

parts of our brain and can act as an acute stimulant, making people more alert and able to perform better on some cognitive tests.

BI: In what ways can lighting be used to improve employee wellbeing, comfort and productivity?

NS: The explosion of tunable LED lighting systems in the last five years has made it easier than ever to create custom lighting schedules that provide appropriate levels and colours of light at different points in our circadian cycle. This allows us to maximise lighting’s effects as a stimulant when it is appropriate for employees to focus during the day, while also taking into account our body’s internal clock.

BI: Can you give examples of buildings in which light was a crucial consideration in the design or was used in a unique way?

NS: Light from the sun and sky is great for use in workplaces because of its excellent colour quality and higher intensity in the blue part of the spectrum. Many of the projects most engaged in designing for wellness have really used daylight in innovative ways. One project opened up its stairway to a central skylight which would distribute light throughout each of the floors in an otherwise dim space. Another eliminated all the executive offices around the perimeter and instituted universal flexible seating, meaning that sunlit offices were no longer restricted to the elite few.

Find out more at: www.wellcertified.com

Introducing a complete world of laser projection possibilities When choosing projectors for your business, you’ll find yourself comparing the merits of traditional lamp-lit models against those of laser-lit devices. And the laser-based route certainly does offer advantages…

• Quick-start/quick-off function

• Low total cost of ownership

• 20,000 hours of maintenance-free operation

• Anti-dust protection

• Ideal for high-usage applications

To deliver these benefits to you, Panasonic offers a complete range of laser projectors, covering a wide range of business applications. That includes…

• PT-RZ370E LED/laser DLP™ projector, offering solid reliability and reduced costs

• PT-RZ570 1-chip DLP™ projector, providing a balance of 5,400 lumens of brightness and brilliant picture quality

• PT-RZ670E, the world’s first 6,500 lumens, 1-chip DLP™ projector, with a laser light source

• PT-RQ13 4K+ laser light source projector, with immersive image quality

For more information on this complete range of laser projectors:Call 020 7022 6530 Email [email protected] Visit business.panasonic.eu

1_00114363 Lighting and Sound magazine ad_v4.indd 1 21/04/2016 15:13

magazine 4101732 759725

Drones

Worker drones

Safety first

Drones, or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), continue to make the news for all the wrong reasons. Back in April a British Airways plane approaching Heathrow Airport was thought, wrongly as it turns out, to have been hit by a drone. In the same month, drones were banned from flying over a large part of London during the visit of US President Barack Obama.

Despite security concerns, calls for tighter rules on drone use and regulatory uncertainty, the drone industry continues to flourish.

Juniper Research expects annual revenues from commercial drone sales to reach $481 million this year, a rise of 84% on last year’s figure of $261 million1. Growth will be strongest in the agricultural sector, which is predicted to account for 48% of all commercial drone sales this year.

In the Queen’s Speech in May the government announced it will introduce a Modern Transport Bill to ensure the UK is at the forefront of technology for new forms of transport, including drones.

Drones are already used for a wide range of applications (some of which we explored in issue 124) and with advancements in technology, such as more compact sensors and cameras, they will continue to be adopted across many industries. Here are a few recent examples:

Following the recent ‘drone’ incident at Heathrow Airport, Business Info asked experts what they would do to stop drones becoming a public nuisance?

James Marchant, Director at Eye Sky Group: “I think the best solution is a mandatory serial number registration system. Simply make it illegal to sell a drone in the UK without linking the owner’s details to the aircraft’s serial number. This is what they do for airguns, which are legal for anyone to buy yet can cause harm. Follow this up by making it illegal to fly a drone without having registered its serial number. It would not require a huge investment to put such an infrastructure in place.” www.eyeskygroup.com

Michael Bugden, Director at The Drone Company: “More education needs to be given at the point of sale, specifically relating to restrictions when operating a drone. Without the correct knowledge hobbyists pose a genuine danger to members of the public by not adhering to CAA guidelines.” www.thedrone.co

Justin Pringle, CTO at Drone Operations: “Like dogs, there is no such thing as a bad drone, just bad owners.” He recommends education at point of sale and the fitting of propeller guards by manufacturers. www.drone-operations.com

Crowd friendly technologyDrones are great for capturing footage at events but their propellers make them a hazard to people. AEROTAIN has now developed a crowd-friendly drone, Skye, that combines aerial imagery, advertising and entertainment. Lifted by helium and powered by electrical motors, Skye can perform a variety of movements, including rolling like a football; can be customised to depict a product or brand name; and can carry broadcasting equipment to take aerial footage. Unique safety features mean it is safe to touch in flight so can fly over crowded places and closely approach people, offering brands a unique opportunity to interact with audiences.

Safer inspectionsDrones are widely used for aerial inspections of everything from oil rigs to buildings and bridges. Justin Pringle, CTO at Drone Ops, which specialises in the commercial application of Small Unmanned Aerial Systems (SUAS), says drones are often the safest option as they remove humans from hazardous situations. “We have developed a drone that can detect air pollution using sensors and a drone that can locate land

Tayla Ansell looks at recent applications of drone technology

mines from a safe distance,” he said. In another example, a drone was used to check radiation levels at Chernobyl.

Animal observation and conservationAnimal charity International Animal Rescue rescues, rehabilitates and releases orangutans in Borneo, placing small radio transmitters under their skin so that they can be located in the wild. It recently trialled the use of drones as a cheaper and more efficient alternative to human trackers. CEO Alan Knight said: “Our idea is to use a drone to search for orangutans at night when they climb to the tops of trees to make nests. The interference is less and the manpower is vastly reduced. Our software picks up transmissions and produces a heat map showing hotspots where the transmissions are strongest. The trackers can then enter the forest and go to within 10m of where the orangutan is sleeping, saving huge amounts of search time.”

Amphibious droneAddressing potential military applications, researchers at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Maryland, US have developed a submersible UAV that can be launched from a fixed position underwater. The Corrosion Resistant Aerial Covert Unmanned Nautical System (CRACUNS) can remain underwater for months without corroding and can withstand the pressure of being submerged at a depth of several hundred feet.

The increasing popularity of drones will no doubt continue to spark safety and privacy fears. However, it is important to acknowledge the benefits they bring to a variety of applications, including greater efficiency, lower costs and safer data collection.

1 Juniper Research: Drones: Consumer & Commercial Applications, Regulations & Opportunities 2015-2020

The Corrosion Resistant Aerial Covert Unmanned Nautical System

The all seeing Skye

We have developed a drone that can locate land mines from a safe distance

Introducing a complete world of laser projection possibilities When choosing projectors for your business, you’ll find yourself comparing the merits of traditional lamp-lit models against those of laser-lit devices. And the laser-based route certainly does offer advantages…

• Quick-start/quick-off function

• Low total cost of ownership

• 20,000 hours of maintenance-free operation

• Anti-dust protection

• Ideal for high-usage applications

To deliver these benefits to you, Panasonic offers a complete range of laser projectors, covering a wide range of business applications. That includes…

• PT-RZ370E LED/laser DLP™ projector, offering solid reliability and reduced costs

• PT-RZ570 1-chip DLP™ projector, providing a balance of 5,400 lumens of brightness and brilliant picture quality

• PT-RZ670E, the world’s first 6,500 lumens, 1-chip DLP™ projector, with a laser light source

• PT-RQ13 4K+ laser light source projector, with immersive image quality

For more information on this complete range of laser projectors:Call 020 7022 6530 Email [email protected] Visit business.panasonic.eu

1_00114363 Lighting and Sound magazine ad_v4.indd 1 21/04/2016 15:13

Month in Numbers

The average UK worker spends 2.5 days a week working remotely, according to a report by TeamViewer, a provider of remote control and online meeting software. The End of Nine-to-Five report reveals that 82% of workers say working flexibly/remotely makes them more effective in their job.

Companies are failing to harness threat monitoring systems and data analytics to catch fraudsters, claims KPMG. Its research shows that at a time when effective data analytics can be used to understand patterns of behaviour and so detect fraudulent activity, just 3% of frudsters are caught in this way. Instead, 44% are still caught as a result of a tip-off or whistleblowing hotline, with a further 24% detected accidentally. According to KPMG, the average fraudster is male, aged 36 to 55, holds a senior role in the company and has worked there for at least six years. The most common ‘white collar’ fraud is the misappropriation of assets – embezzlement and procurement fraud – committed by 47% of fraudsters investigated by KPMG.

The average small business owner spends 33 hours or four days per month battling red tape, according to the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB). Two thirds of smaller businesses (67%) say the amount of time they spend on business administration and compliance is preventing them from focusing on their business’s primary purpose. For example, the average small business owner spends just 8 hours 50 minutes per month on new business development, one quarter of the time they spend on business administration.

CSID, a provider of identity protection technologies, says Citizens Advice could have a role to play in raising awareness of identity fraud, following a survey which highlighted low awareness of official sources of advice. While 88% of UK adults know of Citizens Advice, just 16% and 13% know of Action Fraud and Get SafeOnline.org.

Twitter claims that more than one third (35%) of UK users use the platform for professional purposes. Almost two thirds (62%) use it to keep up to date with news about companies they like or that they’re interested in working for.

The majority of UK organisations (89%) feel ‘somewhat’ or ‘more’ vulnerable to both internal and external data security threats. According to the European Edition of the 2016 Vormetric Data Threat Report, 23% feel ‘very’ or ‘extremely’ vulnerable. The report claims that nearly one in five UK organisations has experienced a breach in the last 12 months.

Women in full and part time employment in London work an average of 1,631 hours a year, 75 hours or 10 working days more than the female workforce overall, claims online beauty company blow LTD. Counterparts in Scotland work 1,626 hours, 70 more than the rest of the UK, just ahead of working women in the North West who work 1,570 hours a year. Millennials aged 22-29 are the hardest working age group, clocking up 1,692 hours a year, 18 days more than other age groups.

Small firms are collectively attacked seven million times per year, costing the UK economy an estimated £5.26 billion. The Cyber Resilience: How to protect small firms in the digital economy report by the Federation of Small Businesses argues that small firms are unfairly carrying the cost of cyber crime.

Employee theft costs British businesses over £190 million, claims office furniture shop Kit Out My Office. Two thirds of UK office workers say they have stolen

The Month in Numbersfrom their office, 11% of whom admit to stealing personal items from colleagues. Fewer than one in seven of those caught stealing from their workplace has lost their job as a result.

Philips Lighting has pledged to sell more than two billion LED light bulbs by 2020 and in doing so save energy equivalent to decommissioning 60 medium-sized coal-fired power stations. Philips Lighting made the pledge in support of the Global Lighting Challenge, a campaign to deploy 10 billion high efficiency, affordable light bulbs (such as LED) to combat climate change. The campaign was launched last December by the Clean Energy Ministerial at the COP21 UN Climate Change Summit. www.cem7.org

Contactless payments in Europe passed a major milestone in May as Visa Europe announced three billion contactless transactions were made in the previous 12 months – almost triple the number made in the same period the previous year. European consumers used their cards 360 million times in April alone, making almost 140 transactions per second.

UK companies are losing £11 billion a year due to poor customer service. Research from NewVoiceMedia, a global provider of cloud technology, reveals that while the number of UK consumers who leave a business due to a bad customer experience has gone down (from 50% to 42%), the main reasons given for leaving remain the same. These include: feeling unappreciated (44%), unhelpful/rude staff (35%), being passed around multiple people (33%), not being able to get answers (27%), being tired of queuing (27%) and not being able to speak to a real person (25%).

2.5

3

4

13

35

89

1,631

7 million

2 billion

£3 billion

£190 million


£11 billion

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