No Wonder 7 out of theTop 10 Enterprise Organizations &Cloud Enviornments rely onArray Networks forFast & Secure Application DeliveryTo �nd out how Array can help your organization scale up and increase productivity in excess of 70%, reach out to

• 64-bit SpeedCore™ architecture• Full IPv6 support, DNS64 & NAT64• 2048 and 4096-bit SSL acceleration• vAPV virtual ADC• Application virtualization• Virtual server integration• Stateful TCP session failover• Application-speci�c certi�cations• eCloud™ cloud management API

Next-Gen Features

Array’s APV Series application delivery controllers (ADCs) o�er scalable, secure access and delivery for key critical enter-prise applications, and network infrastructure.

Array APV series ADCs provide integrated load balancing, security and acceleration capabilities in the datacenter. They combine cutting-edge performance and scalability with transformative features at industry-leading price points, creating unmatched value and ROI.

WHEN PERFORMANCE MATTERS…Application Delivery Controllers from Arrayoptimize the availability and performance of applicationsand services while reducing cost andcomplexity.

www.arraynetworks.com

Srinivas Vege Siva Kumar Raju

+971-50-3466098 svege@arraynetworks.net

+971-55-3113729siva.raju@comguard.net

Contents

R. NarayanManaging Editor

Disclaimer: While the publishers have made every attempt possibleto get accurate information on published content in this handbookthey cannot be held liable for any errors herein.

Editorial

Founder & CEO: Vivek Sharma Managing Editor: R. NarayanArt Director: Faiz Ahmed Sr. Sales Manager: R. Subramanyan Sales Coordinator: Smitha Jithesh

Published by: JNS Media International MFZEP.O. Box: 121075, Montana Building 404, Zabeel Road,Near GPO, Karama, Dubai-UAE - Tel: 04-3705022 Fax: 04-3706639

Partners matter as never before but for vendors what matters most is that they need to be allied with

competent and committed partners. As this is a time of considerable shift with entrenched leaders being challenged by next generation vendors in several domains, they need to ascertain if they indeed have allied with the best.

So for partners, it will require them to show the level of

commitment that each vendor expects from them in taking

their solutions to market. That will require them to not only

make ongoing investments in training or POCs, they will also

need to make sure that they are leaving no stones unturned

in persuading prospective customers about why they should

buy those solutions.

If they are opportunistic and comfortable pushing

solutions from only entrenched brands at the possible

expense of other alternative brands, then that doesn’t lay

seeds for a longer term successful partnership. Vendors

wouldn’t then count on them to take onus of some of the

significant customer leads that they may generate. Those

will go to partners who have proven in terms of their

loyalties as well as competence to deliver.

In any case, partners should have enough competence

across the diverse set of solutions from different vendors

they may carry to provide consultation to customers and

enable them to choose what suits them best, irrespective

of whichever brand it is. Their knowledge about all solutions

they carry must be at a comparable level and not have a

large disparity. Moving towards brand agnostic adoption of

Technologies is more acceptable today for customers than in

the past as long as solutions are of best breed standard and

demonstrated through effective POC scenarios. This helps

widen the market further.

Partners of progress

No Wonder 7 out of theTop 10 Enterprise Organizations &Cloud Enviornments rely onArray Networks forFast & Secure Application DeliveryTo �nd out how Array can help your organization scale up and increase productivity in excess of 70%, reach out to

• 64-bit SpeedCore™ architecture• Full IPv6 support, DNS64 & NAT64• 2048 and 4096-bit SSL acceleration• vAPV virtual ADC• Application virtualization• Virtual server integration• Stateful TCP session failover• Application-speci�c certi�cations• eCloud™ cloud management API

Next-Gen Features

Array’s APV Series application delivery controllers (ADCs) o�er scalable, secure access and delivery for key critical enter-prise applications, and network infrastructure.

Array APV series ADCs provide integrated load balancing, security and acceleration capabilities in the datacenter. They combine cutting-edge performance and scalability with transformative features at industry-leading price points, creating unmatched value and ROI.

WHEN PERFORMANCE MATTERS…Application Delivery Controllers from Arrayoptimize the availability and performance of applicationsand services while reducing cost andcomplexity.

www.arraynetworks.com

Srinivas Vege Siva Kumar Raju

+971-50-3466098 svege@arraynetworks.net

+971-55-3113729siva.raju@comguard.net

Cover Feature - 18

UC makes stridesWeb and Mobility based UC tools are complementing the growing pervasiveness of UC deployments

News In Detail

Fujitsu completes rollout ofPRIMEFLEX portfolio - 12

Citrix enhances EMM solution - 14

News Feature - 16

An ideal startDell Software’s inaugural User Group Conference was a two day affair that saw partners and customers come together to receive Technology updates as well as get to share feedback

TechKnow

Leaping ahead - 22Anand Chakravarthi, Regional Director -Middle East, Africa & India, Pivot3 in conversation with The Integrator Magazine discusses the trends in the HCI market and the unique value proposition of Pivot3

Strength to strength - 26 Ovanes Mikhaylov, Managing Director at Kaspersky Lab Middle East discusses the security trends outlook and the company’s focus

Feature - 24

The way forwardAllied Telesis is crossing the milestone of having completed 5 years of Business in the region and is an occasion for the company to introspect as well as look forward.

Insight

New opportunity frontiers forthe channel - 28In the Middle East, security, IPv6, cloud, big data, SDN and NFV are areas of opportunity in terms of new revenue streams and big margins for the channel opines Glen Ogden, Regional Sales Director, Middle East at A10 Networks

Onboarding customers - 30Having and following an effective onboarding plan is very crucial for enhanced customer experience writes Ajay Alex, Practise head at Finesse.

Regulars

News BytesEyetechStats & trends

4 | July 2015

News Bytes

Aptec, an Ingram Micro company, successfully completed few Solutions Forums in the region. The first in the series of events was a dedicated Forum for the launch of FlexPod Solution, which was co-hosted by leading vendors such as Cisco, NetApp and APC by Schneider Electric on 16th February 2015, at Oberoi Hotel, Dubai. During the event, Aptec launched its FlexPod Partner Program in the presence of more than 40 channel partners who attended the event.

The same Solution Forum was also rolled out to Abu Dhabi partners on 6th April 2015 in Sofitel Hotel with VMWare &Veeam joining the event with their technology solutions for partners.

Together, both events saw a gathering of more than 75 people from reseller community, representing more than 50 IT reseller companies, mostly senior executives and owners. The Forum delivered an intense series of well-run, information-rich speeches and discussions, and a lively, business-oriented networking environment between sessions. The agenda for the event was to focus on FlexPod in general and Aptec’s validated designs in particular.

Following on was the series of Virtualization roadshow in Qatar and Dubai on 26th May and 10th June respectively. Over 50 unique SMB partners attended the event with more than 90 attendees.

Aptec holds Solutions Forums VMware celebrated their leading partners at an awards dinner during the Middle East

Partner Summit hosted in the Atlantis, Dubai. Throughout the evening, 10 different awards were handed out to celebrate the successes of VMware’s top partners over the last 12 months. These included recognising companies and individuals, including Distributor of the Year and Emerging Technology Partner of the year.

"VMware, together with the VMware Partner Network, continues to support businesses in the Middle East in their transformation to thrive in the growing mobile cloud era," said Reeman Ansari, Manager Partner Organization, VMware Middle East North Africa. "We congratulate all of our partner award winners for their accomplishments."

Among the accolades presented on the day, Ingram Micro was recognized as Distributor of the Year. The Distribution Champion of the Year honor went to Sayantan Dev of Redington. Saudi Business Machines was conferred the Specialized Partner of the Year. Gulf Business Machines – Dubai was General Business Partner of the Year. The Rising Star Partner of the Year went to Bahwan IT. Ezzeldin Hussein, VAS was recognized as the VMware Technology Champion of the Year. MDS Computers was the Emerging Technology Partner of the year. The Partner of the Year Award went to Alpha Data.

VMware applauds partners

StarLink has joined the Riverbed Performance Value Added Distributor (VAD) Program in UAE. The Riverbed VAD program is a value-based model, showcasing VAD partners that deliver value-added services in addition to logistical distribution. The VAD program enables StarLink to build closer relationships with resellers and provide high-value services and support so resellers can ensure their customers get the full benefit of the Riverbed Application Performance Platform in performance-engineering their hybrid enterprise for maximum application and business performance.

“Riverbed is the clear industry leader in application performance, and a significant addition to our portfolio,” said Nidal Othman, Managing Director at StarLink. “Our team is looking forward to building upon Riverbed’s existing success and delivering its best-of-breed product portfolio to even more enterprise and government customers.”

StarLink has met the Program requirements and has a valid, mutually executed Distributor Agreement with Riverbed. Having met these requirements, StarLink is eligible to receive the program benefits as an authorized VAD Partner, including that the VAD is eligible to buy and sell Riverbed products and distribute Riverbed products to Authorized Riverbed Performance Partners within a defined territory.

StarLink joins Riverbed VAD Program

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6 | July 2015

News Bytes

Emircom is the recipient of two Cisco Partner Summit awards for UAE Architectural Excellence Data Centre Partner and Emerging Theatre Architectural Excellence Service Provider Partner of the Year. Cisco revealed the winners during its annual partner conference which took place last month in Montreal, Canada.

Awarded to exemplary channel partners, the Cisco Partner Summit Emerging Theatre awards are designed to recognize best-in-class business practices and serve as a model to the industry within their respective theatre. Areas of consideration include innovative practices, architecture-led approach successes, strategic business outcome-focused programs, seizing new opportunities and sales approaches.

“Cisco is privileged to work with some of the best channel partners in the Gulf to connect our customers to the Internet of Everything and change our world for the better,” said Meghan McCarthy of the Partner Business Group for Cisco UAE. “It is my honor to recognize that the Architectural Excellence awards have been presented to Emircom for its outstanding achievement as a Cisco channel partner in the Emerging theatre & UAE.”

“Emircom spares no effort in making available and delivering locally the latest innovative and creative technology solutions and services to its customers, and our long term and strategic partnership with Cisco strengthens our ability to do that,” said Mohamad Abou-Zaki, Chief Operating Officer at Emircom LLC

Cisco Partner Summit Theatre awards reflect the top-performing partners within specific technology markets across the Emerging theatre. All award recipients are selected by a group of Cisco Worldwide Partner Organization and regional and theatre executives.

Emircom recognized at Cisco Summit

Fluke Networks has signed FVC as a value-added distributor (VAD) for the Middle East and Africa region. As part of the new agreement, FVC will align with Fluke Networks to meet customer demand in the region, by making the vendor’s enterprise solutions more widely available.

“Fluke Networks is an established global leader, and we are keen to help Fluke Networks further expand its market reach here in the region. Our partnership with Fluke Networks further strengthens FVC’s capabilities, allowing us to add yet another world class vendor to our IT Infrastructure and Security portfolio,” commented K. S. Parag, Managing Director at FVC.

FVC will market all enterprise solutions from Fluke Networks, giving businesses across the region immediate access to world-leading technologies, providing them with an edge in an increasingly competitive global arena.

“In FVC we have found a distributor who echoes our commitment to providing world-leading technologies to regional business and government entities. With its on-the-ground knowledge, FVC will help us significantly increase our market share in the region,” added Gerhard Auer, VP Fluke Networks.

Fluke Networks also announced the launch of its new Enterprise Partner Program for the Middle East, Turkey and Africa (META) region. The program will help the company’s partners provide complete end-to-end solutions to its customers, including network and application performance management, and wireless LAN security and network monitoring.

Fluke Networks signs FVC as Distributor

Sophos has acquired Reflexion Networks Inc., a leader in cloud-based email security, archiving, email encryption and business continuity services. The acquisition will enable Sophos to add cloud-based email security to Sophos Cloud, the company’s single, integrated cloud-based management console. Together, Reflexion and Sophos will deliver enterprise-grade email security in one affordable and simple-to-manage solution.

Reflexion Networks offers a complete portfolio of cloud-based email security technologies that help organizations meet their needs for secure communications. Reflexion Total Control blocks spam and

viruses before they ever get to the corporate network. Archiving, discovery, and recovery services allow fast search and retrieval capabilities, while encryption services ensure that email communications are only readable by intended recipients. In addition, Reflexion offers business continuity services to ensure uninterrupted business communications in the event of an outage.

Sophos Cloud, which was launched in mid-2013, provides endpoint security, mobile device management and security, server security, and application whitelisting through a single, integrated cloud-based console.

“The Reflexion platform has been built from the ground up to run in the cloud at scale and will strengthen and accelerate our ability to offer email protection when and where the customer wants it,” commented Bill Lucchini, senior vice president of Sophos Cloud Security Group. “As we integrate this technology with Sophos Cloud it will complement our Sophos Secure Email Appliance giving IT professionals the choice of a cloud-based solution, or an on-premise solution."

Sophos acquires Reflexion Networks

01 Available in up to 6TB storage capacities

03 Built to work with High

cameras

05 Designed for up to 8-bay surveillance systems

02 Engineered for always-on 24/7 conditions

04 WD AllFrame™ technology reduces video frame loss

06 Worldwide 3-year limited warranty

When Every Second CountsGive Your Customers The Storage That Will Help Secure Their Home and Business

Surveillance Storage

8 | July 2015

News Bytes

Axis Communications has announced that the official exam for the Axis Certification Programme has gone live and is open to all security professionals who aim to validate their competence and skills in IP video surveillance.

Anyone interested in becoming an Axis Certified Professional can register online to take the exam at any local testing centre offered by Prometric, a global provider of testing and assessment services.

Once a participant passes the advanced test, they will be awarded the Axis Certified Professional designation, which validates that they are well-versed in the latest network video technologies, solutions and Axis products, as well as best-practice design and implementation techniques. Once certified, participants will also earn the Axis global stamp of endorsement that strengthens both their personal and company’s credentials.

“The prospect of having a formal certification process of this calibre lends immediate credence and benefits the video training efforts of integrators,” says Ettiene van der Watt, Axis Communications MEA Engineering and Training Manager.

The 50-question exam was developed specifically for system designers and technical sales professionals.

Axis Communications’ Academy offers a variety of classroom and web-based training along with tutorials and guides to help individuals prepare for the exam. Additionally, the Axis training team will launch a one-day, instructor-led Axis Certification Programme prep-course for those wishing to brush up on their IP video knowledge before the exam.

Axis Certification Programme Testing Goes Live

Avaya has announced that it is the only vendor to be

consistently positioned as a Leader in the Gartner Magic

Quadrant for Contact Center Infrastructure for 15 years,

a position held since the report’s inception in 2001.

Avaya says it is one of few vendors that can

provide the flexibility for midsize to very large

companies to choose the architectural approach to

implementing customer engagement solutions that’s

most appropriate for their needs. Midsize to very large

companies can select a complete, bundled solution or

take a best of breed approach, with both available in

premises-based or public, private or hybrid cloud-based service model.

Avaya claims that it leads the contact center industry in the Middle East region.

The majority of the region’s major banks, telecom operators and public sector services

run Avaya call centers. In the last few years, the company has been engaged with its

largest customers in a digital transformation process of their customer experiences,

transforming traditional call centers to smart customer engagement experiences

using multiple channels like social media, video-based communication, web chat and

others.

Mohammed Areff, Vice President, Avaya Middle East, Africa, and Turkey said,“As

organisations increasingly transform digitally, customer engagement can be a key

priority, and an eye-opener in the GCC region is the number of government entities

that we work with. This level of focus on effective customer service within the

government sector is a very positive trend. We are proud to count some of the key

organisations as our customer engagement solutions clients, and our regional success

has gone a long way in securing this global leadership positioning for the 15th year.”

Gartner names Avaya as Leader for Contact Center Infrastructure

STME was honoured by Hitachi Data Systems at the HDS

Summit 2015 by walking away with the coveted award

for Overall Partner of the Year.

The Summit, which was held from May 26th through

28th in Barcelona, saw various accolades being handed

out to Hitachi’s regional partners. The awards up for

grabs included Best Emerging Partner and Best Seller by

Product, whereby STME was named Overall Partner of

the Year thanks to its gargantuan achievement of highest

product revenue for 2015.

STME’s CEO Ayman Al-Bayaa agreed that the award

will boost the company’s portfolio and credibility among its regional clients, and lauded

the impressive relationship between them and HDS.

“This award reflects STME’s commitment to with excellent delivery and quality, and it

is a recognition of STME’s success in the market,” he said. “The award encourages us to

continue delivering high quality projects through our talented workforce and cutting-edge

technology.”

STME wins Partner of the Year at HDS Summit 2015

10 | July 2015

News Bytes

du held a Telecom Knowledge

Series session on 5G to highlight

latest trends and updates related

to this emerging technology. Held

at du headquarters and led by

SaleemAlBlooshi, du’s Executive Vice

President of Network Development

and Operations, the session projected

reaching 5G commercialisation

beyond 2020 with some prototypes

and trials predicted to begin by 2018.

The Telecom Knowledge Series

session followed the approval by the

International Telecommunications

Union (ITU) of du’s paper on 5G

standardisation, titled ‘Proposal to

launch the 5G studies in SG13’. The

contribution outlines du’s research

on the basic and most important

requirements for the road to 5G, its

current candidate technologies and

architecture, and the concerns and

issues that the telecommunications

provider foresees with them.

“du’s recent launch of the first

LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) live network in

the UAE, forms a significant step on

the road towards 5G. We are proud of

our successful contribution to the ITU

Study Group – led by Dr. Mahmoud

Sherif from du, and we believe that it

cements our objective to be the first

in market for pioneering technologies

that pave the way towards a 5G

future,” said AlBlooshi.

du spells out the road to 5G standardisation

Dell announced that Gartner has recognized Dell across enterprise product lines. The IT industry analyst firm positioned Dell as a leader in its 2015 Magic Quadrant for Modular Servers, a visionary in the 2015 Magic Quadrant for Data Center Networking, and gave the company a positive overall rating in its Vendor Rating report.

“We believe this recognition from an esteemed firm like Gartner is confirmation that Dell understands the data centers of the future,” said Paul Perez, chief technology officer of Dell Enterprise Solutions Group.

As one of the largest providers of x86-based servers in the world, Dell has been positioned as a leader in the Gartner 2015 Magic Quadrant for Modular Servers. The Gartner Magic Quadrant for Modular Servers was published as Dell celebrates its 20-year anniversary providing customers its PowerEdge servers.

Dell’s ability to execute and completeness of vision led to its inclusion in the visionaries quadrant of the 2015 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Data Center Networking. Open Networking is inherent to Dell’s networking strategy. Dell is supporting this shift to a modern network by delivering network switches for every area of the enterprise and providing state-of-the-art service to ensure businesses can support growing bandwidth demands and address the challenges associated with scalability and network management.

Gartner further issued a positive overall rating for Dell in its Vendor Rating. Dell’s recent transition to a private company and its commitment to broadened and deepened technology, solution and service areas were all positive areas of note.

Dell receives multiple recognitions from Gartner

Nexansconducted a successful three-day intensive Certified System Partner (CSP) Training program for their resellers and partners at Crowne Plaza Doha - The Business Park. Under the tutelage of Alain Geypens, Training Manager from Nexans Belgium and in co-operation with Nexans’ distributor in Qatar M/s Al Bawakir Enterprises, participants who successfully completed the training program are now eligible to apply for a 25 years warranty certificate from Nexans including the labour warranty.

It was attended by 40 participants comprising of IT resellers and some end-users. The trainings were divided into different modules which addressed different topics which helped the participants improve their knowledge and skills in the cabling domain.

Mavy Pereira, Sales Manager, Nexans Cabling Solutions said, “At Nexans, we believe our partners need to be well trained on all aspects of Nexans including features and benefits of our products, installation rules and guidelines, installation practice and testing and post implementation support. The transmission quality of a cabling installation depends on the cabling system used as well as on the installation itself and the three-day intensive training that Nexans conducts ensures that our partners are well equipped to handle large and complex projects.”

Nexans organises Partner Training Program in Qatar

12 | July 2015

News In Detail

Fujitsu has completed the rollout of its PRIMEFLEX

portfolio, enabling the company to deliver Integrated Systems that are purpose-designed for specific data center tasks. With its comprehensive PRIMEFLEX line-up of Integrated Systems, Fujitsu is empowering organizations to accelerate digital transformation of their businesses, eliminate complexity and reduce risk.

Integrated Systems are a combination of servers, storage, connectivity and software designed to address certain specific use cases. With its portfolio of PRIMEFLEX Integrated Systems, Fujitsu provides a wide range of purpose- or task-built solutions that enable the faster deployment of more powerful data center technology design, covering areas from Microsoft Exchange to High Performance Computing (HPC) and from SAP HANA to private cloud.

Ayman Abouseif, Vice President Product Marketing, Fujitsu Global Marketing, says: “Customers who want to quickly deploy new types of workload in their data centers are looking to leading

infrastructure vendors like Fujitsu for Integrated Systems. These are solutions specifically designed to effectively run data center workloads including SAP, Microsoft, Big Data, High Performance Computing, Server and Desktop Virtualization, Private Cloud and High Availability. Fujitsu delivered its very first Integrated System 12 years ago, and today our PRIMEFLEX portfolio covers more than 20 distinct solutions engineered to make our customers businesses run faster, more smoothly and efficiently.”

Since launching the new PRIMEFLEX brand in November 2014, Fujitsu has continued to innovate and introduce new solutions that combine server, storage and network connectivity, coupled with software and management layers. A key part of the PRIMEFLEX value proposition is that all components – including both hardware and software – are pre-integrated and pre-tested for specific popular use cases. At launch, PRIMEFLEX already represented one of the industry’s broadest offerings of powerful data center solutions.

Over the last seven months, Fujitsu has continued to expand the PRIMEFLEX portfolio and it now spans more than 20 systems, providing unmatched choice in terms of the full scope of enterprise and mid-size business needs in the data center.

Three new PRIMEFLEX solutions have ben unveiled for Microsoft environments. These are PRIMEFLEX for Exchange, PRIMEFLEX for Lync and PRIMEFLEX for OfficeMaster Gate, which enable mid-size businesses to modernize their infrastructure and improve communication and collaboration.

Recent further additions to the PRIMEFLEX line-up include PRIMEFLEX for SAP Landscapes, PRIMEFLEX for SAP HANA, PRIMEFLEX for Egenera PAN.

PRIMEFLEX for SAP Landscapes enables the rapid, high-quality deployment and

roll-out of infrastructure for SAP workloads, applications and databases, including SAP HANA.

PRIMEFLEX for SAP HANA (introduced in 2012 and formerly known as Fujitsu Power Appliance for SAP HANA), facilitate the creation of purpose-built systems for SAP HANA to meet exact customer requirements, creating secure, reliable architectures that meet the highest demands for running business- and mission-critical SAP software landscapes. In addition to this ready-to-run solution, Fujitsu also offers PRIMEFLEX reference architectures for SAP HANA.

PRIMEFLEX for Egenera PANdelivers the maximum value and utilization from data center resources to create both previously unmatched levels of resource utilization and unrivalled high availability and disaster recovery capabilities.

Fujitsucompletes rollout of PRIMEFLEX portfolio

14 | July 2015

News In Detail

Citrix has announced new technology innovations for

XenMobile enterprise mobility management (EMM) solution. Citrix continues to differentiate its EMM solution by enriching the mobile experience for end users and IT administrators with new business-optimized mobile apps and cloud-based mobility management delivered through Citrix Workspace Cloud (CWC). Additionally, Citrix is expanding its partner app ecosystem to deliver advanced security and performance management, while ensuring a seamless experience from any mobile device.

According to the new Citrix 2020 Technology Landscape report, the workplace is undergoing another major shift from a physical workspace to a software-defined workspace where employees have the flexibility to work on any device with anyone, anywhere, anytime. According to Citrix, XenMobile offers a most comprehensive and flexible solution for managing apps, data and devices with a broad set of business optimized mobile apps. This will be provided on a single platform, while integrating seamlessly

with other partner and Citrix technologies, as illustrated by Workspace Cloud and the new Citrix Receiver, which supports the Citrix mouse on iPads and iPhones.

Citrix is working with many technology providers to offer enterprise-grade solutions. It is partnering with Entrust and Intercede to provide S/MIME support for WorxMail, allowing customers to sign and encrypt email securely. It is working with Aternity for application performance and real time end user experience monitoring and reporting. Through it partnership with AnyPresence, it is working to accelerate secure mobile app development, extending XenMobile technology for app security and delivery to expose enterprise data sources to mobile users. Working with Kony, a leading Mobile Application Development Platform provider, Citrix will enable customers to accelerate development of enterprise mobile apps for customers with mobile experiences that are easily integrated, customizable, and scalable with built in reporting and analytics.

Mobility Management Service from Citrix Workspace

Cloud is soon to be available as a test drive. The Workspace Cloud mobility management service will empower administrators to achieve fast time-to-value with the deployment of mobility services. .

GeirRamleth, Chief Strategy Officer and SVP and GM, Workspace Services, Citrix said, “We are seeing

strong customer traction for XenMobile, outpacing segment growth and capturing EMM market share. This is a testament to our integrated strategy in mobility, which is to take a holistic approach to delivering secure access to data and applications, empowering our customers’ mobile workspace transformation.”

Citrix enhances EMM solution

• XenMobileisdemonstratingnew technology advancements coupled with integrations and an expanded app partner ecosystem to provide stronger security, better user experience and greater flexibility for customers.• WorkflowsOptimizedforBusinesswith New Secure Business Apps - XenMobile continues to pioneer a broad set of core business-optimized mobile apps with integrated workflows to enrich the mobile user experience.• WorxTasks–WorxTasksintegrates with Microsoft Outlook tasks, enabling users to work seamlessly across

desktops, laptops and mobile devices to track, manage and edit their to-do lists on any device.• CitrixforSalesForce–Citrixisdelivering the mobile SalesForce app with a new security wrapper, allowing enterprises to apply policies and manage the app within their EMM environment.• SlideStream–Userscanaccess,view and deliver presentations using SlideStream on an external monitor with no cables required, and when paired with the new Apple Watch, presentations can be controlled with just a few quick swipes.

Distributing Innovative Technologies, Region-wide

Global Networking Strategies. Regional Implementation.

FVC is the leading Value Added Distributor for renowned IT vendors across the Middle Eastand Africa. We bring you innovative solutions in Unified Collaboration and Convergence, IT Infrastructure and Security. We also deliver a range of professional services including Logistics, Implementation and Training Services; enabling us to meet the real-time infrastructure needs of your business enterprise.

Dubai, UAE. Tel: +971 4 4294900 | Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Tel: +966 11 2813540 | Cairo, Egypt. Tel: +20 2 26435280

Casablanca, Morocco. Tel: +212 522 787154 | Nairobi, Kenya. Tel: +254 20 3673 208 | Lagos, Nigeria. Tel: +234 1 4623411 | Enquiries: info@fvc.com | www.fvc.com

Leading edge global technology.Established regional partners.Efficient local execution.

Book Your Free Visit to FVC EBC

16 | July 2015

Dell Software held its first ever User

Group Conference last month, hosting end-users, partners and distributors of Dell Software. The first edition included 3 cities in Emerging markets, Dubai, Istanbul and Warsaw. The event presented the most comprehensive coverage of Dell’s Security, Information Management, and Systems Management portfolio in the EMEA region. Discussions and key-note sessions were led by senior Dell executives, IDC and Gartner Analysts, and key thought-leaders.

The two day event held in Dubai had a day dedicated for partners on the first day of UGC. The day’s content was more specific to partners that comprised of Partner Program Updates that discussed the perquisites and benefits of becoming a Dell Software partner. Partners also had the opportunity to receive channel updates in terms of channel activities and achievements from past 12 months and what the company plans for the partners for next 12 months. This included Marketing updates, updates on business tools and company strategy discussed for the channel partners.

Shahnawaz Sheikh, Distribution Channel Director for META and Eastern Europe at Dell Software says, “We conveyed a very promising roadmap to the satisfaction of our customers and partners; we obtained some valuable feedback on improvement and new feature requests from partners and customers.

Dell Software continues with further investment in R&D and integrating what is available on hand from various acquisitions.“

The second day of the conference was for both end-users and partners that included guest speakers speaking about Security technology and trends. There were product roadmaps discussed and several break-out sessions on products. It also included case studies presented by the customers of Dell Software.

Shahnawaz adds, “Many customers presented how Dell Software solutions helped them overcome the security/data protection or business process challenges and how Dell Software solution and its partners contributed in assisting them overcome those challenges with an end-to-end Dell software solutions that helped operate their businesses at ease.”

The event saw a good turn-out of 200 partners out of which 35% were from outside the UAE. It was attended by different kinds of partners from the legacy partners of various companies acquired by Dell, Dell partners who wantto scale-up their offerings with Dell software solutions in addition to hardware offerings and also new partners that were on-boarded after the Dell Software organization was formed.

Shahnawaz says, “We believe we have a good mix of these partners that are product technology specialists, the partners that

Feature | Dell Software

An idealstart

Dell Software’s inaugural User Group Conference

was a two day affair that saw partners and

customers come together to receive Technology

updates as well as get to share feedback

Shahnawaz SheikhDistribution Channel Director, MEA & Eastern EuropeDell Software

July 2015 | 17

manage some large customers accounts representing Dell offerings as well as new partners acquired from competition due to the value of multitude of technologies that Dell offers. It is also due to the fact that Dell now is an end-to-end solutions company offering solutions in multiple areas viz.., Hardware, Storage, Software, Services and Networking.”

At the show, some of the product areas that were highly in demand for discussion and partnership were Security and Information and Systems Management.

According to Shahnawaz, “We had the customers and partners interested in all 3 core areas of Dell Software offering. Some of these technologies are already well established and there is a growing demand to further boost them and for some niche products and technologies, many partners are coming forward to invest time and resources in building the needed competencies to represent us strongly in markets they represent.”

The concept of bringing

in partners and customers together in one event, according to Shahnawaz, was appreciated and encouraged by both partners and customers and it actually gave them much more confidence to have discussion on core projects and business needs in presence of all 3 stakeholder entities, ie., the Dell team, partners and customers.

He adds, “UGC was a great platform and experience for Dell Software team in the region to get a univocal feedback and updates from both partners and customers about their expectations on products,

support, business tools, pricing etc. We will work on these key areas in which we received positive and constructive feedback and invest more in those areas that bring better value to our customers and partners. As a result of these we would be running a series of sales/technical trainings, conducting some technical workshops and around-the-year, will invite customers to our solutions center where we can demonstrate the end-to-end solutions and the power of Dell.”

The event also witnessed recognition for top performing partners

"UGC was a great platform and experiencefor Dell Software team in the region to get

a univocal feedback and updates fromboth partners and customers about their

expectations on products, support,business tools, pricing etc."

were rewarded in 3 categories, Network Security, Systems Management and Information Management. Some of the award winners were the legacy

Dell Hardware partners who excelled with Software competencies and generated high Dell software business in their markets.

Case studies presented during the event evinced a lot of attention. The case studies were from various solution offerings of Dell Software with diverse customers from Oil and Gas, Banking, Education, Retail, Government etc. The third party views and updates coming directly from existing customers triggered considerable interest among new prospective customers as well as among existing customers of Dell products but who are new to some of the Dell Software solutions.

Overall from Dell’s perspective,the first edition of the User Group Conference was successful and the company is keen to have an even better edition next year, taking into account all feedback received from attendees.

18 | July 2015

cater to rising expectations of seamless communication through multiple channels. Therefore use case scenarios are becoming more diverse and pervasive and is likely to accelerate.

K.S. Parag, MD, FVC says, “UC has now become ubiquitous in our daily business life, especially with the advent of smartphones and applications like Microsoft’s Skype and Google’s Hangouts. It is not uncommon to have video conferences using multiple platforms these days and more so in a region like the Middle East where operations are more spread out.

UC is one of the key focus segments for FVC. FVC works with three of the largest UC players in the market, namely Polycom, Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise and Microsoft and has also built up a network of support vendors to enable their partners to offer their customers an end-to-end solution.

Parag adds, “We have seen UC being used for collaboration projects; for confidential discussions during mergers and acquisitions; for educational purposes covering multiple sites to make better use of educational and teaching resources and of course for general business communications. UC is now seen as a way to increase communications and create a more collaborative environment for businesses.”

An omnichannel approach which enables continuity in communication through multiple platforms will meet those rising expectations for a unified experience.

Savio adds, “Today, however, we are seeing a trend wherein consumers

UC as a tool for enhanced collaboration in the

workplace is now being driven through multiple platforms and therefore it is coming at an accelerated pace. Inexpensive and far more flexible tools, from mobile solutions to cloud based solutions are increasing the pervasiveness of UC deployments.

Savio Tovar Dias, Director – Sales Engineering, Avaya says, “The broad concept of Unified Communications has been traditionally driven by the enterprise, as they sought more efficient ways to ensure that team members in multiple locations, on multiple devices, and with varying connection qualities could all work together successfully. To this end, UC has given rise to BYOD, social media integration and many more innovations.”

The focus is growing towards enabling increased collaboration in the workplace and communication between organizations and customers.

Girish Narayanan, MD of Granteq says, “With the emergence of BYOD & SMART initiatives, legacy systems are now being replaced by collaborative tools. Unified Communications is now an active part of the ICT strategy and has become a priority today. IT decision makers are investing in these initiatives exclusively. UC has evolved not just as a technology but as a rapid decision making tool in each segment, where as per the dynamic industry patterns end user objectives can be met with measurable returns.”

Granteq is an Audio Visual & Unified Communications provider that specializes in Collaborative Technology Design, Integration and Managed Services.

UC deployments have to

Cover Feature | Unified Communications

Web and Mobility based UC tools are complementing the growing pervasiveness of UC deployments

July 2015 | 19

and customers are demanding a range of options with which to connect with their brands and organizations. This means that organizations need to ensure a range of unified communications tools for employees and teams, as well as their customers.Our primary focus now is in enabling our customers to achieve true omnichannel functionality, and we are working with our customers to create positive business outcomes and satisfied customers. ”

Avaya’s offering spans the entire stack of unified communications, from the network level to the applications such as Scopia, a rich, multi-platform, multi-device, online collaboration suite. The vendor has worked with a number of organisations spanning private enterprise and Governments across the GCC and broader Middle East, across their internal UC requirements and customer-facing multichannel contact centres.

The adoption rates in the region is impressive as customers are keen to leverage the benefits of a seamless communication and collaboration platform. According to WaelAbdulal, Senior Manager – Collaboration, Cisco UAE, in the Middle East, companies of every size, industry, and geography are investing in UC and video solutions to enhance productivity and IT costs, and there is a tremendous opportunity for the “as a service” model in the region.

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He adds, “Unified communications (UC) is an increasingly important investment for organisations looking to improve productivity and responsiveness while reducing their IT costs. The convergence of voice, video, and data communications around a shared IP-based infrastructure - allowing users to easily make a call, send a message, or join an audio or video conference - is bringing benefits to businesses of every size, industry, and geography. Information has been at our fingertips for a long time, but UC enables the sharing of this information to create knowledge and value.”

Cisco’s latest UC solutions are designed specifically with the goal of making it easier for teams to instantly connect, communicate and collaborate – so people can respond faster and make decisions more quickly. Cisco is providing customers in the Middle East with a sophisticated collaboration and communication experience that corporate IT expects, while also offering the same intuitiveness and simplicity found in easy-to-use software-based consumer communication tools. These solutions include Cisco TelePresence, Customer Collaboration (contact center), Cisco Jabber, Cisco Unity Connection, and Cisco WebEx Meetings.

Sabu Thomas, VP,Channel Alliance, DVCOM Technology says, “Advancement in growth and innovations has enabled solution providers the ability to provide

quality and simplistic budget-friendly video equipment’s. Enabling organizations of all sizes to use the power of unified communications consequently offering a reduction in overall operational costs, improving workforce productivity and customer service, enhancing efficiency, ultimately enhancing the business performance. The seamless connect of technologies by UC, has increased its adoption rate among businesses.Collaboration is becoming an important component of the UC space. This allows for geographically distributed employees and work groups to cooperate with each other to achieve a business objective or goal.

DVCOM focuses on providing cost effective and efficient Unified Communication solutions in the Middle East region using the power of Asterisk as a building block. It also offers the SwitchvoxIP PBX range of products from Digium that deliver Unified Communications tools, mobility applications, and calling features. It has also partnered with Yealink to offer the Video conferencing range for meeting rooms.

‘Cloudy’ outlookToday, there are many robust web based UC solutions available that offer great flexibility to customers.WebRTC that enables video and audio conferencing through web browsers is now becoming more popular with vendors who are offering UC services. These solutions could find favour with many customers.

Parag says, “The cloud-based video services are more favoured in the SMB and private enterprise sector. Government organizations and large enterprises tends to have limitations for using services in the cloud and prefer a premise-based solution vs a web-based solution.

He adds, “We definitely see the market moving towards more software rather than hardware solutions. Currently, we are seeing a healthy mix with desktop-based UC solutions being mostly software-based while the larger conference room deployments being more hardware-based UC solutions.”

So enterprise users will for instance benefit from a mix of models that offer best fit UC solutions.

20 | July 2015

Savio says, “The regional market is very much an innovation-driven one, and we find that our customers and partners are willing and open to experimenting with the best possible solution. In every engagement, we recommend a mix of technologies to bring out the maximum benefit. Given the high quality of infrastructure that we enjoy, it is a viable possibility that UC can be accessed via the cloud to save on hardware investment. This is not to say that cloud via the cloud can provide all the solutions that enterprises would require. A healthy mix would be the ideal model, especially when scalability and reliability are well-considered and determined in the mix.”

Although there could be a ‘healthy mix’ in several corporate Business environments, hosted UC deployments are likely to see a faster growth rate in comparison to traditional expensive on premise conferencing equipment. That is also because of the ease with which such solutions can be deployed, their scalability and their price competitiveness.

Wael says, “Cloud-based UC solutions are especially seeing strong demand. According to a recent report, non-premises consumption models for UC and collaboration have growth rates that are 1.5 to 2 times that of traditional customer premise equipment, with up to 30 percent of UC revenue currently coming from hosted UC deployments.

Cisco recently unveiled the Cisco

Collaboration Meeting Room (CMR) which leverages the power of the Cisco WebEx Cloud and Cisco Telepresence video infrastructure and scale well beyond any available meeting room service capable of hosting up to 1,000 people on WebEx and up to 25 video endpoints on the same session.

Wael adds, “With this new cloud-based offering, users need not worry about exceeding capacity limits or whether all participants will have access to the “right” technologies—whether the meeting is for two or hundreds, employees can simply focus on delivering meaningful and effective business communications that seamlessly integrate two-way video, audio and data-sharing.”

It is likely that many leading vendors will provide UC solutions on-premises and will offer cloud services as add-on features. In the meantime, PBX hasn’t disappeared completely and is very much alive and well, though shrinking according to Sabu.

Sabu says, “In order to eliminate potential errors, companies adopt private cloud to route their calls for 24/7 effective communication. This is one of the many reasons companies in the service industry are moving away from PBXs Hardware to UC systems. Companies adopting the cloud-based UC solutions are generally those with business models heavily dependent on the advancement of ICT especially financial organisations with call

centre demands.”

UC takes off on the MobileThe growing Mobile penetration in the BYOD era is a compelling driver to enable and leverage UC on mobile devices. Mobile UC is therefore on the upswing. UC on the mobile enables users to enable their convenience to communicate at any given point of time with colleagues as well as completes the cycle of access from a fixed desktop access onwards.

Savio says, “Mobility is another factor that has to be factored into every UC initiative by an organization. The point is that one’s communication with or within the organization has to be unified – whether from a desktop PC, a mobile device connected via public-Wi-Fi or a tablet PC from one’s garden. Today’s business can rarely be completed purely by desk-based activity. An increasingly mobile workforce calls for representatives to be equipped with access to data and broader teams at short notice wherever they may be.”

It is likely that there will be more integration of UC features and tools to enable seamless and continuity in communication access between customers and companies.Savio opines that if customers are able to access customer services via social media platforms or dedicated apps on a mobile device, they would be more likely to choose this option.

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Cover Feature | Unified Communications

July 2015 | 21

He adds, “One issue that businesses grapple with is that social channels and apps cannot just be a tool to create a point of contact. The platform also needs to connect seamlessly to the back-end, and even if on a webchat or on Whatsapp, for instance, the customer expects the agent to have all the information regarding that customer’s account, history and recent issues. This is the Omnichannel customer service strategy – whichever channel the customer wishes to engage with the business over, the resolution and service received will be the same.”

In a fast moving world where employee carries their own devices, organizations have historically trailed behind when it comes to understanding user requirements.

Girish says, “Mobility has encouraged the need for enhanced UC availability because both are technology enablers with a common objective of enabling quick control, integration and communication. UC is still in early adoption even though the world is going mobile. In my view, Mobile UC is the current talk of the IT town and will eventually prove to be a catalyst for maximized UC adoption.”

Girish opines that the region has always been quite inclined to UC deployments and the wisdom of wider access to services from mobile UC enablement would help drive momentum. With wider penetration of mobile connectivity, even specialized tele-health services can be made available to users in remote locations.

He adds, “Wider UC deployments are a culmination of various communication applications, be it IP Telephony, email, audio and video conferencing or the like and the region is quite proactive in this. Enterprises not only are benefited with faster decision making and execution of business processes but have the availability of high speed broadband connectivity today. Hence, these are driving factors for them to deploy UC widely as well as proactively. As connectivity expands geographically we see quite a surge in demand for tele-health systems as it enhances diagnostic interviews or provide specialty care for those in remote areas.”

Customer choicesAs UC is such a rapidly changing market, it has become harder to predict the requirements that an organisation might have in the future. UC deployments need to consider the additional implications on IT infrastructure because the solution will eventually need to scale up beyond the original scope.

Wael says, “Making a narrow decision based on a single application can limit an organisation’s choices when it comes to supporting ever evolving devices such as smartphones, tablets, video or social networking. It is also important for organisations to consider the implications of UC on its IT infrastructure, including security, networking, application hosting, as UC solutions rapidly evolve beyond its original scope. So the key is to build in enough flexibility in order to incorporate new developments as the needs of the organisation evolve. In order to implement UC solutions, network managers need to adopt a UC strategy that empowers businesses’ workforces and streamlines processes, focusing on business needs over IT needs, and helping to increase profitability.”

It isn’t easy for customers to choose UC solutions to use. While cloud based options are rising, there will be always some hardware equipment required to enable the initial UC deployments. Additional web based tools could leverage the basic infrastructure.

Girish says, “Customers often face dilemma to choose the right set of UC solutions simply because of the conflicting messages in the market from various vendors. Moreover, they have to justify the financial investments made. Consolidation of processes and workflow, saving on travel costs, better communication are the triggering factors used in the pitches made by UC sellers but the challenge mutually is to really show the productivity. Many vendors push a migration model for the sake of selling. However we at Granteq, believe in educating the customer first and once the customer has a complete insight, in line with their existing set up & budget we encourage them to decide what works best, be it UC or any other solution. Our partners join us for most of these

sessions as they add value from their domain & region experience.”

Taking these solutions to market could entail several different approaches depending on customer size, verticals they are in, existing infrastructure etc. a lot of consultation is required to get the mix right.

Parag says, “At the enterprise level, UC still requires a lot of consultation and a “need” assessment that understands and evaluates the customer’s objectives before mapping the best solution for their needs. We work with our partners to provide this assessment and after the initial need assessment, we work with them towards providing (sometimes) a POC (proof of concept) to allowthe customer to the experience solution before confirmation and deployment.”

In summary, UC deployments are now moving into an advanced phase of penetration as most Businesses deploy some kind of UC tools for Business connectivity. Alongside the growth and evolution of next generation UC tools, the advent of LTE connectivity can enable best possible outcomes for UC services because of higher reliability, extended bandwidth, better traffic management and faster collaboration.

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22 | July 2015

What are the solutions of focus for Pivot3?Pivot3 is primarily in the hyper converged infrastructure space which is taking the data centre industry by storm of late. Every known large manufacturer is getting into this space. The space is also seeing a lot of start-ups coming in. We are the first vendor to have entered the hyper converged space.

Traditionally, with storage, networking and servers being separate, there were a lot of complexities in managing data centres with the need for separate administrators for each. Hyper convergence does away with those complexities and it becomes a lot easier to manage datacenters. Primarily these are software defined storage solutions and they runs on commodity hardware. Globally, we are perhaps the only true hyper-converged storage vendor in the datacenter space.

What are your advantages over competition?Most of our competitors use data replication which brings down storage efficiency by almost 50%. One box is hyper converged in those cases but that doesn’t scale up in terms of storage efficiency. What makes us different is the Scalar Erasure Coding, also used by Google and Amazon. Scalar Erasure Coding is the way forward for hyper-convergence because of storage efficiencies it brings. Patented Scalar Erasure Coding gives Pivot3’s HCI technology the ability to yield up to 94 percent usable storage.

Pivot3 offers vSTAC OS, a software platform that saves storage space and ensures fault tolerance without resorting to making copies of data.vSTAC OS can function efficiently using as little as 6 percent of

Pivot3 is uniquely placed to benefit from the $17.8B global market opportunity in the hyper converged infrastructure space. Anand Chakravarthi, Regional Director -Middle East, Africa & India, Pivot3 in conversation with The Integrator Magazine discusses the trends in the HCI market and the unique value proposition of Pivot3

TechKnow | Pivot3

local resources, preserving all remaining resources for running workloads chosen by the user. This translates to more useable system resources for a lower cost per virtual machine.

What we offer is‘global hyper-convergence’, wherein all hard drives within a cluster act as a SAN that also has computing power. Our vSTAC OS allows any program running on one appliance within the cluster to access resources across all the appliances in the cluster. This allows high-order data protection that leaves almost all the storage space still available. Other hyper-converged

Anand ChakravarthiRegional Director, MEA & India

Pivot3

Leaping aheadsolutions are only “local” in the sense that they allow VMs to access resources efficiently only on the server where they reside, and use replication and deduplication for data integrity and storage capacity which consumes available space and processing capacity.

Discuss any recent product launches?We recently announced our new hyper-converged all-flash enterprise appliance. These are specifically designed to provide maximum input/output operations per second (IOPS) for high-performance

applications while reducing the cost and complexity of legacy separate server and storage systems. The new all-flash HCI offering from Pivot3 introduces a modular, cost-effective way to scale data centers with the cloud-like benefits of pay-as-you-grow flexibility. This complete our hyper-converged product line which now includes hybrid, all-flash, blade, and data appliances.

What is your go to market solution?Physical surveillance space and enterprise datacenter space are our two business units. In the

July 2015 | 23

most of the time, they don’t reach full capacity deployments. So it creates scenarios of over – quoting and over-pricing. The cost of start-up in a hosting company for

instance could be a lot leaner if they start with the kind of Technologies that we provide. As the customer’s Business grows, you can add boxes and add capacity linearly instead of transferring the excess price burden to customers. As a vendor we make sure any new technology we bring in is non-disruptive as well.

Are VDI deployments in the region picking up?VDI is a big trend in the west but it is still slow here. There are price issues and until the VDI breaches the per physical desktop price point, deployments would be slow in spite of the advantages that VDI brings. We are doing a lot of POCs at the moment. Each vertical has its demands and they expect the same performance and flexibility that they will get from the physical desktops. That is where the challenge is for the application programs. For example we have a full healthcare solution in the VDI space and our largest customer in VDI is NHS in UK.

Pivot3 has announced the general availability of its new hyper-

converged all-flash enterprise appliance. Pivot3’s new all-flash HCI appliances are specifically designed to provide maximum input/output operations per second (IOPS) for high-performance applications while reducing the cost and complexity of legacy separate server and storage systems. The new all-flash

datacenter space, our primary focus in on virtual desktops where we only work with VMware at the moment as the hypervisor. From application point of view, we support VMware Horizon as well as Citrix Xen desktop. The Pivot3 vSTAC VDI solution simplifies Horizon Suite deployments. We have a long vstanding relationship with VMware.

How has the growth been in the region since start up?I came on board to start up pivot3 operations in the region in 2011. Today we are leaders in the premium enterprise surveillance storage space. We have come a long way in the region and have some large customer accounts and over 2000 appliances across the region. Majid Al Futtaim group for instance is one of our customers and we have deployed in 14 of their malls. The first wins came on basis of existing relationships and trust. There have been some good wins since then. Most of customers have been repeat customers and that is a testimony of how we deliver.

Surveillance has been our forte and it was easy for us to move into the datacenter space about two and half years ago.

Discuss other solutions your provideWe offer the Hyper-Converged Disaster Recovery Appliance (HCDRA) which is designed as a cost-effective, high-storage efficiency appliance that secures vital company digital assets and quickly deploys business critical applications in a pay-as-you-grow model. It supports fast, flexible and reliable backup and recovery of virtualized applications and data, and are based on Pivot3’s Globally Hyper-Converged Infrastructure technology. Pivot3’s technology partners deliver simple-to-deploy DR solutions with data center availability software such as CommVault, Veeam or ZERTO running directly on HCDRAs.

Late last year, we also announced the Hyper-Converged Blade Appliance, a solution that simplifies modular VDI deployments for customers who want to achieve enterprise scalability with a very large number of users without the increased complexity and cost of external storage architectures.

The Pivot3 blade appliance uses Pivot3’s vSTAC OS software to define and control a common pool of storage capacity for all virtual machines, and to create a hyper-converged infrastructure for a high-quality desktop experience

When implemented with Dell M820 Blades, the Pivot3 blade appliance delivers significantly increased density resulting in a reduced physical footprint with lower rack space requirements while achieving maximum performance and protection for dynamically scaled desktop deployments.

0n our roadmap, the intent is to become hardware agnostic; we are selling as appliances today but tomorrow, we may sell only as software.

Does HCI suit data hosting companies?It will be a brilliant fit for hosting companies as the model allows pay as you go. Most of the times, they are over provisioning by probably 60-70% today but on basis of a future forecast. However,

"What makes us different is the ScalarErasure Coding, also used by Google

and Amazon. Scalar Erasure Coding is theway forward for hyper-convergence because

of storage efficiencies it brings."

HCI offering from Pivot3 introduces a modular, cost-effective way to scale data centers with the cloud-like benefits of pay-as-you-grow flexibility.

Through vSTAC’s innovzative global hyper-converged architecture, customers get close-to-the-metal performance that eliminates high-cost ingredients like fiber channel. The new appliance is powered by Pivot3’s patented global hyper-

convergence technology, which creates a homogeneous pool of solid-state drive (SSD) resources across appliances in the array to maximize performance of any application.Patented Scalar Erasure Coding gives Pivot3’s HCI technology the ability to yield up to 94 percent usable storage, rendering it optimally suited to provide maximum efficiency from premium all-flash technology.

Pivot3 introduces All-flash Hyper-convergedIT Infrastructure Solution

24 | July 2015

As a late entrant into the region’s market, it was

indeed a steep challenge for the Allied Telesis to make an impact in a market that has been traditionally been dominated by a handful of networking Brands. However, the company found its foothold and over the period has built up a sizeable volume of business with significant client base as well as a growing partner footprint.

Now the manufacturer is poised to step on the accelerator as it looks to consolidate and expand. Having had the opportunity be part of key projects, those are becoming good reference cases for the company in the region. More end users are now aware of the expertise of Allied Telesis in solutions that they deliver.

Sabbahuddin Khan, Regional Manager, Middle East at Allied Telesis says, “This year, we complete 5 years of Business in the region. They have been challenging but rewarding. When we started, we were sort of a new kid on the block in a market that had entrenched leaders and to be seen as an alternative was a challenge. It has been rewarding in the sense that we have crossed several milestones and come a long way in increased partner penetration, creating a loyal customer base, increased brand visibility, deploying a strong pre-sales and post-sales support mechanism as well as a technical training model. We have also been able to expand our reach into other countries in the region.”

The company has focused on strategic onboarding of resources to address requirements of markets. It has in-country, local technical resources deployed in countries such as North African countries, KSA, Pakistan etc.

Towards the next five yearsIn recent years, Allied Telesis has unveiled smart Technologies including the AlliedWare Plus, a layer 3 OS for its high end enterprise network switches and AMF (Allied Telesis Management Framework), a comprehensive suite of management tools to automate network administration tasks. The company is now focused on driving its vision of SDN into the market. It has announced an OpenFlow-compliant interface for a number of high performance Allied Telesis AlliedWare Plus switch families. This interface will complement its extensively deployed AMF network management and control solution. The hybrid nature of the Allied Telesis OpenFlow implementation allows its switches to act as either standard intelligent switches, or as OpenFlow-compliant devices on a per-interface basis.

Sabbahuddin says, “The next 5 years will be more exciting as in the first five we have laid the foundations. As a Japanese company, our focus is on reliability and quality of the product and the support we can deliver.We are spending a lot more on R&D.The X series products feature industry standards based AlliedWare plus software that run these switches.”

The manufacturer has unveiled software and tools that it believes will be the key differentiators in wider acceptance by partners and customers alike, helping the company make deeper inroads into an industry that is undergoing a shift with new tools coming into wider deployment.

Francesco Stramezzi, GM-EMEA and CSA at Allied Telesis says, “Since they are very much

Feature | Allied Telesis

The way forwardAllied Telesis is crossing the milestone of having

completed 5 years of Business in the region and

is an occasion for the company to introspect

as well as look forward. The networking

manufacturer has stayed the course and built a

steady and growing pipeline of Business in the

region.

Sabbahuddin KhanRegional Manager, Middle EastAllied Telesis

July 2015 | 25

industry standards based, it becomes a lot easy for network engineers to work on our products.Technical people find it easier and they find it assuring to work on products that they are comfortable with. In the next few years, we will come out with more products that are based on AlliedWare plus.”

The manufacturer believes its rich legacy of 28 years in operations as a networking infrastructure products manufacture gives it a head-start in this phase of consolidation. It has made a significant addition to its wide product range by unveiling its next generation Firewalls recently. These firewalls feature support for AMF.

Sabbahuddin says, “We have end to end network infrastructure capabilities in terms of solutions. Perhaps security was the missing part and now we are offering that piece as well as we are launching NGFW appliances. So I can safely conclude, we are poised well for the next five years and more.”

Allied Telesis is focused on bringing to market products at great prices and offer high performance and that is a legacy that they want to continue with on the way ahead.

“Francesco says, “IT Managers today want super quality at affordable prices. That is where we come in. Hence our market share is growing at a fast pace across verticals. While we have a growing portfolio of products, the fact is that we also offer them at great price points that are quite affordable. So we bring great proposition to customers with the product range, the Japanese quality, great prices and reliable local support, helping them reduce roughly by around 25-30% of their overall TCO.Many of our products come with 5 years warranty and some of them come with limited

lifetime warranty. “The manufacturer is looking

at investing into new markets including East Africa and North Africa while growing existing markets. The bulk of its Business comes from projects for the enterprise segment while there is a small portion of the Business also coming in from the reseller market- low end products. But the emphasis for the company seems to be more towards products for the enterprise segment.

Sabbahuddin says, “We are likely to focus entirely on the mid-end to high end products with all the investments we are putting into our product R&D as well as channel trainings. We are doing some great projects in Education, transportation, healthcare etc. We are doing many projects of surveillance in the region. We are working with many ELV contractors on new construction projects.”

The manufacturer is quite upbeat that AMF will be a key differentiator for the company on the way ahead. It has conducted

AMF training recently for its partners and has some AMF certified partners now in the region.

Francesco says, “AMF is like a pre-SDN solution. It saves engineering time, especially when there is distance between locations. With this software you can manage network administration from a central location. It is a great tool and is part of our X series with the AlliedWare plus.It is the software that matters in networks eventually and what we offer is quite robust. For instance, we feel the name of the game in future will be video and Allied Ware plus can handle video better than our competition.”

Training more partners is a key aspect of focus for the vendor in the region. Having more number of trained resources will make it easier for customer when it comes to implementations of Allied Teleis technologies.

Sabbahuddin says, “We are focusing a lot on trainings. In 6

months, we have trained close to 100 Engineers. The idea is to have a large pool of qualified technical people conversant with our products. These are hands on courses to help engineers help understand the nitty gritty of design and implementation.”

The manufacturer is keen to have a profitable set of committed partners. It will look at sufficient opportunity for partners in each market without excess coverage.

Sabbahuddin says, “We will work with limited partners but we will look at reaching an optimum number for each market. We want them to be profitable and committed to developing our Business. Like I said, once customers try out our solutions, they have a good feedback about how robust our solutions are.Customers are now more informed and aware. They know it is not just about the Brand name. Functionalities, quality, support all matter.”

Five years ago, when Allied Telesis entered the region’s market, it was around the time of the Economic recession. That was a time, as Sabbahuddin recalls when people were looking for alternatives to solutions that were rather expensive. So while it was an opportune moment, yet there was a fear factor among some of the IT decision makers when it comes to taking a decision on investing in alternative choices as apart from Technologies of established market leaders. While the changes have been slow, there has been a growing acceptance and the manufacturer is driving the momentum further by offering as many POCs to prospective customers. In short, the manufacture is not pulling any stops in trying to ensure that the next five years will see it emerge among the leaders in the region and globally.

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26 | July 2015

Please discuss growth in the endpoint security software market for the region?IDC 2014 Security Content & Threat Management Tracking for 2013 forecasts the region’s biggest market (in UAE) to double in 5 years. Also IDC's 'Middle East IT Security End-User Survey' (released in January 2015) results show that organizations in the Middle East are increasingly deploying and will continue to deploy advanced security solutions in order to proactively mitigate the security issues that may arise from lack of user awareness, network traffic, and hacktivism. In addition, organizations have been implementing more expansive training and awareness initiatives to address the security challenges that exist within their corporate IT environments.

Endpoint security software market is also pushed by the choice of security platforms managed from one security console rather than separate solutions that require special approaches and knowledge from IT specialists. IDC 2012-2016 forecast

for endpoint security reports one of the key trends being purchasing suites of multiple security tools, such as Kaspersky Endpoint Security for Business.

Businesses in the Middle East today are becoming better aware of the security threats and are more willing to invest and secure their networks. Sadly, cyber security is still often introduced in organizations unsystematically, without putting security policies in place or forming a security strategy given changes in their IT infrastructure. Small businesses also often put security solutions in place only after they face a security incident and spend time and money on restoring their data, devices and reputation. All this shows that there’s still a lot to improve. We believe education about the threats is important, as well as cooperation in fighting cybercrime between government agencies, non-governmental organizations and businesses.

Discuss the threat scenario for Businesses with increased mobility of

workforce?According to our 2014 Global Corporate IT Security Risks survey conducted with B2B International, 25% of organizations in the GCC said they have experienced loss or theft of mobile devices by staff, 13% reported that information was leaked or inappropriately shared on a mobile device. Companies that see the benefits in mobile workforce and provide smartphones to their employees for work or adopt ‘bring your own device’ concept, start to understand the risks and pay attention to appropriate security software.

We should also definitely see an investment in providing multi-layered security and high level Fraud Prevention integrations for online and mobile banking to cover all the risks. We expected these changes with our Kaspersky Fraud Prevention platform that prevents costly security incidents and helps banks to preserve their money and business reputation.

Have there been any recent

enhancements to your partner program or engagements?We are working closely with our partners to provide with their help the best experience to our customers. We organize trainings for partners so that they can offer high-quality services, we organize roadshows for them to always be updated on the changes that happen on the security market.

We have started to provide partners with access to new Intelligence Services to enable them to extend the right combination of expertise, solutions and services to their customers.Kaspersky Lab’s Security Intelligence Services team constantly monitors the landscape to identify emerging threats and works out effective defences against potential attacks. These services are available to both customers and partners to make informed decisions and improve enterprise security.

Kaspersky Lab has also automated a number of processes, such as renewals, and offered new tools and resources to its partners.

Strength to strength

Kaspersky Lab continues to go from strength to strength in the endpoint security software segment. Ovanes Mikhaylov, Managing Director at Kaspersky Lab Middle East discusses the security trends outlook and the company’s focus

Ovanes MikhaylovManaging DirectorKaspersky Lab Middle East

TechKnow | Kasperksy Lab

28 | July 2015

Insight | A10 Networks

Value-addition is the name of the game in channel

today. Margins are getting tight on hardware and as hardware costs fall, even these slim margins decline. With customers always asking for more from their solution providers, the need for specialization and differentiation is evident. Developing a well-tailored professional services portfolio is a highly profitable and sustainable way of doing exactly this.

Without a doubt, professional services is the biggest area of opportunity for channel. There is a huge demand for this in the region. Not only do professional services give channel players the ability to make the most revenues and margins, it elevates them to the highly

desirable status of 'trusted advisor', which helps reel in new customers while also introducing the possibility of extending the sales conversation with the existing customer base.

Addressing Vendor CompetitionThe regional interest in professional services is evident. So evident in fact that channel organizations are not the only ones that have stood up to take notice. There are vendors that have their own professional services divisions and this obviously does not leave much room for their channel partners to do the same.

Unfortunately, this challenge is only worsened by a customer mindset that still believes there is a difference

In the Middle East,

security, IPv6, cloud, big

data, SDN and NFV are

areas of opportunity in

terms of new revenue

streams and big margins

for the channel once

they develop their PS

capabilities in these

technology areas opines

Glen Ogden, Regional

Sales Director, Middle East

at A10 Networks

New opportunity frontiersfor the channel

between the quality being delivered by the vendor and the partner. In the Middle East, high spending companies like banks and telcos don’t trust channel service quality and often mandate that a vendor delivers the services. The channel needs to invest in professional service capabilities and also affiliate these in some way to the vendors before it can tap into this set of high-value end customers.

As most channel partners cannot hope to compete with the sheer scale of these vendors, they should instead look at ramping up the skills of their teams up to a point where they are considered to be an arm of the vendor. Once they have done that, there is a huge amount of very 'margin-rich' opportunity. There

Glen OgdenRegional Sales Director, ME, A10 Networks

are also vendors who would rather let their channel partners offer professional services and consultancy. These vendors typically extend a high degree of support to their partners, which rapidly accelerate the skillsets and knowledge of the channel teams.

Areas of OpportunityProfessional services can call for a significantly high upfront investment and recurring operational expenses in order to maintain a high quality of service. Observing market trends and developing proficiency in appropriate or high-growth potential areas is therefore the first step in establishing a flourishing professional services business.

In the Middle East, IT security is a big market and its

July 2015 | 29

rapidly changing nature means that customers are always on the lookout for long term strategic partners who can help them stay one step ahead of their potential attackers. In recent years, enterprises have invested in security solutions and are continuing to invest. So the capability of the channel to service these solutions is going to be key through 2015 - especially within the government sector. Although government entities may have their own internal teams, they typically only have a few individuals who are dedicated to IT security and these professionals need to be supported by the channel.

IPv6 migration is also something that simply cannot

be ignored any longer. Those companies wanting to mitigate their risk are reaching out for Carrier Grade NAT to extend their IPv4 space whilst others are looking to deploy IPv6 services with IPv4 – IPv6/ IPv6 – IPv4 translation technologies. The move to IPv6 brings with it a huge burden for networking teams in both, planning and operations, meaning companies will need the support of the channel for preparation and also in the long term.

The cloud has been trending for a while now and

we are starting to see many more cloud services being deployed in the region, so it still remains a space to watch. Cloud has also been driving our understanding of data usage with latest statistics showing businesses are nearly doubling its use year on year. ‘Big Data’ is fast becoming a priority in the large enterprise, government and health verticals. Supplementing innovative solutions with analytics capabilities will be the need of the hour.

There is also a huge

push throughout the region on virtualization. Organizations are now beginning to take a keen interest in technologies like Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) and Software

Defined Networking (SDN). But with widespread confusion and rampant misconception, there is plenty of opportunity for the channel community to step in and guide the adoption of these new technologies. This again goes back to professional services.

The channel needs to be looked upon the trusted advisor in new areas as enterprises are now looking for a much more consultative sell. It is up to the channel to hone its consultative skills and reap rich rewards in future!

The regional interest in professional

services is evident. So evident in fact

that channel organizations are not the only

ones that have stood up to take notice.

30 | July 2015

Insight | Finesse

place of convenience of the customer, or at the branch as part of digital account opening.

Account Onboarding is an intelligent end-to-end automated solution that captures customer information and pushes through a workflow of checks and verifications. Key customer information attributes like their photograph, Proof of Address, Proof of Identity, Biometric Fingerprints and Digital Signature are captured to comply with regulations. The information thus captured is sent through a series of intelligent workflow checks that include audit, data entry, error correction, QA and electronic warehousing to ensure that the customer on-boarded is a rightful one. The de-duplication engine verifies customer information with those contained in official databases like UIDAI DB, Blacklist / White list, Credit rating Systems, etc to establish customer identity. All this can be done using a Smartphone app, Tablets or Desktop app, making it a very novel and user friendly experience for the end customer, who is accoustomed to do the process sitting in bank with the relationship Manager filling up Account opening forms.

A typical scenario with most banks is that they

have captured attention, demonstrated value, and won over new customers. Now bringing them Onboard shouldn’t be an obstacle. Thanks to strict Central Bank regulations and banks internal paper-driven processes that eat up valuable resources and consume huge processing costs, it also makes for a frustrating customer experience. Obviously does not leave the best first impression. As the old saying goes, “You never get a second chance to make a good first impression.” Onboarding is the first way of illustrating the type of customer experience that can be expected at your organization. Done wrong, trust is broken. This usually leads to customer attrition, quickly. A tedious onboarding procedure can cause a customer to second-guess and walk away.

eKYC norms and emergence of mobile banking in recent times calls for slicker and more efficient Account Onboarding mechanisms. Whether a bank is signing new customers, extending services or cross selling; offering a quick and easy sign up process gives your business a distinct competitive advantage. A seamless solution drastically streamlines your onboarding time and saves valuable resources, improves the customer experience and helps the banks or institutions gain a greater market share.

A simplification strategy that is proving quite effective for banks and institutions is the integration of smart phone/tablet ID card reader functionality to capture primary data and insight both at the

OnboardingcustomersHaving and following an effective onboarding plan is

very crucial for enhanced customer experience writes

Ajay Alex, Practise head at Finesse. Finesse brings

in a futuristic approach to Customer Onboarding for

Banks and Institutions

Ajay AlexPractise Head, Finesse

Finesse is offering solution whosesalient features are:

• TabletapplicationfordocumentandBiometriccapture• CompatibilitywithAndroidtablets&SmartPhones• BluetoothenabledtransferofbiometricdatatoTabletapplication• Foolproofelectronicdocumentstorage-reservedauthorisation• Online&offlineofcustomerDe-duplication• Datalook-up,validationandverification• CrossverificationwithUIDAI,RBI,blacklist,whitelist• CaptureE-signatureofbothcustomersandagents• Automatedcasemanagement

32 | July 2015

eyetech

Thunder 6435 Application Delivery Controller from A10 Networks

PowerEdge C6320

Overview:

A10 Networks has launched Thunder 6435, an application

delivery controller that sets a new standard for secure

high-performance application delivery. The new high-end

Thunder SPE ADC appliance provides SSL performance, and

enhanced DDoS and network protection in hardware with

the Security and Policy Engine (SPE) hardware, allowing

Web giants and service providers to secure the most

demanding data center applications and networks. The

appliance is based on A10's innovative Advanced Core

Operating System (ACOS), which delivers industry-leading

price performance and protection. It also leverages the

same data center-efficient designs as other ACOS-based

appliances, consuming less power, cooling and rack

space, which are critically important metrics for large

data center operators. Trends such as the digitalization

of business practices, big data, cloud networking, and

mobility are driving demand for high-performance data

center infrastructure solutions. Thunder 6435meets

today's escalating performance and security needs by

dramatically increasing L4 and L7 connections per second

and SSL performance benchmarks compared to its previous

generation of appliances.

Key Features of Thunder 6435 (Note: 6435S model is also available which includes SSL Security Processors)

• 2x12-CoreXeonCPUs,16x10GbE,4x40GbE

• Throughput:153Gbps

• SSLCPS(2048-bit):Upto135,000

• DDoSProtection(SYNFlood)SYN/sec:223million

Overview:Dell unveiled the PowerEdge C6320, the latest addition in its 13th generation Dell PowerEdge server portfolio. The PowerEdge C6320 delivers up to two times performance improvement on the leading HPC performance benchmark, and has the right mix of cost-efficient compute and storage in a compact, 2U chassis for HPC and hyper-converged solutions and appliances, allowing customers to meet demanding workload needs.

The notion of aligning HPC and big data has steadily gained traction over the past few years. As analytics and big data continue to be top of mind for organisations of all sizes and industries, traditional IT departments are considering HPC solutions to help provide rapid and reliable information to business owners so they can make more informed decisions. As Dell’s latest future-ready HPC solution, the Dell PowerEdge C6320 helps power the discoveries and insights being made by top research organisations and enterprises around the world.

Additionally, as hyper-converged systems such as Dell Engineered Solutions for VMware EVO: RAIL and Dell’s XC Series of Web-scale Converged Appliances now make up the fastest growing part of the overall converged infrastructure market, the PowerEdge C6320 along with its embedded management software is an ideal platform for these appliances

Key features:• ThePowerEdgeC6320isdesignedtoofferfour independent server nodes in a 2U chassis. • Comparedtothepreviousgeneration,itprovidesupto two times the performance improvement on the LinPack spec, up to 45 percent improvement on the SPECint_rate benchmark) and up to 28 percent better power efficiency on the Spec_Power benchmark. This allows customers to optimise application performance and productivity while conserving energy use and saving traditional data centre space.• ThePowerEdgeC6320featuresthelatestgeneration of Intel Xeon E5-2600 v3 processors and provides up to 18 cores per socket (144 cores per 2U chassis), up to 512GB of DDR4 memory and up to 72TB of flexible local storage. • Inaddition,thePowerEdgeC6320nowcomes integrated with iDRAC8 with Lifecycle Controller.

July 2015 | 33

Overview:NetApp has expanded its all-flash storage array line with new models tailored for enterprise buyers. The All Flash FAS (AFF) 8000 series packs world-class performance and the industry’s best data management in a single solution. It ships with NetApp Data ONTAP FlashEssentials innovations, which increase flash performance and efficiency.

The AFF8000 series delivers the benefits that make all-flash systems ready for broad enterprise deployment. Customers also achieve better ROI for the long term as a result of NetApp’s unique ability to seamlessly move data from flash to disk to cloud as it ages.

Four AFF8000 models are available now and can be ordered as standalone systems and in FlexPod® converged infrastructure solutions. Professional Services, delivered by NetApp or its partners, help users identify those workloads that are best served by all-flash systems.

Key Features:

• TheAFF8000seriesdeliversthemostcompleteall-flash offering for the enterprise.

• Customersbenefitfrombuilt-indataprotection, multiprotocol support, scale-out performance, and seamless data movement from flash to disk to cloud.

• Otherfeaturesincludequalityofservice,multi-tenancy,and NetApp’s best-in-class application integration for simplified configuration and management of SQL and Oracle databases, virtualized servers, and VDI workloads.

• TheAllFlashFASincorporatessoftwareoptimizations derived from NetApp’s advanced technology development lab. These innovations include a flash-optimized read data path, inline compression, and zero-based inline deduplication.

• NetAppOnCommandPerformanceManager2.0 software release gives users a comprehensive dashboard to automatically evaluateperformance and troubleshoot issues to maintain optimal system operation.

• TheworkloadwizardprovidesautomatedsetupforOracle and Microsoft SQL Server installations to simplify storage settings and host server connection setup.

VisualStation VS360HD

Overview: Synology announced the release of VisualStation

VS360HD, a versatile, durable, and compact

monitoring solution. When paired with a Synology

NVR running Surveillance Station, VS360HD is able to

decode and display without latency up to 36 channels

of HD video to a HDMI/VGA monitor, making it the

perfect replacement for a costly computer.

Free from moving parts, VS360HD is more

resistant against vibration and hardware failure. It

is an ideal solution for surveillance monitoring at a

front desk in a hotel, shop, or office building. The

dual mirrored video output and USB ports also make

VS360HD an affordable choice for TV Wall solutions. Its

All Flash FAS (AFF)8000 series

solid outer case and rigid design allows VS360HD to run

withinindustrialtemperaturerangesfrom-20˚Cto50˚C.

Key features:• VS360HDissuitableforbothbeginnerand advanced users. • Theintuitiveinterfaceensureseasyaccesstothemost

common functions, such as Live View, Customizable

Layout, and Timeline. • TheRecordingListallowsforbrowsingandexporting

recordings. With a few simple clicks, useful camera

angles can be saved and grouped together to form

“Patrol” cycles.• WithatotalofthreeUSBports,theVS360HDcan

connect a mouse, keyboard, and even a joystick

for PTZ control. • Thewholesystemfitsinapalm-sizedenclosureand

can be easily attached to a wall or the back of a screen

with the included VESA compatible mounting kit.

34 | July 2015

The Middle East is ideally-placed to advance digital

businesses and society, as total Internet users in the Middle East and Africa will grow 1.6-fold to 425 million by 2019, or 27 percent of the population, thanks to growing demand for mobile devices, video, and social networking, according to the 10th annual Cisco VNI Forecast.

By 2019 there will be nearly 3.9 billion global Internet users (more than 51 percent of the world’s population), up from 2.8 billion in 2014.

In MEA, IP traffic will grow 6-fold by 2019, a compound annual growth rate of 44%. Social networking will be the most highly-penetrated residential Internet service in MEA.

The MEA Trends:• Internettrafficwillgrow6.8-fold from 2014 to 2019.• Therewillbe2.1billionnetworked devices in 2019, up from 1.4 billion in 2014. • 78%ofallnetworkeddeviceswill be mobile-connected in 2019. • M2Mmoduleswillaccountfor 17% (358.9 million) of all networked devices in 2019, compared to 8% (112.1 million) in 2014.• Tabletswillaccountfor4%(93.1 million) of all networked devices in 2019, compared to 2% (24.7 million) in 2014.• Smartphoneswillaccountfor 31% (652.0 million) of all networked devices in 2019, compared to 14% (196.6 million) in 2014 • ConnectedTVswillaccountfor 3% (69.4 million) of all networked devices in 2019, compared to 2% (23.8 million) in 2014.

• Non-Smartphoneswillaccountfor 38.3% (818.9 million) of all networked devices in 2019, compared to 68% (943.6 million) in 2014.• InMiddleEastandAfrica,TVs accounted for 2% of total Internet traffic in 2014, and will be 2% of total Internet traffic in 2019.

Key PredictionsCisco predicts that several elements will shape IP traffic in the coming years:• MoreInternetUsers–In2014,there were 2.8 billion Internet users, or 39 percent of the world’s population of 7.2 billion. By 2019, there will be about 3.9 billion Internet users.• ProliferationofDevicesandConnections – With 24 billion networked devices/connections expected online by 2019, compared with 14 billion in 2014, service provider networks must adapt to an influx of sophisticated devices. • FasterFixedBroadbandSpeeds– Globally, the average fixed broadband speed will increase two-fold from 20.3 Mbps in 2014 to 42.5 Mbps in 2019. Year-over-year, the average global fixed broadband speed grew 26 percent from 16 Mbps in 2013 to 20.3 Mbps in 2014. • NewandAdvancedVideoServices – IP video will account for 80 percent of all IP traffic by 2019, up from 67 percent in 2014. The evolution of advanced video services (e.g., UHD and spherical/360 video) and increasingly video centric M2M applications are anticipated to create new bandwidth and scalability requirements for service providers. Residential, business and mobile consumers

continue to have strong demand for advanced video services across all network and device types, making quality, convenience, content/experience and price key factors. • MobilityMomentum–By2019, more than 14 percent of monthly IP traffic will derive from cellular connections, and 53 percent of monthly IP traffic will come from Wi-Fi connections globally, making differentiated and monetizable mobile strategies more important for all service providers. • TheInternetofEverything(IoE) and M2M Growth – The IoE trend is showing tangible growth as M2M connections will more than triple over the next five years (growing to 10.5 billion by 2019). There will be significant IoE adoption across many business verticals as well as connected home deployments. Connected Health consumer segment will have the fastest M2M connections growth.

• GamingImpact–Ciscopredicts a marked increase in network traffic associated with game downloads driven by availability of storage capacity on gaming consoles, an increase in upstream cloud traffic, and increasing fiber connections.• AdvancedServiceAdoption– Online music will be the fastest-growing residential Internet service with a CAGR of 7.7 percent from 2014-2019, growing from 1.2 billion users to 1.7 billion users by 2019. Mobile location-based service (LBS) will be the fastest growing consumer mobile service with a CAGR of 27.5 percent from 2014-19, growing from 597 million users in 2014 to over 2 billion users by 2019. Desktop and personal videoconferencing will be the fastest growing business Internet service with a CAGR of 23.5 percent from 2014-2019, growing from 76 million users in 2014 to 220 million users by 2019.

Stats & Trends

MEA Internet users to grow to 425 Million by 2019

A20846_1b_Firewall_Cave08.16.2013KB

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SOHCORP11746_Q32013 Next Gen Firewall_Cave_FULL PG_Ad_CW.indd

8-15-2013 11:37 AM Eric Liu / Joan Klitzke

JobClientMedia TypeLiveTrimBleed

SOH COR P11746Dell SonicWALLPrint6.75” x 9.3125”7.875” x 10.5”8.125” x 10.75”

Job info

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For deeper network security

look beyond the obvious.

Copyright 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Dell SonicWALL is a trademark of Dell Inc. and all other Dell SonicWALL product and service names and slogans are trademarks of Dell Inc.

Dell™ SonicWALL™ next-gen fi rewalls provide a deeper level of network security without slowing down performance.

Not all next-generation fi rewalls are the same. To start, Dell SonicWALL next-generation fi rewalls scan everybyte of every packet while maintaining the high performance and low latency that busy networks require. Additionally, Dell SonicWALL network security goes deeper than other fi rewalls by providing high-performance SSL decryption and inspection, an intrusion prevention system that features sophisticated anti-evasion technology, and network-based malware protection that leverages the power of the cloud. Now your organization can block sophisticated new threats that emerge on a daily basis.

Go deeper at: www.sonicwall.com/deepernetsec

DCS-3716PoE HD Day and Night WideDynamic Range IP Camera

DCS-7513Full HD WDR Day & NightOutdoor Network Camera

DCS-6915Full HD High-Speed

Dome Network Camera

DCS-5615Full HD Mini P/T

Dome Network Camera

DCS-6315HD Outdoor Fixed

Dome Camera withColor Night Vision

DCS-6115HD Indoor Fixed

Dome Camera withColor Night Vision

Migrate to IP Surveillance

Making the move to digitaltechnology at your own pace

AUTHORIZED DISTRIBUTOR

Aptec - Aptec - an Ingram Micro Company

P. O. Box 33550Dubai Internet City,Dubai, UAEE-Mail: sdawda@aptecme.com

Tel.: (+971 4) 3697 111Fax: (+971 4) 3697 110www.apteconline.com

www.dlinkmea.com

The security of your business is at risk if there is no monitoring system in place to protect your business assets. Choosing to implement IP Surveillance offers the advantage of leveraging your existing network infrastructure to maximise your investment. D-Link can supply end-to-end networking solutions to build an affordable and easy-to-deploy system to ensure the security and safety of people, possessions and places.