Cisco today announced findings from the Cisco IBSG Horizons Study of IT and business leaders that shows IT is accepting, and in some cases embracing, “bring your own device” (BYOD) as a reality in the enterprise. The study findings underscore that BYOD is here to stay, and managers are now acknowledging the need for a more holistic approach – one that is scalable and addresses mobility, security, virtualisation and network policy management, in order to keep management costs in line while simultaneously providing optimal experiences where savings can be realised.

“As the number of devices being brought into work increases, organisations need a comprehensive mobility strategy,” says Leon Wright, Country Lead, Systems Engineering at Cisco SA. “By leveraging the intelligent network, organisations can now provide their employees with the benefits of working anywhere, anytime: in other words, ‘work your way’. These research findings support Cisco’s assertion that mobility needs to extend well beyond BYOD to include the integration of service provider mobility, enterprise mobility, security, collaboration and desktop virtualisation solutions.”

The study shows some of the quantifiable benefits and complexities associated with allowing employees to use their own mobile devices on their employers’ networks. (more…)

The role of information technology (IT) in the enterprise is changing from being a supplier of devices to becoming a supplier of pooled computing resources, with cloud computing giving IT professionals an opportunity to increase their strategic value to their businesses.

That’s the word from Microsoft’s global virtualisation director, Edwin Yuen, who will be in South Africa for a series of Microsoft Management Summit (MMS) events this month. The events, in Cape Town, Durban and Johannesburg, are expected to draw several hundred IT professionals from some of the country’s biggest companies.

“Cloud computing enables you to deploy continuous services that are always on, always available, and delivered, down to a set of connected devices,” said Yuen. “South African IT professionals should be looking at ways of evolving their roles with cloud computing to help their businesses be more competitive.”

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We have seen a few great enhancements arriving in Windows 8, including a brilliant new touch interface, and much more efficient use of system resources – but most of the marketing seems to be focussed on tablet form factors and touch screens. The other major development is that Windows 8 will have the ability to run on ARM processors (the same type of processor you might find in your phone or tablet), but it has been recently rumoured that this is only relevant to the Metro style apps, and the existing “desktop” will not be made available on the ARM devices.

So what happens to the existing bog-standard mouse and keyboard users? If you have spent some time with Windows 8 Developer Preview, you will know the interface is not particularly intuitive if you do not have a touch screen. Yes, it is by no means complete, but it makes one wonder how relevant the Windows 8 update will be to users who use standard desktop and notebook PCs.

“Windows 8 will be largely irrelevant to the users of traditional PCs, and we expect effectively no upgrade activity from Windows 7 to Windows 8 in that form factor.” – IDC

Now it looks like IDC has been asking this same question – stating that Windows 8 will be “largely irrelevant”, as one of their Top 10 predictions in 2012. Their reasons are simple –

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As more and more popular Internet verticals move into Facebook – like gaming (Zynga), instant messaging/email (Facebook Titan), music (Spotify) and shopping – the next logical step is payments.

Two South African entrepreneurs have done just that. Rob Sussman and Lance Fanaroff, founders of Integr8 – the largest privately owned ICT Company in Africa, have launched ZunguZ.

By connecting banking systems to the social graph, ZunguZ simplifies the process of transferring money and is the fastest and simplest way for users to transfer money to their friends. The social graph confirms the relationship between contacts in order to simplify money transfer. Users no longer need to use cumbersome banking applications to load their contact’s banking details. Instead they simply load the ZunguZ application within their social network, click on their contacts and send money. The recipient does not even need to have an account, as they can create one as soon as they wish to access their new funds. This allows the ZunguZ user base to grow virally via the Facebook social graph.

Rob Sussman says of the service that “ZunguZ has the potential to influence the purchasing decisions of over 850 million users across the world. And while we gear for the release of the second tier of the platform, we are intercepting the unbanked and low banked population at the point of purchase. We have been overwhelmed with requests from some of the largest banks in the world, as well as the most prominent SA banks, to leverage our platform to deliver their services.” (more…)

First National Bank (FNB) has announced that its PayPal withdrawal service, launched in March 2010, is now available to all non-FNB customers.

To have access to the service, users will have to register a free FNB online banking profile and submit a “Know Your Customer” form, as well as FICA documentation. Once this information as been collected and validated FNB will link users’ PayPal accounts with their personal bank account through the FNB online banking profile. While there are no additiaonl fees for utilising the service, non-FNB customers won’t be able to load money onto their PayPal to make payments with PayPal TopUp.

The press release announcing the launch stated that: South Africans already making use of PayPal but not banking with FNB have been able to make credit card-based payment transactions and benefit from the added security of transacting online with PayPal by linking their credit card to an authorised PayPal account.

Chris Savides, FNB’s General Manager for FNB Complementary Online Services said that ““One and a half years after launching our exclusive Top Up and Withdraw services for FNB customers we are pleased to open up the PayPal service for receiving funds to all customers with a South African bank account. They will now be able to withdraw funds from a PayPal account into a qualifying South African bank account regardless of which South African bank that they bank with. FNB is a proud supporter of entrepreneurship in South Africa and PayPal provides entrepreneurs with a safer and easier way to get paid by anyone, anywhere in the world, and in over 24 currencies.”

source: MyBroadband

In order to enhance the MXit user experience in South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria, the largest mobile social platform in Africa has made the move of teaming up with Opera Software in a partnership agreement last week Tuesday. The aim of the deal is to offer Opera users in African countries one-click access to MXit services with MXit users being introduced to the Opera Mini browser through the popular chat client.

Christen Krogh, Chief development officer at Opera explains that the Opera Mini will appear under the MXit applications menu and MXit will appear on the Opera Mini browser’s start page. Both will be accessible via almost any data-capable handset.

The Opera Mini browser offers compression technology which allows for a fast Web experience at a lower price by compressing the size of pages before they are sent out to the consumer while still retaining functionality.

MXit’s CEO Alan Knott Craig says that “MXit empowers African people by helping them build community and make money via their mobile phones. We believe the alliance with Opera will bring us a step closer to fulfilling that vision.”

MXit, bought by World of Avatar back in September, has a global registered user base of 44 million, with the majority of these users residing in Africa.

source: moneyweb

Last night, the winners of the 2011 Bookmarks Awards, run by the Digital Media and Marketing Association,  were announced in Cape Town where the campaigns and players in the digital and online marketing industry were honoured for their respective products and achievements.

“The success of this evening’s event and the calibre of the 2011 entries and winners is a clear indication that the digital industry is growing from strength to strength,” said Nikki Cockcroft, Chairperson of the DMMA and Bookmarks Chair, last night.

Bandwidthblog is proud to have walked away with a Silver award in the Best Specialist Publisher category.

Congratulations to all the winners!

View the full list of winners after the jump.

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Total Access Communication PCL, under the dtac brand,  is one of Thailand’s leading telecommunications firms. The company’s headquarters in Bangkok is home to 3, 200 employees and the company has ensured that all of them are inspired and excited by their daily surroundings. The design is aimed at communicating the brand’s business approach of “play and learn” and enables staff to enhance communication, increase creativity and react quickly to changing conditions.

Australian-based designer Hassell (who also designed the ANZ Centre in Melbourne) created a space that is open and flexible with natural wood, natural light and purpose-built spaces. The office has an indoor Funfloor equipped with an indoor soccer pitch, table tennis, running track and concert area. There is also an exquisite amphitheatre-like library where staff can research and work on their laptops. The many other available chill-out areas are to encourage face-to-face communication among staff members and customers.

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