News Interviews

susan blocher HP VP moonshot marketing and business development

Why Did The IBM VP Board HP’s Moonshot?

Susan Blocher was marketing IBM's PureSystems, till she decided to jump to HP's Moonshot programme. What was the attraction?

Cloud

SugarCRM: Combining Open Source Sensibilities With Commercial Interest

Henning Ogberg and Jennifer Stagnaro from SugarCRM explains how open source platforms can be a good source of revenue

Big Data

Import.io: Semantic Web Is Dead, Long Live Structured Web!

Andrew Fogg, Chief Data Officer at Import.io, wants to start a movement to improve the Web, by turning any website into a spreadsheet

Cloud

IT Life: Taking Book Publishing Into The Digital Age

David McNally from Macmillan Science and Education says embracing change is an acquired skill

Green-IT

The Next 25 Years: No Privacy But Hey… Flying Cars!

Surveillance might be good for us, programming languages could die, and cars may fly, says Nathaniel Borenstein, inventor of email attachments

Data Storage

Dell: The Days Of Feature-Rich Storage Are Numbered

Robin Kuepers from Dell says growing storage capacity on a very tight budget is one of the main challenges facing IT departments in 2014

Cloud

CBT Nuggets: Why IT Training Is Moving Online

CBT Nuggets launches a trial that allows potential customers to train towards a new IT qualification for free

Projects

IT Life: Fixing Other People’s Mistakes

Dmitry Tishchenko is addicted to measurements, and says Agile is the saviour of IT

Mobility

Bell Labs: We Will Need Billions Of Small Cells

Holger Claussen from Bell Labs envisions a future where we all have our own low-power radio access node

Big Data

Sharing Your Healthcare Data Is The Ethical Thing To Do

The NHS wants to share your healthcare data. Gayna Hart tells us that the scheme is safe - and it could be a lifesaver

Security

IT Life: Sharing Data Makes For Security

for Barry Shteiman, security is all about people sharing information to keep each other secure

Check Point: Good Security Is About Discovering The Unknown

Gabi Reish from Check Point explains why traditional IT security solutions are becoming irrelevant

Cloud

eBay’s Data Centre Innovation Won’t Stop With Fuel Cells

Fuel cells and recovered energy are nothing. eBay's Dean Nelson has more ideas up his sleeve

Charles Bligh TalkTalk Business me / Company / Years in IT / Areas of expertise? I have been the Managing Director at TalkTalk Business since 2011 and have been in the IT industry for 22 years, starting at IBM as an Engineer. From there I held a number of senior project management, sales and senior leadership roles in professional services and product related businesses. I have worked across Asia for 4 years (based in Tokyo) and have spent the last 5 years in the UK. What has been your favourite project so far? This one! Joining TalkTalk Business and working over the past two years to further improve the customer experience has been both fulfilling and rewarding, but the best is yet to come. I like to say TalkTalk Business is the best kept secret in the industry. We are just at the beginning. What tech were you involved with ten years ago? Ten years ago, back in early 2000, I was working with companies to help them view the web as a revenue generating opportunity, not just to reduce costs. It all sounds incredibly naive now when you think about how far we’ve come. What tech do you expect to be using in ten years' time? In ten years’ time I would expect to be using, flexible (bendable) touch screen devices integrated into all aspects of my life, at home, on the move and at work. Who's your tech hero? My tech hero is Gordon Moore, the man who came up with Moore Law, which says that everything doubles in performance every two years. The law challenges us to drive innovation while relying on the idea that everything will be smaller, faster and more connected. Who's your tech villain? This is a tough one, I am not sure I would single out one person. I’ve always been a very ambitious person, so when it comes to technology, I think it would have to be any kind of person who says it can’t be done. What's your favourite technology ever made? Which do you use most? The web is my favourite technology and my favourite gadget is my tablet (iPad!), which I use for all kinds of things, to stream movies, surf the web and listen to music. What is your budget outlook going forward? Flat? Growing? Substantial growth! We’ve had a strong first quarter of our financial year and we’re seeing increased demand for our data and carrier services. Apart from your own, which company do you admire most and why? Companies that provide excellent customer service on a sustained basis. At TalkTalk Business we put good customer service at the heart of everything we do, so I value that trait when I see it in other organisations. Barclays, who won an award for Best Customer Experience Centre of the Year last year, is a great example. What’s the greatest challenge for an IT company/department today? One of the greatest challenges the technology industry is facing today is managing the fast growth of mobility and how to harness it in the workplace. The need for mobility to drive business objectives, now combined with the added device-driven dimension of BYOD, presents quite a network and security challenge for businesses of all sizes. To Cloud or not to Cloud? For me, the answer is undoubtedly to Cloud. But which cloud? Your own private or public or hybrid? Businesses are moving into a world where the cloud is used for almost all enterprise applications. The cloud allows companies to use a shared environment, makes it easier to tap into common interest data and provides access to the computing power of hundreds of servers, without the expense. That isn’t to say working in the cloud doesn’t present its own challenges, but with the right technology choices, secure flexible network and ICT partners, they’re not insurmountable. What did you want to be when you were a child? It wasn’t what I wanted to be, but more of where I wanted to be. I wanted to live and work around the world.Name / Company / Years in IT / Areas of expertise? I have been the Managing Director at TalkTalk Business since 2011 and have been in the IT industry for 22 years, starting at IBM as an Engineer. From there I held a number of senior project management, sales and senior leadership roles in professional services and product related businesses. I have worked across Asia for 4 years (based in Tokyo) and have spent the last 5 years in the UK. What has been your favourite project so far? This one! Joining TalkTalk Business and working over the past two years to further improve the customer experience has been both fulfilling and rewarding, but the best is yet to come. I like to say TalkTalk Business is the best kept secret in the industry. We are just at the beginning. What tech were you involved with ten years ago? Ten years ago, back in early 2000, I was working with companies to help them view the web as a revenue generating opportunity, not just to reduce costs. It all sounds incredibly naive now when you think about how far we’ve come. What tech do you expect to be using in ten years' time? In ten years’ time I would expect to be using, flexible (bendable) touch screen devices integrated into all aspects of my life, at home, on the move and at work. Who's your tech hero? My tech hero is Gordon Moore, the man who came up with Moore Law, which says that everything doubles in performance every two years. The law challenges us to drive innovation while relying on the idea that everything will be smaller, faster and more connected. Who's your tech villain? This is a tough one, I am not sure I would single out one person. I’ve always been a very ambitious person, so when it comes to technology, I think it would have to be any kind of person who says it can’t be done. What's your favourite technology ever made? Which do you use most? The web is my favourite technology and my favourite gadget is my tablet (iPad!), which I use for all kinds of things, to stream movies, surf the web and listen to music. What is your budget outlook going forward? Flat? Growing? Substantial growth! We’ve had a strong first quarter of our financial year and we’re seeing increased demand for our data and carrier services. Apart from your own, which company do you admire most and why? Companies that provide excellent customer service on a sustained basis. At TalkTalk Business we put good customer service at the heart of everything we do, so I value that trait when I see it in other organisations. Barclays, who won an award for Best Customer Experience Centre of the Year last year, is a great example. What’s the greatest challenge for an IT company/department today? One of the greatest challenges the technology industry is facing today is managing the fast growth of mobility and how to harness it in the workplace. The need for mobility to drive business objectives, now combined with the added device-driven dimension of BYOD, presents quite a network and security challenge for businesses of all sizes. To Cloud or not to Cloud? For me, the answer is undoubtedly to Cloud. But which cloud? Your own private or public or hybrid? Businesses are moving into a world where the cloud is used for almost all enterprise applications. The cloud allows companies to use a shared environment, makes it easier to tap into common interest data and provides access to the computing power of hundreds of servers, without the expense. That isn’t to say working in the cloud doesn’t present its own challenges, but with the right technology choices, secure flexible network and ICT partners, they’re not insurmountable. What did you want to be when you were a child? It wasn’t what I wanted to be, but more of where I wanted to be. I wanted to live and work around the world.

Cloud

IT Life: Talking With TalkTalk’s Business Head

Charles Bligh loves the cloud, the web and his iPad

Regulation

‘We Can Trust GCHQ On Encryption’

Professor Alan Woodward doesn't think GCHQ or the NSA would have meddled with encryption, given they use it so much

Governement-IT

Sir Nigel Shadbolt: Free Data Can Be ‘As Valuable As You Can Imagine’

The co-founder of the Open Data Institute talks about analytics and how to raise a new generation of data scientists

Regulation

Art Coviello: Attacking Anonymity, Just In The Right Places

RSA chief explains why he thinks anonymity is the enemy of privacy, but is he more than a little motivated by commercial concerns?

Big Data

IT Life: The Human Face of Big Data

Senior vice president of EMEA Field Operations at Informatica and MENSA member Charles Race talks about big data, Clive Sinclair and cricket

Open Source

IT Life: The Future Of Computing Is Distributed

Justin Sheehy, CTO at Basho, talks about NoSQL, Grace Hopper and why distributed computing tools shall inherit the earth

Data Storage

IP Expo: Fusion-io Introduces New ioControl Features

Chris McCall, senior director of ioControl Marketing, talks about the new software Fusion-io has launched in the UK

Cloud

IP Expo: Moving Workloads To Make The Most Of The Cloud

With multiple clouds to choose from, you need a way to move workloads between the different providers, says Ian Masters

Cloud

Hounslow Council Believes In The G-Cloud

Hounslow Council's Anthony Kemp is full of praise for G-Cloud as it becomes Box's first UK government customer

Security

The Uphill Struggle To Security Awareness

Things have changed in the last ten years, says the SANS Institute's John Pescatore, but users still need careful watching

Cloud

IT Life: The Road To Dell

Entrepreneurs and video conferencing get Tim Griffin excited

Regulation

Fire Service IT ‘Sucks And Isn’t Getting Better Fast’

Chief fire officer at Cambridgeshire Fire & Rescue Services explains the many problems with IT across the emergency service

Security

Popular Processors ‘Are Riddled With Backdoors’

IOActive CTO Gunter Ollman says research is uncovering a lot of interesting flaws on much-used chips

Mobility

Video: Getting Touch Into The Enterprise

Everyone uses tablets at home, says Jeff Kilford. It's time to get touch into the enterprise

Mobility

How Better Roaming Will Help Wi-Fi Succeed In Spite Of Itself

Wi-Fi is great, but it's not always as easy as it should be. Edgar Figueroa wants to fix that

Cloud

Linus Torvalds Jokes The NSA Wanted A Backdoor In Linux

Torvalds' LinuxCon keynote covered a lot more than the NSA backdoor joke, says Sean Michael Kerner

Data Storage

IT Life: Security Down The Years

Craig Kensek has been doing security since the "I Love You" virus was doing the rounds