Good times, bad times
Who played a blinder - and who made a blunder - in the IT channel this last two weeks?
Good Times
IBM
IBM is on track in its efforts to morph from an unsightly, hardware-focused pupa into a glorious cloud and big data-loving butterfly, according to its chief executive.
Conveniently glossing over the staff hubbub around job cuts and IBM's 11 consecutive quarters of sales decline, Ginni Rometty was keen to focus on the positives in her annual letter to investors.
Big Blue has, over the past year, made a number of "bold moves" and now draws 27 per cent of its sales from its "strategic imperatives" of cloud, analytics, mobile, social and security.
It would perhaps be stretching it to say it has been a good week for Rometty, but any week in which angry employees aren't baying for her blood is a step up.
The search giant has chosen London as the location of its first-ever branded retail store, dubbed The Google Shop.
It's fair to say the company's fellow tech titans - Apple, Microsoft and Sony chief among them - have endured/enjoyed mixed fortunes in their attempts to crack the high street. But, not to be deterred, the search firm has kitted out a corner of the Currys PC World store on Tottenham Court Road and opened shop last week.
Rumours that 99 per cent of visitors to the nearby Bing, Yahoo and Ask.com stores all asked to be directed to The Google Shop remained completely made up as we went to press.
Young IT enthusiasts
School leavers who have grown up watching a decade's worth of the BBC's The Apprentice might have gained a skewed view of what life is like on a real-life apprenticeship. But dozens of young techies have decided to see for themselves and join the channel straight out of school.
Resellers ANS Group (pictured) and Concorde IT boasted about their new intake of youngsters during the recent National
Apprenticeship Week. Instead of dashing about London collecting a list of obscure objects at bargain prices, the new recruits will complete vendor certifications and work on the service desk.
We're sure they will have absolutely no need to do so, but we can't help but wonder if the reseller duo's senior managers have been trying out their best "you're fired" moves.
Bad Times
The 90s
Anyone with enduringly fond memories of the collected recordings of Sleeper and the grimly stoical batting of Mike Atherton will likely not hear a word said against the 1990s. ‘Twas truly a golden age.
But it seems not everyone sees the decade before last through quite such rose-tinted spectacles, with IT vendors finding themselves lambasted for having partner models that are stuck in a 90s timewarp. Gartner analyst Tiffani Bova recently mused that traditional channel schemes based on product resale volume are now "fundamentally challenged" and in need of wholesale "reimagination".
Next you'll be telling us to ditch the combat pants and lop off the Nick-Carter curtains.
Apple
Users of iPhones might be used to shielding their passcode from prying eyes, but according to recently leaked documents, nosey government snoopers have been working on an easier way to spy on the devices.
The Intercept, a website designed to promote whistleblower Edward Snowden's documents, claims to have seen top-secret info proving the CIA has been on a decade-long mission to hack iPhones and iPads.
It is claimed CIA bods gathered once a year to try to hack the devices at an event they codenamed "Jamboree". We wonder if they tucked into Party Rings and swigged Panda Pops at the seemingly jolly affair.
NetSuite
Like a child forced to choose sides between two bickering parents, one of Sage's top UK resellers has opted to terminate its partnership with NetSuite after an advertising spat between the duo turned ugly.
In November, US-based hosted ERP vendor NetSuite ran an advert featuring a Tube-style map declaring that "all Sage lines terminate here" as it sought to discredit its on-premise rival.
Ensphere Consulting was a partner of both vendors until new owner Certus Solutions opted to work exclusively with Sage. While not the deciding factor behind this decision, Certus' COO, Nigel Griffiths, said he felt NetSuite's "US-driven" campaign was "not the kind of thing we British would do". Our US cousins might well point to the Punch-and-Judy politics currently on display in the election build-up as evidence to the contrary.