Upcoming Meeting Notice

The Association of Service and Computer Dealers International (ASCDI) is a 30 year old, worldwide non-profit organization made up of companies who provide technology solutions, technical support or value added services to the business community.

Members and non-members are invited to learn how to grow your business, find new business opportunities, hear from industry representatives and enjoy some fabulous networking events at our conferences:

2010 EUROPEAN REGIONAL RECEPTION
Thursday, 9 December 2010
Aalborg, Denmark

2011 USA WINTER RECEPTION
January 13, 2011
Atlanta, GA

2011 ASIA CONFERENCE
February 16 - 18, 2011
Singapore

2011 USA WINTER CONFERENCE
March 23 – 25, 2011
New Orleans, LA

2011 EUROPEAN SPRING RECEPTION
Thursday, 12 May 2011
London, England

Click here for more information on ALL ASCDI MEETINGS, to view the agendas, lodging details, attendee lists and to REGISTER AT THE EARLY BIRD RATE.

Cisco
Cloud
Compliance
Economy
HP
Oracle
Storage
Training
Unified communications

Cisco

Cisco extends market leadership in IPv6 with industry and government certifications
Cisco announced that it leads in total USGv6 certification for routers, switches and firewalls, aligning with President Barack Obama's recent directive that all U.S. government agencies upgrade their IT infrastructures in support of Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6), as the remaining pool of IPv4 addresses shrinks. In addition to certifying its routers, switches and firewalls, Cisco is introducing new features in its ASR 1000 Series routers, use cases, and professional services to help customers transition to IPv6. Additionally, Cisco is the first technology vendor to be certified by the IPv6 Forum to offer IPv6 education and certification for information technology professionals. The new IPv6 protocol will help meet the ever-increasing global requirements of organizations of all sizes in all industries to support an expanding numbers of users, applications, devices and services. Several countries, such as Brazil, France, Germany, Japan and the United States, are aggressively transitioning to IPv6 to meet this growing demand.
Visit www.cisco.com.
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Cloud

Desktone accelerates adoption of cloud-based desktop with Desktone 3
Desktone, Inc. announced Desktone 3, making it easier than ever for Desktone and service providers to build and support large-scale, cloud-hosted desktop offerings at attractive prices. With desktops in the cloud, customers gain all of the benefits of virtual desktops with no upfront costs or hardware/software deployment. In 2008, Desktone developed the industry’s first virtual desktop hosting platform, introducing the concept of desktops as a service (DaaS). It remains the only company providing a platform specifically architected with multi-tenancy and a service grid, making it the only product capable of delivering true desktops in the cloud. With this announcement, Desktone unveils new capabilities that improve desktop manageability; enhance access with support for mobile devices including Apple iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch; and provide more technology options that help lower costs and reduce vendor lock-in. Desktone also launched the Desktone Cloud, a new service by Desktone and Rackspace that is powered by Desktone Platform 3 and offers the industry’s most affordable virtual desktops, at $1/day.
Visit www.desktone.com.
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Compliance

Safestone announces AIX compliance reporting tool
Safestone Technologies, a supplier of IBM Power Systems security and compliance solutions, has released Compliance Center for AIX. The log-management and compliance-reporting tool was recently launched for IBM i on IBM Power Systems and paves the way for a multiplatform compliance security solution. Compliance Center for AIX automates the way organizations can manage their security policies for compliance with external regulations and industry mandates. The product is a query-based reporting solution designed to simplify the task of collecting and converting an array of audit, compliance and security events into compliance reports.
Visit www.safestone.com.
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Economy

GE Capital survey: CFOs say worst of crisis behind them
GE Capital's latest survey of U.S. chief financial officers (CFOs) showed that middle-market companies believe the worst of the crisis is behind them and expect to grow at a low-to-moderate pace over the next few years. The third-quarter 2010 survey covered 530 CFOs of companies with revenues ranging from $50 million to $1 billion, operating across seven major industries. While maintaining a cautious tone, 84% of the CFOs said they expect the U.S. economy to be stable (47%) or improving (37%) over the near term. Companies in the food industry expressed the highest level of positive sentiment, followed by technology, metals, and healthcare and retail, which shared the same level of sentiment.

Looking forward, 86% of the respondents see low-to-moderate growth for their businesses continuing over the next few years. Technology companies were the most optimistic, with 59% expecting moderate-or-better growth in the next few years, followed by metals (50%) and general manufacturing companies (45%). Credit market conditions are seen as generally improving, with a full 85% of CFOs surveyed expecting the amount of credit available to them in their next round of financing to remain the same (56%) or improve (26%). A larger share (75% versus 60% in January) expects their company's cost of capital to improve or remain stable this year.
Visit www.gecapital.com.
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HP

HP launches Startup Central
HP launched HP Startup Central, a web portal designed to help technology startups get to market quickly through single-point access to HP tools, programs and resources. HP Startup Central unifies HP’s startup initiatives across all product groups including servers, storage and networking, imaging and printing, and personal computers and mobile devices. The initial phase of the portal offers access to powerful features such as intellectual property licensing and HP’s application development platforms including Palm Developer Program, Snapfish Publisher Beta Program and the HP AllianceONE partner program. HP’s partner network is planned to be represented in the next phase. Startups also gain access to discounts on HP products and relevant news and events. Additional benefits include co-branding and co-marketing programs; access to valuable HP services such as marketing collateral printing from Logoworks by HP and HP Virtual Rooms web collaboration; and third-party tools that help entrepreneurs connect with investors, create term sheets, find employees and learn best practices.
Visit www.hp.com/go/startupcentral.
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Oracle

OAUG announces new groups to serve users’ interests within Oracle community
The Oracle Applications Users Group (OAUG), the world’s largest user knowledgebase for Oracle Applications users, announced it has formed the South Texas Geographic User Group (Geo), the Oracle R12 and Fusion eB Tax Special Interest Group (SIG) and the Channel Revenue SIG. The OAUG Geos and SIGs are affiliated, self-governing, worldwide communities of Oracle users and consultants who volunteer their time and knowledge to achieve common goals connected with special geographic regions, industries or products/product lines. They offer opportunities for knowledge and skill development and interaction with peers through their strong ties with the OAUG and Oracle. The Oracle R12 and Fusion eB Tax SIG facilitates the identification, resolution and communication of solutions to Oracle Development related to Oracle eB Tax issues and enhancements. The Channel Revenue SIG serves users and prospective users of Oracle’s Channel Revenue Management application. It offers a forum to provide feedback on the Channel Revenue module, introduce new concepts utilizing Channel Revenue, provide implementation lessons and discuss current trends in the promotional and deductions arena.
Visit www.oaug.org.
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Storage

Whamcloud announces worldwide HPC file system partnership with DataDirect Networks
Whamcloud announced the signing of a worldwide support agreement with DataDirect Networks (DDN). This partnership will extend the platform-independent work that Whamcloud is doing to evolve and support open source file systems in the HPC community, including the Lustre parallel file system. Founded in 1998, DDN provides more bandwidth to the world's 500 fastest supercomputers (as ranked by Top500.org) than all other vendors combined. Their products are available around the world both directly and through a partner channel that includes Dell, IBM, Sony and other industry leaders. Focused on solving the challenges of data-intensive and high growth markets, DDN was the only storage company to be recently named to both Deloitte's Technology Fast 500 and the Inc. 500|5000.
Visit www.whamcloud.com or www.ddn.com.
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Training

Arrow ECS becomes trainer for IBM storage products
Arrow Enterprise Computing Solutions has received authorization from IBM to deliver training courses for IBM storage products in the United States. Through the agreement, Arrow ECS will broaden the scope of its current IBM training portfolio and offer resellers and their customers another avenue to take classes and gain certifications. These IBM storage classes will be offered at the distributor’s training facilities throughout North America. Private training classes conducted at the place of business of resellers or their customers also are available. “The new training courses are delivered by certified instructors with first-hand knowledge of course material and are provided through our Arrow Fusion professional services unit,” said Mark Taylor, vice president of the IBM group for Arrow ECS. “This agreement underscores the strength of the Arrow Fusion offerings and adds to the many training options we currently provide to IBM resellers and their customers.”
Visit http://ecs.arrow.com/.
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Unified communications

Infonetics Research: Unified communications gaining appeal among North American enterprises
Market research firm Infonetics Research released excerpts from Unified Communication Product Features and Vendor Leadership: North American Enterprise Survey, part of its Continuous Research Service (CRS) series of analyst notes and surveys on the enterprise VoIP and unified communications market.“In our most recent survey of companies that use multi-modal communications, a stunning 96% plan to eventually integrate the various modes into a single unified user experience,” notes Matthias Machowinski, directing analyst for enterprise voice and data at Infonetics Research. Among North American medium and large enterprises interviewed by Infonetics:

• The top reasons for deploying UC are improving employee productivity, reducing operational costs and executive demand.

• The fastest rising stars in the UC market are video, short messaging and social networking, a testament to the changing nature of communication.

• UC is most commonly delivered over a desktop computer today, but that is changing in favor of smaller and more portable devices such as laptops, tablets and smartphones.

Visit www.infonetics.com.
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