Upcoming Meeting Notice


SAVE THE DATE:

ANNUAL USA CONFERENCE
JANUARY 21 - 24, 2009
Hard Rock Hotel - San Diego, CA

ANNUAL EUROPEAN CONFERENCE
JUNE 24 - 26, 2009
Park Hotel Amsterdam - Amsterdam, The Netherlands

(Click here for more information.)

NATD in the news
Meet the new members
Breaking news
Air filters
At CIPTUG
Avaya: European market
Book review
Economy
IP PBX
Power

NATD in the news

Computer and telecom resellers band together to fight counterfeit IT equipment flow
ASCDI and NATD appear before US Government Hearing
The Association of Service and Computer Dealers, International (ASCDI) and the North American Association of Telecommunications Dealers (NATD) have banded together in an effort to work with IT manufacturers and law enforcement to eliminate the increased flow of counterfeit equipment into the IT supply chain.

Background: In 2008, the ASCDI established a Counterfeit Task Force to establish a plan to identify and attack the flow of counterfeit equipment into the computer resale industry.  They were joined by the likes of IBM and the FBI in this effort.  In an effort to broaden the coalition the ASCDI invited the NATD to join the effort.

Recent events: A public hearing on a proposed federal rule to require government agencies to only accept bids from manufacturers or their authorized agents shutting out thousands of secondary market resellers in the process was held on Thursday, December 12th in Washington D.C.  The proposed rule change represents a seismic shift in the federal government’s acquisition practice affecting thousands suppliers of goods and services to the federal government.  A copy of the proposed ruling can be found at http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/2008/E8-27275.htm. Most of the 100 people were in attendance at the hearing held at NASA Headquarters were employees of the federal agencies promoting the proposed rule change.  Six presentations were made by the following agencies or organizations: The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (“NASA”); The Society of Automotive Engineers (“SEA”); The Department of Defense (“DOD”); The Department of Commerce; World Data Products, Inc.; ASCDI & NATD.
 
During 6 hours of testimony, no one challenged the need to eliminate counterfeit products.  Rather, the question boiled down to whether, in order to avoid counterfeit products, is it necessary and appropriate to move the federal government to a policy of sole source acquisition for all IT products eliminating competition for price, quality and terms.  Read the ASCDI and NATD position.

The Civil Agency Acquisition Council and the Defense Acquisition Regulations Council closed the Public Hearing expressing appreciation for the presentations and acknowledged the fact that the proposed rule change was too narrow in focus and did not meet the acquisition needs of all government constituents which may require secondary markets to continue to provide support.

Both ASCDI and NATD have been called upon to submit supplemental public comment by Tuesday, January 20, 2009 together with proposed language addressing the concerns expressed during the hearing.

Contact: For more information about the ASCDI and NATD please go to www.ascdi.com and www.natd.com or contact Joseph Marion at [email protected] or 561-266-9440.

New members
The following new Members have been recently voted into the NATD:

Cal Tel Systems - Rolfe Foxwell
Mid-South Telecom - Todd Leonard
Strategic Products and Services - John Negri
Tele-Communications, Inc. - Ryan Herbst
Telematch BV - Maarten van der Velde

January conference - nominations for election
The NATD Board has approved the following slate to be placed in front of the NATD membership at the conference in January:

Nominated for election:
Officers
Melody McKay              President                    Telpro
Ken Cooke                   VP                               Teleswitch
Richard  Howard          VP Europe                   LaPhone Telecom Ltd.
Nigel Skinner               Treasurer                    Ghekko Exports
Brian Kiep                    Secretary                    Panaseas Int'l.

Directors
Julie Perry                    PB Exchange
Heather Huggett         Sotel Systems
Pete Aiello                   Prospect Communications
 
Remains in Office (not up for election this year)
Michael Prefontaine     Paragon Communications
Douglas Green            Telecom Reseller
Rick French                  Infinity Telecom Inc.

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Meet the new members

Telematch
Established in 1991, Telematch is located in Zoeterwoude-Rijndijk, just 20 minutes away from airport Schiphol in the Netherlands. The ownership rests with three shareholders who work for the company. Telematch is a telecom company that specializes in business telecommunications for medium and large size companies and institutions. Our core business is system integration, service and maintenance of telecom systems. Unique is that Telematch is market leader for Hospitality systems for hotels and health care institutions in the Netherlands. We are reseller of NEC Philips and Alcatel-Lucent products and are looking to expand our TPM business with Avaya, Cisco and Nortel.
Visit www.telematch.nl.


Strategic Products and Services
SPS designs and implements technology solutions to help customers be more efficient and competitive in their markets. Established in 1988, SPS is one of Avaya’s largest Platinum Certified Business Partners and a leading integrator of voice and data converged solutions. With SPS’s recent acquisition of PhoneXtra, SPS now offers Secondary Market products and actively seeks new sources of used equipment. As a proud member of the NATD and the NTTN, the merger enables SPS to serve a wider variety of customers. SPS is ranked at 277 on the VARBusiness 500, a listing of the largest information technology (IT) solution providers, integrators, and service companies in North America.
Visit www.spscom.com. ^Back To Top

Breaking news

Vertical announces upgrade to Wave IP 2500
Vertical Communications, provider of IP-based phone systems and voice applications, announced the 1.5 software upgrade to Wave IP 2500 with Applications Inside architecture. SMBs and larger distributed organizations seeking to reduce overhead associated with managing communications can change legacy telephony infrastructure into an IP platform.  Scalable from 10 to 350, it provides flexibility to support all users whether working at headquarters, branch office, home or on the road, regardless of devices. New features and functions include:

• Users can now coach, monitor or join any active call as a full participant.

• System call recording.

• Fax redirect.

• Multiple call appearances on Vertical SIP phones.

• Call rules, routing lists and call twining. Users can configure personal settings so multiple internal and external endpoints will ring simultaneously for incoming calls.  Calls taken through external endpoints can be pulled back to the internal office phone.

Visit www.vertical.com. ^Back To Top

Air filters

UAF introduces thinnest filter media to meet NEBS standards
Universal Air Filter has created the thinnest media available that meets the UL 94 HF-1 rating and dust arrestance requirements for NEBS. This new 0.12-inch-thick Quadrafoam is perfect for design engineers looking for an ultra-thin media and is ideal for all telecom equipment, including networking servers, ATCA and microTCA chassis. Thin Quadrafoam media is soft and compressible and available in 45, 60 and 80 pores-per-inch (PPI). In addition to filtration applications, it can also be bonded to interior chassis walls for insulation or circuit card stabilization purposes. A design engineer looking to evaluate a UAF air filter can access UAF’s complimentary, round-the-clock prototype service available worldwide via www.uaf.com/thinmedia.
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At CIPTUG

CIPTUG 2008 Application Bake-off winners
At the 2008 Annual Conference, CIPTUG hosted an Application Bake-off Competition where end-users and vendors demonstrated their recently released or about-to-be released applications designed to solve unique, complex business problems across a variety of vertical markets.  The Application Bake-Off Competition provided attendees the opportunity to judge the applications’ applicability to their business needs while offering direct, valuable feedback to the developers. View this year’s award recipients.

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Avaya: Europe market

Q&A: Avaya's European president Michael Bayer
The government announced in this month's Queen's Speech that it plans to open the way for an extension of the right to request flexible working to parents with children up to the age of 16. Currently the age limit is six, and the new law when enacted in April will give 4.5 million extra UK citizens the right to work away from the office - giving a major boost to the technology needed for such mobility. Computing talked to communications vendor Avaya's recently appointed European president Michael Bayer about flexible working, and why senior management in many organizations still don't get it.
Read entire interview.
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Book review

Voice and Video Conferencing Fundamentals
This book is enough of an overview to appeal to those managers and analysts who need to get a sense of the technologies and protocols in short order. Yet it is deep enough to be of real value to more technical professionals charged with the responsibilities of designing, developing, selecting, deploying and supporting advanced IP-based audio and video conferencing systems. In large part, it is an agnostic treatment of the subject, focusing on generic concepts and standards-based technologies. The authors naturally, however, give special attention to a Cisco environment, but not so much as to detract from the overall value of the book to the general population.

Authors: Scott Firestone, Thiya Ramalingam and Steve Fry
Publisher: Cisco Press (March 2007)
ISBN-10: 1-58705-268-7
ISBN-13: 978-1-58705-268-2
Price: $55.00^Back To Top

Economy

Gray market swells as economy swoons
The number of businesses filing for bankruptcy climbed 42 percent to 33,822 in the year ended in June, according to U.S. federal courts. The so-called gray market — supplied by equipment from failed businesses and shuttered offices — could account for 14 percent of technology sales next year, up from 8 percent, said Zeus Kerravala, an analyst at the Yankee Group. And the $25 billion market for servers and networking devices may be among the hardest hit. Sales at Network Liquidators, a company based in Oldsmar, Fla., will increase more than 20 percent to $50 million this year, said Chief Executive Barry Shevlin. The amount of equipment offloaded by businesses has risen as much as threefold and much of it is relatively new, he said. Network Liquidators has seen a 50 percent rise in sales of products from San Jose, Calif.-based Cisco this quarter.  Used equipment could account for 30 percent of the total PC market by the end of the year, up from 10 percent, said Rob Enderle, president of the research firm Enderle Group in San Jose. Still, technology companies may gain customers from the secondhand market because it builds brand loyalty.
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IP PBX

Grandstream announces interoperability with CommPartners
Grandstream Networks announced that their All-in-One GXE502x IP PBX has achieved interoperability with CommPartners Connect, a nationwide CLEC certified, facilities based network operator.  Grandstream’s All-in-One GXE502x IP PBX is a powerful all-in-one voice, video, fax, data communication solution for the small to medium sized business, especially companies with sub-30 seats per location.  The CommPartners Connect CLEC network provides business-grade, IP-based voice and other value-added services in 49 states and the District of Columbia.  CommPartners Connect delivers reliable, high-quality and competitively priced carrier and wholesale hosted IP services for business including IP Trunking and broadband services.
Visit www.grandstream.com or www.commpartnersconnect.com.

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Power

New Emerson Network Power CTO expects new focus on business continuity in 2009
Emerson Network Power recently appointed Victor Lee chief technology officer to guide technology innovation across all of the business’s 12 centers of expertise. In this role, Lee brings increased focus and consistency to research and development platforms addressing continuity challenges in the most critical data center, telecommunications, alternative energy, systems integration and power conversion environments. Lee stresses that this focus will be vital amid a challenging economic climate where any downtime could have major ramifications. The conditions have created a renewed emphasis on business continuity and an increasing demand for energy efficient technologies and solutions. Additionally, any executives authorizing strategic technology investments must emphasize product dependability and flexibility to their vendor partners. Lee said Emerson Network Power products and solutions will meet these expectations while building on the strong commitment to innovation that defines the business.
Visit www.emersonnetworkpower.com. ^Back To Top