Software King of the World, Microsoft, seems to be having issues getting its Windows 11 onto computers — with even Windows 7 and XP being on more seats.
Part of the problem is that less than half of business PCs are capable of running the latest Microsoft Windows operating system (OS), according to a Lansweeper audit.
Software King of the World, Microsoft, has announced it is buying process mining technology company Minit.
Vole says it will empower the company to help its customers digitally “transform and drive operational excellence” (which we guess has been parked in a car park on bricks for a while now).
Minit apparently helps businesses gain insights into how processes run, uncover root causes of operational challenges and help mitigate undesired process outcomes.
Founded in 2017, the tech scale-up has offices in Amsterdam, London, Bratislava and New York.
Justin Graham, Microsoft’s general manager of process insights, said: “This acquisition will further empower Microsoft to help our customers digitally transform and drive operational excellence by creating a complete picture of their business processes, enabling every process to be easily and automatically analysed and improved.
EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager said that Amazon and Microsoft have not raised cloud competition concerns in the European Union.
Last year, Amazon Web Services (AWS) accounted for 13 percent of Amazon’s revenue but 37 percent of its operating profit ($5.3 billion out of $14.3 billion). At the same time, Microsoft’s Q2’22 (ended 31st December) profit rose to a better-than-expected $18.8 billion, with overall cloud revenue climbing 32 percent and Azure cloud revenue up 46 percent.
These firms’ dominance in the European cloud market has caused concern among smaller competitors. French cloud computing company OVHcloud and German software provider NextCloud filed an antitrust case against Microsoft. They claim the tech giant has been stifling competition in the market and making it harder for consumers to choose services from rival firms.
The complaint focuses on Microsoft’s licensing operations, alleging that the company has made it more expensive for users to switch from Azure to a competing cloud provider.
Microsoft partners down under have started an online petition disapproving of newly announced Microsoft partner programme changes, which they universally declare to be “not fair dinkum”.
The petition dubs the tech giant’s new partner scoring system “impossible to achieve as it’s heavily biased toward ‘new sales.’”
One of the petition organisers told the local press that suppliers were concerned that this is going to continue and it’s going to go down the path of Microsoft wanting to ultimately be that direct relationship with the end-user.
Basically, the fear is that Vole will eventually incentivise customers to work directly with the vendor by sticking partners with higher prices and less favourable contract offers.
Microsoft has scrapped the Microsoft Partner Network as it rebrands to the Microsoft Cloud Partner Programme.
From October 2022, all 400,000 partners in Microsoft’s egosystem will use the Microsoft Cloud Partner Programme instead of the Microsoft Partner Network.
Gone will be the days of Microsoft’s Silver and Gold-level certification badges along with the Microsoft Partner Network name which was first launched over 15 years ago.
Microsoft said that changing the partner programme name was a reflection of “the enormous and ongoing transition of business operations to the cloud” and how it claims to support partners in the future.
Software King of the World Microsoft claims that its UK partners will mostly all hit their net-zero targets by 2050. We guess Bill Gates and Mike Magee will be dead by then.
Redmond updated its sustainability research conducted in October, revealing that 89 percent of partners said they are working to ensure that they do not add to the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere by, or before, the target date.
Orla McGrath, Global Partner Solutions lead at Microsoft UK said the research showed that Microsoft’s UK partners are eager to play their part in the UK’s transition to a greener and more prosperous future.
“With their deep expertise in delivering innovative technology and consulting solutions, Microsoft partners are well placed to accelerate both their own journey to net-zero and that of their customers.”
Google has seen off rival Microsoft to acquire cybersecurity vendor Mandiant for $5.4 billion.
For those not in the know, Mandiant provides threat intelligence to protect against cyber-attacks and will. Google claims it will play nicely with Google Cloud’s “existing security strengths”.
Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian said that organisations around the world were facing unprecedented cybersecurity challenges as the sophistication and severity of attacks that were previously used to target major governments are now being used to target companies in every industry.
“We look forward to welcoming Mandiant to Google Cloud to further enhance our security operations suite and advisory services, and help customers address their most important security challenges.”
Google says the cybersecurity firm’s offering will now be used to “enhance” its existing cloud security capabilities – including BeyondCorp Enterprise for Zero Trust, VirusTotal for malicious content and software vulnerabilities and Chronicle’s planet-scale security analytics and automation.
Microsoft has pushed back its plan to increase prices for 365.
The price hikes, which were first announced in August, officially come into effect today but Microsoft has announced a “transitional grace period” until 14 March.
The move is to fit into Vole’s cunning plan for its New Commerce Experience which is basically a licensing system for companies.
It means that new commerce transactions for the six commercial Modern Work SKUs – Microsoft 365 Business Basic, Microsoft 365 Business Premium, Office 365 E1, Office 365 E3, Office 365 E5 and Microsoft 365 E3 – can be invoiced at the February 2022 pricing.
All new commerce transactions for these six Modern Work SKUs submitted after 5 pm Pacific Daylight Time on 14 March will then be invoiced at the increased March price list pricing.
Lemongrass has joined Microsoft in a partnership designed to help large and midmarket enterprises modernise and simplify their SAP environments.
The agreement will focus on the co-development of SAP-centric services that take advantage of the capabilities of Microsoft Cloud and help maximise the value of customers’ SAP investments
Lemongrass specialises in working with SAP in the hyperscale cloud, from planning and migration to operation and automation. With 6,000 SAP servers and 300,000 SAP users under its management, the firm helps customers extract value by moving and running their SAP systems in the cloud.
Vole said it’ll act as a distinctive innovation partner, providing Lemongrass with the opportunity to collaborate with the tech giant on design and engineering initiatives for SAP customers.
More M&A action! Integrity360 has acquired cybersecurity MSP Caretower, as part of its cunning plan to create a £70 million-revenue business across the UK and Ireland.
For those not in the know, Caretower offers managed security services, penetration testing, security consultancy and managed incident response services, working with an array of vendors including Microsoft, Sophos, Kaspersky, Check Point, Forcepoint, Barracuda Networks among others.
The business generated sales of around £28 million in 2021 and has offices in London and Sofia, Bulgaria.
Integrity360 is a Check Point, F5 and Forcepoint partner and claims that the acquisition will bring its group revenues to £70 million in 2022 and boost its headcount to more than 300 employees including 200 cybersecurity engineers, analysts, consultants and specialists.
Microsoft is in talks to acquire cybersecurity firm Mandiant after the company has been involved in a game of pass the parcel with other buyers.
Mandiant was acquired by FireEye in 2013 for a deal in excess of $1 billion, but its security product business was then sold to a consortium led by Symphony Technology Group for $1.2 billion in June last year.
Both Mandiant and Microsoft declined to comment on the reports and the talks may not go anywhere.
Vole has been spending a lot on security outfits lately and wrote cheques for CloudKnox Security and RiskIQ last year. To be fair though, it has needed their services having been attacked itself rather too many times of late.
Intel has appointed Microsoft’s former general manager for worldwide partner sales to head up its own partner sales organisation.
Alyssa Fitzpatrick told her LinkedIn friends about her new role as the chip maker’s vice-president and general manager of global partner sales after six years with Microsoft.
Her responsibilities are listed as “leading the programmes, support, and end-to-end partner journey under the Intel Partner Alliance with a focus on ISVs, systems integrators and cloud partners”.
Tech Data will flog Microsoft’s holographic mixed reality headset to its B2B enterprise partners in Europe.
For those not in the know, Vole’s HoloLens 2 claims to offer users an immersive experience, enabling increased precision on complex physical tasks, remote collaboration using holograms, and a secure ecosystem combining intelligent edge technology and cloud applications.
An Information Services Group report claims that enterprises are increasingly embracing a cloud-first approach to their IT investments.
The “2021 ISG Provider Lens Public Cloud – Services & Solutions Report for the UK” said that enterprises are looking to service providers to help them migrate more of their workloads to the public cloud.
It finds many large UK enterprises interested in hybrid cloud environments, which enable continued use of legacy IT systems, even though an increasing number of companies anticipate a time when they would migrate all of their IT assets to the cloud. Small and medium-sized enterprises, meanwhile, are looking at infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) options to replace their depreciated hardware assets.
ISG partner Jan Erik Aase said that the move to the cloud is expected to be the primary driver of IT market growth in the UK in the coming years.
With IBM in its rearview mirror, spin-off Kyndryl has made a deal with Microsoft to build products on its cloud.
According to the pair, they will jointly work on a co-innovation lab where they will build products on the Microsoft Cloud, with Kyndryl making them available on Microsoft’s AppSource and on the Azure Marketplace.
Meanwhile, Vole will make products developed by the two companies available for its global enterprise sales force and create a training programme for Kyndryl’s 90,000 employees, dubbed Kyndryl University for Microsoft, which has been designed to teach workers how to best use Microsoft’s cloud tools.
