The Cloud is changing the Sales and Marketing function as we know it. Join BMIT and iMovo to learn how the Cloud can help you to put your customers at the centre of your business, by employing the right approach and systems.
The event will feature a number of key experts in the areas of Customer Relationship Management and Cloud Computing as well as a local success story, eCabs, a company that has successfully harnessed the power of the Cloud to obtain operational efficiency and total customer focus.
Date: 26th June 2013 Time: 08:45 - 11:30 Venue: Microsoft Innovation Centre, Skyparks Business Centre, Luqa
Target Participants: Sales and marketing professionals, business development managers, change managers and IT professionals
Agenda:
08:45 Registration and Welcome Coffee
09:15 The Cloud comes Local – the Business Value of using locally-based Cloud Services
09:50 Driving Proftable Sales and Marketing in Today’s World
10:15 Coffee Break
10:30 Customer Case Study – eCabs Limited
11:00 Discussion and Conclusions
Christian Sammut, CEO of local cloud services provider BMIT.
The adoption of so-called ‘cloud services’ in Malta is somewhat limited and doesn’t go much beyond e-mail and file-sharing, ranking Malta down in the list of European countries. However the take-up is increasing slowly but surely and situation is changing.
This is the opinion of Christian Sammut, the chief executive officer of BMIT, a Go subsidiary which is positioning itself as one of the leading hosting and co-location services providers in Malta. Just over a year ago the company launched its groundbreaking cloud services platform, with an investment of over €1 million.
“Research has shown us that many Maltese companies are still relatively new to the concept of cloud. While many of us already use some form of cloud application, beyond e-mail and file sharing services the adoption of other cloud services is somewhat limited. At BMIT we believe that the availability of a locally based cloud provider will help overcome some of the challenges which may exist and will help de-mystify some of the misconceptions and concerns which evolve around the cloud,” Mr Sammut said.
Research has shown us that many Maltese companies are still relatively new to the concept of cloud
“As a matter of fact, although we lag behind many European countries in terms of cloud adoption, we have experienced a gradual but continuous rise in the rate of locally-based companies, big and small, which have taken the plunge and have now subscribed to some cloud service from our own data centre.”
A company that provides its services to international clients, especially in the i-gaming sector, is bound to feel the effects of the international economic situation. BMIT was no exception, though the past year has been quite positive for the company.
“Every year has its own challenges and opportunities – 2012 was no exception,” admitted Mr Sammut.
“We in fact started the year aware of a dynamic and somewhat turbulent environment within the gaming industry all over Europe.
“Notwithstanding, I believe that Malta has fared relatively well in 2012 and has managed to remain one of Europe’s leading jurisdictions.
“During the past year we have worked hard at understanding our customer requirements and have consequently embarked upon a programme whereby we recognise the value of our custom and whereby we continue to improve our quality and service proposition. At the same time, we realise that an opportunity exists in developing new services and markets, even locally.”
Indeed BMIT has enhanced its managed services portfolio and early last year launched the first fully automated cloud platform in Malta. It is now a Microsoft Silver Hosting Partner, its data centres are PCI certified and the company has also achieved ISO 27001 accreditation.
This has not gone unnoticed, as BMIT has been short-listed for the ‘Datacentre of the Year Award’ at the EGR B2B Awards for 2013, to be held next week in London. The EGR B2B Awards are prestigious awards which celebrate the achievements of the very best service providers in the online gaming industry.
The magazine Gambling Insider in its April 2013 issue also interviewed Mr Sammut, though BMIT is trying to diversify and not just remain an i-gaming hosting services company.
When i-Tech spoke to Mr Sammut a year ago he identified the market size and the need to raise awareness and inform the market of the benefits that cloud services bring to businesses as two major challenges for the company. Has the situation changed?
“The dynamics and size of the local economy, its structure and culture, certainly influence and directly impact the rate of cloud adoption in Malta. These challenges will continue to exist for a number of years and as a result, we are continuously striving to reach out to local businesses, to raise the awareness and to adapt our service offering in line with local customer requirements,” replied BMIT’s CEO.
Asked about the role of government in supporting cloud services and the digital economy, he sees the government’s support as vital.
“The Government has announced its intention to develop a new strategy for developing the local digital economy. This together with many other initiatives undertaken by the previous administration, are vital for creating an environment which is conducive to the growth of the ICT economy as well as to the adoption of cloud services.
“We have launched a suite of cloud-enabled applications and services for small to medium sized as well as large enterprises. One idea which comes to mind is the inclusion of such and similar services within a government sponsored scheme to promote the adoption of cloud within micro SMEs and for such organisations to consequently benefit from tax credits commensurate with the level of investment made.”
The outlook for the immediate future looks good for BMIT but the company must continue to strive to provide the best services possible.
“First of all, we must continue to ensure that we provide the best level of service to our existing customers – in the way we serve them, in the way we support them and in the way we develop our relationships. Secondly, at BMIT we are on a journey, a journey which in 2013 will see BMIT consolidating its position in the market as the leading co-location, managed and cloud services provider,” concluded Mr Sammut.
A very real problem in business is the effective analysis of heaps upon heaps of data. Without a tool that helps in this analysis, your business could very well make the wrong decision, or even the correct decision but too late.
With that in mind, here at BMIT we have established a collaboration with iMovo and invested in a Cloud Business Intelligence platform. The first service rolling out off this platform is called Socionomix, an exciting social analytics platform.
We all know that social media can be quite confusing. It has become such a vast scenario that most marketeers see the potential but simply can’t seem to articulate the benefits and returns that it brings.
Most marketeers associate social media value with intangible benefits, such as increased awareness, website traffic and favourable perceptions of the organization. This is all well and good. But how does this awareness and goodwill translate into profits?
For most organisations, the answer is unclear and the challenge stems from the fact that measuring the effectiveness of social media activities can be a daunting task.
This is exactly the reason why iMovo developed Socionomix – to provide insights into social media activity and engagement like never before. Specifically to:
Provide unique insights in a very intuitive and visual format
Allow the benchmarking of social media campaigns against the competition through side-by-side comparisons between your own brand and your selected competitors
Help identify the ‘influentials’ in the ecosystem of fans and customers, enabling you to target them more effectively
Provide insight on the kind of content that works best for your organisation or for your competition, so you can optimise accordingly
Provide unique sentiment analysis: insight into how people ‘feel’ about your organisation
In a nutshell, Socionomix enables you to gain an excellent understanding of the metrics and motivators of social media so that you’re finally able to track social media ROI!
If you would like to learn more about Socionomix and Cloud BI solutions please contact us.
BMIT Ltd, Malta’s leading data centre, cloud and managed services provider announced that they have entered in a sponsorship agreement with Michelle Vella Wood, one of Malta’s top athletes, to assist her in her participation in leading triathlon events, including the Austria Ironman Triathlon in June, the National Triathlon Championships in October and the B’Kara St Joseph Triathlon series.
“We are proud to be associated with Michelle. Her commitment and performance in such an endurance sport is an honour to her and to the local sporting community and as BMIT we are very pleased of this agreement,” said Jack Mizzi, Chief Marketing Officer of BMIT Ltd. “Our support will also help Michelle in her forthcoming events, and especially her participation at the Austria Ironman in June. A 3.8 km swim, followed by a 180 km cycle and then a full 42.195km marathon run sounds daunting enough, but we are sure that Michelle can improve on her best performance so far and continue to add to her recent successes.”
“Thanks to the support of organisations like BMIT Ltd, I am now able to concentrate on the sport and work harder in achieving what I have dreamt of over the years,” said Michelle Vella Wood. “My targets this year include the Ironman Austria race which will be held on 30 June in Klagenfurt in Austria, the B’Kara St. Joseph Sprint Series, including 750 metres swimming, a 20km bike and a 5km run, held in Salina, where I will be looking to achieve a time of around 1hr 5min and finally the National Triathlon Championships, held on the first Sunday in October, with a 1.5km swim, a 40km bike and a 10km run, also held in Salina,” she concluded.
Michelle Vella Wood, who will be sponsored by BMIT Ltd, is amongst the most successful athletes in Malta. As a 31 year old mother of a 2 year old daughter and a PhD student, Vella Wood has been competing since she was 10 years old and has achieved numerous achievements, including three-time champion of the National Duathlon Championship and 2nd place at the Malta Marathon and Cycling Time Trial Championship. This year, Vella Wood has already been on the podium in all the races she has taken part in, including 3rd place at the Malta Marathon, 1st place in the Mellieha AC Duathlon, 2nd Maltese in the Cycling Tour of Malta and for the 4th time, 1st place in the Birzebbuga Middle Distance Race and most recently, winning the National Duathlon Championship on the 18th May.
Michelle Vella Wood
About BMIT
BMIT has, over these last years, established itself as a leading provider of data centre, cloud and managed services. With a customer base spread all over Europe and ranging from retail to financial to gaming customers, BMIT offers an extensive suite of services aimed at both SMEs and corporates. - www.bmit.com.mt.
Interview in Gambling Insider - April 2013 issue
Christian Sammut, CEO of Malta’s largest data centre BMIT, discusses his firm’s involvement in the online gaming industry.
What sort of gaming-specific technology services do BMIT offer online gaming firms?
We have developed a series of services including co-location and associated data centre services, managed services and now also a range of cloud services.
What should e-gaming firms applying for a Maltese licence be looking for in their hosting and data centre providers?
The main considerations are:
Reliability: Including service levels, connectivity and resilience. Experience and Competence: Including their track record, product portfolio and relevant certifications. Support: Including the effectiveness of their support, the quality of their professionals and their ability to troubleshoot. Flexibility: Including their ability to deal with specific customer requests.
How do the technological requirements of the e-gaming sector differ to other industries that BMIT operate in? Two aspects distinguish gaming customers: firstly their total dependence on internet connectivity; secondly the need for us to provide them with customised and flexible solutions in line with very specific regulatory requirements.
How quickly are the technologies adopted by BMIT developing?
BMIT operates in an extremely dynamic environment. Our recent multi-million- euro investment in a cloud platform, coupled with substantial investment in our managed services suite, are proof of the dynamism of the technology that powers the online gaming industry.
How much of a challenge is it for BMIT to ensure that their new technologies are compliant with Maltese gaming laws?
We strive to remain abreast of technological and regulatory developments both in Malta and across Europe. We engage and liaise with leading gaming experts to ensure we are continuously and consistently aware of any new regulatory challenges or opportunities.
The April 2013 issue of the Economic Update - a leading business publication in Malta - gave prominence to BMIT's initiatives in the areas of customer focus and product development
We are extremely proud to announce that BMIT has been short-listed for the Datacentre of the Year award at the EGR B2B Awards for 2013, to be held on Thursday 6th June 2013 at The Pavilion, Tower of London. The EGR B2B Awards are prestigious awards which reward and celebrate the achievements of the very best service providers in the online gaming industry.
We are overjoyed that our achievements here at BMIT are being recognised alongside those of other major players across the continent. This award continues to prove to us that our clients’ faith is well placed with us at BMIT and has bolstered our commitment to further improve our service offering.
In the past, the only way to set up a proper email infrastructure for a company was to invest in server infrastructure and a requisite software solution, most probably a version of Microsoft’s market leading Exchange Server, which has over 70% of the worldwide market share and probably an even higher one in Malta. This involved high upfront investment in terms of hardware and software licensing as well as complex ongoing management costs.
Today, hosted email has increasingly become the way to go. The advantages of hosted email are many; not only do you offset the cost of running your own servers but you can also free up your already hassled IT staff’s time to focus on mission critical work.
However, a number of firms still cling to and use their own in-house Exchange Server religiously. This is somewhat understandable; they have invested precious money into the technology and have become accustomed to it and perhaps are fearful of what a change could bring about.
So where does the problem lie? The cost of complexity! Managing Exchange Server is no trivial undertaking as it requires constant updates, security patches and upgrades to new releases to keep up with Microsoft’s pace of innovation.
While many IT professionals may say, "If it's not broke, don't fix it", others may say, "We have to upgrade, Microsoft said so". One would think that updates are the logical way to go to keep your company at the forefront, however, all too sadly, this is not the case.
At the end of last year (2012) an update called Windows Management Framework 3.0 (WMF 3.0) began appearing in Microsoft Update (MU), Windows Update (WU), Windows Software Update Services (WSUS), and on Configuration Manager Software Update Points.
Essentially this is a suggestion from Microsoft that WMF 3.0 should be installed on all of your servers where the update is applicable.
Released as KB 2506146 and KB 2506143, this update also includes PowerShell 3.0.
DON'T DO IT. Do not update. Step away from the keyboard right now Sir, M’am.
‘Why not?’ you may ask. Well, while PowerShell 3.0 is indeed a great improvement to PowerShell, and this is an indisputable fact, the truth is that Exchange 2010 is not currently qualified to work with PowerShell 3.0. In fact, it simply won’t work and it will break. The same story applies to Exchange 2007 which also is not qualified to work with PowerShell 3.0 and thus far looks like it never will be.
Luckily, Exchange 2013 does work with WMF 3.0 and in fact, WMF 3.0 is required to install Exchange 2013. This is of little comfort to anyone who’s had their server configurations broken, apart from the fact that very, very few companies are actually running Exchange 2013.
Other known issues include emails arriving hours after they’re sent as well as problems caused by Exchange 2013’s love for IPv6, when to be honest, most of us are perfectly happy using IPv4 and have no intention of changing yet.
The long winded solution to this is to go on a multifaceted, multi goals oriented update spree. As you will no doubt know, if you combine multiple goals in to a migration, you will make your life miserable and things will break.
The simple solution is to simply leave this to others and move out of this complicated affair. Host your email using Hosted Exchange at BMIT and let our experts deal with these issues. Rather than blaming your IT people for breaking things they thought would work, let us provide with seamless, undisturbed access to your email, which we very well know is absolutely fundamental to your teams’ work!
Keep it simple. Host your email on Hosted Exchange at BMIT. Contact us today and we’ll take you by the hand and guide you as to what works best for you (and help you avoid all of the above pain and hassle).
To celebrate our first anniversary of offering groundbreaking, always on Cloud Services, we’re giving you a very special offer! Get 20% off ALL of these cloud services:
miniVPS - from just €10 per month
Web Hosting - from just €6.48 per month
Hosted Microsoft Exchange - from just €2.73 per month
Cloud Backup - from just €1.60 per month
The 20% discount will be applied to your annual subscription, so that you save one fifth of the annual price, just like that! To benefit from this special, one time 20% discount is easy:
Go to BMIT Cloud Store
Select any of the above services
Enter the following Promo Code at checkout when purchasing: CLOUD1
Benefit from 20% discount!
Offer is subject to the following terms and conditions:
All services are subject to the standard terms and conditions applicable for standard offerings
Offer is only available for 1 year subscriptions
Offer is not available in conjunction with other offers or special terms
The special discount is applied only via entering the correct promotion code. Please ensure that the discount is applied prior to effecting payment
Payments shall be effected online via our secure payment gateway. Major credit cards are accepted.
BMIT Ltd, Malta’s leading data centre, cloud and managed services provider announced that its 2 data centres in Malta have achieved ISO/IEC 27001 certification – the highest international standard for information security management.
This achievement follows rigorous and independent review of the company’s information security management system for data centre facility management by BSI - British Standards Institution.
“Gaining certification from an accredited certification body such as BSI demonstrates that the security of our information has been addressed, implemented and properly controlled,” said Gordon Bezzina, Chief Technical Officer at BMIT. “This certification recognises the company’s ongoing commitment to reducing information risks faced by our clients and demonstrates a higher level of information security than most businesses could expect to achieve in their own right. By endorsing the company’s internal information security management system and processes, the ISO/IEC 27001 certification sets a security benchmark in information and process management that our clients can rely on.”
ISO/IEC 27001 defines the requirements for establishing, implementing, operating, monitoring, reviewing, maintaining and improving a documented Information Security Management System.
The audit takes into account all these factors and assesses them with regards to the organisation’s overall business risks. BSI conducts the audit and assesses the operation of a data centre, as well as all available applications, IT systems, processes and services provided by BMIT’s employees and contractors.
BMIT is a leading provider of data centre, cloud and managed services. With a customer base spread all over Europe and ranging from retail to financial to gaming customers, BMIT offers an extensive suite of services aimed at both SMEs and corporates.
BSI is a global organization that equips businesses with the necessary solutions to turn standards of best practice into habits of excellence. Formed in 1901, BSI was the world’s first National Standards Body and a founding member of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO).
doesn’t go much beyond e-mail and file-sharing, ranking Malta down in the list of European countries. However the take-up is increasing slowly but surely and situation is changing.
