ICC 4 IT Blog

ICC has recently purchased new premises to cope with the increase in sales and services.

“We were looking to relocate to larger premises once more in order to be able to run the service side of the business as more of an individual company separate to the hardware sales side of the business. We are pleased to announce that we have just purchased new premises with floor space of over 20,000 sq ft. This will be split between the two sides of the business so that we can run these independently. The beauty in doing this is that unlike most maintenance companies who have contract agreements in place, they then have to “spare up” on certain products in order to meet the SLA (service level agreement). In having the two companies co-existing in the same building, we are confident that with any contract we take on, we will always be able to meet the SLA because of our immense stockholding. Every part that needs to be exchanged will be available from stock for immediate despatch with one of our engineers 99.9% of the time. This we know from supplying other TPM organisations, is not always the case, which undoubtedly leaves the customer at risk. This is what we believe will put us one step ahead of other third party maintenance organisations.”

Completion of the move is expected by mid 2006.

ICC has received ISO9001:2000 accreditation. This approval of standards and procedures furthermore enhances our commitment to quality and business process controls.

Certification adds confidence to current and prospective clients so that they know they are dealing with a company that has strict policies and procedures and a system that has worldwide approval.

June 2004 saw yet another record year being set by ICC turnover and profit was increased by a further 28% and we also saw an increase in stock and client portfolios. 2003-2004 saw I.C.C move into new premises which we believe was a major factor to our continued growth and also the continued push into the service sector seems to be paying dividends. Over the next year we look forward to introducing IBM to our product range which will open the door for our services and products into new market areas

ICC completes upgrade project for MFI, for over 5 years we have been supporting the hardware supply of all of MFI’s OpenVMS systems, and at the beginning of 2003 started to configure over 100 refurbished systems that were to be installed throughout the Groups UK stores, this project enabled MFI to increase the life span of there Platform and proven OVMS reliability by another 4 years and improved each stores performance by over 40%.

ICC secures 24hour 365 days a year contract with major manufacturing PLC, Covering their Alpha Platform at their manufacturing plant in Hull, “The contract has been secured and we have migrated our services into our clients site with little or no disruption to the site, and in doing so have cut there annual maintenance agreement costs by 35%,” the contract opens the door for further sites located around the UK and Europe.

Due to the continued success and growth of ICC over the last 4 years, we have relocated into new premises, these new premises allow us to deal with a higher demand of orders and enables us to extend our testing facilties so that we can handle and increase the number of orders being taken and improve our system build times. Our new premises also allow us to increase our stock portfolio therefore allowing us to become a multi-vendor support company, our customers platforms have migrated, moving from the old days of having one manufacturers brand, therefore to keep in tune with our customers demands we need to be able to support and supply their existing platform but also give them the same dedication and expertise in other platforms, this move enables us to do just that.

Green IT is an all too common catchphrase. But amid all the talk, what does green IT actually mean and what does your company need to do to get involved?

Green IT constitutes the activities that contribute to the reduction of greenhouse gases and a company’s overall carbon footprint.

Is it good to be green? Well, yes – to the extent that being green results in operational cost saving and leads to process efficiency. The various steps neded to reduce greenhouse gases are now widely promoted through legislative, media and industry channels. At government level, there is a growing list of international and EU-wide mandates. Each regulation has a different point of focus and can be adopted separately or as a total package.

The IT industry itself has taken the initiative to improve its green credentials through a series of self-imposed programmes. One such project is the Green Grid, a set of standards devised by a consortium of manufacturers including AMD, IBM, HP, Intel and SUN Microsystems. The Green Grid aims to increase hardware efficiency and reduce energy consumption. The availability of a standards based check list makes it easier for IT leaders to not only measure the efficiency of the IT environment, but also to determine the green credentials of their proposed upgrades and replacements.

Datacentres have long been known as major power guzzlers – in the sense of the resource-hungry machines and because of the associated air conditioning requirements. Such problems are getting worse. While a company’s power consumption bill for IT in the past might have contributed up to 10 per cent of the overall operational costs, datacenter resource requirements can reach up to 30 per cent of costs given the rising price of energy.

Costs alone make initiatives such as the Green Grid an imperative. Now other developments are also having a major impact. New blade technology allows servers to run cooler, leading to reduced air conditioning requirements, helping to save energy and enhance the office environment for users.

Another of the most significant IT developments of recent times is virtualization, which aims to provide similar capacity and capabilities to the traditional datacenter – but with a fraction of the normal power consumption.

At desktop level, meanwhile, the drive for operational efficiency has simultaneously led to better power management and an average of 10 to 20 per cent overall energy savings. The savings are being achieved through innovations such as the installation of software that automatically closes down unattended PCs. The cost of a PC left running overnight can be as much as £75. Other applications are timed to boot up PCs at night to run routine tasks, including software upgrades, and to take advantage of off-peak electricity rates, powering down when tasks are complete. Such developments help to prove that rather than just being a marketing bandwagon, IT leaders can use green policies to help cut emissions.