Vietec has turned the ancient town of Glastonbury in to Somerset County’s first Wi-Fi town in a joint Somerset County Council and Connecting Somerset initiative.

The Glastonbury Wi-Fi pilot project has been fully implemented by Vietec in conjunction with our partner Wifi Spark. The project has been funded for three years by Somerset County Council and the South West Regional Development Agency and will give tourists, business visitors, local traders and the public broadband internet access anywhere in and around the main town centre thoroughfares.

The wireless network will take browsers through to a free portal page with information and links about local services and events, and advertising opportunities for local businesses. A steering group including representatives from Somerset County Council, Glastonbury Town Council, Mendip District Council, the Chamber of Commerce and the local community will maintain the content of these pages.

The official launch took place at Glastonbury Town Hall on 15 May. The area covered by the project includes Magdalene Street, the High Street, and sections of Benedict Street and Northload Street.

Councillor Alvin Horsfall, Somerset County Council Portfolio Holder for Economic Development, said: “We have come a long way in making Somerset one of the most connected counties and this project is another major step forward, with great potential benefits for the local community and economy of one of Somerset’s most famous towns. It will attract more tourist and business visitors, and encourage them to stay longer and use local services.”

Somerset County Councillor for Glastonbury, Councillor Alan Gloak, said: “It’s important that Somerset stays ahead of the game. By helping our local businesses be more competitive and addressing their needs we are allowing them to realise their full potential.”

Glastonbury was chosen as the first Wi-Fi town location because of its position as a rural town with international reputation that attracts many foreign visitors. There are plans to offer discounted access to local youngsters, schools and businesses. It is hoped that similar schemes will be set up in other towns in the future.

Ros Wilkins, Mendip District Council’s Area Regeneration Manager, said: “Glastonbury is a tourist town and many visitors are very advanced in the technology they bring with them - they expect their gadgets to work. When booking trips, visitors are asking if the accommodation is Wi-Fi enabled. Having the network is a great asset for business in Glastonbury and I think this will be a great success.”

Vietec Consolidates Express Reinforcements Data Protection Strategy

BakBone Software®, a global provider of heterogeneous integrated data protection solutions, today announced that Express Reinforcements, a UK-based specialist supplier of loose and prefabricated construction reinforcements, has selected BakBone NetVault: Backup to protect 140 GB of data, support 200 employees across five branches and strengthen the company’s overall data protection strategy. The BakBone solution was provided by Vietec Limited, a UK-based reseller with a proven track record in the design, implementation and support of ICT services to the private and public sectors.

‘Before deploying BakBone’s software backups were always hit-and-miss,’ said Matthew Coulson, IT engineer at Express Reinforcements. ‘When our capacity requirements exceeded our backup capabilities, we took the opportunity to implement a solution that would enable us to deploy a consolidated data protection strategy with increased reliability. In the past we used other vendors but found the reliability, support and ease-of-use to be lacking. After half an hour spent testing NetVault: Backup we realised it was clearly superior to anything else we had previously tried. The save sets are absolutely wonderful – we can change huge sections of our backup strategy by simply altering one small setting just once.”

Express Reinforcements’ current backup strategy includes four file servers, one located at each major site to provide storage for the local files alongside the daily backups, two Microsoft Exchange servers, and DLT and SDLT tapes.

‘As a rapidly-growing SME we are heavily focused on maintaining a healthy revenues/cost balance, and the right combination of features, ease-of-use and price is something we look for in every department,’ said John Collins, financial director at Express Reinforcements. ‘NetVault: Backup allows our technical team to easily and quickly adapt the backup processes to the ever-changing business demands without pulling them away from other tasks for extended periods of time. This translates into headcount savings and has a direct impact on our bottom line.’

‘Last year the focus was on taking data protection measures to ensure business continuity and comply with specific legislation,’ said Chris Ross, VP of EMEA at BakBone Software. ‘In 2007 we will see a strong focus on ease-of-use and automation. Successful organisations such as Express Reinforcements rightly expect solutions to be designed to make the IT department increasingly more productive. NetVault: Backup allows its users to concentrate on other aspects of the technical infrastructure. With NetVault: Backup, Express Reinforcements’ backup data is centrally managed and stored, their data protection strategy is reliable and the software is much easier to configure and fine-tune.’

‘Before evaluating BakBone’s NetVault: Backup we considered developing our own solution with a combination of R Sync and batch files,’ added Coulson. ‘However, the plug-ins for Microsoft Exchange and Microsoft SQL offered backup that could not be easily replicated so we decided to search outside. When we tested NetVault: Backup, it just worked, and we decided that was the one.’

By introducing Symbol into the Motorola family, Enterprise Mobility will be a real and obtainable asset for business

The two companies individually help set the standard in enterprise communications. Symbol defined technologies like bar code scanning, RFID, WLAN, wireless communications and mobile computing. And they put these new ideas to work, around the world, for thousands of organizations – from retail, utilities and transportation, to government, petrochemicals and manufacturing.

Now they’ve come together, they are building the future of Enterprise Mobility.

They’ve joined their skills, their knowledge, their reputations, their storied histories of innovation, and their thousands of partners (including Vietec) to create a vision for what Enterprise Mobility looks like in the future and how it will redefine the way we all work. It’s a time where every information worker becomes a mobile worker. And every mobile worker becomes an information worker. Empowered with the information they need to make real-time on-the spot decisions, irrespective of physical location. To make businesses flourish, deliver and succeed like never before.

Motorola can now enable businesses to take ideas that can work both inside and outside the four walls of an organization and make them a reality – by delivering new innovations that offer seamless connectivity from the shop floor to the corner office.

Enhanced by the highly reliable, secure connectivity and business applications platform from recently acquired trusted enterprise partner Good Technology, the result is mobile technology so intuitive and transparent, that it’s almost as if the enterprise is no longer a fixed entity…it is everywhere. Securely and reliably.

The bottom line: You’ll see efficiencies you’ve never seen before. Your business will work smarter and your workers will be more productive because they’re better connected.

Motorola Complete Orthogon Systems Aquisition

Today, May 9, 2006, Orthogon Systems was acquired by Motorola, Inc. (NYSE: MOT). This acquisition brings the full power of Motorola’s wireless and broadband innovation and leadership to you, our customers, offering you a broad range of mobile and broadband solutions, a full complement of support services and far-reaching global presence.

Motorola want to assure you that you will continue to receive the same high-quality products and personal service you have come to expect from Orthogon Systems. Motorola will continue to ship the same products and assist with pre- and post-sales support, technical support, warranty and repair service and on-site engineering support where required.

Both Motorola and Orthogon Systems are committed to a seamless integration of their businesses. For further information visit www.orthogonsystems.com

Announcing OS Gemini 5.4GHz and OS Mux

Orthogon Systems has announced the new OS-Gemini Point-to-Point fixed wireless solution for the 5.4 GHz unlicensed band. The new OS-Gemini family of products for 5.4 GHz will enable you to reach a larger number of operators and enterprises with the same carrier-grade reliability and performance you've come to expect from the OS-Gemini. We anticipate high demand for this latest offering especially in geographies where spectrum was either too congested or not available for our 5.8 GHz solutions.

Orthogon has also introduced their new OS MUX 2 and OS MUX 4 Converter solutions designed to help customers bridge legacy voice and data services. The OS-MUX converters allow users to combine Ethernet and TDM Services over Orthogon’s OS-Gemini Wireless bridges, offering a cost-effective solution suitable for campus network applications, interbuilding LAN and PBX extensions, WISP backhaul, MSO voice and data services, and telco trunking.