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May 2008

Features

DATA CENTRES
Energy lockdown
The chronic shortage of power for data centres – especially in London – is threatening to cap business expansion
By Andrew Lawrence

WOMEN IN IT
Gender gap
What is exacerbating the gender imbalance in the UK's IT workforce and what can be done to reverse its impact?
By Laurie Penny

Perspective

SECURITY
The Jericho Forum's demolition framework
After four years in gestation, the Jericho Forum delivers a blueprint for perimeterless IT security
By Phil Jones

ENTERPRISE RESOURCE PLANNING
Valentino's designer ERP
Fashion house stiches together its empire with a single ERP infrastructure
By Sally Whittle

NETWORKING
White Stuff streamlines data network
Clothing retailer White Stuff uses a third-party managed WAN to accelerate business processes
By Jessica Twentyman

SYSTEMS MANAGEMENT
Virtual recalibration
Virtualisation is helping to undo decades of inefficiency in the IT infrastructure, but it is not without its own difficulties
By Pete Swabey

Industry

MONTH IN REVIEW
Month in review
The top stories from the IT industry in April 2008
By Pete Swabey

WEB ANALYTICS
Omniture puts web analytics in an IT-free zone
Web analytics provider has taken tools out of the control of IT to empower marketers
By JJ Robinson

SYSTEMS MANAGEMENT
Parallels out from under the radar
The virtualisation and systems management tool provider is emerging from the shadows
By Pete Swabey

SECURITY
Check Point capitalises on independent agenda
The gorilla of pure-play security software wants to help customers with all of their security needs, and not just their perimeter defences
By Phil Jones

FINANCIAL REPORT
Profits squeezed in tech sector
SAP and EMC see profits decline. Meanwhile, Indian IT outsources receive a one year exension on their tax holiday
By Pete Swabey

MERGERS AND ACQUISITIONS
Consolidating WAN acceleration
WAN optimisation pioneer falls to independent upstart as market attracts heavyweights
By Pete Swabey

INFORMATION AGE INDEX
Information Age Index April 2008
IT industry goes off the boil
By Pete Swabey

Departments

INTERNET PROTOCOL
The death of the (open) Internet
A leading US telco has once again predicted the death of the Internet. But is an ulterior motive at play?
By Pete Swabey

ANALYTICS
Flying with black swans
Low-cost airline SkyBus learned the hard way that deep analytics cannot predict everything
By Pete Swabey

INFORMATION MANAGEMENT
Open protest
Panic on the streets of Oslo as Microsoft's OOXML document format achieves standard status
By Pete Swabey

BUSINESS APPLICATIONS
Software-as-a-service enters the mainstream
McKinsey research finds SaaS gaining momentum
By JJ Robinson

IT ADOPTION
Denmark tops world IT ranking
Britain dropping down the charts of technological maturity, according to the World Economic Forum
By JJ Robinson

WEB 2.0
'Enterprise 2.0' boom approaching
Corporate spending on consumer-web inspired systems to explode, says Forrester Research
By JJ Robinson

CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT
CRM back in vogue
New software models have revived the once flagging CRM industry
By JJ Robinson

RELATIONAL DATABASES
RDBMS demand still strong
Relational databases have withstood predictions of obsolescence
By JJ Robinson

DATA CENTRES
European data centres greener than in the US
But a lack of standards is holding back energy improvements
By JJ Robinson

Also in this issue...

MANAGEMENT REPORT
Future of Software 2008
A report from Information Age's Future of Software 2008 event
By Information Age

RESEARCH REPORT
Information orchestration
The drive towards more effective information management. An Information Age Research Report
By Kenny MacIver

BUSINESS BRIEFING
Information integrity
Strategies for dealing with shadow data systems. An Information Age Business Briefing
By Information Age

Back issues

Information Age, July 2008 - The evolution of the CIO, Agile development, enterprise content management. Management Report: The Future of the Data Centre 2008

Information Age, June 2008 - Offshore innovation, Green IT in action, storage deduplication. Management report: Business Intelligence 08. Research Report: The value of IT

Information Age, May 2008 - The coming energy drought, women in IT. Research report: Information orchestration. Business briefing: Shadow data systems. Management report: Future of Software 2008

Information Age, April 2008 - Corporate social networking, securing virtual environments, an interview with HP's enterprise chief Ann Livermore

Information Age, March 2008 - IT opportunity and threat in the new Chinese economy, thin provisioning, the Effective IT 2008 Summit

Information Age, February 2008 - Living without an IT director, alternative biometrics, WiMax. Research report: Data governance

Information Age, January 2008 - The Effective IT 2008 Report: The technologies and services behind today's most dramatic business success stories. Plus: Management Report - IT for the M Business

Information Age, December 2007 - Data centre mythbusting, protecting against floods, SaaS meets SOA. Management report: Eco-responsibilty in IT

Information Age, November 2007 - Contactless payment systems, data centre co-location, systems management & virtualisation. Research report: Maximising IT's potential

Information Age, October 2007 - Serious business in virtual worlds, agile development at Standard Life, VMware profile, NHS Direct Q&A

Information Age, August 2007 - The insider security threat, video conferencing, Effective IT Awards winners report

Information Age, June 2007 - New licensing models, search and BI, Capgemini's global strategy, Q&A: British Energy

Information Age, July 2007 - Agile ERP, financial service innovation, Storage, Business Briefing: XML integration, Management Report: The Future of the Data Centre 2007, Research Report: Virtualisation

Information Age, May 2007 - Dynamic pricing, business process management, content management, Q&A: Reuters

Information Age, April 2007 - Cyber assault, managed print services, fixed-mobile convergence, Management Report: Business Intelligence 2007

Information Age, March 2007 - SOA design pitfalls, virtualisation and the operating systems, Business Briefing: Enterprise 2.0

Information Age, February 2007 - Out of India, the life and times of the relational database, The Effective IT 2007 Summit

Information Age, January 2007 - Advanced analytics, green IT, the state of security, The Effective IT 2007 Report