Intellect is helping MOD engage industy with the DCNS programme. The following is a direct extract of the most recent Blog from Cdre Jamie Hay RN who is the DCNS Programme Director:

Welcome to my first blog as the DCNS Programme Director. I am delighted to have the opportunity to lead the DCNS Programme – there can surely be few other programmes in Defence that will impact every single member of the Armed Forces and MOD Civil Service!

How we all work, now and in the future, depends on the successful delivery of the changes and future ICT services that we are charged to deliver.

My predecessor has very successfully set the scene on how we are going to meet the challenge to reduce costs, provide more integrated services to users and be more agile to meet the unpredictable needs of the future while making the most of the very rapid development and innovations in the ICT sector. My theme now is that we move at pace to implement our new model for ICT services acquisition. Our priority must be to ensure that we have our new commercial arrangements in place for transition of our current ‘Big 5′ to meet their current contract end dates. It is also important that all our DCNS Programme workstreams continue to move together at the pace needed so we achieve this transition in such a way that we move rapidly on the journey to becoming an agile Services Delivery organisation. There is much to play for, particularly in working with other public and private sector organisations which have embarked on a similar journey and in working closely with the other change programmes in the Defence Transformation Portfolio so that we stay in step with them and seize the opportunities that will arise along the way. It will be an exciting ride and we are in this together as ‘one team’!

On the theme of ‘pace’, top of my in-tray this month is to address the questions arising from the Business Case submissions taken by the Investment Approvals Committee in late December. We are working closely with COM Joint Enablers and CDM on this. On the theme of ‘one team’ a number of events will be taking place to further develop how the ISS Programmes team works, both internally and externally, so that we use everyone’s expertise, experience and energy to deliver as quickly, effectively and efficiently as we can as we move to the ‘cutting metal’ stage.

Technorati Tags: DCNS, MoD

All avid 3million lives supporters

Last night I attended a reception at the Institute of Directors following the December publication of the government’s life science strategy and its ‘Innovation, health and wealth’ report.  In attendance we had the Secretary of State for Health Andrew Lansley, Under Secretary of State for Health Earl Howe, Universities and Science Minister David Willets and the NHS Chief Executive Sir David Nicholson.  It was a fairly informal gathering with key people from the NHS, DH and industry mingling around slapping each other on the back for a job well done on getting so many stakeholders agree on a collaborate way forward to ensure the NHS continues to lead on innovation and quality.

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Technorati Tags: 3million lives, Future Forum, health IT, information for health, Innovation, Intellect Healthcare Programme, joint plan DH and Intellect, NHS, Telehealth

Innovation, Health and Wealth - government's way forward

“We can be proud of our past – but we cannot be complacent about our future. The industry is changing; not just year by year, but month by month. We must ensure that the UK stays ahead…  – we’ve got to change radically – the way we innovate, the way we collaborate, the way we open up the NHS.”

These are the words of Prime Minister David Cameron, who yesterday announced a series of initiatives to respond to the changing nature of healthcare and the health and life science industries. The Department of Health launched the ‘Innovation, Health and Wealth: accelerating adoption and diffusion in the NHS’.

Complementing these reports DH also published the headline findings from the Whole Systems Demonstrator trial, the largest randomised control trial of telehealth and telecare in the UK, and indeed the world.

On the back of these headline findings David Cameron launched a campaign to roll out telehealth across the nation. He told the Independent:

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Technorati Tags: 3 Million Lives, Digital by Default, health IT, Innovation Health and Wealth, intellect, Intellect Healthcare Programme, NHS, NHS Innovation Review, procurement, Telehealth

Today, the National Audit Office (NAO) published its report on how the NHS, supported by the Department of Health, plans to deliver efficiency savings of up to £20 billion by 2014-15.  It’s a quite useful report clarifying a lot of questions that have been on people’s minds:

• how savings targets have been set across individual trusts and other health bodies;
• how those bodies plan to secure the necessary savings locally;
• how the Department and NHS plan to monitor progress; and
• how innovative practice is being shared.

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Technorati Tags: Department of Health, Efficiency savings, health IT, intellect, NHS, QIPP

The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) figures released this week confirm what we all knew – growth will be slower, borrowing higher and the recovery will take longer than we had hoped.  What fosters even more uncertainty is the fact that the forecasts are based on the assumption that policymakers find a solution to the eurozone sovereign debt crisis.  Given that a resolution seems as far away as ever, further downgrades to growth forecasts seem almost certain. (more…)

Technorati Tags: Ed Balls, George Osborne, growth review, Office for Budget Responsibility, productivity

The much anticipated new version of the Cyber Security Strategy is finally out. But is it any good? Well, generally its reception has been good and, from an Intellect point of view, we support it.

In particular, Intellect was very pleased to see some recommendations from our November 2010 paper Improving Cyber Security Partnerships reflected in the strategy. For example, our recommendations about HMG sharing cyber threat information with the private sector,  the adoption of a widely recognisable kitemark, the rationalisation of UK standards applicable to cyber security products and solutions, and greater transparency of public funded research on cyber security have been incorporated into the HMG’s 2011 Cyber Security Strategy. It is also encouraging that our input into this strategy has also been incorporated into the document.

So what does it say?

First of all, the strategy recognises that the Internet is vital to the UK’s economy. Internet businesses comprise 6% of GDP and are slated to create 365,000 jobs over the next five years. Moreover, HMG’s ‘digital by default’ agenda and its move to migrate services to the cloud will mean that the UK will become more and more dependent on cyber space for our public services.

These growth figures are mimicked internationally. For example, e-commerce sees US$8 trillion change hands annually and current estimates suggest that for every 10% increase in broadband access, global GDP will rise, on average, by 1.3%.

As a result, ensuring that the UK is a safe place to do business is critical to the economic wellbeing of the UK.

The strategy also rightly makes the point that cyber security cannot be achieved by placing responsibility solely in the hands of HMG. However, the view from HMG is companies need to ensure their IPR is protected adequately and need to ensure cyber is recognised at a board level. It’s also been suggested by Government that company audit committees should routinely review this risk.

Some companies are already very good at protecting themselves from the cyber threat. Unsurprisingly, these tend to be the Defence Primes or Internet Technology Companies. This means, other companies – both in the UK and worldwide – need to take action to protect themselves and recognise cyber as a real risk to their business. Achieving cyber security does not require massive investment in new technology. It’s largely accepted that 80% of cyber risks can be addressed by applying good practice within companies, which would include keeping anti-malware applications up to date, ensuring operating system and third party application updates are installed quickly and educating staff correctly.

One of the most important recommendations in the new strategy is the call for greater co-operation between HMG and the private sector with regard to cyber security. Organisations such as GCHQ will now need to work in partnership with commercial organisations. This recommendation is being implemented through the development of a hub and node solution to share information and best practice between the public and private sectors. Intellect and its members fully support this activity. In fact, Intellect – along with ADS – has been working with 25 of its members for the last six months to develop a virtual node that will enable companies in the advanced technology industry to share cyber threat information with each other. We hope that, over time, this node will be integrated into HMG’s Hub initiative.

Intellect also praises the strategy’s recognition that cyber presents a host of opportunities to UK business. Therefore, UKTI will be committed to working with trade associations to ‘to turn the threat into opportunity and make strong cyber security a positive for all UK businesses’.

So how will this affect your business?

Intellect suspects that the impact of the Cyber Security Strategy will be that ‘cyber’ will become part of normal business risk assessment. There will be more pressure from clients (particularly public sector clients), shareholders, and auditors to demonstrate how your business is mitigating cyber threats.

These greater expectations will be complemented by the general public, commercial entities, and public sector customers having better knowledge and an easier time in mitigating the cyber threat. This is because ‘kite-marked’ products, cyber-specific standards, and best or good practice guides will be developed and widely distributed.

To support this Intellect will be issuing its good practice guide aimed at SMEs in early to mid 2012 and will continue to work in partnership with ADS to deliver the advanced technology industry node (Virtual Task Force) next year.

Technorati Tags: Cabinet Office, cyber, Cyber Hub, cyber security strategy, Cyber Strategy, GCHQ, Hub, Kitemark

Intellect launched a suite of important initiatives at yesterday’s Cabinet Office Supplier conference: “The Crown and Suppliers: A New Way of Working”. The initiatives are designed to provide government with better access to the tech market and help with government’s drive to improve ICT and commercial skills in government. This is in recognition of the fact that government is going to great lengths to seize the potential of technology to reform public services, and the technology industry and Intellect, as the industry’s trade association, are keen to proactively help drive that agenda forward.

The conference itself was very well attended with around 800 people registered, many from the private sector (cross-industry) with some key public sector delegates in the audience as well.  With an excellent line-up of speakers, Francis Maude, Joe Harley, Liam Maxwell, John Collington Ian Watmore, Phil Pavitt, Bill Crothers and many more, the event sought to provide delegates with a better understanding of government’s procurement, commercial and ICT agendas and an insight into government’s future potential contracting pipeline.

The highlight of the conference for us was three of the key names in government ICT flagging up the Intellect initiatives I have mentioned above in their speeches: the Cabinet Office Minister Francis Maude, The Government CIO Joe Harley, and the Director of ICT Futures, Liam Maxwell. (more…)

Technorati Tags: Government ICT, Government ICT Strategy, industry government working together, Intellect market access and skills

Following Intellect’s successful 4G Mobile Broadband conference, I would like to thank our speakers and panellists for their enlightening and provoking presentations and insights during the panel discussions.

Our day was kicked off by John Higgins who introduced John Woodget of Intel, followed by H Nwana of Ofcom and Frank Mather of the European Commission.

John Woodget spoke about the service provider sector - particularly the need for the industry to regain leadership. Intel believes this can be facilitated by a number of measures including; swift release of spectrum, development of longer term strategies, regaining international influence and the promotion of UK industry. (more…)

Technorati Tags: 4G, Adam Pollard, Analysis Mason, Android, Andy Nuttal, Apple, Blue Nowhere, DCMS, Dr Matt Yardley, Ed Vaizey, EU, European Commission, Everything Everywhere, Google, H Nwana, ICT KTN, Intel, intellect, iPhone, John Woodget, Kip Meek, LTE, mobile broadband, mobile network operators, Ofcom, Peter Curnow-Ford, Philip Hargrave, Skype, Stephen Lerner, Three, Vodafone, Wimax

This weekend sees the opening of a global gathering of ICT executives, government officials and policy makers, who are meeting to share ideas on how ICT can drive economic growth, create jobs, overcome social exclusion and improve quality of life. (more…)

Following the publication of the strategic implementation plan (SIP) for the government ICT strategy, the Cabinet Office yesterday published sub-strategies for 4 of its 19 delivery areas – cloud, green ICT, end-user devices and ICT capability.  For ease of reference for Intellect members, we have highlighted some of the key points from each of the four strategies.

In addition, here are some of our observations on each of the four sub-strategies.

Government Cloud – The vision of the G-cloud strategy shows that the UK government is in step with the industry.  Commitments to a ‘public cloud first policy’, the move to ‘on-demand delivery’ and buying more solutions from the market ‘as is’ are on the money.  (more…)

Technorati Tags: Cabinet Office, capability, cloud, end user devices, Government ICT, green ICT