BBC NEWS | Business | Retail sales 'continue to rise' More Good News from Gordan Browns UK Economy

BBC NEWS | Business | Retail sales 'continue to rise'

Retail sales rose again in July, as the wet weather lifted demand for furniture and homeware goods, the British Retail Consortium (BRC) has said.

UK-wide like-for-like sales - which pulls out the impact of new store openings - increased by 1.8% last month compared with July 2008.

This was a bigger increase than the 1.4% rise reported for June.

However, the BRC cautioned that rising unemployment was preventing a wider return of consumer confidence.

'Home improvements'

Sales of furniture and homewares saw their biggest year-on-year growth in three years during July, although the BRC said this was against a very low base in July 2008, and lifted by extensive discounting.

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UK Continues to drive growth

Logica and Capgemini reported interim 1Q09 results with UK revenue growth of 7% and 4% respectively. Atos Origin's 1Q09 results (announced on 16 April) showed the UK growing at 8%. For all three companies the UK is now the strongest-performing region worldwide. This is strong evidence that the UK is proving more resilient to the downturn than other markets. Picking the sweet spots and avoiding costly dead ends is going to be crucial for IT services providers in 2009. In the more mature UK market, this equates to a relentless focus on outsourcing to help customers reduce costs, as well as a clear emphasis on the public sector, which continues to spend for now. Standalone consulting has all but dried up, but consulting as a complimentary component to an outsourcing sell is paying dividends.

Telecoms and Software News

UK's potential for further growth

Logica's UK orders shot up 24% in 1Q09, largely thanks to its £76-million seven-year win with the National Police Improvement Agency (NPIA) to develop the Police National Database. This is going to be a phased contract and has the potential to grow following the early development work. We suspect Capgemini's UK orders aren't as impressive, but revenue growth nonetheless was healthy (7%) due to its ability to leverage its public sector assets such as with HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) where it is a key partner in consulting, advisory and outsourcing. Group strategy director Martin Cook says that Capgemini is still benefiting from lots of smaller project deals for early design-phase work - a strength that Capgemini can leverage on some of these embedded customer relationships.

IT outsourcing remains the primary driver

IT outsourcing (ITO) is driving opportunities in the UK. Group-wide, Logica's outsourcing revenues were up 9% in the quarter, and orders are steaming ahead, up 44% thanks to significant wins such as the NPIA and the UK's Law Society (£12 million), as well as with TeliaSonera in Sweden. Logica expects to see outsourcing revenues growing throughout 2009, so the signs are certainly good - not least in the UK, where outsourcing makes up the highest percentage (45%) of Logica's revenue mix.Capgemini too is seeing a surge in outsourcing bookings - up nearly 40% group-wide in 1Q09. Its notable UK ITO deal is a £14-million five-year contract with Atkins to provide IT infrastructure and applications services. Cook stressed that a large number of first-generation ITO are deals coming through, and it should benefit from these over the coming quarters both in the UK and in other territories.

UK public sector keeps on spending

Despite longer-term concerns, the UK public sector is currently acting as a safe haven. Logica saw UK public sector revenues grow 10% in 1Q09, thanks largely to the NPIA deal. Looking ahead, Logica's pipeline is mostly weighted to public sector and telecoms. Capgemini is seeing significant growth too. Group-wide, public sector now accounts for 28% of revenues, up from 24% in 1Q08. Despite a fall last year, Capgemini benefitted from increased project spending at HMRC on business intelligence and information management systems to improve revenue accrual. We expect Capgemini to benefit further as new opportunities emerge to assist HMRC in reducing tax avoidance. The UK government is currently responding to its financial challenges through a proactive investment in systems and technology to plug revenue leakage. Capgemini and other suppliers would do well to seek out related government 'revenue-leakage' opportunities.

Environment Agency big ticket

Both Capgemini and Atos Origin are bidding on the potential £700-million first-generation IT outsourcing contract at the Environment Agency. This contract is one of the UK's largest in 2009, and is attracting a lot of interest. We would expect IBM to be there too since it provides consultancy to the Environment Agency, and is the lead ITO provider to its department DEFRA.The Environment Agency deal has the potential to deliver a £100 million per annum boost for the winner, and all suppliers are competing on an ambitious sustainability-led procurement. Capgemini has a strong message around the desktop (thanks to its experience at HMRC) and is deploying its consultants to test sustainable ideas, while Atos Origin is exploring green data centres and reducing energy consumption. The eventual winner will need to prove its vision for sustainability through a strong track record elsewhere in government and a willingness to be flexible on terms, pricing and delivery.

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EBay-style feedback for services

Source BBC http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7934042.stm

People in England will get more online powers to rate GPs, police, childcare and councils, Gordon Brown has said.

He said it was wrong that consumer websites such as Amazon and eBay had "higher standards of transparency" than those for public services.

Officials liken the new approach to the Tripadvisor site, where travellers can share their thoughts on hotels.

The PM promised an "information revolution", but the Tories said public services were still too bureaucratic.

In a document called Working Together, Mr Brown acknowledges the government has been "much too slow to make use of the enormous democratising power of information".

He sets out what he calls "a new agenda of public service reform" and says government must transfer more power to parents and patients.

'Systematic access'

A site comparing council services is due to go live in May and the government is also bringing together a national crime map for England and Wales to be available online by the end of 2009.

From this summer, patients will be able to comment on local services and provide feedback on GPs via the NHS Choices website.

Childcare providers are to undergo similar scrutiny from parents via a site expected to be up and running early next year.

Mr Brown said: "We are ushering in a new world of accountability in which parents, patients and local communities shape the services they receive, ensuring all our public services respond not simply to the hand of government, but to the voice of local people."

UK government backs open source, will it impact Microsoft position in Public Sector

Source BBC:

he UK government has said it will accelerate the use of open source software in public services.

Tom Watson MP, minister for digital engagement, said open source software would be on a level playing field with proprietary software such as Windows.

Open source software will be adopted "when it delivers best value for money", the government said.

It added that public services should where possible avoid being "locked into proprietary software".

Licences for the use of open source software are generally free of charge and embrace open standards, and the code that powers the programs can be modified without fear of trampling on intellectual property or copyright.

According to some in the open source industry, the shift from proprietary standards could save the government £600m a year.

Simon Phipps, chief open source officer for Sun Microsystems, said the UK government's stance was part of a "global wave" of take up for open source in governments.

Comment: I use a great deal of Open Source software (Linux, Open Office, GIMP, Flock, Second Life) and I think it is inevitable that free software is going to make up more and more of the offering to users in the future. Microsoft needs to extend its IP beyond selling software. The Cloud is where the computer is at.