CompTIA Blog

A look at the week of September 20, 2010, in public advocacy for the IT channelThis week, the Senate passed the Small Business Jobs Act to open credit to small businesses and create incentives to promote expansion and hiring.  Meanwhile, the government has made little progress in implementing a plan to address cybersecurity threats a year after President Obama made it a national priority.  Tech hiring is on the rise, possibly indicating the start of a broader upward trend in hiring.  Representat ...

2010 has been an exciting, if not challenging year for many IT businesses, though the outlook and trends are very positive. Providers and vendors are not only growing their sales pipeline and generating additional services revenue, but several are making acquisitions to strengthen their market position and portfolios. There are countless changes taking place in the IT industry and keeping track of all the new business trends and market opportunities can be extremely difficult. How does the old s ...

On January 24th 1848, James Marshall found gold while working on Sutter’s Mill in northern California.  Word of this discovery spread quickly throughout the state, then extended like wildfire to the rest of the country and the world. It wasn’t long before everyone in the free world understood that fortunes could be made mining for gold in California. The result was an influx of treasure hunters who increased the population of this formerly remote area by as many as 86,000 p ...

A look at the week of September 14, 2010, in public advocacy for the IT channelThis week, the Senate voted to move forward with the Small Business Jobs Act, providing increased loans, programs and tax cuts for small business.  Meanwhile, a growing demand for technology services and electronics is stabilizing tech-heavy metro regions even as the broader economy risks a double-dip.  Although cybersecurity legislation has been listed as a priority for Congress, its passage is far from certain.Small ...

Apple iPads are popping up across the channel, but they won’t be alone. Other PCs are racing to get their tablets out to market. The question is whether tablets will displace PCs. It’s just one of the many issues solution providers and vendors in the channel are wrestling with this week. Beyond tablets, this post from Channel-Lands looks at the benefits of virtualization, increasing demand for custom servers and growing opportunities in professional services.iPad Cannibalizing Notebook SalesYou ...

In a week consumed with stories about burning Qurans and mosque protests in New York City, it was easy to overlook word of a new mass-mailing worm fouling in-boxes across corporate America. But could there be a connection between the prolific attack and the high-profile debates regarding Islam in the Unites States?The worm dubbed “Here You Have,” a nod to the subject line of the offending email, started rolling in on Thursday, Sept. 9, and quickly ensnared machines at corporate heavyweights such ...

Dell has taken the temperature of the healthcare market and has written a prescription for its five-inch Streak tablet as an electronic medical records solution. It’s part of Dell’s big push into healthcare with hardware, software and professional services solutions to digitize and support health care delivery. This is not an unusual strategy. Geoffrey Moore’s book “Crossing the Chasm” codified the wisdom of targeting vertical markets or similar-type companies to ...

There is nothing like watching a courtroom drama on TV when the prosecutor has the suspect on the ropes and is slowly wringing him in with the final line of questioning. Whether you’re a fan of Law & Order (insert your favorite version here), JAG or any other show with a legal theme, you likely root for the good guys to prevail in the end. When the situation occurs on television, it’s entertaining. But when you’re called into court to face criminal charges or answer a civil lawsuit in real l ...

Staff training is a key component to any successful business. But when budgets are tight, margins are razor thin, and sales are flat; where does the small business owner turn? Even in these challenging economic times, business owners need to make sure their team has access to relevant instructional content. CompTIA recognizes this need and is making every effort to assemble a comprehensive library of training materials from some of the leading industry experts—and all readily available in the Me ...

I’ve spent the week monitoring the Channel-Lands from afar in the Far East this past week. Honestly, I’ve been a bit disconnected between trying to keep up with a regular workload and taking in the sights and sounds of Shanghai and the surrounding countryside. Nevertheless, all of the headlines and drama of the channel back home have found me behind the Great Firewall of China. Here’s what tops my list for the stories of the week.Have You ‘Hurd’ about the HP-Oracle Drama?As we used to say in my ...

A look at the week of September 7, 2010, in public advocacy for the IT channelThis week, a failure in Virginia computer networks points to huge system-wide vulnerabilities in every major company and government in the country.  The U.S. has fallen short in awarding contracts to small businesses.  Slow improvements in tech-sector hiring raise questions about the sustainability of future job growth in America. Broad Implications for Crash of Va. Computer Network – The failed data storage unit that ...

Dim news of the U.S. unemployment situation seems inescapable. The official unemployment rate stands at 9.5 percent. Despite trillions (with a big T) of dollars spent on stimulus programs, the sluggishly recovering recession isn’t doing much to spur jobs creation.Comparatively speaking, the tech sector’s unemployment rate – roughly 6 percent – isn’t bad. During the depths of the recession, IT vendors shed tens of thousands of workers, and solution providers eliminated jobs as spending grounded t ...

A look at the week of August 30, 2010, in public advocacy for the IT channel The last week of August, a top Pentagon official confirmed a significant cybersecurity breach in which a flash drive was used to infect U.S. military computers.  A recent report touted the $100-billion Recovery Act as a major source of funding for healthcare IT.  Meanwhile, high tech-sector profits have translated into a frenzy of M&A rather than an increase in hiring.  And with elections approachin ...

Oracle’s outspoken CEO Larry Ellison publicly derides the term “cloud computing” regularly, most notably last January, when at an event detailing the closing of the Sun Microsystems’ acquisition he facetiously bellowed, “What does cloud computing mean? It's just computers, databases and networks. If I'm missing something, please tell me know!”Bluster aside; he’s onto something when it comes to definitions.CompTIA’s first research study on cloud computing is near completion, and one thing evident ...

The last week of summer is supposed to be lazy and quiet, and this past week in the Channel-Lands didn’t disappoint. Well, it was quiet with one exception in the ongoing HP-Dell rivalry. In fact, the quiet could actually signify something deeper brewing beneath the surface.PC Sales Rate Slow (or Is It?)Fears of a double-dip recession in the U.S. and Europe caused Gartner to revise its personal computer sales forecast for the second half of 2010. Originally, Gartner said PC sales would rise at th ...