Karlson Tech Bar

Thursday 16^th February marked another successful event for Karlson UK:

The quiz night event was held at Minster Exchange.  Whilst there were some very tricky questions from our notorious quiz master David Tulip – our hats went off to the winning table with AVNet/NetApp… We can almost be sure that they didn’t have help from Google!

Congratulations also go to our iPad 2 winner Richard Mumford from ASB Law. Richard was a guest of Karlson client Steve Edkins from Fusion.

A huge thank you all our partners that supported this event, Mimecast, EK4M, Kyocera, Ricoh, Virocom, Canon, AVNet/NetApp and Destinations Green.  We hope you gained as much from the event as we did.

Thank you to Tegan Bolwell, our events manager, for organising and making the Tech Bar so successful.

At Karlson UK we really do believe in a personal and professional service; this event allowed our partners, prospects, customers and team to network and really get to know each other.

We hope to see you all at our next Tech Bar on 22nd March, you can register for it right now! The location is a highly guarded secret… But keep following for more information at:
http://www.karlsonuk.com/News.html

Demystifying the Cloud

Just what is the 'cloud' - Karlson tells it how it is:

Cloud computing is a general term for anything that involves delivering hosted services over the Internet. These services are broadly divided into three categories: Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS), Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS).

The name cloud computing was inspired by the cloud symbol that's often used to represent the Internet in flowcharts and diagrams.

A cloud service has three distinct characteristics that differentiate it from traditional hosting. It is sold on demand, typically by the minute or the hour; it is elastic -- a user can have as much or as little of a service as they want at any given time; and the service is fully managed by the provider (the consumer needs nothing but a personal computer and Internet access). Significant innovations in virtualization and distributed computing, as well as improved access to high-speed Internet and a weak economy, have accelerated interest in cloud computing.

A cloud can be private or public. A public cloud sells services to anyone on the Internet. (Currently, Amazon Web Services is the largest public cloud provider.) A private cloud is a proprietary network or a data center that supplies hosted services to a limited number of people. When a service provider uses public cloud resources to create their private cloud, the result is called a virtual private cloud. Private or public, the goal of cloud computing is to provide easy, scalable access to computing resources and IT services.

Infrastructure-as-a-Service like Amazon Web Services provides virtual server instanceAPI) to start, stop, access and configure their virtual servers and storage. In the enterprise, cloud computing allows a company to pay for only as much capacity as is needed, and bring more online as soon as required. Because this pay-for-what-you-use model resembles the way electricity, fuel and water are consumed, it's sometimes referred to as utility computing.

Platform-as-a-service in the cloud is defined as a set of software and product development tools hosted on the provider's infrastructure. Developers create applications on the provider's platform over the Internet. PaaS providers may use APIs, website portals or gateway software installed on the customer's computer. Force.com, (an outgrowth of Salesforce.com) and GoogleApps are examples of PaaS. Developers need to know that currently, there are not standards for interoperability or data portability in the cloud. Some providers will not allow software created by their customers to be moved off the provider's platform.

In the software-as-a-service cloud model, the vendor supplies the hardware infrastructure, the software product and interacts with the user through a front-end portal. SaaS is a very broad market. Services can be anything from Web-based email to inventory control and database processing. Because the service provider hosts both the application and the data, the end user is free to use the service from anywhere.

Toshiba Annual Conference

Steve Todd represented Karlson at the annual Toshiba conference. This prestigious evening is hosted by Toshiba and is noted for its quality and exceptional entertainment.

Karlson Supports Charity Golf Day

A fantastic day was had by all at the East Herts Golf Club - Karlson are proud sponsors and show on the tee looking ultra relaxed is Karlson's Sales and Marketing Director, Steve Todd.

iPad winner at Karslon's Tech Bar event

Karlson's Tech Bar event held downstairs at Minster Exchange was a resounding success. An enjoyable evening of good food, drinks and banter was enjoyed by all.

Winner of the quiz, Richard Mumford from ASB Law was the winner of our monthly quiz and takes home a brand new Apple iPad. Richard was a guest of Karlson client Steve Edkins from Fusion.

Karlson MD Martyn Kidd comments "The Tech Bar this month was our best so far, a great opportunity for customers to spend some quality social time with Karlson and technlogy partners. The evening was very successful and we now look forward to the next one".

To see a full set of pictures from the evening click here

For an evening of knowledgeable banter and entertainment and a chance to win another fabulous prize at the next Karlson Tech Bar event simply register your interest here

The five rings symbolize the five significant continents and are interconnected to symbolize the friendship to be gained from these international competitions.

In 1894, Pierre de Coubertin, proposed a revival of the ancient tradition, and thus the modern-day Olympic games were born.

The Olympic motto: Citius, Altius, Fortius translates as Swifter, Higher, Stronger.