Tag: innovation

Categories
Business UC voip

We are the champions :)

We are the champions. Yay. Last night Timico together with VoIP infrastructure partners Genband triumphed winning the Global Telecoms Business Award for Innovation. In the telecoms world this doesn’t come any better. Folk had flown in from all over the world although because everyone was in a penguin suit the only way you could tell was from their faces. Had everyone been wearing national costume it would have been interesting:)

The event took place at the Park Lane Hotel. If you’ve never been it’s worth a visit. Terrific venue, especially when you win. Champagne corks popped and a wonderful time was had by all.

Our award was for our Unified Communications Solution / mobility for business. This is our SIP service with Android and iPhone clients. If you haven’t tried it it is definitely worth a go. More details here.

The only downside to last night was that they didn’t give you time to do a speech. However because I can write what I like on this blog I thought I’d do it here instead:

“It is a great honour to receive this Award on behalf of Timico in front of such a large and distinguished audience. I’m not going to say much but there are a few thank yous I do need to make. First of all thanks to all the staff at Timico. Couldn’t have done it without you and I’m just sorry that it isn’t practical  for everyone to be here up on the stage and to drink Genband’s champagne in this lovely art deco ballroom.

Then of course there are Genband themselves whose technology has made it all possible and who are great supporters of the trefor.net Xmas bash every year (12th Dec 2013 – make a note in your diaries now). I’m really pleased to be here with David Hiscock the Genband VP for EMEA who is a very good guy.

Next up are mum and dad and my Aunty Mair who has been in hospital but is hopefully now on the full road to recovery. Thanks mum and dad for everything you have done for me. Looking for ward to seeing you in the summer.

I also promised the kids I’d give them a mention so hello to Tom, Hannah, Joe and John. Don’t stay up too late now and make sure you do your homework.

And finally I can’t come up on this stage without saving the biggest thank you of all to my wife Anne who has had to put up with me for 25 years come this August. This trophy is for you although I’m sorry we can’t keep it on the mantelpiece because it will have to go with all the other silverware in the display cabinet in reception in Newark.

None of it is really silver but I’m sure you know what I mean. It’s all high quality crystalware or perspex or some similar material that looks very nice when lit up on display. It is getting quite crammed mind but hey. We don’t want to stop winning awards do we?

I think that’s it. I’ve covered everyone. Oh no and thanks to Global Telecoms Business for being such a great publication and for putting on this wonderful evening. This award makes all the hard work and effort worthwhile.

So thanks again and hope to see you all next year.”

There we go. That would have been my speech. Short and sweet eh? The photo below is of me (on the right) with David Hiscock (left) was taken by Debbie Rowe of Global Telecoms Business. If you click on it you get another photo showing Debbie herself taking the photo of me and Dave.

Timico cha cha cha.

tref & dave hiscock

Categories
Archived Business

What’s in an award? Timico is 3x finalist in ISPAs

Earlier this year I spent an appreciable chunk of my life filling out awards entries. Three of them were for the ISPAs. Google it. These awards entries have pretty strict entry criteria and very fixed number of words that you are allowed to use. Not nearly enough space to adequately cover how great you are at what you do.

However you have to put yourself in the position of the judges, whoever they are. They don’t want to have to plough through several editions of War and Peace (Tolstoy) when they are giving of their time free and gratis. So it takes ages to condense War and Peace into 500 words or whatever the number was (war was waged, someone won).

Anyway the upshot is that of the three categories entered by Timico we made it to the shortlist for all three: Managed Service Innovation, Customer Service and VoIP, as I recall. Yay.

This is great news because we are up against a lot of other great companies with great services (what a great novel War and Peace was). Great.

Companies enter these awards because if you win it means you have bragging rights and can show off to customers and prospects and hopefully turn the prospects into new customers. I think you know what I’m talking about. So I’m reasonably chuffed to make it to all three shortlists.

Details here. Wish us luck on the 11th July. If you’re going come and say hello.

Ciao.

Categories
Archived Business

Timico is the most innovative business yay

winners need to celebrateOn Friday night we won the award for “Excellence in Innovation” presented by the Nottinghamshire & Derbyshire Chambers of Commerce. Yay. A good night was had by all.

neil armstrong grinsThe photos tell it all. Click on the header pic to see more of what me, Kirsty, Kate and Faye are up to. The bloke behind Neil clearly didn’t win, a condition exacerbated by the fact  that he was driving and not quite in the same “joyous” state of mind.

The Most Innovative Business Award goes to TimicoThere have been times when we entered awards expecting to win but came away with nothing. I specifically remember the time when we had just reached 4th position in the Sunday Times/Microsoft Techtrack 100. That means we were the 4th fastest growing privately held tech company in the UK.

That same year we entered the local Newark Business Awards (I think it was for the fastest growing business but time fuddles the memory). We thought it must be a shoe in. In the event it went to a small local gardening business we had never heard of. I guess we must have read the brief wrongly (growing – pun – never mind!).

The lesson there is you have to take these things with good grace. Win some lose some.

Anyway this present award builds on the Best Business in Newark gong we won earlier this year and on the Best ITSP (Enterprise) cert we got at the ITSPAs. A reasonable haul for a 12 month period.

There are some who think these awards are not worth anything. I disagree. They send out a message, both to the outside world and to staff inside the company.

To our staff I say well done. You are a great bunch of people and I am proud to be working with you.

That’s enough emulsion. Ciao…

PS the award was based on our Mobile Access Management product – see here and here for more.

Categories
4g Business mobile connectivity Net

Global Telecoms Business Innovations Awards

ballroom at the Sheraton Park Lane Hotel for the Global Telecoms Business Innovation AwardsHad a great night at the Sheraton Park Lane Hotel. I was there as a guest of BT Wholesale for the annual Global Telecoms Business Innovations Awards. My hosts won an award for their work with mobile network operator Everything Everywhere in rolling out 4G infrastructure that allowed the sharing of backhaul connectivity. Basically you can now have multiple VLANs terminating at different nodes. In the Cornwall project the BT POP was in Bristol and EE in London (I might be wrong with the specifics here – lemonade has a funny way of playing tricks with my memory but you get the gist).

The video below is of Chet Patel, MD of Markets at BT Wholesale and David Salam of Everything Everywhere picking up the awards which I’m sure will find a treasured spot in their respective HQ receptions 🙂

It’s a serious power networking evening and well worth going if you get an invite. BT won another award with Genband, the company that  Timico partners with for our VoIP infrastructure.

My sincere thanks go to Dave Axam at BT for being such a welcoming host. I’ll be writing up the 4G aspects of the Cornwall project sometime soon. 4G was used to provide internet connectivity for some of the more inaccessible parts of the county.

28/9/13 update – comparison of O2, EE and Vodafone 4G networks in London

Categories
Business internet

Is The UK An Innovation Backwater?

I’m sure this is a subject that has raised its head on many occasion over the past decade or two. It struck me this morning that all the futuristic development work that I am looking at is based on technologies and services that have originated outside the UK.

In particular Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, MySpace, Digg it Yahoo, Google etc etc etc are all North American inventions. The one British equivalent that springs to mind is Friends Reunited which looks as if it has missed the boat big time on the social networking opportunity yet it was probably the first in the space. Certainly I never used it seriously because there was a subscription cost.

Not only is the innovation in the USA but all the conferences that you might want to go to to network and discuss innovation are in the USA. I used to work for a company that had offices in San Jose and when visiting could always sense the spirit of entrepreneurship and innovation that pervaded the whole community. 

Now it is true that due to the nature of the internet and thanks indeed to the ability to communicate and innovate that web2.0 has brought (bit of a generalisation I know) the world is a lot smaller. However there still lacks the forum outside of the USA for getting together with like minded people to discuss and progress.  Jeff Pulver’s “Breakfasts” are a good start and I will be attending the one in London on January 28th.

I periodically hold a “Friday Lunchtime Session” in the office at Timico HQ where innovation is discussed. If there are any like minded people in the UK who want to get together on a periodic basis to discuss innovation, technology, Social Networking, Web2.0 et al please get in touch.