2,000 Qld IT staff to be outsourced, says union
Some 2,000 Queensland Government IT staff are set to be outsourced in the wake of the state's disastrous ICT Audit, according to one of the Government's main unions.
Unisys IT modernisation gives Co-operative Bank a boost
Unisys has released a statement saying that its New Zealand subsidiary has improved the Co-operative Bank’s IT infrastructure using Unisys ClearPath Forward systems.
NSW Govt seeks storage as a service
The New South Wales State Government has gone to market for storage as a service capabilities to replace its existing in-house storage solutions, in a move that will add to the rapid ramp-up of the state's adoption of cloud computing services.
You can’t actually buy Windows 8 in Australia [Update: Well, kind of]
Windows 8 has launched in Australia. But you can't actually buy fully boxed copies of it locally. No, really.
Purge: Qld Govt cuts 384 IT contractors
The new LNP Queensland State Government today revealed that it had terminated the contracts of some 384 technology contractors in total over the past few months, as it ramps up its drive to slash technology-related spending while simultaneously remediating dated IT systems left to languish by the previous Labor administration.
Now David Jones gets hacked
news David Jones today notified customers that it had become the latest casualty in a hacking spree which appears to be targeting Australian retailers.
The...
Unita dumps MYOB, Excel spreadsheets for NetSuite
Interior-construction company Unita has replaced a number of instances of MYOB, Accentus and Excel spreadsheets with a single instance of NetSuite OneWorld to manage its core business processes.
Microsoft cranks up student indoctrination program
Chalk this one up to a bit of Microsoft mid-October marketing madness. The big M has started advertising for full-time students at Australian universities to spruik its products for it on campuses all around Australia.
Qld Health’s IT woes just keep coming
An interesting article published here by the Courier-Mail just before Christmas lays out yet another IT-related headache being suffered at the moment by Queensland's favourite technological minefield, Queensland Health.
Bailey quits Macquarie for non-profit COO role
Long-time Macquarie University chief information officer Marc Bailey has left the educational institution to join non-profit group Intersect, which focuses on applying advanced ICT technologies to the practice of research.
NSW Police trials iPad minis for tickets
New South Wales' police force has revealed plans to undertake a four-week field trial of a mobile app for officers to issue traffic infringement notices, which will be deployed in the field on locked-down versions of Apple's iPad mini tablets.
“Waste of money”: Sydney Grammar School bans laptops in class
According to at least one school, these new-fangled devices are a "waste of money" and should be banned.
ASG sues Victorian Govt over cancelled ERP contract
Australian IT services provider ASG is suing the State of Victoria with the aim of recovering its costs arising from a terminated contract.
Specsavers deploys Google Apps, loves cloud
Optometry chain Specsavers has deployed Google Apps to its Australian staff and hopes to continue moving almost everything else into the fluffy happy land of cloud computing, the company's Asia-Pacific IT director Simon Baxter has told iTNews on the sidelines of the CIO Strategy Summit the week before last.
Atlassian installs Valve-esque portals in offices
Not content with already being one of the best places to work in Australia, local software developer Atlassian has taken its coolness factor one step further by installing videoconferencing gear set up to look like actual portals (you know, from the popular video game ‘Portal’) in several of its offices so that staff in different locations can talk to each other virtually.
IBM suffers “catastrophic failure” at health dept
The Federal Department of Health and Aging has accused technology giant IBM of causing a “catastrophic failure” in its IT systems stemming from an update to its storage environment that took down a number of services for a period of time this week.
Recruiter picks Telstra for cloud, telco services
Recruitment and HR services provider Randstad has signed a three-year deal with Telstra, to provide telecommunication services and transition the company into a cloud-computing model.
Brisbane City Council plans IT offshoring
All the cool kids are conducting IT outsourcing initiatives this year. Boral’s doing it, Woolworths is doing it; it’s basically par for the course if you’re a major corporation or government department. But that hasn’t stopped one of the Brisbane City Council’s main unions from jumping up and down over Brisbane City Council’s plans to shift up to 50 IT roles offshore.
NSW finalises colossal datacentre consolidation
The New South Wales State Government this week announced the Leighton subsidiary Metronode as the winner of its long-running and wide-ranging datacentre overhaul project, with the company to construct two new substantial facilities which will allow the state to consolidate its IT operations drastically.
IBM unveils Watson centre in Melbourne as AI adoption takes off in Australia
Global technology giant IBM last week officially opened a new client experience centre in Melbourne where it will show off its Watson artificial intelligence platform, which is increasingly being adopted by major Australian organisations such as Deakin University, ANZ Bank, Customs and Woodside.
Government to retain ownership of Canberra’s ICON network
The Federal Government has announced it will not sell off the Intra Government Communications Network (ICON) – a fibre network connecting public service buildings throughout Canberra.
Where’s My Jetpack? An awesomely epic rant by Australia’s new CTO
If you have even the slightest interest in government IT or technology project management, we recommend you sit down with a cup of tea and your tablet and read this epic rant by Australia's new chief technology officer John Sheridan. It's worth it.
NSW Education Dept’s SAP-based billion-dollar LMBR system is still malfunctioning
Those of you with an enduring interest in State Government IT projects will recall that Delimiter has covered the NSW Education Department's Learning Management and Business Reform (LMBR) project on many occasions.
NSW education board seeks Chief Digital Officer to drive innovation
The New South Wales Board of Studies, Teaching and Educational Standards (BOSTES) is seeking a Chief Digital Officer to drive innovation across schools in the state.
Premier announces “technology revolution” for Victoria Police
Victoria’s frontline police men and women will soon be kitted out with state-of-the-art mobile technology intended to bring about a "technology revolution", thanks to funding allocated in the latest state budget.
Digging into the Creative Cloud cost picture
Local Melbourne blogger Dawnstar Australis has found that Australians may end paying substantially more over the long-term to use Creative Clowd than traditional boxed copies of Adobe software.
Beverage giant picks Win8 tablet over iPads
Microsoft has revealed that the Australian division of specialist beverage company Campari has deployed a number of Windows 8-based tablet devices from HP, as well as having plans to deploy Windows 8 more generally in the business's desktop and laptop fleet.
IBM’s Watson is reportedly expanding into Woodside’s desktops
For most of the time that IBM's Watson artificial intelligence (for want of a better word) system has been around, I suspect many technology journalists such as myself have viewed the platform as something of a toy -- a pet project which Big Blue can use to demonstrate its deep technology research credentials and wow live quiz shows on television. But if this article by iTnews is any indication, Watson is moving past that into something rather more functional.
NSW Education SAP ERP project turning from bad into Queensland Health-style “complete disaster”
Here at Delimiter we've been tracking the NSW Department of Education and Communities' long-running Learning Management and Business Reform project for quite a few years already. And the project just keeps on going from bad to worse, by all appearances.
Gen-i Australia may completely shut down
You couldn’t exactly say that the Australian division of IT services company Gen-i was in rude health, with the company revealing in mid-March that it would sack most of its staff and stop competing for most local contracts, as it shifted focus to only serving Trans-Tasman contracts as per the instructions of its parent Telecom New Zealand. However, according to CRN, things may be even more dire
NSW Govt may scrap IT shared services units
The New South Wales Government has indicated it may follow in the footsteps of fellow states Queensland and Western Australia and drastically re-work its IT shared services strategy, in the wake of questionable benefits having flowed from the scheme.
CenITex has no disaster recovery capacity
An audit of departments and agencies within the Victorian Government has found many don't have sufficient business continuity/disaster recovery facilities to keep them operating in the event of a major disaster, with the situation exacerbated by the lack of capability found at IT shared services agency CenITex.
Xero migrates to Amazon Web Services
New Zealand-based accounting software company Xero has made what it calls the "massive move" to the Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud platform.
Qld to deploy whole of govt search
The Queensland Government has flagged plans to deploy a whole of government search package which will allow Internet users to search its hundreds of websites and other online resources through a single, centralised portal.
Offshore cloud providers popular in Australia
A study has found that two-thirds of Australian enterprises which utilise cloud computing services, do so from offshore providers whose servers are located outside Australia rather than opting for a local provider.
Empired eclipses Fujitsu in Horizon Power IT deal
IT services group Empired has just clinched a deal to manage the ICT infrastructure of electricity provider Horizon Power – a state government-owned company providing electricity to Western Australia.
Poor Victorian IT system affecting child safety
The Victorian Auditor-General has told the state's Department of Human Services to treat the need for a better client information system as a "priority", with revelations that the department's existing system was difficult to use and not being used correctly, as well as the fact that staff are still using cumbersome fax-based technology to report abuse.
Australia Post trials drone deliveries
Australia Post has announced the it will be the "first major parcels and logistics company" in Australia to trial package delivery by remotely piloted aircraft, also called drones.
NSW Govt trials inter-truck safety devices
The New South Wales Government has inked a contract with connected vehicle technology supplier Cohda Wireless, as part of a trial of so-called Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems (C-ITS) which allow heavy vehicles to communicate directly with each other about their position on the road to help reduce road accidents.
Ninefold launches Aussie Box.net rival
Australian public cloud computing company Ninefold has launched a new cloud storage service entitled Business Cloud Drive. This service enables organisations of 100+ users to store, access and share their continually growing amounts of data in a secure, local and easily accessible location.
Actually, Australia trains more IT than fitness staff
Remember last week when REA Group chief information officer Nigel Dalton published a somewhat disturbing article on his site noting that Australia currently trains more fitness instructors than IT professionals? As it turns out, Dalton may have been wrong.
Hyde quits NEC
NEC Australia managing director Alan Hyde has unexpectedly resigned from his role leading the local operations of the Japanese company, with the chief planning officer of NEC Australia, Tetsuro Akagi, to take his place.
DTO mandates APIs for Federal agencies
The DTO is looking to make it mandatory for government agencies to create APIs for all new services, and to consume their own APIs when delivering those services.
Digital Transformation Office adds Sydney digs as formal hiring campaign kicks off
The Federal Government’s Digital Transformation Office has revealed plans to locate a small office on-campus at the University of Technology Sydney, as well as embarking on a rapid hiring campaign in which it will seek the best Australian technologists to help deliver lasting changing in government IT service delivery.
Salesforce.com is making in-roads into Australia’s banking sector again
Cloud computing vendors such as Salesforce.com have had a bit of a difficult relationship with Australia's banking and financial services sector. This week from the company's Dreamforce conference in the US comes news that Salesforce.com is yet again making some headway.
The Australian Cloud: Is it delivering on its promises?
Half a decade ago, cloud computing was hyped to the max as a new class of technologies that would deliver radical improvements to the flexibility and agility of both private sector businesses and governments. But a few years down the track, is it delivering on those promises in Australia? We investigate in this extensive feature article.
Google leaves Australia off cloud expansion list
Google has announced two new regions for its Cloud Platform network of datacentres, with more on the way, but it is still unclear if Australia will eventually be included in the list.
Victoria to replace hacked Myki cards — or not
Victoria’s troubled Myki public transport smartcard project has suffered another high profile setback, with the state to replace over a million of the cards following revelations they can be hacked for free transport.
Trojan takes down entire WA Parliament IT, phone system
Bad news for the Western Australian Parliament, which, it appears, didn't have the most hardened IT security systems on earth. The ABC is reporting today that a "trojan virus" has knocked the Parliament's IT and telephone systems offline.
Oracle reveals swathe of Aussie rollouts
Enterprise technology giant Oracle has published details of half a dozen sizable deployments of its technology by Australian customers, as it continues its push to convince local technology buyers of the popularity of its Fusion platforms.
SAP considers Aussie datacentre
The Financial Review has reported that German software giant SAP is likely to build an Australian datacentre to provide services to Australian organisations, should new privacy legislation pass that could affect vendors' ability to sell cloud computing services locally from global facilities.
AGIMO in flurry of cloud computing moves
The Federal Government’s peak technology strategy division has made a series of announcements aimed at pushing forward its vision with respect to public sector uptake of the new generation of cloud computing services and making such services available on the right terms to departments and agencies.
Programming error costs CommBank over $2.5m
A flawed computer programme has forced Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) to stump up $2.5m in penalties and written off overdrafts, according to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC).
PIPE founder, Gordon Bell invest in OrionVM
Australian cloud computing startup OrionVM today revealed it had taken angel investment capital from two high-profile technology sector luminaries: PIPE Networks co-founder Stephen Baxter and US engineer Gordon Bell, of Digital Equipment Corporation fame.
Govt blocks PCEHR review release
The Federal Department of Health has moved to block the public release of a report reviewing the troubled Personally Controlled Electronic Health Records project, stating that there are not sufficient public interest reasons for the report to be released, despite the fact that Health Minister Peter Dutton has stated the document contains “a comprehensive plan for the future of electronic health records in Australia”.
Medibank nicks ANZ exec to lead IT operations
Health insurer Medibank Private this week revealed it had nicked a senior IT executive from ANZ Bank who had also led IT for the UK’s National Health Service to lead Medibank’s IT operations.
Healthcare Australia dumps in-house Exchange for cloud
The shift to cloud computing/software as a service models in Australian enterprise IT circles is endless, it appears. Yesterday it was retailer Dick Smith switching to Google Apps, and today it’s medical recruiter Healthcare Australia switching off an in-house version of Microsoft Exchange and onto Office 365.
Vic Govt mulls choose your own device policy
When it comes to working in government departments and agencies, you know the drill when it comes to personal IT infrastructure. Public servants are typically issued with an ageing desktop PC bought about five years ago and running Windows XP (or sometimes, God forbid, Windows Vista), a BlackBerry for their mobile phone, and they'll have to argue with their IT support team to get permission to install something as basic as Mozilla Firefox. We've all been there at one time or another. However, if an article published by Intermedium last week is to be believed, the Victorian Government is seeking to shake this paradigm up.
Bendigo and Adelaide Bank adopts IBM cloud
Bendigo and Adelaide Bank has adopted IBM Cloud to boost development of new banking products and services for its 1.6 million customers.
New cloud development aims to support charities
Appichar, a technology company that has been working with not-for-profit organisations for over ten years in the UK and three years in Australia, has launched a locally developed system called ‘Supporter360’ that aims to use the latest cloud technologies to help charitable organisations computerise their operations with minimal capital investment.
15 years later, Health breaks up IBM’s crown
Fifteen years after it first outsourced its IT department to global technology IBM, in a deal renewed half a dozen times and worth hundreds of millions of dollars, the Federal Department of Health has finally placed key components of the deal back on the market, in its first formal request for the tender in the area since 1999.