World Cup gap for SMEs

30 October 2009

The promise of a World Cup windfall for South African business in 2010 is likely to fall dramatically short for Small, Medium and Micro Enterprises (SMEs).  That’s one of the key findings of SME Survey 2009, which set out to gauge expectations of the event among SMEs. Small, medium and micro enterprise owners, it emerged, tend to be overwhelmingly positive for the country as a whole, but have a gap in expectations for themselves.

SME Survey: Beat the recession with business basics

14 October 2009

Business basics will get you through the recession. That is the single most important piece of advice to emerge from SME Survey 2009, the latest edition of the annual study of the factors behind the success of small and medium enterprises in South Africa.

Small and medium-size businesses (SME’s) in key economic sectors are holding their own in the current economic downturn with a healthy 28% reporting that they are strongly profitable, a further 39% reporting that they are trading in the black and 24% breaking even, says Louis van Ravesteyn, Head of Small and Medium Enterprises at Standard Bank.

SME Survey: Potential financial woes worry SME owners

30 September 2009

With the economy in recession for the first time in 17 years it comes as little surprise that small to medium business owners in South Africa are being kept awake at night by financial issues. This is among the key findings from the SME Survey 2009, which tracks the confidence and sentiments of this critical contributor to the national economy.

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Compact and energy-efficient FUTRO S100 is a perfect entry to server-based computing and virtual workplace solutions

20 August 2009

Fujitsu today announces that the FUTRO S100 is the company’s most energy-efficient thin client, providing an affordable entry to the world of server-based computing. An individual FUTRO S100 thin client and monitor combination consumes a maximum of 29 watts under full load, some 66 percent less than the consumption of even a green desktop PC and monitor. The entirely fan less and silent FUTRO S100 model is designed for cost-conscious enterprises looking to drastically cut the costs of their desktop infrastructure.

Far ahead of legal and market standard in fulfilling material, energy consumption and recycling requirements

5 August 2009

Fujitsu today announces the extension of its successful Green IT labeling scheme to the enterprise business, covering storage products under the ETERNUS brand. The Green IT label provides buyers a reliable and easy way to evaluate the “greenness” of IT products and introduces new standards far ahead of current legislation. Choosing storage products that are more energy-efficient can result in significant energy savings as well as lower replacement costs with cooler components lasting longer.

SME Survey 2009: The end of dialup and the continued rise of ADSL

03 August 2009

Dial-up served small to medium sized enterprises well but it is nearing its end as the connection of choice. While wireless broadband apparently held great promise, it has only achieved moderate penetration, with ADSL by far the connection of choice for the SME. This has emerged in the preliminary findings of SME Survey 2009, which confirms that ADSL now reigns supreme as the connection of choice for Internet savvy businesses owing to its reliability and relative low pricing.

Preliminary SME Survey results: Small business coping with recession

22 July 2009

While big business the world over reels under the weight of a deepening recession, the South African small to medium business environment is showing something of a silver lining. Preliminary findings of SME Survey 2009 indicate that these companies are coping well.

The recruitment drive for 2010 World Cup volunteers now on

July 2009

All the hard work has paid off, the FIFA President Sepp Blatter declared the Confederations Cup 2009 a success. During the duration of the tournament there was an air of excitement and patriotism with South Africans wanting to do their bit to make the tournament a success.

Linux cluster of 2,157 nodes to achieve 200 teraflops

16  July 2009

Fujitsu today announced that it has received an order from the Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) for a new supercomputer system which will be the most powerful in Japan when it goes online in 2010.

The Linux cluster, serving as the core of the new system, will employ the PRIMERGY BX900 blade servers that Fujitsu has positioned as a key product in the company’s global expansion. Comprised of 2,157 nodes, the core system will have theoretical peak performance of 200 teraflops (*1), making it the fastest supercomputer system in Japan (*2).

The new system is slated to commence operations in March 2010 and will be used in a variety of areas of atomic energy research, including nuclear fusion simulations. It will play an important role in ensuring the safe use of atomic energy.

New PRIMERGY TX100 S1, available with Microsoft Windows Server Foundation, is an ideal entry-level server for small enterprises

8 July 2009

Fujitsu today announces the PRIMERGY TX100 S1, the successor of the Econel 100 S2. The TX100 S1 is the most affordable PRIMERGY server yet, perfect for small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) that need an entry-level server to increase their operational efficiency, performance and security. Now SMEs can afford to move away from using a PC in combination with an external hard drive for storage and upgrade to a proper business class server.

Fujitsu to offer royalty-free Windows 7 upgrades on all new PCs and notebooks pre-loaded with Windows Vista

26 June 2009

Details of the royalty-free Windows 7 upgrade program were announced today by Fujitsu Technology Solutions. From this Friday (June 26), end customers purchasing qualifying products will be offered an upgrade voucher that can be redeemed when the new operating system is launched by Microsoft later this year.

New ETERNUS DX60 and DX80 online storage systems raise the curtain on consolidated global portfolio of versatile, high-availability storage solutions

9 June 2009

Fujitsu today introduces its new global storage portfolio under the ETERNUS brand name. It provides customers with a comprehensive range of storage arrays and data protection solutions for every type of business.

The recession and the South African SME

18 May 2009

Big business has taken a beating from the global financial crisis, but from car manufacturers to financial institutions worldwide, the possibility of government bailouts has provided a silver lining. There is no such option for the small to medium enterprise, owners of such concerns are compelled to look within their own resource nets to weather the storm. But how prepared and capable is the South African SME for survival?

Best results in virtual machine performance, efficiency and reliability through optimized PRIMERGY support

21 April 2009

Fujitsu Technology Solutions today announces optimized support for VMware’s new vSphere4 server virtualization technology on PRIMERGY rack and blade servers. All current-generation PRIMERGY server models from Fujitsu are tuned to deliver best results in performance, efficiency and reliability for VMware’s new virtualized computing platform, providing a solid foundation stone for datacenter consolidation projects.

Fujitsu to resell first storage system purpose-built to drive efficiencies in virtual datacenters

16 April 2009

Fujitsu Technology Solutions today announces the immediate availability of the first new storage solution purpose-built to support virtual data centers, the EMC® Symmetrix® V-Max™ system.

Microsoft gives the FibreCAT SX88 excellent test scores for the Efficient E-Mail initiative

The Fujitsu Technology Solutions’ FibreCAT SX88 storage solution has received outstanding marks from Microsoft. After completing the “Exchange Solution Reviewed Program (ESRP) – Storage 2.1” test series, the FibreCAT SX88 solution is now listed on the online reference page with storage solutions for Exchange environments. The ESRP tests and lists all the high-performance storage systems provided by the Gold Certified partners to help Exchange customers select the best products in the segment. To qualify, Microsoft partners are required to perform pre-defined load tests to determine the number of mailboxes that can be managed and the latency periods (delay periods) required for read and write operations.

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Thanks to the latest PC-over-IP™ technology, companies can provide full workstation performance via remote access to their employees or service providers

April 2009

Fujitsu Technology Solutions presents a remote access solution for its workstations: all CELSIUS family models are now available with PC-over-IP™. This means that they can be integrated in a desktop centralization model. For example, if the actual workstation is located in the company's data centre or server room, the user can access the workstation via a CELSIUS Remote Access portal from his desk or from anywhere in the world. Connected via a standard IP network such as LAN or WAN, the user can view and edit data, access the entire graphics performance, and make full use of his workplace.

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Fujitsu Technology Solutions introduces three powerful new workstations

The CELSIUS M470, CELSIUS R570 and CELSIUS R670 will be based on the latest Intel® processor technology and, with optimized computing and graphics power, taking workstation performance to the next level.

April 2009

Fujitsu Technology Solutions has introduced a new generation of workstations which offer a new level of computing and graphics performance: The CELSIUS M470, CELSIUS R570 and CELSIUS R670 will be  based on Intel®’s latest workstation platform, codename: Tylersburg, which Intel® announced this week. With Intel®’s latest Xeon® processor 3500 and 5500 series Nehalem EP / WS as well as the new 1S Intel® X58 and 2S Intel® 5520 chipsets on board, the new CELSIUS family members deliver superior performance which makes them the ideal choice for compute-intense, multi-core optimized workstation applications. These are the first product innovations introduced under the Fujitsu brand following Fujitsu Siemens Computers’ integration into Fujitsu as a wholly owned subsidiary on April 01, 2009.

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As a wholly-owned subsidiary, Fujitsu Technology Solutions offers EMEA access to a worldwide portfolio of Dynamic Infrastructures

1 April 2009

Today Fujitsu Siemens Computers becomes a 100 percent subsidiary of Fujitsu Limited and is renamed Fujitsu Technology Solutions (Holding) B.V. The new company is operating jointly with Fujitsu Services and a unified management under the Fujitsu brand. Both companies extend a comprehensive portfolio of products, solutions and services offering on a global scale to corporate customers in the EMEA region.

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SME Survey 2008: ADSL comes of age

November 2008

Five years since its launch, ADSL has finally replaced dialup completely as the connection of choice for the South African SME. This was among the key findings of SME Survey 2008 on the use of information and communication technologies by small to medium South African companies.

“Acceptance of ADSL connectivity has been rapid since its introduction in 2003; in 2005, SME Survey anticipated that it would steadily replace dialup as the connection of choice, but the speed of acceptance has been surprising,” says Goldstuck.

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SME Survey 2008: Micro-enterprises bear brunt of financial turbulence

October 2008

South African SMEs are feeling the pinch of higher interest rates, as the cost of capital and bad debt begins to rise. While the majority of SMEs appear to be confident in their ability to weather the storm, it is the start-up and micro-enterprise that finds itself at most risk in the face of adversity.

This has emerged from the findings of SME Survey 2008, which explored the impact of infrastructural challenges on SMEs during a time of increasing inflation, interest and petrol prices.

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South African SMEs show resilience in the face of adversity

October 2008

Turbulent times have characterised the environment for South African small, medium and micro enterprises (SMEs) in the past year – but most have come through with their competitiveness intact. This emerged with the announcement of the results of the annual SME Survey which indicates that in the main, SMEs have held up remarkably well.

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Crime a daily reality for South African SMEs

August 2008

One in four small businesses in South Africa has been a victim of crime more than once in the past year, according to the interim findings of SME Survey 2008, the latest edition of South Africa’s largest annual survey of small, medium and micro enterprises.

This shock finding underscores recent police statements that small businesses have increasingly become victims of crime.

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SME Survey 2008: Adapting to infrastructure challenges

Are small to medium enterprises coping with power cuts and the prospect of erratic supply for the next half-decade? What about crime? Are other infrastructures failing the SME?

These are among the crucial questions SME Survey 2008 raises as it gauges the competitiveness and profitability of small to medium enterprises which are frequently seen as the engine room of growth in South Africa. Sponsored by Standard Bank and Fujitsu-Siemens Computers, the Survey is in its 6th year and measures sentiment, confidence and the factors which contribute to the competitiveness of an SME.

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Cash Crunch hits SMEs

July 2008  

South African SMEs haven’t forgotten crime, but something more pressing is causing sleepless nights – a cash crisis. This is the shocking interim finding of SME Survey 2008, which indicates that rising fuel and interest rates have surpassed crime and even blackouts as the leading challenge facing small and medium businesses today.

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Fujitsu Siemens Computers and Makro team up to dispose of e-waste

Fujitsu Siemens Computers and Makro have partnered in a joint initiative to provide consumers and businesses with a safe and environmentally-sensitive method of recycling electronic waste (e-waste). E-waste poses a potential environmental threat and this initiative underlines Fujitsu Siemens Computers and Makro’s commitment to protect the environment for the future.

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TPC benchmarks validate superior price/performance results for PRIMERGY TX300 S4 server

Setting a new world record, the PRIMERGY TX300 server from Fujitsu Siemens Computers has shaved a huge 25 percent off the industry standard benchmark* for On-Line Transaction Processing (OLTP) in the efficiency bracket. The TPC Benchmark™ E (TPC-E) is a new OLTP workload developed by the Transaction Performance Council (TPC), a non-profit corporation founded to define transaction processing and database benchmarks.

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SA research chosen for global small business conference

SME Survey, the largest annual study of factors influencing the competitiveness of small and medium enterprises in South Africa, has scored an international coup. A paper based on the findings of the 2007 edition of the study has been selected for inclusion in the prestigious International Council for Small Business (ICSB) World Conference to be held in Canada in June.

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