Category: Blog

iOra speaks at the Maritime CIO Conference, Oslo

Oslo, UK – 3 June 2015: iOra’s Bob Legg is speaking at the Maritime CIO Conference in Oslo on 3 June 2015. Bob will be talking about the challenges of deploying collaboration and cloud software over satellite links that fail at sea as well as the technology that is being developed to solve this critical communications challenge. The one-day Maritime CIO Conference is part of Nor-Shipping, the world’s leading maritime event week, which is now celebrating its 50^th anniversary. iOra is taking part for the first time and has become a Platinum Partner for the event.

The conference will be addressing major challenges that the shipping industry is facing right now covering topics such as how to turn big data into big value, Collaborating Across Distributed Teams and Supply Chains, and how to future proof your IT infrastructure to name a few.

Philip Wye, iOra’s Chief Executive Officer, commented:

“iOra attended the previous Nor-Shipping and the Maritime CIO Conference in 2013, as delegates, and we were most impressed at the size of the event and the calibre of the speakers; we realised that we needed to be part of this massively relevant event in future and that is why we are the Platinum Partner this year.”

iOra’s presentation is focussed on collaboration across offshore supply chains and will be demonstrating how key companies in the industry have solved their communications issues despite poor or failing networks whilst maximising their satellite links.

Bob Legg, iOra’s Business Manager for Offshore Markets added:

“Maintaining consistent communications using collaboration and cloud solutions between ship and shore can prove challenging, yet is vitally important for maritime organisations to work effectively and improve ship communications.

“iOra’s unique data replication solution enables operators to deliver content in the most cost-effective way enhancing sharing across the enterprise. As a result, they can implement more data-intensive systems on their ships and also significantly reduce the costs of transferring documents using satellite communications.”

Ends

1st June 2015
Delighted to welcome James Arbuthnot, MP

Exciting day in iOra on Friday when our local MP, James Arbuthnot, came to have a look around and officially open our new offices. A special plaque proudly displays the details of this event in our reception area. James Arbuthnot, in addition to his constituency duties, has sat on many Defence committees and therefore has a keen interest in companies supplying to the Defence industry. Following speeches by both James and our CEO, Philip Wye, the two men toured the office and met with a number of our staff in Customer Services, Sales and Development.

James Arbuthnot was interested to learn how our replication and compression tool, Geo-Replicator, works by breaking down very large blocks of information across multiple documents and separating out any new updates from the existing information, then packaging, compressing and distributing it and finally reconstructing the revised and now up-to-date documents at the receiving end. iOra allows warfighters and HQ to have a single up-to-date view of operational information – very important in military operations.

31st March 2015
From the very first SharePoint to now

Here at iOra, we’ve been working with SharePoint ever since the first release of SharePoint Portal Server (SPS) and SharePoint Team Services (STS) in 2001. We thought you might like to look back on the history of iOra and SharePoint and how we support each update to SharePoint as it is launched by Microsoft.

In 2001, SPS and STS, marketed under the same brand name but barely integrated in approach, were still very basic compared to today’s SharePoint. So we at iOra gave SharePoint users the ability to view their SharePoint sites offline via our “Mobile Intranet” product (now the Server-to-Laptop functionality of Geo-Replicator).

In 2003, Microsoft released their second version of SharePoint: a much more integrated system, though built for full fat corporate networks. We recognised the need for enterprises to make their SharePoint server data available to offline users and there was also a growing need to make the data available to geographically remote users by providing local, replica SharePoint servers. Our compression and replication know-how could clearly benefit organisations by reducing the time required for those non-local users to access crucial information. It was a situation that was perfect for the use of our Epsilon engine: lots of data, often updated, needing to be sent from one bandwidth-limited location to another.

When Microsoft released SharePoint 2007, the growth of SharePoint was phenomenal. Here at iOra, we upgraded both our Server-to-Laptop and Server-to-Server solutions, adding Server-to-Virtual Server for good measure. With Server-to-Server, we now not only replicated SharePoint documents and list items but the whole SharePoint structure that held the data.

SharePoint 2010 improved the document management and CRM that SharePoint provides. We now replicate SharePoint 2007, 2010 and 2013 sites for organisations all over the world, to servers and laptops on both land and sea. We’ve been making SharePoint global for over a decade now, and we continue to innovate in the collaboration without the Cloud environment. Today, we’re working hard to add even more support for SharePoint replication, as well as thinking about the next version of SharePoint and beyond. We continue to work with Microsoft updating and renewing our Gold Partner status.

SharePoint is virtually in our DNA! More information here.

9th March 2015
iOra Builds on UK MOD Success with £1.5m+ Contract

iOra is delighted to have been awarded a contract worth over £1.5m from the UK MOD that represents continuation of supply of our replication and compression solution.

We provide British troops in remote or mobile locations around the world with mission critical data regardless of slow or intermittent network access. This new contract follows on from a previous, successfully-delivered contract to UK MOD.

iOra Geo-Replicator provides a major benefit within the Defence industry where MOD consortia need to work closely by allowing the sharing of only required information using a web portal wherever and whenever 24/7, 365.

Adele Keeble – Ministry of Defence – Software Asset Management says:

“iOra continues to be an integral part of the Ministry of Defence, delivering essential software across the organisation. The working relationship between MOD and iOra means that we have been able to centralise the procurement route, taking in any future requirement, be it new licences or ongoing support and maintenance for iOra software delivering a one stop strategy, saving time, money and resources.”

9th February 2015
iOra software supporting the Royal Marines at the C Group Dinner

The C Group inspires business to support Marines in Need. Similar to Help for Heroes, the charity supports Royal Marines whose military careers have ended prematurely due to injury. It also supports serving and former Royal Marines, their families and dependants who are in conditions of need, hardship or distress.

iOra is keen to support The Royal Marines with more than our replication and compression software services that we supply to enable collaboration across limited networks and has taken a Platinum Table at the C Group Awards Dinner tomorrow night.

The 2014 London Dinner at London Hilton on Park Lane marks the 350th anniversary of The Royal Marines making it an especially auspicious evening. The Awards praise the individuals and companies that have shown immense support to Royal Marines. After the Awards is the Auction with great prizes donating by businesses and individuals.

We’re looking forward to a great evening! Report to follow………….

1st February 2015
Using IT to reduce risk and business exposure in the face of increasing regulations and penalties

Need to communicate with personnel in remote and hostile locations? Wherever and whenever? You need to read this article in issue 116 of European Oil & Gas. Doesn’t matter if your industry isn’t Oil & Gas! Take a look at Page 7 onwards.

Happy reading!

29th January 2015