Monthly Archives: February 2024

Awards, Education, Events

10th Moving Image Awards Celebrates Rising Stars in Filmmaking

YOUNG filmmaking prodigies were celebrated at the 10th annual Moving Image Awards at a ceremony held at the British Film Institute on 26 February.

 

Proud students, parents, and teachers from across the UK gathered at the prestigious event to celebrate the work of young directors, screenwriters, and producers.

 

The Moving Image Awards, which launched in 2014 in collaboration with the British Film Institute, recognises and celebrates the best moving image productions from students undertaking Eduqas qualifications in Film and Media across the UK.

 

Categories this year included Best Short Film, Music Video, TV/Film Extract, Screenplay, One to Watch and Student Jury Prize.

 

Cherry Ellis, from Steyning Grammar School in West Sussex, took home the coveted Student Jury Prize title at this year’s awards for her film titled ‘The Deep Mind Experience’. The film is an experimental stop frame animation, where the protagonist is taken on a psychedelic dream-like journey inside his own subconscious mind.

 

The judges commended Cherry on her use of contrasting images, colour and music to reflect the mundane real-world vs the colourful and beautiful world of the subconscious mind.

 

Following her win, Cherry said: “I am so surprised to have won this award! After they announced all the winners I didn’t realise there was going to be another category, so I was so surprised and so happy when they called my name! I wanted to create a story that was a form of escapism and wanted to emphasis the difference between the mundane everyday life and the crazy, wacky other worlds.”

 

Winners:

Further awards went to:

 

Short Film:

Ricardo Sokolowska-Pedrosa from Dover Grammar School for Boys, for ‘Uninhabitable’, a short documentary about poor-quality accommodation and unscrupulous landlords taking advantage of vulnerable people in Dover.

 

Judges’ comments: “Excellent for all three categories: technical competence, form and genre, creativity, and resourcefulness. Great topic and excellent storytelling within the genre.”

 

Music Video:

Callum Doddington from St Bartholomew’s School in Berkshire for Erase/ Replace, a music video for band ‘Seize’, consisting of shots of band members as well as montage shots filling in as ‘clues’ to the bigger picture of what ‘happened’.

 

Judges’ comments: “A well filmed and edited music video. Well-structured with consistently excellent technical codes and editing. Very creative in the representation of the band and the enigmatic narrative. Excellent use of narrative motifs. A range of filming techniques used. Excellent lip synching and filming of actual performance.”

 

Screenplay:

Nathan Mitchell from Strode’s College, Egham for Motorway Pastures, a screenplay about a hitchhiker who begins to see the increasingly impossible, all while the ‘corn laughs and the sky splits.’

 

Judges’ comments: “Excellent horror film – clear control of time. Good visualisation and parallel storytelling. Brilliant.”

 

Film/TV Extract:

Harvey Miller from St Bartholomew’s School for AVA, a short pre-title and title sequence for the TV show ‘AVA’ that encompasses the essence of suspense and technological intrigue, and draws inspiration from the series ‘Humans’, ‘Utopia’ and ‘Black Mirror’.

 

Judge’s comments: “Pacy editing to the opening which quickly engages the audience and establishes genre. Excellent use of camerawork to set up imminent danger and suggest the foreboding narrative. Genre conventions are well employed and add to the drama of the sequence.”

 

One to Watch:

Ruby Hagan from Upton Hall School FCJ in Birkenhead for Laika, a short experimental animation detailing the life of one of the first creatures in space: “Laika the Space Dog”.

 

Judges’ comments: “A beautiful inventive animation based on the real-life story of Laika, the Soviet space dog who orbited earth in 1957. The film combines animation styles, including line drawing and painting to stunning effect.”

The winning videos are available to view on the Moving Image Awards YouTube channel.

The event has garnered acknowledgment from educators and professors of film and media studies at various institutions throughout the UK, along with prominent figures within the film industry. Among this year’s guest speakers were film critic and former President of the UK Critics’ Circle Anna Smith, writer and director Lorna Tucker, feature film script editor Kate Leys and Metro chief film critic Larushka Ivan-Zadeh.

Larushka Ivan-Zadeh said: “Today’s award ceremony has been absolutely amazing. It’s always so inspiring! I believe the biggest challenge facing young people today is getting over their own limits and beliefs about being filmmakers. What we’ve taken away from today is that actually, the industry is an amazing place. There is enough work for everyone, you just have to really find your voice and believe in yourself. You have to believe that people really want to hear what you have to say and produce. Go for it!.”

Anna Smith said: “To the students who want to pursue a career in Film or TV I would just say, keep knocking on those doors – don’t give up! You must be very determined but also willing to learn all the way. Don’t be afraid to ask for advice from someone you find inspirational.”

Jenny Stewart, Eduqas Film Studies Subject Officer, said: “We are delighted to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Moving Image Awards. The talent showcased this year is testament to the continued success and growth of the WJEC Eduqas Film and Media qualifications, and the hard work and innovation of young filmmakers and their teachers. We wish all entrants a huge congratulations on your achievements in film and media production.”

Ian Morgan, Eduqas Chief Executive, added: “The Moving Image Awards are always a highlight in my calendar. For a decade now, we’ve been recognising exceptional filmmaking talent, and this year was no different. Each and every entrant should be immensely proud of their achievement, no matter the result.

“We are also incredibly grateful for the unwavering support of our judges. Their dedication and commitment have been instrumental in making this event the resounding success it is today.”

For more information on the Moving Image Awards, visit: http://www.movingimageawards.co.uk/

News

Closing the loop on AI point solutions to deliver context and visibility

Written by Stephen Amstutz, Head of Strategy and Innovation, Xalient 

Today most organisations are thinking about or deploying AI and, in effect, trying it out. This is supported by Gartner, which states that approximately 80% of enterprises will have used generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) application programming interfaces (APIs) or models by 2026.  As AI drives value for organisations, it is fuelling further demand and adoption. One way that organisations are using AI is to review large data sets to identify trends and patterns so they can sequence data accordingly. Today there is a phenomenal amount of data we can now use to train AI. OpenAI’s ChatGPT and other large language models have further enabled vendors to introduce AI into their products to enhance the user experience. AI can engage data that lives in the online world in a more natural way, capturing certain activities and events to provide more information and context. 

 The importance of accuracy and context with AI   

 The challenge is around how these large language models dig into complex subjects. There is a lot of superficial data and there will be limitations for LLMs. For example, they can only look at data that is available. In other words, LLMs predict the best next word based on what has already been provided. This is great if you want help with anything text-related.  However, accuracy and context are important, because the results generated by these LLMs, and other AI solutions, will drive business and security decisions and therefore must be accurate. 

 Over the past year or so we have seen a plethora of new AI capabilities coming to market. However, AI is a bit of a double-edged sword. AI solutions are attracting equally close attention from threat actors who are realising that – while they can be used by companies to identify security weaknesses and address them – they could themselves be a weakness in a company’s security. So, while AI presents breakthroughs in the ability to process logic differently, it also blurs the lines between humans and machines. This is why identity is crucial to ensure that organisations can securely connect people to technology.  

Many vendors are launching new AI solutions  

Many of our Identity and Access Management (IAM) partners have announced new advanced AI capabilities that address this issue without introducing AI risk.  For example, built on a foundation of AI and ML, SailPoint’s Atlas platform delivers the right level of access to the right identities and resources at the right time. This provides visibility, insight, and remediation, so organisations can adapt and ensure the security of every identity’s access.  

Okta AI is a suite of AI-powered capabilities that empower organisations to harness the power of AI to build better experiences and protect against cyberattacks. And it is not just the identity vendors, Zscaler’s AI-powered SASE connects organisations more securely than SASE based on traditional SD-WAN. Traditional networks were designed to solve yesterday’s problems and they introduce unnecessary complexity and risk. Today’s hybrid workforce and cloud-first apps need a new connectivity capability built on zero trust principles and this is where our partner, Zscaler, can help. 

While all these innovations are moving the needle in terms of how they are enabling organisations to harness the power of AI, secure identity, deliver faster secure networking and harness new connectivity capabilities, they are all point solutions working in isolation. For true visibility, they need a layer of observability and orchestration to rapidly effect change and enable customers to ‘close the loop’ and reduce the amount of friction involved in making changes. 

The importance of AIOps 

Today businesses can’t tolerate operational delays and service disruptions; organisations are turning to Artificial Intelligence for IT Operations (AIOps) solutions to help resource-stretched IT teams. These solutions enable automated processes that free valuable resources to pursue innovation while AIOps solutions help organisations maintain uptime, reduce manual incident-management tasks, spot anomalies, and increase productivity. 

Here at Xalient our AIOps capability, MARTINA, is an observability and orchestration layer that augments our partners’ AI technology and effects change. Each piece of infrastructure MARTINA monitors is a vantage point that acts like a camera angle on traffic flow and helps us to determine both the usage and performance of the network and makes sense of the data across the multiple vendors we support.  It contains an API ingestion engine delivering visibility across all these point solutions with context and improvements for the end user experience. Context is key because MARTINA doesn’t duplicate what other technology partners’ solutions are doing, it leverages or augments these by pulling the right context, at the right time, and correlating this across the board.  

Delivering self-healing connectivity  

In effect, by using a combination of telemetry, AIOps, and machine learning, organisations can create self-healing connectivity and an infrastructure that is responsive, adaptive, and ultimately delivers better availability. This ensures high levels of resilience and performance are maintained, enabling customers to deliver a consistent, positive user experience across the organisation’s network. MARTINA lets our customers know exactly what alerts they need to be prioritising and be more proactive in monitoring and resolving impact assessments. 

Ultimately AI will change our world as we know it, and there are many positive productivity gains and innovations that will result.  But there is a need to understand context and, in a world where IT skills are in short supply and in-demand, the ability to automate IT operations swiftly to ‘close the loop’ on all these point solutions is essential. In my next article, I will tackle how organisations can leverage AI to provide secure self-healing connectivity in a zero trust world. 

News, Technology

Cohesity Introduces the Industry’s First Generative AI-powered Conversational Search Assistant to Help Businesses Transform Secondary Data into Knowledge

Cohesity has announced Cohesity Gaia, a first-to-market AI-powered enterprise search assistant that brings retrieval augmented generation* (RAG) AI and large language models (LLMs) to high-quality backup data within Cohesity environments. Cohesity Gaia will be made generally available on March 15. The conversational AI assistant enables users to ask questions and receive answers by accessing and analysing their vast pools of enterprise data. When coupled with the Cohesity Data Cloud, these AI advancements transform data into knowledge and can help accelerate the goals of an organisation while keeping data secure and compliant. Cohesity has announced plans with the three largest public cloud providers to bring their LLM services to Cohesity Gaia.

The underlying architecture of Cohesity Data Cloud manages and secures data with a unique blend of performance, extensibility, and scale. Cohesity Gaia extends the value proposition of Cohesity Data Cloud even further:

  • By building a RAG AI solution on Cohesity’s multicloud platform, Cohesity will be able to seamlessly provide RAG AI conversational search experiences across cloud and hybrid environments that will allow enterprises to gain deeper insights into their data and make informed decisions in the future, no matter where their stored data resides.
  • Cohesity will maintain a fully indexed database of all files, across all workloads, and at all points in time. This robust capability supports the creation of AI-ready indexes for rapid conversational search and responses, providing enterprises with quick and accurate results. Initially, Cohesity will support Microsoft 365 and OneDrive data and will expand to more workloads over time.
  • The unique architecture of Cohesity Gaia ensures that all indexed data is immediately available for reading without the need for backups to be reconstructed. This allows the Cohesity Data Cloud to function like a data lake, providing businesses with real-time access to their data for analysis and decision-making.
  • The Cohesity Data Cloud employs granular role-based access controls and zero-trust security principles, ensuring that only authorised users and models have access to the necessary data. This not only protects sensitive information but also helps enterprises maintain compliance with various regulatory requirements.

Enterprises looking to utilise LLMs often face several challenges. Developers must first create more copies of data, thereby increasing the threat footprint for an attack. What’s more, the data may be incomplete or dated. Finally, this approach requires additional time and resources, and puts an added burden on the system’s performance. Cohesity Gaia overcomes these challenges by integrating AI capabilities within a customer’s backup environment.

Cohesity Gaia helps organisations make better, faster decisions across a myriad of use cases, such as:

  • To assess an organisation’s level of cyber resilience.
  • To quickly perform financial and compliance audit checks.
  • To answer complex legal questions.
  • To serve as a knowledge base to train new employees.

“Enterprises are excited to harness the power of generative AI but have faced several challenges gaining insights into secondary data, including backup, archived and vaulted data – because every approach requires re-hydrating the data, and painfully waiting weeks for the data to be available for analytics and insights. Cohesity Gaia dramatically simplifies this process with our patent-pending approach using Retrieval Augmented Generation,” said Sanjay Poonen, CEO and President, Cohesity. “With Cohesity Gaia, for the first time in our industry, companies will be able to leverage generative AI to query their data in a virtually seamless way. Our approach delivers rapid, insightful results without the drawbacks of more manual and risky approaches. In short, it turns data into knowledge within seconds and minutes.”

“We are an international materials research and manufacturing company, with research centres in many locations, and our researchers speak different languages,” said Ryan Reed, head of IT, JSR Corporation. “We want to be able to use generative AI to quickly discover if work done at one location might apply to other projects. Cohesity Gaia allows us to query our rich store of research data and quickly find relevant work. It will also allow our researchers to use their native language to query the system. This could prove incredibly valuable in accelerating the rate of our research and discovery.”

At the core of Cohesity AI technologies is Cohesity Turing, a patent-pending collection of AI capabilities and technologies integrated into Cohesity’s multicloud data management and security platform, providing operational and data insights. The foundation of these AI innovations is the concept of “responsible AI,” with capabilities and frameworks that enable customers to introduce AI to backup data securely and safely at scale. All Cohesity Turing solutions adhere to these responsible AI principles:

  • Transparency: Protect access to the data with role-based access controls. Promote transparency and accountability around access and policies.
  • Governance: Ensure the security and privacy of data used by AI models and the workforce—so the right data is exposed only to the right people (and models) with the right privileges.
  • Access: Integrate indexed and searchable data securely and easily while ensuring data is immutable and resilient.

“It is important to understand that Cohesity Gaia does not retrieve data like a search engine; it answers questions,” said Greg Statton, office of the CTO – Data & AI, Cohesity. ”For example, if you notice a rise in costs in a region, typically, you would search for dozens of invoices, review and compare them, and see if you can discover the reason for the cost increases. It could take hours, days, or weeks to resolve. With Cohesity Gaia, you simply ask, ‘Why have costs increased in the region?’, and Cohesity Gaia will pull the relevant data from your stored data, analyse it, and return an answer to your question. It’s that simple.”

“Cohesity is the first data security and management vendor to bring the power of AI search to enterprises with the Cohesity Gaia AI search assistant. Gaia leverages generative AI with the latest RAG enhancements to enable conversational search across secondary protected data,” said Russ Fellows, vice president, The Futurum Group Labs. “Gaia enables companies to quickly leverage their existing stored data with the power of generative AI, while preserving data security and compliance. With Cohesity Gaia, customers can quickly turn data into insights, without the complexity of creating an AI application themself, or worrying about their data privacy and security.”

Energy, News

Consumers need better protection against the cost of environmental regulations, say researchers

Tighter environmental regulations can boost industry profits and drive up costs for consumers, finds research from Aalto University School of Business.

Professor of Practice Iivo Vehviläinen at Aalto analysed data on 129 million bids in the Nordic electricity market to reveal the market impact of regulations that protect the biodiversity of river ecosystems but also reduce Finland’s capacity for generating hydropower electricity.

Meeting the EU Biodiversity Strategy target of restoring 25,000km of rivers to a free-flowing state by 2030 would mean closing at most 56 MW of hydropower generation in Finland, he says.

He calculates the cost of removing hydropower dams would lead to €62 million in welfare losses over time, not accounting for environmental benefits, while electricity market price rises would increase revenue for other electricity producers by €318 million over time.

This leaves much of the cost of implementing environmental protection regulations currently at the door of consumers.

This is because, in a competitive market, if consumer demand remains static despite price changes, tighter regulations will raise prices so industry profits increase and consumers end up paying for lost production and additional industry gains, says Vehviläinen.

The findings suggest that instead of lobbying against environmental regulation, agreeing to industry-wide implementation could be beneficial for both corporations and biodiversity.

However, regulators and policymakers should consider how to balance the costs and benefits of improving the ecological status of rivers between consumers and producers before introducing such policies.

“Higher prices may reduce political acceptance of regulations and have equity implications if the economic burden is higher for low-income households. This is especially true for electricity and other necessity goods that face multiple pressures from climate change mitigation to biodiversity protection and to other policy areas,” says Vehviläinen.

This research was published in the Journal of Environmental Economics and Management.

Mental Health, Mental Health at Work

How employers can help staff suffering with conditions like bulimia, anorexia and other eating disorders

Reecord numbers of people are now suffering with eating disorders -and for many it can make going to work incredibly difficult.

Offices and workplaces can be triggering environments – often making it harder for co-workers who might be worried about saying or doing the wrong thing.

Counsellor and author Lynn Crilly, who specialises in helping treat people suffering eating disorders, always encourages her patients to try and return to work when they are well enough.

But she says more education and awareness is needed across many workplaces about how to best support those suffering conditions including bulimia and anorexia.

Lynn, the author of Hope With Eating Disorders,2nd Edition, said: “It is one thing being concerned about someone at work, but quite another knowing what to do about it. Remember that anyone at work has the right to privacy and, regardless of your relationship with them, sharing your concerns with others may breach this confidentiality. If your company has a human resources department, this may well be the best place to take your concerns.

“Whether or not someone in their team shows any signs of an eating disorder, or indeed any other mental illness, employers should feel a responsibility to make their workplace as open and supportive as possible – and that means doing the right thing as well as saying the right thing. Employers, line managers and human resources teams should, if possible, send out a strong signal that their staff’s mental health is valued, and that people can feel confident that raising issues about an eating disorder will be supported in a non-judgemental way and not discriminated against.”

Lynn also believes the rise in the number of people working from home is potentially exacerbating the issue

She explained: “Many might now be suffering in silence, working remotely and away from colleagues who would otherwise be there to provide care and support.

“Although being in a work environment can be a challenge for anyone suffering an eating disorder it is also an opportunity to make that first step towards recovery.

“Working from home can allow a sufferer to hide away and not get the help they need.

And it is harder from a caring and responsible employer to see the signs – and step in.”

 

BREAKOUT How employers can better support staff living with an eating disorder:

Lynn says:

Allowing employees to speak up, to voice ideas, to play a part in the direction of the company will reassure them that what they say matters. If and when in future they need the support of their employer, they will feel more confident that they are likely to get it.

Being a considerate employer, creating opportunities for creating and learning, and encouraging regular one-to-one meetings and mentoring will also help build trust and give employees somewhere to turn and raise concerns if they need to.

If an employer or manager finds out or suspects that an employee has an eating disorder, the crucial first step is to give them the chance to talk honestly and openly in a safe space, and this should continue if they take time off sick. They should ask what their employee needs, such as an extra break or time off for counselling or medical appointments, and make reasonable adjustments to help. It is also important to remember that everyone’s experience of mental health issues is different, and the support provided to employees should – as much as possible – be tailored to that individual’s needs.

It is not an employer’s job to be a therapist to someone in their team. Instead they should provide the individual concerned with access to information which they can use to get the support they need. This may include details of a confidential telephone service or details of one-to-one counselling sessions with a qualified therapist.

Promoting well-being at work:

In addition to providing an open and supportive environment at work, employees – and businesses themselves – will also reap the rewards of a workplace that actively promotes and encourages well-being. From providing strong managerial support to introducing well-being activities such as yoga or meditation, a responsible and caring employee can have a truly positive impact on its team’s mental health and happiness.

As well as looking at the messages that their attitude gives out, employers should also consider how the physical environment of the office may have an impact on those struggling with disordered eating. Are there suggestions or posters that put an undue focus on weight or body image, for example? It is also helpful to think of the culture around eating and lunchtimes. Are colleagues encouraged to eat together or is there an unspoken expectation of eating at desks or not taking a break at all?

And finally creating a working environment that promotes a good work/life balance is absolutely vital for good mental health. Recognising when someone feels overworked, under-valued, lonely or disrespected reflects an employer who cares about their workforce. Promoting discussions about wellbeing and mental health is also important. It shows that these are not taboo subjects and means employees will feel more able to raise their own issues or concerns more quickly.

Logistics

Parcelhero’s move into the £14bn B2B logistics market creates exciting new opportunity for investors

The international delivery expert Parcelhero is introducing Parcelhero Pro, a revolutionary B2B SaaS platform. Its launch creates a new opportunity for potential investors looking to enter the fast-growing B2B logistics market.

The launch of a revolutionary SaaS (software as a service) platform from the international delivery expert Parcelhero creates an exciting opportunity for potential investors looking to get into the £14bn B2B (business to business) logistics market.

Parcelhero Pro’s cutting-edge technology will enable businesses to ship in bulk, optimise cost and completely outsource their after-sales customer support. It is set to disrupt the domestic and international B2B logistics industry when it launches in Q2 2024. Now the company is looking for investors large or small to fund its plans for the growth and marketing of its new platform.

Parcelhero’s Head of Public Relations and Consumer Research, David Jinks M.I.L.T., says: ‘Businesses spend between 5% to 30% of their entire annual revenue on shipping, with billions of pounds wasted every year on inefficient processes and often inflated costs. That’s why there is an urgent need for Parcelhero Pro, which we have invested £15m in developing. It uses groundbreaking technology to give retailers and other growing businesses an end-to-end shipping solution that will enable them to manage and automate every aspect of their shipping, saving time, money and hassle.

‘Enabling companies to choose the best option for each shipment will save them up to 60% on deliveries with the world’s leading couriers. Parcelhero Pro’s revolutionary tracking technology will instantly notify recipients of delays, empowering them to self-serve and proactively resolve their delivery issues. This will reduce the administrative burden on retailers and turn delivery challenges into a competitive advantage.

‘The Parcelhero Group is now launching a campaign on the fundraising platform Floww to fuel our targeted investment in Parcelhero Pro’s marketing and sales. This will help fulfil our aim to become the world’s leading one-stop-shop shipping solution.

‘Currently, most Parcelhero customers are consumers and micro-businesses. By targeting the fast-growing B2B logistics market through our new Parcelhero Pro platform, we will be on an exciting path for further growth over the next five years. The Parcelhero Group has already outpaced all its competitors with 17% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) in revenue between 2012 and 2022 (including 21% CAGR from 2019-22), making it the UK’s fastest-growing logistics comparison group. It had revenues of £25m in 2022 and is forecast to achieve a revenue of £99m in 2028.

‘To realise our vision, we are inviting support from forward-thinking investors. That’s why we are now launching our equity funding campaign on Floww. Floww is an internationally respected fundraising and investment platform, enabling high net worth individuals (HNWI), angel investors and venture capitalists to invest in private companies.

‘Having invested £15m in developing our unique logistics software platform, we’re looking to achieve initial funding of £700k to ensure Parcelhero Pro’s successful market debut. For the first time in our history, we’re offering investors a chance to back this established, highly profitable logistics business that has both a compelling vision for the future and the technology that will take us there.

‘For further information or to register your interest, see our investors page at https://www.parcelhero.com/fundraising-2024

 

 

 

 

 

ENDS

 

 

 

Caption: The revolutionary SaaS platform Parcelhero Pro launches in Q2, 2024.

Art, London News, News

Quintain Doubles Affordable Artist Space For Second Floor Studios &Amp; Arts At Wembley Park

Quintain, the award-winning developer behind Wembley Park, is strengthening its ties with Second Floor Studios & Arts as it confirms a new lease which will see the number of affordable artist workspaces more than double at Wembley Park, consisting of 56 studios, housing 80 artists.

The partnership between Quintain and Second Floor Studios & Arts began in 2016, with the first studios opened in 2018. This initial phase saw 6,880 sq. ft. of studio space built at Wembley Park. A long-term partnership, starting out as a ‘Section 106’ planning requirement, has already successfully ensured over 60% of the artists and makers are residents from the local London Borough of Brent.

The new lease will see the second phase of the affordable workspace launch, with a further 8,293 sq. ft. of studio space later this year, 25% more than required under Quintain’s planning permission. A total of 30 studios are to be provided and will be purpose-built for the visual arts, becoming home to local artists, makers and designers. Ground floor and first floor studios are provided along with a breakout area where artists and designers can come together and exchange ideas as well as a gallery wall where artwork, ceramics and designs can be displayed. All spaces are fully wheelchair accessible.

 

James Saunders, CEO of Quintain commented:

“It has been a privilege to work with Second Floor Studios & Arts to successfully support and boost the local creative community. We are committed to establish Wembley Park as a place for art and culture and have ensured that affordable space is provided so that local creatives can thrive.”

 

Nichole Herbert Wood, CEO of Second Floor Studios & Arts said:

“I am heartened to see the Quintain partnership that we have established since 2016 go from strength to strength, supporting an additional 40 artists. Thanks to backing from Quintain and Brent Council, we are pleased to provide affordable, long-term and high-quality studio spaces for artists which I believe is vital in order to protect the creative and cultural aspects of London and its communities.”

 

Councillor Shama Tatler, Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Planning, Regeneration and Growth at Brent Council said:

“Our borough is brimming with creative talent and we’re committed to supporting local creatives to thrive in their hometown. Partnering with Quintain and Second Floor Studios & Arts, we’re delighted to be delivering 30 additional affordable workspaces in Wembley Park supporting even more local people to flourish.”

Cyber Attack, Cybersecurity, News, Technology

Cybersecurity firm launches simulated phishing-attack training

~ New managed service lets businesses use fake phishing attacks to increase staff awareness ~

London-based managed IT services provider OryxAlign has announced the launch of its new managed cybersecurity awareness training service in partnership with training specialist KnowBe4. The service will allow businesses, especially SMEs, to periodically test their employees’ awareness and preparedness against phishing attacks. Based on their responses, staff will receive a customised training programme and access to a library of thousands of resources, including webinars, quizzes and games to develop their cybersecurity awareness.

Phishing is a type of cyberattack where an attacker sends a fraudulent email, message or website that appears to be legitimate, to trick the recipient into sharing sensitive information, such as login credentials or financial information.

According to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) phishing attacks accounted for 31 per cent of all cyber related incidents. It was superseded only by ransomware attacks at 34 per cent.

The phishing security test from OryxAlign provides businesses with the ability to simulate a phishing attack by sending randomised fake phishing emails to their employees every quarter. The emails are designed to look like real phishing emails that employees may receive. The tool allows organisations to track who clicked on the links in the email or provided sensitive information in response to the email.

Based on their responses, users are given a cybersecurity awareness score, which is used to provide them with an ongoing programme of cybersecurity training, via an online library of webinars, quizzes, games and even a Netflix-style TV series.

“Employees across a business can vary significantly in their cybersecurity skills, so there’s no such thing as a one-size-fits-all training programme to improve awareness and preparedness,” explained Nathan Charles, Head of Customer Experience at OryxAlign. “This is why we’ve partnered with KnowBe4 to offer a simulated phishing attack and training service for SMEs.

“By using this tool, organisations can assess their employees’ ability to identify and avoid phishing attacks. The results of the test can help businesses identify areas of weakness in their security, from shop-floor workers to the CEO.”

The training is delivered virtually at the user’s own pace and organisations can integrate their corporate IT policies into the platform. As well as scoring individual users, the results of the simulated attacks can be used to benchmark the overall score for the company against similar businesses in the same sector.

The cybersecurity awareness training is offered as a managed service, but interested users can carry out a free phishing test for up to 100 employees by filling out the online form on OryxAlign’s website.

News, Pensions, Retirement

Could annuities solve the pension challenge of funding a long retirement?

As Office for National Statistics (ONS)[i] data reveals the over-90’s population of England and Wales reached a record high in 2022, Steve Butler, CEO of retirement solutions at Punter Southall says this could bring major pension funding challenges as it effectively adds another lifetime beyond the retirement age of 66 to fund.

The number of over-90s grew by 2.1% over 2022 to a high of 550,835 and that the number of centenarians had more than doubled since 2002. While it’s something to be celebrated, it will make it more challenging for people to fund such a long retirement.

 

Steve Butler says, “Living longer is something we strive for, but most of us are unprepared to live for 30 years or more in retirement, and risk running out of money in our 80s and 90s. There is also the additional fear of having to pay for social care in the future.

“The government currently is ill-prepared for the social care bill of an ageing population, which means people may have to use their savings or even sell their home to pay for any care they need as they get older.

“It is vital people focus on the retirement challenges they may face in the future.  Relying on structural and government change to happen by the time they reach their nineties is a risky option and one which could leave them severely out of pocket.”

 

Many people already worry their pension won’t be sufficient, with new research from Canada Life[ii] revealing that half of non-retired Brits plan to work beyond state pension age. The findings show that 36% will work longer due to worries their pension will not be enough to cover day-to-day expenses in retirement, rising to 52% in Brits aged 55 and over.

 

Steve Butler adds, “One sensible solution is for those nearing retirement is to take out an annuity which can provide a guaranteed income for life and give them a safety net and reassurance they won’t run out of money no matter how long they live.

“Annuities that were once out of favour are back in fashion due to rising interest rates, and we’ve seen annuity incomes rising 44% in two years[iii]. However, misconceptions around annuities persist such as having to stay with your pension provider, that ill health can rule out the best deals and that you can’t pass an annuity on after you die.

“It’s important to check the whole market when seeking an annuity as rates can vary enormously.  With annuity incomes on the rise, making informed decisions about drawdown options before cashing in a pension is essential to avoid costly mistakes that could significantly impact what could be 30 years or more of retirement ahead.”

 

Punter Southall Aspire offers a retirement service called Pension Potential which offers financial information, insights and guidance about retirement options and taking benefits. It includes and online calculator that provides an independent overview of the best annuity deals.

Pension Potential searches the entire market and shows people how much their pension can buy, making it easy to see the right deal for them. It’s free for companies and free for employees to use, and helps staff to quantify their retirement, consider their options and compare every annuity on offer.

 

For more information visit: www.pensionpotential.co.uk.

—

References

[i] https://www.financialplanningtoday.co.uk/news/item/17006-pension-challenge-as-over-90s-at-record-high?utm_source=newsletter_4519&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=morning-news-pension-challenge-as-over-90s-at-record-high

[ii] https://www.ftadviser.com/pensions/2024/01/12/half-of-non-retired-brits-plan-to-work-until-age-72/?utm_content=278485058&utm_medium=social&utm_source=linkedin&hss_channel=lcp-10391893

[iii] https://moneyweek.com/personal-finance/pensions/605406/buy-an-annuity

HR, HR Tech, HRDs and Technology, Human Resources

Deel Acquires People Development Platform Zavvy

Zavvy performance management and L&D software rounds out Deel’s payroll & HR solutions

Global payroll & HR company Deel announced today that it has acquired German-based people enablement platform Zavvy. All of Zavvy’s team members are joining Deel.

Founded in 2021 by Mehmet Yilmaz and Joshua Cornelius, Munich-based Zavvy is a people-enablement platform. It offers a central hub that covers career development, performance management, and training programs. One of Zavvy’s big differentiators is its embedded AI technology that makes suggestions for managers to assess team performance and create personalized career development plans. Zavvy counts Moss, Primer, LoveBonito, TypeForm, and more as customers.

With Zavvy, HR leaders can run performance and compensation analysis for top performers, provide a library of AI-backed L&D courses, and create bespoke career paths and planning modules for their teams. These capabilities will be integrated into a new product suite called Deel Engage and will cost $20 per user per month.

Deel also announced today that it is making Deel HR – previously free for up to 200 users – free for any size company. For the first time in the industry, learning management, performance, HRIS, and compliance knowledge will be available from one company at one price.

 

This is big news for companies trying to manage a global workforce. Typically, businesses have to patch together different HR and payroll systems, along with performance, benefits, equity, and more. Now with Zavvy integrated into Deel’s payroll and HRIS system, employers can save on admin and supercharge their teams’ efficiency and performance in one global system of record. It provides an unrivaled view of a company’s global workforce across every aspect of the employee lifecycle.

This news positions Deel as the first company to provide a free HRIS product alongside people management, employer-of-record and contractor hiring, global payroll, compliance expertise, and in-house legal and immigration services.

 

Co-founder and co-CEO Mehmet Yilmaz said of the acquisition: “We started Zavvy to help unlock people’s work potential. Joining Deel – the leading HR platform for tomorrow’s workforce – will greatly accelerate this mission. Both companies are passionate about driving innovation in the HR sector, with a focus on hiring and nurturing great talent around the world.”

 

Deel co-founder and CEO Alex Bouaziz said, “Deel is all about helping companies get the best out of their global teams, and Zavvy’s AI technology is at the forefront of people management and talent development. It’s a perfect fit – our customers are looking for a one-stop-shop for all things HR, and Zavvy’s people management tools now fill in that missing piece of our global HR offering.”

 

HR analyst and Managing Partner of 3SixtyInsights, Pete Tiliakos, said, “Zavvy’s people enablement technology is a perfect complement to the broader Deel ecosystem of global employment solutions. The addition is well-timed in enabling employers to develop and retain skills and talent through highly personalized learning and development experiences, while providing employers with a single platform for compliant global employment and talent enrichment.”

 

About Deel

Deel is an all-in-one HR solution for global teams. It helps companies simplify every aspect of managing an international workforce, from culture and onboarding, to local payroll, compliance and now, people management. It owns 130+ country entities and manages in-house, in-country payroll teams, in addition to offering Employer of Record, contractor, immigration and HRIS services worldwide.