# Ultima Business Solutions > Service led. Expert driven. --- ## Pages --- --- ## Blogs - [Microsoft Entra Permissions Management – End of Sale Announcement](https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-entra-permissions-management-end-of-sale-announcement/): For anyone currently using — or considering Microsoft Entra Permissions Management: Microsoft has announced that the service is now at... - [Microsoft price increase for on-premises servers July 2025](https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-price-increase-for-on-premises-servers-july-2025/): Microsoft will be increasing some of its pricing on 1st July 2025. - [Why Your Business Needs FinOps (Before Your Cloud Bill Spirals Out of Control)](https://ultima.com/blog/why-your-business-needs-finops-before-your-cloud-bill-spirals-out-of-control/): If your business is using the cloud—and let’s face it, most are these days—you’ve probably felt the sting of an... - [Microsoft awards Ultima as an Azure Expert MSP](https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-awards-ultima-as-an-azure-expert-msp/): Ultima have today achieved Microsoft Azure Expert Managed Service Provider (AEMSP) status. - [Final call – What TLS v1.0 and 1.1 Imminent Deprecation Could Impact](https://ultima.com/blog/final-call-what-tls-v1-0-and-1-1-imminent-deprecation-could-impact/): For end-to-end communication, encryption is essential for your data integrity, privacy and security. Transport layer security (TLS) is the current... - [Ultima’s IA-Connect solution adds Parallels support](https://ultima.com/blog/ultimas-ia-connect-solution-adds-parallels-support/): Amongst other improvements and features provided in the recent version 9. 6, one major update is the addition of Parallels... - [Are you still using Power BI Capacity SKU?](https://ultima.com/blog/update-power-bi-capacity-sku/): Microsoft have been making changes since July 2024 to consolidate Power BI into Microsoft Fabric by retiring the Power BI... - [Key Tips For Using Microsoft Azure Integrated Intune](https://ultima.com/blog/key-tips-for-using-microsoft-azure-integrated-intune/): As you may already know, Microsoft decided to move from Classic Intune to Azure integrated Intune. There are a few... - [TRANSFORMATION: Optimising IT Infrastructure with Intelligent Automation](https://ultima.com/blog/optimising-infrastructure-with-intelligent-automation/): In this third article in the series, we welcome Cisco’s Rachel Henley to explore how, when it comes to IT... - [So, what's it like to be an IT apprentice at Ultima?](https://ultima.com/blog/apprentice-scheme/): Trying to find a job after education was a daunting task. I started looking and naturally gravitated towards IT-focused apprenticeships.... - [The GDPR Bandwagon Has Just Got Bigger](https://ultima.com/blog/the-gdpr-bandwagon-has-just-got-bigger/): Following the recent high profile exploitation of personal data involving Facebook, Cambridge Analytica and Dr Kogan, there is one inevitable... - [Microsoft Azure Site Recovery](https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-asr/): Hybrid cloud in the form of backup and disaster recovery can be a great fit for organisations who don’t want... - [Can You Keep Up With Flash?](https://ultima.com/blog/can-you-keep-up-with-flash/): Unless you have been living under a rock for the last 10 years, you will have noticed that flash storage... - [The Top 8 Storage Myths Revealed!](https://ultima.com/blog/top-8-storage-myths-revealed/): If you’re still stuck deciding which storage solution is best for you, or are sceptical about what the cloud can... - [Azure D-Series promo pricing is coming to an end. Don't get stung!](https://ultima.com/blog/azure-d-series-promo-pricing-is-coming-to-an-end/): When Microsoft launched the Dv3 and Ev3 VM sizes in July 2017, Hyper-Threading Technology that runs on the latest Intel®... - [TRANSFORMATION – HOW TO DO IT](https://ultima.com/blog/transformation-how-to-do-it/): In this second article in the series, we will explore how to break down IT-driven digital or business transformation into... - [NIS Directive: Facing the Cyber Security Fear](https://ultima.com/blog/nis-directive-facing-the-cyber-security-fear/): ‘2017 was a great year... New variants of Ransomware evaded security controls and compromised thousands of devices, new vulnerabilities were... - [Critical Security Issue Found in Cisco VPNs](https://ultima.com/blog/critical-security-issue-found-in-cisco-vpns/): A critical security vulnerability was recently discovered in the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) VPN functionality of the Cisco Adaptive Security... - [Into the Land of Fire and Ice with HPE](https://ultima.com/blog/into-the-land-of-fire-and-ice-with-hpe/): As anyone who has ever worked in sales will know, all the perks and commission come with high expectations –... - [TRANSFORMATION – WHAT IS IT AND WHY NOW?](https://ultima.com/blog/transformation-what-is-it-and-why-now/): Transformation is all set to become the hottest topic of 2018, with businesses everywhere considering or doing it. - [UPDATE: Security announcement, CPU vulnerability](https://ultima.com/blog/security-announcement-cpu-vulnerability/): Ultima is aware of two major security flaws that have surfaced and are thought to affect all Intel and some... - [Azure host OS maintenance schedule update](https://ultima.com/blog/azure-host-os-maintenance/): Microsoft will be rebooting a large number of VM’s across several Azure regions on Tuesday, 9th January. - [Discover The Latest Updates From Microsoft](https://ultima.com/blog/latest-microsoft-updates/): There have been several exciting changes recently from Microsoft, with an unsurprising weight towards growing the cloud subscription revenue. - [Don't Let The Naughty Elf Into Your Room of Doom!](https://ultima.com/blog/naughty-elf-room-of-doom/): Do you have a store room overflowing with old IT kit? Do you need help to recycle or decommission it... - [Flaunting Fabulous Knits on Christmas Jumper Day](https://ultima.com/blog/christmas-jumper-day-2017/): Christmas Jumper Day, in aid of Save the Children, is a great opportunity to stick on your festive knits and... - [Hidden Keylogger Discovered in Laptops](https://ultima.com/blog/hidden-keylogger-discovered/): A potential security vulnerability was recently discovered by Security Researcher Michael Myng due to a hidden keylogging code affecting numerous... - [How To Make SQL Server Perform Faster With Less](https://ultima.com/blog/make-sql-server-perform-faster-with-less/): Microsoft SQL Server is a relational database management system (RMDBS) and has been the leader in Gartner’s Magic Quadrant (MQ)... - [Cisco Winners Circle Round Up](https://ultima.com/blog/cisco-winners-circle/): Cisco run 3 'Winners Circle' events globally every year for partners in the Americas, EMEAR and APJ respectively and Ultima... - [Citrix in Azure: Disaster Recovery](https://ultima.com/blog/citrix-azure-disaster-recovery/): One of the recurring subjects that customers often raise is “where can we use the cloud to add value today?... - [Dogs for Good Sponsored Puppy Update](https://ultima.com/blog/dogs-for-good-sponsored-puppy/): Dogs for Good are an innovative charity, exploring ways dogs can help people overcome specific challenges and enrich and improve... - [CRN Awards 2017. Ultima Wins Reseller of the Year!](https://ultima.com/blog/reseller-of-the-year/): Wow, what a result at the CRN Channel Awards – we won Reseller of the Year! - [Azure CosmosDB - The New Dog in The Cloud](https://ultima.com/blog/azure-cosmosdb/): For years, as developers we have chosen by default some form of SQL or relational database management system (RDBMS) to... - [What You Need to Know About SD-WAN](https://ultima.com/blog/citrix-sd-wan/): Citrix NetScaler SD-WAN (software-defined wide area network) gives you the ability to intelligently consume multiple network paths, delivering a highly... - [Cyber Security Week of Horrors](https://ultima.com/blog/cyber-security-horrors/): Halloween is upon us and the timing isn’t lost on global threat actors. Two major security incidents are raising their... - [ITV This Morning Puppy Digby - Q&A With His Trainer](https://ultima.com/blog/itv-this-morning-puppy/): We were so excited when our charity partner Dogs for Good gave us the chance to have a Q&A with... - [Announcing: Infraware Partnership](https://ultima.com/blog/infraware-partnership/): Through Ultima’s continuing commitment to deliver value to our clients and to bolster our position as a true, trusted advisor,... - [Microsoft Ignite: Modern Workspace Updates](https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-ignite/): Having just returned from the lush green warmth of Microsoft Ignite in Orlando I thought I would post an update... - [Security Weakness Evident In The WPA2 Secure Wi-Fi Protocol](https://ultima.com/blog/security-weakness-evident-in-the-wpa2-secure-wi-fi-protocol/): On Monday the 16th of October security researcher Mathy Vanhoef of the imec-DistriNet Research Group released a security whitepaper detailing... - [Empowering You To Change The World With Data](https://ultima.com/blog/netapp-data-fabric/): The world of data management is changing; instead of data solely residing within a corporate data centre it is now... - [Dogtober Is Here. Ultima Welcomes Dogs For Good To Reading HQ!](https://ultima.com/blog/dogtober-is-here/): Our charity partner Dogs for Good help thousands of people every day. October is Dogtober, a month-long fundraising event, and... - [Ultima Wins Prestigious Citrix Technology Advocate Award](https://ultima.com/blog/ultima-wins-prestigious-citrix-technology-advocate-award/): The Citrix Technology Advocate (CTA) programme is designed to recognise people that have made a positive contribution to the Citrix... - [Everything You Need to Know About VMworld 2017](https://ultima.com/blog/vmworld-2017/): VMware is a fabled name amongst IT administrators and infrastructure architects, however they have traditionally had very little to no... - [Writing an Azure Function to Programmatically Update Azure Data Factory](https://ultima.com/blog/azure-data-factory/): Let’s imagine that we create an Azure Data Factory (ADF) with a pipeline containing a Copy Activity that populates SQL... - [Check Point CPX 360 Highlights](https://ultima.com/blog/check-point-cpx-360-highlights/): The Ultima security team attended this years’ EMEA event in Vienna, reported to be Check Points largest ever event with... - [Discover The Key Vendors Everyone Should Be Following](https://ultima.com/blog/discover-key-vendors/): Based on CRN's recent Annual Report Card winners, Ultima can help you understand which vendors offer the best value for... - [An Insight Into a Day at Ultima](https://ultima.com/blog/insight-into-ultima/): I am currently studying Business, Economics and Geography at 6th form, so when I was provided the opportunity to undertake... - [Managing your Azure resources with Autonomous Cloud](https://ultima.com/blog/managing-your-azure-resources-with-autonomous-cloud/): Cloud usage is an inevitability for most major organisations. But running workloads in Azure and using those related services is... - [Modelling Assembly Lines Using Azure Logic Apps & Service Bus Topics](https://ultima.com/blog/azure-assembly-lines/): If you’ve ever wondered how to model real life assembly lines in code, then you can using Microsoft Azure Logic... - [Announcement: Ultima is now a specialist Check Point vSEC Partner](https://ultima.com/blog/ultima-specialist-check-point-vsec-partner/): Ultima has made massive strides over the last year or two working closely with Check Point to learn, develop and... - [Microsoft Azure as a Universal Data Store](https://ultima.com/blog/azure-data-store/): If you’ve ever wondered how to use Microsoft Azure as a universal data store, here we detail how the process... - [Automation & Orchestration - The Future of Security](https://ultima.com/blog/security-automation-orchestration/): There’s an ancient proverb which states that time and tide waits for no man, but in the modern world you... - [Why SQL Server 2019 Should be at the Centre of Your Data Infrastructure](https://ultima.com/blog/why-sql-server-2019-should-be-at-the-centre-of-your-data-infrastructure/): With the release of SQL Server 2019, Microsoft have made some exciting changes to its data virtualisation feature; PolyBase External... - [HPE Gen10 Server Platforms - Now Available!](https://ultima.com/blog/hpe-gen10/): The ever-changing technological landscape has driven a change in the way we deliver applications – and the infrastructure supporting them... - [Introducing the new HP Inc Elite Dragonfly](https://ultima.com/blog/introducing-the-new-hp-inc-elite-dragonfly/): Introducing the new HP Inc Elite Dragonfly, the world’s lightest compact business convertible. - [Dogs for Good - Ultima's Charity Partnership](https://ultima.com/blog/dogs-for-good-partnership/): Ultima recently had the pleasure of being invited to the Dogs for Good national training centre to join their Social... - [Transitioning to the Cloud - Supporting Your Legacy Kit](https://ultima.com/blog/supporting-legacy-equipment/): During a transition to the cloud, it's imperative your legacy hardware remains supported. Here are some key points you should... - [Migrating ADFS to Modern Authentication Model](https://ultima.com/blog/migrating-adfs-to-modern-authentication-model/): Active Directory Federation Services “ADFS” was the original and only way of providing single-sign-on for on-premises identities with Microsoft Azure/Office... - [What’s my property worth? - An introduction to Azure Machine Learning](https://ultima.com/blog/azure-machine-learning/): Your aim: To build and publish a cloud-based property price application. Your plan of attack: Azure Machine Learning (AML). How:... - [The Foundations of Intelligent Business](https://ultima.com/blog/the-foundations-of-intelligent-business/): Successful execution of strategy requires alignment in every part of the business. Pockets of excellence are not enough. You need... - [“There is no force equal to a woman determined to rise” – Microsoft Inspire](https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-inspire-2017/): The theme for IAMCP’s (International Association of Microsoft Channel Partners) WIT Charity Luncheon at Microsoft Inspire 2017 was ‘BE BOLD’... - [The Foundations of Intelligent Infrastructure](https://ultima.com/blog/the-foundations-of-intelligent-infrastructure/): An intelligent business is nimble, slick and clever. It out-performs its competitors by out-innovating them. And it’s built on intelligent... - [The Foundations of Intelligent Infrastructure in Financial Services](https://ultima.com/blog/the-foundations-of-intelligent-infrastructure-in-financial-services/): Intelligent infrastructure is the most secure and energy-efficient equipment available, overlayed with intelligent services that together give you operational efficiency... - [Do You Feel Like You’re Drowning In Data?](https://ultima.com/blog/drowning-in-data/): The amount of data that businesses are having to store, manage, protect and backup is increasing at an exponential rate... - [The Foundations of Intelligent Infrastructure in Manufacturing](https://ultima.com/blog/the-foundations-of-intelligent-infrastructure-in-manufacturing/): An intelligent manufacturer is digital, automated and highly efficient. It out-performs its competitors by out-innovating them. And it’s built on... - [The Foundations of an Intelligent Financial Business](https://ultima.com/blog/the-foundations-of-an-intelligent-financial-business/): One way or another you’re in the business of managing risk. Will this stock rise or fall? What’s the best... - [Cisco - The Network That Defends Itself](https://ultima.com/blog/cisco-network/): With the Internet of things, cloud services and an explosion of user devices exposing more entry points than ever to... - [Is there enough Ops in your DevOps?](https://ultima.com/blog/ops-in-your-devops/): DevOps is a popular subject in the industry right now, and with the move to public cloud services DevOps has... - [The Foundations of an Intelligent Manufacturing Business](https://ultima.com/blog/the-foundations-of-an-intelligent-manufacturing-business/): As the leader of a successful manufacturing business, you’re used to investing in technology to give you competitive advantage. It’s... - [Why Does It Always Rain On Me? – The True Cost of Cloud](https://ultima.com/blog/cost-of-cloud/): The public cloud has been mainstream for over 10 years, and during this time most businesses have used the public... - [Reduce Operating Expenses Up To 61% with Cisco DNA](https://ultima.com/blog/cisco-digital-network-architecture/): Your network is the beating heart of your business, it requires your constant attention and you need to make sure... - [Microsoft Office 365 Updates](https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-office365-updates/): Office 365 received several updates throughout June 2017, below is our summary of some of the key updates: - [Microsoft Modern Commerce and how this affects our customers](https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-modern-commerce/): Microsoft licensing has always been a dark art with multiple agreement types, product use rights and portals. Microsoft Partners like... - [Microsoft Exchange Updates](https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-exchange-updates/): Microsoft’s Exchange Team have released the June 2017 quarterly updates for Exchange 2013 and 2016. These cumulative updates will require... - [The simplicity of HCI and the flexibility of converged](https://ultima.com/blog/dhci-blog/): So, after several years of Hyper-Converged Infrastructure (HCI) being the dominant topic of conversation with IT Managers, a new kid... - [What are the key factors to a successful project?](https://ultima.com/blog/what-are-the-key-factors-to-a-successful-project/): We are all undoubtedly guilty of breezing past a successful project, task or event – ignoring why it went well... - [Autonomous Cloud for Azure](https://ultima.com/blog/autonomous-cloud-blog/): Despite the hype of public cloud, operational challenges still exist as customers remain responsible for security, maintenance and support. To... - [When's Ransomware Not Ransomware?](https://ultima.com/blog/whens-ransomware-not-ransomware/): A few weeks ago, we saw a high profile ransomware attack in the form of WannaCry. If you missed it,... - [.NET Framework 4.7 and Exchange Server](https://ultima.com/blog/net-framework-4-7-and-exchange-server/): . NET Framework 4. 7 has been released and is available via Windows Update – support for this version has... - [What are the Key Skills of a Project Manager?](https://ultima.com/blog/what-are-the-key-skills-of-a-project-manager/): It’s a great question and one which can only be partially answered by reading a job advert. Here is my... - [Increase security and simplify support with Citrix Session Recording](https://ultima.com/blog/citrix-session-recording/): Full disclosure, this isn’t new – however this is possibly one of the most frequently overlooked and misunderstood features of... - [Citrix Synergy 2017 – The Highlights](https://ultima.com/blog/citrix-synergy-2017-the-highlights/): As Citrix Synergy wraps up for another successful year we have provided a whistle-stop tour of some key highlights and... - [The 4th industrial revolution and you](https://ultima.com/blog/4th-industrial-revolution/): Much hype has been made around the “4th industrial revolution” or “Industry 4. 0” and as of yet, much of... - [Ultima Propositions Live On G-Cloud 9](https://ultima.com/blog/ultima-propositions-are-live-on-g-cloud-9/): As of the 22nd May 2017, Ultima will be able to sell a broader range of services to Public Sector... - [Ultima's New Beginnings](https://ultima.com/blog/ultimas-new-beginnings/): On May 4th, we announced the opening of our brand new £18 million state of the art HQ in Reading.... - [Ultima set for significant growth in Intelligent Automation offering](https://ultima.com/blog/growth-in-intelligent-automation-offering/): Driven by the acceleration in the market for intelligent infrastructure delivery, Ultima is today announcing that it has received a... - [The Security Architecture of the Future- Today](https://ultima.com/blog/check-point-infinity/): Growing connectivity along with evolving networks and technologies provide great opportunities for businesses, but also present new and more sophisticated... - [18/05 UPDATE - Ransomware Incident 12th May 2017](https://ultima.com/blog/ultima-response-to-ransomware-incident/): Ultima’s Response to the Ransomware Incident: - [Ultima awarded a place on the Crown Commercial Services (CCS) G-Cloud Framework](https://ultima.com/blog/g-cloud-11/): We are pleased to announce that Ultima has been re-awarded a place on the Crown Commercial Services (CCS) G-Cloud framework,... - [How Is Your Data Centre Coping With Evolved Complexity?](https://ultima.com/blog/does-your-data-centre-respond-to-organisational-demands/): The accumulated technical debt within the data centre has reached a point where supportability and agility have become compromised. - [Gone SMishing...](https://ultima.com/blog/gone-smishing/): A recent report into Phishing scams discovered that as many as 85% of organisations have been the subject of a... - [Check Point response to TCP SACK PANIC - Linux Kernel vulnerabilities - CVE-2019-11477, CVE-2019-11478 & CVE-2019-11479](https://ultima.com/blog/check-point-response-to-tcp-sack-panic/): There have been identified 3 related vulnerabilities found in the Linux Kernel. Whilst Check Point provide their own Customised Operating... - [Partnering with Preact to support Dynamics 365 implementation](https://ultima.com/blog/dyanamics365-preact/): We are delighted to announce our partnership with Preact, to help your business achieve its goals through Dynamics 365 and... - [How Does Your Digital Workspace Shape Up?](https://ultima.com/blog/how-does-your-digital-workspace-shape-up/): As consumerisation continues to penetrate the workplace, organisations of all sizes are being forced to review the ways in which... - [Support your Modern Workplace with the Surface Hub 2S](https://ultima.com/blog/surface-hub-2s/): We are now a Surface Hub Authorised Reseller! Whilst this continues to show our fantastic relationship with Microsoft, we also... - [IT Drives Competitive Strength with Ultima's Strategic Offerings](https://ultima.com/blog/it-drives-competitive-strength-with-ultima/): From Modern WorkSpace, Modern Data Centre and Assurance and Compliance, whether on-premise or cloud, your company needs to respond to... - [Putting The Spotlight On Your Information Security (Part 2)](https://ultima.com/blog/threat-prevention-security/): Threat Prevention Security – Now Available To Every Scale Of Operation Many organisations believe that the threat prevention tools and... - [Putting The Spotlight On Your Information Security (Part 1)](https://ultima.com/blog/assurance-as-a-factor-of-organisational-success/): Assurance As A Factor Of Organisational Success. Many organisations are facing ever increasing levels of complexity and ambiguity in managing... - [Why a data strategy is key to a successful digital transformation](https://ultima.com/blog/why-a-data-strategy-is-key-to-a-successful-digital-transformation/): More and more organisations are realising the benefits of moving away from legacy technology systems to modernise, automate and innovate.... - [Ultima at Citrix Summit - [The Updates]](https://ultima.com/blog/ultima-at-citrix-summit-the-updates/): STRONG FOUNDATION: With over 4,000 attendees, another highly successful Citrix Summit is drawing to a close. Some of the highlights... - [Embracing AI: Where to start on your path to digital transformation](https://ultima.com/blog/embracing-ai-where-to-start-on-your-path-to-digital-transformation/): The term ‘Artificial Intelligence’ (AI) evokes mixed reactions – from fear of the unknown to excitement about the possibilities this... - [Announcing The Launch Of The Ultima SAM Platform](https://ultima.com/blog/sam-platform-launch/): Ultima has launched a new Software Asset Management (SAM) Platform powered by the award-winning Snow License Manager technology. --- # # Detailed Content ## Pages --- --- ## Blogs - Published: 2025-05-08 - Modified: 2025-05-12 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-entra-permissions-management-end-of-sale-announcement/ - Categories: Uncategorized For anyone currently using — or considering Microsoft Entra Permissions Management: Microsoft has announced that the service is now at end of sale. For anyone currently using — or considering Microsoft Entra Permissions Management: Microsoft has announced that the service is now at end of sale.    This marks a significant shift for organisations relying on Entra PM to manage cloud entitlements and enforce least-privilege access — especially across multi-cloud environments like Azure, AWS, and GCP. What does this mean for you? Effective, April 1, 2025, Microsoft Entra Permissions Management will no longer be available for purchase by new Enterprise Agreement and direct customers, and effective May 1, 2025, it will no longer be available for purchase by new CSP customers. Effective October 1, 2025, we will retire Microsoft Entra Permissions Management and discontinue support of this product. What are the options? The good news is there are strong alternatives out there. Microsoft has identified Delinea as a recommended third-party alternative, particularly for customers seeking continued visibility and control over cloud permissions. Delinea is well-regarded in the identity and access management space, offering robust CIEM capabilities that align well with Zero Trust principles. At Ultima, we partner closely with Delinea and we’re ready to help you evaluate whether it’s the right fit for your environment — or explore other viable solutions, depending on your needs. Our approach We’ve helped several organisations implement and manage Entra Permissions Management, so we understand how embedded it can be in your security posture. In response to this change, we’re offering support with: Reviewing current entitlements and permission structures Identifying gaps and enhancements with Delinea Seamless migration from Microsoft to Delinea Whether this is a big shift for you... --- - Published: 2025-04-22 - Modified: 2025-05-21 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-price-increase-for-on-premises-servers-july-2025/ - Categories: Uncategorized Microsoft will be increasing some of its pricing on 1st July 2025. Microsoft will be increasing some of its pricing on 1st July 2025. This consists of a 10% increase for on-premises servers, e. g. , for SharePoint and Exchange server. In addition to this, and for those customers still using Core CAL and Enterprise CAL Suites, there will be 15% – 20% increase.   Organisations who are affected are advised to review on-premises cores/servers, assess requirements, and then accelerate any procurement before the 1st July deadline . Ultima is eager to help customers with this and have collaborated with many on this before. Regarding reasoning, it would be easy to align the increase with the end of Microsoft FY in June, helping invigorate all revenue streams and incentives purchased this FY. Microsoft justified its reasoning as follows: ‘To support ongoing maintenance and updates for Microsoft’s on-premises server products, prices for all standalone on-premises server products will increase. ’ Please note that these changes apply exclusively to the on-premises versions of these products. There is no impact to pricing for SharePoint Online, Exchange Online, or Microsoft Teams purchased separately or through a Microsoft 365 license.  See below the official statement and please speak to us to learn more or get support/ advice. Licensing and pricing updates for on-premises server products coming July 2025 | Microsoft Community Hub --- - Published: 2025-04-10 - Modified: 2025-05-21 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/why-your-business-needs-finops-before-your-cloud-bill-spirals-out-of-control/ - Categories: Cloud If your business is using the cloud—and let’s face it, most are these days—you’ve probably felt the sting of an unexpectedly high bill. Maybe you've wondered where all that spend is going, or who's responsible for keeping things in check. That's where FinOps comes in. Wait, what is FinOps? FinOps (short for Financial Operations) isn’t just another buzzword. It’s a practical way to manage cloud costs by bringing finance, tech, and business teams together. Instead of playing the blame game when budgets blow out, FinOps gives everyone the visibility, tools, and accountability to manage cloud spend together. Think of it like DevOps, but for money. So, why should your business care about FinOps? Cloud spending can be a bit like a leaky tap—slow at first, then suddenly flooding your budget. Here’s how FinOps helps you get ahead of it: 1. You focus on real-time visibility into cloud costs Instead of waiting for end-of-month reports, FinOps gives your teams live insight into what’s being spent—and where. It’s like switching on the lights in a dark room. Suddenly, everything’s clearer, and you can see the chunk of lego on the floor before you step on it on your way to the kitchen Less “we’ll fix it next month,” more “let’s sort this today. ” 2. It gets everyone speaking the same language Finance teams care about budgets. Engineers care about uptime and speed. FinOps helps bridge that gap, so decisions are made with both goals in mind—technical performance and financial accountability. FinOps... --- - Published: 2025-03-21 - Modified: 2025-05-12 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-awards-ultima-as-an-azure-expert-msp/ - Categories: Uncategorized Ultima have today achieved Microsoft Azure Expert Managed Service Provider (AEMSP) status. Ultima have today achieved Microsoft Azure Expert Managed Service Provider (AEMSP) status. Azure Expert MSP is the highest Microsoft Accreditation level for Azure and independently validates Ultima’s expertise and quality of Cloud transformation services, covering planning, migration, optimisation, operation, and management of Cloud services on the Azure platform. Ultima offers a dedicated portfolio of Professional and Managed Services, spanning the entire lifecycle of Cloud services running on the Azure platform. These offerings support customers to better assess, migrate, manage, protect, optimise, and innovate with a vast range of Cloud solutions including Infrastructure workloads, Azure DevOps, Azure Sentinel, Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD) and so much more. This highly sought-after accreditation comes following Ultima gaining the Azure-based Microsoft Infra and Database Migration Advanced Specialisation. Obtaining Azure Expert MSP also confirmed Ultima’s skill in automation, especially its own in-house designed Cloud Management Platform (CMP) and systematic processes in managed services, both which were standout areas that Ultima have become increasingly known for in the industry. Having Azure Expert MSP status, puts Ultima in an elite group of partners both in the UK and globally and confirms that Ultima’s experts can design, build and manage a secure, resilient and scalable Cloud infrastructure that empowers and enables any organisation and its users to perform to the best of their ability. For customers, this accreditation validates Ultima's pedigree as a dependable, best-in-class Cloud services provider. Ultima has long provided the highest levels of service and the most robust safeguarding measures to reduce risk, exceed customer expectations,... --- - Published: 2025-03-05 - Modified: 2025-05-09 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/final-call-what-tls-v1-0-and-1-1-imminent-deprecation-could-impact/ - Categories: Blog, Industry News, Microsoft, Technology Updates, Microsoft, Vendor News For end-to-end communication, encryption is essential for your data integrity, privacy and security. Transport layer security (TLS) is the current main encryption mechanism used by vendors and systems worldwide to perfom this function – and you may know this by its legacy name of secure socket layer (SSL). For end-to-end communication, encryption is essential for your data integrity, privacy and security. Transport layer security (TLS) is the current main encryption mechanism used by vendors and systems worldwide to perfom this function – and you may know this by its legacy name of secure socket layer (SSL). SSL is used everywhere when we talk about security in transit, including in web browsers and certificates, but in reality TLS replaced SSL a long time ago in the early 2000s. The name however is so synonymous with the general public it has stuck around. TLS though is also going through a transformation of its own, mainly due to mitigations of potential risks and exploitation of earlier versions. However TLS has been around for so long and used in so many technologies, it has been difficult to force newer versions. Currently TLS v1. 3 is the latest available iteration, but v1. 2 is also supported and currently not marked for deprecation. Microsoft, along with other vendors, have been pushing through over the last few years to finally remove older versions of TLS, specifically V1. 0 and 1. 1. Therefore, for Azure services, you would have likely started to see alerts for sub-services to make sure that you are ready for this deprecation, both as part of the underlying configuration, but most importantly if you are interacting with any of these services through programmatic means. Currently Microsoft are on track to complete disable anything using TLS v1. 0 and 1. 1 by 31st... --- - Published: 2025-02-20 - Modified: 2025-05-09 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/ultimas-ia-connect-solution-adds-parallels-support/ - Categories: Blog, Industry News, Microsoft, Technology Updates, Industry News, WorkSpace, Microsoft, Vendor News Amongst other improvements and features provided in the recent version 9.6, one major update is the addition of Parallels support. This means that customers that need to automate applications that are remote now have more choice than ever, along with our continued support for Citrix and Microsoft Remote Desktop technologies Ultima are pleased to announce a major update to our intelligent automation product IA-Connect. Amongst other improvements and features provided in the recent version 9. 6, one major update is the addition of Parallels support. This means that customers that need to automate applications that are remote now have more choice than ever, along with our continued support for Citrix and Microsoft Remote Desktop technologies IA-Connect is Ultima’s answer to revolutionising real-world AI & automation capabilities for organisations that have repeatable tasks, allowing their workforce to focus on more meaningful work. The solution allows businesses to not only bring automation to legacy applications that are too costly to replace but allows them to combine it with newer API-centric applications, as well as its built-in AI actions. IA-Connect version 9. 6 with Parallels is available today, and a 30-day fully featured free trial including a session with one of experts is also available. Head to our website https://ultima. com/ia-connect/. At Ultima, we’ve been proactively working with our existing customer base that this impacts, but also providing them with Microsoft Fabric proof-of-concept solutions due to them being given access to an entire and modern data platform solution through this change. This has seen significant benefits of adoption and acceleration of data & AI capabilities to these businesses by working with our experts. In short – you’ve got it, so why not use it? And we can get you there at pace with our experience and guidance. If you’ve got any questions about... --- - Published: 2025-02-04 - Modified: 2025-05-21 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/update-power-bi-capacity-sku/ - Categories: Blog, Industry News, Microsoft, Technology Updates, Industry News, WorkSpace, Microsoft, Vendor News Microsoft have been making changes since July 2024 to consolidate Power BI into Microsoft Fabric by retiring the Power BI capacity SKU and replacing it with Microsoft Fabric capacity SKUs. Check your SKU - You may only have 90-days to act. For customers utilising Power BI capacity SKUs, sometimes referred to as P-SKUs: Microsoft have been making changes since July 2024 to consolidate Power BI into Microsoft Fabric by retiring the Power BI capacity SKU and replacing it with Microsoft Fabric capacity SKUs. For those not aware, Microsoft Fabric is built on the existing Power BI platform and provides an all-in-one data platform with AI-powered services to accomplish any data project. Microsoft Fabric is a superset of Power BI Premium; meaning it has all the capabilities of Power BI Premium plus a range of additional workloads, giving access to a data end-to-end SaaS-based solution. Jim Manis, Vice President of Product Management at Microsoft, has provided some succinct information on this change and what the impact means: “... with reservation SKUs now available for Microsoft Fabric, we are announcing the end of life for the Power BI Premium capacity SKUs. Depending on your existing agreement, the retirement will impact you differently: New customers will not be able to purchase Power BI Premium per capacity after July 1, 2024. Existing customers without an Enterprise Agreement (EA) will be able to renew their Power BI Premium capacity subscriptions until February 1, 2025. Customers who have a renewal date after February 1, 2025 will need to replace their Power BI Premium capacity subscription purchase with the purchase of Fabric capacity at the end of their agreement. Customers with an existing EA agreement can continue... --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/key-tips-for-using-microsoft-azure-integrated-intune/ - Categories: Microsoft, Azure As you may already know, Microsoft decided to move from Classic Intune to Azure integrated Intune. There are a few things that need to be considered before you decide to use Azure integrated Intune for patch management. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/optimising-infrastructure-with-intelligent-automation/ - Categories: Cisco, RPA, Transformation, AI, Thought Leadership In this third article in the series, we welcome Cisco's Rachel Henley to explore how, when it comes to IT infrastructure, the rules are being re-written by digital disruption. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/apprentice-scheme/ - Categories: Apprentices Trying to find a job after education was a daunting task. I started looking and naturally gravitated towards IT-focused apprenticeships. I came across an ad for IT sales, and after successfully getting through the initial processes I was offered an interview here at Ultima. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/the-gdpr-bandwagon-has-just-got-bigger/ - Categories: GDPR Following the recent high profile exploitation of personal data involving Facebook, Cambridge Analytica and Dr Kogan, there is one inevitable outcome of this incident... (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-asr/ - Categories: Microsoft, Azure, Cloud, Data Centre Hybrid cloud in the form of backup and disaster recovery can be a great fit for organisations who don't want to carry the cost of an expensive Co-Lo or secondary data centres, but still need the assurance of being able to recover in the event of a disaster. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/can-you-keep-up-with-flash/ - Categories: Big Data, Data Centre, Storage Unless you have been living under a rock for the last 10 years, you will have noticed that flash storage is growing - and it’s growing fast. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/top-8-storage-myths-revealed/ - Categories: GDPR, Big Data, Cloud, Data Centre, Storage If you're still stuck deciding which storage solution is best for you, or are sceptical about what the cloud can offer, I am here to reveal the truth behind some common misconceptions. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/azure-d-series-promo-pricing-is-coming-to-an-end/ - Categories: Industry News, Microsoft, Azure, Cloud When Microsoft launched the Dv3 and Ev3 VM sizes in July 2017, Hyper-Threading Technology that runs on the latest Intel® Broadwell and Haswell processors was introduced. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/transformation-how-to-do-it/ - Categories: RPA, Transformation, AI, Thought Leadership In this second article in the series, we will explore how to break down IT-driven digital or business transformation into three distinct areas, allowing businesses to focus on what matters most (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/nis-directive-facing-the-cyber-security-fear/ - Categories: Industry News, Cyber Security '2017 was a great year... New variants of Ransomware evaded security controls and compromised thousands of devices, new vulnerabilities were exploited exposing millions of machines, high profile data breaches resulted in millions of pounds of losses... A job well done. '* (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/critical-security-issue-found-in-cisco-vpns/ - Categories: Industry News, Cyber Security, Cisco A critical security vulnerability was recently discovered in the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) VPN functionality of the Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/into-the-land-of-fire-and-ice-with-hpe/ - Categories: HPE As anyone who has ever worked in sales will know, all the perks and commission come with high expectations - so when the pressure is piling on, a little extra incentive can go a long way... (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/transformation-what-is-it-and-why-now/ - Categories: RPA, Transformation, AI, Thought Leadership Transformation is all set to become the hottest topic of 2018, with businesses everywhere considering or doing it. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/security-announcement-cpu-vulnerability/ - Categories: Cyber Security, Security Ultima is aware of two major security flaws that have surfaced and are thought to affect all Intel and some AMD & ARM processors. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/azure-host-os-maintenance/ - Categories: Microsoft, Azure Microsoft will be rebooting a large number of VM's across several Azure regions on Tuesday, 9th January. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-12 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/latest-microsoft-updates/ - Categories: Industry News, Microsoft There have been several exciting changes recently from Microsoft, with an unsurprising weight towards growing the cloud subscription revenue. There have been several exciting changes recently from Microsoft, with an unsurprising weight towards growing the cloud subscription revenue. That is not to say the value isn't there for customers - many of the developments are designed to increase the value and power of the cloud. Microsoft 365 For example, the Microsoft 365 licensing suite launched in August - more and more customers are now seeing the benefits of advanced functionality with a subscription cost that can be justified. Much of the work Ultima and myself have completed recently has been around Microsoft 365, and I encourage all customers with any interest to get engaged and understand where (and if) the suite has value to your organisation. Azure With Azure, the savings and capabilities continue to grow. There are several key areas to update and understand, but the headlines include the continuation of leveraging existing investment in on premise Windows Server licenses – with the Hybrid Use Benefit. Microsoft have produced this calculator to help you understand how you could reduce cost in Azure by 40%. Further Azure news includes the replacement of Compute Pre Purchase (CPP) with Azure Reserved Instances, with more licensing cost savings and easier transactions. There are no longer specific SKUs as customers can simply benefit from Reserved Instances as part of the wider Azure monetary commitment. Again, we advise you contact us to learn more about how this can help your organisation. The final point to note, and this will have longer term and wide... --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/naughty-elf-room-of-doom/ - Categories: GDPR, Security Do you have a store room overflowing with old IT kit? Do you need help to recycle or decommission it securely and compliantly? Don't let the 'Naughty Elf' get hold of your data - we have the solution. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/christmas-jumper-day-2017/ - Categories: Charity Christmas Jumper Day, in aid of Save the Children, is a great opportunity to stick on your festive knits and donate to a worthy cause! (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/hidden-keylogger-discovered/ - Categories: Industry News, Cyber Security A potential security vulnerability was recently discovered by Security Researcher Michael Myng due to a hidden keylogging code affecting numerous HP laptops. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/make-sql-server-perform-faster-with-less/ - Categories: Microsoft, Technology Updates, Database Management Microsoft SQL Server is a relational database management system (RMDBS) and has been the leader in Gartner's Magic Quadrant (MQ) for the last few years. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-12 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/cisco-winners-circle/ - Categories: Ultima News, Cisco Cisco run 3 'Winners Circle' events globally every year for partners in the Americas, EMEAR and APJ respectively and Ultima were lucky enough to attend! Cisco run 3 'Winners Circle' events globally every year for partners in the Americas, EMEAR and APJ respectively. Places are awarded to the top 100 fastest growing partners in each region and Ultima were lucky enough to attend! As a global business Cisco did circa $50bn revenue last year. And with over 25,000 channel partners worldwide, I was understandably thrilled that Ultima had won a space - recognising us as a top performer! The events themselves serve several purposes: They’re a great opportunity to network with other professionals in the IT industry and share contacts and best practice You hear the latest updates direct from the horses' mouths (i. e. members of the Cisco senior management team) You get the chance to give direct, one-to-one feedback on how Cisco can help to improve things moving forwards I must admit as the plane touched down in South Africa I felt nervous... maybe it was because it was my first time on the African continent, or the fact my personal phone had completely died on the way out (work phone to the rescue! ) More likely it was because I’d made the somewhat brazen decision to put 'Ross Kemp on Gangs – Cape Town' on the TV as I packed 24 hours earlier. Either way, there was no time for nerves, as I’d be meeting my fellow Winners Circle attendees - as well as my Cisco hosts - within the hour and it was game-face time! Automation & Intelligence As you might... --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/citrix-azure-disaster-recovery/ - Categories: Citrix, Technology Updates, Azure One of the recurring subjects that customers often raise is “where can we use the cloud to add value today? ” – and for many the answer to this may be disaster recovery. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/dogs-for-good-sponsored-puppy/ - Categories: Charity Dogs for Good are an innovative charity, exploring ways dogs can help people overcome specific challenges and enrich and improve lives and communities. As a Dogs for Good Puppy Partner, we receive regular updates on the progress of our sponsored pooch, Poppy. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/reseller-of-the-year/ - Categories: Ultima News, Industry News, Ultima Announcements Wow, what a result at the CRN Channel Awards - we won Reseller of the Year! (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/azure-cosmosdb/ - Categories: Industry News, Microsoft, Azure, Cloud For years, as developers we have chosen by default some form of SQL or relational database management system (RDBMS) to store application data. But now we are entering the age of the cloud, alternatives are beginning to appear. So how does RDBMS fair? (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/citrix-sd-wan/ - Categories: Citrix, Technology Updates Citrix NetScaler SD-WAN (software-defined wide area network) gives you the ability to intelligently consume multiple network paths, delivering a highly resilient and high performance WAN. This is in thanks to the low cost of bandwidth - ten years ago, this was not the case. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/cyber-security-horrors/ - Categories: Industry News, Cyber Security Halloween is upon us and the timing isn’t lost on global threat actors. Two major security incidents are raising their heads this week - Reaper and Bad Rabbit. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/itv-this-morning-puppy/ - Categories: Charity We were so excited when our charity partner Dogs for Good gave us the chance to have a Q&A with the trainer of ITV This Morning puppy, Digby! (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/infraware-partnership/ - Categories: SAM, Industry News, Assurance & Compliance Through Ultima’s continuing commitment to deliver value to our clients and to bolster our position as a true, trusted advisor, we have made a strategic decision to partner with Infraware. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-ignite/ - Categories: Industry News, Microsoft, Technology Updates Having just returned from the lush green warmth of Microsoft Ignite in Orlando I thought I would post an update on some of the themes I picked up on during the week. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/security-weakness-evident-in-the-wpa2-secure-wi-fi-protocol/ - Categories: Technology Updates, Cyber Security, Security On Monday the 16th of October security researcher Mathy Vanhoef of the imec-DistriNet Research Group released a security whitepaper detailing a serious security weakness evident in the WPA2 secure Wi-Fi protocol, impacting any and all current implementations of the protocol. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/netapp-data-fabric/ - Categories: Technology Updates, Big Data, Cloud, Data Centre The world of data management is changing; instead of data solely residing within a corporate data centre it is now spread across disparate infrastructure. Managing this data can prove a challenge to organisations requiring multiple tools and interfaces. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/dogtober-is-here/ - Categories: Ultima News, Ultima Announcements, Charity Our charity partner Dogs for Good help thousands of people every day. October is Dogtober, a month-long fundraising event, and we were delighted to accept the opportunity to help! #UltimateDogtober (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/ultima-wins-prestigious-citrix-technology-advocate-award/ - Categories: Industry News, Citrix The Citrix Technology Advocate (CTA) programme is designed to recognise people that have made a positive contribution to the Citrix Community. This year there are less than 70 members across the globe, and Ultima is one of them! (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/vmworld-2017/ - Categories: Industry News, Technology Updates, Partner News, VMware VMware is a fabled name amongst IT administrators and infrastructure architects, however they have traditionally had very little to no presence in the end user space. With announcements into Workspace ONE, Horizon View and AirWatch at VMWorld 2017, VMware is making great progress in changing that picture. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/azure-data-factory/ - Categories: Industry News, Microsoft Let’s imagine that we create an Azure Data Factory (ADF) with a pipeline containing a Copy Activity that populates SQL Azure with data from an on premise SQL Server database. If we set the schedule with a short interval, say to run every 15 minutes over a 3 month period, then we will discover that it will generate a large number of executions or slices (around 9,000). (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-12 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/check-point-cpx-360-highlights/ - Categories: Ultima News The Ultima security team attended this years’ EMEA event in Vienna, reported to be Check Points largest ever event with over 4500 attendees. The start of the year is welcomed by the annual Check Point Security Summit, hosted in Bangkok, New Orleans and Vienna. The Ultima security team attended this years’ EMEA event in Vienna, reported to be Check Points largest ever event with over 4500 attendees. The event organised to enable product experts, R&D teams, partners and customers to come together and collaborate included keynote speeches, detailed breakout sessions, focused demonstrations and hands on labs; where the Ultima team scored one of the fastest ever times in the Cyber Range challenge – well done. The theme of this years’ event was “Secure your EVERYTHING” and I think this sums up the current cyber landscape quite effectively. The requirement for a next generation security gateway is well known, but with focus on Zero Trust and increased use of dynamic mobile and cloud environments it is not the only surface area that needs protection. Check Point have given focus to ensuring full threat prevention features are available for all organisations large and small, across all technologies and mediums used in the hyper-connected world. It is reported that 80% of corporate investment in IT security is focused on detection abilities, however the speed at which targeted threats can emerge and transit requires focus on AI based prevention with low false positives, immediate action and confidence that will not impact business critical operations. Check Point showcased their 60 security services, 20 of which are new in 2020 enabling organisations to focus on prevention in all areas... --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-12 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/discover-key-vendors/ - Categories: Industry News, Partner News Based on CRN's recent Annual Report Card winners, Ultima can help you understand which vendors offer the best value for your business - so you don’t have to. Based on CRN's recent Annual Report Card winners, Ultima can help you understand which vendors offer the best value for your business - so you don’t have to. This year marked the 32nd run of the awards, where vendors are scored in 22 technology categories. This is based on performance across the following categories: product innovation, support and partnership. The vendors earning the highest marks are below: Winners Cisco – Collaboration, Converged/HyperConverged Infrastructure, Enterprise Networking Infrastructure and Enterprise Wireless LANs VMware - Desktop And Server Virtualisation Dell EMC - Enterprise Network Storage, Industry Standard Servers, Notebooks/Mobile Computers, SMB Networking and Tablets HP Inc - Multifunction Printers Ultima has expertise in all of these key vendors, ensuring you receive knowledgeable advice and peace of mind from a specialist partner: VMware Premier Solution Provider HP Inc Gold Partner Dell EMC Platinum Partner Cisco Premier Partner If you'd like to speak to us about any of these vendors, or another which isn't listed, please reach out to us: --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/insight-into-ultima/ - Categories: Ultima News I am currently studying Business, Economics and Geography at 6th form, so when I was provided the opportunity to undertake work experience at Ultima - and gain an insight into a real operating business - I was beyond excited. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-12 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/managing-your-azure-resources-with-autonomous-cloud/ - Categories: Autonomous Cloud Cloud usage is an inevitability for most major organisations. But running workloads in Azure and using those related services is one thing. I thought I’d start this blog post off with a few stats – because who doesn’t love a stat? More than 90% of organizations will be using some form of the cloud (Source: 451) IaaS is the fastest growing cloud spending service with a five-year CAGR of 33. 7%. (Source: IDC) PaaS spending will be the second-fastest growing category (29. 8% CAGR) (Source: IDC) What we’re getting at here is cloud usage is an inevitability for most major organisations. But running workloads in Azure and using those related services is one thing – how do you actually look after these services while simultaneously driving your cloud journey forwards in an optimal fashion? Traditionally looking after our workloads has involved the use of agents, collecting metrics, and then performing an action against a particular threshold that has been pre-defined. A traditional solution shown below is an incredibly common scenario. But in the new world of Azure this has some severe limitations around the Azure platform itself, especially non virtual machine-based services. As part of the customers cloud journey, sooner or later they will be making use of services away from traditional virtual machines. Even virtual networking in Azure is something you’d want to track – but how? And while we’re at it, how do we track new deployments and monitor and manage them as well without getting our hands dirty? These are the questions we posed ourselves on the development team for our Azure Autonomous Cloud management solution for customers. With... --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/azure-assembly-lines/ - Categories: Industry News, Microsoft If you've ever wondered how to model real life assembly lines in code, then you can using Microsoft Azure Logic Apps and Service Bus topics. Here we give you the low down. Read on to find out more... (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/ultima-specialist-check-point-vsec-partner/ - Categories: Industry News, Cyber Security Ultima has made massive strides over the last year or two working closely with Check Point to learn, develop and deploy their vSEC cloud security solution for Azure & AWS. We are pleased to reveal that Ultima has now been announced as a specialist vSEC Partner. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/azure-data-store/ - Categories: Industry News, Microsoft If you've ever wondered how to use Microsoft Azure as a universal data store, here we detail how the process works. Read on to find out more... This architectural pattern is very generic, in that it attempts to consume data into the Azure cloud; processing, storing and analysing it in a cost effective, highly available and flexible way. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/security-automation-orchestration/ - Categories: Cyber Security There's an ancient proverb which states that time and tide waits for no man, but in the modern world you can add cyber security threats and hackers to the list. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-12 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/why-sql-server-2019-should-be-at-the-centre-of-your-data-infrastructure/ - Categories: Microsoft, Vendor, Technology Updates With the release of SQL Server 2019, Microsoft have made some exciting changes to its data virtualisation feature; PolyBase External Tables. With the release of SQL Server 2019, Microsoft have made some exciting changes to its data virtualisation feature; PolyBase External Tables. With these enhancements, organisations can position SQL Server as the central system for querying nearly all their structured and unstructured data spread across a multitude of different vendors, databases and files, without the requirement to develop complex integrations or extraction processes. Data Virtualisation using PolyBase External Tables Nearly all organisations have multiple sources of data, usually scattered across various disparate systems, applications, hosting locations and legacy database systems. These data pools hold valuable insights for a business and being able to link these systems for complete analysis quickly, has always been tricky. Traditionally this would mean developing complex Extraction, Transformation and Load (ETL) processes which make centralising the data costly, time consuming and prone to error, and trying to query data in near real time in this way has never been an easy task. Linked servers can be used to allow an SQL Server to query an external data set, but this process has performance limitations, complex naming notations and if a database is migrated or is part of an Availability Group, then extra administration is required. With SQL Server 2019, these problems are a lot less challenging. By using PolyBase External Tables, table definitions to external data sources can be created within a SQL Server database. This means to the client, the tables look like they are objects within the database itself, despite queries accessing external data stored... --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/hpe-gen10/ - Categories: Industry News, HPE The ever-changing technological landscape has driven a change in the way we deliver applications - and the infrastructure supporting them - within the modern data centre. In recent years agility, efficiency, scalability and performance have become common phrases; and the modern data centre responds to these organisational demands. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-13 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/introducing-the-new-hp-inc-elite-dragonfly/ - Categories: HP Inc Introducing the new HP Inc Elite Dragonfly, the world’s lightest compact business convertible. Introducing the new HP Inc Elite Dragonfly, the world’s lightest compact business convertible. HP Inc have announced the released of the ‘lighter than air’ HP Elite Dragonfly, featuring a durable iridescent dragonfly blue finish, diamond cut accents and an impressive screen to body ratio. Back in February of this year, Neowin stated that “HP only makes its EliteBooks in Natural Silver, but you just have to look across the board to its consumer Spectre PCs to see just how much better they could look. HP’s Spectre laptops are among the most beautiful on the market, and I really wish that they would bring some of those designs over to the Elite lineup. ” This is exactly what HP have aimed to do with the Elite Dragonfly. Following HP’s global environmental initiative to use recycled plastics in their products, the Dragonfly is the world’s first notebook made using ocean-bound plastic material, so we can all feel a little less guilty for wanting the latest available technology! The iridescent dragonfly blue colouring is a sophisticated tone that represents confidence, prestige and individuality. The Dragonfly colour instils a sense of uniqueness for the user, providing a stark contrast that stands out against a sea of black plastic, carbon and paint. All without having to compromise between having a powerful or lightweight machine. HP Workwell is a wellbeing software that comes preinstalled. It is a system-level software that offers personalised recommendations for breaks and activities dependent on the user. It has been stated that... --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/dogs-for-good-partnership/ - Categories: GDPR, Ultima Announcements, Charity Ultima recently had the pleasure of being invited to the Dogs for Good national training centre to join their Social Afternoon Tea. We were very privileged to be part of such a memorable day where puppy socialisers, dogs and the clients met for the first time; sharing stories from their training and how the relationships were progressing. We also enjoyed a tour of the kennels and training facilities, while of course meeting some puppies - such as Quill pictured right - which was a welcome bonus. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-12 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/supporting-legacy-equipment/ - Categories: Industry News, Maintenance During a transition to the cloud, it's imperative your legacy hardware remains supported. Here are some key points you should consider, as well as details of how Ultima can assist with the process. During a transition to the cloud, it's imperative your legacy hardware remains supported. Below are some key points you should consider, as well as details of how Ultima can assist with the process: In order to minimise the risk of system downtime, what break fix arrangements have you made to repair failed legacy hardware?   Have you thought about uplifting the level of manufacturer warranty to a fix SLA for your critical new equipment? Are your business plans to move to a cloud solution, and as such you aren't investing in new infrastructure? Our Opinion Not every business is ready to migrate to the cloud, but for those who are, many (if not all) will have some form of localised infrastructure in place that will need to be maintained. Ultima certainly would not advise you neglect legacy IT systems as you transition towards a cloud-based solution.  Critical enterprise solutions, such as those used by data centres, remain revered by IT teams. For businesses that need flexible support models to maintain their essential infrastructure during a period of adoption and thereafter, it’s essential they can access trusted service partners who are equipped with the correct skills and accreditations to avoid IT outages and downtime. Our Solution Ultima’s trusted maintenance model is built upon utilising local and tier one accredited resources to deliver a reliable break-fix service, measured by Service Level Agreements.  Our distributed logistics programme ensures OEM spares are delivered to site to facilitate the repair, as such your infrastructure is up and running again within hours... --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/migrating-adfs-to-modern-authentication-model/ - Categories: Ultima News Active Directory Federation Services “ADFS” was the original and only way of providing single-sign-on for on-premises identities with Microsoft Azure/Office 365. It called for a great number of servers and components to be deployed to provide a resilient solution. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/azure-machine-learning/ - Categories: Industry News, Microsoft Your aim: To build and publish a cloud-based property price application. Your plan of attack: Azure Machine Learning (AML). How: Read on... (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-12 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/the-foundations-of-intelligent-business/ - Categories: HPE, AI Successful execution of strategy requires alignment in every part of the business. Pockets of excellence are not enough. You need intelligence at every level – from the foundations up. So how do you lay the foundations of an intelligent business? Successful execution of strategy requires alignment in every part of the business. Pockets of excellence are not enough. You need intelligence at every level – from the foundations up. So how do you lay the foundations of an intelligent business? The CEO’s dilemma As the leader of a successful business, you know what you want. You’re clear on your strategy – you just need to execute it. But that’s the hard part. Getting every element of your business aligned to deliver your strategy isn’t easy. Too often one part of the business, like product innovation will be striding ahead, while other functions like IT will be slowing – draining resources, delaying transformation and putting your competitiveness at risk. What you need is for every part of the business to pull together – from top to bottom. While the top of the value stack will always get your attention, you can’t afford to neglect the bottom line, it’s the foundations on which everything else depends. I’m talking about IT infrastructure, the kind of things you pay other people to think about. If they don’t get the attention they deserve, they can cause challenges for the business that will require your attention all too quickly... That’s why I say to Ultima’s clients that if they want to build what I call an intelligent business, they have to start with the foundations. What is an intelligent business? An intelligent business exploits the newest and smartest ways of doing things, from the best employees... --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-inspire-2017/ - Categories: Industry News, Microsoft The theme for IAMCP's (International Association of Microsoft Channel Partners) WIT Charity Luncheon at Microsoft Inspire 2017 was 'BE BOLD' – something many women face on a daily basis, (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/the-foundations-of-intelligent-infrastructure/ - Categories: HPE, AI An intelligent business is nimble, slick and clever. It out-performs its competitors by out-innovating them. And it’s built on intelligent infrastructure from the foundations up. So, what is intelligent infrastructure, why do you need it, and where can you get it? (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-12 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/the-foundations-of-intelligent-infrastructure-in-financial-services/ - Categories: HPE, AI Intelligent infrastructure is the most secure and energy-efficient equipment available, overlayed with intelligent services that together give you operational efficiency and strategic agility. An intelligent financial services firm is nimble, slick and clever. It out-performs its competitors by out-innovating them. And it’s built on intelligent infrastructure from the foundations up. So what is intelligent infrastructure, why do you need it, and where can you get it? Why you need intelligent infrastructure If you’re like most of Ultima’s financial services clients, you’re already on your way to becoming a better, more intelligent business. You may be a FinTech pioneering a disruptive business model, or an established firm re-inventing itself for the digital era. Either way, you’ll be looking to the latest developments in AI and blockchain, and the most agile DevOps techniques to drive your firm forward. These are the aspects of digital business that get the limelight. But without correspondingly agile foundations, your best-laid plans could crumble. This is why you need intelligent infrastructure – because the foundations of the IT stack have to be every bit as up-to-date, leading-edge and intelligent as the apps and services that run on them. Only on a foundation of intelligent infrastructure can IT become a true partner to the business and deliver the innovation it requires to succeed. What is intelligent infrastructure? Intelligent infrastructure is the most secure and energy-efficient equipment available, overlayed with intelligent services that together give you operational efficiency and strategic agility. At Ultima, we think in terms of two main classes of intelligent infrastructure: intelligent servers and storage, and intelligent operational management. Intelligent servers and storage are secure, energy-efficient devices combined with... --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/drowning-in-data/ - Categories: Industry News, Data Centre The amount of data that businesses are having to store, manage, protect and backup is increasing at an exponential rate of between 40% and 60% per year on average. For unstructured data in the enterprise, the growth rate can be as high as 80%. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/the-foundations-of-intelligent-infrastructure-in-manufacturing/ - Categories: HPE, AI An intelligent manufacturer is digital, automated and highly efficient. It out-performs its competitors by out-innovating them. And it’s built on intelligent infrastructure from the foundations up. So what is intelligent infrastructure and why do you need it? (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/the-foundations-of-an-intelligent-financial-business/ - Categories: HPE, AI One way or another you’re in the business of managing risk. Will this stock rise or fall? What’s the best way to finance this asset? How much does this pension fund need to meet its liabilities? One way or another you’re in the business of managing risk. Will this stock rise or fall? What’s the best way to finance this asset? How much does this pension fund need to meet its liabilities? To manage these risks you need information. The most reliable and accurate information you can get – exactly when you need it – so your people can make smart decisions for your clients and your business. You turn this information into opportunity by applying intelligence. These days, there are two forms: the human intelligence embodied in your people’s skills and experience, and the artificial intelligence encoded in your algorithms and apps. But just having these building blocks isn’t enough – to succeed, you have to line them up. It’s the alignment of risk, information and intelligence that makes for business success. And you need this alignment to extend right down to the foundations of your business. An intelligent business is built on intelligent foundations Ask yourself for a moment: What is your business built on? Information, yes. Skill, certainly. Trust, for sure. What about physically? Today, whether you’re in bricks and mortar or purely online, every kind of financial services business is actually built on IT infrastructure.   It may sound mundane, but it’s the foundation of everything you do. You can’t trade without computers. You can’t advise without them. You can’t gather information, serve clients, take orders, settle or bill. You can’t do your accounts, file your returns, pay your staff. Anything. Can... --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/cisco-network/ - Categories: Industry News, Cyber Security, Data Centre With the Internet of things, cloud services and an explosion of user devices exposing more entry points than ever to your network, it’s not enough to be reactive to security threats - you have to go searching for them. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/ops-in-your-devops/ - Categories: Industry News DevOps is a popular subject in the industry right now, and with the move to public cloud services DevOps has become easier than ever before. Development teams now have greater responsibilities, while delivering to shorter timescales. In a world where agility is becoming the norm, Ops needs to keep up with Dev. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-12 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/the-foundations-of-an-intelligent-manufacturing-business/ - Categories: HPE, AI As the leader of a successful manufacturing business, you’re used to investing in technology to give you competitive advantage. It’s why you’re using robotics, automation and smart supply chains to drive your transformation to digital manufacturing. As the leader of a successful manufacturing business, you’re used to investing in technology to give you competitive advantage. It’s why you’re using robotics, automation and smart supply chains to drive your transformation to digital manufacturing. You understand that you have to adapt to the way the market’s going, embracing new business models like manufacturing-as-a-service and subscription box services. In fact, it’s your commitment to continuously adapting, modernising and improving your business that’s behind your success so far. But there are challenges... Maintaining operational efficiency, continuous production and high asset utilisation. Maximising right-first-time-through, on-spec and on-time delivery. Overcoming the skills shortage by increasing automation throughout your business. To meet these challenges, you need every aspect of your business to be aligned, or you could run into trouble. Having all the robots in the world won’t help you if the computer that controls them goes down. Customer satisfaction’s going to go through the floor if a data breach stops production. In other words, you need as much intelligence in the foundations of your business as in the rest of it. And by foundations I mean IT infrastructure. What is intelligent infrastructure? Intelligent IT infrastructure is a combination of three things: Ultra-secure, energy-efficient servers and storage Cloud-based, AI-driven monitoring and management Highly automated operational services. You may already be experimenting with artificial intelligence in other parts of your business, but having it at the foundations makes complete sense, as they support everything else. Using artificial intelligence to monitor the performance of your... --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/cost-of-cloud/ - Categories: Industry News, Cyber Security, Data Centre The public cloud has been mainstream for over 10 years, and during this time most businesses have used the public cloud - in some form - due to its easy and fast-to-deploy nature. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/cisco-digital-network-architecture/ - Categories: Cisco Your network is the beating heart of your business, it requires your constant attention and you need to make sure it’s strong and successful. The demand on your network is the greatest it has ever been, with even more pressure to come. You need a network that understands what your company desires and works out a way to make it happen; an intent-based network. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-office365-updates/ - Categories: Industry News, Microsoft, Cyber Security Office 365 received several updates throughout June 2017, below is our summary of some of the key updates: (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-modern-commerce/ - Categories: Microsoft Microsoft licensing has always been a dark art with multiple agreement types, product use rights and portals. Microsoft Partners like Ultima pride themselves on keeping up to date with the constant changes and being able to provide our customers with the right guidance when it comes to translating what is needed for customers' environments. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/microsoft-exchange-updates/ - Categories: Industry News, Microsoft, Cyber Security Microsoft's Exchange Team have released the June 2017 quarterly updates for Exchange 2013 and 2016. These cumulative updates will require . NET Framework 4. 6. 2 installed prior to upgrade; . NET Framework 4. 7 is still being validated by the team and should not be installed until validation is completed. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/dhci-blog/ - Categories: HPE, Data Centre, VMware, Storage So, after several years of Hyper-Converged Infrastructure (HCI) being the dominant topic of conversation with IT Managers, a new kid has appeared on the block naming themselves disaggregated Hyper-Converged Infrastructure, dHCI for short. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/what-are-the-key-factors-to-a-successful-project/ - Categories: Careers We are all undoubtedly guilty of breezing past a successful project, task or event - ignoring why it went well and moving on. Instead, we focus on the negative times that are challenging and tough. Project Managers will have come across similar infrastructure based projects, often finding it easy to ignore the reasons for success. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/autonomous-cloud-blog/ - Categories: Microsoft, Azure, M365, intelligent automation Despite the hype of public cloud, operational challenges still exist as customers remain responsible for security, maintenance and support. To overcome these issues, we are excited to release an Autonomous Cloud platform, bundling Azure CSP, 24x7 operational tasks and technical enablement activities into a monthly per-service subscription fee, so you can focus on innovation and delivering better business outcomes. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/whens-ransomware-not-ransomware/ - Categories: Industry News, Cyber Security A few weeks ago, we saw a high profile ransomware attack in the form of WannaCry. If you missed it, WannaCry sought out vulnerable public facing SMB ports, used the EternalBlue exploit to inject shellcode into unpatched Windows XP, Windows 7, Server 2003 and Server 2008 machines, inserted the DoublePulsar backdoor exploit to establish persistence, and then installed the WannaCry ransomware to demand your money. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/net-framework-4-7-and-exchange-server/ - Categories: Industry News, Microsoft . NET Framework 4. 7 has been released and is available via Windows Update - support for this version has not yet been confirmed by the Exchange Team. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/what-are-the-key-skills-of-a-project-manager/ - Categories: Careers It’s a great question and one which can only be partially answered by reading a job advert. Here is my view on the skills required if you are interested in this field. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/citrix-session-recording/ - Categories: Citrix, Security Full disclosure, this isn’t new – however this is possibly one of the most frequently overlooked and misunderstood features of Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops. Hopefully this whistle-stop tour will help demystify this capability and give you a few ideas as to how it can be used in your Citrix environment. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/citrix-synergy-2017-the-highlights/ - Categories: Industry News, Citrix As Citrix Synergy wraps up for another successful year we have provided a whistle-stop tour of some key highlights and announcements that were made during the conference (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/4th-industrial-revolution/ - Categories: Industry News, Technology Updates, RPA, intelligent automation Much hype has been made around the “4th industrial revolution” or “Industry 4. 0” and as of yet, much of it is yet to materialise out side of proof of concepts. There’s one simple reason, change. Humans don’t like change and finance departments aren’t keen on the cost in doing so. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/ultima-propositions-are-live-on-g-cloud-9/ - Categories: Industry News, Public Sector As of the 22nd May 2017, Ultima will be able to sell a broader range of services to Public Sector clients through the Crown Commercial Services G-Cloud 9 framework. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/ultimas-new-beginnings/ - Categories: Ultima Announcements On May 4th, we announced the opening of our brand new £18 million state of the art HQ in Reading. This has enabled us to create 50 new jobs and double the number of apprentices we take on each year from 20 to 40. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/growth-in-intelligent-automation-offering/ - Categories: Ultima News, Industry News, Ultima Announcements, Transformation Driven by the acceleration in the market for intelligent infrastructure delivery, Ultima is today announcing that it has received a significant investment from European private equity group, Apse Capital. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/check-point-infinity/ - Categories: Citrix, Azure, WorkSpace Growing connectivity along with evolving networks and technologies provide great opportunities for businesses, but also present new and more sophisticated threats. We are now facing Gen V (5th Generation) of cyberattacks, which are more sophisticated than ever, crossing mobile, cloud and networks, and bypassing conventional defenses that are based on detection. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/ultima-response-to-ransomware-incident/ - Categories: Industry News, Cyber Security Ultima's Response to the Ransomware Incident: (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/g-cloud-11/ - Categories: Microsoft We are pleased to announce that Ultima has been re-awarded a place on the Crown Commercial Services (CCS) G-Cloud framework, allowing us to offer solutions to more public sector clients. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/does-your-data-centre-respond-to-organisational-demands/ - Categories: Industry News, Data Centre The accumulated technical debt within the data centre has reached a point where supportability and agility have become compromised. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/gone-smishing/ - Categories: Cyber Security A recent report into Phishing scams discovered that as many as 85% of organisations have been the subject of a sustained targeted campaign with 30% of fake emails being opened and clicked. Little wonder that malicious email attachments and links are two of the top three malware delivery mechanisms of choice for attackers. Fortunately advances in technology now allow for even the most evasive of malware to be detected and quarantined before any harm can begin to users' machines. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/check-point-response-to-tcp-sack-panic/ - Categories: Check Point There have been identified 3 related vulnerabilities found in the Linux Kernel. Whilst Check Point provide their own Customised Operating System in the form of Gaia and Gaia Embedded the underlying Operating System that Check Point customise and harden is Linux based. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/dyanamics365-preact/ - Categories: Microsoft We are delighted to announce our partnership with Preact, to help your business achieve its goals through Dynamics 365 and support your CRM implementation. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/how-does-your-digital-workspace-shape-up/ - Categories: Industry News, WorkSpace As consumerisation continues to penetrate the workplace, organisations of all sizes are being forced to review the ways in which they provide IT services to their end users. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/surface-hub-2s/ - Categories: Microsoft We are now a Surface Hub Authorised Reseller! Whilst this continues to show our fantastic relationship with Microsoft, we also hope that this helps us assist our clients with the ongoing collaborative and modern workplace needs. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/it-drives-competitive-strength-with-ultima/ - Categories: Ultima Announcements, Data Centre, WorkSpace From Modern WorkSpace, Modern Data Centre and Assurance and Compliance, whether on-premise or cloud, your company needs to respond to consumer-led demands for innovation. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/threat-prevention-security/ - Categories: Industry News, Cyber Security Threat Prevention Security - Now Available To Every Scale Of Operation Many organisations believe that the threat prevention tools and strategies that protect their Enterprise scale counterparts is beyond their reach. However, these assumptions are now being challenged as the same threats that threaten large enterprises are spreading to all types and scales of organisation. Every organisation is facing the same scale of threat – and every organisation now needs to have a threat prevention policy in place. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/assurance-as-a-factor-of-organisational-success/ - Categories: Industry News, Cyber Security Assurance As A Factor Of Organisational Success. Many organisations are facing ever increasing levels of complexity and ambiguity in managing their Assurance through Governance, Risk and Compliance (GRC) processes. These challenges need to be addressed dynamically, and with structure, to deliver stability for both the organisation and its customers. By identifying and dealing with the risk factors associated with existing compliance policies, an organisation can pre-empt problems and maintain compliance. Identification of up-coming threats will help an organisation comply with regulations from external and internal mandates at a lower cost than fire-fighting changes that are dictated to them. Identifying challenges early is key in this process – although until recently this was never easy to manage. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/why-a-data-strategy-is-key-to-a-successful-digital-transformation/ - Categories: Data Centre More and more organisations are realising the benefits of moving away from legacy technology systems to modernise, automate and innovate. However, unless they have a robust data strategy in place, it’s impossible for them to realise the benefits that AI can bring to their business. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/ultima-at-citrix-summit-the-updates/ - Categories: Industry News, Citrix STRONG FOUNDATION: With over 4,000 attendees, another highly successful Citrix Summit is drawing to a close. Some of the highlights from Citrix's annual partner conference include: Citrix Acquires Unidesk Citrix Cloud Integrations with Microsoft EM+S Licensing (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-07 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/embracing-ai-where-to-start-on-your-path-to-digital-transformation/ - Categories: intelligent automation The term ‘Artificial Intelligence’ (AI) evokes mixed reactions – from fear of the unknown to excitement about the possibilities this new technology has to offer. Whatever your views on AI, the sooner you and your business start to embrace it, the sooner you will see where the positives lie and how to use it to improve business efficiency and drive innovation. It’s relevant for SMEs just as much as larger enterprises. Amyn Jaffer, our Head of Intelligent Automation, explains that many companies are, understandably, unsure of where to start when it comes to introducing AI. You may also be among those wondering what exactly AI means and how it could make a positive difference to your business. (more... ) --- - Published: 2024-12-13 - Modified: 2025-05-10 - URL: https://ultima.com/blog/sam-platform-launch/ - Categories: SAM, Industry News Ultima has launched a new Software Asset Management (SAM) Platform powered by the award-winning Snow License Manager technology. (more... ) --- ---