News in brief

Hung is Multiactive MD

Frank Hung has been appointed managing director, Mulitactive, Australia and New Zealand. Hung, who has some 18 years experience in the IT industry, has worked in Hong Kong, Canada and Australia at senior executive level. Formerly chief operating officer, Asia, at IT and telecommunications services company Powerlan Limited, Hung will now report to the president of abcMultiactive in Hong Kong. As part of a $2 million infrastructure investment Mulitactive will also increase its senior staff levels to assist in market share, particularly in the CRM market. It is planning a new office in Sydney and expects to establish a number of strategic partnerships.

Genesys Labs names new GM

Computer telephony integrator Genesys Laboratories Australasia has appointed James Brooks as general manager, Australasia. Brooks currently holds the position of sales director and is assuming day-to-day operational control from John O'Brien who will move on to a consulting role within the company. Before joining Genesys last year, Brooks was responsible for the call centre program for NEC Australia. Brooks will now be responsible for all Genesys operations within Australasia.

Payne joins Iomega

Data management solutions provider Iomega Pacific, a subsidiary of Iomega Corporation, has appointed James Payne as the vice president, managing director of Iomega Asia Pacific, and corporate vice president, Iomega Pacific. Filling the role left by Bobby Choonavala who left Iomega to pursue another career opportunity, Payne has joined the company from GE Appliances where he was recently regional sales manager, Northwest region, located in the US. Payne's role is effective immediately.

Bohse MD, AltaVista

AltaVista has appointed Ms Mel Bohse as managing director, Australia, New Zealand. Formerly managing director of Engage Australia, Bohse has also held director level positions with Media Tech Pacific, Attachmate/DCA and Anxiety.

Cops trial e-procurement

The Australian Federal Police will pilot a B2B e-procurement hub over the next two months, the second federal government e-trading feasability trial under the Commonwealth Electronic Procurement Implementation Strategy. B2B e-commerce solution provider Online Advantage, already a Department of Communication, Information Technology and the Arts technology partner, will host the e-procurement solution. The solution, based on UK software-maker Infobank's InTrade e-Hub e-procurement platform, supports open standards and allows for interoperability between the agency's buyers, suppliers and service providers, said Pamela Chapman, Online Advantage MD.

Long-serving Cisco exec exits

One of Cisco Systems' longest serving leaders plans to retire at the end of Cisco's fiscal third quarter, in April 2001.

Richard Freemantle, Cisco's senior vice president, Asia Pacific, joined the company in 1990. Over the past 10 years the Australian team has increased from two employees to more than 100. Gordon Astles, currently Cisco's vice president of America's international division, will take over from Freemantle. Freemantle serves on the boards of several Australian technology companies and will continue to be an active leader in the Australian and regional IT industry. He will continue in his current role until the end of January 2001 and will remain with the company until April 2001 to transition his responsibilities to Astles.

AAPT wins WA govt contract

AAPT has won a $1.5 million contract to provide phone services to the Western Australian government's Metropolitan Health Service (MHS). The 12-month contract covers 11 hospitals. The single contract, which also includes dental and psychiatric services as well as MHS head office, will generate savings of $560,000 compared to the previous year, according to the MHS.

Clarity signs Howin contract

Clarity International has teamed up with Pacific Electric Cable and Wire subsidiary Howin Technologies to take advantage of the deregulated Taiwanese telecommunications sector. Under a contract worth $27.9 million, Clarity will provide its integrated operational support system (OSS) product suite, hardware and services to a project that will roll out a fixed line network with full spectrum capacity. Sister company of Howin, the Taiwan Fixed Network Co has secured one of the three fixed-line carrier licences issued by the Taiwanese government last year. Related entity, Pacific Cellular Corporation is also Taiwan's largest and the world's fourth largest mobile operator.

Baltimore adds more security

Baltimore Technologies has extended its security product range with an access and authorisation solution to manage the increasing amounts of company information appearing online. Baltimore said SelectAccess is a policy-driven solution that lets businesses provide customised role-based user access to online information and services. The secured access means users can only execute transactions based on their role, relationship with the organisation and the organisation's security policy, Baltimore said. It can also be coupled with other authentication mechanisms, from passwords to digital certificates, to verify individual's identity claims.

BEA, Broadvision

BEA Systems and BroadVision have announced an alliance based on supplying next-generation e-business solutions. Under the terms of the agreement, BroadVision has agreed to embed BEA WebLogic Server within BroadVision's e-business application platform, One-To-One Enterprise. The two companies have also agreed to engage in collaborate engineering. BroadVision said the addition of BEA's solution to its product suite was part of its strategy to enable full Java 2 platform, enterprise edition (J2EE) support.

Symantec to wrap up Axent purchase

Symantec Corporation's $US975 million acquisition of e-security vendor Axent Technologies will be finalised this week, laying down the foundations for the company's plans to increase market share in the Asia-Pacific region. Speaking to Computerworld about the acquisition, Symantec's global chairman, president and CEO John Thompson said it is aimed at "re-tooling the company" to aggressively target the enterprise space. He said the acquisition of Axent's enterprise e-business solutions will ensure 60 per cent of Symantec's revenues in 2001 will be secured by enterprise customers.

Speak naturally please

Telstra has introduced a voice response service which uses natural voice commands to access the most frequently requested directory assistance information. The new service is expected to manage about 15 per cent of all Telstra's 24-hour directory assistance calls. It will be launched today in Victoria, Tasmania, South Australia, Western Australia and the Northern Territory and will be available in NSW, Queensland and the ACT from January 12, 2001.

Rising star at Sun

At Sun Microsystems Jim Hassell has been named managing director, Australasia, taking over the role following the promotion of former MD Russell Bate within Sun. Hassell has worked with Sun for three and a half years, most recently as UK partner sales director where he ran a $2.2 billion operation. Before joining Sun, Hassell spent 12 years in a range of senior management roles with IBM. Bates has been promoted within Sun, to vice president of product sales operations Asia-Pacific region.

Society names Alston as patron

The Australian Computer Society (ACS) has appointed Minister for Communications and Information Technology, Senator Richard Alston as its national patron. ACS president John Ridge said the appointment cements the relationship between the government and ACS and is recognition of the important role of IT in Australia's future. "We hope it will provide greater opportunities for the ACS to provide constructive input into the process of policy development," he said.

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