Intelligent CIO Europe Issue 14 | Page 15

NEWS UK cybersecurity programme helping youth develop essential skills “To protect an organisation effectively, everyone from the mailroom to the boardroom needs to have the skills and awareness to recognise and protect against cyberthreats. This programme gets to the heart of that by developing talent and future-proofing capabilities into the next generation.” G lobal Knowledge, a worldwide leader in technology skills solutions, has partnered with Qufaro, operator of the United Kingdom’s Extended Project Qualification (EPQ) in cybersecurity, to provide apprenticeship training. The programme provides school-aged youth with the cybersecurity skills that industries need. According to (ISC)2’s information security workforce study, there are up to 2.9 million information security-related roles unfilled worldwide, including nearly 500,00 in North America and 142,000 in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Todd Johnstone, Global Knowledge’s CEO, said: “It’s exciting to be working with Qufaro to provide a new generation of professionals with the skills to have great careers and help organisations protect their people and assets.” The training is delivered by Global Knowledge’s UK Apprenticeships division, which provides blue chip corporate clients with talent development programmes, in partnership with Bletchley Park Qufaro. Dr Budgie Dhanda, CEO, Qufaro, said: “Being based at Bletchley Park, home of the WW2 ‘code breakers’ and considered by many to be the birthplace of computer science, we have the opportunity to immerse students in the historic legacy of the pioneers of computing, as well as enthusing them with the challenges of today and tomorrow.” ///////////////// Nokia’s SOC powers Telefónica UK’s customer-centric operations T elefónica Group has selected Nokia as its Service Operation Centre vendor to support the operator’s journey in the UK from a traditional network-centric operation towards a customer-centric operation with full focus on the customer experience. Nokia’s evolved Service Operation Centre (eSOC) platform will be implemented for Telefónica UK’s 32 million customers. The Nokia eSOC Platform provides the flexibility to interface with existing Telefónica UK systems and data sources, creating an environment that lets Telefónica UK proactively monitor its customers’ experiences and take recommended actions based on measured trends. Thanks to the SOC offering, which enables a range of automation techniques leveraging Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML), Telefónica UK can optimise its operations to best meet its www.intelligentcio.com objectives. Nokia’s SOC Office consultancy will support Telefonica through the process reengineering required for SOC-enabled business transformation. The move from network-centric to customer-centric operations is a growing trend for communication service providers and service assurance is a key differentiator for Telefónica in the mature UK telecoms landscape. With the Nokia eSOC Platform and Nokia SOC Office, Telefónica can proactively ensure the excellence of services that are considered more important by subscribers. transformed this in three of our markets, reaching the next level in automated customer experience management, granting us flexibility and adaptability that serves as a key differentiator. Nokia’s solutions and services will allow us to achieve this goal in a competitive market like the UK.” Juan Manuel Caro, Director of Network and IT operations at Global CTIO at Telefónica, said: “Telefónica has always aimed to offer the best possible experience to our customers which a reactive network monitoring approach to operations could never guarantee. With SOC we have already INTELLIGENTCIO 15