Technology consultancies can expect to come under increased pressure from their clients after research released on June 21 signalled the intent of Chief Information Officers (CIOs) worldwide to squeeze more value from their outsourcing arrangements.

According to the report, From Cost to Value, published by KPMG International, the renewed outsourcing focus is symptomatic of CIOs’ wish to place the topic of getting value from their IT as their top priority.

The report suggests that the new, post credit crisis, CIO agenda is dominated by securing value for money but that it also wants to focus on using IT to help transform the business in terms of innovation and productivity.

Outsourcing appears to have fallen some way from the top of the CIO agenda in its own right, suggesting that outsourcing is now just part of ‘business as usual’ to a typical CIO. However, over two-thirds of the 4500 CIOs surveyed for this report indicated that they now expect to pay far more attention to the price:quality ratio they currently experience. Even more expect to be bringing increased pressure to bear on their sourcing providers.

The report makes clear that this is just one aspect of the move towards a value-driven agenda. Eighty-one percent of the survey respondents feel that getting value from their IT must be their top priority. Cost optimisation trailed in a distant second (58 percent of respondents), ahead of portfolio management (51 percent) – although it could be argued that both of these could be seen as sub-sets of the overall theme of extracting value from IT investments.

The transformational shift is evidenced by the fact that sixty-five percent of respondents felt that IT could assist in enabling and driving business innovation while a similar number felt it could assist with increased productivity. Over half also saw IT’s potential for enabling competitive advantage and improving external customer satisfaction. These are not the responses of CIOs who still see IT’s predominant role as an operational cost centre. Accordingly, the survey shows that the bulk of CIOs expect to be judged by how they create business rather than by how they control costs.

Not all CIOs are making this move from an operational mindset to a transformational mindset at the same pace. The KPMG research suggests that CIOs in the financial sector see themselves as remaining heavily involved in operational matters, with a focus on risk and compliance issues; something which may in part be attributable to a credit crisis hangover. By contrast, their counterparts in the manufacturing sectors claim to be focusing more on ways to innovate and transform their business with the help of IT.

Not that this means that financial sector CIOs do not have transformational ambitions or that other CIOs have consigned their risk and compliance requirements to the past. Rather, it simply suggests that both groups have differing priorities at this point in time. In fact, argues Cruickshank, striking a balance between operational and transformational priorities is all part of a new reality whereby risk and compliance objectives are fused with commercial and business objectives. In turn, this is leading to a fundamental change in the way in which business approach the twin challenges of innovation and transformation within their organisation.

Click here to view KPMGs full report

It’s astounding that until this moment, three years after the iPhone, the biggest software company in the world basically didn’t compete in mobile. Windows Phone 7 Series is more than the Microsoft smartphone we’ve been waiting for. Everything’s different now.

Last week, at the World Partner Conference 2010, Microsoft was publicly previewing Windows Phone 7. The brand new, totally fresh operating system will appear in phones this year, but not until October time. All of the major wireless carriers and every likely hardware maker are backing it, and they’d be stupid not to. It’s amazing. We’ve will have a serious hands on for you to read, but here is everything that you need to know:

The name—Windows Phone 7 Series—is a mouthful, and unfortunately, the epitome of Microsoft’s worst naming instincts, belying the simple fact that it’s the most groundbreaking phone since the iPhone. It’s the phone Microsoft should’ve made three years ago. In the same way that the Windows 7 desktop OS was nearly everything people hoped it would be, Windows Phone 7 is almost everything anyone could’ve dreamed of in a phone, let alone a Microsoft phone. It changes everything. Why? Now that Microsoft has a real phone in its portfolio, the three most significant companies in desktop computing—Apple, Google and Microsoft—now stand to occupy the same positions in mobile. Phones are officially computers that happen to fit in your pocket.

Windows Phone 7 is also something completely new for Microsoft: A total break from the past. Windows Mobile isn’t just dead, the body’s been dumped, buried and paved over by a rainbow brick road. [source GIZMODO]

Global Service Network provider SIPCOM are soon to release a fully intergrated hosted Blackberry Enterprise Service and Microsoft Office Communicator client for the Blackberry.

This service will allow you to engage in immediate interactive communication while you’re on the go. Exchange text messages with other Microsoft® Office Communicator users on your BlackBerry® smartphone*, whether they’re using a desktop computer, BlackBerry smartphone or other mobile device.

Full features to folow soon.

First shown in a teaser video at this year’s WES event, the OS offers plenty of new features, many of which are meant to take advantage of touchscreens. The new swipe gesture support in the home screen and media player are fine examples. There are also new context sensitive menus that appear on screen, and a host of new features such as universal search, an all-new BlackBerry Messenger application, and the ability to post to multiple social media networks  simultaneously.

The new WebKit based browser is sure to please users who have felt hamstrung by BlackBerry’s old browser, and the RSS news feed support should also be welcomed.

From RIM blog, Andrew Bocking, VP of Handheld Software Product Management states: “In addition to the new fluid user interface, the video illustrates a few of the new applications and features in BlackBerry 6 that are designed to provide users with a mobile experience that is fun and approachable, yet extremely powerful. We’ll discuss these features in more detail on Inside BlackBerry as we move closer to the point when BlackBerry 6 becomes publicly available”

This looks to be an exciting developent in the SmartPhones market and will surley be welcomed by users.