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Elon Musk's artificial intelligence company xAI released Grok 4 late on Wednesday evening, its latest large language model (LLM), alongside a "heavy" version that employs multiple AI agents working in parallel. The company demonstrated the system during a live presentation, though as ever we have to take any performance metrics with a grain of salt. Alongside the two model releases xAI also announced a new $300-per-month AI subscription plan, the most expensive of any LLM supplier to date.
Despite all the hype in the release presentation about the capabilities of Musk’s new AI model, just days before xAI faced widespread criticism when its Grok chatbot posted antisemitic content and praised Adolf Hitler on X. The AI referred to itself as "MechaHitler" and made inflammatory comments about Jewish people. Musk commented on X, saying "Grok was too compliant to user prompts, too eager to please and be manipulated, essentially. That is being addressed."
According to xAI, Grok 4 has increased training compute by 100 times compared to Grok 2, though the company provided limited technical details about the underlying architecture. The model was tested on academic benchmarks including the "Humanities Last Exam,” a challenging test measuring AI’s ability to answer thousands of crowdsourced questions on subjects like math, humanities, and natural science. According to xAI, Grok 4 scored 25.4% on Humanity’s Last Exam without “tools,” outperforming Google’s Gemini 2.5 Pro, which scored 21.6%, and OpenAI’s o3 (high), which scored 21%.
During the demonstration, Grok 4 appeared to handle various tasks including mathematical problems, sports prediction, and basic physics simulations. However, xAI representatives acknowledged current limitations, particularly in visual understanding capabilities, with one describing the model as "effectively just looking at the world squinting through glass." Musk also said that with respect to academic questions, Grok is better than PhD level in every subject, with no exceptions. Though he admitted at times it may lack common sense, and it has not yet invented new technologies or discovered new physics, but that is just a matter of time according to Musk. The company also announced plans for specialised coding models and enhanced multimodal capabilities, with training for video generation models expected to begin within weeks using what they describe as over 100,000 advanced GPUs.
The competitive landscape for LLM’s continues to evolve rapidly, with OpenAI’s GPT-5 expected to also be released any day now. From an enterprise perspective however, leveraging these LLM’s is about more than just compute processing and intelligence levels. Successful AI projects must identify the right use cases, and have a wraparound of tools that can monitor and manage cost, performance, security, ethics, safety, governance and integration with company data. For this reason, I think Google Cloud, Microsoft (through Azure AI studio), Open AI and Amazon (through Bedrock) are going to remain the GenAI and Agentic AI platforms of choice. xAI is going to have to demonstrate a significant leap in ability to outweigh all the potential negative aspects of running a model controlled by Musk and his world views.
Posted by: Simon Baxter at 10:22
German AI-led defence technology company Helsing is set to establish a cutting-edge drone submarine factory in Plymouth, as part of a substantial £350m investment in the UK, promising to deliver high-quality employment opportunities to the region.
The Munich HQ’ed firm will construct its "Resilience Factory" at the Langage freeport site in Plympton this year, with the Government announcing the facility as a cornerstone of Britain's strategy to unlock the economic potential of its defence industry. Helsing added the so-called Resilience Factory was due to start production of the SG-1 Fathom "autonomous underwater gliders" by the end of 2025. The AI-powered miniature submarines are designed to protect critical underwater infrastructure for allied navies.
The development forms part of Helsing's accelerated UK investment through its Trinity House initiative, which aims to double the size of the company's British operations. The investment is expected to create specialist, high-value jobs across Plymouth, the South Hams, and the wider region, supporting the growth of sovereign UK defence technology and supply chains. It aligns with the Government's broader ambition of delivering 14,000 additional jobs in the defence sector, as well as a commitment to increase defence spending to 2.6% of GDP by April 2027.
Helsing has emerged as one of Europe's most valuable defence start-ups. Spotify founder Daniel Ek’s investment company led a €600mn funding round in June that valued the tech group at €12bn, amid a surge in interest in the defence sector among investors. Helsing started out focused purely on producing AI software for current and future weapons but has since expanded into producing its own drones and unmanned underwater vessels. Though founded by three Germans, it has offices in London and Paris as well as Munich and Berlin and is eager to present itself as a pan-European company at a time when the continent is seeking to boost its defence capabilities and foster local production.
Posted by: Simon Baxter at 10:12
Tags:
defence
AI
This week we witnessed a landmark moment when NVIDIA became the first publicly traded company to hit a market valuation of $4tn.
For context, Microsoft’s valuation is around $3.7tn and Apple around $3.1tn. NVIDIA hit $1tn about two years ago and has seen its shares continue their stratospheric rise ever since.
Of course, back in April the firm’s share price slumped to c.$96. If you are a shareholder, what did you do as you saw your gains slide? Did you panic and take profit? Or did you “buy the dip”? If the latter, you’ll be laughing now as shares are back at all-time highs, hitting $164 yesterday.
In its Q1 results, we learned that NVIDIA would be liable for a $4.5bn charge for exports to China of its H20 products. This week, the firm said it is looking at a September timeframe for the launch of a new chip specifically designed for the Chinese market.
NVIDIA sits at the heart of many AI ecosystems, working with the global systems integrators and hyperscalers, and playing an important role in funding innovative startups.
Speaking at London Tech Week in June alongside the Prime Minister, CEO Jensen Huang said the UK was in a “Goldilock’s circumstance” with “one of the richest AI communities anywhere on the planet” and the “third-largest AI venture capital investment [area]”. He said the ecosystem is “perfect for take-off, it’s just missing one thing”, which is having its own AI infrastructure.
Posted by: Kate Hanaghan at 09:52
Tags:
shares
AI
marketvaluation
Having successfully navigated a challenging macroeconomic environment in FY25 to both deliver yoy top line growth of 4.2% and cross the $30bn annual revenue mark (see here), TCS found the going in Q126 considerably tougher. Turnover for the three months ended 30th June declined by 3.1% yoy at constant currency to $7.42bn with slowdowns evident across most aspects of the firm’s vertical industry and geographic portfolio. The weaker sales performance did not, however, adversely affect TCS’s profitability as operating margin for the period improved qoq by 30 bps to 24.5%.
All of TCS’s geographic units experienced a sequential softening in their expansion rates during the recently completed quarter. The company’s North American business, which accounts for around a half of firm-wide turnover and had struggled to grow in FY25, saw its Q1 revenues contract by 2.7% (Q425: -1.9%). The UK&I, which had seen its sales rise by 4% in the prior fiscal, also took a turn south during the first quarter. The top line in the region dipped by 1.3% yoy to c.£928m.
In terms of the offshore major’s industry sector focuses, only TCS’s Technology & Services vertical gained any momentum during Q126 as its revenues improved by 1.8% yoy to c.$600m (Q425: 1.1%). The company’s Life Sciences & Healthcare, Communications & Media and Regional Markets units, conversely, all suffered significant declines. Turnover in the latter, which had jumped by nearly two fifths in FY25, receded by almost 9% yoy in during the first three months of new fiscal.
There was more encouraging news to be found on the bookings front. Q126 total contract value rose by 15% yoy to $9.6bn with sales of all TCS’s new service offerings reported to have grown well. In the UK this included securing another seven-year extension of its long running Virgin Atlantic partnership with an AI-focused deal (see here).
TCS is always quick off the blocks in posting its quarterly results. It will be interesting to see whether the company’s softer start to FY26 is echoed in the numbers of its rivals as their first quarter figures are reported over the next couple of weeks. It is very unlikely, however, that TCS is alone in feeling the effects of continuing global macro-economic and geo-political uncertainties (see our latest Market Trends & Forecasts 2025 report for more details).
Posted by: Duncan Aitchison at 22:30
Tags:
results
offshore
IT+services
The National Audit Office (NAO) published a report yesterday on how linked data, analytics, and AI can be used in combination to spot fraud and error (estimated to have cost the public purse between £55bm and £81bn in the 2023-24 tax year alone).
With public bodies responsible for managing the risk of fraud and error in their own organisation and their supply / delivery chains, the NAO focused on how well-placed government is to take advantage of analytics tech to ensure that correct payments are made to and from the right people at the right time. The report found that, whilst the use of data analytics to tackle fraud and error has demonstrated that it can achieve “significant” returns on investment, these have so far been limited (compared with its potential).
In this HotViewsExtra article we look at the key findings and recommendations in the NAO report, and how public bodies can do more to prevent fraud and error by embracing data analytics and AI tech.
TechMarketView subscribers, including UKHotViews Premium subscribers, can read ‘NAO urges wider analytics take-up to combat public sector fraud and error’ now. If you aren't a subscriber – or aren't sure if your organisation has a corporate subscription—please contact Belinda Tewson to find out more.
Posted by: Craig Wentworth at 10:47
Tags:
analytics
fraud
NAO
error
Manchester HQ'd tech training provider Northcoders Group has issued a trading update which states that the company can no longer support market expectations regarding its revenue and profitability in FY25 (the twelve months ending 31st December). The change to Government funding of Skills Bootcamp programmes to a fully regional model announced in April has not progressed as rapidly as anticipated leading to dearth in contract awards through the new mechanisms. In response, Northcoders has taken steps to cut c.£2.2m from its annualised fixed expenditure representing a swingeing 40% decrease on last year’s reported cost base.
The tech training specialist, which counts AO, Barclays and the BBC among its clients, came into 2025 with considerable forward momentum. FY24 had seen a 24% yoy jump in revenue to a record £8.8m (see here). Adjusted EBITDA had also showed a significant improvement, rising to £1.0m (FY23: £0.1m). Double-digit increases in both metrics were expected by the market for the current year.
Northcoders believes that the switch in the Government funding model will mean delays to rather, than cancellations of, contract awards. Multiple bids are reported as remaining pending, albeit several regional authorities have yet to issue tenders or confirm exact future funding allocations. Until greater clarity emerges, however, the company cannot accurately predict the timing of income from Government-backed contracts.
In more positive new, Northcoder’s B2B consultancy division is reported to be making positive progress. The company’s existing £10 million contract with the Department for Education, which concludes later this year, will also help to offset some of the near-term headwinds. As we have noted before, moreover, with an increasingly diversified product portfolio and more efficient operational model, the Group appears better positioned to capitalise on the increasing demand for technology skills training.
Unsurprisingly, investors have not reacted well to the latest trading update. At the time of writing, Northcoders’ share price was down by over 20% on last night’s close. Since the publication of its FY24 results eleven weeks ago, the company’s value has fallen by almost two thirds.
Posted by: Duncan Aitchison at 09:04
Tags:
training
public sector
trading update
Posted by: UKHotViews Editor at 07:00
It was a great day out at Google Cloud's London Summit yesterday. As you would expect AI (especially AI agents) featured strongly, with Google outlining the breadth of its AI centric strategy. At its core was the theme of interoperability, Google is not only seeking to push firms to its Gemini models and Vertex platform, but to be the base for organisations to build and host any type of AI model or AI agent. Whilst all the hyperscalers have such aspirations Google has doubled down on this. A key differentiator is its A2A protocol, which will allow AI agents to communicate with each other, securely exchange information, and coordinate actions.
On the UK front we heard from a number of customers including Starling Bank, who launched a GenAI banking chatbot using Gemini that alllows userd to query their spending habits, and supermarket Morrisons who has developed a product finder app using Big Query and Google Gemini to enable customers to find items across physical stores. Google is also supporting the Imperial War Museum (in partnership with Capgemini) using AI to transcribe 20k hours of historical recordings to bring history to life.
We also had a surprise visit from Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, Peter Kyle, who outlined a new partnership with Google Cloud aimed at ridding the taxpayer of the ‘ball and chain’ of legacy tech contracts and aiming to upskill 100k civil servants in tech and AI. Kyle was keen to embrace his relationship with big tech, in a not-so-subtle dig at the tabloids, and told UK tech suppliers to “bring your best ideas, your best tech, and your best price” to the negotiating table, in bid to secure “a new deal for buying tech for the British taxpayer”.
Whilst many of Google Clouds highlighted products and offerings were not exactly new, they demonstrated the breadth of how the firm is applying AI across the stack, from its infrastructure layer built on its codeveloped (with Nvidia) TPU chips, to its Gemini models, Vertex AI platform and of course its many AI agents that sit at the top of the stack. It has pre-built a number of agents to get clients up and running quickly, supported through its Agentforce platform, enabling no code deployment and management of multiple AI agents. We also saw some attention given to both data sovereignty (which everyone agrees remains nascent in UK) and cybersecurity, though AI stole the show as usual.
The key takeaway is that Google Cloud’s AI offerings are maturing, as is its presence in the UK and especially the public sector. It plans to invest substantially in growing its UK presence, as well as backing UK startups through equity free accelerators. It is also investing substantially in its personnel, seeking to be an end-to-end provider from AI ideation through to prototyping and implementation. SI partners are still going to play a crucial role however, with its commitments to strengthening its technology ecosystem evident throughout the day.
Posted by: Simon Baxter at 00:09
Volume 1 of the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry’s final report was published yesterday. You can read it in full, here.
The report underlines the trauma experienced by the sub-postmasters and the people around them. It is not known when Volume 2 will be published, but given the complexities of the content, it could be 2026 before we see it. Indeed, Sir Wyn Willams says: “As later volumes of my Report will demonstrate, all of these people are properly to be regarded as victims of wholly unacceptable behaviour perpetrated by a number of individuals employed by and/or associated with the Post Office and Fujitsu from time to time and by the Post Office and Fujitsu as institutions.” However, he clarifies that the phrase “wholly unacceptable behaviour” doesn’t necessarily mean that “persons or the Post Office committed crimes or would be liable in civil proceedings”.
It’s clear issues around Horizon stretch back to the very beginning. The system began life as what is now usually referred to as “Legacy Horizon”. It was developed for, and supplied to, the Post Office through ICL Pathway Limited. Fujitsu became the sole shareholder of ICL in 1998, dropping the brand in 2002. The report says: "Prior to roll out, some employees of Fujitsu had discovered that Legacy Horizon was capable of producing data which was false." The newer version of Horizon, known as “HNG – X” or “Horizon Online”, was also, “from time to time, afflicted by bugs, errors and defects.” Sir Wyn Willams says he is “satisfied that a number of employees of Fujitsu and the Post Office knew that this was so".
A spokesperson from Fujitsu Services Ltd said: “We welcome the publication of the first volume of the Inquiry’s report and are considering its recommendations. We have apologised for, and deeply regret, our role in sub-postmasters’ suffering, and we wish to reiterate that apology today. We hope for a swift resolution that ensures a just outcome for the victims. We remain committed to providing our full cooperation to the Inquiry as Sir Wyn prepares his final report and we are engaged with Government regarding Fujitsu’s contribution to compensation.”
The report estimates that there are c.10,000 people who are eligible to make claims for financial redress but it suggests the number could rise. The Department of Business and Trade, Fujitsu, and the Post Office (either together or separately) have until the end of October to produce a report/reports outlining a programme of restorative justice. Meanwhile, this all hangs like a heavy cloud over the Fujitsu business. It has had (and will continue to have) commercial and morale implications for the UK business and staff, while also causing delays to strategic investments.
Read our analysis of the firm’s performance and prospects in UK SITS Supplier Rankings 2025.
Posted by: Kate Hanaghan at 10:45
Tags:
Horizon
ICS.AI has won a contract (via the G-Cloud framework) worth £6.3m for “Phase 2” of Cheshire East Council’s AI transformation work.
The council is pursuing AI transformation driven by acute financial and demographic pressures. According to figures laid out in a paper presented to its Corporate Policy Committee in March 2025, Cheshire East faces a £100m budget shortfall over four years, with Adult Social Care consuming approximately 62% of the overall council budget and service demand having dramatically increased (over 4,600 people are awaiting some form of intervention in adult social care, plus children's services have seen Education , Health, and Care Plan (EHCP) requests double in six months).
The council’s overall AI programme promises substantial returns – projecting financial benefits of between £40m and £60m over a three-year period (with £12m-£14m per year savings ongoing thereafter) – and will adopt a phased implementation approach that starts with “high-impact, lower-risk modules”.
Its AI strategy, approved at the meeting in March, targets three priority areas: Customer Service will deploy an AI copilot system providing round-the-clock support in multiple languages (aimed at reducing contact centre volumes; Adult Social Care will use AI to streamline care needs evaluations and support planning (reducing administrative backlogs); and Children's Services will leverage AI-supported workflows to enhance the EHCP process.
Councils need to accelerate their digital transformation initiatives in order to drive critical efficiencies right across their service portfolios. Cheshire East Council’s AI deployment represents an essential component of its Digital Acceleration Programme – and it will be looking to ape the successes of ICS.AI customers such as Derby City Council, which announced at last month’s SOCITM President’s Conference that it’d made £7.5m in savings from its own AI transformation programme to date; news which prompted ICS.AI to issue a “formally guarantee” of savings of “at least £5m per year” for qualifying mid-sized councils that adopt its SMART: AI platform.
Posted by: Craig Wentworth at 10:17
Tags:
transformation
Local Government
National Highways (NH), a wholly government-owned company responsible for managing and improving England’s strategic road network, has let four data analysis, supply and management contracts together worth over £100m. Spread across three different vendors, the biggest winner from the latest crop of awards was Deloitte UK.
The Big Four firm landed the two largest lots each comprising a five-year agreement worth up to £35m. These will focus on supporting both cross-cutting delivery across NH’s Chief Data Office (CDO) and the work of its Digital Lab. The latter is the CDO’s design and delivery arm for digital products and services.
The other successful suppliers were data asset management specialists, Anmut and GHD Group
(formerly 
known as Gutteridge Haskins & Davey), a global employee-owned multinational technical professional services firm. The deals, which will also run until mid-2030, are worth £25m and £11m respectively. The former has been selected to provide data governance and assurance managed services, while GHD will deliver ontology and taxonomy services to enhance NH’s ability to record, share and manage institutional knowledge.
The successes at NH will be welcome news for Deloitte UK. Having seen its technology-centric consulting revenues decline in FY24 (see here), it appears the firm has continued to find the going heavy in the IT services arena during its just competed fiscal year with its Technology & Transformation division falling materially short of its performance goals (see here).
Posted by: Duncan Aitchison at 10:10
Tags:
data
public sector
contract award
Leeds-HQ’d provider of software and services to the rail and transport industries, Tracsis has announced that Chris Barnes will step down as Chief Executive Officer and from the Board on 31 July 2025. He will be replaced by David Frost who today joins the company and will pick up the reigns at the start of next month.
The change comes after a couple difficult years for the firm. FY24 (the twelve months ended 31st July) saw top and bottom line declines at Tracsis (see here) and the company’s H125 performance was described Barnes as “disappointing”. The transport technology provider’s share price has more than halved since last summer.
Frost is a seasoned CEO in the industrial technology sector with extensive US experience. He most recently served as Chief Executive Officer of Ovarro Ltd, an IoT technology specialist focused on the monitoring and control of remote critical assets in national and critical infrastructure markets. Prior to Ovarro, he held senior position at Eaton Corporation, General Electric and Honeywell. Barnes, who has been at the helm for the last six years, will remain with the business for a period of time to ensure an orderly handover of responsibilities.
The most recent trading update from the company in April (see here) struck a more upbeat tone with Tracsis optimistic that its second half fortunes will improve significantly. Without further material contract wins, the Board expected FY25 adjusted EBITDA to be in the range £12.5m - £13.5m (FY24: £12.8m). This guidance was reconfirmed in today’s press release. It is, however, likely to be another few months before both the full year results are published and we get a better indication of how FY26 is shaping up.
Posted by: Duncan Aitchison at 09:58
Tags:
software
appointment
transportation
CGI's acquisition of BJSS is already paying off, with the first major contract win under the combined entity being announced just over four months after the deal's completion. BJSS, now part of CGI, has secured a £27.8 million three-year contract to be the 'Digital Front Door' (DFD) Delivery Partner for NHS Education for Scotland (NES). The BJSS name now no longer exists as a distinct brand however, so whilst the contract was won under that name (and BJSS and CGI ran in parallel for four months), company integration finalised at the start of July and so the work will be taken forward under the CGI name.
The DFD platform delivers on a key commitment from the Scottish Government's Programme for Government and aims to give people in Scotland straightforward online access to personalised health and care information across primary, secondary and social care, community mental health, screening, and vaccinations. The initial phase will focus on selected specialties within NHS Lanarkshire, with dermatology among the specialties where patients will be able to track their care and treatment progress online, before expanding to a nationwide rollout.
This substantial win demonstrates the commercial impact of CGI's BJSS acquisition, particularly given the latter's growing prominence in NHS digital services. Just months earlier, BJSS (as was) had secured a £37.5 million contract with NHS England to help develop the NHS App (see NHS England awards key digital contracts), positioning the company as a key partner in NHS digital transformation across the UK.
This contract win illustrates CGI's strengthened position in the health sector following the BJSS acquisition. As we highlighted when the deal was announced (see CGI to buy BJSS: UK headcount boost of 40% | TechMarketView), BJSS brought substantial health sector credentials to CGI, with health revenues nudging the £100m mark. While this contract was secured by BJSS, it is clear that BJSS has brought CGI enhanced capabilities to compete for complex health transformation projects, as represented by this DFD contract.
The timing of this win fits well with CGI's broader health sector strategy. In our recent analysis of CGI's UK public sector performance (see Public sector supplier prospects 2025 and beyond | TechMarketView), we noted that FY24 was the company's first full year in Health & Social Care, securing £65m of orders and already achieving £78m of orders in Q1 FY25. The BJSS acquisition has accelerated this momentum, providing both additional technical capabilities and established client relationships in the health sector.
This contract also reinforces CGI's strong positioning in Scotland, where it has built long-term relationships with major local authorities including extended contracts with City of Edinburgh Council until 2029, Scottish Borders Council until 2040, and Glasgow City Council until 2030. The addition of BJSS capabilities enhances CGI's ability to deliver comprehensive digital transformation across both the local government and health sectors in Scotland.
The DFD win demonstrates BJSS's – and now CGI's – continued strength in the NHS digital market following the acquisition. With CGI now positioned as a key NHS digital partner across both England and Scotland, this first announced victory provides a solid foundation for future growth in what remains a priority market for CGI.
Posted by: Georgina O'Toole at 09:00
Tags:
nhs
contract
health
healthcare
IT+services
Why do so many legacy modernisation efforts fail, despite good intentions and big budgets?
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Curious how it works in practice? Read the article and discover how metrics can help you successfully approach legacy system modernisation.
Posted by: Future Processing at 11:30
Public Sector AI specialist ICS.AI has appointed Dr Crispin Bloomfield as Education Sector Leader, bolstering the company’s focus on Further and Higher Education following recent Local Government wins (and the appointment of a Chief Local Government Officer in January).
Bloomfield’s nearly three decades in tech most recently included a four-year stint as Senior Education Architect at Microsoft. His track record also includes work at Durham and Manchester universities, plus collaborations with Imperial College London, Oxford, and a UNESCO AI proof of concept project.
The timing is opportune. With universities facing mounting pressures around student engagement and operational efficiency, ICS.AI’s SMART: platform (with its 4,500 pre-trained topics) could translate well from council tax queries to student admissions, for instance – both involve high-volume, repetitive enquiries ripe for automation. ICS.AI also scored recent success with its bilingual Welsh AI assistant, “ARNY”, at Coleg y Cymoedd (see Coleg y Cymoedd sees £5.9m in benefits from bilingual Welsh AI assistant).
ICS.AI is planning to leverage Bloomfield's C-level engagement and sector experience to expand its AI-powered solutions into education institutions, building on its Local Government success in university settings.
Posted by: Craig Wentworth at 09:53
Tags:
education
appointment
universities
Nestlé R&D and IBM Research are working together using AI and deep tech to address the challenges around food packaging.
The collaboration has already led to the development of a GenAI tool to shrink down the time taken to create new packaging material – a process that can sometimes take years.
Scientists at the Swiss multinational food and drink company worked with IBM experts to train the AI tool to become an expert in chemistry by feeding it thousands of documents on different materials and their properties. The model is now able to understand how molecules are structured and is able to propose new packaging materials that can protect sensitive products from moisture, temperature swings, and oxygen. This has the potential to saves years of R&D time.
Nestlé is using AI elsewhere to support its innovation, for example its recipe optimisation tool that uses advanced algorithms to help product developers better manage the trade-offs between ingredients, nutrition, cost, and sustainability.
In May, Nestlé recently announced its new R&D centre for deep tech, which will be opened in Switzerland in the first half of 2026. The centre will screen, test, and develop new generations of sensors, robots, coding systems, high-performing AI, and virtual/mixed reality solutions.
Delve in TechMarketView’s latest market data and analysis to understand how AI is impacting industry sectors: Market Trends & Forecasts 2025
How does IBM fare across TechMarketView’s Rankings? Find out here: UK SITS Supplier Rankings 2025
Posted by: Kate Hanaghan at 09:50
Tags:
AI
R&D
food
packaging
CPG
One of the world's largest business-to-business technology distributors, Ingram Micro, has fallen victim to a significant cyber attack that has crippled its operations since Thursday. The outage, which has affected the company's website and online ordering systems, has now been confirmed as the result of a SafePay ransomware attack, according to reporting by BleepingComputer.
The attack began early Thursday morning, with employees discovering ransom notes on their devices. Sources have indicated that the threat actors likely breached Ingram Micro's network through its GlobalProtect VPN platform, highlighting the continued vulnerability of remote access systems to cybercriminal exploitation.
Following the discovery of the breach, the company took immediate defensive measures. Employees in some locations were instructed to work from home, whilst internal systems were shut down as a precautionary measure. The company has specifically advised staff not to use the GlobalProtect VPN access, which has been compromised by the attack.
The impact on Ingram Micro's operations has been substantial. The company's AI-powered Xvantage distribution platform and Impulse licence provisioning platform are amongst the systems affected. However, some services including Microsoft 365, Teams, and SharePoint continue to function normally, allowing limited business continuity.
SafePay represents a relatively new but increasingly active ransomware operation. First observed in November 2024, the group has already accumulated over 220 victims, making it one of the more prolific ransomware gangs operating in 2025. The group has previously been observed targeting corporate networks through VPN gateways using compromised credentials and password spray attacks.
Ingram Micro has since acknowledged the ransomware attack (initally just referring to it as an IT incident) and yesterday reported that it has made progress in restoring some aspects of its transactional business. It is still unclear what the full impact and cost of the breach will be.
Posted by: Simon Baxter at 09:45
DXC Technology’s strategic priorities centre on strengthening and further simplifying its offerings, driving performance, and creating differentiated value for its global customers. The newly appointed President of Consulting & Engineering Services (CES) will, according to DXC’s press release, play “a critical role” in moving towards those goals. CES, which focuses on helping clients across numerous industries solve complex strategic, operational, and technology challenges, has 50,000 engineers globally.
Ramnath Venkataraman, who will report directly to DXC President & CEO Raul Fernandez, joins having served three decades at Accenture, where he held a Global Management Committee position. Most recently, he oversaw the firm’s global technology sales, solutioning, assets, offerings, and network of Advanced Technology Centers. DXC highlights his professional services experience leading enterprise-wide modernisation efforts, with scaled delivery, as well as his “forward-looking approach to AI and next-generation technologies”.
This appointment is part of DXC's stated commitment to attracting top-tier leadership to build and grow its priority businesses. Other recent appointments have included Bill Pieroni as Global Strategy and Growth Leader for the Insurance Software & Business Process Services arm (see Pieroni joins DXC to lead Insurance strategy | TechMarketView), Sandeep Bhanote as the company’s new Financial Services Industry Leader for CES (see Bhanote joins DXC to lead Financial Services CES | TechMarketView), and T.R. Newcomb into the company’s newly created role of Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) (see DXC Technology appoints Newcomb as CRO | TechMarketView).
As we highlighted in our recently published UK SITS Supplier Rankings 2025 (see UK SITS Supplier Rankings 2025 | TechMarketView), Fernandez has stated that DXC is “on the right path to building a business with profitable and sustainable revenue growth,” despite global revenue declining 5.8% in FY25 (4.6% on an organic basis) and the projection of an organic revenue decline between 3.0% and 5.0% for FY26. In the UK, we have witnessed significant operational improvements, but the company continues to face growth challenges. In light of DXC’s challenges, this and other recent appointments hold great significance as the company looks to strengthen its competitive positioning.
Posted by: Georgina O'Toole at 09:27
Tags:
leadership
appointments
IT+services
According to reports in the press, UK energy firm Octopus Energy is considering hiving off and selling a minority stake in its technology arm, Kraken Technologies, within the next year. It’s expected that existing Octopus Energy investors would be given shares in a newly-independent Kraken business, with around a fifth of shares also being sold to external shareholders to help validate the valuation.
The move would value Kraken at around £10bn – with that portion of the business then worth around two-thirds of the £15bn value of the Octopus group overall.
Although part of Octopus, Kraken licenses its SaaS-based energy generation and supply management platform to other players in the market. EDF’s UK retail business engaged Kraken and Accenture to help strengthen and modernise its digital core in June last year, for example; and E.ON, Tokyo Gas, and Australia’s Origin Energy are also listed amongst the company’s clients – with Kraken’s platform now servicing over 70m customer accounts worldwide.
If it comes to pass, the demerger of Kraken Technologies will create a formidable force in energy tech – a market with much growth potential. According to TechMarketView’s recently published UK Software & IT Services (SITS) Market Trends & Forecasts 2025 report, Energy was the fastest growing sector for UK SITS spend in 2024 (up 6.5% to £3.5bn). It also ranked #3 in the UK (and worldwide) in terms of sustainability activity across the year too – with TechMarketView’s Sustainability Technology Activity Index logging 21.6% of the year’s global sustainability activities, and 16.8% of the UK’s, as pertaining to Energy sector related use cases.
TechMarketView Foundation Service members can download UK SITS Market Trends & Forecasts 2025 and its companion report UK SITS Supplier Rankings 2025 now. Together they provide an unparalleled multi-dimensional view of the UK SITS market as it looks today and how it’s forecast to evolve in the coming years. Our Sustainability Technology Activity Index 2025 reports (providing essential competitive intelligence and adoption insight into sustainability tech in the UK and across the globe) are also now available, to SustainabilityViews clients.
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Posted by: Craig Wentworth at 09:19
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demerger
Posted by: UKHotViews Editor at 07:00
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