The evolution of technology.

Information is being accessed in many different ways these days- through mobile devices, laptops, personal computers and the so called smartphones. There are so many ways to keep connected but what does this mean for you?

The working life

With the developments in remote access technology and online security it is now possible to work from your office from home, just this week I remotely accessed my work computer to download files, sort documents and work on a few local issues.

This is a great benefit to those with family commitments.

Equally, to those with education commitments who want to study and work at the same time.

This is something, however, that wouldn’t have been possible a few years ago as the technology was there...it just wasn’t as flexible as it is now. It was also a rather specialised field and you would need extensive computing knowledge to use this technology. Now it is available, as a service, via the cloud ironically, that anyone can use.

Keep connected all day every day

While for many of us the idea of never being able to leave our work behind may be slightly horrifying- this gives you more opportunities to keep control when you’re not there. No longer miss meetings, calls and other important communication with mobile devices that keep you connected all the time.

While if you’re just ill and out of the office that day, worry not that you will have to let the office field itself- set up video conferences and free VOIP chats to relay key issues.

There really has never been a better time to stay connected to our personal and professional lives.

Of course, there is such a thing as information overload and sometimes we do need to disconnect from it all. It’s just that the choice will always be there: do you want to be there? Do you want to be here? What do you want from your day? It shows a social evolution to accept such a flexible and dynamic work life, away from the harrowing 9-6 daily routine.

Again, this post doesn’t break any new ground- it’s just a nice relaxed overview of the way technology has evolved and our lives with it.

We are constantly looking for new things to talk about and will have more information topics soon- thank you for reading!

All information presented here is © copyright Carkean Solutions Ltd., 2010 - Not to be used without our permission - The views expressed here are the views of an individual not the corporation

Aquima: Innovation with Mortgages

The effects recession are felt by businesses in all industries but none moreso than the mortgage industry, especially since a major cause of the recession was down to unsustainable increase of house prices just prior to the recession. With 67,300 houses repossessed over the five quarters between 2008 and 2009 the government had to act and act they did.

The government ploughed millions of pounds to rescue struggling mortgage providers and in turn mortgage providers had to be "sensitive" when dealing with customers who were in the red- this combined with low interest rates had crippled some of the most well known and established companies.

While the external factors were very difficult to control (in most cases impossible), many mortgage providers sought ways to cut costs internally. Many organisations opting to cut the number of staff and re-structure the organisations to achieve these goals. While cutting the number of staff cut costs it also had a negative effect on the service provided.

A well established Dutch company decided to take a different approach rather then concentrating on re-structuring the emphasis was on improving efficiency and flexibility to meet the ever changing market needs. The organisation sought the help of the Aquima developers to improve their current system.

The challenge was to provide and automated process to deal with the large number of registrations, guarantees, backlogs, foreclosures and losses (more than 120,000 forms per year). Process integration and STP were essential in this. Due to the nature of the business a high requirement was set for the automation with respect to safety, access authorisation, availability, connectivity, user numbers and the transferability of the application maintenance.

Our rule was to design, develop and maintain a mid and back-office system, to support the business process. A web-based mid and back office system RADAR was developed. the system was used to register, manage guarantees and process foreclosure losses. The system was fully automated providing the business a secure electronic communication system. The realised system was composed of various parts to support every phase of the process.

The finished system was a very efficient process support system. The Dutch company yield benefits almost instantly, The company was able to deal with a considerable increase of registration with with a very limited increase of the workforce. The system was very dynamic and flexible providing a platform for easy and safe data transfer.Employees where able to update policy changes instantly protecting the company and company reputation.

Guest post for 25th January 2010.

All information presented here is © copyright Carkean Solutions Ltd., 2010 - Not to be used without our permission - The views expressed here are the views of an individual not the corporation

Aquima: Full of Energy!

Energy prices are constantly on the rise and with the promise of lowest prices from all energy providers customers are very confused and unsure which companies to trust. The new trend has made it very difficult energy providers to have a loyal customer base and are consistently competing for customers.

Government legislation, giving the customer the right to switch between providers at any given time leaves companies very vulnerable. Most customers are just one bad bill away from seeking another company that would promise a lower price.

All these problems are amplified by the current economic situation, most customers are feeling the pressure and the high level of unemployment is causing mass panic. While most companies are spending millions in advertisement to gain new customers, while very little is done in keeping existing ones.

We here at Aquima have come up with very innovative solutions to all of the above. Our fully automated energy meter gives the customer the ability to change the energy source that they are using instantly and at any given time, for example if a customer wishes to use solar energy in summer and be provided electricity in the winter.

With Aquima's energy meter each customer is treated as an individual, giving each customer the feeling that they are important and that his/her energy provider cares about their individual needs, this should provide a much needed customer loyalty.

Guest post for 24th January 2011.

All information presented here is © copyright Carkean Solutions Ltd., 2010 - Not to be used without our permission - The views expressed here are the views of an individual not the corporation

Cloud Computing: The Future for the OS?

With the emergence of increasingly growing amounts of mobile devices it is speculated that personal computers may suffer, as many consumers are already making the change to other devices.
However it could be said that there is hope for a system that is accessed and deployed mostly online, with a platform-free and cost-effective approach.

Online operating systems? I don't know...

It is true that this is a hard to grasp idea. It doesn't seem feasible but if you consider the current state of play with most OS packages- it's actually a natural progression.
These days Microsoft Windows OS activation is done with an online process and the details are stored on an online server. Periodically these can be checked/acessed.

While the same is said for the delivery of many types of software with some newer distribution systems.

Time was you had to find a specialist computer vendor to get your software and utilities, time now is that download these straight to your machine.
This covers everything from software, to video games, to movies and more which can now be accessed as easy as logging into a website. There's already a lot of things which are deployed via online platforms which would only grow, and diversify, were the entire system cloud based.

This is all done in an effort to reduce the amount of physical materials and packaging that is required for the distribution of products, and to provide instaneous delivery.

Could it be successful?

iTunes is a good example of what we're talking about here. It revolutionised what you looked for in terms of personal entertainment- music, films, TV episodes, education materials- it was all provided via an online service which could be accessed 24/7.
Which would instantly download content to your machine once you purchased it and would allow you to access it in minutes. It broke barriers with previous systems.

Now imagine this on an operating system level of size and depth.

A system that provided services, utilities, anti-virus protection and much more in a streamlined and entirely platform-free environment. To be connected to the the service and have very little need for local storage.
Save for your local machine software which would still be required.

This could be the new and very exciting future of operating systems and it would break many new barriers, as it has never previously been done on such a scale.

In any case, this is a little bit of food for thought on what a system like cloud computing could provide for us.

We are constantly updating our information on cloud computing and will have more information soon- thank you for reading!

All information presented here is © copyright Carkean Solutions Ltd., 2010 - Not to be used without our permission - The views expressed here are the views of an individual not the corporation

Webinar: Intelligent Strategies for Tackling Financial Crime

Carkean Solutions will be hosting a webinar on anti-money laundering and fraud on the 24th February 2011, at 2:30pm, which will be hosted by the Digital Systems Knowledge Transfer Network.

The webinar will be covering key topics to do with the impact and causes of financial crime, how much is lost each year as a result of it and how we can work to solve these problems. It is a brief yet concise overview of the industry and how we can work to improve the level of response in fraudelent cases.
We will also be looking at our revolutionary BPM system and highlighting how that can help to create a dynamic and quick-to-react solution for fraud.

It will provide for an invigorating and thought-provoking look at a problem which has become ever-apparent in recent years.

We will be providing more information on how to connect to this exciting event nearer the date of the webinar. If you're interested in this unique opportunity send an e-mail to info@carkeansolutions.co.uk.

Thank you for reading- we'd love to see you!

All information presented here is © copyright Carkean Solutions Ltd., 2010 - Not to be used without our permission - The views expressed here are the views of an individual not the corporation

Cloud Computing: Reduced Failure Rate

Cloud computing has advanced the modern marketplace and has opened new doors for many organisations, we can say how brilliantly it handles success- but what about the other side of the coin? How does it handle failure?

What should we expect?

Firstly it has a significantly reduced failure rate than you may expect.
While, yes, you're entrusting your data to a open server and you're sharing a great deal of your information. It is protected. And it is backed up regularly by your provider to help in the event of any major failure.
While, thanks to the way cloud computing works, there is less chance of a singular localised failure crippling your organisation and bringing the company down.

Imagine the typical office situation: your computers and information are all stored locally and, while you have access to the office, you have your information to hand and you're covered.
Until someone manages to contract a virus and give it to their terminal..and then you're facing a rather difficult situation. Can you save the information? How? How much is it going to cost? How much downtime? Who can you trust with handling such a volume of sensitive data?

Same applies in cases of heinous weather. Your office is your fort and when the drawbridge is up you can't get in, you're not going anywhere- which is where a platform-independent solution becomes a powerful and effective tool.

Not a technological person? No worries.

In recent years we have advanced to levels of graphical and processor performance previously only dreamed of. Operating systems are no longer the field of the IT professional- but the average home user- and cloud computing is no different in that respect.
While the system is entirely IT based it's not something that is so complex that the average user cannot use it. Which is the second part of the beauty of this.

It not only makes your life easier, your information easier to access and many of your problems solved but it's something everyone can adopt.

It allows your organisation to expand in every way possible as the executives and the administration can use this revolutionary technology. This allows previously unthought of levels of data sharing.
Which, we agree- is not always a good thing to share sensitive data.
But with cloud computing each user has their own access credentials which ascertain whether or not they should access this- and you can choose who can and can't.

This is all for now but we will be expanding further on the topic of cloud computing in future posts. Thank you for reading!

All information presented here is © copyright Carkean Solutions Ltd., 2010 - Not to be used without our permission - The views expressed here are the views of an individual not the corporation

e-Networking: Pace Yourself

One of the other biggest concerns about social media and e-Networking in general is how you’re going to work on it all. Admittedly, that is probably the most difficult thing you’ll have to deal with when it comes to this.

The finer points...

When do you update? When are you going to run out of new updates? What do you do then? Is there any way you can avoid this?

The best tactic for making sure you never run dry of things to say is to work on what you have that you want to share, where you’re going to post it and then set out a plan to help you reach each part but never exceed it.

Things you should ask yourself are:

• What do I want to share on these sites and where?
• What kind of content is this- self-generated (company news) or externally-generated (industry and product news)?
• When are we likely to run out (realistically)?
• Are we going to be able to update indefinitely?

If you find that particularly on the last two questions you’re saying “quite soon” and “no” (respectively) then perhaps you need to reassess your content. Running out is a bad idea if people are expecting new content regularly, while it’s always a good idea to have a rabbit in the hat- an update you can make if you have absolutely nothing else.

If your content is self-generated then it’s likely that for as long as you’re in business you’ll have something to say, while externally-generated is a bit more sporadic. The two together works quite well to keep a consistent “unbiased” update list.

But, lucky for you- there are a few tricks you can use to help you through a dry spell of updating and content writing.

Around the mountain- not over it.

Tools like Twitter’s ReTweet function are invaluable when you have a drought of content, not to mention they can help get your name around. People can ReTweet your content or, equally, you can ReTweet their content if you think it contributes to your sites.

This is an easy way to find something that you really think works for everyone who reads your content and gives you a free pass to let that be your update. Of course, you shouldn’t do it too much and you shouldn’t rely on it- but if you need it- it’s usually there.

Information is great to use for an update. Not your usual content information but information that you may be compiling as some sort of document, as we do with these, little snippets are great teasers. They generate interest, they give you a free content update and you get some initial and raw feedback on it.
If people don’t like what they’re reading- you know that before you’ve gone through the whole process of officially releasing it.

Guest posts are another great way.
If you’re so inclined (and you’ll most likely have people willing to contribute), get a few drawn up from people and then post them regularly sandwiched between the rest of your content.
More user interaction, a different point of view, a lighter content uploading schedule and lots of great content- how can you lose?
It also helps set the stage for later user interaction and more guest posts as after that you’ll most likely get buckets of e-mails asking about writing them.

And that concludes it. There are many other tips and tricks out there so try to find some helpful (and talkative) e-Networking users and learn from them! Share information, ideas, designs and other useful tidbits to help those starting out.
Not to mention, who knows what you’ll get in return?

As always we are continually updating the bank of information we have regarding to e-Networking so check back in the future- there's likely to be new tidbits. Thank you for reading!

All information presented here is © copyright Carkean Solutions Ltd., 2010 - Not to be used without our permission - The views expressed here are the views of an individual not the corporation

How are we spending our money? (UK)

Recently we've been talking a lot about finance and financial regulation, while searching for information on another topic- I unearthed a cache of statistics. These prove to be interesting for both technological and economical reasons.

Technological because these transactions are mostly made with new technology and newly developed situations. While, as a money matter, it deals with the economy.

The statistics suggest that in 2009 there were 608 million purchases made online with either debit or credit cards, totalling over £47.2bn spent and averaging a purchase value of £70-80.
And that in the same period 33.9 million adults purchased online which comprised 67% of the overall adult population.

Meanwhile on the darker side of the equation there was a total fraud figure of £440.3m, which is actually 28% (£170m) less than the prior year.

Suggested reasons for the lessened fraud includes the introduction of Chip and Pin which cut plastic card fraud quite sharply, and even now- we are seeing less and less fraud.
Thre are less ways to steal data under these conditions and thereby this positive trend is great news for the future.

And to grasp the size of the situation- there were 162.6m cards in issue in 2009. Be it debit, credit, charge or ATM cards. While 20.2m credit or charge card holders were using their cards at least once a month.
This figure, again, though seems high, was actually 0.3m lower than the year before and suggested a downward trend on credit spending.

On the debit card side of the fence there were 43.1m debit card holders who (collectively) made 5.9bn purchases, totalling a staggering figure of £264bn and each with an average transaction value of £45.
The impressive figure of 43.1m card holders totalled 85% of the adult population and has yet showed no signs of slowing down.

We hope you have found this informative and yet interesting!

Thank you for reading as always! If you have anything to add feel free to leave a comment or post on our social media sites.

All information presented here is © copyright Carkean Solutions Ltd., 2010 - Not to be used without our permission - The views expressed here are the views of an individual not the corporation

Aquima: Providing Financial Solutions

Financial regulation has been a rather active talking point in recent months since the global recession; this can prove to be a problem with traditional IT systems. Where changes are often expensive and time consuming. And where you could be waiting several weeks to see the changes put in place across all of your systems.

Aquima is different in that you can update your systems in real time and it costs nothing but a small amount of time to do so. There are no extensive lead-on implementation times and changes can be made the same day if you wish. Equally, if you wish to implement them at a later date you can set them up and let Aquima do that for you automatically.

This even applies to documentation and forms as through Aquima’s document creator you are able to access, edit and update these important papers as easily as you can the system.

As you know, combating fraud and identity theft is a time-sensitive matter and requires accuracy to quickly isolate and solve the problem. Aquima provides a dynamic solution that responds as quickly as you do, while providing an unbelievable level of accuracy which helps track problems as they occur.

No longer will you have to sift through layers of data to find what is required for this incident- you can easily comb the entire system in minutes tracking down the possible causes and stop them before they develop further. Which is critical as it allows you to update, reassure and respond to customers in real time and provide answers where needed.

Aquima is not an ‘off the shelf’ solution but a bespoke system which can be tailored to your needs and can be developed to combat the problems you encounter most frequently.

In recent years more systems have become more computerized than ever before, this often leads to the question of security and how well a system protects information. There is also a growing concern of when information can be accessed and from where. These are all things that Aquima takes into account, and delivers on, while storing your confidential information.

Cloud computing allows you to access your information quickly and easily when and where you need it without it being at risk. Our high level of protection and encryption ensure only those who need it, can use it or you allow to use it can access it. Allowing you to continue your day to day operations knowing your information is just a click away.

Incidents with finance usually require a great deal of human input as the situations tend to be unique, while requiring expertise and knowledge from all levels. It is easily possible to make models which many employees can access or limit the access to the select few- allowing Aquima to tackle cases of any size. As, like you know, these cases often start small before escalating rapidly.

Also, were we to look at the worst case scenario, such as several incidents at once, we can once again be reassured that Aquima can handle these as it can support hundreds of models/cases at once. These allow you to have a new-found confidence in the face of what would be, and still is, a very large problem and something that traditional IT systems would not be able to handle.

Thank you for reading as always!
If you have anything to add, any questions or queries, feel free to comment below or on any of our social media sites.

All information presented here is © copyright Carkean Solutions Ltd., 2010 - Not to be used without our permission - The views expressed here are the views of an individual not the corporation

Aquima: Solutions for Petroleum Pt. 2

As promised earlier this month we are re-visting the topic of solutions provided by Aquima for petroleum companies. We discussed many of the problems that petroleum companies faced and their solutions, today we are going to take a different approach where instead of providing solutions for existing problems we are going to look at the innovation aspect of Aquima.

One of the most innovative and useful tools offered by the Aquima system for the petroleum industry is the oil search engine. This is truly an amazing feature, with the ability to predict oil rigs with a very high level of accuracy. The process is a very simple one, data is collected from all previous successful (and unsuccessful) oil searches and through the powerful AI (artificial intelligence) of Aquima a number of highly plausible oil fields locations are drawn up.

The high level of accuracy associated with the application can instantly reduce the cost connected with the initial stage of searching for oil. While the application does not claim that major saving will be made in the testing phase, the savings are made in the initial stages where most companies would rely on costly methods of searching for oil from geologists. Using of powerful computers and data based on endless research a where the smallest mistake would lead to millions of dollars being wasted.

Many companies suffer more than the cost of the investment when drilling into an empty well, it is often that the after effects that are far greater and more costly. The damage to company reputation would certainly lead to share price deflation, hindering the business's ability to secure new investors and keep existing ones. As seen recently a British based company's share price fell by 60% overnight after discovering that a promising oil well was empty.

While the oil search engine application does not save costs after the intial stage there are many tools in the Aquima BPM system that do, these will be discussed in greater detail in the coming weeks.

Guest post for January 11th 2011
All information presented here is © copyright Carkean Solutions Ltd., 2010 - Not to be used without our permission - The views expressed here are the views of an individual not the corporation

Carkean Solutions: Pushing Innovation in Finance

We at Carkean Solutions are passionate about innovation and we're always exploring new ways to provide long-lasting, competitive and exceptional growth to our clients. One way we do this is to provide new technology wherever possible.

For instance, we're working closely with financial organisations to provide systems that are highly transparent and dynamic.
Not only to meet the needs these companies have today but tomorrow, as well.
Transparency in fiancial systems is needed now more than ever. Following the global recession there was an outcry that we see more where our money is going, to who and for what as we were concerned about our money.

But the truth is that many traditional IT systems don't provide this level of transparency.

While it is equally true that many organisations have long lead-on times to sort problems when they occur due to restricted systems.

The last thing we want to imagine is problems with our money.
Identity theft and credit card fraud have become a serious problem as most of our transactions have switched to "new" systems. Whereas, once was the case, signatures were required- all that is now required is a PIN number.
With a card that is none too often checked before being slotted into the reader ready to pay for the purchases.

Which makes this a frightening new truth we have to deal with and one that technological innovation could curb. We are confident that, in the future, in several years time, we could effectively cut down these happenings to a small percentage.
But for now we are looking to cut the possibilities and provide more opportunities to come back, without loss, from these unfortunate situations.

Which is why we feel that technological innovation is the future- as many things are handled by technology these days.

As a management consultancy we get the pleasure to work with many organisations and this takes us to many industries. We see and do a lot. Working with a number of clients and constantly adapting our solutions, and software, to match the new problems which arise from the industry over time.

That's all for now- thank you for reading as always!
If you have anything you'd like to add (comments, questions, inquiries or feedback) just leave a comment and we'll get back to you.

All information presented here is © copyright Carkean Solutions Ltd., 2010 - Not to be used without our permission - The views expressed here are the views of an individual not the corporation

Keeping your money safe.

Money laundering is a far-reaching and immensely crippling problem for financial organisations. Started from something as simple as transferring money, it can be a difficult problem to detect while being even harder to combat.

The heart of the problem is in the methodology.
Laundering takes place in three steps: the first involves transferring the money from the main account to the recipient accounts. Then the money is “layered” to provide a smoke screen to make it seem like it was legitimately acquired. Finally, the last stage involves transferring the ill-gotten gains into a form of wealth or profit.
Due to the layering and integration processes it can be very difficult to track the money after it reaches this point, resulting in losses (or worse).

Previously, the term was applied only to financial transactions related to organized crime.
Today its definition is often expanded by government and international regulators such as the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to mean any financial transaction which generates an asset or a value as the result of an illegal act, which may involve actions such as tax evasion or false accounting.

There are, however, measures which have been introduced to try and choke the ability for organisations/individuals to launder money.
These come in the form of anti-money laundering laws which are upheld by financial regulatory bodies, financial organisations and government policies. Examples of these laws involve diligence when verifying a customer’s identity, or requiring a check to be undertaken when large sums of money are required to be transferred.
In the US, any sum larger than $10,000 requires a CTR (currency transaction report) which notes and details the transaction for future purposes.

That said, many countries and regulatory bodies handle these in different ways.

Some go as far as to provide details of suspicious transfers even if they have not yet been proved (as is the case in the US), while some require proof (as is the case in Switzerland), to be handed to the regulatory body.
This is a form of money laundering prevention as it is possible to catch some transactions before they are able to transfer a large bulk of the money.

It does, thereby, create an amount of work and requires an amount of cost to monitor these transactions. Some would argue that the cost more than covers the benefit of the solution.

That's all for now!
Thank you for reading, as always. We hope to bring you more informative financial and technological news in the coming weeks.

Any comments or questions? Feel free to post below.

All information presented here is © copyright Carkean Solutions Ltd., 2010 - Not to be used without our permission - The views expressed here are the views of an individual not the corporation

Aquima: Solutions for Petroleum.

Petroleum companies are often multinational organisations sharing similar resources; this can include data, staff and even assets. The problem is that many companies do not use the same IT system, thereby data transfer is difficult and time consuming.
There are many reasons for the lack of integration between different branches of an oil company trading in different countries.

Many IT systems are made specifically for a branch operating in a specific country, as most of the software is tailored to their needs and requirements.
Which may not apply to other branches of the company, as most software used relies on heavy coding it is not possible to create a system that would meet the needs of the different branches, making effective and flexible data sharing virtually impossible.

Another problem faced by companies trading in different countries is that data is collected in several languages and would need to be translated before it is useful, which limits the speed of which a company can react to change in the market or government rules and legislation. Thereby having a negative effect on profits and company image.

The Aquima BPM system is equipped with the tools necessary to solve all of the above problems and more. Aquima software is able to run in any language providing the continuity and integration that is required. One of the main advantages of Aquima is that it is platform independent enabling the business to collect data from any source possible.

Aquima's instant translation tool is a feature that is very desirable for all multinational companies, as it allows communication and data transfer between two or more people with no common language to be realised in real time saving the cost of hiring translators and the time it takes for the translation to take place.

The Aquima systems has many more features that are of great benefit to companies operating in the petroleum industry that would be discussed in detail at a later time.

Guest post for 4th January 2011
All information presented here is © copyright Carkean Solutions Ltd., 2010 - Not to be used without our permission - The views expressed here are the views of an individual not the corporation

Aquima: Using the Right Tools.

Aquima BPM systems have been successfully utilised in a variety of industries; today we're talking about Aquima in the retail industry and how the system was used to improve the services provided by a leading DIY outlet in the Netherlands and Belgium.

In an attempt to differentiate the services provided and gain a competitive edge, the DIY outlet introduced a new marketing campaign. The theme of the campaign was "inspiration and advice". Part of this new marketing campaign was a web based service focusing on home designers and decorative individuals. The challenge for the DIY outlet was to provide an online customised odd-job advice.
This turned out to be a very difficult task, as the website had to cater for a large number of people, meet the needs of each individual and still be very user friendly.

After numerous failed attempts, the the management team decided to seek help in the form of Aquima.
Aquima consultants conducted interviews to investigate what information and advice was considered to be important and collected knowledge from the organisation. The knowledge was used to create web-based applications with the aid of Aquima, leading to the realisation of customised advice by means of clever dialogue. This resulted in various odd-job manuals that can be expanded easily and quickly.

The web applications are extremely flexible, user friendly and easy to expand. As well as style-independent. Meaning that the layout is made separately, allowing the application to change automatically when a new design is implemented.
This means new designs are realised quicker without having to take the older designs into account.

There were many benefits to the business including more visitors to the website. The online advice was amongst the top five most viewed pages, which led to an increase of customers visiting the stores and less pressure on staff to provide advice, thereby improving staff motivation and customer service.

Guest post for the 4th January 2011
All information presented here is © copyright Carkean Solutions Ltd., 2010 - Not to be used without our permission - The views expressed here are the views of an individual not the corporation