News
1st Thought have been invited to join TeamTIBCO
24 June 2008
1st Thought have been invited to join TeamTIBCO, becoming the first UK based consultancy to join this select group of high performing TIBCO partners.
TeamTIBCO represents the pinnacle of TIBCO’s partner programme. It is reserved for current partners who have a proven track record of successful TIBCO engagements. Memberships reflects 1st Thought’s excellent ongoing relationship with TIBCO and our continued commitment to achieving outstanding results with TIBCO technologies for our customers.
SOA Test automation solution now extends support to TIBCO’s iProcess
11 June 2008
London (PRWEB) June 10, 2008—Green Hat, a leading provider of automated testing solutions, today announced the world’s first test automation product to combine both BPM and SOA validation. With the addition of BPM capabilities, Green Hat now offers customers a way to test all aspects of their SOA projects, including exception handling and manual processes.
“Some of the world’s largest organisations are using BPM in conjunction with SOA to deliver maximum business value. Until recently, automation of BPM testing has always been a stumbling block. GH Tester now extends the agility, quality and cost-savings benefits Green Hat’s customers have been enjoying on their SOA-only projects to those encompassing BPM too. This ensures they extract maximum business value from their BPM deployment.” Said Peter Cole, Green Hat’s President and CTO commenting on the new release.
Green Hat’s BPM support has been developed in conjunction with 1st Thought, an emerging market-leader in the European BPM services sector. The first BPM platform to be supported is TIBCO’s iProcess.
Nigel Winship, CEO 1st Thought, says: “We are delighted to be partnering with Green Hat to bring BPM capability to the GH Tester product. The ability that GH Tester now provides to drive the testing of a process end to end is genuinely ground breaking and we believe affords huge scope to drive down delivery costs for BPM projects. We are looking forward to leveraging the significant benefits of this technology with our customer base.”
About Green Hat:
Since 1996, Green Hat has been providing expertise in the use of integration technologies to deliver cost-effective solutions to real business issues. Our suite of GH Software products facilitates significant savings in time and cost to organisations implementing SOA architectures using messaging-based technologies. Our customers range from the niche financial trading boutique to international telecom players and investment banks, a diverse range of businesses, united through their need for scaleable, reliable, integrated solutions.
About 1st Thought:
1st Thought are leading specialists in the delivery of BPM technologies. Since 2001 we have been helping our customers improve their business performance by composing innovative technology solutions. These solutions work with “crown jewel” business processes, organizational policies and rules, and existing technology investments to drive significant competitive advantage.. Within the 1st Thought TIBCO practice we have recently joined TeamTIBCO, a select group of partners that has proven track record of successful engagements.
Contact:
Bret Freeman, Global Marketing and Business Development
Green Hat
+44 (0) 20 7776 4713
http://www.greenhatsoftware.com
Robert Cooper, Head of Consulting Services
1st Thought
+44 (0) 1425 200620
http://www.1st-thought.com
1st Thought announce a formal partnership with Spotfire
28 May 2008
1st Thought are delighted to announce a formal partnership with Spotfire, the industry leading, graphical, real time business analytics solution. The partnership will give 1st Thought a distinct position in Europe as formal partners with both TIBCO and Spotfire.
Commenting on the partnership Nigel Winship, 1st Thought Managing Director said:
“We are delighted to be bringing Spotfire’s unique and powerful analytic solution to our customers. We are excited by the opportunities that Spotfire provides to drive process improvement through dramatically enhanced visibility on process performance. To this end we will be leveraging our extensive knowledge of the best Business Process Management (BPM) solution architectures to build fast start templates, linking (initially) the TIBCO iProcess product set with the Spotfire solution. We also see Spotfire playing a key role in the emerging market for real time business solutions an important growth area for 1st Thought.”
Closing The Loop - Free breakfast briefing
11 April 2008
Using BPM and Analytics to Drive Process Insight and Business Improvement
When
08:30 to 10:15 on Thursday 22nd May 2008
Where
Adam Street Club, 9 Adam Street (off The Strand), London
Event Summary
- Under pressure to know what’s really going on with your processes?
- Would you like to use real time data from your processes to drive process improvement and/or better decision making?
- Want to take your investment in BPM to the next level?
1st Thought and Spotfire present a must see breakfast briefing on how the latest generation of user friendly analytics are coming together with process management technologies to drive process insight and improvement.
Join us at the fantastic Adam Street Club, just off The Strand in London to hear how to maximise your investment in process management technologies by gaining real insight into how your processes are performing.
Agenda
08:30 to 09:00
Registration - Coffee / Croissants / Bacon Rolls
09:00 to 09:10
Introductions and Welcome – Mike Southon
09:10 to 09:35“Closing the Loop” – How process insight maximises the return on BPM: Nigel Winship – 1st Thought Managing Director
09:35 to 10:00
An Introduction to Spotfire - The radically faster business intelligence experience: Brad Hopper VP TIBCO Spotfire Division
10:00 to 10:15
Question and Answer Session – Facilitated by Mike Southon
10:15
Briefing Close
10:15 – 11:00
Product Demonstration and Networking Opportunities
Event Speakers
Nigel Winship
Managing Director 1st Thought – Nigel is the founder and MD of the UK’s leading specialist Business Process Management (BPM) delivery consultancy. 1st Thought are TIBCO and Spotfire Alliance Partners and experts in delivering process excellence through BPM/SOA technologies.
Nigel holds an honors degree in Information Systems from The University of Humberside together with PGDip in Advanced Computing from Bournemouth University.
Brad Hopper – VP Spotfire
Director TIBCO Spotfire Division - In his role as Senior Director, Industry Solutions for TIBCO Spotfire Brad is responsible for identifying and developing areas of technical and business need across operational value chains where Spotfire’s interactive visual analytics can deliver competitive advantage to its customers. Brad is also responsible for field and customer development, business partner relationships, plus product and configured solution direction in support of high tech manufacturing and oil and gas. Brad has held roles of increasing responsibility in product management, consulting services, and technical marketing in his 8 year tenure at Spotfire.
Brad holds a BS and MS in Materials Science and Engineering from UC Berkeley.
Mike Southon (Facilitator)
One of UK’s leading business figures, Mike has made frequent appearances on television and radio and has a weekly column on entrepreneurship in the Financial Times. Mike is an experienced conference moderator, skilled at facilitating focused events with excellent levels of audience involvement that have no “death by powerpoint”!
Mike is a Visiting Fellow in Innovation and Entrepreneurship at London South Bank University.
Register Online for this free event. Spaces are limited so don’t delay!
The Companies House Information System (CHIPS) goes live…
17 March 2008
The Companies House Information System (CHIPS) went live over the weekend of the 1st/2nd March 2008. This large and complex project has delivered a completely new technology platform for Companies House. As a member of the Companies House Partnership, 1st Thought have been instrumental to the business process management (BPM) stream of the programme and are delighted that the solution has gone in so successfully.
“1st Thought’s intimate knowledge of Business Process Management (BPM) technologies has proved invaluable to Companies House.”
Tony Samra - Change Director - Companies House - January 2007
06 March 2008
Due to continued expansion, 1st Thought has relocated it’s Head Offices to new larger offices in Ringwood. The new office will house Sales, Marketing, Administration and Practice Management teams. Our consultancy, managed services, training and finance teams will continue to be based at the Nottingham Office.
Nigel Winship, Managing Director of 1st Thought commented “This is a great modern facility, ideal for our consultants when off-site and a professional space to host both our customers and partners.”
The new office is located at :
Market Place
Ringwood
BH24 1AP
Tel: 01425 200620
The offices are located in Market Place, next to Letchers Solicitors and opposite the Church.
1st-Thought sign service agreement with Barclaycard International
28 January 2008
1st Thought has recently signed an innovative managed service agreement with Barclaycard International. The agreement covers the ongoing support and development of Barclaycard’s Spanish card processing application, a solution designed and delivered by 1st Thought.
The managed service will deliver application support together with development capability split between Northampton (UK) and the operational customers of the solution in Zaragoza (Spain). The agreement continues a successful working partnership between Barclaycard and 1st Thought which is now well into its third year.
For larger development activity during 2008, Barclaycard now also have the option of augmenting 1st Thought’s niche expertise with offshore development capability supplied through Zensar Technologies.
28 January 2008
Need to know more about the real benefits of Business Process Management (BPM)? Want to cut through all the marketing blurb?
Based on our many years of experience of composing and implementing BPM solutions, 1st Thought is offering a free, no obligation Business Briefing session to companies that are looking to see how BPM can improve their Businesses.
We will be answering questions such as:
- What really is BPM?
- What can it do for your business?
- What business problems are ideally suited to BPM?
- How do Service Orientated Architecture (SOA) principles and Business Activity Monitoring (BAM) fit with BPM.
- Can BPM help out my Six Sigma and Lean gurus?
To fit in with the busy working day, this two hour session can be held as either a Breakfast Meeting or Lunchtime session.
Robert Cooper, Head of Consulting Services at 1st Thought said “We have found that these sessions are particularly useful to help get buy in from senior management. Because we do this for an Individual Company, we can tailor it to make it relevant to each one, for example to meet challenges in a given vertical”
For more details please contact
1st Thought Sponsor Dragon Boat Regatta
21 December 2007
1st Thought were delighted to sponsor a Dragon Boat in the December regatta down in sunny Zandvlei in South Africa! The boat was crewed by a team from the local Masiphumlele township. The 1st Thought team made it through to the semi-finals losing out by a mere 0.5 seconds!
The event raised valuable funds to support Masikane school in the township, as well as helping with the construction costs of a second school in the area which is currently ongoing. We look forward to supporting the event again next year. Thanks to Alan Walters and all the team at Cape of Good Hope Rotary club for giving us the chance to get involved in such an exciting and worthwhile event.
Introducing Robert Cooper - Head Of Consulting Services
03 December 20071st Thought are delighted to announce that Robert Cooper has joined the company as Head Of Consulting Services.
Robert comes to 1st Thought with over 10 years of experience of delivering process management solutions at leading vendors like Software AG and TIBCO. Robert’s most recent position was Global BPM Practice manager at Software AG.
Robert’s experience will be of huge value in the management of the mission critical engagements that are typical in the 1st Thought portfolio. Robert will also focus on further developing 1st Thought’s service offerings and strengthening the company’s position as a leader in the composition of enterprise process applications.
Commenting on the move Robert said “I am really excited about joining 1st Thought. It is a great time to be a member of the leading consultancy in its field. I look forward to engaging with new and existing customers as the company continues to evolve”. 1st Thought Managing Director Nigel Winship said “We are delighted to have someone of Robert’s caliber joining the team here at 1st Thought. Our customers will get massive benefit from his attitude, energy and experience. We are enjoying an exciting and sustained period of growth and see Robert playing an important role as this continues through 2008 and beyond.”
1st Thought Charity Golf Day, Tuesday 29th April 2008
31 October 2007
Join us for a fantastic day of golf at the prestigious Remedy Oak golf course - http://www.remedyoak.com - set in 256 acres of ancient woodland near the Hampshire/Dorset border.
“A delightful golf course in a marvelous setting with some very interesting and challenging holes. One of the most superbly constructed new golf courses in the South of England” - Peter Alliss - Life President Remedy Oak
“Truly magnificent. When it matures it will be England’s finest inland course, It’s special.” - Sky Sports Commentator - Ewan Murray
The day will be funded by 1st Thought. All proceeds including entrance fees will go direct to Global Angels. This amazing charity is dedicated to providing hope and freedom to children in need around the world. Find our more at – http://www.globalangels.org We are hopeful that the day will raise in excess
of £5,000.
Entrance fees are £99 per person or £375 for a team of four. This includes:
* Coffee and bacon roll on arrival
* One round of golf
* Drinks reception
* Sumptuous sit down meal
* Prizes
* Goodie Bag
Registration and Light Breakfast from 10:00. Tee off times 11:00 to 12:30. Presentations 17:00. Dinner 17:30 to 18:30.
To book please contact the 1st Thought Golf Day event team via email or call 01425 489513 quoting 1st Thought Golf Day.
Please confirm your interest ASAP as places are limited.
I look forward to seeing you there for what promises to be a great day!
1st Thought Open Nottingham Office
21 August 20071st Thought have opened a new office in the centre of Nottingham. The new office is at:
Gothic House
Barker Gate
Nottingham NG1 1JU
Commenting on the opening, 1st Thought Operations Director Mick Abbott said: “Having a base in the East Midlands makes a lot of sense as many of our consultants are from this part of the world. As the company continues to experience significant growth, the new offices provide a great working environment to progress off-site projects.”
09 August 2007
1st Thought Chairman Alan Bates and MD Nigel Winship were interviewed this month by best selling author and leading business speaker Mike Southon. The podcast, which appears on Beermat Radio in association with The Daily Telegraph, explores the concept of business mentoring.
You can download a copy of the podcast from our Resources Library.
16 April 2007
1st Thought are pleased to announce that they have signed a formal Alliance Partner Agreement with TIBCO Inc.
Commenting on the deal 1st Thought Managing Director Nigel Winship said “We are delighted to be formally partnering with TIBCO. This agreement deepens our relationship with a world leader in the enterprise software space, which in turn is great news for our customers. The deal makes 1st Thought the UK’s only niche BPM centric consultancy that is working in partnership with TIBCO.”
First Thought Launch Application Support Service
09 April 2007In response to strong customer demand, First Thought have launched an application support service.
Commenting on the new service First Thought Managing Director Nigel Winship said:
“The process led applications that we deliver for our customers are typically business critical, driving huge value and often crucial differentiation in crowded market places. It is therefore not surprising that our customers want the very best expertise supporting these key components of their business. First Thought is delighted to offer this support through our new Application Support Service.”
The service will enable customers to leverage First Thought,s world leading knowledge of process management, business rule and integration technologies in the support of business critical applications. There will be a dedicated helpline for each customer, as well as tailored reporting.
The first customer of the First Thought Support Service is one of the world,s leading financial institutions.
For more information on how this service can transform the support of your applications call our office today on 01425 485372.
First Thought Strategic Seminar a Massive Success!
02 April 2007First Thought’s recent seminar on Process Management in Financial Services at the Institute of Directors in Pall Mall London, was a massive success. Over 65 delegates attended the session including senior representatives from the likes of Barclays, Citigroup, LloydsTSB, Merrill Lynch and The Stock Exchange.
Speakers Tim Jones (Board member of Capital One and ex of Retail Banking at Nat West) and Jon Pyke (Chair of the WfMC, ex CTO of Staffware and chairman of The Process Factory) and chair Mike Southon (The Beermat Entrepreneur) entertained and informed a packed Burton Room. Watch out for our next event in the autumn!
“The best event I have attended of its kind bar none” - Principle, The Bridge Management Group