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PCS and MNA nominated for major IT award

UKIT Awards- Finalist Wednesday 15th September 2010
Publishing software developer PCS finds itself in high-powered company having gained a place in the final of the prestigious 2010 UK IT Industry Awards organised by BCS the Chartered Institute for IT and Computing magazine...

Midlands-based PCS has been nominated with the Midland News Association for the implementation of its ground-breaking digital content management and publishing system, Knowledge, which has been successfully rolled out to the MNA’s industry-leading regional evening newspapers, the Express & Star and Shropshire Star and their associated weekly titles over the last 12 months or so.

The Knowledge implementation is one of 10 nominations for Business Project of the Year, alongside entries from major organisations such as telecoms giant BT, the Post Office, car-makers Volkswagen, hotel and restaurant chain Whitbread and pharmaceuticals multinational Pfizer.

Projects will be presented to the competition judges on Friday, October 1 at the Madjeski Stadium in Reading and the winners will be announced at the awards evening in London on Thursday, November 11.

PCS managing director, Phil Walker, said: “We’re absolutely delighted to be nominated alongside the MNA for this award and even being in the same company as some of the finalists makes me think we’re punching way above our weight when you look at the resources they have behind them.

“In the beginning we listened very hard to what the MNA wanted to achieve and we’ve worked closely with them to build from the ground up a new digital publishing system in a relatively short timeframe. Knowledge not only helps secure their core print business, but opens up opportunities in digital media that wouldn’t have been possible before.”

Adrian Faber, editor of the Express & Star, the UK’s biggest-selling evening newspaper, said: “We knew around three years ago that to maintain our competitive advantage, we needed to replace what was essentially a print-centred ‘editorial system’ with something that allowed us to do what we did more efficiently and give us seamless access to the potential of what at that time was the web and mobile, but has since become smart phones and things like the iPad, too.

“Knowledge has been a partnership of ideas, allying PCS’s technical innovation to our huge experience in what it takes to run a complex multi-edition publishing operation that continues to defy trends by producing high quality, genuinely local, same-day print products. And now we have the opportunity to so much more with our content digitally.

“What’s more, we’ve been able to do that relatively quickly and with minimum disruption to production. We’ve also managed to make some efficiencies in the way we work and we expect there are more to come.”

Quality assurance for PCS customers

ISO9001 accredited Thursday 1st July 2010
The managing director of Midlands-based publishing software developer PCS has hailed his company’s achievement of the ISO 9001 quality standard as a benefit not only to PCS, but more especially to its customers.

Phil Walker, welcomed confirmation of the accreditation, saying: “While we are proud to be able to proclaim that PCS is ISO 9001 certified, what that actually does is send out a message to our customers that we take quality seriously.

“It should give them the confidence to know that we are taking care in everything we do, continually scrutinising the software we deliver and the way we deliver it, to ensure that we’re always looking to be the best we can be on their behalf.”

He added: “The accreditation sets us apart as a UK publishing software developer and supplier and it acknowledges that we have reached a measurably high standard in our business processes.”

ISO 9001 also requires companies to maintain a rigid set of key business processes which can be monitored to ensure they are working as they should. It also demands effective record keeping and quality assurance procedures, which are expected to be continually improved.

Said Walker: “It’s a process that doesn’t stop. Achieving ISO 9001 is the platform on which we expect to build as we continue to develop industry-leading software for our customers.

“There are standards we have to meet. People can be confident they have been met and that we have a high quality approach to customer service.”

PCS has been serving the UK publishing industry for more than 35 years and has developed a range of software products covering all aspects of publishing, including its brand new award-winning digital content management and publishing system, Knowledge.

The browser-based system, launched at Publishing Expo in London in March, has been developed from the ground up to give publishers the genuine simultaneous multi-channel publishing capability they have been looking for to compete in today’s challenging market. On one fully-integrated platform, Knowledge embraces the full spectrum of media output from print, through web to smart phone and the latest media readers such as the iPad.

Telegraph website takes PCS award

Newspaper Awards 2010 Friday 14th May 2010
Managing director Phil Walker led a strong PCS presence at the annual celebration of excellence in news, the 2010 Newspaper Awards, in association with Production Journal and Fujifilm at the Hilton on Park Lane in London.

Accompanied by Commercial Director, Lawrence Hill and Sales Director, Mark Read, plus a number of guests including Adrian Faber, editor of the UK’s biggest selling evening newspaper, the Express & Star and his deputy, Keith Harrison, Walker was there to present the PCS-sponsored Digital News Service of the Year Award.

This year, the PCS Award went to the Belfast Telegraph for its website belfasttelegraph.co.uk.

Walker joined compere Hugh Dennis on stage to present the award to the Telegraph’s online editor, Jerome Crolly.

In selecting the Telegraph site, thejudges said: “The site successfully balances commercial imperatives with a genuine desire to service the needs and harness the perspectives of its users.”

PCS was among the candidates for the Fujifilm Grand Prix with its recently launched digital content management and publishing system, Knowledge, the award going to Guardian News and Media for its iPhone app.

And there was recognition for one of PCS’s sister companies, the Jersey Evening Post, which took the Regional Supplement/Magazine of the Year award for its HomeLife publication.

'Inspiration and Innovation': PCS and the PPA

Magazine sector potential Thursday 6th May 2010
"PCS is well placed to take advantage of the changing requirements of the UK publishing industry through its new digital content management and publishing system, Knowledge", says the company’s Commercial Director, Lawrence Hill.

Hill led the PCS sales team attending the Print Publishers Association (PPA) annual conference – Publishing 2010 at London’s Park Plaza Hotel, where 400 leaders of the UK’s most dynamic magazine and business media organisations came together to discuss a range of issues on the theme of ‘ Inspiration and Innovation’.

Among the subjects tackled by an array of expert speakers were: Methods of turning digital investment into profitable growth; ways of making the most of high quality content across multiple platforms; social networking; the rise of the iPhone; and e-readers and tablet devices – all of which are addressed by Knowledge.

Said Hill: “The recurring question among delegates was how to maximise revenues from new digital mediums and new routes to market. PCS is at the forefront of this revolution with Knowledge, our concurrent multi-publishing technology.”

He added: Knowledge allows the multiple use of the same content access different mediums in the format appropriate to that medium. Text, video, pictures and sound can all be automatically delivered to where they are required, aided by intelligent workflows.

“The next year will be critical to the publishing industry. If we can’t make consistent growth and new revenues from the new opportunities in the mobile and digital arenas then the industry cannot maintain the prestigious position it holds, which will reduce opportunities for the future.

“PCS is providing the market with new technologies and applications that allow the publishing community to exploit the potential available and earn new revenues. The time is now right for publishers to review their investment and target where they will gain the most in both cost savings and extra income."

PCS drive forward growth plans for magazine sector

Magazine sector potential Friday 9th April 2010
PCS, the independent technology arm of family-owned regional newspaper publisher The Claverley Group, has identified the magazine sector as its major new target for its innovative and already successful publishing platform 'Knowledge'. The company’s plans include a target of becoming the preferred publishing platform for the magazine industry within two years.

Many of the trends and challenges faced by the newspaper industry are also driving the magazine sector. Publishers must now make their processes more efficient by meeting the challenges of publishing across both old and new media; managing more geographically distributed editorial teams, and driving revenue through new ways of delivering and accessing content. Particularly pertinent to the magazine sector is how they license and syndicate their content. Whether between different in-house titles, or when they have a global brand and reach and license the content to other publishers, PCS is confident that its Knowledge platform will help overcome these challenges for the sector by transforming the publishing process to make it more comprehensively connected.

Knowledge is able to create and produce content for both traditional print and new media simultaneously within the same application. All functionality runs from a web browser to manage the publications in their entirety – whether from an editorial or advertising perspective – from any location or device connected to the Internet.

"We believe there is a huge opportunity for Knowledge to bring efficiencies and new revenue opportunities to the magazine sector”, says Phil Walker, managing director of PCS. “It’s an exciting time within publishing and we’re seeing many traditional magazine publishing houses taking stock of their publishing assets and looking at how technology can play a part in making the most of them. Knowledge offers increased capability compared with existing editorial systems, with breakthrough options to help publishing houses compete more effectively within the changing media landscape”, concludes Walker.

PCS is using database and integration software from the technology company InterSystems as the foundation for Knowledge. PCS chose InterSystems Caché®; a high performance object database that makes applications faster and more scalable, and InterSystems Ensemble®; a seamless platform for integration and the development of connected applications, after an extensive review of the market.

Sky's the limit for PCS's new content system

Sky's the limit Tuesday 6th April 2010

PCS’s recently-launched digital content management and publishing system, Knowledge, has literally reached new heights in work-anywhere accessibility – around 41,000 ft to be more precise.

As our picture shows, the Midland software developer’s managing director Phil Walker and Knowledge product manager Peter Cole have been able to access Knowledge using aircraft Wifi while on a business trip between Orlando and Pittsburgh in the USA.

Walker and Cole were on their way to a presentation to a potential customer in Pittsburgh when they used the Wifi on their airTran flight to hook up a laptop to the Knowledge system producing the Midland News Association’s Express & Star, Shropshire Star and associated weekly titles across the other side of the Atlantic.

Said Walker: “We think it may be something of a first. Not only were we able to connect to the system and pull up a view of the front page of the Express & Star, we took a picture of it and emailed it back to our headquarters in Wolverhampton while we were still in the air.

“While it was quite a neat trick to pull off, it actually demonstrates just what we mean about the access-anywhere capability that’s such a key feature of Knowledge and its Software-as-a-Service capability.

“Maybe we’ll have to change our marketing a little. In the past we’ve indicated that freedom with a picture of someone using a laptop halfway up a mountain. We’ve actually gone a little higher than that in real life.

“Everybody’s talking about working in the Cloud, we’ve shown that, in fact, we can use Knowledge not only in the Cloud – but even a few thousand feet above it.”

Successful launch for Knowledge

PCS team at Publishing Expo Friday 26th February 2010
PCS managing director Phil Walker has been reflecting on a successful launch for the company’s new digital content management and publishing system, Knowledge, at Publishing Expo.

The PCS team was kept busy for both days of the magazine industry sector-centred show at London’s Olympia 2 on February 24 and 25.

Said Walker: “Over the two days we gave more than 40 demonstrations to potential customers from a wide spectrum of the publishing sector, from small to medium-sized magazines to one or two major players in the regional and national press.

“Our visitors were interested in the comprehensive publishing package that Knowledge offers, from edition planning, through design and content management to output not only to print, but to e-reader, mobile phone application or, of course, to the web.”

He added: “We had a number of demonstration slots pre-booked, but the prominent position of our new stand – which also had its first outing at Publishing Expo – right in front of the main entrance, meant it was virtually unmissable and that contributed to a healthy number of walk-on visitors over the course of the exhibition, too.”

Knowledge is currently being rolled out on two of the country’s biggest regional evening newspapers – the Express & Star in Wolverhampton and the Shropshire Star, based in Telford and is already producing the Shropshire Weeklies and Wolverhampton Chronicles series of weekly titles.

Said Walker: “This is an exciting time for PCS as a company refocused on development and for Knowledge as a product of that focus. We have taken it out to a wider audience for the first time and now our job is to capitalise on the interest it has clearly created.”

Publishing Expo 2010

Thursday 3rd December 2009
PCS will be exhibiting at Publishing Expo 2010, at Olympia, London, 24th and 25th February.

PCS will be demonstrating the benefits of a suite of functionally rich publishing systems, headlined by Knowledge – their ground-breaking browser-based, content management and publishing system, which simultaneously manages the collection, creation and production of digital content to multiple publishing channels for web, e-readers, mobile phones and print.

Knowledge revolutionises the gathering and distribution of content and is accessible through any broadband connection.

Knowledge embraces all the planning, design, editing and distribution functions a publisher needs – whether that’s in business or public service, magazines or newsprint – using built-in data-mining to help create intelligent workflows that let the content do the work.

Built around an industrial-strength object oriented database and backed by resilient hardware and real-time shadowing, Knowledge has been built from the ground up to be available in a Software-As-As-Service option.

That makes Knowledge not only powerful, intelligent, geographically independent and efficient – but entirely affordable – and a must-see for any publishing enterprise.

To book a demonstration of Knowledge, please contact Michelle McClure by email: mmcclure@presscomputers.com

PCS demonstrate Knowledge to Butler Group

Butler Group Thursday 3rd December 2009
The MNA’s new editorial content management and publishing system, Knowledge, is beginning to attract attention outside the newspaper industry.

Following the successful rollout of the system to the Chronicles series in Wolverhampton and the Weeklies series in Shropshire, Phil Walker, MD of PCS, who are developing Knowledge in conjunction with the Claverley group, has been invited to demonstrate the system to two important non-publishing industry forums.

In September Walker, with Knowledge product manager Peter Cole, demonstrated the system live to an audience of more than 200 at the InterSystems Symposium at the Marriott Hotel at Twickenham and in November he was asked to reprise the presentation to a conference organised by leading systems analysts The Butler Group.

Earlier this year, Knowledge earned PCS the annual Worldwide Innovator Award from InterSystems, makers of the Cache database at the heart of the system.

Said Walker: “The Butler Group invitation was a direct result of the interest we generated at the InterSystems Symposium.

“Bearing in mind that Knowledge is still very much a system in development, we were able to show it live running across hotel broadband and the internet to our servers in Wolverhampton – raw, no smoke and mirrors.

“There was even a bit of a gitch when the broadband went down, but we were able to carry on when it came back.

“We not only made up a document in a browser – with content created on the day reporting the speakers from a previous session – but also proved that we could simultaneously output the content to a couple of web sites, an e-reader and an iPhone application.

“After the presentation we produced a print-quality pdf of the document, had it printed locally and returned to the venue for delegates to take with them.”

The presentations come on the back of articles about Knowledge appearing in a number of technology magazines in the Europe and the USA, part of a ‘soft marketing’ strategy to raise awareness of the system while it continues to mature.

Said Walker: “Our first and most important aim is to fulfil the rollout of Knowledge across the MNA and that’s progressing well. The system has gone in to the Features and Business desks at both Queen Street and Ketley and it is on course for rollout to Sports desks next before the key push onto News.

“But it has always been part of the strategy of developing Knowledge in-house that it becomes a product we can take to market. We can only see as encouraging the kind of interest it is creating , within and outside our traditional pubishing markets, even at this early stage.”