Placecube Ltd

Knowledge Hub Digital Collaboration Groups

Free or low-cost collaboration spaces helping you effectively communicate, collaborate, and connect with stakeholders, partners, and colleagues. Exchange knowledge and experience in secure communities of practice, project groups and workspaces. Groups can be open, access controlled or hidden and include collaboration tools, such as discussions, shared libraries and news listings.

Features

  • Activity stream and email notifications: catch up on contributions.
  • Identity: add your own logo to raise brand awareness.
  • Discussion forum: ask questions, have conversations, problem solve, share experiences.
  • Library: upload, share, comment on and organise your content.
  • Real-time document collaboration and wiki pages: work on documents together.
  • Ideas: generate and vote on ideas, challenges and suggestions.
  • Member directory: find and connect with peers and send messages.
  • Events: promote, organise and manage forthcoming events.
  • Polls: ask your members key questions and share results.
  • Administration tools: manage and monitor your group; communicate with members.

Benefits

  • Improved efficiency: less email traffic, pooled knowledge and resources.
  • Time and money saved: less duplication of effort.
  • Acquire new skills: knowledge management, facilitation, digital collaboration.
  • Inspire innovation through new ways of working and connected intelligence.
  • Trusted, secure (https), UK-hosted, mobile responsive.
  • No set up fees, no maintenance, hosting or upgrade costs.
  • Quick set up time: can be established within minutes.
  • Unlimited data storage and users.
  • Expert technical, online and community and knowledge management support.
  • Community-led development path and platform-wide upgrades.

Pricing

£0 to £800 a unit a year

Service documents

Request an accessible format
If you use assistive technology (such as a screen reader) and need versions of these documents in a more accessible format, email the supplier at jenny.dias@placecube.com. Tell them what format you need. It will help if you say what assistive technology you use.

Framework

G-Cloud 13

Service ID

7 8 7 2 5 1 5 2 7 3 8 7 4 9 9

Contact

Placecube Ltd Jenny Dias
Telephone: 020 8895 6756
Email: jenny.dias@placecube.com

Service scope

Software add-on or extension
No
Cloud deployment model
Public cloud
Service constraints
Scheduled maintenance takes place outside of the standard service hours of Monday-Friday 08:30-17:30. Planned maintenance downtime is always advertised in advance, and outside of these windows the service is normally available for use 24x7.
System requirements
No specific system requirements, but up-to-date web browsers preferable.

User support

Email or online ticketing support
Email or online ticketing
Support response times
Full email helpdesk facilities are available Monday to Friday 08.30-17.30 (excluding bank holidays). Most emails to our support helpdesk are answered on the same working day and many are answered within 2 hours.
User can manage status and priority of support tickets
No
Phone support
Yes
Phone support availability
9 to 5 (UK time), Monday to Friday
Web chat support
No
Onsite support
Yes, at extra cost
Support levels
As stated above, full UK-based helpdesk services are provided Monday to Friday 08:30-17:30 free of charge. Our helpdesk is staffed by a team of experienced community managers, who are not only able to advise on functional use of the Knowledge Hub, but can also provide advice and guidance on how to run a successful online group. See information below covering onboarding for more information.
Support available to third parties
Yes

Onboarding and offboarding

Getting started
There is a broad range of free help resources available to all members of the Knowledge Hub via the help pages. Anyone new to managing an online group is provided with comprehensive information free of charge about how to administer their group together with helpful tips and advice on growing and managing online communities. All group administrators are invited to join the Online Facilitators Community that offers extensive advice not only from Knowledge Hub’s experienced team of community managers but also from facilitators across the wider Knowledge Hub community. Walkthrough webinars are also available for group administrators to familiarise themselves with group features. On-site, one-day training courses covering online community management are available at additional cost. (See Knowledge Hub Digital Community & Knowledge Management Training)
Service documentation
Yes
Documentation formats
  • HTML
  • PDF
  • Other
Other documentation formats
Video
End-of-contract data extraction
Any files uploaded to folders within a group library can be easily downloaded in a zip file. A group member list can be downloaded via the group management reports. Other group data can either be manually copied, or could be provided as an encrypted zip file (see next question for additional detail).
End-of-contract process
When the service is no longer required, subject to legislation, including General Data Protection Regulations, a backup of all appropriate data and file content can be provided on request in encrypted zip format. Any extraction or migration of data would usually carry an additional charge depending on amount of data and format required. Once it is decided that a Knowledge Hub group should be deleted, it will be removed from the site along with its content within an agreed period.

Using the service

Web browser interface
Yes
Supported browsers
  • Internet Explorer 11
  • Microsoft Edge
  • Firefox
  • Chrome
  • Safari
  • Opera
Application to install
No
Designed for use on mobile devices
Yes
Differences between the mobile and desktop service
The mobile service is a responsive version of the main site. Web pages are displayed in an appropriate format for the device screen width. The service can be accessed on Android, iOS and Windows Phone.
Service interface
Yes
User support accessibility
WCAG 2.1 AA or EN 301 549
Description of service interface
Accessible via easy-to-use interface available over the internet through web browser.
Accessibility standards
WCAG 2.1 AA or EN 301 549
Accessibility testing
Third party testing, customer testing, internal testing.
API
Yes
What users can and can't do using the API
Knowledge Hub members may use the API to display collaboration group content on external sites. Knowledge Hub Digital Network Clients may also have access to view, create, edit and delete any entity their user account has permissions to perform those actions on.
API documentation
Yes
API documentation formats
HTML
API sandbox or test environment
Yes
Customisation available
Yes
Description of customisation
Group administrators have permissions to add a logo or image to their group to enable it to stand out and identify it with their organisation. Uploading a logo is straight forward using an image picker to select an image file from your desktop. Other customisations such as renaming group elements, or pulling in Twitter and RSS feeds are possible on request, as they can only be done by a Knowledge Hub system administrator. Further customisation options are available to Knowledge Hub Digital Network Clients.

Scaling

Independence of resources
The service is proactively monitored and auto-scaled.

Analytics

Service usage metrics
Yes
Metrics types
Group administrators can add a Google Analytics code to their group in order to monitor sessions, visits, page impressions etc. They can access this through their own GA dashboard and account. Group administrators can also access a set of downloadable management reports within Knowledge Hub, providing details of group membership and social activity.
Reporting types
  • Real-time dashboards
  • Regular reports

Resellers

Supplier type
Not a reseller

Staff security

Staff security clearance
Conforms to BS7858:2019
Government security clearance
Up to Security Clearance (SC)

Asset protection

Knowledge of data storage and processing locations
Yes
Data storage and processing locations
United Kingdom
User control over data storage and processing locations
No
Datacentre security standards
Supplier-defined controls
Penetration testing frequency
At least once a year
Penetration testing approach
‘IT Health Check’ performed by a CHECK service provider
Protecting data at rest
Other
Other data at rest protection approach
All data encrypted at rest using AES-256.
Data sanitisation process
Yes
Data sanitisation type
  • Explicit overwriting of storage before reallocation
  • Deleted data can’t be directly accessed
Equipment disposal approach
In-house destruction process

Data importing and exporting

Data export approach
Any files uploaded to folders within a group library can be easily downloaded in a zip file. Other group data can either be manually copied, or could be provided as an encrypted zip file (see previous question for additional detail). The platform also has built-in export tools to download a compressed archive of data (LAR file).
Data export formats
  • CSV
  • Other
Other data export formats
  • Zip file
  • Files can be downloaded in the format they were uploaded.
  • LAR (zip) files
Data import formats
  • CSV
  • Other
Other data import formats
  • Most file types supported for upload to group library.
  • LAR (zip) file

Data-in-transit protection

Data protection between buyer and supplier networks
TLS (version 1.2 or above)
Data protection within supplier network
TLS (version 1.2 or above)

Availability and resilience

Guaranteed availability
We aim to provide at least a 99.9% uptime service availability level. The service is fully resilient, with no single points of failure throughout the technology stack. The service comes with a 4-hour recovery time objective (RTO) and a 1-hour recovery point objective (RPO). This means that in the event of a major loss of infrastructure, the service would be available again within 4 hours, with a data loss of no more than 1 hour.
Availability excludes agreed scheduled maintenance events, customer-caused or third party-caused outages or disruptions, or outages or disruptions attributable in whole or in part to force majeure events. Any service-impacting planned maintenance work is always performed outside of UK business hours, with adequate notification to our clients.
We take nightly backups of all operating system and user data, with a 35-day backup retention as standard.
Approach to resilience
Redundancy across all application tiers, spread across multiple physical data centres.
Outage reporting
Incidents such as an unexpected break in service are reported on directly to members within the Knowledge Hub and via email. We use our KHub Connects group as a place for open feedback about the service. Any member of the Knowledge Hub may report a problem with the service for investigation via our helpdesk, which operates Monday to Friday 08.30-17.30.

Identity and authentication

User authentication needed
Yes
User authentication
  • Identity federation with existing provider (for example Google Apps)
  • Username or password
  • Other
Other user authentication
Users login with a username and password or sign in via federated authentication method, such as Google, Linkedin, or any OpenId Connect provider.
Access restrictions in management interfaces and support channels
Access rights to management interfaces within all Knowledge Hub Digital Collaboration Groups are allocated to group facilitators only via defined role permissions.
Access restriction testing frequency
At least every 6 months
Management access authentication
  • Identity federation with existing provider (for example Google Apps)
  • Username or password
  • Other
Description of management access authentication
All users have individual access through their email address and their own password, private to them. Authentication is also possible through Open ID Connect.

Audit information for users

Access to user activity audit information
Users contact the support team to get audit information
How long user audit data is stored for
At least 12 months
Access to supplier activity audit information
Users contact the support team to get audit information
How long supplier audit data is stored for
At least 12 months
How long system logs are stored for
At least 12 months

Standards and certifications

ISO/IEC 27001 certification
Yes
Who accredited the ISO/IEC 27001
UKAS by Bureau Veritas
ISO/IEC 27001 accreditation date
13/07/2020
What the ISO/IEC 27001 doesn’t cover
Physical parameters which are covered by AWS our Hosting Partner
ISO 28000:2007 certification
No
CSA STAR certification
No
PCI certification
No
Cyber essentials
Yes
Cyber essentials plus
No
Other security certifications
No

Security governance

Named board-level person responsible for service security
Yes
Security governance certified
Yes
Security governance standards
ISO/IEC 27001
Information security policies and processes
We follow ISMS standards and processes. Placecube have a policy and manual set that all staff must accept sign and adhere to.

Operational security

Configuration and change management standard
Supplier-defined controls
Configuration and change management approach
Change Control Policy and Procedure – Specifies the scope and process for change control of our organisation’s information processing facilities for hardware, software and devices.
Vulnerability management type
Supplier-defined controls
Vulnerability management approach
All components within the stack (infrastructure and software) are continuously tested for vulnerabilities. We are alerted of any detected vulnerabilities by third party suppliers, and take action on a timescale commensurate with the severity.
Protective monitoring type
Supplier-defined controls
Protective monitoring approach
Services are monitored continuously, with alerting to the support team, who assess the potential compromise and undertake corrective action according to the severity threat level.
Incident management type
Supplier-defined controls
Incident management approach
Managed through our support desk. The CSO and ISO ensure appropriate action taken in accordance with ISO27001 Incident management policy.

Secure development

Approach to secure software development best practice
Independent review of processes (for example CESG CPA Build Standard, ISO/IEC 27034, ISO/IEC 27001 or CSA CCM v3.0)

Public sector networks

Connection to public sector networks
No

Social Value

Fighting climate change

Fighting climate change

Placecube will be Net Zero by 2030.

All employees and associates/contractors work from home, eliminating the need to travel to and from work. Travel to attend face to face meetings is undertaken only when absolutely necessary and journeys made via public transport, unless impractical to do so.

We use technology and digital tools to conduct our business, reducing the use of paper and printing. Supplies are procured from environmentally friendly sources. In an effort to tackle economic inequality we recycle computer equipment and mobile devices to benefit those most in need.

We encourage employees to adopt environmentally sustainable working practices and to contribute ideas as to how we improve.

We have ceased the use of ‘branded goodies’ at conferences and are exploring more environmentally friendly approaches
Covid-19 recovery

Covid-19 recovery

Minimal Impact due to Virtual working
Tackling economic inequality

Tackling economic inequality

We work collaboratively and ensure that our clients never pay twice for the same development, actively promoting re-use, and repeatable services.

Digital Place is open-source, and non-proprietary, meaning that our customers can choose to resource new digital projects internally, or through local supply chains. Our promotion of local economic opportunities extends beyond the confines of the Authority, for we actively encourage collaboration by making the platform free to use for partner organisations and community groups. The product can be shared at no additional cost - delivering real economic gain for the public purse.

Supporting the development of strong integrated communities, through the use of the Digital Place Platform delivers a meaningful impact on local employment and economy – benefiting the wellbeing of those communities.

In an effort to tackle economic inequality we recycle computer equipment and mobile devices to benefit those most in need.
Equal opportunity

Equal opportunity

Placecube embraces diversity, inclusion, and equality through our people. Our actions, supported by our various policies and processes enable this. We are committed to the Living Wage movement, are Disability Confident, and support the Armed Forces Covenant.
We recognise that the social value of place-based, connected, local public service can transform the lives of the most vulnerable in communities and make best use of the public purse, so that ever tightening resources can be focused on priorities and not duplication.
We contribute to the public sector and the not-for-profit sector through our free-to-use open knowledge exchange platform. Through Knowledge Hub, we contribute to best practice sharing and collaboration, supporting sector-led improvement, knowledge retention and skills development.

Our product, Digital Place, facilitates and promotes collaboration and knowledge sharing across communities, without location restraints. Our commercial model is designed to remove barriers to growth, so that our customers feel empowered to engage the communities they serve. For example, multi-agency use is part of our standard subscription in order to remove limits on users, enabling collaboration without additional cost.
Wellbeing

Wellbeing

The company and its leadership team are focused on the mental health and wellbeing of all our employees, clients, customers, partners, and suppliers, which has a positive impact on productivity and wellbeing. We have appointed a Mental Health First Aider to support our objectives.

Pricing

Price
£0 to £800 a unit a year
Discount for educational organisations
No
Free trial available
Yes
Description of free trial
Open and restricted groups are free of charge for public sector and not-for-profit organisations as standard. Private (hidden) groups are £800+VAT per year. A free trial is available to test out all group tools for a period of 30 days.
Link to free trial
https://khub.net

Service documents

Request an accessible format
If you use assistive technology (such as a screen reader) and need versions of these documents in a more accessible format, email the supplier at jenny.dias@placecube.com. Tell them what format you need. It will help if you say what assistive technology you use.