Good morning, channel partners. Here are five technology news updates, insights, chatter, and plenty more to start your day for Thursday, March 23, 2017.
Actually, there are 13 updates for VARs, managed services providers (MSPs), cloud services providers (CSPs), independent software vendors (ISVs), telco master agents and telco agents to sip on…
13. Datto Hires CISO: Datto has hired Ryan Weeks as chief information security officer. Weeks will drive the company’s information security initiatives to ensure that the company’s products continuously meet the demanding challenges of Datto’s Managed Service Providers (MSPs) and their customers, the company said. He reports to CTO Robert Gibbons. Prior to joining Datto, Weeks was VP and associate director at FactSet Research Systems, where he managed the company’s information security program. We'll share more thoughts soon.
12. Application Performance Monitoring (APM): Splunk and New Relic have partnered to launch the Splunk App for New Relic. It's available now as a preview release on Splunkbase. It gives developers, IT operations teams and MSPs "a comprehensive view into both application performance and infrastructure health with seamless sharing of data across both Splunk and New Relic platforms," the companies claim. We'll share more details soon.
11. Cloud Consulting Momentum: Accenture's Q2 2017 net revenues were $8.3 billion, up 5 percent from Q2 2016. Keep an eye on the company's continued M&A activity -- especially in terms of ServiceNow-focused IT consulting firms.
10. DDoS Attack Protection: Array Networks has launched vAPV and APV Series application delivery controllers (ADC). They guard against DDoS attacks, intercept SSL-encrypted streams to provide visibility into encrypted traffic, and support enhanced global server load balancing (GSLB) for multi-site high availability spanning both public and private clouds, the company asserts.
9. MSP Partner Program: LiveAction, which specializes in IT network management, visualization and analytics, has launched a Managed Service Provider (MSP) partner program. Building on its existing reseller agreement, ePlus is the first MSP to join the program and is rolling out the LiveNX network management platform across four US-based operations centers, the companies said.
8. MSPs and Azure Cloud Management: Cloudyn, which develops multi-cloud management tools MSPs, has expanded its support for Microsoft Cloud Solution Providers (CSPs). This will allow Microsoft CSPs to manage and monitor their customers' Microsoft Azure deployments. Infosys, Westcon-Comstor and Insight already leverage the solution...
7. M&A - AWS Expertise: Hosting.com has acquired Stelligent Systems, an Amazon Web Services expert. Here's a closer look at the deal.
6. IoT Platforms: PTC and OSIsoft intend to integrate the ThingWorx Industrial Internet of Things (IoT) Platform with the OSIsoft PI System. The result should be faster development of IoT solutions from connected data sources, the companies claim. PTC's IoT business surpassed $100 last year. Channel Chief Kevin O'Brien has been driving much of that growth.
5. Compliance: IDdriven, which develops cloud-based Identity and Access Management ("IAM") governance security solutions, is positioning itself to help partners address HIPAA compliance issues. But then again, so is just about every other IT security company these days...
4. Steve Mills Plays an Encore: Former IBM Software leader Steve Mills has joined Bridge Growth Partners as a senior advisor. Bridge Growth is a private equity firm that targets the technology and technology-enabled financial services sectors. Mills led IBM's software transformation from mainframes and minicomputers to Unix, Linux and Windows applications. IBM acquired 150 software companies while Mills led that group.
3. Partners of the Year: Digium has unveiled its partners of the year. The company specializes in Asterisk, an open source PBX platform. Similar to Red Hat's corporate success with Linux, Digium has emerged as the de facto commercial leader with Asterisk.
2. Good Advice: The item above reminds me... During a dinner with Digium CEO Danny Windham around 2009, he gave me and my business partner Amy Katz some great advice. He described the need to "fail fast" -- a term that hadn't quite gone mainstream back then. The idea was to keep experimenting -- but don't be afraid to abandon a project that isn't gaining traction. Hush, hush: At the time, Amy and I were considering a potential IT media platform launch to serve the Asterisk partner and customer ecosystem. But please don't tell anyone that since we like to revisit classic ideas from time to time...
2. What Happened at CompTIA AMM?: We spent most of Wednesday interviewing key sources at CompTIA Annual Member Meeting in Chicago. Stay tuned for a range of analysis and channel trends sometime today.
1. Hey You: You! Yes, you! Stand still, laddie! And fill out the ChannelE2E Top 100 Vertical Market MSPs survey. We'll unveil the honorees and associated research during our April 27 webcast.
