5 things

5 Channel Partner Updates: 12 September 2016

Good morning, channel partners. Here are five technology news updates, insights, chatter, and plenty more to start your day for Monday, September 12, 2016.

Actually, there are 15 entries for VARs, managed services providers (MSPs), cloud services providers (CSPs), independent software vendors (ISVs), telco master agents and telco agents to sip on. Take a look…

15. Mergers and Acquisitions, Part I: HP Inc. this morning confirmed plans to buy Samsung's printer business for $1.05 billion. Here's why.

Adam Famularo, CEO, erwin
Adam Famularo

14. Mergers and Acquisitions, Part II: Erwin Inc. has acquired Corso Ltd., a UK-based provider of cloud enterprise architecture solutions, the two companies confirmed this morning. Erwin, formerly a CA Technologies business, is a data modeling and big data solutions provider. Erwin CEO Adam Famularo, a CA veteran, has been reshaping and focusing the company's software development, sales and marketing teams since April as part of an overall strategic growth strategy.

13. Microsoft Azure Cloud Outages: Microsoft Azure suffered outages in Europe and India last week. Although the problems appeared to be limited in scope, the issues did extend across multiple services. Generally speaking, Microsoft and its key rivals (Amazon, Google) have increasingly strong track records for cloud reliability.

12. Microsoft Azure Cloud Resource Management: Microsoft is pointing managed cloud providers and IT professionals toward Azure Resource Manager, which allows you to "deploy, management and monitor of the resources for your solution as a group" -- rather than managing each resource individually.

11. Oracle Cloud Partner: Inspirage has achieved the Cloud Select North America designation within the new Oracle PartnerNetwork (OPN) Cloud Program. Inspirage specializes in supply chain management solutions. Oracle is expected to rally additional cloud partners during the company's OpenWorld 2016 conference next week in San Francisco.

10. Oracle Platform as a Service Management: The database giant has released PaaS Service Manager Tool -- a command line interface (CLI) tool that allows IT pros and service providers to  manage various Oracle Public Cloud services.

9. Managed Media Services: dock10 continues to expand its managed media services for cloud-based editing, billing management and more. Among the company's recent moves: dock10, based in the UK, is Avid's first cloud MSP for a range of media editing tools.

8. DigitalOcean Cloud Discounts: DigitalOcean, a cloud platform provider, has launched a program that offers training, mentoring and infrastructure credits to startups, eWeek reported. Many of the world's top CSPs offer so-called cloud credits (a limited amount of free services) to attract startups onto their platforms.

7. Huawei Unveils BES Cloud: The China-based networking giant has massive cloud ambitions. The latest Huawei move is called BES -- short for Business Enabling System. The platform leverages "global cloud infrastructure" to help customers roll out SaaS applications. Details about the actual infrastructure and partners, however, remains unclear.

Thomas Gibson

6. APM Services Talent: Computer Aid Inc. (CAI), which specializes in application performance management (APM) services, has hired Thomas Gibson as division manager. He'll oversee CAI's commercial business for the north central region. Gibson will manage the region's sales organization, marketing programs, client relationships, and partnerships with SAP, Oracle and ServiceNow. CAI, a global IT services firm with 4,500 employees, has deep expertise in SLA_based application support and development.

5. Honeywell IoT Layoffs?: Keep an eye on Honeywell, which has been making targeted layoffs across the U.S. in recent months. The latest cuts are surfacing in Orlando. Overall, it's difficult to see the complete picture since most of the chatter involves regional cuts and localized news stories in specific cities. But it sounds like something bigger could be unfolding...

4. Compensation and Overtime Regulations: New U.S. Department of Labor overtime wage regulations arrive on December 1. The new regulations expand the number of employees who are eligible for overtime pay. Here are the figures you need to know. We'll share more analysis soon.

3. Small Business IPOs: Roughly a year after the passage of new rules making it easier for fledgling businesses to tap U.S. capital markets, just a handful of them have succeeded in doing so, according to The Wall Street Journal. We told you about the Registration A+ rule for small business IPOs last year. Fast forward to present day, and only a handful of companies have leveraged the Reg A+ rule. The Journal explains why.

2. Nutanix IPO?: Could the hyperconverged data center specialist launch an IPO before the end of this month? Hmmm...

1. Help Wanted: Submit your company's career openings to the ChannelE2E Job Board. Listings are free. We'll be blogging about the latest submissions later today and on most Mondays going forward. That equates to free publicity for your company -- assuming you've actually submitted career openings to the board.

More: Read all of our daily 5 Channel Partner UpdatesPlusSubscribe to our daily enewsletter. Thanks to those who already have.

Joe Panettieri

Joe Panettieri is co-founder & editorial director of MSSP Alert and ChannelE2E, the two leading news & analysis sites for managed service providers in the cybersecurity market.