Good morning, channel partners. Here are five technology news updates, insights, rumors and hypothetical developments to start your day for Friday, January 8, 2016.
Actually, today’s update involves 11 items for VARs, managed services providers (MSPs), cloud services providers (CSPs) and independent software vendors (ISVs) to sip on.
11. Carbonite Marketing Changes: Can Carbonite effectively brand backup services for consumers, small businesses and midmarket customers? That's the question facing Norman Guadagno, Carbonite's new senior VP of marketing. He succeeds former chief marketing officer Nina McIntyre, who left the company after less than one year with Carbonite. It's the latest in a growing list of recent moves at Carbonite, which recently acquired EVault, hired a new channel chief, and recruited Christopher Doggett to oversee sales. We'll be back with more insights on this later today.
10. Unified Communications for MSPs: Technology Assurance Group (TAG) will have a major presence at Navigate 2016 -- Continuum's annual partner conference. TAG represents unified communications companies in North America that generate $350 million in products and services.
9. Juniper Surprises: It's safe to expect Juniper Networks to make some key partner moves next week during a major executive leadership conference. And it's safe to expect ChannelE2E to have the details...
8. Silicon Valley vs Europe: Apple, Google, Facebook and other US tech companies continue to criticize potential UK legislation that bolsters the British government's spying powers, according to The Wall Street Journal. But ironically, business appears to be booming for Amazon, Microsoft and other cloud giants that are opening local data centers in Europe -- giving European companies peace of mind that their data won't be shipped abroad.
7. His Next Move: Former Work Market CEO Jeff Leventhal apparently has raised about $2 million in seed money for his next startup business. At least, that's what the grapevine tells us -- though we haven't had a chance to ask Jeff directly about the rumor. So what is he up to? We may get some answers when we meet Leventhal at Work Market's offices next week. Stay tuned.
6. VC Market Cools Off: New research from KPMG International & CB Insights says there were only nine new unicorns birthed in the fourth quarter, versus 23 in Q3. Unicorns, as you may recall, are startups that have valuations of $1 billion or more. Deal-making activity in general fell to its lowest levels since the first quarter of 2013, according to Re/code. Those figures suggest venture capitalists are making fewer investments, and at lower valuations. Though there are exceptions: Datto, which is profitable, raised $75 million in Q4 at a valuation of more than $1 billion.
5. Apple Warning Signs: Hon Hai, a major Apple supplier in Taiwan, saw its December sales slump 20 percent. The company, which assembles Apple iPhone 6S models, announced the results on Friday. You can accurately guess how Apple's stock has been reacting amid multiple warning signs from Asia...
4. Partner Relationship Management: ViaWest, the hybrid IT solutions provider, is leveraging Impartner to overhaul the company's partner community portal. ViaWest's partner base apparently has doubled over the past 18 months or so. To manage that growth, the PRM system streamlines partner registration and onboarding; helps to keep marketing and training materials fresh, and has analytics to measure performance, according to a statement from both companies.
3. Government Cloud Contracts: Apparently, the Pentagon doesn't have a clear definition of cloud computing, nor does it have a complete list of cloud computing service contracts. Hmmm... As ConnectWise CEO Arnie Bellini would say: It's time for an MSP to step in and offer some vendor management services...
2. ChannelE2E Podcast: In our latest ChannelE2E Podcast (Episode 058), learn how Vital Network Solutions Managing Director Lee Evans managed the recent MSP buyout of Octari. Both UK-based MSPs are Autotask partners with a heavy focus on Microsoft-related services. Tune in here.
1. Surprise: After Nines Inc. will begin briefing our sponsors about ChannelE2E's next move in the next few days. A public announcement for readers and all vendors will occur shortly thereafter. Stay tuned. It's shaping up to be an exciting year.
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