Good morning, channel partners. Here are five technology news updates, insights, chatter, gossip and plenty more to start your day for Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2015.
Actually, today's update involves 12 items for VARs, managed services providers (MSPs) and cloud services providers (CSPs) to sip on.
12. Follow Facebook's Lead: So, you manage an IT network, cloud apps or mobile systems. Instead of bragging about your top-line performance, perhaps you should spend more time fixing your worst customer experience. Facebook, for instance, slows its own corporate network to "2G" speeds for an hour each Tuesday -- to remind the development team how lousy some apps perform on narrowband networks.
11. Oracle's Cloud Differentiator: It's SaaS. Got it? Sure, Oracle has IaaS as well. But the software giant isn't out to compete with Amazon Web Services. Instead, IaaS is a check mark for Oracle SaaS customers that want to extend in an IaaS direction.
10. Don't Blame the Cloud: The SEC is investigating IBM's accounting for certain transactions, but the probe is not related to an earlier investigation of IBM's cloud revenues, according to The New York Times.
9. Carbonite Financial Results: The publicly held cloud backup provider said revenues rose 10 percent to $34.6 million in Q3, and bookings rose 12 percent to $34.2 million. I suspect plenty of privately held BDR (backup and disaster recovery) companies are watching Carbonite's results closely... ...
8. Simple MSP Sales Pitch: Have you complicated your managed services sales pitch with lots of technical jargon? Perhaps you should steal a page from Logicalis and boil down your pitch to seven managed services customer benefits -- including skilled resources, lower costs, best practices, proactive management, guaranteed uptime, predictable costs and time savings. That's it.
7. Hosted Docker: Rackspace has launched Carina, a hosting platform for Docker containers. The big question: Can Rackspace's managed services differentiate Carina from other cloud-based Docker systems?
6. Top 10 CIO Concerns for 2016: So, what are the top CIO priorities and concerns for 2016? They mostly revolve around business and IT alignment, speed to innovation and the usual "do more with less" mindset. Information Management recaps the Top 10 CIO Concerns for 2016 here.
5. Pinch Me: So, writing this blog is the first thing I do every business day.
4. Cisco Systems Security: The networking giant has acquired three security companies this year. The latest deal involves Cisco buying Lancope for $453 million. New CEO Chuck Robbins seems obsessed with Cisco's classic "acquire and tuck in" M&A strategy from the 1990s. I like the strategy, too.
3. Intel Security Part I: Is it two steps forward and one step back for Intel Security (a.k.a. the former McAfee software business)? During the company's Focus15 conference yesterday, Intel unveiled a new security strategy. The company also announced new products like McAfee Endpoint Security 10.X, McAfee Active Response for endpoint threat detection and response and McAfee Data Exchange Layer to support Structured Threat Integration Expression (STIX).
2. Intel Security Part II: So far, so good. Until you check some of Intel's recent exit statements. Some partners are still wondering why Intel decided to kill several SaaS security services. Now comes word that Intel is also selling off firewall businesses like Stonesoft and Sidewinder to Websense. Rivals like Sophos are opening their arms to Intel partners that may be seeking alternatives.
1. November Travel: In addition to attending IT Nation and Ingram Micro ONE, I also plan to attend the WestconGroup Connect conference. Anybody else notice that all three conferences are on ChannelE2E's Technology Event Calendar -- which now tracks more than 100 partner summits through the end of 2016 (and beyond). Is your partner conference or summit listed?
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