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5 Channel Partner Updates: Friday 19 October 2018

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Here are five technology news updates, insights, chatter, and plenty more to start your day for Friday, October 19, 2018.

Actually, there are 14 timely updates designed for managed services providers (MSPs), cloud services providers (CSPs), IT consulting firms, systems integrators, VARs, independent software vendors (ISVs), telco master agents, and telco agents to sip on. Take a look:

14. Net Neutrality Lawsuit: Five industry groups representing major Internet providers and cable companies filed suit on Thursday seeking to block a Vermont law barring companies that do not abide by net neutrality rules from receiving state contracts, Reuters reports.

13. Dell Tracking Stock Vote: Dell Technologies on December 11 will ask holders of tracking stock involving VMware to vote on a $21.7 billion buyback, Reuters says. Activist investor Carl Icahn is pushing back against the plan.

12. Partnership - Accenture & ServiceNow: Accenture is making deeper investments to support ServiceNow customers and associated IT service management projects in Europe. Among the key moves: Accenture and ServiceNow have developed a three-week program to attract talent from local universities. Accenture’s ServiceNow certifications in Europe saw 173 percent growth in 2018 from 2017, the most number of ServiceNow certifications globally, the company says. Accenture holds the world’s largest global pool of 2,400 ServiceNow certified professionals, the company claims.

11. Talent - Service Providers: Zoom Telephonics has hired former Scientific-Atlanta and Cisco Systems exec Joseph Wytanis to help the broadband CPE supplier attack the service provider market, LightReading notes.

10. Talent - IT Monitoring: LogicMonitor has hired Datto veteran Daniela Streng as managing director for the UK and EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa). Streng previously was sales director at Datto, where she helped to build new revenue streams across Benelux, Germany and UK, according to LogicMonitor. I believe she reports to Chief Revenue Officer Mark Banfield -- another Datto veteran.

9. Managed Services - Nutanix: Insight’s Cloud & Data Center Transformation (CDCT) division, Datalink, has expanded its OneCall support and managed services offerings to support Nutanix Enterprise Cloud OS and related platforms. Insight also supports both Nutanix software and Cisco UCS hardware for organizations deploying Nutanix on the Cisco platform, the company says.

8. Public Cloud Alternative - R&D: French cloud computing company OVH plans to triple investment in the coming years to take on U.S. Internet giants Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud Platform in this fast-growing sector, Reuters says. (ChannelE2E says: Hey, what about Azure?) The privately-held company will invest between US$4.6 to US$8.1 billion over its next five-year plan starting in 2021, the report says.

7. Partner Program Expansion: Network analytics provider Kentik has expanded its SaaS platform into Europe with a location in Frankfurt, Germany. Also, the company is lining up European channel partners and adding field support personnel for channel partners, according to VP of Channels Jim Frey.

6. Cloud Monitoring Expansion: Datadog has expanded its cloud monitoring and analytics platform into Europe. The effort involves a hosted instance based in Germany.

5. Carbonite MSP Push: Carbonite has introduced Server Backup VM Edition for Service Providers, which enables Carbonite’s community of Managed Service Providers (MSPs) to offer a fully integrated service that protects virtualized environments both locally and in their own cloud. It's a key move against Veeam's virtualization protection efforts with MSPs.

4. Veeam Momentum: The data protection specialist has generated its 41st consecutive quarter of double-digit growth, Co-CEO Peter McKay disclosed in a blog post.

3. Private Equity, M&A and Telecom: Grain Management has completed the acquisition of Great Plains Communications, the largest privately-owned telecommunications provider in Nebraska. The company has a 9,500-mile high quality fiber network deeper into the Midwest, while continuing to meet rising bandwidth demands through enhanced products and personalized customer service.

2. SolarWinds IPO: It's expected to happen today at a price of $15 per share.

1. Top 100 Public Cloud MSPs: We've unveiled our Top 100 Public Cloud MSPs list and research. It identifies the top MSPs worldwide for Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud Platform. Special thanks to MSPs worldwide that participated in the research.

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.