5 Channel Partner and MSP Updates: Wednesday 23 September 2020

Here are five (actually more) technology news updates, insights, chatter, and plenty more to start your day for Wednesday, September 23, 2020. Sip up.

Our Daily Brew

A. What’s Happening Today

1. Funding -MSP Help Desks: ConnectWise Co-founder and former president David Bellini has invested in CrushBank, an artificial intelligence (AI) software solution and IBM Watson partner. CrushBank is designed to automate help desks and IT support services.

2. MSP Software Security: ConnectWise has launched a bug bounty program to further harden the company’s business automation and IT management software for MSPs.

3. Talent - No-Contract MSP: Modern Managed IT, a contract-free MSP for small businesses, has hired Rackspace veteran Sean Wedige as CTO. Modern Managed IT offers SaaS and hardware as a service (HaaS) without long-term contracts, though we're checking for exact details.

4. Talent - Machine Identity Management: AppViewX has named Bromium veteran Kevin Mosher as chief revenue officer. With more than 30 years of impressive enterprise software, sales, and leadership experience, Mosher will oversee all revenue generation, customer and partner operations, and multi-channel go-to-market activities to streamline global field operations and across emerging and existing markets, the company says.

5. Talent - Business Communications: Mitel has promoted Scott Peterson to chief revenue officer. Peterson will be responsible for driving Mitel’s global revenue growth via the execution of its go-to-market strategy and through its channel ecosystem of value-added resellers, service providers, distributors, and master agents, the company says.

6. Integration - Microsoft-ServiceNow: ServiceNow workflows are now integrated with Microsoft Teams.

7. Mobile World Congress 2021 - Date Change: The conference has been pushed back from March to June 2021 in order to further mitigate risks related to the coronavirus pandemic.

8. Partnership - 5G Network Management: Gigamon and Nokia are promoting a joint 5G solution -- which delivers real-time analytics for its global customers, and provides network traffic visibility required by 5G providers, the companies say.

9. Partnership - Global Network Performance: Akamai and AT&T are extending their business relationship through 2023. This renewed agreement continues to give AT&T business customers around the world access to Akamai services as part of AT&T’s portfolio of cloud and network services, the companies say.

10. Expansion - Canadian Networks: Opengear, a Digi International company, has achieved more than 100% growth across Canada since 2017. The company posted similar growth within its channel partner program in Canada, which now accounts for more than 15% of the company’s North American resellers. OpenGear's actual Canadian revenue figures were not disclosed.

B. Technology Conferences and Virtual Partner Events