Here are five (actually more) technology news updates, insights, chatter, and plenty more to start your day for Friday, June 25, 2021. Sip up.
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- Who We Serve: Content for managed services providers (MSPs), IT service providers (ITSPs), technology solutions providers (TSPs), cloud services providers (CSPs), IT consulting firms, systems integrators, VARs, independent software vendors (ISVs), and any other partner acronym that further caffeinates our already stellar SEO.
- Frequency: Every business morning.
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A. What’s Brewing Today: Technology News
1. M&A - Small Business Marketing Software: Constant Contact is acquiring SharpSpring for $240 million. SharpSpring is a cloud-based marketing automation platform for SMB customers. The seller's platinum partners include Ulistic, which leverages the SharpSpring platform to help MSPs go to market.
2. Funding - Data Centers: Princeton Digital Group, an Asia-focused data center operator backed by private equity firm Warburg Pincus, is considering raising funds from investors in a deal that could boost its valuation to about $2 billion, Bloomberg reports.
3. Funding - Automation Software: Tonkean, which develops software for no-code process automation, has raised $50 million in Series B funding, led by Accel. Additional funding round participants include Lightspeed Ventures, Foundation Capital, and executives such as Atlassian co-CEO Scott Farquhar, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, as well as executives from UiPath.
4. Help Desk and IT Support Automation: CrushBank's Resolve module, powered by IBM Watson, now works inside ConnectWise Manage and automatically creates answers to trouble tickets, CrushBank says.
5. Executive Leadership - MSP: Logicalis US has hired three leaders in the western region:
- David Dunn, regional VP for the West;
- Matt Taylor, area sales director; and
- Matthew Simmons, director of collaboration, security and networking.
6. Executive Leadership - PSA Software: Kimble Applications has hired FinancialForce and Workday veteran John Breul as the company’s VP of alliances. The alliance program focuses on driving revenue-generating relationships with Salesforce, ISVs, and global system integrators, Kimble Applications says.
7. Technology Alliance - Japan: Deloitte Tohmatsu Consulting (DTC) and Ingram Micro's CloudBlue business are "collaborating to accelerate digital transformation for Japanese customers in key verticals," the companies say. The effort involves subscription business models for the entire channel ecosystem. Key areas of focus include:
- The "establishment of a business model that includes channel management and management of customer contact points in multiple channels as a provider of subscription services"; and
- the "establishment of a business model that adds value by combining services from multiple companies and selling them as a distributor of services on the channel side."
8. Distribution - Financial Results: Synnex announced Q2 2021 quarterly financial results. Key metrics include:
- Revenue of $5.8 billion, up 31 percent from Q2 of 2020.
- Net income of $93 million, up from $56.9 million in Q2 of 2020.
Meanwhile, the planned Synnex-Tech Data merger is on track to close in the second half of 2021, Synnex indicated.
B. Channel Partner Summits, MSP Conferences and Virtual Events Calendar
- Microsoft Inspire 2021 (July 14-15, Virtual)
- CompTIA ChannelCon 2021 (August 3-4, Virtual)
- Build IT Live 2021 (August 30-September 1, New York)
- IT Nation Connect APAC 2021 (September 1-3, Australia)
- Salesforce Dreamforce 2021 (September 21-23, Multiple Cities and Virtual)
- ChannelE2E’s complete event calendar
- Add Your Annual Event To Our Calendar: Submit it here
