Good morning, channel partners. Here are five technology news updates, insights, gossip, rumors and more to start your day for Friday, Oct. 23, 2015.
Actually, today's update includes 12 items for VARs, managed services providers (MSPs) and cloud services providers (CSPs) to sip on.
12. Cloud Hits and Misses: Microsoft shares hit a 15-week high, and Amazon shares skyrocketed. The common theme: Strong earnings driven by cloud computing. On a related note: Google also evangelized its cloud momentum during an earnings call. That doesn't mean cloud computing is easy. The strong showings came the same day that HP confirmed plans to kill its public cloud, and Intel confirmed plans to end some SaaS security services (though replacement Intel services apparently are on the way).
11. He's Right: Continuum CEO Michael George says public clouds will ultimately be more secure than building your own private cloud. We're on the same page. I've made similar statements for several years, especially as VARs and MSPs weighed data center buildouts vs. public cloud adoption. ChannelE2E will share more of George's thoughts later today.
10. Reseller Business Unit Sold: Presidio, the big MSP and IT consulting firm, sold its Atlantix Global Systems subsidiary, a reseller of reconfigured and refurbished IT and telecom equipment, to an equity group led by Millstein & Co. Why? Atlantix wasn't core to Presidio's core growth plan involving managed and hybrid cloud services.
9. Midmarket Cloud Revenues: 8x8, which promotes cloud-based unified communications to midmarket customers, seems to be gaining momentum. Q2 revenues jumped 29 percent to $50.9 million, though the company did have a $1.9 million net loss. Perhaps more importantly, average monthly service revenue per business customer rose 20 percent to $360...
8. Oracle OpenWorld 2015: The big conference is next week. ChannelE2E will catch up with Bill Swales, Oracle's North America Channel and Alliance Leader, later today. It's a safe bet most of Oracle OpenWorld 2015 will focus on Oracle's cloud and big data strategies. We'll look to Swales for some context. Stay tuned for more...
7. Midmarket IT Spending: Watch for midsize companies to invest more heavily for growth in 2016, according to new survey results from The Hartford. Surely, that will include some strategic IT spending. We'll share more thoughts soon.
6. Rating IT Management Software: A lot of folks ask me for IT management software reviews and customer rating information. TrustRadius, which crowdsources software reviews from real users, is one reasonable place to start -- though the data is somewhat limited.
5. Chief Data Officer Summit: A Chief Data Officer Summit is set for New York on Dec. 1-2. For channel partners trying to understand data-driven technologies and priorities within customer settings, this could be a good event for gathering industry insights.
4. An Apology to Steve Ballmer: When it comes to former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, I liked some of his moves (the cloud push), disliked some of his moves (Nokia acquisition, bad Office 365 partner program at launch) and dismissed some of his moves (like the Bing search engine). Well, time for me to eat some crow on that last item. Bing is now profitable, and competition from Microsoft keeps Google Search on its toes.
3. Dell Selling Off Assets?: Dell may sell some assets off in order to pay for the $67 billion EMC buyout, re/code reported... Hmmm...
2. Bad Ink: Sure, 3-D printing is hot. But it's not an easy market to master. For instance, Stratasys will post a larger 3Q loss than expected because the company's MakerBot buyout from two years ago isn't performing as well as expected. MakerBot has 3-D printing expertise... but less than revenue than expected...
1. Next Week's IT Events: The lineup includes Oracle OpenWorld 2015 and Tigerpaw Partner Conference 2015. Check the ChannelE2E Technology Conference Calendar for a look at every major channel partner summit and conference now through the end of 2016. (Is your company partner conference listed? Why not?)
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