Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) has named Eduardo Kassner as CTO of the company's worldwide partner group (WPG). Kassner, an enterprise and cloud veteran, won't be locked away in an Azure data center. Instead, he's set to hit the road -- and will surface at Microsoft Ignite 2016 next week in Atlanta, Georgia.
Kassner should feel right at home at the conference, which promotes Microsoft's core enterprise technologies. The CTO has been with Microsoft since April 2005. His roles have involved enterprise technology strategy, infrastructure optimization, and sales enablement. Most recently he was worldwide director of cloud and data services solution architecture.
Much of Kassner's focus has involved Azure customer adoption and consumption. Translation: His new role signals Microsoft's continued efforts to extend partners from Office 365 (SaaS) to Azure (IaaS) opportunities.
Azure Cloud: Center Stage at Microsoft Ignite
No doubt, thousands of partners now resell or manage Office 365 for end-customers. Demand has been especially strong in the MSP market, where tools like ConnectWise Cloud Console have caught on for managing the SaaS platform.
But the next round of partner opportunities surely involves Azure, which rivals Amazon Web Services as the most popular IaaS platform. Eager to build on that momentum, Kassner will lead the following sessions at the Ignite conference, according to a Microsoft blog:
ChannelE2E will cover Ignite once the show kicks off in Atlanta.
