Comments on: Symantec Launches Partner Program for SaaS

By: Lane Smith

Lane Smith — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 20:53:29 +0000

Rich,

Thanks for the insight. I will be on the lookout for what you end up with, once you have it figured out I am sure the product will be excellent. We have been a Backup Exec user and reseller for many years.

Thanks

By: Richard Goodwin

Richard Goodwin — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 20:27:39 +0000

Lane,

I’m a Product Manager at Symantec working on Online Backup.

At this time, a seed backup needs to take place over the wire. Once the initial backup is done (and in fact before it completes in many cases) we begin storing only the delta (changed) bytes so that another full backup is not needed–ever.

However, we definitely understand the need for alternate solutions for large amounts of data, and we have several under investigation. Stay tuned to the blog and forums (or look for email updates if you’re a current customer) for news in this area.

Richard Goodwin
SPN Product Management

By: Lane Smith

Lane Smith — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 18:30:19 +0000

John,

This product looks pretty good. I am curious how they handle a seed backup? It takes a bit of time to push 50GB over the wire. Not too practical.

By: Jeff

Jeff — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 18:08:57 +0000

I think you’re all underestimating SPN. It’s an extensive platform that will take on security, virtualization services and more over time. It’s going to be a big, massive Symantec cloud. And partners should learn as much as they can about that cloud. We’re getting in early.

By: John Doe

John Doe — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 17:20:50 +0000

We’ve had a lot of success selling Backup Exec for about 5 years. Now we’re going back to those customers and recommending they extend Backup Exec with offsite services from Symantec Protection Network.

The customer response has ranged from confusion (why do we need that?) to instant sales. But in every case, the conversation is opening up doors for us. We’re educating customers about saas and closing some new deals. We’re happy.

By: SYMC Partner

SYMC Partner — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 16:35:31 +0000

Your views on Symantec Protection Network are pretty much on target. It did get off to a slow start. We’ve been speaking with Symantec about SPN since late 2007. We finally gave it a try in July and we signed up our first few customers in August.

Will it make our company rich? No. Is Symantec doing a good job engaging us? Yes. Do we see a bright future for SPN? Yes. In two or three years, I expect our recurring revenue from SPN to be quite substantial. We’re laying the foundation for that future now.