Managed Security Services
Margins from traditional anti-virus and PC security products have evaporated. Managed service providers, however, continue to make a healthy living by focusing on total endpoint security and infrastructure security. Get Started: Register to enter our Resource Center, where you’ll be able to download guides to managed endpoint security and other services that generate recurring monthly revenue. And check back often. We post new guides in the MSPmentor Resource Center every week.
Before increasing its focus on managed service providers (MSPs), security specialist SonicWALL spent a few months studying the market. Jan Sijp, director of policy management at SonicWall, earlier this year began interviewing MSPs to get a sense of what approaches to pursue, and pitfalls to avoid, in building such a business.
Are there lucrative opportunities in the managed security services market? SecureWorks Inc. sure seems to think so. In fact, SecureWorks’ pending purchase of VeriSign Inc.’s managed security services business brings together two entities with channel ties. Here are some perspectives on the pending deal.
Call it a sign of things to come: Verizon Wireless is running television ads in the US for Hewlett-Packard Mini Netbooks tied to 3G wireless services. I’m not suggesting managed service providers should run out and introduce Netbooks. But if you’re interested in hardware as a service (HaaS), there are some emerging Netbook trends you should closely track.
Although it doesn’t bill itself as such, 
In separate but somewhat related news items, The Wall Street Journal and Symantec are evangelizing managed services to broader audiences. The newspaper has published a pretty big story declaring managed services as the hot trend in telecommunications. And Symantec has unveiled research that tracks growing demand for managed security services.
Hewlett-Packard is emerging from its famed R&D garage and joining the managed services party. The hardware giant has announced some new SMB initiatives for solutions providers. Buried within the release was news about HP’s Insight Remote Support tools for MSPs. HP also partnered with USA.NET to offer hosted Microsoft applications to VARs. Here’s MSPmentor’s perspective.
With Heartland Payment Systems’ potentially record-breaking data breach now sparking a 
From time to time we hear about “zero-day” or other critical viruses that garner national interest, and require immediate action. The most recent example was the Conficker virus. Naturally, business owners started asking “am I protected?” As we looked at the steps necessary to resolve this issue for our own customers, we were again reminded why being a Managed Service provider is so critical.
As regulation creeps into all phases of data lifecycle management, managed service providers are assuming greater data protection responsibilities on behalf of their customers. While many customers understand that they have regulatory compliance gaps, challenges persist in how to translate these requirements into data protection policies that are actionable, enforceable, and auditable. The natural place for businesses to turn to is you, their trusted MSP partners to help them translate their data protection requirements into actionable policies that can be centrally managed, enforced and tracked.
GroundWork Open Source and Roaring Penguin Software Inc. are preparing a technology alliance to jointly serve VARs and managed service providers starting in January 2009, MSPmentor has learned.
Despite all the bleak economic information around us, there are still some bright spots in the managed services market.
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