MSPmentor

There was plenty of official news at this week’s CompTIA Breakaway conference in Washington, D.C. But off stage MSPmentor also stumbled onto plenty of industry chatter. Here are seven managed services blogs that our team didn’t have time to write for the week ending August 5, 2011.

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How do you explain the following: masterIT, a managed services provider in Tennessee, recently told me annual revenues are on track to grow 30 percent this year. And Rackspace‘s CEO yesterday said business demand for cloud services is insatiable. Yet Wall Street and foreign markets have tumbled amid growing debt fears in the U.S. and Europe. So what’s the real economic outlook for MSPs and cloud services providers (CSPs)? I have some hopeful, educated guesses…

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A managed services community is finally taking shape with CompTIA — the Computing Technology Industry Association. I don’t have exact numbers, but I hear 80 to 90 people attended an MSP Partners session yesterday at the CompTIA Breakaway conference in Washington, D.C. And a large number of the attendees were resellers and VARs who are exploring recurring revenue business models.

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So much for a summer break here in North America. The channel conference machine is preparing to rev its engine again. Some MSPmentor readers are hitting the road over the next few weeks — surfacing at CompTIA Breakaway, HostingCon, VMworld and XChange, among other destinations. But before you head to your local airport here are seven managed services blogs that MSPmentor didn’t have time to write for the week ending July 29, 2011.

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The heat wave continues here in New York. I gave up iced latte earlier this week… but that resolution ended when the temperature here hit 100 degrees. So, I’m back on my caffeine kick — with just enough energy to tell you about the seven managed services blog entries that MSPmentor didn’t have time to write for the week ending July 22, 2011. Here they are.

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Kaseya and Ingram Micro, which already work together in Australia, are set to expand their managed services partnership into North America sometime in Q4, a spokeswoman for the distributor confirms. Here are the potential implications for managed services providers.

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Much of the managed services market spent this week at Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference 2011 (WPC11) in Los Angeles. But there was plenty of managed services news elsewhere. In fact, here are seven managed services blog entries MSPmentor didn’t have time to write for the week ending July 15, 2011.

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Artisan Infrastructure and 2X Software have banded together to let MSPs deliver applications in the cloud. The recently announced arrangement expands upon ad-hoc collaboration between the companies with joint customers. Artisan contributes its virtual private data center platform, through which MSPs can build and manage public and private clouds. 2X Software, for its part, provides its 2X ApplicationServer, which the company says tunnels any Windows application or desktop to remote end user devices. The combined solution enables MSPs to deliver applications via Artisan’s infrastructure-as-a-service offering.

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Here’s a novel idea: What if there was a central, well-organized list of channel partner conferences and partner summits designed for managed services providers (MSPs), VARs and solutions providers? And what if you could use that list to plan your schedule for 2011? Alas, MSPmentor doesn’t have such a list… Only a lunatic like The VAR Guy would be crazy enough to pull together all that information. And here it is: 75 channel partner events and channel partner conferences designed for MSPs, VARs and everything else channel. Take a look and feel free to post your suggested changes/updates.

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New Intronis CEO Kent Plunkett (pictured) says the online backup company grew about 50 percent over the past year, thanks to deep channel relationships with managed services providers (MSPs). Plunkett’s background includes building and growing Salary.com, which he eventually took public. So is Plunkett planning an IPO at Intronis? Not so fast. In this MSPmentor FastChat video, Plunkett describes a long-term view for Intronis and its managed services partners. Take a look.

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Call it the latest shot in the emerging MSP software wars. Autotask — in an apparent bid to counter ConnectWise, LabTech Software and maybe even Kaseya — has reached out to several RMM (remote monitoring and management) software companies with a free Autotask Go offer. Level Platforms and PacketTrap embraced the offer, but not all RMM players are joining the Autotask Go freemium effort. Here’s the update … plus the potential implications for VARs and MSPs.

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Microsoft continues to bang the drum — quietly but steadily — for Windows Intune, a forthcoming remote management platform for Windows PCs and servers. Several MSPs say Microsoft demonstrated a Windows Intune beta during the recent Xchange conference in Dallas. Were MSPs impressed? Here are some thoughts, plus MSPmentor’s perspectives.

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I recently attended the terrific “Breakaway 2010” event put on by CompTIA, the leading computer industry association, and I was glad to see the big emphasis that was being placed on opportunities in the healthcare vertical market for IT solution professionals.

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Forget Computers, a Chicago-based MSP, continues to expand its Mac-centric managed services. Specifically, Forget Computers has launched Supplemental Mac Service for IT Pros, which is designed to help Windows-based IT professionals to improve their Mac support offerings. Here are some quick details.

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MSPmentor had a busy week covering the CompTIA Breakaway conference. We also managed to visit quite a few technology companies headquartered in San Antonio and Austin, Texas. What exactly did we hear during those meetings and visits? Here are seven managed services blog entries we didn’t have a chance to write for the week ending Aug. 13, 2010.

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I’m set to moderate a channel chief panel hear at CompTIA Breakaway this morning. But before I unplug to participate in the panel, here are seven managed services trends, news tips and industry chatter that I heard during Day 2 of CompTIA Breakaway here in San Antonio, Texas.

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As Cisco Systems prepares to announce a comprehensive channel strategy for commercial sales, the networking giant is pitching managed services opportunities to channel partners at this week’s CompTIA Breakaway conference in San Antonio, Texas. Here’s what Cisco had to say.

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Hundreds of VARs and managed services providers are attending this week’s CompTIA Breakaway conference in San Antonio, Texas. There’s plenty of official managed services news at the conference. And there also are numerous rumors in the halls. Here are seven managed services highlights from the first day of the conference.

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I’ve been a bit distracted today putting the final touches on the third-annual MSPmentor 250 report, which tracks the world’s top managed services experts, entrepreneurs, executives, coaches and community leaders. In the meantime, here are seven managed services blog entries the MSPmentor team didn’t have a chance to write for the week ending Aug. 6, 2010.

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Call me surprised: Managed print services (MPS) seems to be an obvious recurring revenue opportunity for VARs and MSPs. But so far, fewer than 30 percent of top MSPs offer managed print services to their end-customers, according to our MSPmentor 100 report (2010 edition). Will more MSPs embrace the managed print opportunity? Or is there something inherently wrong with the MPS market? We could get some answers during the CompTIA Breakaway conference (San Antonio, Aug. 9-12). Here’s why.

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Plenty of MSPmentor readers are heading to CompTIA Breakaway (Aug. 9-12, San Antonio). No doubt, the conference will stir plenty of cloud channel chatter. I wonder: How many VARs and MSPs attending Breakaway generate some revenues from cloud and SaaS applications right now? Also, how will the worlds of managed services and cloud computing converge? Here are some clues.

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I’m being pulled in two directions. On one hand the weekend is calling. But on the other hand more deadlines await me here at MSPmentor. Before I stop blogging and actually return some emails and voicemails over the next few hours, here are seven managed services blog entries MSPmentor didn’t have a chance to write for the week ending July 23, 2010.

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Spiceworks is preparing to beta test version 5.0 of the company’s free, advertising-based managed services platform. The Spiceworks 5.0 release seems to target network-centric MSPs. Here’s a quick preview of the release and some more background on Spiceworks.

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