MSPmentor

The fourth-annual MSPmentor 100 survey closes today, so we’re busy checking in with last year’s MSPmentor 100 companies to see how they’re performing. Today we look at All Covered, where growth — organic and inorganic — is an important element of the company’s success. Here’s the update.

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OpenDNS is a fairly well-known name in the IT world, with a claimed 1% of all Internet users taking advantage of their DNS services. But what many don’t know is that for the last year, OpenDNS has provided enterprise services like web filtering and security by way of the cloud. And now they’ve packaged OpenDNS Enterprise up for MSPs, enabling them to offer SaaS web protection with the MSP’s logo on it. Here’s the scoop.

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Rackspace Hosting says their hosted email services has  hit a major milestone with the signing of their 2 millionth paid business user. It’s a major sign of growth in hosted services. Here’s the scoop.

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Google loves to highlight enterprises big and small that have made the leap to the Google Apps suite. But now the search giant is looking for up to five companies from each of the major geographic regions to star in a new billboard campaign. Maybe they should try Googling for them.

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A post over at the Google Enterprise Blog highlights the new features that have been made available to users of the ever-more-popular Google Apps cloud productivity suite over the past few weeks. Headlining the list is the long-awaited (by MSPmentor, at any rate) revision history for Google Docs. Here’s the scoop.

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Cycle30, itself a subsidiary of Alaska’s giant telecommunications and cable provider GCI, is launching billing services for telecom, cable and utility operators based on SunGard Availability Services’ cloud platform. Here’s the scoop.

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Google quietly launched an update for their Microsoft Exchange migration tool. The feature list may look anemic, but a few new Google Apps Migration for Microsoft Exchange features can go a long way. Here are some details.

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This is a case where the headline says it all. A Google Apps rollout at the City of Los Angeles has missed its migration deadline, the Los Angeles Times reports. The roadblock? The Los Angeles Police Department, which is refusing to move off the old system to Google’s SaaS-based approach. Here’s why.

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Is Japanese tech giant Fujitsu going to offer Microsoft’s Windows Azure cloud platform within its data centers? A Dow Jones Newswires report came out suggesting just that. And yes, Microsoft and Fujitsu confirmed pieces of the story today during the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference (WPC10). Here are the details.

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IT solutions provider American Integration has announced that it’s replacing its SilverBack monitoring tools with a Nimsoft On Demand SaaS deployment. The former is owned by Dell, and the latter by CA Technologies, which means this is a small-scale victory in a large-scale battle for MSPs and the IT channel. Here are some perspectives.

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Trend Micro today launches the new version of the InterScan Messaging Security Virtual Appliance (IMSVA), now a hybrid on-premises/cloud-based solution. And it may have the pleasant side-effect of opening up opportunities to sell managed services. Here’s the scoop.

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Question: How do big software companies build their SaaS channel management applications and programs? In some cases, the answer involves ServiceSource, a cloud-based revenue performance solution that appears to be catching on. The latest adopter is CA Technologies (formerly CA Inc.). Here are some details.

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As you begin to evaluate white label SaaS solutions for your customers, VARs and MSPs must also develop a SaaS sales pitch to help articulate your value proposition. To get started, listen and submit your questions during The VAR Guy Live’s webcast at 2:00 p.m. eastern today (Wednesday, June 9). The topic for today’s webcast: How to Sell Initial SaaS Solutions. Here are some more details.

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As you begin to evaluate white label SaaS solutions for your customers, VARs and MSPs must also develop a SaaS sales pitch to help articulate your value proposition. To get started, listen and submit your questions during The VAR Guy Live’s Wednesday, June 9 webcast. The topic for this week’s webcast: How to Sell Initial SaaS Solutions. Here are some more details.

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Virtela, which bills itself as the world’s largest independent managed network services company, has launched the Virtela Enterprise Services Cloud (ESC), a carrier-independent open cloud architecture to deliver anything as a service from anywhere across any network. Moreover, they’re launching the “Virtela Cloud-Based Application Acceleration Service,” which does exactly what it says on the tin for $5 a day. All of those claims sound pretty lofty. Here’s a closer look at the Virtela effort.

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Managed messaging and collaboration provider Azaleos Corporation dropped MSPmentor a line to let us know that they’ve recently closed a deal with the US Government to provide managed Microsoft Exchange 2010 services for 20,000 seats at the United States Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta. Here’s the scoop.

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While Google already offered tools to help administrators migrate Exchange and Lotus Notes data to the Google Apps platform, there wasn’t much for end-users do the same. Until now, that is, with the launch of Google Apps Migration for Microsoft Outlook, designed to help users get their stuff from Microsoft’s mail client onto Google’s cloud quickly and painlessly. Here are the details.

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Yesterday, we gave our take on a City of Los Angeles memo that indicated a possible delay in their adoption of Google Apps. Since then, Google itself reached out to me to point out a blog entry from the migration project itself addressing the concerns raised. The message? Keep calm and carry on. Here’s the deal.

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A City of Los Angeles memo suggests the municipality’s much-hyped Google Apps migration might not be a Hollywood love story. Specifically,  users in the pilot program are reporting frustrations with the search giant’s SaaS suite, leading to talk of a a delay in the deployment timetable. Critics say it’s proof that the cloud isn’t ready for primetime. I say it’s proof that nothing generates FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt) like the cloud. Here’s why.

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For the most part, many of the major MSP software providers are doing business in Europe. Now there are signs that those efforts are expanding. The latest examples involve ConnectWise getting its first French partner and N-able signing a Swedish distribution agreement. Here’s a quick look at the news…

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Azaleos Corp., the managed messaging and collaboration provider, has released the results of a study that finds that 44% of companies with 1,000 seats or more plan a move to Microsoft Exchange 2010 in the next 18 months. Here’s what Azaleos has to say about the stats.

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Add Tokyo-based Fujitsu to the list of technology giants offering a cloud platform to the channel, as they announce the launch of their infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) solution to the global market. But don’t expect to see the platform in the U.S. until around 2011. Here’s the scoop.

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System management solution provider TriActive, active in the healthcare and academic verticals since 1997, is coming out of a 3-year-long absence from the spotlight with the launch of their new SaaS Systems Management Suite (SMS) for MSPs. I had the chance to see a demo, and I came away intrigued. Here’s why.

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