The most recent articles from CRN

Bell offers SME VARs increased credit terms

Sam Trendall — 2008-11-21T10:18:00.000Z

Sam Trendall, CRN, Friday 21 November 2008 at 10:18:00

Distributor gives VAR a 15-day increase in credit terms and bolsters credit lines by as much as 100 per cent

Distributor Bell Micro is offering a helping hand to smaller VARs by giving them extended credit terms and increased credit lines.

The company is sending a letter to several hundred selected SMB resellers next week informing them credit terms are to be extended from 30 to 45 days if they agree to pay by Direct Debit. The letter also states that, owing to the twice a month frequency with which Direct Debit payments may be taken in some cases, VARs could end up benefiting from a 45 to 52 day payment term in which to pay the distributor. To take advantage of the offer, Bell Micro requires a completed Direct Debit mandate.

Some resellers being offered the extended credit terms will also enjoy increased credit lines with the distributor. VARs utilising 100 per cent or more of their credit line will have it doubled, while those using between 50 and 75 per cent will be given a 75 per cent increase. VARs utilising 40 to 50 per cent will be given a 50 per cent increase and those using between 30 and 40 per cent will have their credit line raised by a quarter.

In the letter, director of credit Eddie Pacey tells recipients: "The reality, by and large, is that trade credit in the channel is more than ample. What we offer you today carries greater weight and, in today’s climate, a tangible benefit to your business."

Pacey told CRN: “This is a selective chosen band of SME clients with credit lines of up to £50,000 currently. I am not an advocate of limit accelerator programmes as these frequently place undue strain on the reseller to utilise a specified percentage in order to continue the upward climb. This is an effort to assist some of our SME clients in managing their cash a little easier”

ISVs urged to try on Red Hat

Sam Trendall — 2008-11-20T17:16:00.000Z

Sam Trendall, CRN, Thursday 20 November 2008 at 17:16:00

Open source software vendor bolsters its JBoss Certified ISV programme

Open source software vendor Red Hat is expanding its JBoss Certified ISV Programme to make it more welcoming for ISVs wanting to buy into the vendor's middleware offering.

The programme, which sits as a component of the wider Red Hat Partner Programme, currently has 250 ISV members worldwide. The programme will now offer enhanced software, support and sales and marketing benefits to ISVs integrating their applications with JBoss enterprise platforms.

Red Hat indicated that 2008 has been a fruitful year for partner recruitment for JBoss. It also claimed end users are looking for increased service level agreements around support, patches, updates and business continuity and that the JBoss programme was being expanded to help ISVs deliver these.

ISVs can join the JBoss programme for free. It offers benefits including discounts on technical support and training, help with marketing and access to Red Hat's Partner Centre and inclusion in is Partner Catalogue.

Craig Muzilla, vice president of Red Hat's middleware business unit, said: " As industry momentum shifts away from complex and expensive proprietary platforms towards proven and tested industry-leading open source platforms, there is increased demand for an easy path for ISVs to certify on JBoss Enterprise Middleware. The JBoss Certified ISV Program will help our partners meet these demands and will expand the reach of JBoss Enterprise Middleware by ensuring that ISVs are developing their next generation applications on and with JBoss platforms.

HP shares up 14.5pc on positive fourth quarter

Fleur Doidge — 2008-11-19T11:10:00.000Z

Fleur Doidge, CRN, Wednesday 19 November 2008 at 11:10:00

Preliminary results push HP shares over US$33 each 18 November

HP shares rallied 14.5 per cent to more than US$33 each yesterday on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) on predictions its fourth quarter revenue will surge 19 per cent to US$33.6 billion.

However, HP shares on the NYSE index fell below US$30 earlier in November, and HP’s price has a long way to go before it reaches a December 2007 high of around US$52 per share.

HP’s 10-year high on the NYSE peaked at around US$65 a share in mid-2000, just before the dot.com bubble burst.

“HP delivered another solid quarter as it continues to benefit from its global reach, diverse customer base, broad portfolio and numerous cost initiatives,” said Mark Hurd, HP chairman.

“Our ability to execute in a challenging marketplace differentiates HP, enabling it to increase share, expand earnings and emerge from the current economic environment as a stronger force.”

HP announced revenue of $33.6bn in its preliminary results for the fourth quarter.

That’s an increase of 19 per cent year on year – or 16 per cent if adjusted for the recent volatility of the greenback.

Net revenue for the year is expected to be up 13 per cent to US$118.4bn.

“Excluding the impact of the EDS acquisition, HP revenue grew five per cent year over year or two per cent when adjusted for the effects of currency,” HP said in its NYSE announcement.

Earnings per share hovered around US$0.84-US$1, depending on whether after-tax amortisation of purchased intangibles, restructuring, in-process research and development and other acquisition-related charges were included.

“For the full fiscal year 2009, HP expects revenue of approximately US$127.5bn,” the company said.

Out with the new

Mike Morgan — 2008-11-18T16:03:00.000Z

Mike Morgan, CRN, Tuesday 18 November 2008 at 16:03:00

Recruiting new partners should not be a bigger focus than building up existing relationships, argues Mike Morgan

Analysis by Aberdeen Group suggests that 52 per cent of top vendors are deploying strategies around partner recruitment.

Thirty-eight per cent are focused on growing business through existing partners and 28 per cent have a strategy for empowering their most successful partners.

It is far easier and arguably more important to retain, develop and use existing business relationships, whether customers or partners than create new ones.

The truth is that many vendors with large, two-tier indirect channels don’t know or don’t care about 80 per cent of their partner community.

Also, partner recruitment is comparatively easy to do; results can be immediate, easily quantifiable and implementation relies upon basic marketing principles.

Yet holistic partner relationship management is complex and requires different skills, expertise, infrastructure and business processes.

In the IT industry it is not uncommon to see anything up to 95 per cent of vendor sales coming from as little as five per cent of the partner base.

Are resellers really that bad?

Either the top partners are exceptionally large, exceptionally good or they’re selling exclusively for the vendor and the rest are exceptionally small, exceptionally bad or they’re selling for the competition.

Or perhaps, could it be that the vendor has failed to exploit the potential of the vast majority of their partner community?

When pressure mounts to grow channel revenues, the easy option is always to recruit rather than develop in the hope of finding a few more ‘gold’ partners.

Before embarking on a recruitment campaign, vendors must plan for the aftermath.

All too often channel partners tell me the same thing: “The vendor spent a great deal of time, effort and money recruiting me and then…nothing!”

Unless a vendor has a partner relationship management strategy and the means to implement it, they can not manage the partner lifecycle.

If they fail to work well with a new partner, the reseller probably won’t perform well and most will join the 80 per cent under-achiever group.

Thus in twelve months time, vendors will be recruiting again.

For a vendor, trying to find a handful of potential top performers can be like seeking a needle in a haystack and if they know about such partners already, the chances are they will be working with the competition and will be hard to convert.

Vendors need more information

Many factors influence the success of a partner strategy. Yet a common theme is a lack of data upon which to base key business decisions.

Many vendors simply do not have enough intelligence on their partners and if a vendor lacks essential information about their actual and potential partner network, it will be impossible for them to begin to formulate a cohesive partner program that will facilitate the partner lifecycle and take advantage of partners’ capabilities.

Yet time and time again, we encounter vendors trying to do just that.

Even when such data does exist, vendors are often restricted by the lack of accessibility to and holistic visibility of the data for the people in that organisation who need it because the data rarely resides in one place and in a consistent format.

Vendors need to put information at the heart of their partner strategy – and develop the right combination of reliable systems, processes and procedures to capture, manage, share and use that data.

Then they will:

Recruit and retain the right partners more easily

Communicate and build relationships with them more effectively

Develop them to their true potential

Support them to a highest standard at the lowest possible cost

Manage them to ensure that business goals are achieved.

If vendors got things right with their existing partners, they might not need to recruit new ones after all.

Mike Morgan is COO at partner relationship software provider Foundation Network Limited

Citrix buys audio-conferencing firm

Sam Trendall — 2008-11-17T13:07:00.000Z

Sam Trendall, CRN, Monday 17 November 2008 at 13:07:00

Application delivery vendor splashes out up to $34m on Vapps

Application delivery vendor Citrix has announced it has bought audio-conferencing specialist Vapps for a cash sum of $26.6m (£18m).

Continued good performance from Vapps could net it an extra $4.4m payment and the deal could be worth up to $34m after various options are included. Vapps was founded in 2002 and specialises in managed audio conferencing products aimed at the SME, enterprise and service provider markets. It is based in New Jersey, has about 18 staff and its largest backer was Azure Capital Partners.

The Vapps deal is the latest in what has been a fruitful year for Azure. Online and phone payment specialist Bill Me Later was bought last month by eBay for $945m. In January Carrier Ethernet specialist Worldwide Packets was snapped up by Ciena for $300m.

Azure partner Paul Weinstein told VentureBeat: "Despite the economic situation, we know there are a lot of big companies out there with cash and they will probably want to use it to buy future growth.”

Online platforms and collaboration

Fleur Doidge — 2008-11-13T17:15:00.000Z

Fleur Doidge, CRN, Thursday 13 November 2008 at 17:15:00

Online platforms are key for channel collaboration, says Andy Horn

Key to streamlining any organisation is having easy access to information online. For vendors, presenting information to resellers in a timely, coherent manner is a fundamental issue.

Online platforms are increasingly important to reseller and vendor relations. Our expectations are driven by our experiences as consumers.

We can use a travel website, for example, to select, configure, price and pay for a holiday. Resellers expect that sort of functionality with their online business relationships too.

In the telecommunications market, there is huge demand for easy access to accurate information and interactive systems.

Resellers need to access pricing, delivery dates, orders, fault tickets and billing details and place and configure orders online as well.

If they can track the entire lifecycle of their orders, they can be more responsive to their customers, reduce administration and eliminate many frustrations associated with manual processes.

They can focus on their core business and revenue generating activity.

Online collaboration also has a positive impact on the day-to-day relationship between vendors and resellers.

If the transactional tasks are easily done online, we can spend more time on business planning and developing joint approaches to market. Online takes the ‘noise’ out of the relationship.

While there are many online tools for resellers, vendors must ensure user adoption and continual improvement.

Many system roll-outs fall flat because they are not properly tested with the user community. Resellers need to play a part in the development through rigorous testing and beta trials.

We are going to see increasing investment in online collaboration in the next couple of years because the benefits are so clear.

Today, most online platforms offer a secure way to expose service providers’ core systems to their partners. They are going to get increasingly sophisticated.

As different back-end systems are combined at the web level, they will be able to provide up-to-the-minute data and transaction processing so that sales and marketing functions are much faster and more efficient to complete.

Increasingly, we are also going to see service providers white-labelling their online systems so resellers can offer the online system to their end customers.

We find that resellers increasingly want to form true long-term partnerships with their chosen vendors. Online platforms will be at the heart of that closer collaboration if properly designed for the reseller community.

Andy Horn is head of the UK SME division at Colt

BSA takes Advantage of SAM

Sam Trendall — 2008-11-13T12:42:00.000Z

Sam Trendall, CRN, Thursday 13 November 2008 at 12:42:00

Global anti-piracy body hopes to drive up adoption of software asset management through its latest programme

The Business Software Alliance (BSA) is hoping its new software asset management (SAM) programme will give VARs the skills to drive widespread adoption of the practice.

Pilot programmes of BSA SAM Advantage will begin soon with a full roll out taking place over the course of next year. The BSA claim Advantage is the only worldwide SAM programme built on standards issued by the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO).

The BSA also claims the programme, which is customisable to cater for differing levels of comprehension, benefits from the support of the world's top software developers. The programme was developed in response to the ISO/IEC 19770-1 SAM standard published two years ago by the ISO. It will be conducted by a mixture of resellers and SAM practitioners.

BSA chief executive Robert Holleyman said: "BSA SAM Advantage is being designed to provide all parties with the knowledge and support they need to adopt world-class practices in software asset management through a flexible, step-by-step process.”

The programme contains four tiers which vary in the level of detail covered. The first tier aims to provide a basic framework for implementing SAM and covers license compliance requirements while the second covers effective management. The third looks at integrating SAM into key operational processes while the fourth tier covers complete systems integration and full compliance with ISO/IEC 19770-1. Advantage is targeted at software users and publishers, as well as IT managers and resellers.

Peter Beruk, the BSA's senior director of compliance marketing, claimed SAM adoption has been hamstrung by a lack of ubiquitous standards. "SAM practitioners have made great strides in recent years. But, until now, there has not been a consistent, authoritative approach that is easy to implement. BSA SAM Advantage fills that need,” he said.

David Bicket, convener of the ISO’s Working Group for the ISO/IEC 19770-1 SAM standard, added: “We recently undertook a worldwide survey which demonstrated that an incremental approach like BSA SAM Advantage is definitely needed. In delivering this, and in providing a clear route towards the standard, I believe BSA SAM Advantage meets real business requirements. The approach proposed by BSA is now being officially trialled as a potential future international standard itself.”

Catching the wave

Andrew Mason — 2008-11-13T11:29:00.000Z

Andrew Mason, CRN, Thursday 13 November 2008 at 11:29:00

An SaaS storm surge is approaching and resellers may sink or swim

The software-as-a-service (SaaS) bandwagon is well and truly rolling, with Gartner forecasting the worldwide market to pass $19bn (£12bn) in three years. But is SaaS a paradigm shift? And will some stellar sectors outperform others?

SaaS is now moving into the IT security or IT security management space. The market in point security solutions has exploded in line with the exponential increase in malicious threats, particularly over the past five years or so. This has

combined with regulatory pressure on organisations to ensure confidential data on their networks is not compromised.

The result of all this activity for many organisations can be a complex array of technologies and new network security appliances defending an already complex corporate IT infrastructure and requiring a full-time team to manage.

Various security software vendors have developed applications with the aim of helping simplify the network management process. However, this often means buying expensive software and packing yet another appliance into an already crowded rack, which itself requires professional management.

In this type of environment it is easy to see why an on-demand, web-based system of monitoring the vulnerability of an entire

business network would appeal.

For the channel, this new take on the SaaS concept, security as a service, can make sense from many different perspectives.

At a simple level, SaaS can provide resellers with an opportunity to earn additional revenues by charging customers a fee to enable them to check their basic security posture as part of a best practice security policy. However, for specialist

security practices this may also provide a platform around which specialists can develop value-added services.

Such services can provide additional information to standard reporting, leading to high-value consultancy projects and lucrative network security product sales.

Like SaaS itself, the security market is also predicted to continue to grow for the foreseeable future, a trend that is being fuelled by initiatives such as the Payment Card Industry (PCI) data security standard. Even small merchants will now have to take this standard seriously to avoid the heavy fines that a loss of customer data can incur.

A key requirement for PCI compliance is a quarterly vulnerability scan and, with the number of card payment transactions predicted to rise from nine billion to 15 billion a year by 2016, according to UK payments body the Association for Payment Clearing Services (APACS), the need for an on-demand system of checking compliance can only increase.

The downside of this approach is that success is dependent on scale, which makes it important for resellers to gear up now for this market explosion and allow time to reach the critical mass needed to maintain a sustainable revenue stream for the business.

Andrew Mason is chief executive of IT security services provider Randomstorm, which provides vulnerability management SaaS.

Marshal and 8e6 come together

Doug Woodburn — 2008-11-13T11:00:00.000Z

Doug Woodburn, CRN, Thursday 13 November 2008 at 11:00:00

Vendors claim merger will allow them to become a leader in the secure web gateway market

Another transatlantic union has occurred in the security space, with UK-based Marshal and US-based 8e6 the latest vendors to join forces.

The duo claim the enlarged firm, Marshal8e6, can be a genuine contender in the secure web gateway market with combined billings of $50m (£33.5m) in the last 12 months. Marshal comes from the email and web content security side, while 8e6’s heritage is in web filtering.

The combined company boasts 20,000 customers in 96 countries. Its major R &D and sales operations are in California, Basingstoke, Taipei and Auckland.

George Shih, chief executive of 8e6 Technologies, said: “Our customers are demanding coordination of content policy and protection across all these major communications streams, and this combination addresses that need.

“Together we will have a broader product line, more advanced technologies and greater resources to deliver best-in-class solutions."

Ed Macnair, chief executive of Marshal, claimed Marshal8e6 has all the pieces in place to be the new leader in the secure web gateway market.

“Today’s threat landscape does not discriminate between web-based and email threats. To combat these threats effectively, you need the ability to integrate email and web security," he said.

2e2 runs with Clearpace

Sam Trendall — 2008-11-11T14:16:00.000Z

Sam Trendall, CRN, Tuesday 11 November 2008 at 14:16:00

Database archiving vendor signs up VAR to integrate its technology into HP's offering

Reseller 2e2 will integrate software from new vendor partner Clearpace into its existing portfolio of HP database archiving products.

2e2 will focus on aiding customers to reduce the complexity and cost of storing historical data in Oracle applications. The VAR will integrate Clearpace's NParchive with software from long-standing vendor partner HP. 2e2 claim the integrated offering will allow inactive Oracle data to be relocated to highly compressed but accessible archives.

The Newbury based reseller also indicated the product suite would help customers upgrading to new Oracle applications by allowing them to store and manage data from decommissioned legacy systems. 2e2 claims this will allow customers to eradicate application maintenance fees, lower storage costs and do away with the need to maintain infrastructure museums.

2e2's managing director of business applications David Kirby said: “We have seen a sharp increase in application database growth among our customers over the past few years, coupled with an awareness that all data, including database data, must be retained for longer periods for legal, regulatory and internal audit reasons.

"As a result, we proactively encourage our customers to review their current data retention and archiving procedures so they are compliant, while also driving storage and operational cost reductions in the process. We have become very familiar with the HP Database Archiving product, and the complimentary data compression, time-proofing and immutability capabilities that NParchive provides, allow us to achieve all these objectives for the customer.”

Clearpace chief executive John Bantleman added: “It was important for us to partner with an experienced IT services provider such as 2e2, who have the vision and expertise to deliver integrated solutions to market. Many companies have reached an inflexion point where they are generating more data than they can economically manage.

"These companies are looking for advice and guidance from trusted partners such as 2e2, to help them overcome the burden of long term data retention. In particular, 2e2’s Oracle expertise will allow them to become the service provider of choice for addressing the issues associated with large and growing Oracle applications.”

Micro-P shows Ability

Kayleigh Bateman — 2008-11-10T17:56:00.000Z

Kayleigh Bateman, CRN, Monday 10 November 2008 at 17:56:00

Distributor to offer its resellers ASI's Ability software on a memory stick

Software vendor Ability Software International (ASI) has signed an exclusive distribution agreement with Micro Peripherals (Micro-P).

The distributor will offer the ASI Ability Office software on a 1GB USB memory stick to it reseller base.

Mark Kahr, director at Micro-P, said: “The USB version of ASI Ability Office targets the widest possible range of hardware. It is of course relevant to any PC or notebook system, but especially resolves the twin issues of how to load productivity software onto a netbook and how to do so affordably.

“By adopting the USB version of ASI Ability Office, our resellers can now fulfil their customers’ core software needs without in any way negating the crucial lower-priced value proposition inherent in netbooks.”

The ASI Ability Office USB is available in two formats – the USB device and Quick Start Guide with a single user licence for OEM usage only and again the USB device, but with two user licences.

David Hennell, group sales and development director at ASI, said: “As the market grows ever more competitive in today’s credit-constrained environment, end-users of all types, whether business or consumer, are looking for value.

“We are therefore delighted to have agreed this arrangement with Micro-P, given their pro-activity within all areas of the UK IT reseller space.”

BSA shuts auction sites

Kayleigh Bateman — 2008-11-10T15:47:00.000Z

Kayleigh Bateman, CRN, Monday 10 November 2008 at 15:47:00

Anti-piracy body clamps down on auction sites selling pirated software

The Business Software Alliance (BSA) is urging auction sites to do more to warn their customers of the risks of software piracy, as the industry body announces the closure of over 18,000 sites.

The BSA has shut down 18,314 auctions globally selling 45,000 items of pirated software - worth a combined value of $22m (£12m).

Neil MacBride, vice president for anti-piracy and general counsel at the BSA, said: “Auction sites must do more to protect consumers - to increase protection for their customers, auction sites should, at the very least, assume responsibility and highlight the risks to customers buying software online.

“Forging close collaborations with the software industry, auction sites could alert software companies of auctions posted and slow the process down by stopping the ‘buy it now function’ - providing more time to monitor and catch pirated software.”

BSA claims its activity around pirated software sold via the internet has increased three fold since 2007, with a heightened focus on cracking down across EMEA.

MacBride said the anonymity of buying over the internet leads to the distorted belief that intellectual property (IP) theft is a victimless crime.

“Whilst many would not dream of shoplifting a music CD or package of software from a store, they are willing to go online to seek out copies of what is clearly illegal software. Ignorance is not an excuse – businesses should be making basic checks to ensure that what they are buying is authentic,” he said.

The BSA has also recently released a report covering the threats of using illegal software downloaded from the internet.

GlassHouse expands US support

Kayleigh Bateman — 2008-11-06T11:34:00.000Z

Kayleigh Bateman, CRN, Thursday 6 November 2008 at 11:34:00

Storage consultancy opens call centre across the pond

Storage consulting firm GlassHouse Technologies has bolstered to its call centre support base, with the addition of a 14,000 square foot, US-based operation and an upgraded communications system.

The Customer Support Services (CCS) extension will allow GlassHouse to accommodate its customer base with more call centre support, 600 logistics locations and 20,000 field services representatives.

Andy Norman, chief operating officer of GlassHouse, said: “We are expanding our services and support footprint around the world in response to customer demand and the tremendous growth we’ve experienced over the past two years.

“We continue to offer technology companies a cost-effective way to quickly add capacity while providing their customers superior support with a global reach.”

Miller leaves Trustmarque

Kayleigh Bateman — 2008-11-05T17:59:00.000Z

Kayleigh Bateman, CRN, Wednesday 5 November 2008 at 17:59:00

Boss of software reseller stands down after eight years at the firm

Ross Miller, managing director of Trustmarque, has left the Microsoft LAR after eight years, CRN has learnt.

His departure comes two years after the software reseller announced the completion of a £28m MBO with the financial backing of Lloyds TSB Development Group (LDC) (Channelweb, August 21, 2006)

For more details read Monday’s issue of CRN.

Neither here nor there

James Hall — 2008-11-05T11:40:00.000Z

James Hall, CRN, Wednesday 5 November 2008 at 11:40:00

Centralisation conflicts with demands for faster access to data made by an increasingly dispersed workforce, says James Hall

The Office of National Statistics (ONS) reported a doubling of the number of home-based and mobile teleworkers over the last 10 years to 2006.

The ONS estimates that 3.1 million of these mobile and home workers now exist in the UK - roughly 12.1 per cent of the working population and rising steadily year on year.

Also, demand is increasing for rapid access to data from mobile ‘power users’. For example, construction site managers viewing CAD files from an architect on site increasingly want rapid access to such large electronic files.

Just a few years ago, they would have brought paper plans.

Senior managers working in companies with offices all round the country or around the world these days may require access to their desktop applications and documents at LAN-like speeds, wherever they are.

This goes some way, we think, to explain a surge in demand for WAN optimisation in the last 12 months.

Parallel trends around corporate data storage, backup provision, Software as a Service (SaaS) and desktop virtualisation are creating centralisation of data in ever-larger server rooms.

This can put greater strain on corporate WAN connections and slow data retrieval.

WAN optimisation projects being accelerated even as the economy takes a turn for the worse.

Companies are focusing on extracting greater productivity from fewer people and need to make sure they have fast access to information and applications, wherever they are.

Many companies are consolidating local servers into fewer data repositories – and into off-site datacentres – to cut maintenance costs and are then face larger bandwidth provision costs to deliver LAN-like performance across the WAN.

WAN optimisation solutions can reduce such costs, because data can be stored, accessed and transferred to distributed users more efficiently.

James Hall is marketing director at Teneo