SICL claims speed lead with Fast Cloud launch

West Yorkshire VAR claims to have edge on SMB rivals after wedding its WAN acceleration nous to its cloud proposition

VAR SICL is leaning on its WAN acceleration expertise and claims its new Fast Cloud offering gives it the edge over competing SMB cloud computing providers.

The Leeds-based Cisco, Dell, Microsoft and Riverbed partner has recently designed the service and is targeting it at firms with remote or mobile workers, or those operating in low-bandwidth areas. Using its long-standing WAN optimisation know-how, SICL claims it can deliver a range of applications at optimum speeds - even on 3G - thereby overcoming some firms' main barrier to cloud adoption.

Cliff Fox, managing director at the VAR, told ChannelWeb the first customer has already gone live on the Fast Cloud service.

"I do not see anybody else doing this at the moment," he added.

Fox explained that his firm has been operating in the cloud space for several years, having taken a decision to build on its SMB reseller roots. A fifth of sales now come from the corporate world and delivering as-a-service technologies, particularly in the SMB arena, is now a core revenue stream.

"Cloud has been quite successful for us for a while; for me, it is the future of SME," he said. "I think the SME market is more ripe for it. They see the business case for it, they want simplicity, they want all the benefits. We have started with our existing managed services customers. The cloud business is pretty young, but is a big emphasis for us."