Software King of the World Microsoft has more than 60 percent of its commercial business on the cloud.
Partner boss Joe Macri told the assembled throngs at the outfit’s London Partner Executive Summit that Vole was pushing cloud-first business models with some success.
Macri said that over half of Microsoft’s UK partners have now made cloud solutions the primary focus of their businesses.
Cloud outfit Nutanix announced today that it is enhancing its channel charter which it calls Power to the Partner.
The idea is to extend opportunities to value-added distributors (VAD) and global systems integrators (GSI) along with additional opportunities for resellers. The new updates provide benefits to partners across the industry.
Cloud Data Management outfit Rubrik has announced support for the new Amazon S3 Intelligent-Tiering storage class.
The move should mean that Rubrik can cut storage costs of archived data that is infrequently accessed. The new integration provides customers with an additional option to further optimise their cloud archive storage costs.
Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) has written a cheque for the AI and big data start-up BlueData.
BlueData was founded in 2012 and has raised £30.6 million. HPE said the deal will “significantly expand” its footprint in the AI and machine-learning space and bolster its big data analytics capabilities.
Milan Shetti, SVP of HPE’s storage and big data business, said: “BlueData has developed an innovative and effective solution to address the pain points all companies face when contemplating, implementing, and deploying AI/ML and big data analytics.
Cyxtera Technologies, the secure infrastructure company, announced the expanded availability of its Cyxtera Extensible Data Centre (CXD) platform in key markets.
CXD is an intelligent, software-defined platform that enables customers to dynamically provision connectivity and dedicated hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) on-demand within and across Cyxtera data centres. Provisioned via API or web portal, enterprises usingCXD can easily procure, deploy, and configure services in less than a day, allowing for rapid expansion of existing colocation environments and speeding time to market in new locations.
Thomas
Kurian, former Oracle President of product development and technologist, is going to head Google Cloud from early next year.
The current CEO of Google Cloud Diane Greene will continue through January, working with Mr Kurian to ensure a smooth transition and will remain a Director on the board of Alphabet, Google’s parent company.
Kurian worked at Oracle for 22 years but quit over disagreements with Executive Chairman and CTO Larry Ellison over the future course of the company as the Cloud business gets highly competitive.
“Kurian, a respected technologist and executive, will be joining Google Cloud on November 26 and transitioning into the Google Cloud leadership role in early 2019”, Ms Greene said in a statement on Friday.
Datto which packages its IT solutions through managed service providers (MSPs), announced exceptional growth in Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA).
The outfit serves small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) through more than 3,000 MSP partners. Globally, Datto now serves more than 500,000 SMEs in over 130 countries through over 14,000 MSPs.
Datto said that its increasing investment in EMEA has created a wide-array of partner-focused employees, with product management teams and staff dedicated to building products, servicing, and supporting Datto partners. Datto continues to hire in EMEA.
Datto has recruited over 750 new MSP partners in EMEA since the start of the year, achieving over a 40 percent year-over-year increase.
Datto’s local workforce now has more than 230 European employees located across seven offices. In addition to the company’s data centres in the United Kingdom, Germany, and Iceland, Datto invested in a new data centre in the United Kingdom at the start of 2018, and is opening a new data centre in Germany in the first half of 2019, aiming to migrate European customers’ data in time for Brexit.
Paul Burns, chief technology officer at Technology Services Group said that the Datto and Autotask merger brought together two organisations, which has been fantastic for the channel,” commented.
“As a Datto partner, this is an exciting time for our business, and we are eager to see the rapid innovation cycle continue across all product lines.”
SMEs are increasingly outsourcing their IT needs to MSPs due to continued technology investment and stricter data regulations, providing tremendous growth opportunities for MSPs.
Increasing demand for Cloud-based services has seen a further four resellers join Advanced’s partner programme TruePartner, since its launch in February this year.
Minerva UK, Deans Computer Services, HBP and BME Solutions have all demonstrated their commitment to helping SME customers transition to the Cloud.
Rewarding resellers for their Cloud-first strategy, TruePartner claims to provide “disruptive yet focused” Software as a Service (SaaS) solutions the channel can use to engage new customers.
Dean McGlone, Channel Director at Advanced, said: “Resellers are starting to see the breadth of opportunities the Cloud can deliver, and this is exemplified by the four new partners that have joined our TruePartner programme. We’ve found that an overwhelming number of SMEs across the country want to embrace the Cloud, but many lack the knowledge and experience to make the transition confidently. In fact, according to our research, just 33 per cent admit to being experienced in the Cloud.
“As part of TruePartner, each reseller is supported in delivering genuine Cloud solutions to their customers, while harnessing the benefits of a Cloud subscription service, from recurring revenue to client retention and acquisition. We’re continuing to see a need for Financial Management Solutions (FMS), but SMEs are increasingly demanding Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), which can be delivered with our Business Cloud Essentials solution.”
Advanced said n the SME community is “vocal” about the need for better support when it comes to transitioning to the Cloud. Advanced claims that a massive 88 percent of business leaders think Cloud providers need to do more to build confidence in the Cloud.
Jo Dixon, Managing Director at HBP, said: “We recognise that moving to the Cloud is not only right for our customers, but it also’s right for us and we’re looking to adapt quickly. Advanced is fully supporting the traditional reseller channel in its transformation to adopt the Cloud, proving to be the right partner for us.”
Patrick Clayton, Managing Director at Deans Computer Services PLC, stated “There’s a growing pace of shift to the Cloud, based on the huge benefits to end users. Our new partnership with Advanced gives us the opportunity to support businesses with their transformation, giving them a fully integrated, true Cloud ERP solution with all the advantages that offers.”
John Chadwick, Managing Director at Minerva, said: “Minerva has been in business for 35 years. Over that period, we have cultivated a portfolio of “best of breed” applications which were designed primarily for on-premise situations and we have serviced that requirement from both our Applications software and our Networking teams.
The market is moving, be it conservatively, towards Cloud alternatives and we have been searching for some time for a suitable Cloud partnership. We are confident Business Cloud Essentials now fills that void, and we intend to embrace the opportunity.”
Cloud channel members should be rubbing their paws with glee at the news that cloud spending is on the increase
IDC has increased its forecasts for the amount of cloud infrastructure sales that will be sold globally this year on the back of a solid showing in the second quarter.
The analyst house has charted a 48.4 percent increase in the sale of infrastructure products, including servers, storage and Ethernet switches, sold by vendors and fulfilled by the channel in Q2. As a result, the forecasts for the full year are now coming in a $62.2 billion, an increase of 31.1 percent on last year.
Spending is increasing in public and private cloud areas, up by 58.9 percent and 28.2 percent in Q2 respectively, with the combined investments in cloud infrastructure now accounting for almost half of all the infrastructure spending globally.
IDC is forecasting that spending in cloud environments is going to grow by double digits this year.
Non-cloud IT is dying, and it still accounted for just over half of the total infrastructure market in Q2 and came in with 21.1 percent growth, but it is markedly lower than cloud-related spending.
Natalya Yezhkova, research director, IT Infrastructure and Platforms at IDC said that as the share of cloud environments in the overall spending on IT infrastructure continues to climb and approaches 50 percent, it is evident that cloud, which once used to be an emerging sector of the IT infrastructure industry, is now the norm.
“One of the tasks for enterprises now is not only to decide on what cloud resources to use but how to manage multiple cloud resources. End users’ ability to use multi-cloud resources is an essential driver of further proliferation for both public and private cloud environments”, she added.
The top three regarding market share were Dell, HPE and Cisco. But the shining star regarding revenue growth year on year in Q2 was Lenovo, which delivered a 223.5 percent increase putting it in fourth place.
The dark satanic rumour mill has manufactured a hell on earth yarn claiming that the Chinese retailer Alibaba is launching a London datacentre.
The rumours are based on information displayed on a newly added landing page, where the outfit said it offer flexible compute services from £30.87 a month from its new London region as it bids to take on AWS, Azure and Google in the UK.
Under the heading ‘London is Calling’, Alibaba trumpets the fact that “an Alibaba Cloud datacentre is coming to the UK”, although stops short of confirming a launch date.
Alibaba is not commenting further but the evidence does seem to have legs. It seems to suggest that Alibaba is gearing up from a real battle for the clouds in the UK.
Alibaba operates 18 cloud regions globally, 14 of which are in China and Asia-Pac. Two are situated in the US, a country Alibaba is reportedly struggling to crack. Its only European region, Frankfurt, serves continental European customers.
Featured products for the London region include flexible computing, storage, networking, database and security.
In its latest quarter ending 30 June 2018, Alibaba claims its cloud computing business grew by 93 percent year on year to $710 million.
Cloudy outfit Rackspace said that its year-long spruce up of the channel is continuing and it needs more partners.
It said that it is in a position to provide its partners with a wide number of options to take out to customer, across public, private and hybrid cloud environments, and as a result has seen its base increase.
At the moment it is contacting traditional VARs looking to take steps into the cloud as well as providing options for those looking to add more options for their customers looking at a multi-cloud strategy.
John Coulston, Director of Partners & Alliances, Rackspace, EMEA, said that it was building and investing more in the channel.
“We are definitely looking for more partners and have a significant growth target for our channel”, he added “We have pretty big aspirations in the channel space.”
Kicking Pat Gelsinger claims his Cloud Provider Program has established a “meaningful” area of revenue for VMware.
The VMware Cloud Provider Programme attributed more than 30 percent to the vendor’s revenue stream, which rose 12.5 percent to US$2.17 billion.
Gelsinger, who is the CEO of VMware, said that there has been a consistency to that area of VMware’s that “shocked” everyone.
“There was a prevailing view in the industry that the big cloud guys – AWS, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud Platform will eat up everybody. The result has been an area of consistent and steady growth for us, and increasingly, we’re being seen as the technology source for all other clouds. Clearly the mega guys are building much of their own technology, but all of the other cloud providers are increasingly relying on VMware’s technologies as the base for building off their cloud”.
Most of that revenue in the past has been driven from vSphere, Gelsinger said and the offering was now gaining more traction for NSX, vSAN and vCloud Director.
“We’re also working to make that program, a great channel for other services. CloudHealth and VMC on AWS will be resold through those channels as well. We’ll be putting more of our products focus through that business relationship. That I believe will be the biggest aspect of our long term growth.”
Gelsinger highlighted many areas of growth opportunities within network with NSX and storage with vSAN, saying VMware was just getting started.
Software King of the World is feeling a bit short in the money department and thinks that the best way to remedy this is to jack up its prices on a range of on-premise and cloud products in October, the vendor has confirmed in a blog post.
The changes include a 10 percent increase in Office 2019 commercial prices, while the price of Windows 10 Enterprise will also be raised.
Microsoft said the changes will be implemented in October, with a preview set to be available in September.
Writing in his bog, a SpokesVole said: “On 1 October 2018, we will adjust pricing for our licensing programmes and make price adjustments to on-premise and cloud products.
“These changes will highlight the benefits of our pricing for a cloud-first world, help us move from a programme-centric to a customer-centric pricing structure, and create more consistency and transparency across our purchasing channels.”
It appears that the changes will simplify Microsoft’s licensing offering but on the downside prices will rise with Voles Cloud Solutions Provider (CSP) partners may be the most affected.
The Scottish Legal Aid Board (SLAB) has ‘gone-live’ with Oracle Cloud. The move which, is in line with the Scottish Government’s Digital Strategy for Scotland means that it is the first public body to make this transition.
SLAB is responsible for managing legal aid in Scotland and enables people, who would otherwise be unable to afford it, to get help for their legal problems. Running efficient IT systems is an important element in delivering this successfully.
At SLAB’s Edinburgh HQ, Oracle Platinum Partner Inoapps has now implemented finance (ERP), i-expenses, and procurement in the Cloud, including sourcing and invoice scanning. Following shortly will be Oracle Cloud HCM and Payroll. This will also be the first public sector implementation of Oracle Payroll Cloud in both Scotland and the UK.
John McLeod, Head of Information Systems at SLAB, said: “We chose Inoapps to drive our implementation as it is a proven and award-winning Cloud adopter with a successful track record in delivering multi-pillar Oracle Cloud implementations. What impressed us was the strength of their implementation team, as well as their change management capabilities and the strong alliance with Oracle. There was also a willingness to listen to and interpret our needs in partnership.
“By consolidating financial, HR and payroll processes into one system, we hope to achieve far greater visibility of these activities across the organisation. This, combined with the improved reporting capabilities available in Oracle Cloud, should lead to improved insight and decision-making.”
Graeme Hill, Director of Corporate Services at SLAB, notes: “By embracing cloud technology, we hope to achieve greater system stability and lessen the need for internal specialist expertise.”
Inoapps is experiencing successful expansion across multiple sectors and the consultancy’s credentials in delivering best-in-class Oracle solutions within the public sector continue to develop from strength to strength.
Commenting on the implementation Andrew Norris, Head of Inoapps’ European Business said: “We’re very pleased to add SLAB to our growing list of public sector clients. We understand that, across the board, the sector is under mounting pressure to pursue a Cloud First agenda to streamline processes and achieve cost efficiencies. The nature of our Oracle Cloud solutions and Managed Services is highly transferable across many industries, and together with over a decade’s experience in Oracle and our status as Oracle’s Cloud First Partner of the Year, this has been instrumental in us securing ongoing work within the Public Sector.”
The SLAB implementation started in June 2017 with an initial launch for Finance in the Cloud in December 2017 followed by HR and Payroll being live by the end of September 2018.
HFX is lifting the kimono on its latest flexitime and workforce time management gear at the CIPD HR Software and Recruitment Show.
New for 2018 is HFX’s cloud-based Imperago Time & Attendance (T&A), which is an all-in-one SaaS package that covers software, hardware, support and maintenance on a pay as you go basis with no upfront capital outlay. Imperago T&A built for companies across all vertical sectors with 200 employees and above, particularly for those with shift-based workers.
Also on show will be HFX’s Imperago Flexitime Management solution for public sector and local government organisations.
HFX’s latest Imperago EveryOneCloud connects people and devices and logs time, supporting workforce planning and Time & Attendance solutions, enabling organisations of all sizes to monitor their staff and productivity.
The idea is to knock up a cloud solution, EveryOneCloud within minutes, with no need for servers, software installation or heavy up-front costs. It integrates with and sends data to T&A, Payroll, Student Attendance and Workforce Management solutions – including rostering & shift management.
HFX will be publishing a series of Practical Guides on How to Improve Productivity which will cover everything from capturing hours worked, devising the best working patterns, meeting customer demand and coping with peaks and troughs, to improving staff engagement through providing more flexible working.
Nick Whiteley, Managing Director of HFX commented: “Once organisations can harness technology to view staff working hours, they have the data to investigate inefficiencies and improve productivity. Our series of papers on the topic of Improving Productivity, provide practical guides tackling different aspects of staff productivity in easily actionable, bite-sized chunks that focus on quick wins, to gain buy-in and engagement from staff, management and the board.”
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