Other enhancements reflect top priority being given to mobile optimization and to bringing more of a consumer software experience into FP&A software.
HPE made a big play in 2018 around servers in the SMB space, followed up by solutions related to hybrid cloud. While those will continue in 2019, the company is also looking to roll out similar initiatives around simplification around storage and hyper-converged solutions for SMBs.
Microsoft shipping their turnkey Windows Virtual Desktop in the spring, where Liquidware is a go-to-market partner, is likely to increase partner opportunities around services.
CloudJumper announces that their Cloud Workspace Management Suite in now available on the Azure Marketplace. They also spotlighted their integration with Microsoft Windows Virtual Desktop at the IT Nation Connect event, and created a new position of VP Strategic Alliances, where the management of the Microsoft relationship is a critical element.
NetApp made a flurry of announcements on Wednesday at Insight extending their data fabric, with special relevance to developers and architects, emphasizing their cloud-first focus, and articulating their hybrid and multi-cloud proposition.
NetApp is touting the new Azure NetApp Files as a huge extension of their Microsoft relationship, which gives them a level of integration with their Azure cloud that Microsoft has not done before with anyone. Other announcements include the General Availability of NetApp Cloud Insights, NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP, and new ONTAP support for NetApp HCI.
Axellio has only had its new product portfolio on the market for a little over a year, but has met with a strong response for their edge solutions in the performance part of the market, and just introduced a new HCI solution in partnership with Microsoft that is based on the Microsoft software-defined stack.
Zerto 6.5 has new feature enhancements, which will be of particular interest to Cloud Service Providers, but the most significant news here is more likely the continued moves towards their upcoming version, which they see as a massively disruptive offering.
The newly announced ones are the Voyager 4200 UC, aimed at the ‘corridor warrior,’ and the Savi 8200, which extends the range of the Plantronics line that supports deskphones, mobile phones and PCs. They also recently announced the Elara 60 series, which is a mobile phone station.
The new solutions include the last two HPE ProLiant servers to be refreshed with Gen 10 technology, as well as software developed in collaboration with Microsoft, which includes new HPE Rapid Setup Software that HPE says will slash partner install times by up to 70 per cent.
Cohesity says a new integration with Office 365 Exchange Online, support for the new Azure Data Box, and new failover and failback capabilities for Azure DR should make it easier to sell joint Azure-Cohesity solutions, which have shown strong recent momentum.
Riverbed adds support for Microsoft’s Hyper-V hypervisor, and their newly announced Microsoft Azure Virtual WAN.
WaaS provider CloudJumper makes single-tenanted deployments feasible for MSPs and customers in the 10-15 seat range – down from about 100 seats before.
Microsoft is making literally dozens of announcements at the event, with Microsoft Authenticator, which the company says will end the era of passwords, and a new Microsoft Search at the top of all 365 apps likely to catch the most headlines.
Key enhancements include a new RPO-driven backup capability and the first automated Any-Point-In-Time Recovery capability for NoSQL databases.
Microsoft previewed two major components of the October 2018 release for Dynamics 365, with three new AI applications and two mixed reality business applications, with a strong emphasis on their being easier to deploy and use than their competition.
Equinix names company veteran Meyers, most recently their President of Strategy, Services and Innovation, as President and CEO. He talks with ChannelBuzz about the opportunities he sees in the market, and how the company can best leverage them, including how their channel fits in.
Microsoft’s channel chief discusses the software giant’s plans to expand a program where Microsoft sells partners’ products and services, including hooking partners up to its AppSource store.
MVISION Endpoint layers McAfee endpoint protection over Windows Defender, using the latter to manage endpoint defense through ePO, while MVISION Mobile consolidates mobile device security into one console.
CloudJumper has had partners ask for this to reduce the complexity of working with Azure, and large integrators who had not worked with the company before see this as a way to make large Azure deployments more cost-effective.
