Kaseya is making moves to help managed service providers (MSPs) spin up compliance-related practices.
Kaseya on Wednesday announced that it had acquired RapidFire Tools, which specializes in IT assessment, internal threat detection and compliance products. Terms of the deal weren't disclosed. More
Posted by Scott Bekker on September 05, 20180 comments
Longer refresh cycles are contributing to a gloomy outlook for personal computing devices, according to data published by market researcher IDC this week.
IDC is predicting that total unit shipments of traditional PCs, workstations and tablets will decline by 3.9 percent this year. The compound annual growth rate (CAGR), if growth is the right term, is -1.5 percent for the next five years.
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Posted by Scott Bekker on August 31, 20180 comments
A big deadline is approaching this week for the Microsoft Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) program. Partners who re-enroll as Direct Providers after this Friday will need to purchase one of two partner support plans.
Those plans start at $15,000 a year. While large-volume partners should be able to spread the costs evenly among their customers, it will be a hardship for many smaller partners. More
Posted by Scott Bekker on August 27, 20180 comments
A new analyst report on the Software as a Service (SaaS) market contends Microsoft's strength in collaboration services is making it tough for other vendors to catch up.
The report this week on the enterprise SaaS market from Synergy Research Group valued the whole sector at $20 billion in the second quarter of 2018, growing at 32 percent per year. More
Posted by Scott Bekker on August 23, 20180 comments
Want to be recognized as one of the top Microsoft partners in the United States? The entry form is open for the third annual RCP 200 list.
This is a qualitative list of the Microsoft solution provider companies that demonstrate a laser focus on Microsoft technology and a strong commitment to providing great value for their customers. More
Posted by Scott Bekker on August 15, 20180 comments
The wait for a functional and supported integration between the Amazon Alexa and Microsoft Cortana digital voice assistants is over.
It took a little longer than the companies originally anticipated. An end of 2017 planned release came and went without comment, but Amazon Alexa and Microsoft Cortana did appear together on stage for a successful demo at the Microsoft Build conference in May. More
Posted by Scott Bekker on August 15, 20180 comments
In a move that could significantly reduce Azure Stack's attack surface and simplify network integration, Microsoft is consolidating a number of ports for the hybrid cloud platform.
Specifically, Microsoft plans to collapse port requirements for various Azure services running on Azure Stack from 27 different ports to just one. The services will communicate via Port 443, the standard port for HTTP over TLS/SSL. The change will take effect in an upcoming release, according to a Microsoft announcement last Friday. More
Posted by Scott Bekker on August 13, 20180 comments
In a lively panel discussion this week on "The Future of Windows," expert speakers from the TechMentor conference in Redmond touched on controversies surrounding the Windows 10 update cycle, looked ahead to features coming in Windows Server 2019, and exchanged best bets for IT pros to keep their skills current.
TechMentor co-chairs Sami Laiho and Dave Kawula moderated the panel on Wednesday that featured session presenters Peter De Tender, Petri Paavola and Orin Thomas, all of whom are current or recent Microsoft Most Valuable Professionals (MVPs). More
Posted by Scott Bekker on August 09, 20180 comments
A major new feature of Microsoft OneDrive represents an important new option for moving customer data from desktops into the cloud, according to a senior Microsoft product manager.
Stephen Rose, senior product manager for OneDrive for Business, provided an update on the file hosting service's roadmap during the main keynote at the TechMentor conference, being held this week at Microsoft's campus in Redmond, Wash. The TechMentor conference is hosted by Redmond Channel Partner's parent company, 1105 Media Inc. More
Posted by Scott Bekker on August 08, 20180 comments
Three weeks after unveiling the Surface Go, Microsoft on Thursday made the smallest of its 2-in-1 devices available in the United States and Canada.
Sold in Microsoft Stores, Best Buy and through reseller partners, the Surface Go sports a 10-inch screen, weighs 1.15 pounds, is a third of an inch thick and runs a 7th Generation Intel Pentium Gold Processor 4415Y. More
Posted by Scott Bekker on August 02, 20180 comments
Microsoft licensing changes coming next quarter will tilt the playing field further toward cloud subscriptions versus on-premises licensing, especially for Office 2019.
Microsoft announced several licensing changes this week that will go into effect on Oct. 1. More
Posted by Scott Bekker on July 27, 20180 comments
Just as it beat the drum around Windows XP's end of life a few years ago, Microsoft is now starting to warn its partners and customers that a popular desktop configuration is nearing the support cliff.
The new focus of the upgrade talk is Windows 7 and Office 2010. Ron Markezich, corporate vice president for Microsoft 365, started the Windows 7/Office 2010 conversation during a keynote last week at Microsoft Inspire. More
Posted by Scott Bekker on July 25, 20180 comments