The rapid rise of Cloud computing alternatives to traditional on-premise data centers has sparked a new round of debates regarding industry technology and software standards. Industry standards have always been a source of intense arguments among vendors and concern among users. And, the advent of the cloud creates another layer of complexity and an area of dispute about which architectural approach and implementation method should be considered the best standard for organizations exploring their cloud options. Click here to read THINKstrategies’ perspectives regarding the state of today’s Cloud industry standards on AT&T’s Networking Exchange.

Key executives from Corent Technologies, CorSource Technology Group and SoftServe have agreed to speak again at the third annual Cloud Channel Summit on Monday, November 4 at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, CA.

The latest executives to sign up to present their views at the Cloud Channel Summit peer-to-peer networking forum are:

Feyzi Fatehi, CEO, Corent Technology
Eileen Boerger, CEO, CorSource Technology Group
Russell Hertzberg, Vice President Technology Solutions, SoftServe Inc.

These senior executives will join Tim FitzGerald, Vice President of Avnet Technology Solutions’ DataCenter & Cloud Technology Solutions Practices, who will kick off this year’s Summit.

They will be joined by the following executives returning to the Summit to provide their perspectives regarding strategies and tactics for building successful partnerships in the Cloud:

Daniel Saks, President and CEO, AppDirect
Katherine Hunt, Director of Communities, CompTIA
William McCarthy, Senior Vice President, InsightCloud Solutions

The Cloud Channel Summit is … Read More »

Last month, I had the privilege of moderating a panel that discussed how Data is taking over the business world and participated in an Analysts Roundup regarding the Cloud opportunities and challenges ahead. You can check out these video recordings of these sessions below.

Data: Taking Over the Business World

Analysts Roundup – Your Opportunities Ahead

THINKstrategies announced today that FrontRange has been named a winner of the Best of SaaS Showplace (BoSS) Award. This program promotes the measurable business benefits delivered by today’s Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) solutions.

The BoSS Awards is an ongoing program administered by THINKstrategies’ Cloud Computing Showplace to recognize SaaS companies that are delivering measurable business benefits to specific user organizations. These benefits can include increased sales, lower costs, higher customer satisfaction, faster operations and greater profitability.

FrontRange’s Cloud-based Service Management solutions maximize operational efficiency by reducing service desk call volume and time spent on application deployment. Additionally, FrontRange’s Service Management solutions reduce downtime by utilizing end-to-end, integrated client management capabilities to enable the standardization of business processes across the enterprise. As a result, FrontRange solutions reduce total cost of ownership (TCO) while improving service quality and compliance.

A specific example of the measurable business benefits derived from FrontRange’s … Read More »

THINKstrategies, Inc., the leading strategic consulting company focused on the business implications of the on-demand services market, announced today that Quorum has been named the latest winner of THINKstrategies’ Cloud Computing Business Value (CCBV) Awards program, which is aimed at promoting the measurable business benefits being delivered by today’s cloud computing solutions.

The CCBV Awards program was launched in 2010 to recognize Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) and Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) providers delivering tangible business benefits to specific user organizations. These benefits include lower costs, faster deployment times, greater profitability, etc. The CCBV Award program builds on the success of THINKstrategies’ Best of SaaS Showplace (BoSS) Awards program which was initiated in 2009.

The Quorum Hybrid Cloud solution delivers instant recovery of data, applications and systems with one click, ensuring small and mid-sized businesses (SMBs) remain always on and avoid costly downtime. The solution’s on-demand … Read More »

It seems like everywhere you look there is a natural or man-made disaster in the news. These events not only cause human tragedy, but can also be fatal to many businesses. A growing number of enlightened corporate executives and IT professionals are starting to recognize that Cloud-based Recovery-as-a-Service (RaaS) alternatives are perfectly suited to mitigate the business risks associated with these events.

While there is plenty of debate about what is causing the increase in the number of hurricanes, tornados, floods, fires and other natural disasters, there is no argument about the fact that they are becoming more common. And, the consequence to businesses caught in these disasters can be severe. Ever since Hurricane Katrina, I’ve been talking to CIOs about how this type of life-changing event also changes their view of the ‘Cloud’. Click here to read THINKstrategies’ perspective about … Read More »

A pivotal principle that sets Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) apart from the on-premises, legacy applications of the past is the shift of the vendors’ priorities so they better align with their customers. Rather than placing the burden of deploying and managing the software on the customer, SaaS vendors have to ensure customer satisfaction, minimize churn and maximize the lifetime value of their customers.

Achieving this objective requires the right combination of staff skills, business processes and support systems. Although every successful SaaS company has been committed to the idea of customer success, capturing the right data to gain a holistic view of the customer to better serve their needs has been a significant challenge.

Click here to read why, how the Pulse2013 conference hosted by Gainsight brought attention to this issue, and how THINKstrategies sees a new generation of Cloud-based ‘Customer Success Management’ solutions is addressing … Read More »

If you missed the 2013 Cloud Analytics Summit in NYC on May 2, or would like to get a second chance to capture the insights shared at the event, all the presentations and roundtable panel sessions, as well as one-on-one speaker interviews, and event highlights from the Cloud Analytics Summit executive forum are now available online.

As you’ll see, the Cloud Analytics Summit brought together a group of real innovators — both vendors and CIOs — to discuss how the Cloud is redefining business intelligence (BI) and data integration, and enabling organizations of all sizes to overcome their Big Data challenges to achieve their business objectives.

Click here to view the Summit presentations and panel sessions. You can also click here to view one-on-one interviews with many of the Summit speakers. And, you can find other highlights from the Summit here.

We are now focusing our energies on putting together the third annual Cloud Channel Summit on Monday, November 4, at the Computer … Read More »

In one of my recent commentaries in Sandhill.com, I discussed the growing opportunities incumbent software vendors (ISVs), especially publicly traded ISVs, have to move their applications to the cloud and offer a new generation of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) solutions to their customers. Click here to read about one path I think provides particular promise to those ISVs that are concerned about cannibalizing their installed base of perpetual license customers and disrupting their existing business models in Sandhill.com.

Even as enterprise adoption of cloud-based alternatives accelerates, IT and business executives are learning that fully capitalizing on these new ‘on-demand’ resources entails extensive systems integration, staff training and process reengineering. Despite these obstacles, my travels have confirmed that enterprises of all sizes across nearly every industry are moving quickly to take advantage of cloud services to achieve their corporate objectives. Read my views in Datamation about how these enterprises are expecting their Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) deployments to entail a long, multi-stage process that will produce significant business benefits beyond simply reducing operating costs.