THINKstrategies, the Cloud Computing Showplace and Rising Tide Media are very pleased to welcome the first corporate sponsors of the Cloud Channel Summit – AppDirect, Agilis Solutions and Scribe Software.

The purpose of the Cloud Channel Summit is to bring together senior executives from leading Cloud Computing vendors and their channel company counterparts to share industry best practices and innovative ideas for building profitable and successful partnerships in the Cloud. The Summit will take place on Monday, November 7, at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, CA, and will kickoff with a keynote presentation by Google’s Director of Channels and Business Development, Stephen Cho, entitled, “Making Rain in the Channel: New Opportunities in Cloud Computing”.

“We have been overwhelmed by the positive response we’ve received to the idea of the Clouod Channel Summit,” stated Jeffrey Kaplan, Managing Director of THINKstrategies and founder of the … Read More »

I’ve had the privilege of publishing my point of view on Sandhill.com regarding two of the blockbuster announcements over the past week,

Will Google’s Purchase of Motorola Be a Path to Greater Android Success or Pandora’s Box?
HP’s Software Transformation Cloudy without Consumer Channel to Market

Yesterday’s NY Times included a good article discussing the new challenges facing Google as it enters the smartphone business, echoing my concerns with this terrific quote,

“When Google decides to evict a small Web publisher from its ad service, it sends a computer-generated form letter with the bad news. It says the Web site “poses a risk of generating invalid activity.” Why, the publisher might ask? You will never find out from Google. The only appeal is to fill out a Web form. Good luck. You can’t talk to an algorithm.”

There was also a seminal commentary by Marc … Read More »

 The Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA), the leading trade association for the software and digital content industries, has entered into a partnership with THINKstrategies, Inc., the Cloud Computing Showplace, and Rising Tide Media in support of their upcoming industry conferences – the Cloud Channel Summit and All About Mobile.

Cloud Channel Summit will bring together senior executives from Cloud vendors and channel companies to discuss winning strategies for building successful and profitable partnerships to create new business opportunities in the Cloud marketplace. Monday, November 7, at the Computer History Museum, Mountain View, CA. 

“Channel development is essential to the continued success of the Cloud movement, and the SIIA is pleased to be working with THINKstrategies, the Cloud Computing Showplace and Rising Tide Media to make the Cloud Channel Summit a valuable forum where leading players can share their best practices and success stories,” according to Rhianna Collier, Vice President of the … Read More »

THINKstrategies, the Cloud Computing Showplace and Rising Tide Media are very pleased to announce that Stephen Cho, Director of Channels and Business Development – Google Enterprise, has agreed to present the opening keynote talk at the Cloud Channel Summit on Monday, November 7 at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, CA.

Google has been a pioneer and driving force in the development and delivery of Cloud services for years, and Cho has been instrumental in building Google’s channel strategy and partner ecosystem. He launched the Google Apps Reseller program in 2009 which now includes over 2,000 value-added resellers (VARs), IT consultants, large professional services firms, global systems integrators, Internet service providers (ISPs) and telecom providers, and a broad range of SaaS vendors and other Cloud service providers. 

Previously, Cho served as Director of Product Management for Google Apps and Partner Products, Director of Online Sales and Operations responsible for millions … Read More »

THINKstrategies, the Cloud Computing Showplace and Rising Tide Media are very pleased with the positive response we have received regarding our plans for the Cloud Channel Summit on Monday, November 7 at the Computer History Museum in Mt. View, CA, from a wide array of Cloud vendors and channel company executives, as well as many industry associations, publications and others.
 
Although we have already received many speaker suggestions, we’d like to simplify and expand the submission process to ensure that we can select the best speakers to make our event a success.

Click here if you’d like to submit a speaker proposal for the Cloud Channel Summit. Our deadline for accepting proposals is Friday, September 2, 2011. 
 
If you would like to submit a speaker proposal, please remember that the goal of the Summit is to discuss industry best practices in specifc and … Read More »

In order for the Cloud Computing industry to build on its initial success and gain even greater market acceptance and adoption, leading Cloud vendors must enlist a broader set of channel partners to address specific customer requirements. However, many traditional channel companies feel threatened by the direct sales and support model which has typically been used by Cloud vendors to date. THINKstrategies, the Cloud Computing Showplace and Rising Tide Media are hosting a one-day gathering of industry leaders to provide a forum to discuss these issues and share industry best practices. The Cloud Channel Summit is specifically aimed at bringing together business development and strategic partnering executives from Cloud vendors and their channel company counterparts to foster greater communication and collaboration so they can jointly attack the growing opportunities in the Cloud marketplace.
 
Because we believe the Cloud Computing industry is at an historic crossroads, we are holding this … Read More »

Dimension Data’s acquisition of OpSource marks the end of an era and illustrates how the Cloud Computing competitive landscape is expanding to encompass every type of tech vendor and service provider.

Although it is only a fraction of the size and has only a fraction of the brand equity of Salesforce.com, OpSource has had a disproportionate impact on the growth of the Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) market and broader Cloud movement.

The company’s CEO, Treb Ryan, has been a tireless evangelist for the business value of SaaS and now the Cloud. He and his staff have invested heavily in educating and facilitating the industry’s growth through an endless stream of webcasts and whitepapers, and founding the industry’s most important annual gathering, the SaaS Summit, now known as “All About the Cloud” and managed by the SIIA.

Rather than simply offer a set of hosting services, OpSource put together … Read More »

Today’s official launch of Microsoft Office 365 squarely positions the company as the latest major contender seeking to win a share of the rapidly growing Cloud Computing marketplace.

Although Microsoft has been saying that it is “All In” and funding a TV ad campaign which has made the catchphrase “To the Cloud” popular, Microsoft 365 represents the company’s boldest offering to date. The company has been watching its Office suite suffer attacks from Google Apps for years. In fact, Google Apps are quickly becoming the basic productivity suite of choice for most new college graduates entering the workforce.

Many of these new entrants to the workforce are forgoing email altogether by relying more on Facebook, Twitter and text to communicate. In response to these trends, Salesforce.com is pushing its Facebook-like Chatter communications platform as a dramatic switch from traditional email.

IBM is also attacking the … Read More »

THINKstrategies announced today that Kaseya has been named the latest winner of the Best of SaaS Showplace (BoSS) Awards program, which is aimed at promoting the measurable business benefits being delivered by today’s Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) solutions.

The BoSS Awards is an ongoing program of THINKstrategies’ new Cloud Computing Showplace which recognizes SaaS companies that are producing tangible business benefits for specific user organizations. These benefits can include increased sales, lower costs, higher customer satisfaction, faster operations and greater profitability.

Kaseya is a leading global provider of IT Systems Management (ITSM) software. Kaseya solutions empower everyone from individual consumers to large corporations and IT service providers to proactively manage and control IT assets remotely, easily and efficiently from one integrated, Web-based platform. Kaseya IT Center saves users valuable time by helping them make sure all their patches are up to date quickly and efficiently.

Click here to read about the measurable … Read More »

One of the most vexing challenges facing today’s IT and business decision-makers is how to integrate critical corporate data across a widening array of on-premise and on-demand systems and applications.

Many believe that the age-old data integration issues of the past have only been compounded by today’s rapidly expanding assortment of Cloud-based solutions which raise the expectation of easy end-user access from anywhere at any time.

While there are a growing number of application program interfaces (APIs), Web-based connectors and Cloud-oriented systems integrators that are reducing the difficulty of overcoming this integration issue, it still represents an important impediment that many organizations are reluctant to face.

Intuit announced a new program yesterday aimed at addressing the data integration issue. The Intuit Anywhere program promises to give software developers a new method of extracting QuickBooks data directly into their third-party applications, including web and mobile.

This new data export and integration capability … Read More »