The VAR Guy

If you can sneak away from the office, feel free to join me at one or more of the following events on February 7, February 14 and March 30-April 1. Each event is designed for managed service providers, solutions providers and small business owners. The events have different themes and formats, but all of them will extensively cover the managed services space.

Perhaps The VAR Guy pursued the wrong career. He’s blogging for free, but could be making $229 per hour or so — that’s nearly $460,000 a year — troubleshooting Windows Vista PCs for his neighbors. That may sound a little far fetched. But check out this amazing math, using some quick cost estimates from The Geek Squad.

Our sister Web site, MSPmentor.net, has identified 100 of the world’s most progressive managed service providers. It’s called the MSPmentor 100. You’ll find a free PDF of the report in the MSPmentor Resource Center (registration required). You can read the PDF off-line at your leisure. Or, you can read individual components of the report online by visiting the MSPmentor 100 main content area.

There’s no free lunch (if there was, The VAR Guy would have found it by now). But Citrix is offering partners three free (or greatly discounted) training perks to help solutions providers grow revenue in 2008. Here’s a quick look at the perks.

The VAR Guy is in beautiful Palm Desert, Calif., waiting for the venerable Demo conference to begin. A quick scan of the dozens of demo-ing companies shows an interesting range of businesses potentially of interest to the channel. Here are 10 companies and technologies worth watching…

Each time Microsoft announces quarterly results, The VAR Guy takes a look to see how the company’s profits stack up against the competition. If you think open source and software as a service will destroy Microsoft, look at this stunning fact: It takes Microsoft only 10 hours to exceed the quarterly profits of Red Hat. Skeptical? Check out the math, and six other jaw-dropping facts about Microsoft’s profits.

The party is over — at least for the short-term — at VMware. Share’s in the company fell 26 percent amid an earnings shortfall and slowing growth rates. Fortunately, The VAR Guy didn’t have any money tied up in VMware. Nor did he write any crazy blog entries predicting that virtualization is the way to ride out an economic slowdown. Besides. he thinks the hot story in virtualization going forward is Parallels Server.

When The VAR Guy first heard about Cisco’s forthcoming data center push back in mid-2007, he was skeptical. What did Cisco — the wiring closet expert — know about data centers? But time and several key interviews have made The VAR Guy far less skeptical. Based on a meeting with a major Cisco partner two weeks ago, The VAR Guy is now convinced that Cisco’s Data Center 3.0 strategy is poised to succeed. Here are five reasons why.

Still skeptical about the managed service provider (MSP) market? Looking to learn from the best? Perhaps The VAR Guy’s sister site, MSPmentor, can give you a feel for the hottest trends — and players — in the MSP space. Check out the MSPmentor 100, which identifies 100 of the most progressive managed service providers in the world. The research project, published today, includes MSPs from across North America, Europe, Australia and other regions.

Give Novell credit. Rather than slamming The VAR Guy for a particularly harsh blog post about the software company, Novell reached out to him and engaged in a healthy dialog. During a lengthy telephone chat, Novell Senior VP and Chief Marketing Officer John Dragoon (pictured) discussed the company’s business performance and strategy. Here’s a recap of the conversation, and some updated reactions from The VAR Guy.

We’re not out of the woods yet, folks. Recession whispers continue. But positive financial news from multiple tech companies — Avnet, Symantec, Sybase and Xerox — lifted The VAR Guy’s spirits today. Alas, he doesn’t own any shares in the companies. But he always welcomes bullish statements from high-tech leaders. Here’s a sampling of what each company had to say.

Well, the rumors are circulating. MergerMarket is speculating that IBM may ink a tight relationship with AMD — or perhaps event purchase AMD. No doubt, AMD has some great technology and IBM would gain value through a close strategic relationship. But IBM buy AMD? The VAR Guy doubts IBM would make that move. Here are five reasons why.

It’s one small step for Dell, and another great leap for Asterisk — the open source VoIP phone system. Dell plans to promote Fonality (a major Asterisk proponent) to small business customers seeking IP telephony systems. It’s a landmark development, folks, that benefits Dell in multiple markets (open source, VoIP, unified communications, and managed services). Here’s why.

It’s time for The VAR Guy to eat a little more crow. Last week, he suggested nobody really cared about Lotusphere anymore. Boy was he wrong. Turns out IBM and the Lotus team unveiled some major partnerships at the event. Here are the top six highlights from Lotusphere, and the potential benefits for VARs.

Every few months, a tech company announces yet another software suite aimed at toppling Microsoft’s Small Business Server. The latest entry comes from IBM. And this isn’t just another application hodge-podge bundled on servers. Here’s the scoop.

As networks and applications converge with one another, many pundits are focused on the looming showdown between Cisco Systems and Microsoft. But there are plenty of subplots worth following in the unified networks market. One of them involves Microsoft channel veteran Steve Hale (pictured), who is quietly working to build the networking industry’s next $1 billion company.

On the hardware front, Apple’s new MacBook Air may be the thinnest notebook on the planet. But on the software front, the title of “thinnest” notebook likely belongs to Wyse Technology. During a chat with The VAR Guy earlier today, Wyse CEO Tarkan Maner (pictured) mentioned growing interest in the company’s thin notebooks. Here’s a recap of the conversation.

Okay, the headline is a bit dramatic. But the Sun-MySQL business combo makes The VAR Guy wonder: Will Novell wake up and start buying open source application providers … or is Novell doomed to repeat the exact same mistakes it made in the 1990s? Alas, Novell in 2008 looks a lot like Novell from a decade ago. That’s not good. Here’s why.

The VAR Guy has heard the rumors: IBM Lotus plans to announce Notes support for Apple’s iPhone next week during Lotusphere in Orlando. The VAR Guy has two quick observations.

Sun Microsystems finally matters again. The company is buying MySQL, the open source database leader, for $1 billion. That’s huge news for Sun, systems integrators and the open source community. But this new opportunity for Sun also includes five key challenges, according to The VAR Guy. Here’s a look at those challenges, and how Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz (pictured) will need to address them.

When Intel reported quarterly results today, net income was short of Wall Street’s expectations. Sure, the chip giant remains a profit machine. And Intel is kicking around AMD these days. But that’s not good enough for skeptical Intel investors, who want stronger results. Fact is, the chip giant faces at least three major challenges in 2008. Here’s a look.

This could have been a huge week for the open source industry to cash in on the retail industry. Instead it’s a missed opportunity. Microsoft, Oracle, IBM and other traditional software companies are making big news at a major New York event for retail CIOs, but open source application providers like OpenBravo are largely silent. Big mistake. Here’s a closer look at the situation.

Rising energy prices. Sub-prime lending woes. Slowing consumer spending. Amid all these economic fears, IBM disclosed stronger-than-expected quarterly (though preliminary) financial results today. The VAR Guy is a little bit relieved. But let’s not celebrate too much. It’s great to hear good news from Big Blue–but plenty of question marks continue to surround the IT market in 2008.