The VAR Guy

The VAR Guy has spent a few days digesting recent developments from Cisco, EMC and VMware. The trio, as you may have heard, have teamed up and unleashed a cloud effort dubbed “Vblock.” Hmmm. What are the implications for channel partners? Take a look.

TelePresence just took another step toward consumer homes. The reason: Logitech International, one of the best-known consumer peripheral brands, has acquired LifeSize Communications, developer of HD video conferencing technology. Here are the implications for VARs.

When Nortel declared bankruptcy last year and started selling off its assets with a vengeance, resellers and customers alike were left with a lot of fear and confusion regarding the flailing company’s product lines. So the collective sigh of relief was audible when Radware –  a company long familiar with the channel — picked up the Alteon line of application delivery products. Here’s why.

William Arruda, a personal branding guru, was the keynote speaker for this evenings’ Cisco Partner Velocity conference in Paris. Here’s a recap of Arruda’s keynote, which focused on how to build and manage your personal brand.

It’s been about ten days since I installed Ubuntu 9.10 on my main computer.  Here are some thoughts on the latest and greatest version of Ubuntu, now that I’ve used it intensively for my daily workflow.

Only days after Microsoft slashed its own SaaS (software as a service) prices, third-party service providers are marching forward with new hosted Exchange 2010 offerings. Two cases in point: Intermedia claims to be the first third-party provider of hosted Exchange 2010. And Azaleos has unveiled a managed Exchange 2010 service. What are the implications for VARs and MSPs? Here are some clues.

The VAR Guy has landed in Paris for Cisco Partner Velocity, a marketing-centric conference for roughly 200 Cisco channel partners. Our resident blogger will be covering the event live, Nov. 10-12 — assuming he’s not out touring Paris or, worse yet, making the rounds at Paris Disneyland…

At the Symantec Partner Engage conference, the security and storage company unveiled four new resources for channel partners. The resources include new demonstration capabilities, an expanded renewal program, a new specialization, and an online community. Here are the details.

Recently listening to a group of Channel Partners with Unified Communication (UC) expertise was fascinating. Questions ranged from when it will become ubiquitous in small and medium business to the industry players that are going to make it a reality. Here’s a closer look at the conversation.

McAfee, Inc. announced Email and Web Security Appliance 5.5, with several new features designed to protect SMB users while also lightening the load on a network, will become available to its partners later this quarter. Here’s a quick look at the move.

At the VoiceCon 2009 conference in San Francisco, there was growing buzz about softphones potentially replacing standard hard land-line phones. Here’s a quick overview on the opportunities and challenges awaiting VARs and MSPs in the next-generation unified communications market.

At San Francisco’s VoiceCon 2009, Siemens Enterprise Communications Group previewed Twitter integration with their OpenScape Unified Communications application while running in an Amazon EC2 (Elastic Compute Cloud) environment. Siemens also says they plan to release the SDKs to allow customers to create their own social networking and communications “mash-ups” and test them in a scalable instance of OpenScape.

Microsoft’s has disclosed the official timeline for the launch of Windows Azure, their cloud-based operating system, over at one of their official blogs. The software giant hopes VARs and managed services providers will transition customer applications into the Azure cloud. Here’s what you need to know.

Parallels, best known for their virtualization platform offerings, has introduced Small Business Panel 10, a web-based all-in-one interface for cloud service providers that target small and midsize businesses. Parallels claim it’s a game-changer; decide for yourself after hearing the details.

Twice a year, when it comes time to upgrade to the newest Ubuntu release, I’m reminded of how nice it is to have my /home directories on separate partitions from the system directories–except when they’re not, because I chose the default Ubuntu partitioning scheme instead of configuring it manually.  Indeed, life would be much simpler if the Ubuntu installer gave /home a dedicated partition automatically.  Here’s why.

A build of the nouveau video driver for nVidia cards was included in the Ubuntu repositories beginning with Jaunty.  I’ve been meaning to test it for a while, and finally found some hardware recently to give it a shot.

At the Symantec Partner Engage event in Orlando, Fla., Symantec CEO Enrique Salem reinforced the company’s continued commitment to Software as a Service (SaaS) . Still, Salem said SaaS will only represent 15 percent of company revenues (or $1 billion in annual sales) within five years. Here’s more on Symantec’s SaaS strategy.

As Google continues to build the Google Apps Reseller partner program, the search giant is considering another bold SaaS (software as a service) move. Specifically, Google has started brainstorming about a possible partner program for independent software vendors (ISVs), The VAR Guy has learned. Here’s the scoop.

Red Hat is starting to evangelize its Enterprise Virtualization Platform to VARs, managed service providers and other channel partners. Here’s some perspective on Red Hat’s continuing efforts to diversify beyond Linux.

Ingram Micro has launched a Physical Security Division as technology security and physical security continue to converge. Here’s a quick look at the effort.

TeamLogic IT, a US-based network of VARs and solutions providers, says it is now servicing Windows 7. The move is the latest channel-related vote of confidence in Microsoft’s new operating system. But perhaps the bigger news here: TeamLogic IT is using low-cost PR moves to potentially ride the Windows 7 wave into customers’ networks. Rival VARs might be wise to follow TeamLogic IT’s marketing lead.

Asterisk — the open source IP PBX — has dialed up another opportunity in the IT channel. This one involves Computer Troubleshooters, a major channel player that has more than 200 U.S. solution provider franchises. The VAR Guy hears Computer Troubleshooters will increasingly promote Fonality’s IP PBX solution. Here’s the scoop.

If all goes according to plan, Ubuntu 10.10 will sport Gnome 3, which represents a radical overhaul of Ubuntu’s default graphical user interface in the form of Gnome Shell, when it debuts a year from now.  In order to get a taste of what this desktop of the future will look like, I’ve spent the last few days using the development version.  Here’s what I’ve found.