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| Recent SBSC North West Events July 2010 Agenda: Thursday 15 July (18:30-21:00) July’s meeting welcomes Matt Rose of Quintadena to discuss the quote and proposal process within IT businesses, and Jake Mason from Orchid Distribution to discuss their distribution offers on Audio Visual equipment.
Matt Rose of QintadenaQuintadena are the World’s Leading Solutions Partner for QuoteWerks and have supplied and implemented QuoteWerks into dozens of IT businesses from “one man” companies up to the largest users of ConnectWise in the UK. Quintadena’s discussion will cover: - Insights into what your customers would like to see on your quotes.
- Case studies in how companies, just like yours, are saving 90% in their quoting.
- How it’s possible to raise a simple quote (w/ images, detailed descriptions and live pricing from the likes of Ingram Micro and Computer2000) in 60 seconds.
- How you can give your customers more detail, with less effort.
- A detailed demonstration, with interactive discussions, of QuoteWerks.
Also discussed will be Quintadena’s referral programme. Many QuoteWerks users in the IT space have Managed Service agreements with clients that have a requirement to make their quoting more efficient – engaging Quintadena as a sub contractor has made them the ‘go to’ people for IT solutions and keeps your clients ‘sticky’ to your offering.
Jake Mason of Orchid DistributionJuly’s meeting welcomes Jake Mason from Orchid Distribution to discuss their distribution offers on Audio Visual equipment. Orchid distribution are a midlands based organisation who distribute innovative ICT and AV empowering corporates, trainers and presenters, educators and teachers throughout the UK. Orchid’s discussion will cover: - What innovative ICT solutions Orchid offer for the corporate, public and education sectors.
- Interoprability with existing presentation and classroom technology being used.
- The benefits of Visualisers and the positive impact they have within learning environments.
- The promotion of ICT based teaching, training and assessment for a more efficient cost and improved time management.
- Training rooms and schools of the future.
Orchid distribution work continually with approved proactive re-sellers to push the boundaries and further the technological advancement for the use of audio visual products to universitys, schools, and colleges, achieving the highest level results possible, plus the enhancement and effectiveness of any training, corporate communication or presentations.
May 2010
The May meeting welcomed Cécile Cathala of StorageCraft and hopefully Dell Quinn of Microsoft for a discussion on the new version of ShadowProtect followed by a discussion on the new Partner Network by Microsoft. StorageCraft provides innovative disk-based backup, disaster recovery, data protection, migration and security solutions for Windows servers, desktops and laptops. On April 21st StorageCraft released ShadowProtect version 4 for Servers, Small Business Servers and desktops/laptops that include new exciting features that maximise your Business Continuity and minimise your Recovery Time Objective. StorageCraft’s key strengths are: · Bare Metal Recovery of Windows Servers, desktops and laptops in minutes · Hardware Independent Restore (P2P) · Restore to and from ANY virtual environment (P2V, V2V, V2P) · Recovery / Boot CD featuring Windows 7 PE and Windows XP PE · Scheduled automatic incremental images down to every 15 minutes! · VirtualBoot technology for quick failover to a virtual server · Virtual Converter converts backup images to a .VHD or .VMDK. · Compression and encryption of backup images · Granular recovery of individual files and folders · Consolidation of point-in-time backup images on daily, weekly or monthly basis · Central Management Console · Image verification and re-verification · Notification/Reporting · Push install ShadowProtect to all servers from a central location · Granular Restore for Exchange (add-on module) · Offsite Data Replication (add-on ImageManager Enterprise) · HeadStart Restore technology for near-instantaneous recovery to a Virtual Server (included with ImageManager Enterprise) StorageCraft also offers ShadowProtect IT Edition, a tool specially designed for IT engineers that can backup and restore any system, anytime, anywhere. Following on increasing success in the UK market, StorageCraft opened an office in London in 2009 and continues grow and recruit channel partners and MSPs of all sizes. During the meeting Cecile will provide a general overview of StorageCraft and the ShadowProtect disaster recovery solutions. Focus will be given to a demo of ShadowProtect illustrating how to schedule backup jobs, perform a Hardware Independent Restore and more (depending on what members would like to us to show).
APRIL 2010 This April meeting welcomes James Akrigg and David Overton of Microsoft for a double-act, and dove-tailed, presentation on Office 2010 and BPOS, with Exchange at the core. Microsoft say the following about Office 2010: Microsoft® Office 2010 offers rich and powerful new ways to deliver your best work at the office, home, or school. Grab your audience’s attention and inspire them with your ideas visually. Create results with people at the same time and stay connected to your files across the town or around the world.1 With Office 2010, you’re in control of getting things done and delivering amazing results according to your schedule. See it in action and read what others are saying. Microsoft say the following about BPOS: Microsoft Business Productivity Online Standard Suite is a set of messaging and collaboration solutions hosted by Microsoft, and consists of Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, Office Live Meeting, and Office Communications Online. These online services are designed to give your business streamlined communication with high availability, comprehensive security, and simplified IT management. Your business benefits from always up-to-date technologies that are deployed rapidly, maximizing your valuable IT resources and reducing your need for infrastructure investments. Why choose the Business Productivity Online Standard Suite? For customers who need more than one standalone service, the Business Productivity Online Standard Suite provides the best value to customers by bundling multiple services at a discounted price. Exchange Online offers 25GB mailbox storage per standard license. Download Datasheet: Word | XPS Learn more about hosted solutions with Microsoft Exchange Server
Agenda Timings: 18:30 – 18:30 Brief intros and airing of recent/current technical challenges 18:40 – 19:40 James Akrigg with demo and key differentiators of Office 2010 19:40 – 19:50 Pizzas and break to discuss technical challenges 19:50 – 20:50 David Overton with demo and discussion on the unique offering of BPOS and how it fits with Small Business environments 20:50 – 21:00 Wash-up period to bottom out technical challenges March 2010 This March meeting welcomes Webroot promoting their security offerings for small businesses, and Alex McLaren of ViaTel Solutions Ltd explaining his ability to attract and use marketing funds. · Webroot provides industry-leading security solutions to consumers, enterprises and small to medium-sized businesses worldwide. · The company’s software-as-a-service (SaaS) offerings, Webroot® E-Mail Security SaaS and Webroot Web Security SaaS, provide better manageability, better value and better protection than any other E-mail or Web security solution available for business users. · Webroot's UK route to market is 100% channel. In 1997 Webroot was chosen as UK Channel Security vendor of the year. · Webroot Security services protect customers such as Morphy Richards, Everton FC, Mills & Boon, FA Premier League, Royal Doulton, Premier League, Law Society of Scotland and a third of UK Education - all sold through Webroot's channel partners. · Webroot gives you, the reseller, the opportunity to provide security solutions to a small business that are cost effective, highly resilient and functional and give them the protection that is normally only affordable by a larger corporate business. · For your own use and protection Webroot also offers very attractive and special pricing on their services (email filtering, web filtering, email archiving and email business continuity). · Winner of Network Computing "Messaging Product of the Year 2009 and 2010". · Webroot named one of Cloud Security Industry’s Best Channel Vendors 2010 – Business Solutions Magazine. · Winner CRN Security Vendor of the Year 2007 - Runner up 2008 & 2009 & 2010 CRN Security Vendor of the Year · Webroot offers you the opportunity to sell the fastest growing security and SaaS (Software as a Service) offerings available to your small business clients. · Customers are buying SaaS E-mail and web solutions more and more each day and Webroot is seeking more resellers to benefit from this lucrative and profitable opportunity. · "Gartner estimates that in-the-cloud e-mail security services don't account for more than 20% of the total e-mail security market, but will jump to 35% by year end and 70% by 2013." · “1% percent of the secure Web gateway market is SaaS - We predict it will be 25% in three years" (Gartner 2008) From Alex McClaren of ViaTel Solutions Ltd - http://www.viatelsolutions.com (be back up shortly) "Alex McLaren of ViaTel Solutions Ltd would like to introduce ViaTel’s services to the Group. ViaTel Solutions is a business development and marketing services company, whose primary goal is to assist B2B firms to achieve their sales goals and targets. To this end ViaTel provide an end-to-end marketing service, ranging from the provision of marketing consultancy services, to focused campaign drives, to total outsourced telemarketing services. ViaTel can handle marketing campaigns from the simplest ‘high-volume mailer follow-up’ or database cleansing campaign, to the most sophisticated ‘CEO-strategy’ campaigns. In the current challenging business climate, it is more important than ever for IT firms to become more innovative in the methods they employ to win new business and create a healthy business pipeline. To this end, Alex would like to discuss how IT resellers’ can maximise limited marketing budgets by working with the IT manufacturers, to generate and nurture a steady stream of opportunities.
Historically ViaTel has worked with a very broad range of IT hardware and software manufacturers. These include IBM, HP, SUN, HDS, EMC, NetApps, Lenovo, Cisco, 3Com, Alcatel, Siemens, Panasonic, Microsoft, VMware, Citrix, SAP, Oracle, Infor, JDE, Chorus, Sage, MessageLabs, Symantec, and many of their distributors and resellers. For further information on how ViaTel Solutions can assist your business, please feel free to contact Alex McLaren at alexm@viatelsolutions.com, or visit: www.viatelsolutions.com." February 2010 This February meeting Malcolm Wilson of Synergy Technology will pitch their MySpamBin external virus and spam filtering service, followed by Paul McAdam of Indigo Solutions on the software auditing techniques he offers as a service.
Malcolm Wilson of Synergy Technology would like to introduce MySpamBin to the group. MySpamBin is Synergy Technology's cost effective email filtering managed service, which has been designed specifically for the SME marketplace with a prices starting from £10/month. With the growth in quantity and variety of threats now sent and received by email, successfully filtering it is business critical. Companies do not have the time or resources to deal with the headaches caused by viruses or spam. Put simply, businesses that consider email to be a vital communications tool have the following options: Do nothing; Install software; purchase an appliance; or purchase a managed service. As hosted services offer so many benefits over the competition, customers are switching from software and appliance solutions at a rapid rate. Consequently the managed service sector is growing at an estimated 44 percent per year (Datamonitor) due to the benefits. · Set up is both quick and simple, requiring no hardware or software · Unlike software and hardware, email is filtered on the Internet, before it reaches the user’s IT network, thereby saving bandwidth by delivering only “clean” email; a key benefit given the rapid escalation in volumes of email traffic worldwide · With security experts managing the solution, the user is no longer concerned with whether their system is armed with the latest virus updates. A spectrum of dedicated filters takes away the burden to give the user peace of mind · Networks are protected from Denial of Service attacks · Each customer retains full, real-time and flexible control Paul McAdam of Indigo Solutions will explain the reasons behind these latest trends, what is happening in the marketplace and the top "Licensing Gotchas" which could snare your customers if they are subjected to a SAM audit.
Gartner recently reported that the likelihood of an organization receiving at least one vendor software audit has risen to 56 percent in 2009 compared with 30-35 percent in 2008. Closer to home, numerous large software resellers have been investing in Software Asset Management (SAM) practices.
Paul will also describe how you can turn these market developments into a shared services opportunity which will leave your business looking like that all important "Trusted IT Advisor".
For further information or immediate help with SAM and Licensing issues please see www.indigo-solutions.co.uk, and feel free to contact Paul McAdam directly.
January 2010 This January meeting Sprint Communication Systems will pitch their mobile phone connection and device solutions, and Think4 IT will demonstrate some new Ultra Mobile PCs. Sprint Communication Systems are local independent B2B communication providers to the small to medium size business market. Specialising in solution based mobile provision Sprint provide a high level of service and support bridging the gap between the Networks, customer and IT providers. As one of Vodafone and Orange leading B2B partners Sprint having built a reputation as “Blackberry” specialists but in January were selected as only 1 of 20 dealers in the UK authorised by Apple & the networks to officially provide the iPhone to the business sector. The presentation will focus on the synergy between the mobile and IT providers in offering the most efficient cost effective solution for the customer covering the following area’s:- · “Bit of Everything Ltd”: 1 iPhone, 2 Blackberry’s and 4 Nokia’s. Today’s average business · Pro’s and Con’s of the most popular devices and practical applications. · The ultimate battle ground. “Blackberry v iPhone” debate · Applications: Business & Social media · Mobile & IT providers “a Partnership” not a threat. Will Atkinson's fine Spring Communications presentation slides Think4 IT are gratefully contributing to the life of the group by demonstrating some new Ultra Mobile PCs: Simon Thomas of Think4IT would like to introduce to the group some of the ViliV product range. ViliV have recently showcased some Ultra Mobile PC units at the CES in Las Vegas. This led ViliV to receive the “Best Notebook award” at CES. This, out of a competition of around 10K other contributors at the show! Ultra Mobile PC (UMPC) has been around for a while through other manufacturers, however the battery life on such units along with the usability has really left it in the shadows. Until now! ViliV have a product range that allows “True all day computing” through extended battery life (10 hours) and much more user friendly devices. For further information please visit - http://www.myviliv.com/eng/index.asp November 2009 This November meeting G Data visit to pitch their AntiVirus solution, and Think4 IT presents a demonstration of various hosted services. Whilst G DATA is fairly new to the UK, they are firmly established across Europe and have been awarded more European awards than any other AV supplier. They are looking to take on new partners to provide the G DATA range of security products to their customer base. One of their unique points is that they use 2 engines, meaning customers should have extra protection of your current offering, without impact to the performance of the machine than a single AntiVirus. The engines used are re-evaluated every 6 months to ensure that they stay on top of the current and ever changing threats, without impact upon the end user. This also allows them such high detection ability, and their new file fingerprinting system means regular scanning becomes quicker each time. Market Info Since joining the UK market G DATA have been reviewed by Virus Bulletin and come out on top for their detection capabilities. The link is as follows: http://www.virusbtn.com/news/2008/09_02 , a sample of some of our competitors are: - AVG - Malware = 95.8% Spyware =87.0%
- Sophos - Malware = 97.5% Spyware = 95%
- Panda - Malware 91.8% Spyware = 95.6%
- Symantec - Malware 98.7% Spyware = 95.4%
- Nod32 (Eset)- Malware 94.4% Spyware = 94.7%
AV CoComparatives http://www.av-comparatives.org/comparativesreviews/corporate-reviews VIRUS BULLETIN (We are AVK/G DATA) http://www.virusbtn.com/news/2008/09_02 PC WORLD http://www.pcworld.com/reviews/product/61695/review/internet_security_2010.html ComputerWorld http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&taxonomyName=Security&articleId=9133345&taxonomyId=17&pageNumber=7 Think4 IT are gratefully contributing to the life of the group with 10 min presentations on: § Microsoft SPLA § Online Backup § Hosted Spam Filtering J § Microsoft Apprenticeship Scheme And would like Partners to pitch in with their answers to the following questions; § Which manufacturers do people prefer and why different vendors fit different markets better? § What do people want from manufacturers? Agenda Timings: 18:30 – 18:30 Brief intros and airing of recent/current technical challenges 18:40 – 19:40 James Coombes presenting the G Data AntiVirus solution for business networks 19:40 – 19:50 Pizzas and break to discuss technical challenges 19:50 – 20:50 Paul Glass and Robert Gibbons presenting on various hosted service solutions 20:50 – 21:00 Wash-up period to bottom out technical challenges October 2009 This October meeting we take a look at the Managed Service software solution from CentraStage, followed by Jamie Burgess of Microsoft introducing Windows 7. CentraStage is an IT support platform with a difference - designed and built in the UK for the IT support company servicing the SME marketplace, it simplifies the management and support of thousands of remote devices over multiple customers, giving IT support companies visibility and control of their environment through a web-based management interface. Uniquely, however, and unlike many other managed service platforms and support technologies, at £1 per device per month CentraStage is priced to go on every device – PCs, laptops, servers – and works out of the box. With the core functionality of CentraStage being remote support, audit and monitoring, software deployment and configuration, reporting and web-based administration, CentraStage allows cost-effective management of customer devices through a single system. The CentraStage pricing model means no upfront capital investment - you pay monthly for what you use. Simply log in, deploy the CentraStage client software and you are up and running. For more information visit www.centrastage.com, and for a flash demo - http://centrastage.com/img/flash/centrastage_demo.html.
Microsoft’s Jamie Burgess will provide an overview of Windows 7, outlining the opportunity for partners and describing the new features and functionality of the product. He will demo it and is happy to answer your queries in terms of deployment, administration, and any trouble-shooting.
August 2009 This August meeting will be hosted by Chris Byrd of Manchester's newest secure and high quality data centre - Open Hosting in Trafford Park. It will include a tour of the centre and explanation of its infrastructure offering, followed by a presentation on the use of Voice over IP by Alistair Vernon of ITS Easy Solutions.
The Open Hosting data centre has a 100.00% uptime service level for power and network connectivity and offers high quality connection speeds of up to 10 Gigabit and having phenomonal latency connections to other data centres for some serious resilience. Chris Byrd will take us on a tour of the facilities and discuss co-location and hosting options.
Alistair Vernon of ITS Easy [solutions] with demonstration the Voice over IP solution he deploys using reconfigured Cisco handsets with a 3CX Exchange (read up on it at www.3cx.com). He'll also explain why he deploys the solution slightly differently than their recommendation - using Cisco 7940G phones which have to have their firmware adapted to work with SIP (by default they use Cisco protocols called Skinny or Call Manager).
Alistair will go through an example of re-flashing the firmware and the benefits of using the Ciscol 7940 & 7960 phones - something to do with them being dogs parts, and that refurbed phones can be found at very low cost compared to other IP phones available.
Also, he'll go through how to setup a little exchange and make it work, how to setup a SIP provider trunk service, and benefits of an IP PBX. He’ll bring down two or three phones and disprove the myth that VoIP is a poor cousin to copper wire or ISDN 30 (which is VoIP over SDSL anyway).
June 2009 So, as mentioned at the last meeting, Alex Rimmer of Sirona Solutions has put together a discussion document on establishing some useful collaborative working arrangement – see http://sbscnorthwest.org/Documents/Trusted_Suppliers_Agreement.pdf as a very good starting point for establishing some useful working relations between partners to cover for busy and holiday periods. SO NO NEED TO MEET AT 6PM FOR THIS DISCUSSION.
We’ll kick off with Ian Charles and Aaron Engels of Bull Terrier Systems focussing on 3 well known Codework products that Bull Terrier have developed using a SaaS sales model. They will focus on the value that they add to your sale using this delivery method and how you may use them to deliver additional revue streams either as up sell products to existing customers or as a means of developing new name accounts. The 3 products are AccessPatrol, BrowseReporter and BrowseControl – see http://sbscnorthwest.org/Documents/Bull_Terrier_on_Codework_17_June_2009.pdf for full details. March 2009
This month we focus on the issue of Customer Engagement – making best use of existing customers and developing mechanisms to attract new ones. We'll kick off with a discussion on the Microsoft CRM Dynamics led by Roger Collins of The CRM Business. After the Pizzas and changeover, we'll be treated to a discussion led by Mike Gelder on business networking with the likes of BNI, and capturing new customer through the use of things like Viral Videos.
The CRM Business is a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner focussed solely on delivering Business Solutions through Microsoft Dynamics CRM. Keeping PowerPoint to a minimum, and welcoming questions throughout, Roger Collins will:
• Introduce the Microsoft Dynamics CRM & give a brief demonstration of its capabilities
• Describe some customers (large & small) and how they are using CRM
• describe why he set up the company, experience of working with Microsoft and the CRM market
• Show how they use CRM in-house to solve some of the problems they experience as a small IT company. This month we focus on the issues of data protection and recovery - constant themes for IT Consultancy and Support personnel. We'll kick off with a more open discussion on data backup strategies deployed by Partners with short demos of the solutions used by Tony Caballero of Cara UK and Julian Wilkinson of Ginger to lead the discussion. After the Pizzas and changeover, we'll be treated to a discussion led by Computer Science Labs (CSL) who will be outlining the capabilities they can provide to the Group - explain the partnership framework, and showcasing the technical capabilities, training and support opportunities offered. Through their links to DataClinic, CSL say they can offer unrivalled Data Recovery solutions across a wide range of data storage media including Hard Drives, RAID Systems, USB Flash Drives etc. CSL also offer comprehensive Training, Technical Support, Products and Applications covering all aspects of Data Recovery, RAID Systems, Forensic Data Recovery as well as offering On-Line Data Backup services. December 2008 Following last month’s useful meeting where David Williams of Microsoft came along with Sean Hanlon of BT to go through concerns of Microsoft Partners in the BT Partner offering. Many of us have signed up to the offering, at least to have a look at it in more detail so it would be good to get some feedback on how that’s going. This month, we’re honoured to welcome Jamie Burgess of Microsoft (in Chris Parkes’ absence and as he’s an SBS 2008 specialist with direct line to headquarters technical support), who will lead an informative and technical session looking at both the migration of SBS 2003 R2 to SBS 2008, and also a fresh installation. He will cover the customer uses, and the benefits to Microsoft Partners, including Windows Sharepoint Services 3.0 in more depth.
Jamie will be bringing a real living breathing SBS 2008 demo environment, so will not only be able to show you the technology but if there are any specific scenario based questions he will not only be able to answer them, but should be able to show you how it is possible. It's going to be an action packed, dedicated session on partner experiences in deploying SBS2008, and Jamie is looking forward to seeing everyone, and hearing your feedback from those already using SBS 2008. If you feed back some of your experiences ahead of the meeting on Facebook or by Email, this will help Jamie prepare and can be built into the agenda timings.
Julian Wilkinson will also be able to give feedback on the technical training course he attended ‘4CO101 - Implementing and Administering Windows® Small Business Server 2008 - 2 Day’ (a similar one is due in Stockport 16-17 February). October 2008
In preparation for the launch of Windows Small Business Server 2008 and Windows Essential Business Server 2008, Gareth Hall and Emily Lambert from Microsoft will be coming along to deliver some readiness awarenes training. Microsoft are sponsoring the whole meeting and inviting regular attendees and their friends (bring a partner, win a prize – the friend must be relevant and either an existing SBSC who does not currently participate in the group, or a Microsoft Partner looking to become an SBSC partner). September 2008 · Leslie Cuppitt from Business Solutions Ltd led a discussion on Rootkits – A Practical Demonstration. Ian Charles from Bull Terrier Systems led a discussion on ways to sell outsourced IT to clients, and explaining how he sees Kaseya technology facilitating that process in terms of technology and business model. | |
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