February 18, 2011
Cloud to ‘shrink channel’
Channel Register
Richard Chirgwin shares Frost & Sullivan’s prediction of why cloud computing technology may not be so good for channel organizations.
“The cloud-computing boom is bad news for channel organizations, according to analyst firm Frost & Sullivan. At a media trends briefing in Sydney Wednesday, analyst Arun Chandrasekaran said cloud computing squeezed resellers from both ends: software vendors offering SaaS were cutting into boxed application sales, while the concentration of compute power into the cloud was cutting out the local hardware channel. ‘The problem the [software] vendors have is that they already have a channel. That channel sells services – they don’t want their vendors to sell services.’ He also highlighted the likely loss of maintenance revenue, which can make up 50 per cent of the IT budget in a large organization, as a danger to the channel”
Windows 8 tablet sooner than we expect?
ZD Net
James Kendrick writes that based on information recently leaked out by Dell, Windows 8 tablet may be coming out soon.
“Microsoft is scrambling to get some traction in the slippery tablet space, even though it invented the genre back in 2002. The next version of Windows, called Windows 8 for now, is supposed to embrace the tablet form better than anything produced to date. That should be a long way out, but information leaked by Dell implies it will release a Windows 8 tablet in Q1 of 2012. Can that timetable be met?.”
Software Appliances: A New Profit Generator for VARs?
The VAR Guy
Dan Dufault writes about the software appliance market.
“The software appliance market is forecast to break the $1 billion threshold by 2011 and grow to $3.7 billion by 2014. IDC attributes this fast growth to the fact that software appliances reduce acquisition costs and increase operational efficiencies thanks to zero integration and simplified management. So what is a software appliance? It typically includes a specific application – like e-mail, groupware, CRM or ERP software – tightly integrated with an operating system like Linux. The software appliance approach eases customer configurations and speeds deployments. In a study of five ISVs participating in the SUSE Appliance Program, IDC found that, with minimal investment, these ISVs recognized an average ROI of 566 per cent and an average payback of less than seven months.”
