CommVault on Tuesday announced new enhancements to its PartnerAdvantage program designed to help channel partners accelerate revenue growth and simplify collaboration as they expand into new markets, such as data protection, archiving, mobility and cloud services. The expanded program includes a globally consistent tiering approach, deal registration processes, enablement and demand generation capabilities, and an intuitive partner portal to deliver a more predictable and profitable engagement model.
To meet global demand for modern data management, channel partners need consistent ways to deliver data management and IT-as-a-service solutions that help enterprises extract value from their data and adapt to dynamic business requirements. The PartnerAdvantage program tightens CommVault’s relationships with its partners and helps ensure that solutions based on Simpana® software can meet the needs of customers, regardless of their IT requirements, and creates demand for distributor, value added reseller, systems integrator and service provider partners who invest in CommVault.
Monthly Archives: April 2014
How our Managed Services Team Responded to Heartbleed
By Jay Keating, Vice President of Managed Services
A lot has been written about the Heartbleed bug impacting versions of OpenSSL software in recent weeks. For an in-depth description of what Heartbleed is and how to respond to the vulnerability, you can refer to http://heartbleed.com/ or any number of 3rd party reports. This blog won’t review the actual weakness, but rather describe how our Managed IT Services team responded to the incident in support of our customers.
As software and hardware vendors release code updates to deal with vulnerabilities such as Heartbleed, our Managed IT Services team assesses overall risk in context to mitigating factors and then recommends a course of action. In the case of Heartbleed, since the scope was so broad, we prioritized our assessment in the following tiers:
- We quickly evaluated our internal systems and support tools. This important step had to happen immediately so our own management tools weren’t creating risk or concern for our customers.
- We then evaluated all Managed IT Services customers’ Internet-facing devices such as firewalls and web servers. All devices that were exposed have been patched at this point, and customers were notified of the risk and mitigation plan immediately. In this case, given the extent of the exposure, we declared emergency maintenance windows with our customers rather than wait for pre-approved monthly maintenance windows.
- Finally, with the Internet-facing systems no longer vulnerable, we have refocused on our customers’ internal networks for the next round of assessments and mitigation. As we work through this phase, we will once again work collaboratively with our Managed IT Services customers to coordinate an acceptable maintenance window as soon as possible.
With Heartbleed still top of mind, I suggest a few moments of reflection to think through how your organization responded. Here are some questions to help frame your review:
- Do you have a formal security incident response program in place and was it useful in responding to Heartbleed? If not, who will manage your response and what process will be followed?
- How long did it take you to fully understand your risks? How long did you expect it to take?
- Do you have support and maintenance contracts in place for all components of your infrastructure, and are the support contact details documented within your security incident response plan?
- Who is responsible for internal and external communication in case you need to declare emergency maintenance periods?
- What will your staffing plan be if your team goes into extended hours of operation in response to a security threat?
- Who are your key IT delivery partners and what resources could they bring to your assistance if you need help with assessment, planning, communication, mitigation, and / or recovery?
Just answering those six questions will improve your response program. Let us know if we can help.
Learn more about how your organization can properly manage your IT environment
Removing Obstacles to Enterprise Printing Across the Cloud
Printing and the cloud are seemingly at opposite ends of an organization’s infrastructure spectrum. Printing remains one of the last bastions of an organization’s infrastructure that cannot be completely virtualized since the whole point of printing is to take something virtual and make it physical. The cloud allows businesses to be more efficient and printing should be one of those business processes, maybe even the most basic business process that could be simplified with the cloud.
The big benefit of cloud printing is that it drastically simplifies intra-organizational printing structures and flattens the complexities of coordinating hardware across a widely distributed system of computers. Of course, not all cloud printing is created equal, and – as with any new technology – the cloud brings with it a slew of new challenges. Among these are the differences between public and private cloud printing and the ease of implementation to achieve these benefits. Figuring out these differences is central to understanding how to successfully implement a cloud-printing solution for your organization.
Removing Obstacles to Enterprise Printing Across the Cloud
Printing and the cloud are seemingly at opposite ends of an organization’s infrastructure spectrum. Printing remains one of the last bastions of an organization’s infrastructure that cannot be completely virtualized since the whole point of printing is to take something virtual and make it physical. The cloud allows businesses to be more efficient and printing should be one of those business processes, maybe even the most basic business process that could be simplified with the cloud.
The big benefit of cloud printing is that it drastically simplifies intra-organizational printing structures and flattens the complexities of coordinating hardware across a widely distributed system of computers. Of course, not all cloud printing is created equal, and – as with any new technology – the cloud brings with it a slew of new challenges. Among these are the differences between public and private cloud printing and the ease of implementation to achieve these benefits. Figuring out these differences is central to understanding how to successfully implement a cloud-printing solution for your organization.
Enterprise API Adoption Patterns
APIs came about to help companies create and manage their digital ecosystem, enabling them not only to reach more customers through more devices, but also create a large supporting ecosystem of developers and partners. While Facebook, Twitter and Netflix were the early adopters of APIs, large enterprises have been quick to embrace the concept of APIs and have been leveraging APIs as a connective tissue that powers all interactions between their customers, partners and employees.
As enterprises embrace APIs, some very specific Enterprise API Adoption patterns and best practices have started emerging.
In his session at 14th Cloud Expo, Sachin Agarwal, VP of Product Marketing and Strategy at SOA Software, will talk about the most common enterprise API patterns and will discuss how enterprises can successfully launch an API program.
The New Face of Procurement
The power of data-driven business networks is increasing, but how do enterprises best leverage that intelligence as they seek new services, products and efficiency?
The next BriefingsDirect thought-leader panel discussion focuses on the future of business and how companies can benefit from the new insight and analysis that transparent business networks and processes allow.
The power of data-driven business networks and the analytics derived from them are increasing, but how do enterprises best leverage that intelligence as they seek new services, products and efficiency? How do automation and intelligence enter the picture for better matching buyers and sellers?
Data Management Decisions: Five Direct Questions
The market is full of buzz about cloud computing, and with it come sweeping claims about simplicity and savings. Deciding to migrate some or all database management to a cloud hosting provider, however, is a more complex undertaking than conventional wisdom may suggest.
This white paper from Peak 10 addresses five primary questions posed by technology leaders as they assess their data management options. We address the true cost of a hosted data storage strategy; safety and security issues; access to peak period resources; data latency concerns; and the value of quality consultative and technical support.
How Big Data is driving Cloud adoption among businesses
A survey report published on the ExpertIP blog late last year showed that enterprise CIOs see big data as the technology that will cause the biggest organizational impact over the next few years. However, given the complexity of the systems involved, only 40% of the CIOs are expected to rise up to the big data challenge by 2017.
One area where big data is expected to be a game changer is in cloud adoption.
A recent Technology Business Review study showed that big data analytics has helped in significantly driving the revenues of the top cloud service providers over the past few years. Their study found the cloud market to be a $15.1 billion market during the fourth quarter of 2013. This growth has been primarily through the adoption of big data analytics.
Take the example of Salesforce.com. According to the TBR report, companies like Salesforce and enterprise …
Social Cloud: Revolutionizing Sharing, Starting from the Infrastructure
The social media expansion has shown just how people are eager to share their experiences with the rest of the world. Cloud technology is the perfect platform to satisfy this need given its great flexibility and readiness. At Cynny, we aim to revolutionize how people share and organize their digital life through a brand new cloud service, starting from infrastructure to the users’ interface.
A revolution that began from inventing and designing our very own infrastructure: we have created the first server network powered solely by ARM CPU. The microservers have “organism-like” features, differentiating them from any of the current technologies. Benefits include low consumption of energy, making Cynny the ecologically friendly alternative for storage as well as cheaper infrastructure, lower running costs, etc.
Cloud Computing: Solving the Next Friction Point
Today, developers and business units are leading the charge to cloud computing. The primary driver: faster access to computing resources by using the cloud’s automated infrastructure provisioning. However, fast access to infrastructure exposes the next friction point: creating, delivering, and operating applications much faster.
In his session at 14th Cloud Expo, Bernard Golden, VP of Strategy at ActiveState, will discuss why solving the next friction point is critical for true cloud computing success and how developers and business units can leverage service catalogs, frameworks, and DevOps to achieve the true goal of IT: delivering increased business value through applications.