Acronis Cyber Platform APIs to spark new channel business
Acronis aims to broaden the services and product integrations available to its partners, thanks to new developer APIs for the Acronis Cyber Platform; other news from the week.
Data protection vendor Acronis has revealed plans to open up its underlying technology platform to third-party developers.
The company said the move aims to expand the variety of partner-provided services and third-party application integrations with the Acronis Cyber Platform. The Acronis Cyber Platform forms the basis for the vendor's services, which include backup, file sync and share, notary and disaster recovery. Until now, access to the platform APIs has been limited to a handful of integration partners, including Microsoft, Google and managed service provider (MSP) software vendor ConnectWise.
"We believe the [developer] community, joining in with the Acronis platform, will be able to solve more use cases and deliver more value to more organizations than ever before," said William Toll, head of cyber platform marketing at Acronis.
In addition to creating new functionality for the Acronis Cyber Platform, partners can use developer APIs to integrate their applications with Acronis' cyber protection products. Developers can also integrate Acronis technology into their own technology or marketplaces, according to the company.
Public access to the new Acronis Cyber Platform developer APIs is slated for October, but Acronis partners can sign up for early access to the platform, said Gaidar Magdanurov, chief marketing officer at Acronis. Acronis will select early-access partners based on potential joint business opportunities, he said.
Magdanurov said Acronis expects to see a multitude of new services developed by third-party developers and resold by Acronis partners. Acronis' channel ecosystem includes ISVs, OEMs, service providers and resellers. Acronis said it works with about 50,000 partners globally.
William Toll
"We hear from service providers all of the time, every time they add an additional service, they decrease the [customer] churn. Because the customers have more services, they are less willing to consider changing the service provider," he said.
"What we want to see is ... almost all of our existing channel partners ... reselling additional services developed by third-party partners. That will be our goal," Magdanurov added.
Turnkey RPA offering debuts
A group of software vendors and a service provider are offering robotic process automation on a turnkey basis.
IGrafx, a business process management (BPM) vendor based in Tualatin, Ore., unveiled RPA Accelerator, which combines IGrafx's BPM software, MyInvenio's process mining tool, RPA bots from UiPath and Servicetrace, and professional services from BP3 Global.
Krista White, vice president of marketing at BP3, based in Austin, Texas, said the company offers complexity-based, fixed-fee pricing for its bot implementation services. An entry-level service covers one or two bots, a project-level service covers three to six bots, and a program-level service is customized to meet the customer's requirements. In addition, BP3 offers RPA as a service, in which it manages and hosts bots on its own system or the customer's system, White said.
Other news
- Networking vendor Gigamon revamped its partner program. Launched this week, the Catalyst Channel Program redesigns Gigamon's partner incentive structure, technical sales enablement resources, and training and certification program. Additionally, the Gigamon partner portal now fully integrates with the company's sales force and order automation systems, Gigamon said.
- D&H Distributing, based in Harrisburg, Pa., said it has entered an agreement with Ubiquiti, a wireless networking provider, to carry the vendor's UniFi wireless networking offerings. Those products include single- and dual-band wireless access points, routers, security gateways, switches, bridges and other products geared toward MSPs. The offerings let MSPs deploy large-scale, distributed Wi-Fi networks in environments such as campuses and branch locations, according to the company.
- Lifeboat Distribution, a value-added distributor in Eatontown, N.J., has inked a distribution pact with Zadara Storage, a storage-as-a-service provider. Zadara offers enterprise NAS and SAN services with NFS, CIFS/AD and iSCSI interfaces and dual HA controllers, according to Lifeboat.
- Remote monitoring and management vendor Pulseway added a third-party patch management module to its platform. Pulseway said the module aims to automatically update Windows and third-party applications.
- StorOne, a software-defined storage vendor, signed a distribution deal with Tech Data. Tech Data will offer StorOne all-flash array, virtual machine, high-capacity and secondary storage technology, according to StorOne.
- Green House Data, an IT services provider based in Cheyenne, Wyo., said it has become a Microsoft Azure Expert MSP. Microsoft launched the Azure Expert MSP program in 2018.
- RSM US, a midmarket audit, tax and consulting services firm based in Chicago, has opened a Technology Experience Center in Denver. The center aims to help current and prospective clients plan their digital transformation, according to the company.
- Varonis Systems, a data security and analytics provider, launched an invitation-only program for customers and partners. The Varonis Elite Program aims to connect and recognize contributors to the Varonis Customer Community, the company said. A Varonis spokesperson said the program is available to existing and future partners after they have worked with Varonis for a year.
- Continuum, an IT management software provider, has expanded its security platform to include five solution areas. New to the portfolio are Continuum Enable, a technical training, certification and sales coaching program for MSPs; and Continuum Assist, which lets service providers tap personnel in Continuum's network operations center, security operations center and help desk to support clients. Three other areas have been rebranded: Continuum Fortify (formerly Continuum Security), Continuum Command (formerly Continuum RMM) and Continuum Recover (formerly Continuum BDR).
- Kronos Inc., a human capital management software vendor based in Lowell, Mass., has added new partner integrations and solution extensions to its Workforce Dimensions Technology Partner Network.
- Anexinet Corp., a digital business solutions provider based in Philadelphia, launched its data Storage Health Check offering. The service includes a complimentary storage system analysis. After the analysis, the company offers customers a report describing how their existing array affects projects and applications.
- Cloud distributor Pax8 said it will provide a suite of StorageCraft services in North America. StorageCraft services include ShadowProtect, File Backup and Recovery, Cloud Backup for Office 365 and G-Suite, and Cloud Services for MSPs.
- OPAQ, a network security cloud vendor in Herndon, Va., unveiled a set of offerings providing up to 15 Gbps of hyperscale security-as-a-service networking to support digital transformation initiatives. OPAQ service provider partners are able to sell the new offerings.
- SkyKick, a cloud management software provider targeting IT solution partners, disclosed a new agreement with NTT Communications to boost the adoption of Microsoft Office 365 in Japan. NTT Communications is launching Office 365 data migration and data protection offerings using Seattle-based SkyKick's Migration Suite for Office 365 and Cloud Backup for Office 365.
- Probax, a cloud management platform vendor, released a digital marketing toolkit for MSPs. Available in North America, the toolkit offers brandable resources for executing lead-generation marketing campaigns, Probax said.
- Sparkhound, a digital solutions firm, has appointed Kent Jordan as practice director of infrastructure and named Ron Wilson as managing director of strategy and analytics. Both executives join the company's Dallas office, which has grown by more than 90% since 2017.
- Rackspace appointed Kevin Jones as CEO. Jones was most recently CEO at MV Transportation Inc. Prior to that role, Jones held management positions at DXC Technology, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Dell, HP and Electronic Data Systems.
- Diamanti, a bare-metal container infrastructure vendor, named Bill Cordero as its vice president of worldwide channels. Additionally, Diamanti said it launched the Diamanti Edge partner portal, which offers additional presales support to its certified channel partners.
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