CompTIA ChannelCon: Barracuda Networks, CloudPlus, Emerging Tech Take Center Stage
From conversations and presentations ChannelCon, it is clear that the industry is undergoing significant change.
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The theme of ChannelCon was “Game On.” It’s a catchphrase for a lot of what happened at the event, where emerging technologies such as drones were discussed as intently as more everyday concerns, including talent development and workforce diversity.
While originally developed as an event for channel companies including VARs, resellers, IT consultants and MSPs, ChannelCon has evolved into a broader industry and community gathering. There were more presentations for IT professionals, for example, and the showcasing of new initiatives that revolve around CompTIA’s longtime role in education and skills development. At ChannelCon, the Chicagoland-based trade group showcased its new framework called The Future of Tech, which is a free library of assets designed to help a learner of almost any ability better understand digital innovation.
To convey the industry’s readiness for new issues and opportunities, CompTIA arranged to have old-style video games on hand. True geeks had an opportunity to wind down with classic games including Pac-Man, Space Invaders, Mario Brothers and more.
If you were looking for insights on AI, IoT, blockchain, drones and biometrics, ChannelCon didn’t disappoint. Industrial applications and use cases for drones were widely discussed, focusing on promising opportunities in mapping and surveys, inspections, surveillance, emergency services and commercial photography. According to IDC, the market for drone equipment to make applications for these markets will generate $9.2 billion in 2019. Another researcher, Drone Industry Insights, says the market for drone-related technologies will reach $43 billion by 2024.
While thought leaders at ChannelCon 19 were generally upbeat about the future of emerging technology, some well-known names advised moving cautiously. This includes Dave Sobel, senior director of MSP evangelism at SolarWinds. A self-described geek at heart, Sobel nonetheless cautions channel practitioners to not overlook the “hazards” of emerging technology.
In a session moderated by CompTIA senior research director Seth Robinson — and featuring Sobel (middle); Madelaine Martin, head of growth and education at Smith.ai (left); and Rob Rae, vice president of business development at Datto (right) — Sobel told the story of a dispute between the FCC and The Weather Bureau. The dispute revolved around competing tech standards. If one of the bandwidth ideas proposed was embraced, it would have weakened the ability of weather professionals to track storms — so much so that forecasters would have likely underestimated the threat from Hurricane Sandy. Under the proposed idea, computer models would have forecast the storm moving out to sea before causing too much damage.
Let’s make sure we get technology right before going all in on now and then, Sobel says.
Martin had a slightly different take. She says there are valuable lessons that can be learned by establishing yourself as a tech pioneer.
One of the more compelling presentations was delivered by Eric O’Neill, a former FBI counterterrorism and counterintelligence operative, national security attorney and current corporate security consultant. The author of Gray Day, O’Neill is the subject of Universal Studios’ feature film, Breach, which showcases the role he played in the capture of the most notorious spy in U.S. history, Robert Phillip Hanssen.
O’Neill’s stories of cloak and daggers were enthralling. But his message was more sobering: The spy game has changed so much due to the ability to conduct surveillance, gather information and inflict harm online that we can no longer limit ourselves to cyberdefense. The U.S. must now think in terms of cyber offense, he says.
“Remember breach anxiety? Now we are desensitized” to new cyberattacks, which is worrisome because data has become the currency of our lives, says O’Neill.
To drive his point home, O’Neill told the crowd that there are no hackers, only spies.
Big man Shaquille O’Neal, one of the stars of Dream Team II, the gold medal-winning U.S. Olympic basketball team from 1996, has achieved success in a number of pursuits. He was a successful investor in three startups: Google, Ring and The General Insurance. Since leaving the NBA in 2011, he’s earned a doctorate degree in human resource development. He’s also developed into one of the most admired television sportscasters in the nation for his work on Inside the NBA on TNT.
O’Neal credits his parents for giving him grounding. Early mistakes also played a role in his life. When he joined CompTIA CEO Todd Thibodeaux on the ChannelCon main stage, he told the audience that people have approached him with all kinds of get-rich schemes. Often, they involved selling relative ordinary things such as “tables” and expecting huge profits afterward. He learned early on in his career that these endeavors didn’t produce wealth. Investing in things that change humanity and the world, which he learned from Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, does.
Another billionaire taught him another valuable lesson. O’Neill says the day he heard Bill Gates say, “Don’t focus on a problem but the solution instead,” he changed his outlook.
Another thing he learned early in his career: Don’t spend your paycheck without knowing about taxes.
One day, O’Neill joked, he and “FICA” were going to fight it out.
Photo courtesy CompTIA
Tony Francisco is the CEO of a small tech company that has Shaq-like potential. The company is CloudPlus, which Francisco insists has the opportunity to do to software distribution what Airbnb did to the vacation rental market.
At ChannelCon, Channel Futures sat down with CloudPlus, which provides the digital services that end customers need, white-labeled for solution providers. Francisco, who has been working on the idea for several years, says he’s now in a “game-changing” position. What started off as a marketplace has now been transformed into a true, hosted services distribution platform.
“Customers face the ease of consumption counterbalanced by vendor management today,” says Francisco. Having a single location where customers can buy and manage all of their digital services no matter what they are is exactly what Amazon did, he says. And CloudPlus, thanks to the addition of a single user name and password for all services, is in a similar position.
X-as-a-service has fundamentally changed the way that technology is delivered. So says Neal Bradbury, the head of business development at Barracuda MSP. Bradbury is a familiar face in the channel, which warmed to the data protection technology his company, Intronis, began selling several years ago. (Intronis was acquired by Barracuda in 2015.)
Bradbury is also a familiar face at CompTIA, where he has served as the vice chair of the group’s IT Security Community. At ChannelCon, Channel Futures sat down with Bradbury, who focused his attention on Barracuda’s recent momentum in email protection solutions. (Bookings of Barracuda Essentials, the company’s all-in-one email security, backup and archiving service, grew 46% year over year in the company’s recently completed 2020 fiscal first quarter. What’s more, the company’s MSP division enjoyed growth of 122% in recurring revenue for its email protection in the same period.)
Bradbury notes that email threats and breaches will only continue to grow. Every day, CFOs are being asked to transfer funds, presumably by their CEOs in various schemes. Alas, a good many do so after it’s too late.
In addition to talking email protection, Bradbury took a moment to reflect on his years of attending ChannelCon events and seeing changes in the channel. Unlike some, Bradbury believes cloud computing and X-as-a-service, in particular, have helped partners develop more profitable revenue streams and increase customer intimacy.
Amid all the phishing schemes he’s helping MSPs combat, it’s nice to know that the internet is still transforming some business lives in a positive way.
After serving as the president of Passportal, which was acquired by SolarWinds in April, Dan Wensley surfaced at another company, Warranty Master. Wensley joined in June as CEO, which proves the adage that it’s hard to keep a good man down. Make that out, as in “out of the channel.”
ChannelCon 2019 was the first time Channel Futures got to sit down with Wensley one on one since he joined Warranty Master. The former CompTIA board of directors member says he’s as excited about Warranty Master as he’s been about any company.
“Warranty Master, much like other technology companies I have been involved with, is hitting some of the key value propositions for MSPs and their internal partners,” he says.
This includes lowering IT service deliver costs, providing optimization, delivering automation for partners internally, and providing them with a new revenue opportunity thanks to the reporting tools and dashboards Warranty Master is developing.
“We’re helping partners drive more revenue because they are now able to have more consultative conversations with their customers about renewing desktops, laptops, network devices and servers. At the end of the day we are just an integrated asset life-cycle management application, but we help partners sell more and service less,” says Wensley.
Today Warranty Master has 6,000 partners. Every month, 250 more sign up with the company.
That’s not bad company to be in. Just ask Dan.
After serving as the president of Passportal, which was acquired by SolarWinds in April, Dan Wensley surfaced at another company, Warranty Master. Wensley joined in June as CEO, which proves the adage that it’s hard to keep a good man down. Make that out, as in “out of the channel.”
ChannelCon 2019 was the first time Channel Futures got to sit down with Wensley one on one since he joined Warranty Master. The former CompTIA board of directors member says he’s as excited about Warranty Master as he’s been about any company.
“Warranty Master, much like other technology companies I have been involved with, is hitting some of the key value propositions for MSPs and their internal partners,” he says.
This includes lowering IT service deliver costs, providing optimization, delivering automation for partners internally, and providing them with a new revenue opportunity thanks to the reporting tools and dashboards Warranty Master is developing.
“We’re helping partners drive more revenue because they are now able to have more consultative conversations with their customers about renewing desktops, laptops, network devices and servers. At the end of the day we are just an integrated asset life-cycle management application, but we help partners sell more and service less,” says Wensley.
Today Warranty Master has 6,000 partners. Every month, 250 more sign up with the company.
That’s not bad company to be in. Just ask Dan.
Channel Futures huddled with industry leaders at last week’s CompTIA ChannelCon 2019 conference, which attracted hundreds of vendors, IT service providers, business consultants and thought leaders. While at the event in Las Vegas, Chanel Futures sat down with the CEOs and channel chiefs of several companies, including Warranty Master, CloudPlus, Barracuda Networks and more.
From these conversations and presentations at ChannelCon, it’s clear that the industry is undergoing significant change. New technologies are showing promise of creating significant revenue opportunities for partners, while old challenges – including margin erosion, industry consolidation and a talent shortage – loom large. So do increased concerns over cybersecurity, which permeated almost every presentation and discussion.
No wonder it was often hard to find an empty seat at ChannelCon 19.
In the slideshow above, we present some of the finest thinking from the event, some of which came from very unexpected sources. Who knew that former NBA great Shaquille O’Neal was such a geek and entrepreneur at heart? The wisdom O’Neal provided herein is some of the best from the event.
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