Drobo and Acronis Partner to Provide Storage Solutions for Small Businesses

by OpenView

Data storage specialist Drobo is teaming up with Acronis, a provider of disaster recovery and data protection solutions, to deliver a backup and recovery solution for small and midsize businesses (SMBs).

The joint solution incorporates Drobo’s business storage arrays as well as backup and recovery solutions from Acronis.

A recent global threat awareness survey from Acronis found that businesses are struggling to maintain adequate backup and recovery provisions as their environments evolve and expand. More than half of survey respondents admitted to not backing up their virtual data as often as their data on physical machines, and nearly 60 percent are using separate solutions for their virtual and physical environments. The combined solution from Acronis and Drobo is designed to help ease the IT management burden and accelerate data recovery following an unexpected failure.

Drobo also announced the development and enhancement of lab-tested and joint-partner solutions in the form of simple “how-to” guides and online video tutorials created with industry partners including VMware, Citrix, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Veeam, Symantec, Acronis, Double-Take, Carbonite, Pogoplug and OCZ. These resources are designed to address small and midsize business (SMB) storage solution needs, including virtualization, cloud computing and data protection.

Drobo solutions include the server virtualization platforms such as VMware vSphere and Citrix XenServer for high-availability applications and OCZ for automated data-aware tiering of mixed workloads in virtualized environments; disaster recovery such as VMware Site Recovery Manager for leveraging vSphere replication between dissimilar storage; Double-Take Availability from Vision Solutions for physical and virtual server DR failover; and off-site file replication for unstructured data in smaller organizations leveraging Drobo Sync.

The solution set also includes cloud storage services from Amazon for leveraging the AWS Storage Gateway for automatic off-site backup to cloud, Carbonite for off-site cloud backup and Pogoplug for remote access to files and cloud backup.

In the category of data protection and backup, Drobo offers solutions featuring Veeam Backup and Replication for protecting VMware and Microsoft virtual environments, Acronis Backup and Recovery for heterogeneous backup of physical and virtual servers, and Symantec Backup Exec for extending storage for SMB backup with deduplication options.

The company said it would continue its solution development and training in the coming weeks with dedicated solutions for Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft Hyper-V, VMware vCloud and others.

For each solution, Drobo develops materials that allow customers and resellers to design their solution with need-based components, and Drobo also provides detailed instructions for sizing and implementing the solution in a validated manner. Each solution includes a 30-minute video tutorial by an expert and a detailed how-to guide providing step-by-step instructions.

According to recent cloud usage research conducted by Drobo, 96 percent of SMBs (with up to 500 employees) report they will store at least 50 percent of their data on-site for a minimum of the next three years. Factors cited included cloud performance, security and reliability concerns. Both businesses and individuals did state they want tighter and more automated integration between their on-site data and their cloud provider.

About Acronis

Acronis is a leading provider of easy-to-use disaster recovery and data protection solutions for physical, virtual and cloud environments. Its patented disk imaging technology enables corporations, SMBs and consumers to protect their digital assets. With Acronis’ disaster recovery, deployment and migration software, users protect their digital information, maintain business continuity and reduce downtime.

Acronis software is sold in more than 90 countries and available in up to 14 languages. For additional information, please visit www.acronis.com. Follow @Acronis on Twitter: http://twitter.com/acronis

Acronis® and the Acronis logo are registered trademarks or trademarks of Acronis Inc. in the United States and/or other countries.

Contact Information

Lucy Millington
Acronis, Inc.
T: 781.782.9181
E: [email protected]

Meredith Eaton
March Communications
T: 617.960.9877
E: [email protected]

Acronis Wins Best Small Call Center of the Year Award

by OpenView

Acronis, a leading provider of easy-to-use disaster recovery and data protection solutions for physical, virtual, and cloud environments, today proudly announced that its Customer Central Support team has received the most prestigious award in Russia for its exceptional level of customer support.

Acronis has won the Crystal Headset award for Best Small Call Center of the Year.

The Russian Call Center Guru Community has been awarding the Crystal Headset to the best customer support teams since 2005. These annual awards have since grown to become an industry standard, recognizing customer support excellence across Russia and 9 other countries in Eastern Europe. In 2012, the judges received 223 nominations from businesses across the region and recognized only the top 20 with awards.

“Customer satisfaction is central to Acronis corporate strategy,” commented Ed Benack, chief customer officer & CIO at Acronis. “Being honored by this highly regarded community is a great achievement for our team. The quality of global call centers in Russia is incredibly high, so to win this award against competition from all sectors and some major brands is a testament to the rigorous standards and commitment to customers that our team deliver on every day.”

Serving Acronis customers worldwide in 8 languages, the Acronis Customer Central Support team won not only the Best Small Call Center of the Year award, but was also honored as a finalist in two other categories: Best Customer Service Call Center and Best Call Center for Work.

“One of our core values is to err on the side of the customer,” continued Frost. “Our support professionals receive the highest levels of ongoing training, along with the empowerment to ‘make things right’ for our customers. It is this commitment to personal development that also ensures Acronis can attract the top talent in the industry. We are also very proud to be honored as one of the best places to work.”

Acronis Customer Central uses Customer Operations Performance Center Inc. COPC-2000® CSP Standard 5.0 as Operational Frameworkwhich is the world’s highest Customer Service Standard. The team plays a crucial role in the ongoing development and improvement of processes across all Acronis operations to maintain the highest levels of customer satisfaction.

Notes to Editors:

  • Acronis was recently awarded the 2011 Global Call Center of the Year Silver Award for Strategic Value by the International Customer Management Institute (ICMI)
  • Acronis maintains five Customer Call centers worldwide, in four countries serving more than 2.6 million customers in 9 languages.

About Acronis

Acronis is a leading provider of easy-to-use disaster recovery and data protection solutions for physical, virtual and cloud environments. Its patented disk imaging technology enables corporations, SMBs and consumers to protect their digital assets. With Acronis’ disaster recovery, deployment and migration software, users protect their digital information, maintain business continuity and reduce downtime.

Acronis software is sold in more than 90 countries and available in up to 14 languages. For additional information, please visit www.acronis.com. Follow @Acronis on Twitter: http://twitter.com/acronis

Acronis® and the Acronis logo are registered trademarks or trademarks of Acronis Inc. in the United States and/or other countries.

Contact Information

Lucy Millington
Acronis, Inc.
T: 781.782.9181
E: [email protected]

Meredith Eaton
March Communications
T: 617.960.9877
E: [email protected]

VersionOne’s AgilePalooza Community Event Comes to Portland, Oregon

by OpenView

VersionOne, recognized by agile practitioners as the leader in agile management tools, today announced that its popular AgilePalooza event is coming to Portland, OR on April 13th.

AgilePalooza is a community event that brings together internationally recognized agile coaches and trainers with local software professionals. Attendees will learn about advancing agile methods through workshops and collaborative sessions.

During breakout sessions, attendees will have the opportunity to ask questions and participate in group discussions. The keynote presentation, ‘Creating Strawberry Jam: A Roadmap for Enterprise Agile Transformation,’ will be delivered by Dr. Ahmed Sidky, also known as Dr. Agile.

About the Event

Who:

Attendees will benefit from several educational sessions and workshops delivered by recognized and experienced agile experts, including:

Dr. Ahmed Sidky has a Ph.D. in value–based process frameworks for effective agile adoption. Ahmed’s work has gained popularity and respect in the agile community as a pragmatic approach for organizations of all sizes attempting to adopt agile.

Ahmed is frequently referred to as “Dr. Agile,” on account of developing a free online agile readiness assessment tool named Doctor Agile (http://www.doctoragile.com). He is the co–author of a top-rated agile adoption book, Becoming Agile in an Imperfect World. On Twitter @ASidky

Diana Larsen Drawing on 15+ years of experience working with technical professionals, Diana is a pragmatic agile consultant with FutureWorks Consulting. Diana leads system-wide groups in collaborative thinking and planning, as well as guiding teams through project kick-offs, chartering and retrospectives.

She coaches managers and leaders on their roles in a changing workplace, and presents workshops on agile adoption, self-organizing team development, team leadership and management, organizational change, and leading retrospectives. Diana is a current officer and former chair of the Agile Alliance Board of Directors, and has co-authored Agile Retrospectives: Making Good Teams Great! On Twitter @DianaofPortland

Dave Sharrock drives change within technology-driven organizations through the introduction of agile product development practices, using agile frameworks such as Scrum.

As an agile coach, Dave works closely with clients to help introduce sustainable agile change into an organization, providing direction and coaching to executive management teams, supporting organizations to overcome the challenges of agility at scale, and introducing and working with agile teams and product managers on the implementation and improvement of agile methods. On Twitter @DaveSharrock

What:

For $69, attendees receive a full day of agile learning, lunch and the opportunity to participate in one of two tracks: Practicing Agile and Planning Agile. The Practicing Agile track is geared toward those interested in agile fundamentals and engineering practices and the Planning Agile track is for those planning and managing multiple teams and projects.

Additionally, the all-afternoon Open Space continues to provide great opportunities for learning. Open Space is a fun, interactive, simple, collaborative discussion format where all attendees have a chance to share best practices with peers and VersionOne’s network of experts.

Where:

Sheraton Portland Airport Hotel, 8235 NE Airport Way, Portland, OR 97220; (503) 281-2500

When:

Friday, April 13, 2012; 8:30 am – 4:00 pm

More: For more information on AgilePalooza Portland, or to register, please visit:http://agilepalooza.com/Portland2012/default.asp

About VersionOne

VersionOne is recognized by agile practitioners as the leader in agile project management tools. By simplifying the planning and tracking of agile projects, we help teams deliver better software faster. Since 2002, companies such as Adobe, Boeing, bwin, Intuit, Lilly, Lockheed Martin, McKesson, Oppenheimer, Qualcomm, Sabre and Siemens have turned to VersionOne.

Today more than 50,000 teams from around the globe use VersionOne. Agile Made Easier @ VersionOne.com.

Media Contact:

Andrea Keeble
678.648.1275
[email protected]

PartyLite Upgrades to Zmags CommercePro to Strengthen E-Commerce Sales

by OpenView

News Facts:

  • Zmags, the leading provider of rich media mobile and social merchandising, announced that PartyLite, the direct selling company specializing in candles, candle warmers, premium home fragrances and decor, has increased its investment with Zmags to boost product discovery and purchase online as well as via mobile and social channels.
  • PartyLite has selected Zmags CommercePro as the platform for the direct seller’s new commerce-enabled digital catalogs. PartyLite customers will now enjoy a rich and engaging digital brand experience that complements the unique PartyLite home-party experience, and they will also be able to complete purchases directly within the catalog.
  • Previous to this upgrade, PartyLite’s Zmags-powered catalogs helped the direct seller reduce e-commerce programming costs by more than $60,000. By upgrading to CommercePro, PartyLite will also drive top-line sales across its online, mobile and Facebook catalogs.
  • Zmags CommercePro integrates commerce transaction capability directly into the digital catalog or brochure, enabling retailers and brands to monetize online, mobile and social merchandising while providing a unified experience across tablets, websites, smartphones and social networks.

Supporting Quotes:

“Using Zmags, our catalogs are rich and engaging so that PartyLite online shoppers and Facebook fans feel like they are still part of a true PartyLite experience and are more motivated to browse and purchase,” said Michael Norris, President of PartyLite North America. “Our greatest strength is the unique home-party experience that our independent consultants create. Thanks to Zmags, they can now extend that experience to customers wherever they spend their time online.”

“PartyLite is a great example of a company that has built its reputation not only on premium products but also on an effective direct-selling business model that engages its clientele and builds lasting relationships,” said Sean Ford, COO and CMO of Zmags. “With Zmags, PartyLite is providing its representatives a new way to serve their customers, expand their reach and optimize their sales using today’s most popular tablet, mobile and social channels.”

About PartyLite

PartyLite is the number one direct seller of candles, candle warmers and home-fragrance products in the world with nearly 60,000 independent consultants in 18 countries. PartyLite holds the number 21 spot in the Direct Selling News Global 100: The Top Direct Selling Companies in the World.

Based in Plymouth, Mass., PartyLite was established in 1973 and is a subsidiary of Blyth, Inc., a leading multi-channel designer and marketer of home fragrance, home decor products and household convenience items. For more information about PartyLite, please visit www.partylite.com and www.facebook.com/partylite.

About Zmags 

Zmags helps thousands of the world’s most progressive global retailers and brands design brilliant and consistent marketing and merchandising campaigns across social, mobile, tablet, and e-commerce platforms, driving product discovery and inspiring purchases. Using the Zmags on-demand rich media merchandising platform, leading brands have measurably and dramatically increased customer engagement, conversion rates, order size and brand loyalty without the burden of IT constraints.

Zmags is among the fastest growing technology companies in North America, ranking #70 on the Deloitte 2011 Technology Fast 500. Zmags is headquartered in Boston, MA. with European offices in London and Copenhagen. For more information about Zmags, please visit www.zmags.com.

Contact: 

Samantha McGarry
InkHouse for Zmags
[email protected]
781-966-4107

UnboundID Receives $12.5 Million in Series B Funding from OpenView Venture Partners

by OpenView

UnboundID, a leading platform provider for identity services, today announced that it has secured $12.5 million in series B funding from OpenView Venture Partners.

The funds will be used to expand market penetration into new geographies and vertical markets, and to develop new products to meet existing and future customer needs. UnboundID plans to accelerate product development for its identity services platform, which enables companies to dynamically manage, protect, and share real-time customer data across cloud, mobile, and social applications.

“We are excited to partner with the team at UnboundID and to make our first investment out of our third fund,” said OpenView Managing Director Adam Marcus.

“The company is already solving the big data problem facing many of the world’s largest consumer brands and cloud vendors. Their platform enables marketers to get a single view of their customers at every touch point, which we believe will be mission critical going forward.”

The explosive growth of cloud, social, and mobile computing has forced a dramatic shift toward simplifying how user information is managed, secured, and exposed. UnboundID has successfully taken advantage of this trend to help its customers tap into the new revenue streams being created by today’s identity services-driven economy.

“We’ve set clear and challenging goals for the next two years, and OpenView’s support will help us achieve them,” said UnboundID CEO Steve Shoaff.

“We know where the opportunities are, we have the technology and professional expertise to hit the market sweet spots, and we now have the additional resources to make it happen in short order. We want to thank OpenView for putting their trust in us, and we look forward to another successful year.”

Identity information is a major contributing force behind big data, which will become a key driver of competition fostering productivity growth, innovation, and consumer surplus. UnboundID is an established leader in providing the technology to handle the tremendous growth in identity data.

In February, at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, UnboundID unveiled its platform development and marketing strategy for enabling the proliferation and management of identity services to facilitate the open and secure, real-time exchange of identity data.
Unlike traditional identity management solutions, which may increase efficiency and productivity but are still relegated as cost centers, UnboundID’s identity services platform enables companies to maximize average revenue per customer. Like currency, identity data is traded by individuals for information and services, and traded among companies who use it to increase the value of their offerings.
For more information on how the currency of identity data will drive business value, see UnboundID’s new white paper, “Prospering in the Identity Economy.”
OpenView Venture Partners announced its third fund of $200 million March 21. The Boston-based venture capital firm invests in high-growth software, Internet, and technology-enabled companies.

About OpenView Venture Partners

OpenView Venture Partners (openviewpartners.com) is an expansion-stage venture capital fund based in Boston that is focused on high-growth software, Internet, and technology-enabled companies. Through its staff of seasoned operating executives, who collectively bring several decades of technology and management experience to the firm, OpenView is able to help portfolio companies quickly optimize their product, go-to-market, and organizational and operational functions.

Founded in 2006, the firm invests globally and has approximately $445 million in total capital under management.

About UnboundID Corp.

UnboundID is a leading platform provider for identity services, enabling companies to dynamically manage, protect, and share customer data in real-time across cloud, mobile and social applications. UnboundID solutions help companies increase average revenue per customer while significantly lowering their costs for service and application delivery.

UnboundID is a privately held company based in Austin, Texas and is funded by Silverton Partners and OpenView Venture Partners. For more information, visit www.unboundID.com.

UnboundID is a registered trademark of UnboundID Corp. All other company and product names mentioned are used only for identification and may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.

Contacts

for UnboundID
Jennifer Pett, 512-573-9516
[email protected]

Zmags Presents Live Webinar: “Taking Your Brand Beyond the Web — And Why You Need to Do It Now”

by OpenView

Zmags, the leading provider of rich media mobile and social merchandising, today announced a live webinar that will help retailers determine what is needed to take a brand beyond the Web and meet customers where they want to shop.

The webinar will address how to best deliver a consistent, branded experience across all touchpoints.

Title: Taking Your Brand Beyond the Web—And Why You Need to Do it Now
When: Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Time: 1:00 p.m. ET / 10:00 a.m. PT
Presenters: Lauren Freedman, president, the e-tailing group
Sean Ford, CMO & COO, Zmags
Why: Connected consumers were the big news in 2011. Adoption of tablets and smartphones skyrocketed, and so did shoppers’ appetite for discovery-driven online purchasing.  This pace is only going to heat up in 2012. To get ready for the multi-channel marathon leading into the 2012 holiday season, retailers must start planning now.
What: During this free webinar, the expert panel will share some key trends and takeaways from the 2011 holiday season as well as best practices to help retailers take their brands beyond the Web—now. Attendees will learn:
    • The evolution of the omnichannel online shopper—demands, behavior and buying patterns.
    • The meteoric adoption of tablets, and what leading retailers are doing about it.
    • To app or not to app? Are there better ways to go?
    • What’s up with social e-commerce? Will it ever deliver?

Register Here: http://bit.ly/GDwWGB

About Zmags

Zmags helps thousands of the world’s most progressive global retailers and brands design brilliant and consistent marketing and merchandising campaigns across social, mobile, tablet, and e-commerce platforms, driving product discovery and inspiring purchases.

Using the Zmags on-demand rich media merchandising platform, leading brands have measurably and dramatically increased customer engagement, conversion rates, order size and brand loyalty without the burden of IT constraints. Zmags is among the fastest growing technology companies in North America, ranking #70 on the Deloitte 2011 Technology Fast 500.

Zmags is headquartered in Boston, MA with European offices in London and Copenhagen. For more information about Zmags, please visit www.zmags.com.

Contact:

Jen DeAngelis
InkHouse for Zmags
781-966-4105
[email protected]

Research Company Deploys Acronis Virtual Machine Backup

by OpenView

London-based IFF Research has deployed Acronis vmProtect 7 to provide virtual machine backup and disaster recovery provision.

IFF Research conducts research for a wide variety of private- and public-sector clients in the UK. Faced with growing amounts of data, the company recently virtualized 90% of its IT infrastructure in a VMware environment to help cut costs. The company needed a backup and recovery solution to safeguard all its data.

Having already deployed Acronis Backup & Recovery 11 Advanced Server to protect its physical IT infrastructure, IFF Research opted for Acronis vmProtect 7 for VMware vSphere servers using ESX hypervisors to complete its backup and recovery strategy. The product carries out agentless backups of virtual machines, and installation took less than an hour as there was no need to install the software on each VM.

Simon Hulbert, IT manager at IFF Research, said, “Acronis vmProtect 7 is intuitive and effective. It provides all the backup tools we need for our virtual environment. It also gives us the peace of mind that we require that our data is always protected and that we are meeting all data protection regulations.”

 

ExactTarget IPO: Stock Price Soared 33.95% than Offering Price

by OpenView

ExactTarget IPO watch:

The U.S. e-mail marketing software giant ExactTarget landed on the New York Stock Exchange on March 22 under the symbol “ET.”, with an opening price of $23.05, 21.3% higher than the ExactTarget IPO price.

After opening, the ExactTarget stock price went down shortly, then was followed by a rapid rise and fluctuated to a pullup by the end of the market.

The ExactTarget stock price finally closed at $25.45 per share, a premium of 33.95% over the ExactTarget IPO price. Calculated by the public offering price, the company’s market value reached approximately $1.64 billion, with the first trading day volume of 48.95 million shares.

ExactTarget recognized net sales of $207 million for the fiscal year 2011, up by 55% compared with a year ago; net loss widened from $12 million of last year to $35 million for 2011, mainly due to the increase in marketing costs and employees. The number of employees added to 404, up 25% compared with a year earlier.

ExactTarget was incorporated in 2000, is focusing on e-mail marketing; it provides on-demand multi-platform interactive marketing applications to the customers. As of September 30, 2011, ExactTarget had a number of customers over 4600.

The ExactTarget IPO application was submitted as early as 2007 and the company planned to list on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange, but then ushered into the U.S. financial crisis, therefore, the company withdrew the IPO plan.

ExactTarget announced its IPO price of $19 per share, higher than the previously proposed ExactTarget IPO price range of $15 to $17 per share. J.P. Morgan Securities LLC, Deutsche Bank Securities Inc. and Stifel, Nicolaus & Company, Incorporated served as the ExactTarget IPO’s lead underwriters.

RBC Capital Markets, LLC, Pacific Crest Securities, LLC, Canaccord Genuity Inc., Raymond James & Associates, Inc. also participated into the ExactTarget IPO underwriting syndicate.