technolog y reseller.co.uk COMMENT 3 If there's a theme running through this issue, it is that we live in a heterogeneous, diverse, multifarious, plural world. As we report on page 22, Microsoft made this point forcefully at the recent Microsoft Decoded event at ExCeL, London, where it unveiled new Surface devices and demonstrated some of the advances it is making in mixed reality computing. At the event, Panos Panay, Microsoft Vice President for Surface, said: “Innovation is when devices disappear and ideas come to the fore.” What he meant by this is that we are getting to the stage where we can interact with our devices using a variety of input methods, from keyboards, mice and pens to eyeballs, voice and touch, switching seamlessly between them all without a second thought and without interrupting our creative flow. This is an argument that could also be made by Oblong Industries, creator of the immersive, interactive, gesture- controlled, multi-screen collaboration solution used by Tom Cruise in the 2002 film Minority Report . It was futuristic then. Today, the technology can be found in boardrooms across the globe and, with the launch of the Mezzanine 200 series (see page 26), in smaller huddle rooms as well. Instead of the serial, one-to-many presentations endured by so many for so long, this solution lets everyone join the discussion, pass control back and forth, add notes and comments to each other's documents and bring in content from dozens of sources with the wave of a wand. Best of all, it only takes minutes to get up and running and for the technology 'to disappear'. Technology is disappearing in a more literal way, or at least moving off-site, with the rise of cloud computing. This is already having a big effect on channel businesses and its influence will only increase. For the time being, resellers are having to meet the diverse needs of a heterogeneous customer base by keeping one foot in the past as they place the other down in the future, still selling hardware but also offering cloud services on a subscription model. This is something NexStor is doing very successfully (see page 36) and which Daisy Wholesale is inviting other IT resellers to emulate with its new hosted IP platform (see page 23). Services create new challenges for resellers, and in the Q&A on page 33, Mark Banfield explains how Autotask, now merged with Datto, can help channel businesses overcome them – using software-as- a-service, of course. James Goulding Editor ,
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[email protected] www.technologyreseller.co.uk No part of Technology Reseller can be reproduced without prior written permission of the publisher. © 2017 Kingswood Media Ltd. Design: Sandtiger Media www.sandtiger.co.uk 04 Bulletin Technology reseller news and updates 14 Managed Network Services Making cloud migration easy 16 MPLS The practical solution for interconnectivity 18 What’s New A selection of new IT and CE products 23 Telecoms Daisy Wholesale launches hosted IP service 26 Collaboration New reseller kit for Mezzanine 200 series 30 Cyber Security Why FUD is the wrong sales tactic 33 Q&A What the merger of Datto and Autotask means for resellers 36 Data Storage NexStor doubles its turnover and moves to larger premises 38 Insider Phil Jones MBE shares his thoughts on the fast changing IT industry 38 Social Media Why it is a sales person’s best friend 40 Exhibitions Channel Live 2018 dates announced 41 Interview How Xerox plans to reach out to IT resellers 43 60 seconds... Garry Growns, Sales Director of Daisy Wholesale v07 · 2017 technology reseller.co.uk Comment Register online To receive your regular FREE printed copy of TECHNOLOGY RESELLER Magazine simply fill in our online registration form at www.technologyreseller.co.uk/register Read Technology Reseller online, on tablets and smart phones www.technologyreseller.co.uk Join us : Follow us @Techresellermag www.facebook.com/TechnologyResellerMag technology-reseller-magazine Editor: James Goulding 07803 087228 ·
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[email protected] ISSN 2055-3110 (Print) ISSN 2055-3129 (Online) CyberSecurity: TheInnovation Accelerator Global research intothe links betweenstrongcybersecurity andbusinessdecision-making, growthand innovation Vodafone Power toyou