So, you may already know that the vendors in this area call this stuff Managed Print Services (or MPS), not to be confused with Managed Service Provers (or MSPs). Yes, I know, it bothers me too, which is while I’ll actually avoid using acronyms for most of this particular blog entry.

I’ve actually spoken already with two of the major printer vendors about their thoughts around this subject. This entry isn’t meant to be any kind of comparative view about their respective programs, I will just relate a couple of their core foci. (Wow, I actually got to use that word in context!) And, a disclosure: I have done some white paper work recently for one of the vendors that I am about to mention, OKI Data.

Dena Bernard, director of customers satisfaction and services for OKI Data, views MPS as an opportunity for printer resellers to build a more trusted relationship with their customers even as margins from straight product resales continue to decline. Businesses of all sizes are scrutinizing every facet of their IT infrastructure and managing printer lifecycles, as well as the consumables related to use them, has become a higher priority. There are several reasons for this, Bernard says, including the need for companies to minimize their capital budgets, regulatory compliance considerations, and even corporate sustainability/green IT initiatives.

“Printing costs are not well understood,” Bernard says. “Many companies are undergoing downsizing and they are seeking to minimize costs. Being able to help them understand their printing cost and helping them control them in a way that matches their printer needs. This is a valuable skill set.”

Realistically speaking, any reseller that continues to base their printer business solely on earning hardware margins will find business tougher over the next three years as fewer businesses buy printers outright and more seek to establish a leasing or managed service relationship. One analyst firm, The Photizo Group, believes the growth rate for these services will be 25 percent into 2010. Growth for straight business printer sales, on the other hand, will be flat at roughly 6 percent.

OKI Data isn’t naive enough to think that a solution provider will be able to just drop all its other business practices in order to get focused on managed print services. It is, in effect, hedging its bets by creating a wide range of special printer technology, managed support services and programs that allow many different elements of the channel to become involved. These services all sit under an umbrella program called Total Managed Print and include everything from a starter program that pays the VAR an agent fee up to special equipment designed for members of the channel that are staking their entire business on these services and solutions.

“This is a program for the channel built by the channel,” Bernard says. “It lets the partner plug in at their level of capability.”

Xerox has been developing its U.S. managed print program for the past three years (it started in Europe about five years ago), according to Tom Gall, director of value channel marketing, who represents the Xerox PagePack initiative.

The rallying cry for Xerox is helping IT solution providers talk about printing in terms of the cost per page. The challenge in establishing manage print services within accounts is the relatively long product lifecycle for printers: It is rare that a company will switch out more than one-third of its printers in any given year, says Gall. That said, that sort of behavior just begs for a managed services approach, under which customers can have better visibility into where their true costs lie, he says.

Both Xerox and OKI Data believe that providing the services and infrastructure so that their partners can manage heterogeneous printer technology (instead of just their own devices will be critical). Equally as important: Both vendors believe that the partners who will be successful with managed print initiatives are those who dedicate human resources to this challenge: a managed print champion, if you will.

I’ll leave you with this video about PagePack from Xerox and a couple of its channel partners.

As you might gather from the name, this is an offering that ascribes to the cloud philosophy of aggregating applications and IT services in a central server location. In this case, it is a private cloud that a solution provider can assemble for a K-12 school using HP servers, thin client hardware and a service called ClassLink that serves out applications and data to students, administrators and teachers.

The touted benefits include cost savings in terms of management, better visibility into what students are actually doing with their assignments, and the ability to accommodate more individualize learning needs. Remote access support allows the same audience to grab information from their home computer (ANY home computer, even a Macintosh).

The Hudson Falls Central School District, which is one of HP’s poster accounts for this technology, went from managing 1,400 computers to running their applications off 10 servers. Here’s a video with more information about the account.

And here is more information about HP SchoolCloud.

Some of the solution providers that I speak with in the course of my journalist and analyst life question their role in cloud computing, suggesting that they’ll be cut out of the equation. HP SchoolCloud is a great example of why thinking might be short-sighted. The real opportunity isn’t in selling cloud to your existing customers. Yes, you may lose some of them. The magic lies in all the new prospects you’ll be able to reach through innovative applications of the cloud concept.

That can’t happen anymore.  With PDC 2009 kicking off this week, Microsoft  has precious little time to make good on Azure promises. It’s playing catchup with uber-nemesis Google and — perhaps more importantly — to Amazon which has real-world cloud services out and functioning now for real, paying customers.

Microsoft’s  public Azure plan calls for continued free beta use of current services till year’s end. It will start charging for said services February 1, 2010. Microsoft Chief Software Architect Ray Ozzie (or “silent Ray”  as he’s been dubbed by some wags in the press) should have news in his Tuesday PDC keynote.

Put it this way: He’d better.

Microsoft’s cloud competitors are already making noise going into the event.

On Friday, Amazon helpfully dropped a note to reporters on Friday to remind them of various Amazon Web Services (AWS) landmarks.Like how  AWS’ EC2, S3, SimpleDB, Relational Database Service, Simple Queue Service et al  will be available in Asia-Pacific region in the first half of next year:

Oh, and how the AWS SDK for .NET makes it a breeze for Windows developers to build .NET applications for AWS.

(A cynic might think that Amazon’s SDK news in early October was a reaction to Microsoft’s announcement a few weeks before about its Eclipse-oriented Azure tools.  By bringing Eclipse developers into the Azure fold, Microsoft can claim to embrace non-Microsoft development tools and Microsoft wants all developers programming for Azure. A real cynic might think Microsoft heard word of the Amazon announcement and rushed what was going to be a PDC Eclipse announcement out early. But I digress. )

In its post Friday, Amazon also points out that AWS  has “successfully completed a Statement on Auditing Standards No. 80 (SAS70) Type II Audit” …. You get the picture.

 
And then there’s Google, which is winning some paying accounts–well at least one paying account for Google Apps Premier Edition. But it’s a big one: Los Angeles is paying $7.2 million for Google to run municipal email in a secure “government cloud.” Google beat Microsoft out there and don’t think they’ll let anyone forget it.  (Unless there’s a melt down and Messrs. Schmidtet al will quickly change the subject.)

So, no pressure for Ozzie and his cohort in LA this week and in the market for the rest of this year. No pressure at all.

Check out more IT channel news on SearchITChannel.com.

The new Healthcare Specialized Business Unit will represent tools that help resellers and IT solution providers break into healthcare accounts. It inclueds the following:

• Server, storage, virtualization, and power and cooling technologies that can serve as the underpinning for electronic medical records solutions
• Mobility products that address the need for clinical professionals to roam many different points of care throughout a given day
• Security solutions that address privacy and compliance concerns, as well as those focused on physical security applications
• Content management software and information capture devices
• Digital signage

Business resources include the following:

• The TechMed Solutions Pavilion, which is about one-third of its existing solutions center
• The TechMed Web Resource Center, which includes practice development information
• A grant service that will help resellers figure out which customer prospects might be eligible for federal or state money
• TechMed Event Series, include real-world and virtual seminars and events

Aside from the healthcare resources, Tech Data also has opened a Symantec Solutions Center within its main 6,000-foot solutions demonstration facility. The focus is on the vendor’s security and data-protection products including:

Symantec Endpoint Protection
Symantec Backup Exec
Symantec Backup Exec System Recover
Symantec Enterprise Vault
Veritas NetBackup
The Altiris Client Management Suite
Symantec Data Loss Protection

Tech Data resellers can use the new solutions center for demonstrations as well as customer training.

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This is not to say that cloud computing will be an easy sell.

For one thing, it probably will be mainly appropriate in cases where an organization doesn’t already have the infrastructure in place for an on-premise alternatives. Which means it is more likely that small and midsize businesses will lead the way with adoption.

Given all this, the folks at NetSuite have been pushing hard to position their suite of cloud-based business application services as a better total cost of ownership proposition than the on-premise alternatives. The latest illustration of this is a research study from analyst firm Hurwitz Associates called “The Compelling TCO Case for Cloud Computing in SMB and Mid-Market Enterprises.”

In the report, Hurwitz outlines the different costs associated with deploying a cloud solution versus an on-premise one. One of the most impressive numbers from this report is that in a 100-user scenario using NetSuite as an example, a cloud solution will cost $730,745 less than the on-premise option, based on infrastructure costs, training, implementation, and support. The report concludes with recommendations on how organizations can do their own cost comparisons.

Which leads me to ask all those IT solution providers out there. Where does this leave you? Actually, in not such a bad position. The Hurwitz data suggests there is still a serious role for VARs or service provider resources that have skills in solution design, implementation and integration. In the Hurwitz cost analysis, the researchers estimate that approximately 30 percent of the costs for a cloud solution will be related to VARs or consultants, compared with 58 percent to 60 percent in an on-premise model.

A much smaller percentage, maybe, but the focus will be on design, process consulting and application integration, which typically lead to higher profit margins than straight infrastructure deployment.

Here’s a link to the complete Cloud Computing study by Hurwitz Associates.

A new study of more than 1,500 IT workers by CompTIA finds that approximately 37 percent are planning to earn some sort of security technology certification over the next five years. About 18 percent of them will go in for an “ethical hacking” certification (I didn’t even know they had official certs for that!) while about 13 percent will focus on security forensics.

Other certification areas in which IT professionals intend to invest include green IT, healthcare IT, mobile technology and software as a service (SaaS) best practices.

The key driver for interest in new certifications is the promise of a career boost: 88 percent of the certification holders included in the CompTIA study said they took them to improve their resume. About the same number cited personal growth as the reason.

You can more information about the study on the CompTIA site.

 HP must be really, really serious about beating Cisco.

Marius Haas, senior VP of HP ProCurve Networking, and Ron Sege,  prez and COO of 3Com,  will preside over this evening’s inevitable teleconference.

I guess this paves the way or someone, anyone, (Oracle? Anyone?) to snap up Brocade Networks. Juniper Networks anyone? Bueller?

The EC’s antitrust body opened the inquiry into Oracle’s proposed buyout of Sun in March and had till January to issue its findings.

Oracle posted a response to the EC’s objection late Monday:

 
“The transaction does not threaten to reduce competition in the slightest, including in the database market. 

The Commission’s Statement of Objections reveals a profound misunderstanding of both database competition and open source dynamics. It is well understood by those knowledgeable about open source software that because MySQL is open source, it cannot be controlled by anyone.  That is the whole point of open source. 

The database market is intensely competitive with at least eight strong players, including IBM, Microsoft, Sybase and three distinct open source vendors.  Oracle and MySQL are very different database products.  There is no basis in European law for objecting to a merger of two among eight firms selling differentiated products.  Mergers like this occur regularly and have not been prohibited by United States or European regulators in decades”

 

Sun issued a similar statement that added that  any final decision by the commission is subject to appeal appeal to the European Court of First Instance.

Oracle has shown no desire to spin off MySQL, a move that would placate the Europeans.

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The focus of the staff will be on development work for industries including banking and financial services, life science and healthcare, and manufacturing and retail.

Check out more IT channel news on SearchITChannel.com.

Last week, both Novell and Microsoft cut jobs. Novell sliced 3% — or about 100 to 130 —  of its 3,900 employees, according to published reports. And it suspended company-paid 401K contributions, according to its 8K filing.

This is the second round of cuts from Novell this year. In February, the company said it would cut up to 100 from a total of 4,200 employees. Novell watcher Pam Derringer says last week’s layoffs follow significant losses in all divisions except the company’s Linux-focused Open Platform Solutions, which grew about 16% this year. The Linux is about a third of Novell’s total revenues. 

Check out more IT channel news on SearchITChannel.com.