Telecom Reseller / Technology Reseller News

by Gary Audin

Cloud services; nearly everywhere, offering nearly everything IT wants. Unfortunately each service has its own portal, way of doing business, and provisioning methods. When a channel wants to offer cloud services, the task can be daunting and confusing. This is where a cloud service aggregator delivers the benefits and value of the cloud without the complexity and confusion.

Ryan Walsh, Chief Channel Officer at pax8 www.pax8.com and Gary Audin recorded this podcast at the CompTIA ChannelCon conference. Ryan discusses cloud service distribution and why a channel can benefit from an aggregation vendor. The channel can offer business continuity, email, security, and backup services, however each service has its own way of conducting business and each has its own portal. He talks about the integration of multiple services in ways that can help procurement and provisioning. Ryan points out that through pax8, channels can brand their own service package. This offers fast time-to-user functions and features. He also points out that many customers want to trial service and then if they like it, scale rapidly. By eliminating multiple portals and providing easy access to products, channel customers can validate their choices and find the best services on the market.

Pax8 www.pax8.com is the leading value-added cloud distributor offering top cloud products and solutions to the IT channel. The company is driving the business transition to the cloud through its comprehensive enablement and technology. The Pax8 cloud marketplace provides efficient and intelligent cloud product configuration so service providers can easily create and customize bundled solutions for their customers. To fuel partners’ success, Pax8 offers on-demand marketing programs, sales assistance and training, provisioning automation, and subscription billing. As the experts in cloud innovation, Pax8 is well-engineered to sell, assemble, and deliver quality cloud solutions to its worldwide channel of service providers.

by Gary Audin

Channels need to keep finding new revenue. One avenue is through selling VoIP and UC services. But this is not as easy as expected. There can be liabilities and risks. Major unknowns are the legal and taxation issues. Working with the right white label provider is the way to go.

Scott Seltzer, President of ConnectMeVoice www.connectmevoice.com and Gary Audin recorded this podcast at the CompTIA ChannelCon conference. Scott discusses VoIP and UC services and how to avoid the risks and difficult processes encountered. He talks about attractive service pricing models. The partners are extremely successful selling to restaurants, real estate agents, schools, accounting firms, auto dealerships, and accounting offices, i.e. small and branch offices. Scott also delves into their call center service. He focuses on the ability of their partner’s customers to evaluate what is offered through free trials. To ensure the partners are successful, he offers training, videos, and support with an assigned growth manager.

ConnectMeVoice www.connectmevoice.com is a hosted voicemail and custom telephony application service was originally known as American Voicemail Network (AVN). Its founders had deep-rooted experience in the earliest hosted voicemail systems. They used this intimate telephony knowledge to build new services that boasted flexibility, cutting-edge features, and affordability for small and midsized businesses. ConnectMeVoice provides hosted VoIP and SIP Trunk service to thousands of SMB customers nationwide. Customers range in size from single home-based businesses to chains with thousands of locations. Check out their useful blogs at https://www.connectmevoice.com/voip-blog/

Komutel, a leading call recording and communication software and public safety company, has announced that Tim Kenyon has joined as Vice President Business Development for the Komutel’s US operations. In this podcast, Kenyon outlines his background in the industry, his goals for Komutel and Komutel’s unique value proposition.

Read the press release

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Caller identification has become a real issue and the source of a very large amount of fraud. Patrick Cox, CEO of TRUSTID explains to Don Witt of the Channel Daily News, a TR publication, how their technology quickly authenticates callers before the call is answered.  There is no need for the old fashioned personal identification information, Pin code, or your mothers maiden name. Call centers are now able to speak directly to the caller’s issue or request without wasting time asking questions or creating a bad experience for the caller. What a novel idea.

TRUSTID has solid technology that works, improves the user experience for customers that implement the technology and reduces fraud.  Listen in, Patrick provides a very easy to understand description of their patented product which provides the Telephone Firewall®.

TRUSTID’s pre-answer caller authentication service reduces call center operating costs, improves customer experience and increases fraud fighting ROI. TRUSTID ‘s patented approach is an essential element of comprehensive call center solutions that may also include IVRs, telco hardware, SBCs, multi-factor authentication and professional services. They partner with leading technology firms and solution providers to deliver customer-ready solutions.

For more information, go to: https://www.trustid.com/

by Gary Audin

Not every carrier has service everywhere. How do you determine if there are multiple carriers providing access to your location? How do you compare the prices? How do you compare their services? Do you find that you have to deal with multiple carriers for a single project? Multiple carriers mean you have multiple bills to manage. Do you have the staff to manage the project with multiple carriers? Can the carriers you selected scale up as you expand?

Mike Chase, SVP of Solutions Engineering at airespring www.airespring.com and Gary Audin recorded this podcast at the CompTIA ChannelCon conference. Mike discusses the function of an aggregating carrier. He points out that when you work with an aggregator, you deal with one team, one quote, and as he says “you have one place to choke the provider” i.e. airespring. Dealing with an aggregator provides you competitive pricing in one place through a portal and one place to submit a support ticket. Airespring has offices throughout the US, Philippines, and India. They offer a wide range of SIP trunking capabilities and support 4 billion calls per month. Because the channel may be relatively new in supporting projects, he offers online training and a very flexible design for the solution. This can include managed security and manage firewalls.

AireSpring www.airespring.com is a Nationwide Managed Services Provider and Network Operator serving thousands of businesses. AireSpring has the largest national footprint in the U.S. and a partnership with over twenty major network providers. They are renowned in the industry for delivering a broad range of innovative solutions at competitive rates. Airespring delivers Managed Connectivity and Cloud Communications solutions that are custom built for a business’s individual needs. The company has built a solid reputation of integrity, reliability and dependability with its channel partners, end-user customers and technology providers.

by Gary Audin

You need a better contact center, better help desk, or customized workflow. Every enterprise is trying to perfect their operations while not operating exactly like their competition. Channels are looking for revenue in professional services, license fees, and support arrangements. Delivering agile business software solutions is the way to go.

Brandon Wright, Director of Partner Relations for Agiloft www.agiloft.com and Gary Audin recorded this podcast at the CompTIA ChannelCon conference. Brandon discusses no code software that accelerates the time-to-market for solutions. Agile software has to be easy to configure and customize for constructing business applications. He discusses how Agiloft supports channels though online training and certification tools. He points out that they have been successful in Biotech/pharma, higher education, and a range of government organizations.

Over 3 million users at organizations ranging from small enterprises to U.S. government agencies and Fortune 100 companies depend on Agiloft’s www.agiloft.com innovative applications for Help Desk, Contract Management, Custom Workflow, and more. Agiloft specializes in automating processes that are too complex for competing vendors. Our best practice templates and agile technology ensure rapid deployment and a fully extensible system.

Brian Troesch, BICS Vice President of Sales Americas, discusses with Don Witt of the Channel Daily News, a TR publication, the acquisition of TeleSign which allowed BICS to be the first end-to-end CPaaS provider. While BICS is not well known in the US, they are a significant provider on the international scene.

If you are a carrier or large enterprise, you will want to hear Brian’s company overview. They may be able to provide the international connections for you. You will also learn about their new CPaaS offering.

BICS is connecting the world by creating reliable and secure mobile experiences anytime, anywhere

BICS is a leading international communications enabler, one of the key global voice carriers and the leading provider of mobile data services worldwide.

Their solutions are essential for supporting the modern lifestyle of today’s device-hungry consumer – from global mobile connectivity, seamless roaming experiences, fraud prevention and authentication, to global messaging and the Internet of Things.

They have a Global network with a strong presence in Africa, Americas, Asia, Europe and Middle East.

For more information, go to: https://bics.com/

by Gary Audin

More and more people want or have to work where they are and not in the office. There are many consumer devices available for this environment but they are not ruggedized for a lot of the applications people are considering. We think of ruggedized devices in the military, with first responders, and federal and local government applications. What is needed is a device that is somewhere between the heavy ruggedized products and consumer products that you can apply to your business operations.

Brandon Williams, Director, US Mobility Channel https://na.panasonic.com/us/computers-tablets-handhelds/computers/laptops/toughbook-31 and Gary Audin recorded this podcast at the CompTIA ChannelCon conference. Brandon discusses why phones and tablets that have been introduced to the market although highly mobile, don’t meet the many business requirements. He notes that retail, warehouse, transportation, and logistics applications require rugged devices. Brandon provides an example of small businesses, pest control companies that need such a device because their technicians are constantly in the field. He discusses transitioning from Windows CE to Android devices. He points out that ISV team support has become very important to Panasonic. We had a very important discussion about battery life and why users need 12 to 14 hours of battery life and longer to support their business usage.

Panasonic offers the Toughbook 31 https://na.panasonic.com/us/computers-tablets-handhelds/computers/laptops/toughbook-31 which is a reliable Windows notebook offering the highest performance in this class with a very rugged design. It has been tested to MIL-STD-810G and IP 65 certifications. It contains fifth generation Intel processors to deliver the performance needed as well as amazing battery life of 18 or 27 hours. The idea of this Toughbook is to deliver what users expect on their office desktop out in the field.

by Gary Audin

When you want to offer Unified Communications and Collaboration services, you will learn it is not about features and functions, not about selling a telephone system, but about value. When you start the process of building a UC&C service, the American model of doing business does not build an ecosystem but the European ecosystem model does. Further, you want a modern design based on WebRTC which facilitates a rapid-to-market implementation.

Robert Cooper, US Manager and Co-Founder and CEO Steve Osler at Wildix www.wildix.com and Gary Audin recorded this podcast at the Enterprise Connect conference. Robert discusses browser-based communications using WebRTC. He discusses the success of their business model that is not only attractive to traditional VARs and SIs, but now of great interest to CLECs, ISPs, and MSPs. Robert has a goal to make Wildix customers profitable in 60 days. To deliver this, he provides the education and support necessary to ramp up to profitability rapidly.

Wildix www.wildix.com  is a multinational company that develops browser-based Unified Communications solutions and VoIP products. The Wildix solution is aimed at small and medium businesses that need to provide their employees and collaborators with efficient yet simple to use communication tools. It was designed to be easy to install and to manage with low maintenance costs.

Wildix system is a complete and scalable solution for companies that need to upgrade their communication tools by introducing such features as videoconference, chat, and user’s presence, and in the same time, reduce operating costs.

by Gary Audin

You have unified communications (UC). Your systems and networks generate a massive amount of data about the health and operation of UC. There are management challenges. You need to develop effective and rapid responses to outages. And don’t forget the user complaints as well. Collecting the data is a good start, but analyzing it is what makes the difference. This is where big data intersects with unified communications operation and management.

Ross Williams, Chief Operations Officer at Virsae www.virsae.com and Gary Audin recorded this tutorial EDUcast. The phrase “Leverage big data for Unified Communications” is the core theme. Ross helps the viewer learn what big data is and how it can be leveraged in unified communications. He then focuses on the service management data generated in Avaya environments. He discusses three challenges, a MG outage, SIP trunk outage, and customer complaints. He then continues by justifying why you need significant processing power to deal with big data (a big engine) that can be delivered economically and effectively through a cloud service.

What you will learn in this EDUcast:

Big Data defined

Big Data in UC

Challenges

Outages

You Need a Big Engine

Automation

Businesses around the world use Virsae’s cloud-based platform, Virsae Service Management (VSM), to monitor and manage their communications technology and security. Virsae keeps business communications at peak performance, so every channel remains open, customers always get an answer, and workers stay productive. www.virsae.com