Recent Articles
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Salesforce.com Acquires InStranet Customer Service Knowledge Base
Salesforce.com, a 9-year-old company that has grown mostly from internal expansion, disclosed on Aug. 20 that it has acquired AppExchange partner InStranet, the producer of customer service knowledge base technology, for $31.5 million. InStranet’s knowledge base technology is used by business-to-consumer or business-to-business customer service call centers to give service agents online reference and policy databases…
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SAP Creates Ecosystem for Nonpartner ISVs, Consultants and Integrators
Do you sometimes work with SAP customers but not enough to merit paying the 2,400-euro SAP channel partner fee? Or do you work with SAP so much that you need to outsource some of the work to other qualified solution providers? For partners who answer "yes" to either of those questions, SAP has a new…
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The VAR Channel’s Marketing Challenge
The typical solution provider’s lack of marketing skills is a challenge rivaled in gravity only by direct-sales competition from vendors. It’s no secret that founders of channel companies typically are technologists, and that marketing isn’t one of their strengths. So you may have the best technology and the best services on the planet, but if…
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Are Enterprises Ready for Biometrics as a Security Solution?
To hear some tell it, all signs are pointing to an era when biometrics will be a key element of authentication for enterprises. Just how close that era is depends on who you ask. For companies like UPEK, the time for biometrics is now. The company strategy has involved partnering with notebook vendors such as…
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HP on the Hunt with VARs
Like any society, the channel is made up of hunters and gatherers that play a vital role in maintaining a balanced ecosystem. But every now and again the balance between hunters and gathers gets out of whack, and steps need to be taken to restore the natural order of things. That seems to be where…
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New AMD Processors Slated for Business Desktops
Advanced Micro Devices has released a pair of new Phenom processors, along with two more Athlon chips, that will round out the chip maker’s offerings for its recently released corporate desktop platform. The new AMD processors, which the company announced Aug. 14, include a high-end, quad-core Phenom X4 9750B (2.4GHz) processor and a triple-core Phenom…