Recent Articles
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Dell Smartphones? A Welcoming Channel Awaits
The rumor mill is spinning on speculation that Dell will introduce a smartphone this month, but solution providers are taking a decidedly more subdued stance on the possibility. “I just heard about it last week,” said Ray Paganini, CIO of Cornerstone IT in Cleveland. “My first question would be whether it runs Microsoft Mobile. But…
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SAAS or On-Premise E-mail: Which is Best?
No application has succeeded in superseding e-mail as the killer app of modern business. While few people think of e-mail as being a business-enabling tool, few people would want to run their business without persistent access to digital messages from employees, contractors, suppliers, partners and—most of all—customers. Microsoft Exchange has long held the dominant title…
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Cisco’s Daunting SMB Challenge
Cisco Systems, the IT networking giant, continues to expand and strive to dominate new markets. In this case, the market isn’t new, but the degree of financial investment and product portfolio is. The company has had a “commercial” products division for years with products and partnerships aimed at the SMB market. Historically, SMB really meant…
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Dell Sets Channel Program Team, Plans Global Initiatives
Dell’s corporate reorganization around customer segments will standardize channel organization tools and infrastructure for Dell globally, looking to pull from best practices in each of the company’s regions. For example, Dell’s North American direct sales and channel deal registration have been operated on the Salesforce.com platform, but the European operations have used a tool that…
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FileMaker Resuscitates Database Market with Pro 10
There was a time when the PC market was filled with database vendors pitching their various products. Names like Dbase, FoxPro, Paradox and Clarion were all the rage when it came to relational databases, simply because those products helped to legitimize the PC for business use. Most of those vendors have faded into the past,…
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A Cisco Server: Sheer Brilliance or Act of Desperation?
Cisco Systems’ announcement that it will launch a line of servers is drawing mixed reactions from solution providers, as they wait to see how the networking giant’s move affects the overall data center market. For years, Cisco has dominated the data networking market, making nearly $40 billion a year in revenue mostly from the sale…