After two days of advanced tech training for partners and a four-hour, pre-day LogMeIn session on monetizing the BYOA (bring your own app) trend, the 2nd annual Datto Partner Conference officially got underway today at the ARIA Resort & Casino in Las Vegas with a full-day program.
Unlike last year’s inaugural conference, the 2014 event, with a theme of “No Boundaries,” features a sales and marketing track and a technical track. Both highlight and discuss common issues among MSPs and VARs such as BDR go-to-market strategies, marketing cloud services, and solving support tickets.
Austin McChord, CEO of the hybrid-cloud business continuity and BDR provider, opened the event with a keynote address to 500 of the company’s VAR and MSP partners. In his talk, McChord made several announcements, the first three of which are available today: retention-based billing for all SIRIS devices, creation of an end-user portal, enhancements to Datto NAS 1.1, and the launch of a virtual appliance the company is calling Virtual SIRIS, which will be available next week.
Virtual SIRIS is compatible with VMware ESXi versions 5.1 and 5.5 and is designed to leverage the benefits of the hypervisor. Virtual SIRIS enables its partners to provide their clients with a business continuity solution that operates on the same platform as their existing virtual infrastructure.
“The market demands products that work within virtual environments,” says McChord. “Many of the aspects that make Datto products great are founded in the benefits of virtualization, and breaking into this platform has opened endless possibilities for the future of both Datto and our partners.”
Virtual SIRIS builds on the same core software and interface that is found in the traditional, physical SIRIS 2 appliances. It features instant virtual-failover for both physical and virtual systems without nested virtualization and provides off-site redundancy through a secure hybrid cloud architecture.
Also on tap at the conference are presentations by Jeffrey Ma, business strategist, MIT Blackjack Kingpin, and inspiration behind the movie ’21’; Paul Sagan, former Akamai CEO and current vice chairman; and Arlin Sorensen, founder/CEO of HTG Peer Groups.
Networking is also a key ingredient to a successful partner event, even for the hosts. “It’s always a privilege to network with our partners,” says Rob Rae, Datto’s vice president of business development. “We designed the conference to equip partners with all the necessary tools to further grow their businesses and client base, along with surprises. Attendees will find the time away from the office resourceful, a major return on investment, and a fun time.”
What more could a partner want?
