Tell us about how the company started and your executive team?

John and Ellen quickly raised a $7.4M Series A financing and recruited George Moberly (VP Product Management, formerly of Bladelogic) and Fred Olivera (Chief Architect, formerly of EMC). Shawn Henry (VP Engineering, formerly RSA) and John McEleney (CEO, formerly of SolidWorks) joined shortly thereafter. Outside investors were interested in the company and the management team received a pre-emptive $8M Series B financing a short 6 months after the A round.

What about your experience and history before CloudSwitch?
I have worked in the application software industry for over 20 years. I joined SolidWorks when it was approximately 20 employees and $0 in revenue. I was the CEO from 2001 to 2007, and during this period we tripled the business from approximately $100M to over $350M. I have a technical background, moved to sales and marketing and have been in senior management for approximately 15 years.

What market segments are you targeting?
CloudSwitch’s software can be used by enterprises in a wide range of industries. We are focusing on companies and industries that are likely to be the earlier adopters of public clouds. These tend to be medium to large enterprises that have existing data centers, with virtualization of at least a part of their servers and a desire to take advantage of the cost and agility benefits of the cloud.

Where did the company get its name?
As the name suggests, CloudSwitch is focused on helping companies who want to switch to the cloud, and to have the flexibility of switching between multiple clouds and their data centers.

Is there a person or company involved with Cloud storage that you admire or are keeping an eye on?
While CloudSwitch is not specifically in the cloud storage space, we think there are several great companies in this area, including Carbonite, Nasuni and Actifio.

Why create a new company? Aren’t there already many suppliers involved with leveraging the cloud?
As you would expect, with a computing platform shift like cloud computing, we’veseen a plethora of new companies with innovative offerings to help people take advantage of this new platform. Many companies are focused on providing public cloud services, or helping enterprises build their own internal clouds. At CloudSwitch we’ve taken the unique approach of extending the corporate data center out to the cloud through our CloudSwitch software appliance, enabling enterprises to take advantage of cloud computing securely, easily and affordable without changing their applications or management tools.

How is portability a concern on where you want to host your applications?
Without CloudSwitch, portability is a big challenge for enterprises, since they’d have to re-architect their applications for a specific cloud, and would then be locked into that cloud if they decided to move between clouds or back to the data center. With CloudSwitch, portability is not a concern, since our software automatically takes care of all of the logistics in moving a customer’s applications to the cloud.

When is the right time to move to the cloud?
Enterprise IT departments are struggling with costly, over-provisioned and un-responsive data centers. They are eager to find ways to move to the cloud to take advantage of its on-demand pricing and rapid, self-service provisioning. The cloud provides the ability to offload specific applications and avoid expensive build-outs, as well as to scale our capacity as needed for applications with short-term or cyclical demand, especially web and test/development apps. For most enterprises, the time to move to the cloud is now.

What things are holding cloud computing back from wider adoption. What issue is top-most in your mind and why?
It is very clear that the cloud as a compute platform is real and it is happening today. Like any major platform shift, people are going through a process to understand the benefits for their organization, the risks and the challenges. The single greatest perceived issue is security. Organizations are concerned, and rightfully so, about how secure their applications and data can be in the cloud. At CloudSwitch we designed our solution from the ground up to provide provable end-to-end security, including encryption of all data and communications, in transit and at rest, enterprise control over key management, and roles-based access controls for authorization and permissions.

How would you compare your firm with Enomaly, TwinStrata?
Enomaly and TwinStrata are in different segments of the cloud market. Both of these solutions are targeting the data storage segment. While CloudSwitch does deal with storage-related issues, we are focused on moving applications (with NO changes) to the cloud. As a result of moving these applications we can take the full stack (including data) or people can “stretch” the application from the cloud back to the data center.

For the technologist reading this or the “Cloud Champion” who appreciates “the deep dive”, can you tell this person something that he would really appreciate about your product/service?
Our patent-pending Cloud Isolation Technology enables seamless migration of applications to the cloud, and full isolation of the customer’s cloud resources, so they remain under enterprise control. In addition, we automatically create a layer 2 network to bridge between the data center and the cloud, so that the cloud-based applications retain their original data center IP addresses, identity, etc. and still look exactly as they did in the data center.

What channels are being used to sell CloudSwitch?
We are reaching out to customers directly via the internet as well as inside sales.

Do you have any OEM deals now or is this being looked at?
We are engaged in many discussions with many players.

As chief executive officer at CloudSwitch, John McEleney brings over two decades of experience in scaling software businesses to market leadership. Prior to joining CloudSwitch, John was the CEO of SolidWorks Corporation, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Dassault Systems S.A. (NASDAQ: DASTY). John’s rise to CEO was built on his strong record of results over a 20-year career in the CAD industry. During his tenure as CEO, annual revenues grew from US $100 million in 2001 to over $350 million in 2007.

Before joining SolidWorks, John held management positions at Computervision, where he was involved in a wide array of functions including marketing and product development. John has a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Rochester, a master’s degree in manufacturing systems from Boston University, and a master’s degree in business administration and marketing from Northeastern University.

• Physical to virtual conversion – vConverter SC
• Reporting on storage over-allocation – vOptimizer WasteFinder
• Ease of creation of scripting and admin functions – Virtualization EcoShell

vOptimizer WasteFinder

Scans through VMware vCenter Servers (formerly Virtual Center) to locate over allocated virtual storage and misaligned Virtual Machines (VMs). The vOptimizer WasteFinder Space and Alignment Report provides totals of wasted storage and also a potential savings estimate if the space is reclaimed.

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vConverter SC: Server Consolidation Freeware

Enterprise-class software that significantly reduces the time, cost, and effort required to convert physical and virtual machines to VMware®, Microsoft®, or XenServer™. vConverter SC is suitable for all types and sizes of server consolidation initiatives where several or even thousands of physical servers need to be virtualized.

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Free Desktop Application for Script-based Administration of Windows® PowerShell

Virtualization EcoShell™ is a freeware desktop application that enables IT administrators to unlock the full potential of their virtual infrastructure and reduce the daily operating costs of managing multi-platform environments.

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Register to watch or download this March 4th webinar on Virtualization as part of your DR-Plan.

Host: Brian Vendegrift, VP at Venyu
Duration: 39 Minutes 

According to leading IT analyst firm ESG, data backup and recovery remains 1 of the top 3 spending areas for 2010. Data backup and recovery as an industry has gone through major changes and continues to challenge IT as data volumes grow and new technologies emerge – such as virtualization. 

Brian Vandegrift, VP & Product Evangelist for Baton Rouge and Boston-based Venyu Solutions will help clear the air and explain what is “state-of-the-art” backup and recovery today. With so many businesses strapped for resources, it’s critical to make an educated decision that will serve your business today and years down the road.  

In this webinar, you will learn …
• The pros and cons of in-sourcing vs. outsourcing
• Best practice backup & recovery for virtual servers
• How is the “Cloud” applied to the world of backup and DR? 

Please enter your information and you’ll be forwarded to Venyu to download or watch the on demand webinar recording. 

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Describe for us what is your company involved with?

Your background?
A corporate level strategist and change agent with over fifteen years in information technology including the past 5 years in a Vice President role, six years managing technical professionals in advanced technology, telecommunications, systems programming and 4 years as an IT technical professional. My specific experience includes retail, manufacturing/production, consumer products and health care.

How large is your IT staff?
(31) FTE’s split into three segments; Applications, Telecommunications, Infrastructure/Help Desk & Security

Most significant business challenge that you face today?
An increased level of competitive threats to our business lines means that our technology solutions need to remain solid, easily scalable and be delivered in a timely manner.

Do you have key initiatives planned for this year? What are they?
Our most major initiative will be the replacement of our phone switch servicing our headquarters in Providence. With over 600 handsets deployed to our back office employees and nine call centers we easily receive 250,000 in-bound calls per month. In the case of Road Service there cannot be downtime at all. Once this replacement has been completed we will then focus on incorporating our remote Branch offices via SIP IP Trunking to reduce costs and increase productivity.

Are you using Microsoft Hyper-V? If no, any plans to do so?
We have tested Hyper-V but have not deployed it anywhere in production. It may have a fit down the road as we take a deeper dive into VDI for our various call centers.

Your thoughts on “The Cloud”?
There isn’t a day that goes by that my e-mail inbox doesn’t receive some sort of message regarding Cloud Computing and how it is the next-generation to the Information Technology industry. The reality, consumers who use Hotmail, Facebook and/or iTunes are already using an application form of Cloud Computing and don’t even know it. Meanwhile the Amazon’s Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) offering has been a dream for web developers who need the ability to test and then scale their solutions in minutes instead of days. In my opinion Cloud Computing will gain its largest adoption in the mobile space for applications and services in the next three years. The main contributing factors; consumers love their mobile applications and continue to adopt feature phones that have smarter built-in web browsers.

The IT project that you are most proud of?
The successful launch of our Membership Relationship Management “MRM” custom software solution about 18 months ago. Our “MRM” solution enables our organization to provide specific and relevant offers individually tailored to each member. The 360 view component provides a snapshot of the products and services a Member utilizes, recent contacts and recent campaigns the member has received. The centralized Member profile allows a Member to obtain a quote in one branch and complete the purchase in another branch. This has really been a business enabler offering Club associates a complete picture when assisting a Member which allows them to present the right product at the right time in our goal to create a ‘Member For Life.’

If you had a magic wand that could do 3 IT tasks for you instantly what would they be?

1. Reduce costs of high-speed data network connections (speeds greater than 100MB). Consumers are now able to receive extremely high speed bandwidth connections at home, oftentimes for $60.00 or less per month, to download high-definition movies, songs, gaming, etc. As a result service providers are requiring larger and faster pipes just to keep up with the amount of requests.
2. Make a strong network security posture and set of policies a ‘hit’ with end-users. IT has always the bad guys when enabling a good security program -the more secure systems are the less user-friendly applications and passwords become to navigate and utilize.
3. Require all telecommunication vendors to present their monthly recurring billing in a clear and concise manner making it easier for those processing bills to understand the line items they are being billed for versus the agreed upon rates in the contract (oftentimes signed more than 2 years prior).

Dean Patterson is Vice President of IT – AAA of Southern New England and a member of the VIB Advisory board.

March 8, 2010 -

Give them a try and provide your feedback to the developers.

These tools are being called “flings”:

“A fling is a short-term thing, not a serious relationship but a fun one. Likewise, the applications offered here are intended to be played with and explored.  They are not yet part of any product offering and there is no support for them.  They are, however, totally free. And you don’t even have to fill out a form before downloading them!”

These flings include:

Apache Pivot- Apache Pivot is a platform for building rich internet applications in Java. It combines the enhanced productivity and usability features of a modern RIA toolkit with the robustness of the industry-standard Java platform.

Dynamo RIO- DynamoRIO is a runtime code manipulation system that supports code transformations on any part of a program, while it executes. DynamoRIO gives complete control over the runtime code stream and does not limit transformations to trampoline insertion.

esxplot - The software runs on Linux systems, and generates timeseries graphs for selected esxtop fields (as png graphs). The software will also generate simple statistical measures including mean and standard variation for selected esxtop fields.

Onyx- Onyx is a standalone application that serves as a proxy between the vSphere Client and the vCenter Server. It monitors the network communication between them and translates it into an executable PowerShell code. Later this code could be modified and saved into a reusable function or script.

SVGA Sonar- SVGA Sonar is a demo application for SVGADevTap. SVGADevTap is a user-level library that communicates with the VMware SVGA guest driver to provide low-latency notifications of changes to the screen.

vApprun- The vapprun command-line tool brings the full vApp model to Workstation and Fusion. It builds vApps that contain multiple VMs or nested vApps. Configure start/stop ordering of child elements of a vApp. Power-on/power-off/shutdown of vApps.Supports OVF Properties and the OVF Environment.

vCMA – Ever wish you could restart a virtual machine or migrate it to another host from the convenience of your mobile phone? With VMware vCenter Mobile Access, you can monitor and manage VMware Infrastructure from your mobile phone with an interface that is optimized for such devices.

VGC – VMware Guest Console (VGC) is an application to manage the Guest Operating Systems installed on a VM. VGC includes a Unified Task Manager, Guest file system explorer, Snapshot Manager and a VM Manager. VGC is supported with vmware server and desktop products like vSphere, Server 2.0 and Workstation and can connect to multiple hosts simultaneously.

VI Java – The VMware vSphere Java API provides a full set of libraries to manage and control VMware virtual machines and servers. Ver 2.0 includes a high performance Web Service engine much faster/smaller than Apach AXIS.

Virtual USB Analyzer – We developed vusb-analyzer at VMware as an efficient way to debug our own USB virtualization stack. We wanted a tool that made it easy to see problems at a glance, and we wanted a way to solve both correctness and performance bugs. As a result, we ended up with what we think is a fairly unique tool. We’re excited to have the opportunity now to release this tool as open source software, under the MIT license.

March 8, 2010 –

The Citrix Ready program helps customers identify third-party solutions that are recommended to enhance virtualization, networking and cloud computing solutions from Citrix. The Xsigo I/O Director completed a rigorous verification process to ensure compatibility with Citrix XenServer, providing confidence in joint solution compatibility.

The Citrix Ready program makes it easy for customers to identify complementary products and solutions that can enhance Citrix environments. Customers can be confident that the Xsigo I/O Director has successfully passed a series of tests established by Citrix, and can be trusted to work effectively with Citrix XenServer, an enterprise-class, cloud-proven server virtualization platform that delivers the critical features of live migration and centralized multi-server management.

Virtualization projects that use Citrix XenServer products coupled with virtual I/O technologies, like the Xsigo I/O Director, further optimize efficiencies and realize additional cost-savings benefits. The Xsigo I/O Director is an enterprise-class solution that provides LAN and SAN connectivity for up to hundreds of Citrix XenServer hosts. Under software control, any XenServer host may be configured with access to any LAN or SAN — “virtually”. Because vNICs and vHBAs can be configured on-the-fly without a server reboot, the server’s network connectivity is highly flexible and reconfigurable.

As a result, Citrix XenServer combined with Xsigo virtual I/O allow customers to receive predictable application performance by: dynamically allocating server bandwidth; isolating resources by assigning connectivity to a specific server; and achieving QoS by controlling both network and storage bandwidth to specific virtual NICs and HBAs.

Razorsight Launches Profit Enhancement Center (TM) 6.0. Major Release of Cloud Solution Leverages New Architecture for Improved Scalability, Simplicity and Integration for Cost and Revenue Management

FAIRFAX, Va., March 8, 2010 – Razorsight Corporation, the only Cloud Computing provider of profit analytics solutions for communications service providers (CSPs), today announced the launch of its new Profit Enhancement Center (TM)(PEC)
6.0 release. This is a major release delivering substantial benefits for Razorsight’s customers. PEC 6.0 will be deployed FREE of charge to all existing customers as part of Razorsight’s SaaS/Cloud Computing delivery methodology. PEC
6.0 leverages a web-based portal to deliver a suite of applications to support the management and analysis of all cost, revenue, network, and off-net inventory data for CSPs.

PEC 6.0 provides customers with improved business intelligence and analytics through powerful dashboards that track real-time key performance indicators (KPI’s) related to network cost, revenue leakage, and operational efficiency.

In addition to delivering new and innovative features and solutions, PEC 6.0 integrates solutions acquired by Razorsight in 2009 which complement its existing flagship Cost Management, Data Capture and Analytics products. PEC 6.0 provides significant enhancements focusing on productivity, navigation, automation, and ease of use.
Razorsight’s integrated solution suite provides one-stop shopping and intuitive, easy to use and efficient access to all Cost, Usage, Inventory, and Revenue data.

PEC 6.0 becomes the first of its kind — a highly flexible, modular platform that clients can use for point solutions such as automated data loading and master data management, or more expansive needs like workflow automation (Invoice Receipt to Payment) as well as full revenue and cost management. A key benefit of PEC 6.0 is the integration of new modules to include inventory analysis, detailed usage analysis, and revenue assurance. “Razorsight is offering a wealth of new solutions to help clients better manage modular components of their business around Costs, Wholesale Revenue Leakage and ultimately Profitability and Margin Management,” said CTO Suren Nathan. “We’re excited to provide a FREE, 30-Day Test Drive to showcase the power and utility of 6.0 enhancements.”

New product suite offerings integrated into Profit Enhancement Center (TM) 6.0 include:

Inventory Analytics - Inventory Analytics harmonizes inventory data across multiple disparate sources and performs automated correlation, reconciliation and cleansing of network inventory to ensure ongoing inventory data integrity. The web-based, On Demand solution offers service providers the ability to cleanse and correlate circuit information from multiple systems including inventory, billing and vendor invoices to ensure that all circuits are accounted for and matched.

Usage Analytics – Usage Analytics is a powerful cloud-based solution for comprehensive usage analytics and auditing.
Architected to process billions of records per month, Razorsight Usage Analytics carries out CDR level analysis for anomaly detection, rate and volume validation, traffic analysis and cost audits. Razorsight Usage Analytics reconstructs usage costs based on call flow, tariff/agreement and usage element, and carries out powerful audits and analysis.

Revenue Analytics - Revenue Analytics provides a powerful solution that processes, validates and maximizes wholesale (intercarrier, 3rd party) revenues using cutting-edge technology, built-in best practices, and powerful auditing and analytics tools. Wholesale Revenue Assurance minimizes revenue leakage, identifies revenue and margin uplift opportunities, and makes revenue assurance a repeatable process.

Claims Analytics - Claims Analytics provides a solution for identification, generation, management and communication of intercarrier dispute claim information. Utilizing this unique automation tool, complete lifecycle management of claims is delivered to providers with the choice to integrate seamlessly into Razorsight’s flagship Cost Analytics solution.

About Razorsight
Razorsight is the only provider of Cloud-based business intelligence and profit analytics for the Communications Industry. Razorsight delivers the optimal solution for managing both the Buy Side and Sell Side of Carrier-to-Carrier relationships. Razorsight’s Profit Enhancement Center is a unique Cloud solution offering integrated Cost Management, Revenue Assurance, and Network Optimization in a single platform. As a Cloud-based solution, Razorsight easily integrates with legacy systems, while combining multiple disparate data sources into a single, robust analytics engine.

Razorsight’s tools deliver value across multiple departments (Finance, Sales, Marketing, Engineering, and Procurement).
Razorsight provides a unique set of Actionable Business Intelligence via web-based alerts, dashboards, and custom reports that have a profound impact on Operating Margins. We deliver carrier-grade performance and Tier-1 scalability, while ensuring near immediate ROI. Razorsight’s software is deployed at numerous industry leaders including AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, Telus, IBM, Windstream and Telekomunikacja Polska.

Razorsight has consistently ranked among the fastest growing companies in the U.S. Razorsight’s software has won accolades from partners such as IBM and Accenture, and Razorsight’s success has been recognized with industry awards including Deloitte Technology Fast 500, Inc. 5000, Virginia Technology Fast 50, and SmartCEO Future 50.

Describe for us what your company is involved with?

What is your background?
Spent 5 years in the Royal Australian navy deploying networks around the country. Left the service after they civilianized the IT support and returned as a contractor. Finally was able to step foot on a ship, something I had not had the chance to do during my enlistment. Spent the next three years installing networks on all major fleet units. Migrated to Canada and worked as a Network Field Technician for 7 years before migrating to the USA. Most of my work now with CRA is supporting their server infrastructure and ongoing development of our virtual environment.

How large is your IT staff?
In North America we have approximately 20 people.

What are the most significant business challenge that you face today?
Cost containment. Any new project must be evaluated to determine what is the most cost effective way to implement it. This includes looking at both in-house and hosted solutions.

Do you have key initiatives planned for this year and what are they?
Migration to vSphere 4.1 and implementing VDI.

Are you using Microsoft Hyper-V today?Any plans to do?
No. We are only running VMware. I feel it is the most mature virtual solution in the market and provides an excellent feature set and support.

Your thoughts on “The Cloud”?
It’s currently a technology undergoing a lot of development. Concerns are speed of access, security and cost effectiveness. There is definitely an advantage for Disaster Recovery, but the other issues must be addressed and access must be seamless before we could move our larger business processes to ‘the cloud’.

The IT project that you are most proud of?
Of my recent projects, the migration of most of our services to our virtual environment. This has resulted in significant cost savings for our company which has helped during the current economic climate.

If you had a magic wand that could do 3 IT tasks for you instantly what would they be?

1. High bandwidth, low cost data connectivity to give users LAN like access to all points of our network.
2. A completely replicated virtual environment providing seamless business continuity.
3. A printer that could pump out perfect $100 bills to pay for all the cool IT toys our upper management craves.

With 15 years in IT, Andrew is currently working with Charles River Associates supporting their North America offices. He has been heavily involved with the virtualization of the environment, with over 50% of systems now virtualized. This has proved to be very interesting work due to the rapidly evolving nature of virtualization tools and technologies.

Where:
Fleming’s Prime Steakhouse
217 Stuart Street
Boston, MA 02116

Take a look at the restaurant here.

Please register below

High availability solutions are no longer an all or nothing discussion about expensive, complex, or proprietary systems. Today there are wide range of affordable alternatives that provide the required level of availability at a cost justified by the risks of downtime.

Join Marathon for this free lunch seminar to learn:

• How to align your business needs to today’s spectrum of affordable high availability technology options
• How to present your recommendations and ROI analysis to management in business (not technology) terms for faster approval
• A Q&A session with Marathon’s application availability technical experts to answer all of your questions

We will also provide an overview of Marathon’s everRun® technology options for high availability (HA) and disaster recovery (DR) for Windows and XenServer environments, along with real-world deployment examples from companies including Abercrombie & Fitch, Argo Global Capital, and Smith & White Hospital.

everRun was recently selected as 2009 “Best High Availability/Disaster Recovery Product” by Windows IT Pro magazine.

How everRun enables applications to ComputeThru® failures

Eliminate the Hidden Costs of Traditional High Availability Software with everRun
everRun® is Marathon’s next-generation automated high availability software. everRun eliminates the complexities and hidden costs of traditional high availability and data protection products to give you more reliable, affordable application protection. everRun is proven in the most demanding availability environments such as stock exchanges, television networks, and pharmaceutical manufacturing plants. You can run business critical applications such as SQL Server, Exchange Server or SharePoint Server or mission critical specialized applications without worries of outages or data loss.

Lunch and Learn hosted by:

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Does your company have an active project to evaluate HA or DR solutions?*	Within 6 months Within a year >12months No planned project
Does your company have an active IT technology upgrade project? (please select any that apply)*	Microsoft Server 2008 migration X86 Server hardware update Consolidation of critical windows apps Exchange or SQL Server upgrade Other None
Other upgrade project:
When was the last time your company experienced downtime?*	Within last 3 months 3-6 months 6-12 months >12 months Never experienced downtime Don’t know
Please note that Marathon’s HA software works in Windows and XenServer environments only:*	OK
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“We invited all of our storage partners to demonstrate to the market what makes their solutions unique in our Citrix Ready StorageLink Challenge. While this challenge is about products, technology, and integration, we think it should be fun as well. We let our partners work at their creative skills and here is what they came with…”

Take a look at their video: GreenBytes and Citrix StorageLink Present: When a Boot Storm Strikes, and vote for your favorite contender HERE.

About GreenBytes
GreenBytes, Inc. is a provider of high-performance, energy-efficient inline deduplication storage appliances. The company’s GB-X Series storage appliances combine highly innovative software technology with a world-class server platform to address the storage and energy efficiency crises facing today’s IT operations. GreenBytes’ high-performance inline deduplicating storage appliances incorporate energy-efficient technologies and the industry’s highest levels of scalability and reliability in an easy to-use, cost-effective package, designed to bring the benefits of data deduplication to the broader storage market. GreenBytes was founded in 2007 and is based in Ashaway, Rhode Island. For more information, visit: www.getgreenbytes.com.