5 Companies That Had A Rough Week

The Week Ending March 24

Topping this week's roundup of companies that had a rough week is Microsoft, which suffered through a lengthy Office 365 service outage.

Also making the list this week were Intel and its customers who are struggling with short supplies of solid state drives (SSDs); Cognizant employees who face the prospect of layoffs; Apple and a hacker's threat to delete customer data; and Tanium for its sudden need to fill a critical executive position.

Not everyone in the IT industry was having a rough go of it this week. For a rundown of companies that made smart decisions, executed savvy strategic moves – or just had good luck – check out this week's Five Companies That Came To Win roundup.

Microsoft Hit With 17-Hour Office 365 OneDrive Outage, Outlook.com Disruption

A 17-hour intermittent Office 365 outage prevented some customers from accessing their OneDrive accounts earlier this week. That, coupled with two hours of Outlook.com login problems, made for a rough week for Microsoft and its cloud partners and customers.

The latest service problems came just a week after "storage availability" issues interrupted Microsoft's Azure public cloud service for more than eight hours in the eastern U.S. And both Microsoft incidents come on the heels of a massive system outage at Amazon Web Services on Feb. 28 that disrupted websites, online applications and Internet services around the world for four hours.

The incidents have raised questions about how much businesses should rely on public cloud services.

Intel Warns Partners About Tight SSD Supply Through 2017

Intel is warning channel partners that demand for solid-state drives is expected to outstrip supply and that the company is prioritizing production of data center SSDs over lower-cost consumer SSDs. That's according to a memo from Intel obtained this week by CRN.

Intel said the SSD and NAND memory industry is experiencing record demand across all markets, and SSD supply is expected to remain tight for all of 2017.

That's tough news for Intel. But it's even worse news for system builders and solution providers who told CRN that the SSD shortage is impacting their enterprise system and PC businesses and cutting into their sales.

Cognizant Could Lay Off 6,000 To 10,000 Employees As Part Of Digital Shift

It hasn't been a good week for employees at systems integrator Cognizant, following reports that the company will likely slash between 2.3 percent and 5 percent of its workforce as automation makes many of the company's lower-end IT jobs redundant.

The company, No. 7 on the CRN Solution Provider 500, is expected to move ahead with between 6,000 and 10,000 job cuts as the company shifts its focus from traditional to digital IT services.

As of the end of 2016, the company employed more than 260,000 globally, including 47,500 in North America and 180,000 in India.

Tanium Finds Itself With A Critical Job To Fill

CRN reported this week that Tanium chief operating officer/chief financial officer Eric Brown (pictured) left the company suddenly last week, a departure that comes at a critical time as the company reportedly begins laying the groundwork for an initial public offering.

No reason for Brown's departure was given and Brown himself declined to comment.

Tanium, founded in 2007, has been regarded as one of the hottest startups in the security space, raising $262 million in funding and reportedly reaching a valuation of $3.5 billion.

Apple Scrambles To Respond To Hacker Ransom Threat

Apple found itself dealing with a highly publicized threat this week by alleged hackers who claimed to have access to Apple email and iCloud accounts and threatened to erase customer data, messages, photos and videos unless Apple paid a ransom.

The hackers, calling themselves the "Turkish Crime Family," claimed to have stolen email accounts and passwords to hundreds of millions of Apple email and iCloud accounts (reported numbers ranged from 250 million to more than 600 million). The alleged hackers were reportedly seeking a ransom of $75,000 in cryptocurrency, although some reports have said the demands have increased to $150,000.

The incident was first reported on Motherboard, with other media outlets including The Verge and Fortune picking up on the story.

Apple has publicly stated that its systems have not been hacked, but said the alleged list of addresses and passwords appears to have come from previously compromised third-party services, according to a company statement. Apple also said it's working with law enforcement to identify the hackers.