Two Vendors Rethink Channel

Two such vendors, Austin, Texas-based Neverfail Group and Mountain View, Calif.-based Teneros, are providing their channel partners with new ways to tackle e-mail data-management issues.

Neverfail, which this month received a D-round of venture funding of $10 million, is taking a software approach with a turnkey solution that, for between $7,000 and $10,000, turns industry-standard Windows-based servers into a high-availability solution that keeps the Microsoft Exchange, SQL, File Server, Internet Information Services and SharePoint data available in case of system failure.

That funding is slated for product development and channel programs, said Neil Robertson, group CEO.

With the Neverfail technology, SQL, for instance, can recover from a system crash in as fast as 10 to 30 seconds, compared to five to 20 minutes normally, Robertson said. “In most cases, the users don&'t even know there was a problem.” Company officials said that versions for Oracle and Lotus Notes are expected to ship in March or April.

Teneros, however, takes a hardware approach to protecting e-mail data with its Application Continuity Appliance for Microsoft Exchange, which offers instant failover and 24x7 uptime in the event of a planned or unplanned Exchange server downtime, company officials said.

Early this month, Teneros plans to expand its product line—which currently consists of a 100-Gbyte model that&'s been shipping since September—with new appliances that have storage capacities of 50 Gbytes, 250 Gbytes and 500 Gbytes.

Jeanette Munoz, sales manager for Domain Consultants, a Woodland Hills, Calif.-based Neverfail solution provider, said that Neverfail helps customers focus less on managing e-mail and more on core business. “Instead of being around the servers all the time, getting an alert and rebooting for two to three hours, Neverfail fails-over to the new server automatically,” she said. “It gives IT a chance to fix the problem and restore the server all while the data is online.”