22 01732 759725 He recommends asking how much customers are spending to host data they no longer need, how much bad data is contributing to bad decisions and how much customer dissatisfaction is being caused by bad data. Using AvePoint’s platform to identify data-related issues, to organise data, to ensure its quality, to manage and control access to it will help organisations improve security, reduce waste and increase their agility, while enabling MSPs to develop deeper, longterm relationships with customers. New capabilities This advice dovetails neatly with AvePoint’s ongoing strategy to enhance its platform with new data security, governance and resilience capabilities, while enabling MSPs to develop additional recurring revenue, for example by upselling managed security services with centralised governance, proactive monitoring and automated policy enforcement. As Chris Shaw, Head of Channel at AvePoint UK, explained to Technology Reseller during an OnPoint coffee break, these changes are already generating growth for AvePoint and its partners. “We’ve got two main metrics of growth. Firstly, revenue is up significantly like for like (year-on-year quarter vs. quarter), and that’s a very solid trend. Depending on the quarter, we’re typically anywhere between 30% and 50% up on the same period in the previous year. “The other metric is the number of transaction partners and, by extension, how much revenue those partners are bringing in. We have some technologies AI‑readiness and cyber-resilience. In his opening keynote, Dux Raymond Sy, Chief Brand Officer at AvePoint, pointed out that for AI to make good decisions and to be trusted you need good data, good data security and good data governance. All grist to the mill for AvePoint – and a big opportunity for partners as organisations increasingly deploy AI not to cut costs but to drive growth with innovative data‑based solutions. Cyber resilience Good data management is also integral to effective cybersecurity, especially now that organisations are pivoting from detection and defence to resilience. Former hacker and cybersecurity expert Greg Van Der Gaast, in the second keynote of the day, argued that in every one of the last 25 years businesses have increased expenditure on cyber security, both in absolute terms and as a percentage of IT and business budgets. Yet, over that same period the cyber security of organisations has got ‘exponentially worse’. If it’s not working, he says, it simply makes no sense to do more of the same. His epiphany, he says, was the realisation that every security vulnerability is essentially a quality defect – a defect in code, in architecture, in life cycle management – that organisations can best address by fixing the root cause in areas they own and control. Fixing data management issues, for example, will help to fix identity issues. This will lower the number of security issues that arise, reducing the burden on cybersecurity staff and the likelihood of something getting past an organisation’s cyber defences. Van Der Gaast’s advice for MSPs and IT resellers is to focus not on cyber security technology per se, but on improving the health of customers’ foundations – their IT lifecycle, IT processes, IT management, identity & authentication, their ability to deploy patching, their ability to manage data etc.. The latter, he suggests, is particularly important as burgeoning unstructured data is making it easier for people within a business – the insider threat – to discover sensitive data that they may be tempted to use in a bad way. AvePoint has come a long way from its roots in backup and migration to become a much broader data lifecycle management platform with extensive capabilities across data protection, data security and data governance & compliance. As UK partners heard at the London edition of its flagship partner event AvePoint OnPoint on October 1, the company’s focus on modernising, optimising and securing digital workspaces gives it an important role to play not only in digital transformation but also AI-readiness and the need for more effective cybersecurity are driving demand for Avepoint’s data security, governance and resilience platform. James Goulding finds out more from AvePoint UK Head of Channel Chris Shaw Good foundations DATA SECURITY Chris Shaw
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