Continuum is best known for a range of platforms designed for small business MSPs. But CEO Michael George has also found a doorway into another customer segment: Hosting providers.
Indeed, Continuum's 2014 buyout of R1Soft -- a backup and recovery cloud solution -- apparently has found a growing niche in hosting provider data centers. A case in point: InfoLink, a hosting provider in Brazil, has boosted IaaS revenue 40 percent while also lifting disaster recovery revenues another 20 percent since adopting R1Soft's platform, the two companies said.
Hosting Providers, MSPs Converge
Is the InfoLink-R1Soft combo unique -- or will more hosting providers adopt Continuum's backup and recovery platform?
"There is clearly an opportunity within the inevitable merging of hosting service providers and MSPs as they serve much the same end client," says Continuum CEO Michael George. "They are also both playing a role in the transition to cloud based services; one a facilitator, the other the destination."
MSPs, George asserts, are facilitating the transition of on-premises or privately hosted business applications to the cloud. Hosting service providers, he adds, provide the required infrastructure and its management. Continuum is "very deliberately bridging the gap here" as MSPs and hosting providers increasingly work together, he concludes.
George has been outspoken about the shift from private clouds to public clouds in recent months, asserting that backup companies should stop building their own infrastructure, and instead tap into hosting providers and public clouds. George believes public clouds will leverage economies of scale to deliver the most cost effective, most secure solutions.
