The new version of the N-central platform represents the first integration of the Solarwinds N-able and LogicNow’s technologies, with more on the way.

SolarWinds MSP has announced SolarWinds MSP N-central 11, the new version of the company’s remote monitoring and management [RMM] platform. It features several new enhancements, with one, the introduction of an integrated Backup and Recovery component, being particularly noteworthy. It comes from the LogicNow technology acquired earlier this year by SolarWinds, and represents the first cross-platform technology collaboration on the company’s roadmap.

“This is a release with a perfect balance,” said John Pagliuca, SolarWinds MSP’s GM. Pagliuca, who had been CFO at LogicNow before its acquisition, emerged at the top of the SolarWinds MSP pyramid as part of a significant restructuring in September. He heads both the LogicNow and N-able portfolios, although those brand names have now disappeared. JP Jauvin, who had previously been GM at SolarWinds N-able, is now in a senior sales role, part of a senior sales leadership — Mike Cullen, Frank Colletti, and David Weeks – that comes from the old Solarwinds N-able side of the house. Other than Pagliuca, the top LogicNow officials, Walter Scott, Alistair Forbes and Steve Garland, have all left the company.

“I have spent the last 90 days bouncing all over North America and Europe, talking to customers and partners, with a simple message,” Pagliuca said. “We are taking LogicNow blue and N-able yellow and making green – not just making money for the company -but for our MSPs and their end customers.”

Pagliuca said that the new Backup and Recovery component will be a big money-maker for everyone.

“The Backup and Recovery comes from LogicNow, and is the first major platform announcement that crosses over,” he said. “We have had the product at LogicNow since 2013, and is one of our best product from a customer satisfaction point of view. Other Backup and Recovery products used by our competitors are cludgy and heavy. They need a tech with eyeballs on the screen to monitor them. But where our competitors take snapshots and back the whole thing up, our system is slick and light, and only backs up the data where the files have changed.”

Pagliuca acknowledged that almost all MSPs already have a Backup and Recovery capability, but he thinks this is a sufficiently superior product to encourage them to switch.

“It’s integrated into the platform, and can be accessed with one click, so it’s more efficient to manage,” he said. “It’s just a better way of doing things. We have pitched it to our largest customers and many have already adopted it. We expect that the great majority will convert over.”

Pagliuca also thinks this will be attractive for new MSPs.

“New entrants are looking for MSP tools that are a single pane of glass, which will help them get to market better,” he said. “On the LogicNow side, when we announced a risk intelligence tool, adoption doubled month over month over month.”

SolarWinds MSP N-central 11 has also enhanced its new role-based user permissions to enhance security. This feature lets MSPs create groups and user profiles and gain greater precision when granting selective access to core functions within the MSP N-central server.

“Like many other RMM platforms, we had some user permissions before, but we concluded that we needed to add a significant enhancement to that,” Pagliuca said. “They can go in and get very specific access to everything, and be able to do this very quick and intuitively. They can also create a couple quick user roles and reuse them.”

This release also opens up SolarWinds MSP’s APIs to facilitate easy custom PSA integration from either the MSP’s ticketing system of choice, or their own home-grown tools.

“We have always in the past integrated with top PSA tools, but MSP partners wanted to bring in things,” Pagliuca stated. “We created a thorough API set to allow anyone in good standing to come in and integrate their own home grown tools. They also don’t have to wait for us to build a specific integration to a new version of a PSA tool, or one that we don’t support.”

This release also introduces a Patch Control Homepage, which lets MSPs bring all patch management elements together in a single screen.

“More advanced partners need granular controls and that can be messy,” Pagliuca said. “Now with the home page, everything funnels into that one page for deeper configuration and patch management.”

Mac Scripting is also being introduced, with support for BASH and AppleScript languages to enhance automation across Mac devices.

“Before, we were just focused on Windows, but as Macs become more prevalent, it’s not just the design team that owns the Mac, so we are expanding support,” Pagliuca said. “Being able to script opens up the door to start that automation path.”

Finally, an upgrade to the AV Defender engine [AVD 6.0] makes the engine significantly more lightweight, with a lower processing load to lessen the impact on system performance. It also includes an enhanced anti-ransomware component.

Pagliuca said that the integration will continue throughout the whole of calendar year 2017.

“Our integration is 60 to 90 days ahead of what we were calling for,” he said. “The old product lines will continue to blur, as we continue to leverage from both sides and integrate and leverage the technologies.”