The new offering is a bundle of existing components, adding Acronis Backup and a choice of partner VDI offerings to the Scale HC3 platform, but it is purpose-built for organizations looking to protect home-based workforces.
Craig Theriac, director of product management at Scale Computing
Scale Computing, which makes edge-focused hyperconverged solutions, has bundled together their core technology with solutions it accesses through strategic partnerships to make a new Business Resilience Solution available. It is intended to response to both the short-term issues created by the pandemic as well as longer term consequences for the workforce, with a major focus on companies who are not already using Scale.
The base of the Business Resilience Solution is Scale’s HC3 platform. The bundle adds Virtual Desktop Infrastructure [VDI] from one of Scale’s two VDI partners, LeoStream or Parallels. The final component is Acronis Backup.
“We were selling them all separately before, but not as a single holistic solution,” said Craig Theriac, director of product management at Scale. “Some partners would take us to market sometimes with Acronis, and sometime with the VDI. What we have done here is pull it all together for them.”
The purpose of the bundle is to address the transitions in workforce deployment created by the pandemic, which to some degree at least, are likely to continue after the pandemic has faded. Cybercriminals have capitalized on the transition to steal from companies, both by targeting home-based employees who don’t have the same level of protection that they did in an office, and hitting them with ransomware and COVID-related phishing scams.
“Companies are learning that in this kind of environment, you don’t protect remote employees by letting them log in with a VPN,” Theriac commented.
Theriac also noted that Scale doesn’t see the market opportunity here just as a short term one.
I believe that even if we cure COVID tomorrow, somewhere between 37-40% of all jobs could optimally be completed outside the four walls of the office,” he said. “Not everyone working from home now will want to stay there, but some will, and at least for them there will be long-term demand for this.”
Theriac acknowledged that the full Business Resilience Solution is likely to be a redundancy for many existing Scale customers, although it may be a fit for those who do not already have VDI.
“If they already have the component pieces of the solution, there’s no real reason for they to buy the bundle,” he said. “But most customers now have started to look at work from home solutions, and purchasing the VDI likely will require a full other cluster, so there may be interest there.”
Theriac indicated that the major attraction of the new bundle is likely to be among companies who are not already working with Scale, however.
“We think that the packaging of this solution will appeal to new prospects,” he said.
Scale goes to market entirely through channel partners, and Theriac noted that this type of solution responds to requests that many partners have made.
“Partners have been asking us to make offerings focused on solutions and use cases,” he said. “This kind of packaging provides the type of offering that they want.”
