Sage 100 Contractor and Sage 300 Construction and Real Estate are now available in the Sage Partner Cloud through strategic hosting partners. Two U.S.-based hosting partners have been announced, with more likely, although probably not in this calendar year.
Sage 300 Construction and Real Estate
In late 2020, business software vendor Sage launched the Sage Partner Cloud Program in the U.S. and Canada, in order to accelerate the migration of the SMB-focused Sage 100 and Sage 300 offerings to the Azure cloud. Now, Sage has announced the expansion of the Partner Cloud, with the addition of two subscription-based offerings, Sage 100 Contractor and Sage 300 Construction and Real Estate [CRE]. Sage has also added two new strategic hosting providers, Cloud at Work and Swizznet, to the Sage Partner Cloud program.
The addition of strategic hosting partners to the program gives Sage partners another option to take the four solutions now covered by the program to market.
“When the program was rolled out, channel partners managed the hosting of Azure,’” said Mike Edgett, Director, Product Marketing at Sage. “We gave them the tools to be able to manage Sage 100 or 300. The addition of these hosting partners gives channel partners another option. It means that instead of a partner having to be a MSP, they can instead go to an accredited strategic hosting provider.”
Out of the gate, there are only two of these providers. Cloud at Work is New York City based, and one of Sage’s top partners in North America. They do not have Canadian facilities, but they do have customers in Canada. Swizznet is also American, with main offices in the St Louis MO area. They do not have a data centre in Canada, but they do host data for Canadian customers who are not subject to a Canadian residency requirement.
“We chose to limit the number of hosting partners out of the gate,” Edgett said. “As we get further along, we will add other hosting providers as needed, and we have several other partners who already have a robust hosting capability. We do have a program that these hosting partners are required to go through to demonstrate that they have the necessary security and availability. We don’t expect any new hosting providers in the balance of this calendar year, however. We want a few months under our belt before we add anyone else.”
Cloud at Work will host Sage 100 and Sage 300, as well as the newly available Sage 100 Contractor and Sage 300 CRE, while Swizznet will host the two newly available offerings only.
Sage 300 is a more significant product in Canada than Sage 100, in part because Sage 300 built up a strong legacy base when they were ACCPAC, a Vancouver-based firm, and have retained that even as customers transition from the original on-prem product to cloud. The company is hopeful that Sage Partner Cloud will stimulate both of the construction offerings, however.
“Canada is a growth market for the construction and real estate business at Sage,” said Jeremiah McNicholas, Product Marketing Manager, Construction and Real Estate at Sage. “We believe Sage Partner Cloud availability will drive the adoption of our Sage 100 Contractor and Sage 300 Construction and Real Estate products in the country.”
Edgett said that Sage 100 Contractor and Sage 300 CRE were planned to be rolled out from the beginning.
“We are seeing more customers interested in moving to the cloud, so we are giving them the tools for either a cloud or a hosted environment,” he stated. “Whether we add any other products to the Sage Partner umbrella is still to be determined.”
