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HyBlue Launches First Proactive Network Management Service for Small Businesses; Network Diagnostics and Management Priced for Rapid, Risk-Free Deployment

Posted on: Monday, 14 February 2005, 12:00 CST

HyBlue, the first proactive network management service for small business, today announced general availability of its monitoring services, sold exclusively through value added resellers (VARs). The market for network management, dominated by Tivoli and Opsware, has yet to reach small businesses.

"Most network monitoring tools cost hundreds or thousands of dollars per month and return mountains of useless data or impose an awkward user interface," explained Matthew Sutton, HyBlue CEO. "Resellers don't have time to wade through dozens of low level alerts. HyBlue is inexpensive, filters irrelevant items and, through its proprietary Expert System, reports critical issues and suggested remedies to VARs."

Analyst firm IDC estimates that network management services is one of the hottest growth segments in the SMB market, for which most SMBs rely on VARs. Forrester, another analyst firm, reported that 80 percent of SMBs used independent contractors or VARs last year.

HyBlue differentiates itself by offering its services exclusively through VARs. With no up-front fees and monthly service pricing for end-users around $10 per desktop and $100 per server, the service is designed from the ground up to appeal to VARs and integrate with how they work, based on the company founders' more than 30 years of VAR experience.

"Server uptime has become a hot commodity and managed services such as HyBlue's allow VARs to respond to customer demand quickly and without major fees or commitments," Sutton, said. "We're the first vendor to offer a highly sophisticated network monitoring service to SMB VARs. The small business segment is the hardest to reach because it's so fragmented, but that's where most of the networks are."

HyBlue Expert System

The HyBlue Expert System database can identify thousands of potential Windows operational issues and known remedies. Predictive analysis is based on thousands of hours of monitoring experience. HyBlue's suggested remedies differentiate it from competitors, most of which simply tell VARs or IT managers that the computer has failed, not how to fix it.

"HyBlue is particularly valuable to VARs for its simple interface and ability to suggest fixes," said Don Kerzel, director of sales and marketing for Cascade Computer Maintenance, a mid-size VAR based in Salem, Oregon. "We're monitoring hundreds of servers throughout the Northwest. We've virtually eliminated surprise system crashes and their costs with HyBlue, providing our customers with reliability and a low monthly fee."

The monitoring service consists of three elements: HyBlue's Expert System which captures network knowledge, a Customer Portal to communicate with IT professionals, and a Software Sensor that runs on the local computer and communicates with the Expert System. The Sensor monitors servers and workstations for potential problems and communicates potential problems to the Expert System via the Internet. The Expert System compares the problem with thousands of potential problems in its database, gauges the possible severity, and reports the issue with suggestions of possible remedies to the VAR in a manner commensurate with the problem.

Pricing and availability

HyBlue Remote Monitoring is available immediately through participating VARs with a manufacturer's suggested price of $10 per desktop and $100 per server. While other server monitoring services charge two orders of magnitude more per system, HyBlue is priced for rapid, low risk deployment on thousands of systems immediately.

About HyBlue

HyBlue is a hosted network management service provider for VARs serving small- and medium-sized businesses. The company was founded by IT support and infrastructure veterans to give IT service providers a new set of services to offer their customers. HyBlue created the Web-hosted Expert System to proactively support Windows(R) servers and workstations with no additional hardware or upfront software license fees to enable rapid and risk-free deployment.

Source: Business Wire

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