Zynstra, the pioneer in hybrid cloud solutions for small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), today announces the launch of O365Connect. Developed in association with Microsoft and HP to provide SMBs with a managed Hybrid IT solution, it delivers all the comfort and control of on-premise IT but with the economics and service levels typically associated with public cloud services.

Aimed at businesses with between 5 and 250 IT users, O365Connect provides a seamless integration with Microsoft Office 365, giving the end user complete control over the management of their data, backup and print services as well as employee access to applications via Single Sign On. O365Connect will be sold exclusively through and managed by the channel.
Nick East, CEO of Zynstra commented on the launch. “Many SMBs still feel unwilling or unable to fully adopt cloud services due to restrictions on their broadband capabilities, security concerns, or a feared loss of control. Hybrid IT is growing in popularity.”

All of Zynstra’s cloud managed server appliances are built on the HP ProLiant server range with the unique Zynstra software that enables local IT workloads to be run as a service in a virtualised Windows and/or Linux environment. Users of O365Connect are also able to benefit from Zynstra’s patent pending keep current and keep consistent technology which is “built in” so that SMBs need not worry about having to update systems. With Zynstra’s extensive software IP, each appliance is also provisioned, updated and managed from the cloud at a scale not previously possible.

Andy Burton, Chief Revenue Officer for Zynstra commented: “O365Connect has been designed from scratch with the SMB in mind, offering the best of on-premise IT and cloud services. We chose to build a complete proposition, working in close partnership with Microsoft and HP to ensure that what resulted was an IT service that once and for all put the notion of ‘legacy’ technology to bed.”

Zynstra O365Connect handles local networking, security, identity, file and print management, and the management of Single-Sign-On to Office 365 and other applications. It provides a fully managed backup service of the local files as well as maintaining a full backup of the cloud managed email and file data from Microsoft’s Office 365 locally on the Zynstra solution. An additional Disaster Recovery option, allows the appliance to be fully backed up to Microsoft’s Azure service enabling the solution to be spun up in the cloud in the event of an entire loss of physical office or appliance.

Glenn Woolaghan, Microsoft UK SMB Director, Small & Midmarket Solutions & Partners, unit commented “We have seen tremendous interest and uptake in our cloud services, both for Office 365 and Azure, but we also recognise that many customers want to keep some local presence running workloads and applications on the familiar Windows Server environment, whether for management of user credentials and local printer services or for accounting and CRM activities. The need for a solution that brings these two worlds together in a simple managed environment that the reseller community can adopt to support their customers is considerable. What’s more it has relevance not just to businesses but to Schools, Primary Care Trusts and charities, as well as Remote and Branch Offices of larger companies.”

Lee Knott, HP’s UK&I lead for SMB also welcomed the launch of the new Zynstra service. “A Hybrid IT solution for the SMB just makes complete sense. No longer do customers need to choose between customer owned solutions and full cloud adoption. Now they can have the advantages of both in a single, managed solution without sacrificing productivity. Customers can enjoy all the benefits of Office 365 integrated to the local IT experience based on HP’s world-class server technology, providing a robust, efficient and reliable IT platform with flexibility to add applications as the business grows. We see Hybrid IT becoming the norm for many organisations, especially SMBs, where there is a growing need for converged infrastructure solutions across servers, networking and storage.”

Zynstra’s O365Connect is available from 17th February 2014.