Product Announcements

Preview Parallels Plesk Panel 11 and Register for Training Sessions Today

Parallels is pleased to announce the availability of Parallels Plesk Panel 11 marketing preview #1 and Parallels Plesk Panel 11 partner training sessions. We continue to work towards out April 24th target RTM date, and to help you prepare for the upcoming launch, Parallels Plesk Panel 11 marketing preview #1 is now available for download and training sessions are open for registration.

Take advantage of these great opportunities to learn about Parallels Plesk Panel 11, and join us for the official launch of Parallels Plesk Panel 11 at WHD.global 2012 in Germany.

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Parallels Automation for Cloud Marketplace — Now Offering 15 Leading SMB Applications

With Parallels Automation for Cloud Marketplace, service providers have the ability to instantly launch a customized storefront with more applications that come complete with pre-negotiated licensing terms and white label support, which dramatically improves both time-to-market and time-to-profitability. Applications include: Attracta, CloudFlare, Ecwid, Evernote, Global Mentoring, Keepit, Infratel Infra Cloud Receptionist™, MXSweep, Norton, PinnacleCart, UNITY Mobile, SiteLock, SpamExperts, StopTheHacker and Trustwave.

Learn more here.

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End of Purchase Ability for Older Versions of Parallels Panels

Parallels is committed to providing high-quality, cost-effective solutions to our customers. Rapidly changing technologies influence the level, timing and character of demand for particular product versions and components. All of this drives the need to introduce new products and services as well as to end support for older software versions.

In keeping with our Parallels Plesk Panel lifecycle policy, we will be ending the ability to order certain older key types. These key types will be:

• Parallels Small Business Panel
• Parallels Plesk Panel 8.x or older
• Parallels Plesk Panel 9.0 — 9.3.x
• Parallels Plesk Panel 9.5.x and Parallels Plesk Panel 10.x keys will not be affected by this change.

The above listed keys will no longer be available as of April 1, 2012. After this date, your new customers must purchase Plesk 9.5 or Plesk 10.x licenses. Please ensure that your key ordering systems and processes are updated with this new availability to ensure your operations will not be affected.

Headlines

A Record-breaking Parallels Summit 2012; Parallels SMB Reports and Infographic Available for Download

Parallels Summit 2012 wrapped up the week of February 13 in Orlando, FL. This year set attendance records compared to the previous six Parallels Summit events. Over 1,200 attendees enjoyed keynotes from speakers such as Guy Kawasaki and Birger Steen, Parallels CEO. If you weren't able to attend, you can see what you missed and watch videos of the presentations here.

At Parallels Summit 2012, we unveiled new and improved material, including the Parallels SMB Cloud Insights™ reports and the infographic poster. These are now available for download.

• Parallels SMB Cloud Insights™
  New Parallels SMB Cloud Insights™ reports for 2012 — including the US, Global trends, Brazil, and Mexico reports — are now online. These four reports were first released to attendees of Parallels Summit 2012 and enjoyed extensive coverage among industry media and analysts. Download your copy of these reports to help you build your SMB business in the cloud!

  • Parallels Partners: Register for the new and improved PartnerNet. All of the SMB Cloud Insights™ reports are available in our SMB knowledge headquarters.

  • All others: Download here. You will need to fill out a short registration form to download.

• Parallels Infographic
  The poster addresses the market landscape, opportunity, and diversity; highlights the cloud service delivery blueprint and the Parallels portfolio; and features our ISV and cloud service provider ecosystem.

  You can download your copy here.

  If you would like a physical copy, please contact your sales representative. We will gladly mail you one.

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Parallels and Runa Capital Partner in New GTM Accelerator Program for ISVs

At Parallels Summit 2012, Parallels and Runa Capital announced their partnership in a new go-to-market accelerator program for independent software vendors of cloud applications and services for small and medium business (SMBs). Read more

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Parallels Highlights the Expansion of its ISV Ecosystem

Parallels highlighted the vast expansion of its ISV ecosystem at Parallels Summit 2012. The Application Packaging Standard (APS) has created a valuable new revenue opportunity — for both hosting industry service providers and ISVs — by introducing a "pluggable" approach to hosting and cloud applications and services. ISVs continue to embrace the potential of the APS, which includes certified applications such as Google Apps for Business™, Microsoft® Dynamics 2011, and Open-Xchange. See the APS website for a list of other certified applications. Read more

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Parallels and Quest Software to Deliver Valuable Hosted Application Solutions

Parallels and Quest Software partner to deliver valuable hosted application solutions to service providers. Quest adds Microsoft Exchange Migration, Desktop as a Service, and Remote Network Management Solutions to the Parallels Automation Cloud Marketplace. This new partnership agreement will enable service providers to drive more revenue faster with three essential solutions targeting specific customer workloads available within Parallels Automation and Parallels Plesk Panel Suite. These solutions enable service providers to deliver self-service Microsoft® Exchange migration services to Microsoft® Office365 or Hosted Microsoft® Exchange, as well as Desktop-as-a -Service deployment and management services, and remote network monitoring and management services. Read more

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Symantec Receives Parallels 2011 APS ISV Service of the Year Award

Symantec received the Parallels 2011 APS ISV Service of the Year at an awards ceremony at the Gaylord Palms Hotel and Convention Center in Orlando, Florida. Parallels gives its APS ISV Service of the Year Award to the top independent software vendor (ISV) who has utilized the Application Packaging Standard (APS) to deliver a cloud-based application on the Parallels platform, providing a stellar end-user experience and driving accelerated run-rate growth for Parallels service provider partners. Read more

Learn how Symantec leverages new Parallels-automated platforms to deliver cloud services to SMBs.

Events

Parallels APS and Cloud Services Webinar Series for Service Providers — Tuesday, March 13, 8:00am (PST)

Register today for the next partner webinar. Cloud services providers should attend this webinar to hear directly from application and service vendors on the features and benefits of their applications and how vendors can help service providers profit by offering applications to small business customers. This is a great opportunity to find out how to sell high demand commercial applications and services and to learn how Parallels and the vendors can help you be successful in increasing ARPU and reducing customer churn. This webinar series features a wide range of proven and revenue generating application categories.

The March webinar will feature:

• McAfee Security-as-a-Service
• IASO Backup Software
• Ecwid Shopping Cart

This popular and well-attended webinar series helps connect ISVs and cloud service providers to drive new business. Past products and companies highlighted include: Microsoft, BackupAgent, MXSweep, 4PSA, UNITY Mobile, Open X-change, Ksplice, Panda Security, Pinnacle Cart, goMobi, Infratel, OfficeDrive, Stopthehacker, Video Most, Parallels PACM, Attracta, CloudFlare, MessageSolution, SofCloudIT, LiveOffice, SmarterTools, SpamExperts, Symantec.cloud, and Alteva.

You can also watch past webinars.

News from the Parallels Support Team

Parallels Global Support is proud to introduce the FastLane™ support program. By being in the FastLane™, customers will be placed at the top of the support queue and assured that their urgent issues are quickly resolved.

In order to participate in the FastLane™ support program in 2012, customers must meet 8 of the following 10 best practices for operational excellence*:

1. Training & Certification from Parallels — employ at least 2 relevant product experts who have achieved “Engineer” status in Parallels certifications
2. Maintain a staging environment which replicates the production system including a copy of the customer database that is no greater than 1 month old
3. Provide evidence of a documented Change Management process that includes tracking of system changes
4. Install micro-updates up to the current version
5. Stay current with major updates or be only one version behind
6. Have Watchdog enabled and reporting to Parallels (POA, PBA)
7. Have 3rd-party infrastructure monitoring in place and submit details of that solution to Parallels
8. Must have Network Operations Center support staffed 24x7
9. Maintain troubleshooting process for incident resolution that includes Initial Incident triage, troubleshooting and resolution where solution available
10. Have Microsoft Certification (if deploying modules for Microsoft technology such as IIS, Exchange, SharePoint, Office365, CRM, etc.)

*Customers must also commit to meeting 100% of the requirements within 12 months

PartnerNet will be updated with the FastLane™ qualification form soon.

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Tips and Tricks from Parallels Global Support

Parallels Virtuozzo Containers for Windows

• For best practices on how to propagate Parallels Containers for Windows to End Users please see the following Knowledge Base article.

• Before migrating containers in Parallels Virtuozzo Containers for Windows you must carefully check operating systems on the source and destination nodes. For an up-to-date compatibility table and migration rules to help you avoid any mistakes please see the following Knowledge Base article.

Connect With Parallels Global Support!

• For general Customer Support and Service, and updates from the Global Support organization you can tweet to @ParallelsCares on Twitter! @ParallelsCares.

• Follow Parallels Knowledge Base on Twitter and you will see when new* Knowledge Base articles go live as soon as they are created or updated! @ParallelsKB.

*@ParallelsKB will tweet new and updated KB articles for the following products only: Parallels Desktop for Mac, Parallels Plesk Panel, Parallels Virtual Automation, Parallels Virtual Automation, Parallels Operations Automation, Parallels Business Automation — Enterprise, Parallels Business Automation - Standard.