The 10 most valuable microsoft solution providers 2018

December 2018
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Reforming Organizations through its Disruptive Software Solution
The
Most Valuable
Solution Providers 2018 Edition

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Simplifying the
Complexities of
Businesses with
Evolved Microsoft
Solutions
icrosoft has touched our lives significantly and continues to do so with the priceless solutions it
Moffers, with the intent to simplifying our lives. Microsoft has traveled a long way since the
launch of MS-DOS, in the 80s. From then, it has continued inventing, in terms of software,
hardware, and cloud solutions. Over the years Microsoft has transformed into a technological brand and
kept its competitors on their toes by consistent innovation and incorporation of evolving trends.
Today, the digital disruption has caused a widespread revolution in every business sector. Microsoft offers
a huge spectrum of products and solutions that are built on the basis and pillars of scalability, rich and
innovative functionality. Microsoft’s advanced and refined product portfolio, supporting a diverse range of
programming languages, frameworks, third-party tools, and systems, has reinvented business execution
across industries. Microsoft, being a driver of technological innovation, designs customizable solutions
and products that are designed for the digital world which is driven by big data, cloud, and artificial
intelligence.
Microsoft products and solutions vary from personal digital assistants to finding newer ways to benefit
from the Internet of Things, cloud services, Blockchain, Microsoft data platform, SAP on Azure, Big data
and analytics, and Office 365 suite. With the help of Microsoft Solutions, it also becomes possible to
unleash the potential hidden in big data, whether it’s on-premises, in the cloud or at the edge – and reveal
insights and opportunities to transform businesses. With Microsoft, it is possible to transform businesses
with a unified data platform. The Microsoft data platform brings Artificial Intelligence to data and it helps
to gain deep knowledge about businesses and customers like never before. With help of targeted
integration and analysis of data Microsoft Solution providers strengthen the competitiveness of businesses.
Microsoft solution providers easily integrate data into different apps and use a rich set of cognitive
services to build human-like intelligence across any scale of data. It is possible to build intelligent apps
backed by Microsoft’s innovations. Certified solution providers empower businesses to function

efficiently, better, faster, from anywhere, anytime. These providers specialize in delivering up-to-date
Microsoft technology-based customer solutions all over the world. A certified Microsoft solution
provider can assess business goals, identify a solution that meets business needs and it helps
businesses become more agile and efficient. These solution providers help businesses take full
advantage of the cloud, opening a wide array of newer opportunities to grow businesses and their
revenue. Trusted Microsoft solution providers tap the power of technology, innovation to simplify the
complexities of businesses. Certified Microsoft solution providers help businesses save time, money,
and in the continuous growth of businesses by delivering required solutions.
With all this, we can say that the amount of value that Microsoft solution providers bring to the table
of any organization and for the purpose of improving businesses is priceless. And therefore having
the right Microsoft solution provider to meet all business goals is absolutely critical. Recognizing
this, Insights Success has shortlisted, “The 10 Most Valuable Microsoft Solution Providers in
2018.”
Notable Microsoft Solution Provider TimeXtender is recognized globally as one of the fastest
growing private software companies, which enables businesses to make quality business decisions
®
faster with its flagship technology platform, Discovery Hub . It has partnered with Microsoft to
® ®
deliver Discovery Hub on Azure. Discovery Hub is now fully certified for Microsoft Azure and
available in the Azure Market Place. By running Discovery Hub® on Azure, it provides business
users with self-service analytics. The design of Discovery Hub® enables fully automated data
preparation, providing data analysts with the accessibility needed to maximize advanced analytics
and AI.
We distinguished various other organizations which facilitate the world with their various unique
Microsoft solutions. CAL Business Solutions has installed over 300+ accounting systems for
companies nationwide, with a focus on Microsoft Dynamics GP and Acumatica for businesses in
Connecticut and Southern New England; Colorado Technology Consultants, Inc. is a global
provider of IT Consulting and Training services. It specializes in helping medium to large businesses
leverage technology to reach a sustained competitive advantage; The Exceedra system supports a
closed-loop, integrated business planning process and revenue management activities to drive better
control, decision making and visibility across the enterprise; Salt Essential IT’s solutions empower
its employees to work better and faster, from anywhere, anytime. Its services also stabilize its client’s
operations while increasing their bottom line; Winspire Solutions has been providing clients of
every size with consultancy, customization, training and implementation of ERP, CRM, SCM and
Business Intelligence solutions.
Additionally, this magazine contains articles that are the contribution of our in-house editorial team
and industry pioneers which incorporates the importance of having certified Microsoft solution
providers to improve the value that businesses deliver to the world.
Let’s turn over and have an eye further!
Sharad Chitalkar

ARTICLES
Editor’s Pick Energy Eﬃcient Technology
Green Cloud Compu ng Saving
Energy through Technology
24 36
- Cover Story
TIME TENDERX
Reforming Organiza ons through its
Disrup ve So ware Solu on
08
CXO
The Impressive Impact of
Organic Networking
Challenges and Risks in
adop ng Digital Disrup on
Minimize Risk of Digital
Transforma on Failure
Top 5 Email Security Threats
TECH-TALK
18 30 42

CAL Business Solu ons:
So ware Systems That Work
22
Colorado Technology
Consultants, Inc:
Impar ng IT Consul ng and
Training Services Globally
28
Exceedra:
Integrated Business Planning and
Revenue Management
34
Salt Essen al IT:
Helping Businesses to Operate
Be er since Incep on
40
Winspire Solu ons:
Delivering World Class ERP Solu ons
46

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Reforming Organizations through its
Disruptive Software Solution
Discovery Hub is the future-proof analytical®
platform, enabling quality business decisions
with data, mind and heart.
‘‘
Cover Story
The
Most Valuable

Taking into consideration the drive to ceaselessly
transform the ever-evolving IT ecosystem,
formulation and delivery of reformative software
solutions and services, and a profound knack for
innovation, TimeXtender has been recognized as one of
the most valuable Microsoft solution providers.
TimeXtender, with headquarters in both Denmark and the
U.S., instigates quality business decisions with data, mind,
and heart. The company does this for one simple reason,
“because time matters.”
TimeXtender was founded in 2006 and is a privately owned
company. It serves its customers, including Fortune 500,
large-sized enterprises and mid-sized companies,
through a global network of partners.
TimeXtender, recognized globally as one of
the fastest-growing private software
companies, enables businesses decisions
faster with its flagship technology
platform Discovery Hub®.
With Discovery Hub®, users get
actionable insights, simplify their
compliance journey and make
better decisions in less time.
Using this unified platform,
business users, Business
Intelligence (BI) and IT
developers can collaborate on
an agile, fully integrated
information platform that supports
iterative workflows to quickly create reports and
dashboards. This lets business leaders make quality
business decisions without impacting the core systems of
the business.
Exemplifying Microsoft Solutions Worldwide
TimeXtender is devoted to developing ongoing technology
advancements with Discovery Hub® for the Microsoft
community. The company’s research and development staff
has worked diligently to augment its Microsoft capabilities
over the years. An example of this is TimeXtender’s recent
announcement that Discovery Hub® now supports Azure
Data Lake.
The company is closely aligned with Microsoft Azure and
along with Azure Data Lake, supports Azure SQL Database,
Azure SQL Database Managed Instance, Azure Analysis
Services, and Azure Data Warehouse. Discovery Hub® is
also Azure certified and available in the Azure Marketplace.
TimeXtender has been a Microsoft Partner, Gold Data
Analytics and Power BI technology partner for many years.
Transformative Technology Leader
Heine Krog Iversen is the Founder and CEO of
TimeXtender and has been involved in enterprise IT for
more than 20 years. Through hard work, diligence, and
persistence, Heine has transformed TimeXtender from a
start-up organization in Denmark into a global company
with employees and offices around the world. Currently,
TimeXtender has more than 3,000 customers in more
than 70 countries on six continents.
Heine has worked tirelessly to educate the
industry about the benefits of instant access to
data for any person, from any location, at
any time. Having access to data in a
secured and governed manner helps
business users make strategic decisions
quickly and in an organized manner to
help the business prosper. This
capability for a company is absolutely
essential for businesses of all sizes,
across all industries, for one
fundamental reason, “because time
matters.”
Also, Heine has greatly contributed to this
industry shift of instant data access for business users as
evidenced by the number of articles he has published and
various events and meetings he has spoken at over the
years. He has fostered myriad business relationships
throughout global regions and is often called upon for his
insights about the IT industry and matters surrounding
corporate data.
Embedding Discovery Hub® Globally
TimeXtender’s Discovery Hub® is the next generation of
data architecture, simplifying and automating the
implementation and operation of the entire data
infrastructure. With Discovery Hub®, there is no longer a

need to stitch numerous tools together, nor a need to think
about data preparation or fuss with long manual
development cycles based on complex architectural
designs.
Discovery Hub® is a comprehensive end-to-end solution
that lets businesses easily merge data from a wide variety of
data sources into a “single version of the truth,” thereby
removing conflicting reports and silos of extractions and
transformations. It allows automation to model data so that
line of business users can easily understand the data. At the
same time, data is properly defined so that all users of
reports and analytics speak the same language.
By combining this agile platform with a company’s
preferred visualization tool (Power BI, Qlik, or Tableau),
corporate business users have the full power of business
intelligence in a structured, governed and secured
environment – all within a self-service analytics framework
that helps meet compliance needs.
A Distinctive Competence
Commenting upon the organization’s strategy for tackling
competition, Heine believes that an unrelenting focus is
paramount to achieving market leadership.
“First off, it begins by maintaining a focus and long-
standing commitment to doing what you excel at and not
trying to be everything to everybody,” said Heine. “This
focus has helped TimeXtender build one of the most
respected technology platforms to help companies and their
business users get instant access to their data for anyone, at
any time, from anywhere.”
Simplify, Automate, Execute;
because time matters and we
engage fully charged.
‘‘

Be the best at what
you do!‘‘
TimeXtender’s culture is built with modernization in mind.
The company listens closely to the market and its
customers’ needs and continuously designs new
functionality to service those requests and to ensure it is at
the forefront of innovation. Moreover, it develops new
innovation and brings those revelations to the market to
help its customers advance in ways not previously
considered. To this end, Discovery Hub® is the recipient of
new advancements and capabilities on an ongoing basis
with an aim to building innovative capabilities and modern
functionalities, suitable for Microsoft Azure and cloud
capabilities.
Inspired by Technology Trends
Prior to TimeXtender, Heine was a co-founder of another IT
consultancy that provided business process optimization,
workflow, ERP systems, and business intelligence services.
From this experience, he realized that to implement
business intelligence on top of ERP systems, organizations
often had the same problems that needed to be solved by
the same type of coding. The answer rested in automation.
This discovery led to the founding of TimeXtender.
Initially, TimeXtender tried partnering with some ERP
consultancy firms but this idea was not a great match for the
company as business models contradicted with the notion of
automation. Given this, partnering with a new generation of
companies was a better fit for TimeXtender. This led to
alliances with Power BI, Qlik, and Tableau partners. These
types of businesses had a modern outlook and believed
wholeheartedly in the benefits of automation software as a
scalable solution, and as the backbone behind visualization
and analytic tools.

The company has a constant eye on emerging trends and
industry developments. It intends to consistently deliver
future-proof solutions for its customers by regularly
updating Discovery Hub® and by working closely with
Microsoft to help ensure it delivers on that promise.
TimeXtender has an agile and flexible way of thinking and
maintaining its roots of being a fast-moving, innovative
startup.
Ensuring Efficiency to Customers
TimeXtender regularly hosts seminars, workshops and user
groups to speak directly to its vast number of customers.
These events are quite useful for the free flow of ideas,
shared feedback and engaged learning. The company
markets and sells Discovery Hub® entirely through its
worldwide network of partners. These partners also
provide assistance to local customers in their
respective geographic
regions.
TimeXtender has taken
great steps to create and
make available written
technical documentation,
video tutorials and hosted
webinars about Discovery
Hub®, and issues
surrounding the
development of a central hub and next-generation data
architecture for companies. Company executives also
attend, exhibit and speak regularly at various events around
the world, making a concerted effort to meet with customers
and partners at these venues.
Beholding the Future
TimeXtender has helped change how the industry has been
working for the greater part of the last 30 years, as people
have stopped talking about the patchwork of tools or
building a data warehouse as the end goal, and rather are
focusing on the WHY, and are now building a Data Estate
and Data Platforms.
TimeXtender has contributed greatly as a market leader,
convincing the industry that businesses can automate the
work of preparing data for instant access, regardless of the
number of sources. The company perceives itself as a
pioneer in moving away from writing code and from having
technical discussions around the underlying technology.
As innovation continues to progress, organizations will
have a need to follow along. Today, TimeXtender considers
it essential to move to a platform mindset, where it can
separate the data modeling from what underlying
technology a company is using. Discovery Hub® can be
deployed on Azure or on-premise.
When it comes to Azure, using several different database
technologies including Azure Data Lake becomes evident.
TimeXtender also comprehends that the days where the
user had to do a 12-month project to redo their entire
solution are over, and now this will be handled just by a
click of a button in the software. TimeXtender is well
positioned and is leading the way to help businesses around
the world achieve just that.
Gratified Clientele
With more than 3,000
customers worldwide using
Discovery Hub®,
TimeXtender is proud that
its technology is being used
in so many organizations
across various global
markets.
Following are two of the
many testimonials from satisfied customers.
“Choosing Discovery Hub® by TimeXtender came down to
ease of implementation, cost and the all-important: ‘Can it
work with the ERP that we were implementing?’. “We also
looked at other software, to see how that would stack up in
terms of ease of implementation. But it was quite an easy
decision to go with TimeXtender.” - Kerry McRae, BI team
leader & stream lead at O’Brien.
“We save the hours not on the analysis but on the operations
to actually just make sure we get the data. I’d say that we
spend maybe only 20% of the time we’d previously spent
on preparation before Discovery Hub®.” - Peter Hansen,
manager and BI architect at PANDORA.
We believe in serving our
customers through a global
network of partners.
‘‘

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ManagementCompany Name
Booz Allen Hamilton Inc
boozallen.com
Horacio Rozanski
CEO
Booz Allen Hamilton is a global firm of 24,225 diverse,
passionate, and exceptional people driven to excel, do right, and
realize positive change in everything it does.
Colorado Technology
Consultants
coloradotc.com
Julie Yack
COO & Founder
Colorado Technology Consultants, Inc. is a global provider of
IT Consulting and Training services. It specializes in helping
medium to large businesses leverage technology to reach a
sustained competitive advantage.
Massey Consulting
masseyconsulting.net
Philip Massey
Founder & President
Microexcel Inc
microexcel.com
Paul Simon
CEO
Microexcel Inc., is a leading technology services and solutions partner
for global customers. Founded in 2001, it provides end-to-end,
innovative and comprehensive services that helps customers leverage
high quality, flexible delivery models for cost efficiency, enhanced skill
set, and deep domain expertise.
CAL Business Solutions
calszone.com
George Mackiewicz
Founder & President
Since 1982 CAL Business Solutions has installed over 300+
accounting systems for companies nationwide, with a focus on
Microsoft Dynamics GP and Acumatica for businesses in
Connecticut and Southern New England.
Exceedra
exceedra.com
Chris Rice
VP Sales & Marketing
The Exceedra system supports a closed-loop, integrated
business planning process and revenue management activities to
drive better control, decision making and visibility across the
enterprise.
IT-Logix AG
it-logix.ch
Samuel Rentsch
CEO, Partner
Through the targeted integration and analysis of data, IT-Logix
AG helps companies in Switzerland to strengthen their
competitiveness.
TimeXtender
timextender.com
Heine Krog Iversen
Founder & CEO
Winspire Solutions
winspiresolutions.com
Jitendra Kulkarni
Founder & CEO
Winspire Solutions has been providing clients of every size with
consultancy, customization, training and implementation of
ERP, CRM, Supply chain Management and Business
Intelligence solutions.
Massey Consulting is a full-service consulting firm in Raleigh, NC,
specializing in accounting software products and services, such as
implementations and integrations.
TimeXtender is recognized globally as one of the fastest
growing private software companies, which enables businesses
to make quality business decisions faster with its flagship
technology platform, "Discovery Hub®.
Salt Essential IT
salt.na
Vanessa Maresch
Business
Development Manager
Salt’s solutions empower its employees to work better and faster, from
anywhere, anytime. Its services also stabilize its client’s operations
while increasing their bottom line.
Brief
The
Most Valuable

David Cahn is
Global VP of
Marketing for Elemica,
the leading provider
of a Digital Supply
Network for process
manufacturers.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
David Cahn
Global VP of Marketing
Elemica
December 201818

Technological innovation is happening at a faster
rate than ever before, causing digital disruptions for
many businesses. A digital disruption is a
transformation that is caused by emerging digital
technologies and business models. These innovative new
technologies and models can impact the value of existing
products and services offered in the industry, actually
disrupting the current market and causing businesses to re-
evaluate their competitive advantage.
Ignoring digital disruptions can impact businesses.
Remember Polaroid? The company led the market with its
cameras that created instant pictures. Yet in 2001, the
Polaroid Corporation filed for federal bankruptcy protection
because the company failed to make the smooth transition
from analog to digital cameras. The corporation decided to
bet on their past innovations and, as a result, lost to
companies who jumped on the digital bandwagon. By
keeping abreast of changes in demand, businesses can
follow the trends and adjust their strategies to embrace
these changes, which will help them to thrive and grow
profits.
Today’s digital disruptors are companies like Amazon and
Uber, who use technologies to out maneuver the
competition and build growth. Disruptors can be startup
companies or long-established businesses. A wait-and-see
attitude will not give a business sufficient time to make a
comeback when the disruptor begins to dominate the
industry.
Companies must continuously reinvent their business using
digital disruptive technology or watch from the sidelines
while they lose market share. Yet, many businesses still
struggle with acceptance, and others don't know where to
start the journey.
Accepting Digital Disruption
Digital disruption is fueled by next generation technology,
such as artificial intelligence, data analytics, the Internet of
Things and software-enabled platforms that tie all these
technologies together. C-level executives understand that
any industry can be profoundly affected by digital
disruption and no one can afford to ignore the threat. In
other words, digital disruption rewrites the rules of
business.
Digital disruption begins with acceptance of digital
transformation using digital technologies within operations
and ecosystems. Today’s technology allows all business
stakeholders to share a single network, connecting and
collaborating on supply chain operations from one end of
the enterprise to the other. Each trading partner has access
to information generated through the network in order to
gain visibility to all aspects of production, procurement,
transportation and distribution. With the proper information,
executives can make qualified decisions that drive
improvements in the business.
Accepting digital disruptions within the enterprise means
the business is no longer worried by the disruption and
CHALLENGESCHALLENGES
& RISKS IN ADOPTING
DIGITAL DISRUPTIONDIGITAL DISRUPTION
December 2018 19

instead leverages strategic planning and technologies to
drive the business. Disruption is accepted into the culture of
the organization so innovation is a day-to-day experience.
Instead of concern, the business will be better able to sense
and respond to changes in demand and disruptions to
mitigate any risk.
Often a business has to decide whether to respond to the
digital disruption or not. While it is not conducive to ignore
the disruption, businesses may not always have to respond.
Instead, the business can complement the disruption by
adding value to it. An example would be to create
technologies that augment the disruption, such as software
(added value) for an iPhone (disruptor).
Beginning a Digital Transformation Journey
To start the journey, management needs to design a strategy
for digital transformation that involves people, processes
and partners. The strategy should be broken down into
process steps that contain material, information and people
flow. Each employee knows that the product moves from
process A to process B in a specific quantity, at a specific
time, to a specific location. Because of digital technologies,
people have visibility into what is happening with each
step, giving them the ability to uncover bottlenecks that can
cause delays or poor product quality.
Today’s technology allows all stakeholders to share a single
network, connecting and collaborating on supply chain
activities from one end of the enterprise to the other. Each
trading partner has access to information generated through
the network in order to gain visibility to all aspects of
production, procurement, transportation and distribution.
With the proper information, executives can make qualified
decisions that drive improvements in the business.
Digital Supply Networks (DSN) are part of a digital
transformation journey, providing a technology foundation
for improving inter-business processes, expanding supply
chain relationships, increasing revenues and reducing
operating costs. DSNs create greater opportunities by
integrating suppliers, customers, and logistics service
providers in various ways depending on the level of inter-
business processes that are performing.
One method is to connect via ERP-to-ERP integrations with
high-volume suppliers and customers to streamline and
automate sell-side and buy-side transactions. A second
technique is through some type of portal for order capture
and invoicing for inter-business automation. Finally, some
leading DSNs provide email as a simple onboarding method
to digitize an inter-business process without requiring
supply chain partners to have any integration software.
Benefits of Digital Disruptions
Digital transformation helps customers know where their
“stuff” is at all times, similar to the conveniences derived
from mobile apps, where a taxi is ordered and the route
visualized on the phone screen. Emerging next-gen end-to-
end visibility applications in concert with a network of
interconnected buyers, suppliers and logistics providers are
enabling companies to lower working capital and operating
expenses, mitigate risk and improve customer satisfaction
by breaking down silos within the organization. With digital
transformation, the supply chain is now a completely
integrated ecosystem accessible by all stakeholders.
With end-to-end visibility as the key driver for an effective
supply chain improvement strategy, businesses must rely on
building more collaborative relationships across their
network of trading partners. Gaining end-to-end visibility
across transportation processes can deliver 6% or more in
transportation savings, remove the equivalent of 15 people
from operating costs by improving productivity, and reduce
the Cash-to-Cash cycle by 4 days or more.
Digital systems gather data, which can be used for
predictive analytics and machine learning to continually
improve the organization. More informed decisions can be
made by management. Disruptions from digital
technologies can reshape markets and help with launching
new products or services for less cost.
With a digital transformation in the supply chain, silos
dissolve and every part of the ecosystem has full visibility
to what is happening from end-to-end. Supply and demand
signals can travel through the network uninhibited, alerting
the appropriate parties to low levels of raw materials or
inventory, or seasonal spikes in demand. Because trading
partners get this information in real time through the digital
supply network, they can react accordingly. Digital
disruptions from digital transformations will results into
huge gains in customer satisfaction, profits and efficiencies.
December 201820

Asuccessful business solutions company bases
their reputation on providing technology and
expertise to help their clients keep pace with
current business innovations and prepare for their future
growth. CAL Business Solutions, a Connecticut-based
company focused on Microsoft Dynamics GP (Great
Plains) and Acumatica accounting software, specializes
in implementing the right software systems at the right
price.
George Mackiewicz, Founder and President of CAL
Business Solutions, started the company in 1982 and has
built a practical, hardworking team that has implemented
over three hundred accounting systems, both on premises
and in the Cloud, nationwide.
Honest Approach
CAL Business Solutions strives to be realistic yet
flexible with every project. Their honest approach to
evaluating what a company really needs has gained them
customer loyalty. CAL Business Solutions won’t
recommend its product if it is not the right fit. They will
be glad to make recommendations, even if it means
losing the project. They sell clients what they actually
need and only products that will enhance their present
business processes and position them for future growth.
CAL sells Microsoft Dynamics GP which, with over
47,000 businesses using it, is the best ERP mid-market
solution on the market. Having worked with it for 20
years, George feels it is the most stable product on the
market. CAL also sells Acumatica, an ERP solution
designed for the Cloud. Between the two products,
George feels that CAL is offering the best of both
worlds.
Leader’s Contribution
George began as a programmer on the technical side,
creating the solutions in the early stages of the company.
Back then there really wasn’t any packaged ERP
software; everything was custom. In the early 1990s,
pre-packaged software came on the market. George
already had a view of software from an architect’s
George Mackiewicz
Founder & President
CAL Business
Solu ons:
So ware Systems That Work
December 201822

standpoint and was able to ask:
“How was it built? How does it run?
What are its features? What will it do
for customers?”
Whereas other companies might
concentrate on the bigger features,
like how does it fit into the Microsoft
stack, George’s early experience
enabled him to look at the core and
how it functioned. He focused on
how it works and what features of the
core product are things that will
make his potential customers more
competitive.
CAL Business Solutions is focused
on maintaining long term
relationships with their customers
and on helping them achieve success.
Best interest of their clients
A guiding principle for CAL
Business Solutions is the idea that it
does not have to dominate an entire
industry. They strive to be not the
biggest partner, but the best. They
want to be a company that other
partners, customers, and even
business people that are not its
customers, recognize as a good
source of information and direction.
CAL has helped hundreds of
organizations improve business
productivity. Their customers
appreciate their honesty, and they
have formed hundreds of long-term
relationships. Also appreciated is
their expertise. CAL has been
recognized by Microsoft for
outstanding customer commitment
and sales achievement. When you
choose CAL, you choose an
organization with an impressive,
proven track record.
Mature Solution Microsoft
Dynamics GP
Microsoft Dynamics GP is the core
financial and business platform
which can also interface to unique
vertical platforms. The fact that this
product can be utilized in so many
ways to help so many companies
makes for some pretty amazing
stories and shows how good the
CAL wants to find ways to take the
core platform that its customers are
comfortable with and find new ways
to apply it to their business’s
changing needs. The new cloud
based PowerGP Online allows CAL
to do that.
Testimonials of Clients
“We put together a dream list of
technologies we wanted to
implement. CAL Business Solutions
researched our dream list realistically
and brought to the table solutions
that were forward-looking, could be
implemented in a realistic timeframe,
and at a budget that made sense.
CAL Business Solutions has
delivered everything they said they
would. They’ve succeeded in making
us self-sufficient.” - Jason Kloter,
President, Kloter Farms
“I must say that CAL Business
Solutions has restored my confidence
in software providers. They know the
product, don’t waste time, and don’t
bill me unnecessarily. As a business
owner, that matters. CAL does
business the way we do business:
stand behind the product and the
work and make the customer happy.”
- Robert Amenta, President, Modern
TireMicrosoft Dynamic GP platform is.
Microsoft Dynamics GP is a mature
solution that is not going to be
changing a lot in the near future even
with Microsoft’s investment in other
platforms. CAL will continue to
expand its competencies to take care
of not only its present clients but also
companies that are still looking for
that mature ERP system.
We want each client to
feel that they are
talking to a Partner that
is looking out for their
best interest, not just trying
to make sales.
The
Most Valuable
December 2018 23

he main reason for the invention of website,
TInternet and technology devices that provides the
platform for software to run and connect with each
other is mainly to make networking of services, products
and people possible. Technology leaders such as Cisco,
Arista and Apple are dedicating their resources to provide
various business enterprises and the masses the ability to
communicate their values through technology mediums
called as Networking.
The works and provisions of these organizations are very
outstanding, and are believed to last for ages. This is
because the growth of technology is not going out of style
so soon, but rather it is believed to continue into the future.
Technology networking strategies is good, but to make it
more eﬀective there is the incessant need to incorporate
organic strategies.
You may be asking what I mean by Organic Networking or
Strategies. The organization that will survive in the market
in the near future, considering the increasing rate of
competition are the ones who take the necessary steps, to
develop more human connection for their business, more
than they do for machines such as provided by AI.
The Factors to Consider for an Eﬀective Organic
Networking:
Even as our age is encouraging more of technology
strategies, if we must survive the future of it all, then we
must connect more people, than we do for machines. As an
The
Impressive Impactof
Organic
Networking
Editor’s Pick
December 201824

innovative networking solution
provider, it is going to pay more, when
you include human intelligence and
physicality in your networking
strategies over machines.
Imagine a day that the machines are
going to have a serious breakdown,
and the owner organization do not have
the capable persons to figure out the
cause of the breakdown and possibly
provide a feasible solution? What will
be the fate of the organization? This
means that, there will be a great loss of
value and possibly a strike off the
industry. I know you would never want
that to happen. So, plan from now, to
never pay for the loss in the future.
Balance Your People to machine
Deployment
Social Medias are for networking,
Newspapers and various Medias are
also for networking, but there are
people behind the arc of this
innovation. The more you incorporate
AI and machine learning strategies,
always remember the need for Control
Engineers and those are human beings.
The most successful organizations
identify the major importance of
people networking and how best to
utilize human intelligence in their
business quest.
For example; if you write an article
and share it on a website, who do you
expect to read your article; human
beings or machines? It is obvious that
the organic networking aspect of
computing will never go out of style;
else, there will be a day in the future
that digital connection and values will
be measured on the number of bots that
read your articles and/or that paid for
your services. So, remember to balance
the rate of your people to machine
deployment, by acknowledging the
need of human networking over
technology networking.
The Need for Organic Sense in
Networking and the Future:
Technology is the miracle of our age,
Artificial Intelligence is a major
molding factor of this development,
IoT is the liberator from machine
isolation by providing the platform to
interconnect millions of them over the
virtual platforms, but humans make
these things possible.
Networking is an innovative concept
with high profile technology terms. If
one does not implore deep interest and
concentration while exploring this
realm, there may be a serious distortion
of original motive of indulgence, and
this can lead to serious breakdown of
enterprise infrastructure. Sometimes, it
maybe direct and other times, it will be
indirect, but in all, it will always have
an impact. The future of technology is
very bright, and that is mainly
dependent on how available we make
the resources to help manage what we
have today in the near future. For this
to be possible, the networking solution
providers must incorporate more of
organic sense in their solutions and
industry advancements.
Technology will advance, more
machines will be connected, devices
will be programmed to run
independently, but in all these things,
the humans in the network will still
rule the universe. The more organic
you make your networking strategies,
the lesser the fear of a disastrous future
for your organization.
December 2018 25

n an interview with Insights
ISuccess, Julie Yack, the COO &
Founder of Colorado
Technology Consultants Inc, shares
her company’s journey and insights
about its specialized solutions and
services. She has broadly discussed
CTC’s core competencies and
explains how the company is
established in the global market. She
also mentions CTC’s current status,
its vision and various functionalities
used in developing technology
globally.
Below are the highlights of the
interview conducted between Julie
and Insights Success:
Give a brief overview of the
company, its uniqueness and its
vision.
Colorado Technology Consultants is
an ever-evolving company. Our roots
are in custom software development
and we currently have a very
comfortable presence in the world of
Microsoft Dynamics, and things
related to Dynamics like Azure, IoT
and more. In addition to training and
curriculum, we do select project
work. Sometimes that looks like a
small implementation, sometimes
that’s a rescue implementation and
sometimes it’s an audit and review of
an organization.
Colorado Technology
Consultants, Inc:
Impar ng IT Consul ng and Training
Services Globally
Globally providing
solu ons and training
for the future.
“
”Julie Yack
COO & Founder
December 201828

What are the cutting-edge products/solutions offered
by Colorado Technology Consultants?
We are the first experts in an emerging product or release.
Our relationships allow us early access to many of these
new technologies so we can be prepared ourselves. But it
also offers the chance for us to quickly bring others up to
speed.
Give a detailed description of your personnel’s
influence over the company and the valuable Microsoft
solution.
I and David Yack are the two founders of Colorado
Technology Consultants We both are recognized as global
experts in the Microsoft stack, specifically in Dynamics,
Azure, and related technologies. We both have been
awarded as Microsoft MVPs and additionally David is a
Microsoft Regional Director. The size of CTC has ebbed
and flowed over the years, but always intentionally stayed
small. It is important for all of our clients to have direct
access to a decision-maker.
Describe the experiences, achievements or lessons
learnt that have shaped the journey of the company.
I wish I could say we’re on some long established and
planned journey. We are a group of fairly smart people
with good intentions that work hard every day. We are
thankful for the opportunities that hard work has offered
and have made some great friends along the way. Our
team members stay with us for a long time, in an industry
(tech consulting) where loyalty is hard to find. For us, our
biggest accomplishments are the people.
What are the challenges faced while providing
Microsoft solutions and how is Colorado Technology
Consultants serving to tackle them?
For us one of our challenges is staying the right size to
continue to properly care for our clients. It can sometimes
be tempting to say yes to every opportunity. But, in order
to stay true to our roots, sometimes that means saying no
to a job where we would struggle to succeed. In those
situations, we make every effort to make an introduction
to a like-minded solution provider so that the needs are
still met.
What according to you could be the potential future of
Microsoft solutions and how does Colorado
Technology Consultants envision sustaining its
competency?
For years there has been a severe shortage of talent in
Dynamics, particularly a shortage of good developers. We
tried to address some of that by offering training and have
successfully trained several hundred professionals. With
the Power Platform and the emergence of a strong citizen
developer story, I think we have a cycle or two of figuring
out how this will affect projects longer term. Some
developers will feel a little left out. But, there is still a big
need for developers in this space. As one developer on our
team once told me, with this platform (XRM), I can focus
on the fun stuff because the tedious parts are handled by
the platform.
About the Company
Colorado Technology Consultants, Inc. is a global
provider of IT Consulting and Training services. The firm
specializes in helping medium to large businesses
leverage technology to reach a sustained competitive
advantage. CTC’s capabilities span a vast array of
technologies but it primarily focuses on Microsoft .NET
solutions. In 2017, CTC celebrated its 15th year of
serving customers to drive innovation with technology.
CTC’s unified technologists focus on emerging
technologies and prominently works with its clients on
advanced solutions. They are frequent trainers, speakers
and often write about Microsoft technologies. CTC is
fortunate to have its staff recognized by Microsoft as both
Most Valuable Professionals and a Regional Director.
About the leader
Julie Yack is one of the founding partners of Colorado
Technology Consultants, Inc. Julie has been named a
Microsoft Most Valuable Professional for her efforts in
the Dynamics professional community. She is a
Microsoft CRM Certified Professional, Microsoft Small
Business Specialist and a Certified Scrum Master.
Julie accomplished her MBA in 2010 and currently she
has been a vital part of several large scale publications.
She was a contributing Author for Voices for Change:
Women’s Words to Politicians.
The
Most Valuable
December 2018 29

ne of the greatest agonies in test automation is the
Otime and effort spent to continuously testing what
has been developed. The simpler and the more
straight-forward the mobile applications look to the
customer, the more complex they are in the background. As
the number of of mobile platforms and devices increases,
enterprises need to provide their developers with effective
way to test across the platforms — testing fast, verifying
the code quickly.
Why is it so important? Because continuous digital
transformation is an inevitable part of growing the business.
Often more than 60% of customer interactions happen
through the smartphones. What is the number like at your
business? Anyway, an effective mobile testing needs to be
in place to accomplish a successful and smooth delivery on
Digital Transformation promise, and to avoid loss of money
and prestige. Every kind of transformation project comes
across a certain resistance; a mobile application delivered
with no issues will minimize this resistance.
Better Application through Continuous Testing
Most of our customers in Continuous Software are
switching to agile project delivery in order to rapidly
evaluate and provide for the internal and external demands.
The traditional test processes, which are done at the end
phase of a project, remain insufficient for the agile
management. For better quality and a rapid outcome, testing
and development has to be a continuous process of DevOps
course. Thanks to test automation scripts throughout the
whole development process, softwares and applications can
be tested before going through end-user tests with minimum
amount of problems.
One of the key trends in the market is the increase of native
application development, which enables the usage of
mobile devices in a broader spectrum. With the increasing
demand towards more complex, stronger functionalities and
interface, the responsive design techniques are outdated. To
provide an optimum result for mobile testing, conducting
the tests with actual devices, a device lab, has a large
importance. The problem here is how the manual testers
and test automation systems will share devices. This is
solved by creating a mobile device lab according to
producers, models and operating systems.
Renting a device lab on cloud, uploading your scripts and
running your tests in a parallel execution costs you serious
amount of money. We couldn’t ignore the fact that this
method makes our customers’ apps less profitable every
minute. If you create an actual device lab by purchasing
every kind of smartphones out there, you still ned a web
interface to run all those scenarios and scripts to manage
your mobile device lab.
Continuous Software developed an interface, where you can
run your scripts on different devices with its own cloud
G` j ` m
St qf t s
Chairman
Transformation
Failure
Transformation
Failure
December 201830

device lab, observe text execution and integrate with source
control systems. You can use it with your own mobile
device server, or you can connect your device to your
mobile lab with client integrations. As a result you’ll be
able to observe your text execution in real time with
detailed results, clickable stack trace exceptions and
screenshots, and see how much of the resources (CPU,
Memory, System Logs) your app consumes. No matter
which language your scripts were written or no matter
which tool was used to write them, by integrating with open
source automation servers this interface allows you to
include mobile testing to your continuous DevOps process.
Continuous Software
Our first business line is application testing. Today we offer
a wide range of services such as Manual Sourcing, Test
Automation, Performance Testing, Security Testing, Service
and Network Virtualization and Mobile Application Testing
and Mobile Device Lab Management. Our philosophy lies
on the successful implementation of test automation
frameworks, enabling the rapid creation of test automation
scripts that are stable and easily maintainable. Our scalable
test automation framework optimizes every level of
application from network to code- speeding up he execution
and reducing test maintenance.
Our success comes from working together with
organizations to optimize every level of application- from
the network to the code. We have solved the complexities of
software testing through our unique solutions and helped a
multitude of enterprises in accomplishing desired results.
We believe our Mobile Device Lab will be a game changer
in the industry.
Case studies
One of Top 5 Banks in Turkey
This bank has decided to make a transformation project
with Mckenzie. Part of the transformation project they
found out that one of the biggest bottleneck is Software
testing. As they were planning to use Agile project
management approach within this initiative; testing was
becoming even more critical for the success of the project.
That is why they have decided to implement Test
Improvement Project. They have identified 5 areas and
Continuous Software has been involved in all these five
workgroups which are Functional Test Automation,
Performance/Load Testing, Service Virtualization, Test
Environment Management and Test Data Management. The
project scope covered core banking, alternative channels,
international banking and credit cards application suites,
they all are in-house developed application based on Java,
.NET and IBM Mainframe. This was a teamwork, which we
have worked together with the bank’s testing team.
Development team has also participated to the project when
it was needed. We have identified sample applications,
designed processes, decided on technologies that will be
used and finally implemented the best practice within
sample applications to prove the solution. We have guided
the bank’s team and prepared documentation for them to
continue after project has been finalized. During the project
we have used HPE UFT, HPE Loadrunner, IBM Service
Virtualization, CA Test Data Management and HPE Codar
and OO solutions for respective areas.
One of the Top 10 International Banks
Entered to Turkey by acquiring an old bank, which was not
able to invest in IT for a long time. After the acquisition,
they have been audited by BDDK (Banking Regulation
Authority) and BDDK gave them a deadline to resolve their
compliance issues. Within a very limited timeframe to
implement an end to end automated Devops process which
starts from demand collection till deployment of the
applications to production environment. The solution had to
be fully automated, no human interaction other than
development of the application and be traceable on each
level of the process. Continuous Software delivered end-to-
end DevOps project to make sure to have a complete
process from demand to production deployment. Created
five different pipelines for core baking (oracle forms),
alternative channels (java), credit cards (.NET) and ATMs
(.NET). Jenkins, SVN, Nexus, HPE Codar, HPE ALM,
HPE UFT, HP PM, HP SM are implemented in project
scope. Thanks to Continuous Software, this bank passed the
audit successfully and avoided to pay a big amount of
penalty.
Management
Levent Ozalp is a serial entrepreneur and the Founder and
CEO of OPTiiM. He created 3 startups in Turkey, 1 in
Ireland and 1 in UK from military tech to system
integration. Having launched Continuous Software now
boasts 100+ employees and customers all over Turkey,
Middle East, North Africa and Europe.
Hakan Turgut is the Continuous Software Chairman. His 30
years career span took him to executive positions in IBM,
CA and Nortel. He brings maturity and wisdom to the team.
About the Author:
Levent Ozalp is a serial entrepreneur. He created 3 startups
in Turkey, 1 in Ireland and 1 in UK from military tech to
system integration. Having launched OPTiiM now boasts
100+ employees and customers all over Turkey, Middle
East, North Africa and Europe.
Hakan Turgut is the OPTiiM Chairman. His 30 years career
span took him to executive positions in IBM, CA and
Nortel. He brings maturity and wisdom to the team.
December 2018 31

Revenue ManagementExceedra:
Microsoft certified solution
providers specialize in
providing up-to-date
Microsoft technology-based customer
solutions all over the world. Exceedra
is one such solution provider company
which develops and distributes
business planning and trade promotion
management solutions. The company
offers sales and operational planning,
joint business planning, trade
promotion optimization, customer
business planning, and deductions and
claims management solutions. It caters
to the consumer packaged goods
sector.
Commitment towards Driving Value
Over the last two decades, Exceedra
has grown from a small integrated
business planning company, operating
primarily in the UK to an award-
winning, global organization. It utilizes
optimization analysis tools, bringing
Integrated Business Planning solutions
to Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG)
customers around the globe.
Exceedra understands that for an
Demand Management system to be
valuable, it must meet today’s
requirements, i.e. providing immediate
benefits in capability, speed and
efficiency in the planning and
execution process.
Exceedra is committed to driving value
for its consumer goods clients globally,
by integrating business planning and
optimization analysis to improve the
overall performance in trade promotion
management for CPG companies.
Agile Decision Making
Exceedra is the leading Global
provider of integrated business
planning and revenue management
systems for CPG. This includes Trade
Promotion Management (TPM), Trade
Promotion Optimization (TPO),
Customer Business Planning (CBP),
Joint Business Planning (JBP),
Demand Planning, and Sales &
Operations Planning (S&OP).
This platform is a key enabler of agile
decision making in an integrated
business planning process supporting
S&OP by providing live forecast
actualization, scenario planning,
snapshots, and reporting.
A global company with offices in the
US, UK and Australia, Exceedra is set
to disrupt the global market, and its
goal is to become the de facto solution
for Integrated Business Planning and
Revenue Management for Consumer
Goods companies worldwide.
Leader with Extensive Experience
Chris Rice is a 30+ year CPG industry
veteran with extensive experience in
sales and marketing from a
manufacturer and solution provider
perspective. This vast experience of
him comes from varying roles at IBM
Demand Tec, Information Resources
Inc, CAS and Quaker Oats Company.
His Expertise areas include TPM, TPO,
Post Event Analysis, strategic trade and
marketing planning, shopper insights
and retail execution.
Chris has helped many clients make
improvements to their trade planning
processes and systems, to provide trade
solutions to various CPG customers
such as; Abbott Nutrition, ACH Food,
Agropur Cooperative, Bayer,
California Olive Ranch, Corby Spirit &
Wine, McKee Foods & Twinings.
Forums and Webinars
As a recognized thought leader in the
industry, following the success of the
Revenue Management & IBP events in
London, Exceedra hosted the first
forum in Chicago Illinois, with over 60
registered attendees. The forum offered
a day dedicated to discussing the role
that price and promotion play in
driving and achieving profitable
growth, with a selection of interactive
working sessions designed to help
identify the drivers behind success.
Delegates listened to real life CPG
companies: ACH Food, California
Olive Ranch, Keurig Dr Pepper, and
pladis UK, along with presentations
and learning from leading consultants:
Simon-Kucher & Partners, Clarkston
Consulting, and The Partnering Group.
Presentations throughout the day
focused on the main challenges
consumer goods companies face on the
journey to true IBP.
The
Most Valuable
December 201834

Chris Rice
VP Sales & Marketing
To deliver a successful project in
this space, it is essential that the
software is viewed as a key enabler
to the overall process.
In addition to hosting and sponsoring various events
globally, Exceedra runs a variety of webinars throughout
the year, and as such it helps the company retain its strong
market position.
Microsoft Solutions
Exceedra utilizes a variety of Microsoft technologies within
its sales planner solution which range from middle tier &
back end development to front end reporting. Exceedra has
some extraordinary capabilities embedded within the
system using the Microsoft Power BI reporting tool,
allowing users of the tool pre-built reports and customizable
views alongside pivot tables. Such Microsoft tools allow
Exceedra to help CPG organizations manage their trade
spend effectively. In regards to hosting, Exceedra offers
CPG consumers on premise or hosted /private cloud hosting
in partner with the Microsoft Azure application. Azure
allows the freedom to build, manage and deploy
applications on a global network.
Future Market Solutions
Looking to the future, the firm will continue to grow and
build upon its current success. Exceedra Software
continually researches the challenges that its customers face
in the ever-changing retail landscape. To ensure that clients
receive truly cutting-edge solutions, Exceedra invests a
significant proportion of its revenues in Research and
Development. The firm continually research advancements
in technology both from development and deployment
perspectives so that clients can receive the solutions they
need to succeed.
Exceedra will continue to invest in the use of Azure and a
predominantly Microsoft stack for its reliability,
consistency, popularity and extensive knowledge base
available through both Microsoft Documentation and
popular development forums such as Stack Overflow.
Shining Reviews
“We researched the market and established Exceedra as the
leading provider for Integrated Business Planning and
Trade Promotion Management.” – Sales Director, Tyrrell’s.
“Exceedra offers all the functionality we require to support
our integrated planning processes.” – VP of Sales ACH
Food.
“Exceedra is easy to use, very intuitive, and enables us to
develop our business in these competitive times.” – Sales
Director, Hain Daniels Group.
“The Exceedra solution provides us with much greater
Forecast Accuracy as a result of improved visibility of both
availability and stock.” – Planning Group GM, Panasonic.
‘‘ ‘‘
December 2018 35

Green
Cloud Computing
Saving Energy through Technology
The rapid expansion in data centers, due to the exponential growth of the cloud computing has
caused the dramatic increase in energy consumption and its effect on the environment in terms of
the carbon footprints. To reduce the power consumption, it is required to develop some energy
efficient solutions. The Green Computing is the practice of executing policies and the procedures to
improve efficiency of the computing resources in such a way as to reduce the energy consumption and
environmental impact of their utilization. Green Cloud Architecture is rising from these trends leading, not
only to energy efficiency, but also a carbon emission aware concept. In order to reduce energy
consumption, a greener environment needs to be built.
Among all industries, the information communication technology (ICT) industry is arguably responsible
for a larger portion of the worldwide growth in energy consumption. The goal of green cloud computing is
to promote the recyclability or biodegradability of defunct products and factory waste by reducing the use
of hazardous materials and maximizing the energy efficiency during the product's lifetime.
Energy to be saved
The objective is to reduce power consumption of the data center. It offers the features like
online monitoring, live virtual machine migration, and optimization of Virtual Machine
Placement. Through this proposed Green Cloud Architecture, energy up to 27% can be
saved. The need to manage multiple applications in a data center creates the challenge of
on-demand resource provisioning and allocation in response to time-varying
workloads. Data center resources are statically possessed to applications, based on
the peak load characteristics, in order to provide performance guarantees and to
maintain the isolation.
Energy-efficient resource management has been first introduced in the context of
battery fed mobile devices, where energy consumption has to be reduced in
order to improve the battery lifetime. Techniques which are developed for
mobile devices also can be applied or adapted for servers and data centers; this
kind of systems requires specific methods.
The primary method is to consolidate the Dynamic Voltage Frequency Scaling
technique in an efficient way to maximize the resource utilization and to
minimize energy consumption of the datacenters which will result in the reduced
Energy Efcient Technology
December 201836

carbon footprints and thus will help more in achieving
the Green Computing.
The Green Benefits
Cloud computing is the way to save money and
energy for the business. Users emphasize
Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and can improve
their manageability and facilitate the maintenance
of the resources. It means that benefit of business
enterprises implicates to avoid spending on
software and infrastructure resources, and allow
business clients to focus on earning money rather
than being weighted down with infrastructure
concerns. Therefore, operating this model allows
reducing the consummation of the power energy
without spending money on running the servers.
Moreover, with no servers to repair, the absence of
hardware to upgrade and no software to install, labor
costs are also reduced.
With SaaS software accesses usually through a browser-
based client, i.e., it can run on virtually any authorized
computer, making desktop and laptop resources easily
replaceable. Thus, when the user also saves on the support, it doubles
the impact and in fact increases green role in business. The employees can
work remotely, traveling and moving from one place to another because they have
fast access to the internet and the ability to use all the services at hand, on the other hand, it reduces the consumption of fossil
fuels and the harmful pollution that results from vehicle emissions as well.
The reduction of energy and power consumption has become a first-order objective in the design of modern computing
systems. The roots of energy-efficient computing, practices can be traced back to 1992, when the U.S. environmental
protection agency had launched Energy Star, a voluntary labeling program which was designed to identify and promote the
energy-efficient products in order to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions. Computers and monitors were the first labeled
products. This has led to the widespread adoption of the sleep mode in electronic devices. The term “green computing” was
introduced to refer to the energy-efficient personal computers.
Interesting Research Findings
While deploying data center, the sole concern is high-performance, and this demand has been fulfilled without paying much
attention to the energy consumption. An average data center guzzles energy as much as 25,000 households. There is a
necessity to move the focus to optimizing for energy efficiency while maintaining high service level performance than
optimizing data center resource management for pure performance, as the energy cost is increasing while the availability
dwindles. According to certain reports, the total estimated energy bill for data centers in the year 2010 was $11.5 billion and
energy costs in a typical data center doubles every five years.
For the development of cloud computing and it to sustain green technologies is exceedingly essential. Of the numerous green
methodologies enquired, the DVFS technology is a highly hardware oriented approach and hence it is less flexible.
Cloud computing is a highly scalable and cost-effective infrastructure for running an enterprise and the web applications. But
the critical issue is the drastic surge in the energy consumption of data centers which is triggering by the growing demand for
cloud infrastructure. Hence, the energy-efficient solutions are required which results in less number of carbon footprints and
thus help in achieving greener computing.
December 201838

Have you ever tried to cook a meal without salt?
Probably not, because salt is an ingredient that
helps make food tastier. Similarly, Salt Essential
IT helps businesses operate better, make more money, and
boast with happy employees by providing collaboration,
connectivity and support services. The organization’s
services are crucial elements that allow businesses to
provide better services to their customers. Salt’s solutions
empower its clients’ employees to work better and faster,
from anywhere, at any time. Its services also stabilizes
operations while increasing client’s bottom line. Salt is
known to make the impossible possible for its customers. It
paves the way with new, innovative technologies and IT
solutions in its markets.
Shaping the Journey
Salt moved from single to multiple Data Centers, from
dedicated servers to virtualization, and from simple back-up
through disaster recovery to business continuity. Constant
transformation all the time with one constant: Microsoft all
the way.
Now Microsoft is 365 and Salt is embracing it. Out with
hosted exchange, in with Exchange 365! Welcome to
Teams, work from anywhere, meetings from across the
town, country or the globe, access staff and people
wherever you are. Combine Microsoft and local Cloud from
Salt, and data is in safer places, more accessible and at a
less cost than ever before. Out of the box and smart ways to
do business, increasingly affordablility: Salt practices these
transformations and passes them on. In a country with a low
market density, the population is sparse and everywhere
else is a mission to get to, the technology is moving
business practices to productive spaces not imagined a few
years ago.
Like most other organizations Salt has also faced few
hiccups and some tough decisions had to be made. Stunning
successes and expensive mistakes, comfort zone shifts for
many who want to stay where they are, brands and products
have come and gone, value gained, value lost.
Two constants: Microsoft and Salt.
Cutting Edge Products
When it comes to offering solutions, Salt always provides
the best in class;
Email eXchange Point – With this solution, Salt’s
customers get guaranteed uptimes and access to email,
while ensuring security and compliance. Its solutions are
known to have saved businesses up to 50% on IT costs.
Security eXchange Point – This set of products keep
employees connected to their Cloud services reliably and
securely, from any location or device. With an added layer
of security, leveraging off Microsoft Advanced Threat
Protection (ATP) enables user management, firewalls and
backups. Salt guarantees 99.99% access to services. It has
achieved savings between 25% and 75% on monthly ICT
bills.
Desktop eXchange Point – With this solution, Salt offers its
customers the latest versions of both Microsoft Office and
Windows, these Cloud based services help its employees to
be more productive, and the business to be more
responsive.
Information eXchange Point - This is a secure platform with
associated services that allows users to access their desktop
application from anywhere, and from any device,
irrespective of the type of connectivity being used. This
solution is built using Microsoft Office 365 Business,
InTune, OneDrive for Business, and Skype for Business,
now being unified with Microsoft Tools™
Redefining Leadership
Vanessa Maresch the Manager of Business Development
has been a Saltie for 11 long years. During her time, she
drove the business with a single goal in mind; to make sure
that Salt becomes a Microsoft Partner. She was a key player
in adopting the move to the Microsoft Cloud by driving Salt
Salt Essential IT:
Helping Businesses to Operate Better since Inception
The
Most Valuable
December 201840

Salt paves the way with innovative new
technologies and IT solutions in our markets.
—Vanessa Maresch
Business Development Manager
Salt Essential IT
to become the first and only Cloud Solution Provider Direct
Partner in the country during 2016.
Vanessa has also made sure that Salt could deliver all its
solutions to all the Namibian businesses, including the
enterprise space. As a result, Salt became an Enterprise
Direct Advisor in 2011. Her work to ensure that Salt is only
one of two Service Provider Licensing Advisors (SPLA) in
Namibia, has cemented Salt’s place in the market as the
only Microsoft partner being able to deliver Microsoft
Cloud services to all segments of the Microsoft Customer
Ecosystem.
But no woman is an island. Sonja Coetzer recently joined
the Salt team as our Solutions Advocate, fresh from the
ranks of Microsoft. Sonja was intimately part of the journey
to guide Salt in the right direction. Vanessa and Sonja have
worked together over the last three years to attain this
unique status for Salt.
Peter Muller, the Managing Director, embraced the positive
change that the Microsoft wave presented to the company
and fully supported the journey. Frans Herle, who has been
part of Salt for 19 years, makes it seem impossibly easy to
manage the company’s three data centers from which its
customers receive full Business Continuity including Work
Area Recovery.
These four are what the organization calls the Core Salties,
but it has a phenomenal team of experienced and fiercely
dedicated Salties that make this animal run like clockwork.
Tackling Roadblocks and Planning for a Better Future
Microsoft’s One Commercial Partner program helped Salt
to design and build solutions that are secure and addresses
the current market. Salt worked closely with its Microsoft
Partner Development Manager, its extended Microsoft
teams, and a business strategist to outline critical action
points to deliver world class solutions. A 3-year journey
with dedicated Salties, the company defined its solutions
and services, incorporating its unique IP that enabled Salt’s
customers to grow their business while shaving off ICT
costs. The last element of the company’s story is its loyal
customers who have stuck by the organization throughout,
and helped to pilot solutions.
Microsoft’s vision to empower every person and
organization on this planet to achieve more in order to offer
enabling and inclusive solutions through partners, created a
new direction for partners. Salt understood this and as such
aligned itself accordingly. The company acquired resources
to drive IP based solutions that enables its customer to
achieve their core business goals and objectives while
reducing the total cost of ownership.
Salt’s development plan on Cloud Productivity and Cloud
Platform competencies are at the heart of its business and
leverages from all training and certification platforms
available via Microsoft. A regular review of Salt’s
competency is performed as part of its Partner Business
Plan review.
December 2018 41

Top
5EmailSecurity Threats
Nearly 95 percent of all successful attacks on
enterprise networks targeted organization s users’
through email. With the industry of cybersecurity
evolving so rapidly, hackers are consistently changing their
tactics, keeping it almost impossible to keep up with.
With today s growing security landscape, email threats are’
one of the most common strategies utilized by cyber
criminals. What started off with spam emails sent to your
junk folder, has evolved to a more robust tactic to deliver
destructive content straight to your inbox. Here are the top
five email security threats that we ve seen so far this year:’
Emotet Banking Trojan
Emotet is an advanced, modular banking Trojan that
primarily focuses as a downloader or dropper of other
banking Trojans and continues to be among the most costly
and destructive malware affecting governments, private and
public sectors. Emotet can evade most signature-based
detections, and because it is Virtual Machine aware, it
generates false indicators when ran in a sandbox.
Additionally, Emotet has several methods for maintaining
persistence, including auto-start registry keys and services
as well as Dynamic Link Libraries to continuously update
and evolve its capabilities.
Initial infection of this malware occurs when a user opens
or clicks a malicious download link, PDF, or macro-enabled
Microsoft Word document included in the malspam. Once
downloaded, Emotet establishes persistence and attempts to
propagate local networks through one of its incorporated
spreader modules. The negative consequences from an
Emotet infection can be temporary or permanent loss of
sensitive proprietary information, disruption of regular
operations, financial losses incurred to restore systems and
files, and potential harm to an organizations reputation.
Ursnif Banking Malware
A new version of the infamous banking Trojan Ursnif made
its appearance again earlier this year in June. This malware
is well known in the cyber security community and was the
most active malware code in the financial sector from the
end of 2016 into early 2017. This malware is capable of
stealing users' credentials, credentials for local webmail,
cloud storage, cryptocurrency exchange platforms and e-
commerce sites.
Once Ursnif infects a new machine it will attempt to spread
to other users in the address book of the compromised email
accounts. It tricks the victim into opening the malicious
email because the message is presented as the reply to an
existing conversation conducted by the victim in the past.
For example, if you receive an email that was a replay to a
previous conversation from a while back, you can look at
the “To:” field in the email and see if it's replied to a large
number of unsuspecting users.
Another feature about this malware is its ability to keep
track of company names and title the malicious document
“VICTIM_COMPANY_.doc” in order to look legitimate.
Once the victim clicks enable macros, the second step of
the infection process begins, which launches a malicious
December 201842

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Shawn Pope is the Cyber
Security Engineer of
Nuspire Networks, a
state-of-the-science
managed network
security provider for some
of the largest and most
distinctive companies
around the world.
cript that downloads and executes a payload from a
sserver controlled by the attackers. Once installed,
Ursnif can operate without being noticed by both the
user and the operating system.
Extortion Campaign
Extortion campaigns have been around for quite some time
but there was one that was in full swing across the globe
that used a clever twist to trick unsuspecting users into
paying a ransom. The attacker for this extortion campaign
claims to have installed malware on your system and has
also used your webcam to record you watching porn. The
attacker then goes on to threaten the release of this video to
everyone in your contacts unless you pay the Bitcoin
ransom.
The basic premise of this type of extortion attempt has been
around for quite some time, but the addition of the
Username/Password combination in the subject line has
unsuspecting users worried. While researching this
campaign, Nuspire’s Security Analytics Team (SAT) came
across multiple different counts of affected users claiming
the Username/Password combination was something they
had used eight years ago. In this case, the attacker has
somewhat automated the attack to create a script that pulls
directly from usernames and passwords of a given data
breach that happened eight years ago. Therefore, every
victim who had their password compromised as part of that
breach, is now getting this same email at the address they
used to sign up for the hacked website.
Hopefully, if you were affected by that data breach you
updated your username/password combination. Granted, the
people who didn't bother changing this information, this
attack directly affects them, but rest assured this attacker
doesn’t have a recording of you that they plan to send out to
your contacts. It is merely scare tactics to make some easy
money, and upon investigation of multiple Bitcoin
addresses associated with this campaign, the attacker was
indeed making easy money.
This attack could evolve in the future and use more up to
date data breaches which in turn could scare more users into
paying the ransom, so be on the lookout.
GandCrab Ransomware
GandCrab holds the top spot in ransomware, partly because
it’s used by the Magnitude botnet. Although GandCrab is
usually spread via spam email, it has recently been
distributed via compromised websites and is now
Shawn Pope
Cyber Security Engineer
TECH-TALK
December 2018 43

ppending the .KRAB extension to the encrypted
afiles.
Towards the end of April 2018 a campaign with the subject
line “Your Order #{Random Digits}” was circulating. There
is limited content in the body of the email and has an
attached ZIP file which includes a Word document that
contains malicious macros that download and execute
GandCrab ransomware.
GandCrab is under constant development where new
versions are consistently being released at an aggressive
pace. Its basic functionality is well document and does the
same typical things ransomware does, including encrypting
files with the. KRAB extension, changing the user’s
background, and leveraging Tor for communications. One
of the interesting elements of Gandcrab is its use of
namecoin domains for Command and Control (C2)
communication. These are easily identified by the .bit top
level domain (TLD). Since attackers rely heavily on Tor
and namecoin domains to help evade identification, it is a
no brainer for them to use a decentralized DNS service that
does not rely on central authority. This also increases the
difficulty of having domains shut down and identifying
those that are potentially behind them.
Phishing
By the end of Q2 2018 Microsoft had taken over the top
spot from Facebook for the number one target of corporate
phishing attacks. Reason being, it’s highly profitable for
hackers to compromise an Office 365 account. Hackers see
email-based attacks as an easy entry point into data, files,
and contacts from other Office 365 apps, including
SharePoint, OneDrive, Skype, Excel, and CRM.
We see all different types of Phishing attempts from quite
possibly the worst attempts to exact replicas of a legitimate
Office 365 login page. Unfortunately, Phishing will always
exist and can slip through the gaps in email filtering due to
the fact that new domains/URLs are popping up every day
to host fake login pages. This is where user awareness
training is extremely important. Educate your users, roll out
training exercises where employees with fake Phishing
emails and see who clicks on them and who doesn’t.
Because Phishing has become so popular, education will
pay off in the long run.
Solutions
Aside from training and educating employees on malware,
and ransomware that might come in through a user’s email,
there are a few other solutions to take into consideration
that can prevent these attacks from entering your network.
1. Use antivirus programs with behavior and heuristic
detection capabilities, with automatic updates of
signatures and software on clients and servers.
2. Implement a spam filter to filter out known malspam
indicators such as malicious subject lines, and block
suspicious and blacklisted Ips.
3. Mark external emails with a banner denoting it is from
an external source, this will assist users in detecting
spoofed emails.
4. Implement a block policy for file attachments that are
commonly associated with malware such as .dll, and
.exe, and attachments that cannot be scanned by
antivirus such a .zip files.
5. Implement Domain-Based Message Authentication,
Reporting & Conformance (DMARC), a validation
system that minimizes spam email by detecting email
spoofing using Domain Name System (DNS) records
and digital signatures.
6. Implement a solution that can send the
unknown/suspicious files to the sandbox for further
investigation and analysis.
7. And most importantly employee training on social
engineering and phishing. Urge employees not to open
December 201844

Winspire Solutions:
Delivering World Class
ERP Solutions
Perspective of an IT Consultant and that of end users
running the business are quite different. Technology
can be learned quickly, but domain expertise takes
years to develop. Winspire brings these two perspectives
together to provide the best to its customers. Winspire
specializes in providing industry vertical ERP solution in
Distribution, Equipment Rental and Project Management
Industries. It mainly focuses on South East Asia, Middle
East and India markets. Along with ERP, Winspire also
provides CRM, Business intelligence, E-Commerce, Cloud
Infrastructure and Productivity solutions based on
Microsoft Technologies. Its uniqueness lies in its high level
of domain expertise in its chosen industry verticals with
team members who have actually worked in those
industries.
End to End Solutions
Winspire provides end to end solutions including Microsoft
Dynamics NAV, AX, Dynamics 365 Business Central,
Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations, Dynamics 365 sales
and Marketing, LS Retail, Power BI, Jet reports, Azure, and
O365 for the industry verticals mentioned above. Besides,
the company has its own e-commerce solution and industry
vertical add-ons. It has its own IP for Distribution and
International Trade which has several unique features
including in-depth functionality to manage large scale and
complex distribution business. The IP also has
functionalities like principal and channel / end customer
scheme management, e-commerce, advanced warehouse
management including mobile based solutions,
transportation, trade finance management, etc.
Similarly, Winspire has highly verticalized solution for
Equipment rental Industry, localized payroll solution for
Singapore, UAE and India. Testimony from its current
customers of these solutions gives required confidence and
comfort to its prospective customers.
A Proven Leadership
Winspire is the masterpiece of Jitendra Kulkarni, the
Founder and CEO. Jitendra started Winspire in 2006 after
leaving his job as a CEO of a billion dollar Distribution
Company. The company was initially started with a clear
focus on cost effective ERP solution for Distribution
Industry. This was mainly due to his personal expertise and
long experience of running a large distribution company. He
evaluated various options and found Microsoft solutions the
most suitable since they are easy to use and customize.
Another reason for choosing Microsoft was its partner
friendly approach and a great partner eco-system. The
distribution industry solution was initially designed by him.
Presently, Jitendra focuses on keeping abreast of what is
happening in the industry in terms of new technology,
business models and decide on the strategic direction of the
company. He believes that continuous learning and
transformation is the key to remaining relevant and this job
is best done by someone who has the best view of the
company. Another area he focuses on is recruitment and
mentoring, since that is the foundation to success.
Drivers of the Growth
During the course of time, Winspire learnt that staying
focused is of vital importance. It helped the company
develop higher level of expertise, which improved its
productivity and helped it bring down the cost. Winspire got
early success by focusing on distribution vertical. In a span
of 3 years, it had over 40 customers in distribution.
December 201846

Winspire helps
customers lay a
strong foundation
towards their Digital
transformation in
order to positively
alter the economics
of their business.
“
” Jitendra Kulkarni
Founder & CEO
Similarly, Winspire also believes in the importance of
maintaining start up culture of innovation, risk taking,
freedom, and empowerment. As the company grows, there
is a tendency to become complacent and shift focus to day-
to-day operations to drive the numbers. A company needs
conscious efforts to maintain this culture which is so crucial
for continued success.
According to Winspire, in consulting and services business,
trust plays an extremely important role since it is a long
term relationship. For Winspire to be successful, its team
had to earn customer's trust both in terms of the quality of
its solution and itself as a company.
Admirable Recognitions
Over the years, Winspire has received several awards /
recognitions including partner of the year from Microsoft in
2010, 2011 and 2014, Singapore Indian Chamber of
Commerce (SICCI) leading Enterprise Award in 2013 and
2016, and Asia Top outstanding Enterprises award from
Enrich in 2014.
Effects of Technological Changes
With the fast pace of technological changes, Winspire
always faces the challenge in adapting to the new
technologies, training the team, and rolling out these to the
market. There are always some teething problems when
something new is introduced. Likewise, getting the right
talent for a particular solution /technology is always a
challenge.
Secondly, different geographies are at different level of
maturity when it comes to technology adoption. For
example, what works in Singapore may not work in Middle
East and vice versa. Thus, Winspire tweaks its strategy by
considering geography.
Transition to Cloud Solutions
Jitendra believes that there is no other technology company
which has as much global impact as Microsoft has. Its
resilience, ability to respond to changing technologies and
its marketing prowess has helped it remain dominant in the
market for over 40 years. It is investing heavily in Cloud,
AI and Machine Learning and businesses are already
witnessing great results on the cloud front. Another plus of
Microsoft solutions is that its spread of solutions like OS,
office, cloud, database, Business Applications, LinkedIn,
Skype and many more are integrated with each other and
provide unmatched value to the customer. Winspire has
already made transition to cloud solutions and is looking at
adopting AI and Machine learning in the near future.
The
Most Valuable
December 2018 47

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