ThinkGrid Cloud Services Included in Tech Data's StreamOne™ Solutions Stores
Agreement Allows ThinkGrid to Reach 60,000 Value-Added Resellers

Mercer Island, WA (January 23, 2012) — ThinkGrid, the world's first cloud enablement platform vendor for the channel, today announced an agreement with Tech Data Corporation (NASDAQ: TECD), one of the world's largest wholesale distributors of technology products. With this agreement in place, ThinkGrid's class-leading cloud services, including Hosted Virtual Desktops, Virtual Servers, Hosted E-mail and ground-breaking control panel, will be distributed through Tech Data's network of over 60,000 value added resellers (VARs) in the United States.

ThinkGrid's success has been in building innovative cloud solutions that allow partners and customers the flexibility to design, build and launch business services that solve specific problems. ThinkGrid's Windows7 Hosted Virtual Desktop, a fully isolated virtual machine, is the most advanced and secure solution on the market. It allows users to install any application, fully customize their experience, offering the tightest integration of existing cloud and on-premise computing. Complementing the Hosted Virtual Desktop solution is the HVDI Management Suite, the world's first tool to enable IT administrators or Managed Service Providers (MSPs) to take control of important management tasks in the cloud for their Hosted Virtual Desktop infrastructure.

ThinkGrid's Virtual Servers represent the next generation of server environment, replacing the conventional concept of the dedicated server. They can be set up in less than five minutes and allow businesses to manage the precise power and space they use, as well as make changes at any time without capital expenditure or the costs associated with moving from one server to another. ThinkGrid's Hosted E-mail solution allows businesses to use Microsoft Exchange with no on-premise technology investment and provides enhanced redundancy, anti-spam, anti-virus and ease of management. All of ThinkGrid's Hosted Virtual Desktops, Virtual Servers and Hosted Email solutions are delivered with the highest security and availability from ten secure data centers geographically dispersed around the world.

"Our StreamOne partnership with ThinkGrid reconfirms Tech Data's commitment to provide our customers with innovative software that will continue to help them meet their business goals," said Stacy Nethercoat, Vice President of Software Product Marketing for Tech Data. "By working on a unique enablement platform and offering a complete array of cloud-based IT services our network of resellers are able to provide business value and an innovative solution to end-users."

Rob Lovell, CEO at ThinkGrid, said: "Our partnership with Tech Data and the unique cloud offering should spell a great opportunity for the U.S. channel to engage in a new era of cloud-based IT for small and medium businesses. We believe the channel is central to the success of cloud computing. However, resellers need to be able to change to a value-based, cloud-led business as demand for this technology increases. The partnership will combine Tech Data's extensive global reach with our cloud technology and experience, providing resellers with the IT infrastructure and ongoing support they need to enable this transformation. The flexibility of the IT infrastructure offered means that the solution will be scalable, so that end users can add or take away certain services each month to suit their changing business requirements."

To learn more about the StreamOne Solutions Store, visit www.techdata.com/streamone/.

StreamOne is a trademark of Tech Data Corp. in the United States and/or other countries.

About Tech Data

Tech Data Corporation is one of the world's largest wholesale distributors of technology products, services and solutions. Its advanced logistics capabilities and value added services enable 125,000 resellers in more than 100 countries to efficiently and cost effectively support the diverse technology needs of end users. Tech Data generated $24.4 billion in net sales for the fiscal year ended January 31, 2011, and is ranked 109th on the Fortune 500®. To learn more, visit www.techdata.com.

About ThinkGrid

Founded in 2008, ThinkGrid is a private corporation headquartered in the UK, with offices located in London, Seattle, Sydney, Belgrade and Lviv run by an experienced management team. We operate multiple highest tier datacenters across the world to house our platform, which delivers real IT services such as Hosted Virtual Desktop, Virtual Server and Email to our partners. Partners can then use our state-of-the-art software platform to manage and service their customers in real time, with or without white label rebranding options.

ThinkGrid have over 10,000 users accessing services on a daily basis, powered by our partner ecosystem. This encompasses VAR, MSP and ISV Partners who deliver and resell our services, packaging them for different vertical markets. For more information visit: http://www.thinkgrid.com

ThinkGrid Secures Runa Capital Investment to Accelerate Growth

Moscow, October 27th, 2011 - Runa Capital, a global venture capital firm with offices in Moscow, Russia and Berlin, Germany, today announced a significant investment in ThinkGrid, a platform vendor enabling the IT channel such as Value Added Distributors, MSPs and Value Added Resellers (VARs) to become cloud service providers.

ThinkGrid is in growth mode after three successful years of establishing itself as a leader in its market. The company is a channel-focused vendor providing turnkey worldwide infrastructure and a control panel platform that allows IT solution providers to become cloud service providers; able to create, bill and manage IT services from the cloud in real-time. The investment will be used to scale sales and development teams and open more datacentres to support international growth of the partner ecosystem.

"There are many large vendors threatening mainstream adoption of the cloud by cutting out traditional channel partners and going directly to customers with restrictive and often substandard cloud offerings," said Rob Lovell, CEO at ThinkGrid. He continued: "The partner community has historically played a critical role in helping customers with new technology decisions. This is why ThinkGrid has become both successful and unique in the market place by delivering a cloud platform with a full portfolio of services to the channel. With support from Runa Capital, we are now in a position to continue to build upon our success and further drive adoption of the cloud for IT providers around the world."

The ThinkGrid platform includes a full range of services such as Hosted Virtual Desktop, Exchange, VoIP, Software-as-a-Service and Virtual Server Infrastructure. Partners are able to re-package, resell and even rebrand ThinkGrid’s products and cloud services. More recently, ThinkGrid also launched a Private Cloud solution, which allows partners to accelerate time-to-market of their own cloud services. ThinkGrid’s core development is based in the Ukraine where it has an R&D facility.

"ThinkGrid represents Runa’s eighth significant investment since the fund’s launch last year, and demonstrates our commitment to supporting technology talent internationally," said Andre Bliznyuk, Partner at Runa Capital. "Its unique, channel-focused model and powerful platform for cloud computing services reflects the type of innovative thinking we’re keen to champion. We are extremely excited by the firm’s existing success and long-term prospects."

About Runa Capital:
Runa Capital (www.runacap.com) is an early stage venture capital firm with offices in Moscow, Russia and Berlin, Germany, established to pursue opportunities in the rapidly growing areas of Cloud Computing, Internet, Virtualisation and Mobile Applications. Founded by Serguei Beloussov (founder of Parallels and Acronis) and Dmitry Chikhachev (Ericsson, Ritzio, Uvenco), and advised by Alexander Galitsky (Almaz Capital Partners), Runa Capital is run by a team of successful entrepreneurs, most of whom have worked together for over 15 years. It is a united team with broad geographical and cross-industry experience, as well as an extensive professional network. Runa Capital investment team members possess an excellent track record in tech investments.

Runa Capital’s investment strategy focuses on early stage opportunities, where venture capital is scarce and deal flow abundant. The key execution point is to select promising teams and drive and support them in the global marketplace, turning them into international champions

Runa Capital’s investments announced to date include: OnAir3G/Telefir, developer of a voice-enabled mobile communications platform; Jelastic, a cloud-based application development platform; Metabar, provider of tools used to enhance browser experience; Travelmenu, one of the Top 3 online travel companies in Russia and the Ukraine; BigTime® Software, Inc. (USA), a leading provider of cloud-based productivity tools for growing professional services firms; Nginx - the third most popular web server in the world, which powers 43 million websites and more than 20 percent of the top 10,000 busiest websites including Facebook, Groupon, Dropbox, LivingSocial, WordPress and Yandex

About ThinkGrid
Founded in 2008, ThinkGrid is a private corporation headquartered in the UK, with offices located in London, Seattle, Sydney, Belgrade and Lviv, run by an experienced management team. ThinkGrid operates nine data centres across the world to house a unique platform, which delivers real IT services such as Hosted Virtual Desktop, Virtual Server, Voice to a network of partners. Partners then can use our state-of-the-art software platform to provision, bill, manage and service their customers in real-time.

ThinkGrid have over 10,000 users accessing services on a day to day basis, powered by our partner ecosystem which encompasses over 150 partners who deliver and resell our services, packaging them for different vertical markets. For more information visit: http://www.thinkgrid.com

Leading Cloud Platform Vendor Launches Key Integration with Top Business Management Solution

ThinkGrid, the world’s first platform vendor enabling real IT services from the cloud, today announced an integration with ConnectWise, the leading business management solution for IT service providers, to simplify and accelerate cloud adoption for Managed Service Providers (MSPs). This integration gives MSPs the ability to provision and bill customers for ThinkGrid’s comprehensive portfolio of cloud services from their existing ConnectWise platform.

Rob Lovell, CEO at ThinkGrid commented: "ConnectWise has extensive relationships with major MSPs and has had great success in delivering a powerful and trusted billing platform. With increasing competition from direct-from-vendor services, as well as entrants such as telcos now making a play in the cloud space, it’s really important for MSPs to move quickly and capture this opportunity. Our partnership with ConnectWise means that for the first time, MSPs can access a one-stop-shop of cloud services and deliver these alongside other traditional offerings using a single provisioning and billing engine."

ThinkGrid has integrated the full range of its cloud services including Hosted Virtual Desktop, Exchange, VoIP, Software-as-a-Service and Virtual Server Infrastructure with ConnectWise. These innovative services allow end customers to significantly lower Capex investment in IT infrastructure and enjoy the Opex benefits, as well as reduced management overhead this new model of computing brings. Subsequently, MSPs are now in a position to quickly realise revenue opportunities by removing complexity and encouraging customer adoption of the cloud by offering a single, consolidated billing agreement for all services.

Jeannine Edwards, Director, ConnectWise Community added: "This integration will help our partners to integrate ThinkGrid’s cloud services into the ConnectWise software, allowing them to choose exactly which services they want to use and ease the decision process in picking those services. This enables our partners to harness the benefits of cloud computing in one place with a single bill on a single platform."

About ThinkGrid
ThinkGrid provides an IT services platform from the Cloud. Launched with the aim of disrupting the way that businesses currently purchase, use and manage IT, ThinkGrid provides its network of channel partners with enterprise class IT services which can be customised and delivered to small and medium businesses. ThinkGrid removes the management and cost burden of owning IT by offering it to customers as an on demand service. Its current services include Hosted Virtual Desktop, Exchange, VoIP, Software-as-a-Service and Virtual Server Infrastructure. With ThinkGrid, each user is given their own personalised IT that operates in exactly the same way as a traditional computing environment. The difference is that with ThinkGrid’s Cloud Computing platform, services can be accessed from anywhere in the world through an Internet connection and customers only pay for what they need, able to scale up and down at the click of a mouse. For more information visit: http://www.thinkgrid.com/

About ConnectWise
Designed exclusively for the IT Channel, ConnectWise is the leading business management solution for service providers, MSPs, technology consultants, integrators, and developers. Today more than 49,000 IT professionals rely on ConnectWise to achieve greater accountability, operational efficiency and profitability. ConnectWise fully integrates CRM, sales, help desk ticket and tracking, project tracking, IT service management, SLAs, dispatch scheduling, mobile IT services, time and expenses into a singular IT management software to dramatically streamline IT companies. Over the last 28 years, ConnectWise has become the premier business operating system for IT solution providers. ConnectWise APIs are accessed by over 300 organizations, including ConnectWise partners and industry leaders of the IT Nation. For more information visit www.ConnectWise.com or call 800-671-6898.

ThinkGrid recognised by Everything Channel’s CRN Magazine as One of the Coolest Cloud Computing Vendors

London, March 28, 2011 - ThinkGrid, worldwide enabler of cloud computing, today announced it was named one of the Coolest Cloud Computing Vendors by Everything Channel’s CRN. The comprehensive list highlights the most innovative cloud vendors and solutions for the channel - including storage cloud offerings, security cloud offerings, cloud apps, cloud infrastructure and cloud platforms to assist solution providers in navigating the cloud phenomena successfully.

"This year’s Coolest Cloud Computing Vendors list is based on a cloud vendor’s approach to creating an innovative product, or an innovative approach to supporting solution providers in the IT channel," said Kelley Damore, Vice President and Editorial Director CRN. "Specifically, these Cloud vendors help resellers transform themselves into true service providers and help organizations and enterprises take advantage of the ease, flexibility, scalability, elasticity and cost savings that leveraging cloud computing has to offer." ThinkGrid’s Web-based cloud computing management platform lets any organization tap the enormous power of cloud computing for scalable, cost-effective IT infrastructure on demand, while maintaining complete control and flexibility.

ThinkGrid reduces the complexity of cloud computing, enabling organisations to deploy business critical applications in a matter of hours, without the risk of lock-in at any level. With a spectrum of services available from VDI, VOIP, Virtual Server, Hosted Exchange and Collaboration, the fully-automated also cater for the needs of the IT channel by providing billing, provisioning and customer management functions in a single pain of glass. Rob Lovell, CEO of ThinkGrid said "We are very pleased that ThinkGrid has been recognised as one of the coolest cloud computing vendors by CRN magazine, a reliable publication for the channel. By tackling all aspects of the cloud, including the billing and automation with innovation in mind, we have managed to deliver a service oriented cloud platform. Our partners are given the necessary tools to design, build and launch business services, bill and manage clients in the same interface. The scalable, on-demand power of cloud computing services is made available to everyone, regardless of technical sophistication, application complexity off-premise."

A sample of the list can be viewed in the March 28th issue of CRN: http://www.crn.com.

About ThinkGrid
ThinkGrid provides an IT services platform from the Cloud. Launched with the aim of disrupting the way that businesses currently purchase, use and manage IT, ThinkGrid provides its network of channel partners with enterprise class IT services which can be customised and delivered to small and medium businesses. ThinkGrid removes the management and cost burden of owning IT by offering it to customers as an on demand service. Its current services include Hosted Virtual Desktop, Exchange, VoIP, Software-as-a-Service and Virtual Server Infrastructure. With ThinkGrid, each user is given their own personalised IT that operates in exactly the same way as a traditional computing environment. The difference is that with ThinkGrid’s Cloud Computing platform, services can be accessed from anywhere in the world through an Internet connection and customers only pay for what they need, able to scale up and down at the click of a mouse. For more information visit: http://www.thinkgrid.com/.

Everything Channel
Everything Channel is the premier provider of IT channel-focused events, media, research, consulting, and sales and marketing services. With over 30 years of experience and engagement, Everything Channel has the unmatched channel expertise to execute integrated solutions for technology executives managing partner recruitment, enablement and go-to-market strategy in order to accelerate technology sales. Everything Channel is a UBM company. To learn more about Everything Channel, visit us at http://www.everythingchannel.com. Follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/everythingchnl.

New Encryption Service Addresses Cloud Security Concerns

ThinkGrid, the world’s first platform vendor enabling real IT services from the cloud, today launched a new encryption service designed to give customers greater confidence in cloud adoption. Powered by data loss prevention specialist Cryptzone, ThinkGrid Cloud Encryption can be purchased as part of a full portfolio of cloud services to encrypt all data that resides on or is taken from the company’s cloud platform. Based on AES 256 Bit encryption, this is the first service of its kind to address the barrier of data security that prevents certain organisations from adopting cloud computing. As with all ThinkGrid services, ThinkGrid Cloud Encryption is purchased on a monthly, per user basis allowing customers to continue to benefit from the on-demand, Opex-based usage model.

"Security is clearly the last remaining barrier to mainstream business adoption of the cloud but it’s a problem that few, if any, cloud service providers are able to currently address," said Rob Lovell, ThinkGrid CEO. "Our cloud platform has become a highly attractive alternative to on-premise IT, as it removes a significant amount of the IT management burden, as well as Capex investments in hardware and software. Nonetheless, there are certain organisations that want these advantages but are limited by compliance regulations. For example, healthcare organisations are governed by privacy laws around medical records, which strictly prohibit them from moving unencrypted data from their internal databases."

ThinkGrid Cloud Encryption protects all files including emails that are migrated to ThinkGrid’s Cloud platform rendering all this data inaccessible without the correct decryption keys. This means that all data remains encrypted even if a user removes or copies it from ThinkGrid’s infrastructure. The service is based on Cryptzone’s Data Leak Prevention solution and is the first of its kind to integrate AES 256 Bit encryption technology into a cloud platform. The service can be obtained from ThinkGrid’s network of partners that also offer its full portfolio of Hosted Virtual Desktop, Exchange, VoIP, Software-as-a-Service and Virtual Server Infrastructure.

"Cloud encryption further enhances the broader security benefits of this IT model, particularly in high risk areas such as remote working. Businesses no longer have to worry about lost or stolen devices as all applications and data reside in the cloud and are now fully encrypted," added Lovell.

About ThinkGrid
ThinkGrid provides an IT services platform from the Cloud. Launched with the aim of disrupting the way that businesses currently purchase, use and manage IT, ThinkGrid provides its network of channel partners with enterprise class IT services which can be customised and delivered to small and medium businesses. ThinkGrid removes the management and cost burden of owning IT by offering it to customers as an on demand service. Its current services include Hosted Virtual Desktop, Exchange, VoIP, Software-as-a-Service and Virtual Server Infrastructure. With ThinkGrid, each user is given their own personalised IT that operates in exactly the same way as a traditional computing environment. The difference is that with ThinkGrid’s Cloud Computing platform, services can be accessed from anywhere in the world through an Internet connection and customers only pay for what they need, able to scale up and down at the click of a mouse. For more information visit: http://www.thinkgrid.com/

Resellers Empowered to Stimulate Cloud Adoption with Rapid Migration to Hosted Exchange

ThinkGrid, the world’s first platform vendor enabling real IT services from the cloud, today announced a new partnership with MigrationWiz designed to accelerate adoption of cloud services. Resellers that offer ThinkGrid’s cloud based Hosted Exchange service can now significantly reduce costs associated with migration from on-premise Microsoft Exchange Server or Microsoft Small Business Server to the cloud. Traditional approaches to Exchange migration typically require resellers to visit a customer’s premises and manually perform the migration. Using MigrationWiz with pre-configured settings for ThinkGrid Hosted Exchange seamlessly automates the entire process over the cloud. This ensures that downtime is dramatically reduced. For resellers, this not only breaks down barriers to cloud adoption, it allows them to increase margins on the professional services they offer their customers alongside other cloud offerings.

"Hosted Exchange is a great door opener and clearly highlights to the customer the potential of cloud computing. Businesses see a rapid ROI from this cloud service as it’s low-cost, hassle-free and, in many instances, much more reliable than having an Exchange server onsite," said Rob Lovell, CEO at ThinkGrid. "Resellers often come to us for Hosted Exchange because they see the opportunity for long-term recurring revenue streams. Nonetheless, migration to Hosted Exchange can be a time-intensive, manual process. Thanks to our partnership with MigrationWiz, resellers now have a significantly faster and pain free approach for taking customers to the cloud. In fact, once customers are on board with Hosted Exchange, they then start to see the benefit of moving a variety of applications to the cloud."

MigrationWiz is a complete cloud-based migration service with no hardware or software to install. This patent pending self-service solution is the only one of its kind, allowing resellers to scale to hundreds of thousands of simultaneous migrations at any given second. In contrast, on-premise migration software requires deployment of additional servers.

According to Geeman Yip, CEO at MigrationWiz: "A key driver for cloud adoption is greater efficiency and flexibility with IT, particularly when it comes to costs associated with hardware and software. Using on-premise migration software is essentially a step backward because you’re asking customers to shoulder extra infrastructure costs in order to move to the cloud. It just doesn’t make sense. By working with ThinkGrid, we’re able to help solve this problem for thousands of resellers that are now seeing the advantages of offering cloud services."

ThinkGrid’s Hosted Exchange settings are pre-configured and MigrationWiz is available today. Resellers can secure significant discounts by signing up for the MigrationWiz partner program at: http://www.migrationwiz.com/Public/PartnerProgram.aspx.

Allows not-for-profit organisations to benefit from cost effective, highly scalable and flexible IT

ThinkGrid, the world's first platform vendor enabling real IT services from the cloud, today announced that it is partnering with appiChar, a leading provider of managed IT services, including cloud computing for the not-for-profit sector, to give UK's charities unprecedented access to cloud computing services. The partnership will see appiChar offer customers ThinkGrid's portfolio of cloud computing services including Hosted Virtual Desktop, Exchange, VoIP, Software-as-a-Service and Virtual Server Infrastructure on a per user per month basis. This new offering, branded "The Charity Cloud," will allow not-for-profit organisations such as charities to reduce complexity, improve efficiency and dramatically lower the cost of IT.

"Today's tough economic times have hit everyone hard, including the not-for-profit sector. With fewer individuals and businesses able to make donations and the Government clamping down on grants, not-for-profits need to transform the way they use IT so that they can operate more leanly, without high IT overheads," said Richard Ferriman, CEO at appiChar. "In addition, because they rely heavily on volunteers, their headcount fluctuates throughout the year which can leave them paying for IT, such as software licenses that they don't need all year round. With IT not core to their operation, most aren't aware that there are other options and they get shouldered with these costs. However, thanks to ThinkGrid, they will have access to cloud computing services for the first time, which will allow them to use the latest technology without any initial IT outlay or the hassle of paying for costly upgrades or ongoing maintenance."

Founded in 2001, appiChar is based in central London and provides managed IT services to third sector organisations such as charities and NGOs across the United Kingdom and Australia. The services range from IT support and management to thin-client desktop solutions and online backup. It will now add ThinkGrid's cloud services to its portfolio and, in turn, offer not-for-profits the ability to benefit from access to the latest desktop software and applications built on enterprise class infrastructure but at extremely affordable costs.

The services will be structured on a price per user basis to allow better choice and control of IT services, as well as an easier way to keep track of costs. This pricing plan is perfectly suited to the fluctuating headcount model of most third sector organisations that benefit from the help of many volunteers who come and go during the year. Having this type of flexible approach means that these organisations are not locked in to a long term contract for a certain number of users and the service can scale quickly according to their needs. In addition, this model shifts the cost from a capital expenditure to an operating expense spread over time which better suits their budgets.

ThinkGrid's private-label platform and cloud services will be re-branded as appiChar's own services and bundled with offerings such as training, online back-up and disaster recovery capabilities, and strategy and performance analysis. This involves taking a close look at the not-for-profit's internal policies and four year business strategy to ensure that the IT environment will meet those goals. This not only helps the organisation plan its budget but ensures that it will have the right technology at the right time delivered in the most cost effective way. appiChar is also encouraging not-for-profits to collaborate and share services delivered through the cloud for even greater cost efficiencies.

Rob Lovell, CEO at ThinkGrid said, "We're excited to be working with a company so dedicated to helping not-for-profit organisations. appiChar has a solid reputation for delivering managed services on time and on budget, with a genuine understanding of the specialised needs of this sector. By working together with ThinkGrid, appiChar has been able to create a compelling and unique service in the cloud computing space. The partnership will allow charities and other not-for-profits throughout the UK to benefit from the lower costs and high availability of IT delivery through cloud computing without having to invest in IT skills themselves. This is a great opportunity for all involved and we look forward to growing our relationship with appiChar in the future."

Cloud Computing Providers Partner to Offer Enterprise-Level Services to Businesses Worldwide

(Winston-Salem, NC)"Two leading cloud computing service providers have combined their resources to offer an increased level of hosted virtual desktops and cloud computing solutions to businesses throughout North America.

Voyss Solutions, headquartered in Winston-Salem, NC, and ThinkGrid, with headquarters in the UK, have formed a strategic partnership that will provide cloud computing services to businesses in North America. In addition, the two partner organizations are able to offer enterprise-level solutions to small/medium size businesses, without the enterprise-level investment.

The alliance, which became official on August 1, 2010, brings the best of each of the companies together to form a robust model for enterprise-level cloud services. Overlapping infrastructures and expanded product/services mixes ensure the highest level of service across all platforms.

Each company also brings longevity to the market, established leadership, professional staffing, and years of technology and businesses experience.

"Many businesses today want more choice and flexibility around IT and cloud computing delivers on this. These customers are also asking themselves why they should continue with the status quo, making upfront capital expenditure investments and carrying all the risks associated with large-scale IT implementations," said Rob Lovell, CEO at ThinkGrid. "We therefore created a cloud platform that allows our partners to help their customers eliminate these risks. As a result, we have been able to build greater trust in this new computing model. The alliance with Voyss Solutions will further demonstrate the huge savings and management benefits of IT services delivered from the cloud."

Voyss Solutions will expand the sales and customer relations responsibilities through its channel partners and direct relationships. "This partnership increases our delivery capabilities and allows us to serve businesses across North America." noted Perry Swaim, Voyss Solutions CEO/President. "Voyss Solutions has been a strong regional player with national distribution; this alliance now expands our presence as a global player with international distribution."

About Voyss Solutions Voyss Solutions provides SMBs with complete enterprise-level communications and data management capabilities without the enterprise-level expense. Based in Winston-Salem, NC, Voyss Solutions serves more than 1,000 businesses with cloud computing services, managed services, hosted desktops, designed and hosted websites, VoIP, document management and disaster recovery, and carrier services.

About ThinkGrid ThinkGrid is a cloud computing vendor providing an IT services platform from the Cloud with the aim of disrupting the way that businesses currently purchase and manage IT. ThinkGrid works with the IT partner channel to provide enterprise class IT to small and medium businesses over its worldwide network. ThinkGrid removes the management and cost burden of owning IT by offering it to customers as an on demand service. Its current services include Hosted Virtual Desktop, Exchange and Communications, Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS), Virtual Server Infrastructure and Cloud Storage. With ThinkGrid, each user is given their own personalized IT environment that operates in exactly the same way as a traditional computing environment. The difference is that with ThinkGrid’s Cloud Computing platform, it can be accessed from anywhere in the world through an Internet connection. ThinkGrid partners only pay for what they use, based on the needs of the business, and can scale up and down at the click of a mouse.

ThinkGrid Named "Cool Vendor" by Leading Analyst Firm

Vendors selected for the "Cool Vendor" report are innovative, impactful and intriguing

London, UK, 22nd April 2010 - ThinkGrid, the leading cloud computing platform, today announced it has been included in the list of "Cool Vendors" in the "Cool Vendors in Infrastructure Services" report by Gartner, Inc.

ThinkGrid’s CEO Rob Lovell noted, "We are especially pleased that ThinkGrid has been recognised by one of the most respected analyst organisations in the world as, in my opinion, a company focused on innovation in cloud computing. Through our continuing innovation in our cloud computing platform, delivering business IT services through our partner we aim to deliver the scalable, on-demand power of cloud computing services to everyone, regardless of technical sophistication, application complexity off-premise."

According to the Gartner report, "The trend toward the industrialization of IT infrastructure services is irreversible. It is currently reshaping the way providers organize, deliver and price their services."

ThinkGrid’s Web-based cloud computing management platform lets any organization tap the enormous power of cloud computing for scalable, cost-effective IT infrastructure on demand, while maintaining complete control and flexibility.

ThinkGrid reduces the complexity of cloud computing, enabling organisations to deploy business critical applications in a matter of hours, without the risk of lock-in at any level. With a spectrum of services available from VDI, VOIP, Virtual Server, Hosted Exchange and Collaboration, the fully-automated also cater for the needs of the IT channel by providing billing, provisioning and customer management functions in a single pain of glass.

Cool Vendor Disclaimer
About Gartner's Cool Vendors Selection Process
Gartner's listing does not constitute an exhaustive list of vendors in any given technology area, but rather is designed to highlight interesting, new and innovative vendors, products and services. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness of a particular purpose.

Gartner defines a cool vendor as a company that offers technologies or solutions that are: Innovative, enable users to do things they couldn't do before; Impactful, have, or will have, business impact (not just technology for the sake of technology); Intriguing, have caught Gartner's interest or curiosity in approximately the past six months.

About ThinkGrid
ThinkGrid is a cloud computing vendor, providing an IT services platform from the Cloud. Launched with the aim of disrupting the way that businesses currently purchase and manage IT. ThinkGrid works with the IT partner channel to provide enterprise class IT to small and medium businesses over its worldwide network. ThinkGrid removes the management and cost burden of owning IT by offering it to customers as an on demand service. Its current services include Hosted Virtual Desktop, Exchange and Communications, Software-as-a-Service, Virtual Server Infrastructure and Cloud Storage. With ThinkGrid, each user is given their own personalised IT environment that operates in exactly the same way as a traditional computing environment. The difference is that with ThinkGrid’s Cloud Computing platform, it can be accessed from anywhere in the world through an Internet connection. ThinkGrid partners only pay for what they use, based on the needs of the business, and can scale up and down at the click of a mouse. For more information visit: http://www.thinkgrid.com/

ThinkGrid are pleased to announce a case study for NetStar

Read the Case Study!

University of London have added yet more cloud services to their portfolio, extending from Microsoft Exchange 2007 to Cloud Storage and SharePoint to allow distrubution of important university information.

Read the Case Study!

The Enterprise Strategy Group has written a report on desktop virtualisation for 2010.

Desktop virtualization has the potential to bring about a fundamental change in end-user computing. Deployments will have an increasing impact on data center operations, desktop support, security policies, service levels, and, ultimately, the way businesses deliver applications to their employees. Who wins and who loses depends on who can reach senior level IT professionals as they place long term bets and invest in desktop virtualization.

Read more here

ThinkGrid, a leading platform vendor enabling IT services from the cloud today announced that care provider the Independent Living Group (ILG), will deploy 100 ThinkGrid Hosted Virtual Desktops across its head office and registered care homes across South England. ILG will also use ThinkGrid’s platform to host Cold Harbour, an industry standard management application for care providers, as well as ThinkGrid’s low cost Hosted Exchange solution. ThinkGrid’s services will replace ILG’s existing Citrix-based hosted solution, moving the entire IT operation to a fully supported and highly scalable enterprise-class cloud infrastructure. ILG will continue to enjoy the benefits of reduced CapEx by purchasing IT on a pay-as-you-use basis, and make additional savings by deploying ThinkGrid services on its existing desktop hardware.

"Whilst there’s no doubting the role IT plays in improving the quality of the care we provide, it can still be a huge cost and management burden. In order to maintain ILG’s (Independent Living Group) high standards of care, it is critical to remain focused on delivering the best service possible to the people we support, which is why we have pursued an outsourced IT strategy that allows us to drive greater efficiency in our day-to-day operations," said Alex Korniak, IT Consultant for ILG. "The challenge now is that ILG has reached a size where for many similar businesses the obvious next step is to invest in an internal IT to retain quality, whilst reducing outsourcing costs. So when the time came to review our existing IT services contract, we needed a partner who would be able to sustain our outsourcing strategy without compromise. I recommended ThinkGrid’s cloud platform as it gives ILG the best of both worlds: high quality and affordable IT services."

Managing and maintaining IT can become time consuming for organisations such as ILG; PCs need to be patched and maintained, email and file servers must be managed, applications need to be updated and software licences kept up-to-date. With ThinkGrid’s IT services from the cloud, these pains are taken away and the IT infrastructure grows and contracts in line with the business, with customers only paying for what they use on a monthly basis. Staff at ILG’s 43 learning and disability homes will now benefit from ThinkGrid’s Hosted Virtual Desktop and Hosted Exchange services, which will run on their existing PCs:

Hosted Virtual Desktops look and work exactly like traditional PCs, but users connect over the Internet to their desktop, which is hosted on a secure ThinkGrid cloud infrastructure. Staff at ILG will continue to use familiar applications including Microsoft Office and the Cold Harbour application, which are all delivered as a service. Moving to a hosted desktop model creates additional benefits such as mobile working, reduced management overhead, and full disaster recovery protection.

Hosted Exchange allows ILG to benefit from enterprise email and collaboration both in the office and on the move. The service grows alongside ILG’s business, with user accounts added as needed but without the pain of management and provisioning."

According to Rob Lovell, CEO at ThinkGrid: "For many outsourced IT contracts there can be a high degree of pain involved in switching services to another supplier. In a matter of one weekend it’s been possible to move ILG’s entire infrastructure over to our cloud platform so they could literally start using our services with no impact on day-to-day operations when staff returned to the office on Monday morning." He continued: "By moving IT to the cloud, businesses become less dependent on expensive infrastructure such as servers and PCs. In fact, ILG is extending the life of their existing PCs because Hosted Virtual Desktops perform effectively even on low spec machines such as thin-clients. All in all, ILG are proving how many businesses today can significantly transform the way they use, purchase and manage IT by adopting the cloud services model."

London, 27th October 2009: SMEs and small businesses moving into serviced office space can now benefit from a new partnership between Avanta Managed Offices and ThinkGrid, avoiding the need to make capital investment in IT hardware and software. Avanta operates 19 serviced office centres in London, Manchester, the Thames Valley and Edinburgh, whilst ThinkGrid provides hosted business IT services from the cloud, on an on demand basis. As a result, businesses no longer need to make large upfront CapEx investments in PCs, servers and supporting software licenses, or dedicate time and resources to managing IT. Instead, they can move all these costs to more predictable monthly contracts fully managed for them.

By working with ThinkGrid and Avanta, new businesses moving into Avanta serviced offices can immediately begin to use low cost PCs called thin clients, familiar desktop software and applications such as Microsoft Windows and Office as well as file servers for saving data. Alternatively, established businesses relocating to Avanta can continue to use their existing PCs to access ThinkGrid’s services and then switch to thin clients when these older machines need replacing.

ThinkGrid’s services are built on the same type of IT infrastructure that corporate businesses and banks use, and can be accessed via a standard internet connection, anywhere in the world. This means that employees on the move or working from home can benefit from the same level of IT as those at Avanta’s offices.

ThinkGrid also enables Avanta customers to securely store their valuable business data off-site, so removing the cost and headaches associated with storage, disaster recovery and data back-up. As customers only pay for what they use on a monthly rolling contract, they are also free to scale the number of users up and down, as well as adding and removing applications - all at the click of a mouse.

"Avanta serviced office centres are known for providing outstanding levels of customer service, and this new deal with ThinkGrid extends those levels even further," comments Geraint Evans, Avanta’s sales & marketing director. "Our business service package already includes 4 or 8Mb resilient internet access and together with telecoms services, the deal with ThinkGrid now completes the menu of services available to Avanta customers."

"In the current economic climate, most SMEs and small businesses need to channel their management resources on their core business without worrying about the cost, availability and security of their IT systems. So, by linking up with ThinkGrid we have taken a significant step towards minimising customer IT issues by providing them with a cost-effective solution that will provide them with real peace of mind."

"Avanta has built a strong reputation around delivering high-quality, flexible serviced office space that offers customers everything they need to start operating from day one. We are therefore extremely pleased to be partnering with them to offer no fuss, flexible IT that is ready to go the minute customers move in," said Rob Lovell, CEO at ThinkGrid. "Thousands of our SME customers across the UK are already seeing the value of our business IT on-demand services, which remove all the pain and leave only the benefits of IT, so that they can focus on what they do best. Avanta customers that want a free trial of our services should go to www.thinkgrid.co.uk/avanta."

ThinkGrid is pleased to announce that its continued programme of international expansion will now see the company moving into into the southern hemisphere, with the establishment of new points of presence in Sydney. The city is regarded as Australia’s technology hub and is a key centre for internet distribution and ICT services exports in the country.

CEO Rob Lovell explains: "Our new data centre facilities in Sydney will extend and improve our capability to provide IT services from the cloud, and will allow us to reach more customers than ever before. With their specialised knowledge of the country’s IT market, our network of partners will be able to bring the advantages of truly scalable cloud computing services to many of the 1.8 million Australian SMEs who do not have the financial resources of larger enterprises. In order to ensure full redundancy, two sites are already live and able to provide low latency services, and these facilities provide good connectivity not only to Australia but to the entire Asia-Pacific region, giving us the opportunity for continued growth across the globe."

ThinkGrid has already signed up several new partners in Australia. Simon Probert, Director of Skybox, stated: "We are pleased to align ourselves with ThinkGrid as our primary delivery partner. The Australian market is perfectly suited for the adoption of cloud computing services as there are numerous incumbent suppliers still entrenched in the 'old way' of providing IT services. The main challenge is one of educating the business consumer that the Australian broadband infrastructure is perfectly capable of supporting on-demand cloud based services, in particular the Hosted Desktop product line. According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, over 90% of Australian businesses already have fast broadband capability - but interestingly only a small percentage of this capability is being used beyond the usual web surfing and email scenario. With Skybox in partnership with ThinkGrid we hope to release the Australian business owner from the rigid constraint and cost of owning and maintaining IT systems."

When asked how businesses in Melbourne and Sydney were reacting to the Skybox proposition, Simon commented: "The reception so far as been amazing. Small and medium-sized business owners seem to grab the cost saving aspect very quickly. ThinkGrid was a logical choice for us to partner with as they are able to provision the full range of cloud services that a typical business can benefit from. This relationship also gives Skybox clients confidence that their services are being delivered on a tried and tested enterprise-grade cloud platform."

ThinkGrid is pleased to announce the acquisition of historic Heythrop College as one of its newest customers. The specialist philosophy and theology college of the University of London chose to move to ThinkGrid’s state-of-the-art Hosted Exchange platform instead of Microsoft’s BPOS offering because of the quality of customer care and value-added services provided by ThinkGrid's partners. Nadeem Ahmad stated: "The excellent level of service and dedicated technical support offered by ThinkGrid was the deciding factor in our selection process."

Established for nearly four hundred years, Heythrop College has among its lecturers some of the leading thinkers in their fields, and will now benefit from cutting edge technology delivered by one of the UK’s leading hosted IT providers.

ThinkGrid has announced its partnership with Mezeo Software Corp. As part of its IT on demand service offering, ThinkGrid will soon be able to utilise the Mezeo Cloud Storage Platform, which allows users to access, share and collaborate on files on an ‘anytime, anywhere’ basis.

ThinkGrid COO David Pratt states: "We are proud to announce that ThinkGrid has been selected as Mezeo’s first PHP (Premier Hosting Partner) in the whole of Europe. This relationship will allow us to deliver the company’s deployable cloud storage platform to service providers and other resellers, bringing added value and greater competitive advantage at a time when these qualities are more important than ever. Mezeo’s highly secure cloud storage platform was purpose-built for the IT service provider market, and it has given us the opportunity to quickly deploy cloud storage services without the costs or delays involved in developing the solution from scratch ourselves."

Cloud storage is growing in popularity due to the benefits it provides, such as simple, CapEx-free costs, anywhere access and the removal of the burden of in-house maintenance and management.

Steve Lesem, Mezeo’s President and CEO, explains: "We believe that mass adoption of cloud-based IT services requires that they be offered by significant, trusted service providers, which is why ThinkGrid was a perfect choice to partner with us. As for security in the cloud, the combination of the Mezeo platform and its use of encryption for data in motion and data at rest with the management and infrastructure of a trusted service provider like ThinkGrid establish the required confidence for cloud storage to take off. ThinkGrid is an innovative and reliable presence in the marketplace, and is doing much to bolster belief in the cloud, so we fully expect that together we can make great strides in continuing to establish cloud computing as a trustworthy and secure solution as well as a cost-efficient and convenient one."

ThinkGrid’s cloud storage service is due to be launched later this month.

ThinkGrid has just established a new North American POP (point-of-presence), in addition to its existing facility in Chicago, at a high-specification data centre in Ashburn, Virginia.

CEO Rob Lovell explains: "In conjunction with our partners SoftLayer and HP, we have expanded our US presence in order to meet the escalating demand for our hosted IT services. As well as providing increased capacity and additional resilience, the new facility will help us to deliver lower latency for our services around the world, along with more choice for our customers."

Located within the Dulles Technology Corridor, the Tier 3 & 4 facility receives power from two redundant Dominion Virginia Power grids and includes three on-site, 600-ton cooling towers, fully meeting N+1 cooling requirements. It features multiple power feeds, 10 GB fibre uplinks, dedicated generators and battery backup to ensure the highest level of performance, reliability and interoperability.

Mr Lovell continues: "By utilising facilities in strategic sites like this, we create a level of geographical diversity that is ideal for maintaining system and data redundancy, as well as for positioning systems in the best physical location for traffic volume and speeds. The new facility will allow more customers than ever to take advantage of the comprehensive set of hosted services we offer, including hosted desktops, VOIP telephony and a full range of software on demand."

Plans to open a third US POP in Seattle later this year are already underway.

Online IT publication vnunet.com has awarded ThinkGrid’s Hosted Desktop service 4 stars (out of a possible maximum of 5) after the service was reviewed by one of its experts.

Describing it as ‘responsive’ from either an office internet connection, a domestic broadband service or a laptop via Wi-Fi, journalist Daniel Robinson said of his sample hosted desktop account: "I found it pretty much like using a thin client session, except you have your own desktop that can be customised to appear how you want it."

Confirming ThinkGrid’s claims to provide a near-identical experience to running the infrastructure in-house, he continued: "(it) looks and feels exactly as if it was running on the computer in front of you. I perceived no lag in either mouse movements or keystrokes when accessing the desktop." He also noted that the service "could prove especially useful for smaller companies that do not have a dedicated IT staff."

ThinkGrid CEO Rob Lovell commented: "We are very pleased with VNU’s review, and I think this backs up what we have been saying - that hosted desktops ARE a great alternative to PCs, and they offer a huge array of benefits. Our average user rating is actually 5/5 stars, but we are working on improving our service all the time to deliver desktops from the cloud."

A full review of the service can be found at: http://www.vnunet.com/

Why the channel must embrace a new business model to sell IT

2009 has had a bleak beginning. The news of doom for the UK economy seems to be growing every day. The implications for IT departments are clear: they are under more pressure than ever to cut spending - but, at the same time, they are still expected to deliver more value to the business. Inevitably this is placing the channel under substantial pressure as resellers risk going to the wall while competing for ever decreasing pots of budget. As Computacenter’s recent withdrawal from PC distribution has shown, resellers need to adjust their business models if they are to come out of the current recession with a sustainable business. However, for those that don’t have the ability or luxury of being able to pull out of entire lines of business, what else is available? David Pratt, COO at ThinkGrid believes ‘business IT on demand’ offers an entirely new opportunity to regain margin and build new revenue streams during the downturn.

"The channel has to realise that to remain competitive it is necessary for them to start behaving differently. ‘Business IT on demand’ is basically a hosted IT infrastructure that customers subscribe to on a ‘pay-as-you-go’ model. It offers a lifeline to resellers that are struggling to survive during a time of economic recession and continued decline in margins from PC and server sales."

How does it work? Instead of selling the hardware and software needed to build an IT infrastructure, resellers offer customers a ‘business IT on demand’ service. The customer benefit is that they no longer need to make large upfront CapEx investments in PCs, servers and supporting software licenses. They simply continue to use their existing IT, but access the latest desktop operating system, applications and stored data from ThinkGrid’s enterprise-class hosted infrastructure.

"The beauty is that cash strapped customers only pay for the IT they use, can scale up or down as needed and move a CapEx cost to a far more manageable OpEx entry, which is ideal for the bean counters. For the channel, this opens the door to double digit margins and recurring revenue streams. It is ideal for those resellers that are finding that customers simply do not have the cash to make upfront investments in technology at the moment. This is because when IT is supplied on demand, there is no need for investment in hardware, software or administration, which in turn removes a major cost for resellers and their customers. By offering ThinkGrid, or a white label version of it, resellers have a low-cost and simple route-to-market that can quickly lead to revenue from other high-margin services such as consulting and training. They will also find that business is ‘stickier’. Rather than shopping around for expensive, one-off IT purchases, customers will be providing a guaranteed monthly income - a predictable revenue stream that offers a degree of security in these uncertain times."

Virtual Planet is one of the first resellers to offer ThinkGrid’s ‘business IT on demand’ and as a result has already experienced significant benefits with this approach. David D’Orazi, CEO at Virtual Planet thinks that geographical boundaries that previously prevented resellers from exploring other markets are also removed.

"ThinkGrid’s ‘business IT on demand’ allows us to target the global market, as the infrastructure is available from anywhere in the world. This is because the hosted nature of the offering means that any user can access their entire desktop over any PC that is connected to the internet. At Virtual Planet, we have seen lots of interest in hosted solutions - businesses are clearly looking for an alternative way to buy and use IT. Our hosted offering based on ThinkGrid is providing an alternative; customers don't need to make expensive CapEx investments but can still get the latest technology."

About ThinkGrid ThinkGrid provides business IT on demand. Launched in 2008 with the aim of disrupting the way that businesses currently purchase, use and manage IT, ThinkGrid provides enterprise class IT to small and medium businesses. ThinkGrid removes the management and cost burden of owning IT by offering it to customers as an on demand service. Its current services include Hosted desktop, Exchange, VoIP, Hosted BlackBerry Enterprise Service and Dynamic Server Infrastructure. With ThinkGrid, each employee is given their own personalised hosted virtual desktop that can be accessed from anywhere in the world through an internet connection. ThinkGrid customers only pay for what they use, based on the needs of the business, and can scale up and down at the click of a mouse. For more information visit: http://www.thinkgrid.co.uk/

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