Micromail.com Blog

Micromail wins Microsoft Operational Excellence Award for Large Account Resellers

micromail — Thu, 10 May 2012 14:16:24 +0000

Micromail headed off competition from all over Europe to win the Microsoft Operational Excellence Award for Large Account Resellers at the Microsoft 2012 EMEA Partner Operations Conference recently held in Dublin.

Sean Deasy and Cormac Hayes accepted the award for Micromail. Contrary to belief, beards were not mandatory on the night.

The prize rewards Microsoft partners for meeting or exceeding Large Account Reseller performance criteria. The award was presented to Micromail’s Cormac Hayes and Sean Deasy at a ceremony attended by 300 distributors and resellers from Northern Europe and Scandinavia.

“This award from Microsoft confirms the high quality of our operational standards, and our services to customers,” said Willy Kelly, Technical Sales Director, Micromail

Combined with retaining our Gold Partner status for the 6th consecutive year and our recent ISO certification its been a great 25th anniversary so far!

Many thanks to all our customers and partners for all your kind congratulations.

Micromail retains Microsoft Gold Competencies in Volume Licensing and Software Asset Management

micromail — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 16:23:29 +0000

Micromail demonstrates best-in-class capability and market leadership through demonstrated technology success and customer commitment.

For the sixth consecutive year, Micromail has attained Microsoft Gold Competencies in Volume Licensing and Software Asset Management. This achievement places the company within the top 1 percent of Microsoft’s world-wide Partner Network, and demonstrates a “best-in-class” ability & commitment to meeting Microsoft customers’ needs in today’s dynamic business environment.

To earn a Microsoft gold competency, a company’s staff needs to successfully complete Microsoft Certified Professional exams to prove their level of technology expertise. The certified professionals are then designated uniquely to one Microsoft competency, ensuring a certain level of staffing capacity. Businesses must also submit customer references as evidence of successful projects, and implement a yearly customer satisfaction survey. They must also meet a revenue commitment (for most gold competencies), and pass technology and/or sales assessments. Microsoft technology competencies identify a partner’s capabilities, allowing customers to find qualified solution providers with expertise in specific areas.

“By achieving a portfolio of competencies, partners demonstrate deep expertise and consistent capability on the latest Microsoft technology,” said Jon Roskill, corporate vice president, Worldwide Partner Group at Microsoft Corp. “These partners show true commitment to meeting customer technology needs today and into the future.”

“These specific licensing competencies, which have been increasingly challenging to achieve, enhance our ability to provide top class consulting services directly to customers, or indirectly through solution & deployment partners whose skills complement ours,” said Micromail Technical Sales Director Willy Kelly.

Micromail has 25 years’ experience in licensing consultancy & sales. As a Microsoft Large Account Reseller and Enterprise Software Advisor the company offers the full range of Microsoft products and licensing programs. Micromail’s services cover the entire software lifecycle from consultancy & procurement to renewal, audit & asset management.

Please contact us for more information.

Adobe CS6 – Your Upgrade Options

micromail — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 16:21:13 +0000

Adobe have announced the long awaited CS6, due to ship on May 7^th; and with major changes to upgrade options on the way now is a great time to consider moving up to CS6.

Initial Launch Offer:

Firstly, you can buy CS5/CS5.5 now and get a free upgrade to CS6, up until May 7^th; essentially get CS6 at CS5.5 prices!

CS6 Upgrade Policy:

If you have a Suite from one version back (in this case, from CS5 or CS5.5 since CS5.5 was a point release) you will qualify for upgrade pricing to a CS6 suite. Owners of individual CS5 or CS5.5 products also qualify for upgrade pricing to the same product, but can no longer upgrade to a Suite.

Under Adobe’s new policy, any version earlier than CS5 will not be eligible for upgrade pricing. However, Adobe are making a special offer to owners of CS3 and CS4 individual products and suite editions that will give them a temporary upgrade path to CS6 until December 31, 2012. After this date, only customers on CS5 or CS5.5 will qualify for upgrade pricing to CS6.

Recommendations for CS4 and CS3 Users:

If you have CS4 then it is highly recommended that you upgrade now to CS5 and receive a free CS6 upgrade; if you wait until after May 7^th you will be upgrading from CS4 to CS6 (two versions back) at a higher cost. Upgrading now could save you hundreds of Euro!

For CS3 users- upgrade before the end of the year or you will be paying full price from 2013 on! For CS2 users, you only have until May 7^th to upgrade!

Adobe Upgrade Matrix:

You own one of the following suite editions	Upgrade to
Creative Suite 5.5 Design Premium, Design Standard, Web Premium, Production Premium, or Master Collection	Any Creative Suite 6
Creative Suite 5 Design Premium, Design Standard, Web Premium, Production Premium, or Master Collection	Any Creative Suite 6
Creative Suite 4 Design Premium, Design Standard, Web Premium, Web Standard, Production Premium, or Master Collection (special offer expires December 31, 2012)	Any Creative Suite 6
Creative Suite 3 Design Premium, Design Standard, Web Premium, Web Standard, Production Premium, or Master Collection (special offer expires December 31, 2012)	Any Creative Suite 6

So any questions?

by Fionán Ó Cinnéide
Licensing Specialist

New Delphi User Group Ireland

micromail — Tue, 13 Mar 2012 16:41:47 +0000

Last Wednesday in Jury’s Croke Park Hotel Dublin, Embarcadero ran the latest in their series of interactive workshops – RAD Studio XE2 in Action LIVE! As Irelands authorised Embarcadero Reseller Partner Micromail was in attendance. Presenting was Embarcadero’s Stephen Ball who as always gave an excellent presentation. FireMonkey with its cross platform capabilities was the biggest crowd pleaser on the day.

After chatting with some of the developers in attendance the subject of re-starting the Irish Delphi User Community was raised again. As a first step I have created a new LinkedIn group with the imaginative title of Delphi Irish User Group. This is an Open Group so any Delphi users out there, please feel free to join and contribute.

Look forward to meeting you there.

- Stephen Foley, Embarcadero Licensing Specialist.

Symantec Maintenance Renewals and Grace Period Changes

micromail — Mon, 12 Mar 2012 16:17:07 +0000

Most Symantec customers are well aware of the support/maintenance subscription that comes with their Symantec Licences whether it be for Symantec EndPoint Protection or Symantec Protection Suite etc. Support is usually procured as Basic or Essential with your original licence purchase and renewed annually thereafter.

Some recent news from Symantec may impact the next time you are looking to renew your Symantec Maintenance.

Symantec previously had a generous grace period whereby you could renew your maintenance upto 90 days post expiry. While not recommended for such an important security update many customers would have renewed support quite late in the day. Recently, Symantec has decided to close this gap and from April will operate a strict 30 day grace period for all renewals.

Our recommendation – get your Symantec support renewed before expiry date but certainly within the 30 day grace period so you are not faced with Upgrade costs to re-instate this vital maintenance contract.

Need a quote for an upcoming maintenance renewal? Get in touch, we’d be happy to help.

Basic Maintenance Renewal Options

Symantec Basic Maintenance Services

60-minute response target for Severity 1 issues
24x7x365 access to updates and patches
Call Center access during business hours
Two designated callers per product title
Tecnical support news bulletin subscription services
Symantec security alert notifications
Option for additional designated callers

Essential Maintenance

30-minute response target for Severity 1 issues
24x7x365 telephone access
Follow-the-sun model for around the clock issue resolution
One-stop interoperability support
Six designated callers per product title
Technical support news bulletin subscription services
Symantec security alert notifications
Option for additional designated callers

Cloud Computing Graduate Programmes

micromail — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 17:05:40 +0000

On foot of the successful launch of CITs M.Sc. and B.Sc. programmes in Cloud Computing, last Autumn, CIT has now lauched a new distance learning Cloud Computing Graduate Conversion Programme.

Delivered online using Adobe Connect and starting in June 2012, both programmes are supported by the Higher Education Authority (HEA) and Department o f Edu cation and Skills which means the tuition fees normally associated with such programmes are waived. CIT also notes that “we have been informed that successful applicants who currently receive either the Jobseeker’s Allowance or Jobseeker’s Benefit will continue to receive this payment.”

Click here for more information and sign up details.

Happy Birthday to Us

micromail — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 15:05:49 +0000

Micromail is celebrating a successful quarter-century!

As we are feeling misty eyed (for a moment or two), we would like to share some of that history with you. We were set up in 1987 to supply software to computer users, along with manuals and books on every aspect of computing & IT. Our first website and an online shop were added in 1995. Our areas of expertise grew over the years in response to technological developments and to customer demand, and we developed the range of competencies which has made us one of Ireland’s leading suppliers of software licensing and services.

Our first 25 years in business have been full of interest and incident. We witnessed the rise, fall & rise again of Apple & the late Steve Jobs. When we entered the industry Lotus 1-2-3 and WordPerfect reigned supreme, only to be displaced within a few years by Microsoft Excel & Microsoft Word. In the nineties we sold thousands of books about the amazing growth of the internet, and in 2000 and 2001 we experienced the dotcom boom & bust: among the casualties were several of our own customers.

We have partnered with Microsoft since the early years of its rise to dominance, and forged strong and enduring relationships with other major software vendors like Adobe, Symantec & Embarcadero. We have enjoyed playing an active part in the challenging, demanding and ever-changing IT scene. We have no doubt that each successive wave of innovation will create even more astonishing new technologies in the future.

We look forward to the next quarter-century, ready for the challenges ahead, and hope that you, our loyal customers, will continue the journey with us.

Happy Birthday to Us!

Micromail Achieves ISO 9001 Quality Certification

micromail — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 18:05:30 +0000

Micromail Achieves ISO 9001 Quality Certification

Earlier this year Micromail was accredited with the coveted International Quality Standard (ISO 9001:2008) for its provision of software licensing solutions and Software Asset Management (SAM) services. The awarding body was the National Standards Authority of Ireland (NSAI). ISO 9001:2008 is the latest version of ISO 9001 and is the internationally recognized standard for a Quality Management System which focuses on an organization’s actions to meet and continually improve customer satisfaction and quality requirements.

Micromail is celebrating 25 years in business this year and the investment in ISO 9001:2008 demonstrates our ongoing commitment to offer our customers the highest levels of service possible.

by Stephen Foley – Quality Manager

Further Changes in Adobe Upgrade Policy

micromail — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 10:00:18 +0000

Some good news from Adobe; they have decided to push back their changes to the Upgrade Policy announced before Christmas; so for the rest of 2012 customers WILL be able to upgrade from CS3 & CS4. The following is from Adobe’s upgrade page:

“To ensure customers have the opportunity to evaluate CS6, Adobe will extend an introductory offer to CS3 and CS4 customers for special upgrade pricing on CS6 until December 31, 2012. This will give CS3 and CS4 customers an upgrade path to CS6. Customers who remain on CS2 or earlier will not be eligible for upgrade pricing for CS6.”

Adobe have announced that CS6 will be launched in the first half of 2012 so all CS2 users should consider upgrading now while they are still within upgrade eligibility. There’s also a 15% upgrade promotion to CS5.5 running until March so there’s never been a better time to upgrade.

by Fionán Ó Cinnéide – Adobe Licensing Specialist

Major Changes In Adobe Upgrade Policy On The Way

micromail — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 15:24:01 +0000

Adobe is completely overhauling their upgrade policy as part of significant licensing changes announced during Adobe Max last month. Once CS6 is launched (expected in 2012, based on previous release patterns) customers will only be allow to upgrade from either CS5 or CS5.5. So those used to upgrading from three versions back will now be faced with the prospect of purchasing a full new licence rather than an upgrade.

Given the enduring popularity of CS3 this will affect many Creative Suite users; but there is some good news. Adobe are offering a 20% discount on all upgrades from CS2/3/4 until the end of 2011. So the onus is on the customer to upgrade now, or find themselves out of the upgrade loop and facing high software refresh costs in the future.

Even the single applications like Photoshop, Dreamweaver etc. are entitled to this discount so I would highly recommend that this avenue is explored.

There have been some major changes to Creative Suite with each new version so it’s worth checking all the new features that will be available to you if you upgrade. You can explore this and all your upgrade options on Micromail’s dedicated CS upgrade site.

Fionan.