Gartner VP, Jeffrey Mann, Joins Open-Xchange Partner Summit Lineup

NUREMBERG, GERMANY, September 22, 2010 (Press-News.org) Open-Xchange, a provider of business-class open source collaboration software, today announced its second Open-Xchange Partner Summit will take place on November 4 in Cologne, Germany at KölnSky. The Summit provides the partner community with a forum to learn how to advance their business with e-mail and collaboration services.

"Mega-trends in Cloud Computing, Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) and Mobility" will top the agenda at the Partner conference. Together with Summit sponsors, eleven, eZuce, IPBrick, LuxCloud, LWsystems, MESH, MicroDoc, Parallels, Sachsen DV, Scality, Sourcegarden, Univention and VIPcom, Open-Xchange will share strategies, technologies and best practices about how system integrators and resellers can benefit from Open-Xchange in cooperation with hosting partners, ISPs and telecommunications companies.

"Our partner community is key to our success as we do 100 percent indirect sales in cooperation with our partners -- and never compete with them selling directly to end customers like our competitors, Microsoft and Google," said Rafael Laguna, CEO of Open-Xchange. "More than 120 enthusiastic participants attended the first Open-Xchange Partner Summit and helped us to increase the number of Open-Xchange users by 80 percent to more than 15 million in 2009. This year, we expect more than 200 industry experts at our annual conference."

Highlights of the Open-Xchange Partner Summit include:

• Jeffrey Mann, research VP, Gartner, providing an in-depth look into top industry trends for cloud and collaboration and sharing ideas and strategies about how system integrators, hosting providers, independent software vendors (ISVs) and channel partners can benefit.
• Rafael Laguna, CEO of Open-Xchange, providing the audience with exclusive previews and live demos of upcoming Open-Xchange technologies and products.
• Frank Hoberg, executive vice president of sales and marketing, Open-Xchange, explaining how channel partners can take advantage of Open-Xchange's on-premises and SaaS offerings in different market segments.
• Presentations by industry executives from eZuce, Scality and Univention providing perspectives on integration, Unified Communication and scalability.

Through its partner community, Open-Xchange is successful selling open source collaboration services as both an on-premises solution and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) using exactly the same source code. Open-Xchange enables SaaS providers and on-premises channel partners to join forces and leverage their respective strengths, while system integrators and resellers can partner with service providers to offer hosted Open-Xchange to their customer base without any upfront investments in complex and secure hosting infrastructure. SaaS providers can benefit from resellers' and system integrators' local and regional customer base and in-depth technical and consulting expertise.

The Open-Xchange Summit features separate business and technical tracks. Keynotes and tracks provide in-depth technology and marketing strategy sessions for business and technical professionals interested in learning more about how to grow their business with Open-Xchange messaging and collaboration solutions. The Open-Xchange Partner Summit concludes with an evening networking event.

For the detailed agenda and free registration, visit http://www.open-xchange.com/partnersummit.

About Open-Xchange
Open-Xchange is the innovator of scalable and integrated open source e-mail and collaboration solutions for enterprises, academic institutions, and government authorities. The company provides on-premises versions called Open-Xchange Server Edition and Open-Xchange Appliance Edition, along with Open-Xchange Hosting Edition, which enables web hosting companies to provide an easy-to-use and feature-rich application delivered as Software as a Service (SaaS). The Open-Xchange Hosting Edition is architected to integrate into a hosting provider's existing infrastructure, such as authentication, provisioning, billing, and e-mail storage and does not require that these systems be replaced.

Open-Xchange AG is a privately-held company headquartered in Nuremberg, Germany with offices in Olpe, Germany and Tarrytown, N.Y. For more information, please visit http://www.open-xchange.com.