FARGO, N.D., May 8, 2001 — Microsoft® Great Plains Business Solutions today announced that the following companies have successfully met its stringent third-party certification requirements for application service providers (ASPs): Allegrix Inc., ASPEN, EYT, FutureLink Corp., ManagedOps.com Inc., Mareechi.com LLC, NextCorp Ltd., RSM McGladrey Inc., Surebridge Inc. and Vobix Corp.
Microsoft Great Plains has established third-party certification requirements for its ASPs to help customers identify those ASPs who are uniquely qualified to host Microsoft Great Plains solutions.
To achieve certification, Microsoft Great Plains ASP partners must meet many requirements, including having a written service level agreement (SLA), a secure datacenter facility, security systems that protect against unauthorized access, daily data backups, and written policies and procedures that cover disaster recovery, security, change requests and system monitoring. Additional requirements include customer support, a staging environment to test upgrades, equipment maintenance procedures and a minimum of two staff members who have been certified to implement Microsoft Great Plains solutions.
Microsoft Great Plains has selected reliability standards from eQuest Technologies Inc., IBM Corp., KPMG LLP Information Risk Management Practice, Microsoft Corp., RSM McGladrey, SysTrust Services Corp. and TruSecure Corp. ASPs that want to host Microsoft Great Plains solutions must first have their systems independently tested by one of these approved vendors.
“We’re assuring customers that our approved ASPs can host mission-critical business solutions reliably and securely,”
said Jim Traynor, director of ASP business development at Microsoft Great Plains.
“High-quality products, service and support are essential to improving the lives and business success of our partners and customers.”
Microsoft Great Plains provides business applications that help small and midsize companies become more agile in today’s interconnected economy by extending specific information and procedures to employees, customers, vendors and partners. The business applications automate end-to-end business processes across financials, distribution, project accounting, electronic commerce, human resources and payroll, manufacturing, supply chain management, business analytics, sales and marketing management, and customer service and support. More information about the solutions offered by Microsoft Great Plains can be found at http://www.greatplains.com/ or at http://microsoft.com/business/greatplains/ .
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