SaaS Alerts, led by CEO Jim Lippie, raises $1.2 million in early stage funding from Gary Pica, David Bellini & additional MSP industry pioneers.
The lineup of investors includes Gary Pica, David Bellini, Adam Slutskin, Paul Cissel, Pete Peterson, Kevin Lancaster, Paul Brady, John Barrows and Michael France, ChannelE2E has confirmed.
SaaS Alerts secures funding
The funding arrives at a key time for SaaS Alerts and the MSP software industry. Indeed, thousands of MSPs have successfully extended from on-premises device monitoring to reselling SaaS applications, such as Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace (formerly Google G Suite).
However, most MSPs have yet to monetise the monitoring of SaaS, IaaS and PaaS applications.
The SaaS layer
SaaS Alerts addresses one of those Big Three cloud opportunities - namely, the SaaS layer
SaaS Alerts addresses one of those Big Three cloud opportunities - namely, the SaaS layer. The startup is a cyber security company “purpose-built for MSPs to protect and monetise customers’ core SaaS business applications”, as per the firm.
With that focus in mind, SaaS Alerts offers a unified, real-time monitoring platform for MSPs to protect against data theft, data at risk and bad actors, the company adds.
SaaS Alerts: Angel Investors of Note
The SaaS Alerts seed funding round features funding from such MSP technology industry veterans as:
- Gary Pica, a former MSP Owner who now leads TruMethods - an MSP coaching firm,
- David Bellini, CFO at ConnectOn, and Co-Founder/Former President of ConnectWise,
- Adam Slutskin, Chief Revenue Officer at Liongard, and former CRO at ConnectWise,
- Paul Cissel, formerly CEO of Internet & Telephone, an MSP that successfully exited to OnePath,
- Pete Peterson, CEO of Merit Solutions, a major MSP,
- Kevin Lancaster, Executive VP of Kaseya and founder of ID Agent,
- Paul Brady, CEO of Gtms,
- John Barrows, CEO of JBarrows sales training, and
- Michael France, Managing Partner at Taylor Business Group.
Importance of protecting the SaaS applications
In a prepared statement about the funding, David Bellini said: “The technology landscape has been evolving for a while, but the rate of change has been hastened by the pandemic. Now more than ever, MSPs need to realise the importance of protecting the SaaS applications, which they and their customers use daily. Based on this transformation, I feel like SaaS Alerts is the right solution at the right time for the MSP community.”
SaaS Alerts’ Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Jim Lippie, stated: “When we started our fundraising efforts, it was important for us to bring in investors who truly understand the MSP industry and how it’s changing. We now feel like we have a dream team of investors who have seen the industry evolve and know exactly where it’s headed. Receiving investment from such an impressive group of MSP veterans is a real endorsement of our vision and mission at SaaS Alerts.”
SaaS Alerts to use funds to accelerate R&D, sales
SaaS Alerts will leverage the funding to accelerate R&D, sales and marketing
Jim Lippie joined SaaS Alerts in January 2021. The move reunited Lippie with Co-Founders - Chip Buck and Seth Bostock. The trio previously built independenceIT, a desktop as a service (DaaS) provider that ultimately joined CloudJumper and then tucked into NetApp.
SaaS Alerts will leverage the funding to accelerate R&D, sales and marketing. But to be clear: The cloud-based platform is up and running, supporting MSPs, and already processes more than two million events per day.
Next-generation cloud monitoring, management for MSPs
Meanwhile, a growing list of startups along with larger technology providers is striving to help MSPs manage and monetise SaaS, IaaS and PaaS workloads.
Examples areas of development include:
- Windows Virtual Desktops: Nerdio has emerged as a major partner that helps MSPs to further automate and manage Windows Virtual Desktops on Azure.
- Public Cloud Data Protection: Numerous backup and disaster recovery (BDR) companies now run natively and protect such public clouds as Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud Platform. The latest example involves Datto, which will start beta testing Datto Azure Cloud Continuity for MSPs in Q2 2021.
- Cloud Cost Management Tools: Some of the options help MSPs to optimise public clouds and mitigate runaway customer costs.
- Cloud Security Posture Management Tools: CSPM tools can help MSPs to ensure cloud services are properly configured without accidental security loopholes.
- Application Performance Management and Monitoring (APM) Tools, such as DataDog, New Relic and Cisco AppDynamics, among many others.
- SaaS Monitoring Tools, such as SaaS Alerts, Augmentt (from N-able veterans Gavin Garbutt and Derik Belair), and Torii. Also, Sherweb has announced a monitoring, detection and response service to safeguard Microsoft's cloud applications.
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