Thread Wins PitchIT Contest At IT Nation Connect 2023
Thread, a startup focused on IT service collaboration, won the PitchIT contest at IT Nation Connect, ConnectWise’s partner conference held this week in Orlando, Florida.
A “Shark Tank” like contest sponsored by ConnectWise, PitchIT is an annual accelerator program designed for startup integration partners dedicated to managed service providers (MSPs). In its fifth year, PitchIT accepted 27 companies for the 2023 cohort; the participating companies all took part in a 16-week business transformation course, led by industry experts, covering sales, marketing, branding and messaging, product security, and more, plus pitch-building. The three finalists, Thread, Nodeware, and vCIO Toolbox, all presented before a panel of judges at IT Nation Connect.
Built by former MSPs for MSPs, Thread offers an inbox where service techs can manage all their support tickets from different sources like Slack, Teams, and mobile; Messenger Bot for Teams and Slack; a workflow engine; and the Copilot AI assistant. Thread is integrated with ConnectWise Automate, Control, and Manage; Datto Autotask; IT Glue; and more.
Thread was founded in 2018 and rebranded from ChatGenie last year. Matt Linn, co-founder and COO, says he and co-founder and CEO Mark Alayev had PitchIT on their radar for a while.
“We’ve applied a number of times, and really it was like a North star for us,” he says. “We measured our year based on how well we did at IT Nation, really with an eye towards … winning PitchIT. So, for us, it’s a big full-circle moment. We’re really excited, and I think it sends a really strong validation signal to the channel that what we’re building is really cool and it’s providing value to our partners and their customers.”
As the winner, Thread received a $70,000 prize, which Linn says they will direct toward more integrations, deepening their footprint with ConnectWise, and rewarding staff.
At IT Nation Connect, Thread also announced ServiceGPT, which Linn says will allow technicians to “ask for things like, ‘Can you draft me a response to this customer?’ And then the AI turns around a fully formed response based on the context of the service request, which they can then just copy and paste back to the user,” explains Linn, adding that it will be in beta next week and in production shortly after that.
Malwarebytes Rolls Out Two ThreatDown Offerings Built On Its EDR/MDR Service
Malwarebytes, a provider of real-time cyber protection, launched its ThreatDown portfolio with two new offerings for businesses, partners, and MSPs at IT Nation Connect. Formerly named Malwarebytes for Business, ThreatDown is built on the company’s endpoint detection and response solution and managed detection and response service.
Available now, ThreatDown Security Advisor analyzes an organization’s cybersecurity and generates a health score, highlighting gaps in defenses and providing actionable recommendations. And ThreatDown Bundles pair technology with services. Options range from AI-assisted remediation to fully managed 24/7/365 support.
LastPass And Acronis Partner To Help MSPs Streamline Password Management
Password management vendor LastPass and cybersecurity vendor Acronis announced a partnership offering the first password management integration for MSPs with Acronis Cyber Protect Cloud, an all-in-one data and cybersecurity protection platform. The integration is accessible from the Acronis Cyber Protect Cloud marketplace.
With the LastPass integration, MSPs’ clients and their employees can log in to accounts and generate, secure, and share credentials without interrupting their workflow. Additional LastPass admin functions include managing user access, requiring master password changes, and more. The integration connects with customers’ existing infrastructure for immediate control over their business ecosystem.
Acronis Cyber Protect Cloud MSPs joining the LastPass Allegiance Partner Program will now have access to LastPass onboarding and support, a library of marketing resources, and more to simplify deployment and adoption, and the LastPass University training platform for admins, users, and partners.
Liongard Makes Cork Cyber Warranty Available To Customers Through MSPs and Announces New Partnerships
Liongard announced that starting November 15, MSP partners purchasing Liongard and the Cork cyber warranty together can get $100,000 of cyber warranty coverage from Cork for as little as $129 a month with full access to the Liongard Configuration Change Detection and Response platform
Liongard also announced new strategic partnerships with MSPbots, Pia, and Rewst. When Liongard’s CCDR platform is combined with MSPbots’ proactive intelligence, Pia’s AI-led automation, and Rewst’s robotic process automation (RPA), it delivers continuous cybersecurity posture management to help MSPs reduce the breach lifecycle.
SaaS Alerts Now Has A Mobile App
SaaS Alerts, provider of an automated SaaS security platform purpose-built for MSPs, announced a mobile app. Features include immediate alerts for any actions within the platform’s Respond module; an intuitive interface for quickly reviewing Respond actions; and real-time low, medium, and critical alerts. The mobile app is available for both iOS and Android.
