Gordano offers the full Gordano Messaging Suite as a hosted version to give customers secure e-mail, calendar, tasks, contacts, instant messaging and collaboration as part of GMS Cloud.
Gordano is jumping onto the cloud bandwagon by launching GMS Cloud, a hosted
version of its Gordano messaging platform on Nov. 16.
GMS Cloud has the Gordano Messaging Suite in the back end, according to John
Stanners, Gordano senior vice president. All the features of GMS are available
in GMS Cloud, including the antivirus and anti-spam capabilities, instant
messaging, and other collaboration features, he said.
The
Gordano
Messaging Suite is a full-featured set of e-mail, calendaring, contacts
management and tasks applications. It replaces Microsoft Exchange for a "fraction
of the cost," Stanners told eWEEK.
"E-mail is a mission-critical application for our customers, and they
are looking for solutions that will help them ease the time and challenges in
managing their messaging environments," said Stanners.
Gordano is pitting GMS Cloud against Microsoft's
Exchange
Online by touting its mail and messaging capabilities. For emerging
markets, GMS Cloud is priced "very competitively" and Gordano offers
unlimited storage, which is a "big differentiator," Stanners said.
Offered in two distinct versions. Standard GMS Cloud accounts, with the full
Webmail experience, start at $2.85 per month per user, and professional
accounts, which include Outlook integration, start at $7.50 per month per user,
said Gordano. A minimum of five users is required, and volume discounts are
also available, according to the company. New accounts can be provisioned
immediately via a Web-based administrative interface.
"GMS Cloud offers a low entry cost to the Gordano Messaging Suite and
provides a flexible and accessible option to those looking for a secure hosted
messaging platform, enabling them to focus on their core business," said
Stanners.
In addition to the hosted GMS Cloud service, Gordano also announced the
general availability of GMS 17.1 and GMS Sync, a synchronization service with
mobile devices. GMS Sync provides push e-mail and full data synchronization
from GMS to any smartphone or basic handset, said Stanners. Even users without
data plans or smartphones can still access e-mail, view calendars and scroll
through contacts from their phone, he said.
Lisa Kirman, Gordano's operations director, claimed that "one of five"
cell phone subscribers used prepaid phones and prepaid services were growing
faster than traditional contract-based services. GMS Sync makes it possible for
these users to "inexpensively and easily" access e-mail via their
phones, Kirman said.
Gordano previously did not offer archiving options on GMS, but organizations
are concerned about data and security when moving to the cloud, according to
Stanners. For GMS 17.1 and GMS Cloud, Gordano partnered with
Jatheon
to offer enterprise-level e-mail archiving with policy management and
e-discovery features. Instead of trying to figure out compliance requirements
and data recovery strategies, Gordano chose to partner with Jatheon who already
had the expertise, Stanners said.
GMS offers "very low" management on "modest" hardware,
said Stanners, claiming many organizations on older versions of Exchange who
can't refresh their hardware to meet current requirements see GMS as an
attractive alternative.
"It doesn't matter what kind of platform, the user interface remains
the same," Stanners said.
Gordano positions GMS for the larger enterprise and the Softalk
Collaboration Suite, acquired as part of Gordano's Softalk takeover earlier
this year, for the smaller end of the market with five to 20 users, Stanners
said. GMS Cloud fits the space in between, offering organizations of all sizes
an alternative to Exchange, Stanners said.
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