A screenshot from the APS website, showing some of the most downloaded APS-packaged applications
(WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — At the Parallels Summit this week in Orlando, Florida, the hosting software company announced a partnership with tech investment firm Runa Capital to create a program providing financial and co-marketing support for select software vendors who certify and package their software for Parallels’ Application Packaging Standard.
Runa, operated by former Parallels CEO (and current executive chairman) Serguei Beloussov along with a group of prominent hosting industry figures, already has prominent investments in several emerging technologies related to the hosting business, including Jelastic, NGINX, StopTheHacker and Ecwid – focusing up to this point on technology companies emerging from Russia.
The Runa Capital-Parallels APS Accelerator Program, according to the press release, will make strategic investments – in financial and co-marketing support – in new and emerging ISVs that build innovative APS-enabled applications, particularly those applications that appeal to service providers and small and medium sized businesses.
The companies say SMBs are the fastest-growing IT segment for cloud and other hosted solutions – hence the focus on service providers. Those service providers are part of the Parallels ecosystem of hosting platform, software tools and small business customers. And the APS standard is a key element of that ecosystem.
Parallels and Runa don’t offer too much specific insight into what the size of the investments through the program might be, but they say companies interested in getting involved can reach out to the companies at aps@runacap.com.
“Part of Runa Capital’s mission is to serve as an incubator for the hosting and cloud industry. By investing in those ISVs who embrace the ASP Standard, we can ensure companies in our portfolio have an enormous head-start for building their sales channel,” says Beloussov, quoted in the press release. “We’re focusing on ISVs that APS-certify their applications and services because once certified, these apps are easy to deploy and maintain.”
Parallels says the program inherently provides those ISVs that get involve with access to the sales channel of more than 5,000 Parallels service providers and resellers, which in turn serve more than 12 million SMBs.
About Liam Eagle
Liam Eagle has worked as a contributor to the Web Host Industry Review since its inception in 2000, and as editor since 2003. He has been editor of the WHIR's print magazine since its launch. His daily involvement in the gathering and reporting of Web hosting news and his regular interaction with Web hosting leaders gives him an uncommonly broad appreciation of the issues and tends facing the business. Through his WHIR blog, Liam spots Web hosting trends and offers opinions on the industry-wide impacts of major developments and the motivation behind big announcements. Follow him on Twitter @liameagle
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