Blade raises the FTP bar

Successful Wellington software consulting firm, Blade, has teamed up with distributor Soft Solutions to bring its exciting Blade Transfer Services 2.0 to the New Zealand market through the reseller channel.  Blade Transfer Services is the only enterprise file transfer solution based on XML web services.“If you or your clients start with a product based on security and integrity, you want to move it with equal security and integrity,” commented Paul Leslie, Business Development Manager for Soft Solutions.  “Blade is a solution in its own right, but it also pairs up with our Shadow Protect solution very well, which makes it a great addition to our product suite.”Blade began in 2001 as a consultancy firm with business partners Valentine Boiarkine and Paul O’Dowd at the helm.  Boiarkine and O’Dowd were soon approached by Microsoft Redmond to provide technical content.  “I’m a software architect, and Peter is into infrastructure and communications,” explained Boiarkine.  “Together we cover a lot of different aspects of the modern information environment.”  Blade started by writing a lot of content for internal Microsoft training and Microsoft partner and customer events.  However, when it came time to hand off the very large files to Microsoft’s Redmond offices, Boiarkine and O’Dowd realised that there was no solution available on the market that allowed them to do so in a secure and expeditious way.  Having to write content to DVD and post it to the United States put Wellington-based Blade at a significant disadvantage to U.S. competitors who could offer content quickly.  “From a time perspective,” reflected Boiarkine, “local U.S. competitors could beat us because we had to take shipping times - often up to one week - into account.”Time and security concerns led Blade to investigate many FTP solutions.  “We found that they lack the security required by many companies, and it is also hard to regulate compliance.  We had to write our own solution,” Boiarkine said.  The solution, Blade Transfer Services, is now being used by Microsoft, after the company hammered the code to ensure there were no vulnerabilities.  In addition to the security benefit, Blade Transfer Services is extremely easy to use, even for non-technical users, which makes it an ideal solution across many verticals.  Until now, Blade Transfer Services has been sold primarily online and by word of mouth, but Soft Solutions is taking it to resellers, and will assist interested resellers in marketing the solution to end user customers.  While it is ideal for large corporations with wide-spread offices, the low price point makes it accessible to SMBs, such as publishing houses, which may also have niche requirements that make it a wholly suitable solution.  Blade Transfer Services is internet browser independent.  It works by placing data on an internal file server.  The key difference is that it can be configured to place data on a SAN, as opposed to a traditional FTP that would store data on a web server.  It has Checkpoint Restart functionality, which means that if connection to the server is lost for any reason, the upload is not lost – it automatically resumes from the point of shutdown.  The solution allows for full administrative control and compliance, and data is secured at every point.  Download an evaluation trial of Blade Transfer Services from www.blade.net.nz, or contact Paul Leslie or Cliff Hedley at Soft Solutions on 0800 733 233 for more information.