Rackspace buys Sharepoint consultancy

Network World - Cloud services company Rackspace has purchased SharePoint911, a consulting firm for SharePoint users.

SharePoint is the Microsoft product used by businesses to collaborate on and manage projects. Since 2008, Rackspace has hosted SharePoint in its suite of cloud offerings in a software-as-a-service model.

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Rackspace said in a press release that by adding SharePoint911 it will be able to offer a wider variety of SharePoint services, from hosting the software to consulting businesses on how to use it. The move could also help Rackspace compete with other providers of SharePoint, such as SharePointForMe and Microsoft itself.

SharePoint911, which was started in 2004, provides support via phone, e-mail or remote sessions billed in 15-minute intervals. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

This past summer, SharePoint911's Todd Klindt wrote an analysis of SharePoint disaster recovery strategies that appeared in Network World and began: "SharePoint has become vital to the business infrastructure and, in many companies, it's even used as the company's face to the world: its public facing website. Because of this dependency and high visibility, a well-thought-out disaster recovery strategy for SharePoint is imperative."

Network World staff writer Brandon Butler covers cloud computing. He can be reached at BButler@nww.com and found on Twitter at @BButlerNWW.