iWeb Communities: Blog

iWeb announced the strategic acquisition of Montreal-based managed hosting provider Netsimplify. This move brings iWeb closer to providing its own brand of managed hosting services – which represent the majority of Netsimplify’s revenues in 2008.

“Customers face an increasing complexity in managing their IT infrastructure, and many of our dedicated hosting customers have requested that iWeb provide additional services.” says Eric Chouinard, iWeb’s President and CEO.  “Netsimplify’s customer-driven approach brings a lot of experience, expertise and depth, all of which are important aspects of iWeb’s services”

“This is a logical step towards both cloud computing and managed services” said Martin Leclair, iWeb co-founder and President of Products and Technology. He added that “It is also a homecoming of sorts; Netsimplify’s founder, Simon Boulet, was one of iWeb’s first employees before he left to start his own company nearly three years ago – Welcome back Simon!”.

Simon Boulet will be appointed to the newly created position of IT Manager, from which he will spearhead internal development initiatives.

“We looked at a number of companies and individuals, and Simon was naturally at the top of the list of potential candidates.” Said Cyrille Mertes, Vice-President of IT and Infrastructure. He then points out that “in the medium-term, Simon and the entire infrastructure team will integrate cloud computing and automation into iWeb’s service offering”.

The transfer of Netsimplify’s customers to iWeb is almost complete, a task made easier by the fact that Netsimplify’s infrastructure was mostly colocated within iWeb’s data centers.