IT service management (ITSM) platform provider FrontRange today announced plans to release Heat 2013, an ITSM solution that supports on-premise, multi-tenant cloud and hybrid deployments. The announcement comes a year after Jonathan Temple joined the company as CEO and helped define the company's vision for hybrid IT service management, Kevin Smith (pictured), GM of cloud business at FrontRange told MSPmentor. The new platform, generally available starting at the end of May, and plans to take that platform to managed service providers, telcos and other service provider businesses is the realization of that. Here are the details.

FrontRange, founded in 1989 brings nearly 25 years of help desk and service desk management experience to the new solution. Over the last seven years, Smith told me, the market started to evolve with more adoption of software-as-a-service solutions and the cloud. "We feel like the time of SaaS being enough is behind us now," Smith said. "We've really moved into the era of hybrid now. It gives customers and MSPs more choices and flexibility."

Next Generation

With Heat 2013, FrontRange hopes to bring its solution to more MSPs, telcos, and other compatible providers. "We have a handful of MSPs we are working with and we see the MSP market growing," Smith said. Smith told me that FrontRange is seeing more demand by companies for service providers to provide managed services.

Licensing will be billed on an annual basis  and charged per end-user or sold as a block of capacity, Smith said (a practice that he said is standard in the industry). In some cases the company may offer quarterly billing, he added.  I could be wrong, but it sounded as though the company's frequency of billing for MSP partners and service providers may evolve as it grows more familiar with the needs of this market. Currently the MSPs FrontRange works with are in the $50 million to $500 million turnover range, Smith told me.

Heat 2013

Here's more about the Heat 2013 platform, straight from the company's promotional material:

Heat 2013 integrates voice and workflow automation with client management applications that are delivered on-premise and in the cloud. New capabilities include the following: