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December 13, 2022

What the Acquisition of Cumulus Technology Services Inc. Means for Our Customers

By: Scott Drossos

Over the last 20 years, Apogee has earned the trust of campus leaders at over 350 colleges and universities by helping them identify challenges and evaluate opportunities to enhance the student experience and institutional competitiveness with our portfolio of managed technology services. In October 2022, we announced the expansion of our Managed Campus Services Portfolio. Yesterday, we shared more exciting news – the acquisition of Ventura, California-based Cumulus Technology Services Inc., an expert in secure cloud services for higher education and AWS Select Consulting Partner. You can read more about the acquisition here. This transaction further extends Apogee expertise into cloud and hybrid cloud and continues to set Apogee apart as we build on our promise to be the technology services partner of choice for higher ed.

I have a great appreciation for the power of the cloud in higher education, and the role it can play in helping to transform both efficient and secure management of infrastructure, data, and applications. Prior to joining Apogee, the company had already made a sizeable commitment to leveraging the cloud, and the Cumulus acquisition further accelerates and broadens Apogee’s capabilities to provide managed cloud services to its customers. Apogee’s managed technology services portfolio started with ResNet (residential networks), then expanded into video services and campus engagement services, followed by the introduction of Managed Campus network services in 2020. In 2022, we expanded the Managed Campus portfolio to include managed IT and cloud services, strategic advisory services, and an increasingly valuable set of wrap-around client support services, tools, and data.

I’ve known the founders of Cumulus since they were college technology leaders and admired their talent, innovativeness, and leadership when they were on-campus practitioners. Their technical prowess, higher education knowledge, and capacity to architect, deploy and deliver cloud and hybrid-cloud technology services is second to none. It wasn’t a surprise to see them quickly build-out Cumulus Technology Services into a leading edge and formidable cloud services and security solutions higher ed business. In just a few years they have impacted colleges that serve hundreds of thousands of students.  

Cumulus Technology Services founders Dave Fuhrmann and Mike Rose and their team have over 100 years of combined higher ed experience in technology planning and project management, cloud readiness and migration, software development and integration, and workforce development and process modernization.  The Cumulus and Apogee cloud services and related technical certifications will be combined to further deepen and broaden Apogee’s team and relationship with its key partners.

This higher education-specific cloud expertise and experience combined with Apogee scale, velocity, SLA-driven approach, and predictable managed services budgeting model create an enhanced portfolio of managed technology services that our higher ed customers can count on to unlock time to focus on top priorities and innovations that address numerous pressures:

Dave conveyed his thoughts on our journey to combine forces: “Mike and I have worked for and with higher education institutions for over 35 years combined. To have this opportunity to join a national higher ed managed technology services company with such a strong reputation and market presence validates all our hard work in delivering high-quality cloud and security services. We are so excited that Apogee will enable us to scale our talent, experience, and IP, and we are elated to join a company whose passion for higher education matches ours.”

The excitement at Apogee is palpable as we embark on integrating our two companies. I invite you to reach out to our team of higher ed experts today to begin learning how we can help your campus do and achieve more.

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Scott Drossos

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