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Blue Alliance Announces Strategic Investment from Prairie Capital

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Revolutionizing the MSP Landscape: Our Innovative Platform Breaks Through Consolidation Clutter, Gaining Momentum

CINCINNATI, Feb. 14, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — Blue Alliance, a fast-growing, operator-led MSP collective, announced today that it has completed a growth recapitalization transaction with Prairie Capital, a proven firm in scaling companies across a wide array of industries. Prairie Capital’s investment will enable Blue Alliance to accelerate its growth strategy and offer more MSP owners an alternative to the standard agreement, as well as the opportunity to be part of a strong, supportive community focused on scaling and shared success.

For Nick Recker, founding partner and CEO of Blue Alliance, the fundamental synergies of the two companies felt like a partnership right from the start. “Freedom drives entrepreneurs like me. We designed the Blue Alliance model to offer MSPs owners continued freedom throughout our partnership, and Prairie’s business model resembles ours in that way.” Blue Alliance will continue to operate independently within the Prairie portfolio.

“We hand-selected Prairie as our investment partner because the two companies share many of the same philosophies for growing businesses,” added Recker. These shared philosophies include protecting the company’s brand, stakeholders, and relationships; leveraging best practices and building scalable platforms; embracing an entrepreneurial mindset; encouraging autonomy and focusing strategic investment in operational areas to unlock incremental value and growth. 

Blue Alliance is the fourth company founded by Nick Recker, and it was inspired by his experience and passion running the Cincinnati-based MSP, Path Forward IT, a company he founded in 2002 that specializes in providing concierge IT services to healthcare practices. The global interruption to business in 2020 exposed vulnerabilities, especially for founder-business owners. “I recognized that banding together would make us stronger. That sentiment became the vision to create a platform for MSP owners that fosters collaboration, sharing resources, buying power and expertise.” 

Today, Blue Alliance is redefining the MSP landscape by translating the founders’ experiences as MSP owners into a collaborative ecosystem where elite MSPs can thrive and grow, but it’s an increasingly crowded market.

“Consolidation is flooding the MSP industry. Regardless of whether it’s called a roll-up or a platform, most consolidations are transaction-based,” said Patrick Jensen, Partner, Prairie Capital. Blue Alliance is built on the understanding that for MSP owners, it’s not merely a transaction; it’s their life’s work and legacy. “Blue Alliance stands out for its empathetic approach and deeper integration model, making it a compelling alternative to traditional acquisition platforms.” 

“Our mission is to champion the independent MSP,” says Shaun Sexton, founding partner of Blue Alliance. “We set out to create an option for MSP owners like us who were ready to partner and take their business to the next level but hesitate because they don’t want the company they built to be dismantled, to lose its soul,” Sexton added. “Our approach is about collaboration, not control. We know the collective is only as strong as the sum of its parts. That’s why our mission is to amplify all the good things about a member MSP company, not change them.”

“What we’ve built at Blue Alliance is different from the other MSP platforms. For us, it’s personal. We’ve been where they are, we speak their language,” says Recker. “With Prairie on our team, we’ll be able to move faster, offering freedom to more MSP owners.”

ABOUT BLUE ALLIANCE
Blue Alliance is a fast-growing, operator-led MSP collective that offers a different option for MSP owners looking to invest in their future and unlock the full potential of their business. Built on first-hand entrepreneurial experience and insights, Blue Alliance invests in and nurtures a community where the best MSPs can unite and grow without losing their identity. For more information, visit bluealliance.com.

ABOUT PRAIRIE CAPITAL
Founded in Chicago in 1997, Prairie Capital is a private equity fund with a long and successful track record of scaling growth-oriented, lower middle market companies in partnership with talented founders and management teams. Since inception, Prairie has invested over $1 billion in 100+ platform companies. Prairie makes control equity investments in founder-owned companies that require company-building investments to evolve into scalable platforms capable of sustaining accelerated growth. Prairie targets companies that participate in growing subsectors within business services, consumer, education, healthcare, industrial, and technology. More information about Prairie can be found at www.prairie-capital.com.

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SOURCE Blue Alliance

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11:11 Systems Announces Strategic Partnership with Cato Networks to Deliver SASE Solution for Distributed Enterprises

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New Managed Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) solution combines SD-WAN, cloud-native networking and security capabilities with 11:11’s connectivity, cyber resilience and cloud expertise

SYDNEY, July 22, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — 11:11 Systems, a leading managed infrastructure solutions provider, today announced the global availability of its 11:11 Managed Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) solution and a new strategic partnership with Cato Networks.

11:11 Managed SASE is a fully managed secure connectivity solution leveraging Cato Networks AI-native network security platform. This solution brings together intelligent SD-WAN, cloud-delivered security and global connectivity into a single offering. It enables organisations to simplify and secure access across branch offices, data centres, users and cloud environments, reducing complexity without sacrificing performance or control.

Built on the Cato Networks cloud-native SASE platform, 11:11 Managed SASE combines zero trust network access (ZTNA), firewall as a service (FWaaS), secure web gateway (SWG), cloud access security broker (CASB), advanced threat protection and centralised visibility into a unified managed experience. 11:11 also delivers 24x7x365 monitoring and support, incident management integration and operational accountability to help customers limit vendor sprawl, increase agility and free internal teams to focus on higher-value priorities.

The offering is backed by 11:11’s broader networking, cloud and cyber resilience capabilities. Through its global backbone, carrier-agnostic connectivity options and integrated portfolio spanning cloud, backup, disaster recovery and security services, 11:11 gives customers a practical path to modernise network and security architecture while strengthening resilience across the business.

“Enterprises are under pressure to support users, applications and locations that are more distributed than ever, while limiting complexity and improving security,” said Justin Giardina, CTO, 11:11 Systems. “Our Managed SASE solution provides customers with a unified approach to modernising networking and security, along with the visibility, support and flexibility they need to thrive in a rapidly changing environment.”

According to Karl Soderlund, global channel chief, Cato Networks, “As enterprises move beyond fragmented legacy networking and security stacks, they need a simpler way to gain visibility, context and control across hybrid work environments and reduce the operational burden on IT. Through our partnership, we can address these challenges head on and deliver end-to-end visibility and protection in a single service built for the reality of modern work.”

The joint offering is well suited for distributed enterprises, multi-site organisations, hybrid workforce initiatives, SD-WAN refreshes, security modernisation efforts and businesses with limited IT resources. 11:11 meets customers where they are by supporting existing environments, simplifying multi-vendor operations and serving as a single provider accountable for network, security, cloud and data integration.

This partnership expands 11:11’s Network as a Service portfolio and follows Forrester’s inclusion of 11:11 Systems in its report, “The Secure Access Service Edge Services Landscape, Q1 2026.”

About 11:11 Systems

11:11 Systems is a managed infrastructure solutions provider that empowers customers to modernise, protect and manage mission-critical applications and data, leveraging 11:11’s resilient cloud platform. Learn more at www.1111Systems.com and follow 11:11 on LinkedIn.

View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/apac/news-releases/1111-systems-announces-strategic-partnership-with-cato-networks-to-deliver-sase-solution-for-distributed-enterprises-302830322.html

SOURCE 11:11 Systems

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Crowell & Moring Expands Financial Services Group with Former UBS Bank USA General Counsel Cristina Diaz

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NEW YORK, July 21, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Crowell & Moring has added Cristina Diaz, former executive director and general counsel of UBS Bank USA, and most recently head of legal for UBS’s U.S. Remediation Management Office, to the firm’s Financial Services Group as senior counsel in New York. Diaz brings more than two decades of in-house counsel and law firm experience in bank regulation, compliance, and risk management.

At Crowell, Diaz will counsel banks, fintechs, and digital assets companies on a broad range of bank regulatory matters, including charters and licensing, permissible activities, capital requirements, regulatory enforcement, M&A, and corporate governance. She will also counsel clients navigating the intersection of traditional banking and emerging financial services, including digital assets companies seeking to acquire or establish national banks, and banks exploring partnerships with fintechs and digital assets firms.

At UBS, Diaz advised on the firm’s most pressing regulatory matters, including most recently UBS Bank USA’s charter conversion from a Utah industrial bank to an OCC national bank and key compliance remediations. This work gave Diaz extensive experience navigating relationships with state and federal financial regulators. Earlier in her career, Diaz spent eight years at Davis Polk & Wardwell advising U.S. and foreign banks on bank regulatory matters, M&A, and capital markets transactions.

“Cristina is a highly experienced, solution-oriented attorney who brings deep knowledge in the bank regulatory space. She will be an enormous asset to the firm’s growing regulatory and transactional offerings to banks, digital assets businesses, and fintechs,” said Carlton Greene, Co-Chair of Crowell’s Financial Services Group.

“I am delighted to join Crowell & Moring and integrate my bank regulatory experience with the firm’s nationally-recognized digital assets practice. As traditional banking and emerging financial technologies continue to evolve, clients need actionable and sophisticated legal counsel. Crowell offers the collaborative platform to help institutions successfully execute their growth and compliance strategies,” said Diaz.

Diaz received her J.D. from New York University School of Law, where she was a member of the New York University Law Review, and received her B.A., summa cum laude, from New York University. She is fluent in Spanish.

About Crowell & Moring LLP
Crowell & Moring is an international law firm with operations in the United States, Europe, and MENA. Drawing on significant government, business, industry, and legal experience, the firm helps clients capitalize on opportunities and provides creative solutions to complex regulatory and policy, litigation, transactional, and intellectual property issues. The firm is consistently recognized for its commitment to pro bono service, as well as its comprehensive programs and initiatives to advance the professional and personal development of all members of the Crowell community.

Media Contact:
Email: prteam@crowell.com

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SOURCE Crowell & Moring LLP

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Quantinuum and SoftBank Corp. Publish Joint White Paper on Scaling Practical Quantum Computing Use Cases Toward the Fault-Tolerant Era

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The companies have published a joint white paper mapping commercially relevant quantum computing use cases in quantum chemistry and graph analytics to Quantinuum’s hardware roadmap.The paper provides a framework for assessing how advances in quantum hardware and algorithms, could affect when practical industrial applications become feasible.SoftBank Corp. and Quantinuum will use the roadmap to inform their exploration of future quantum AI data center services and related business models.

TOKYO and BROOMFIELD, Colo., July 22, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Quantinuum (NASDAQ: QNT) and SoftBank Corp. (“SoftBank”) today announced the publication of “Quantum Computing Frontiers,” a joint white paper that maps two commercially-relevant quantum computing application areas against Quantinuum’s hardware roadmap. The analysis examines how advances in quantum hardware and algorithms could affect when these applications become practical for industrial use.

The paper focuses on two representative application domains that SoftBank is actively using Quantinuum’s systems to research: quantum chemistry for new materials discovery and energy research, and topological data analysis for large-scale graph analytics, including for telecommunications fraud detection. The authors anchor their assessment of the scalability of these two application areas against Quantinuum’s published hardware roadmap, examining how projected advances in hardware capabilities and algorithms may enable the commercial readiness of future industrial applications.

Building on this use-case roadmap, the paper also examines how quantum computing, AI, and high-performance computing could be integrated into future computing infrastructure. It considers how progress across successive hardware generations could inform future quantum AI data center services and related business models, a key focus of the Quantinuum and SoftBank partnership announced last year.

“The key takeaway of this study is that organizations do not need to wait for large-scale, fault-tolerant systems to explore where quantum computing can begin creating value,” said Duncan Jones, General Manager, Applications Group at Quantinuum. “By using today’s systems to develop, benchmark and refine applications in areas such as quantum chemistry and graph analytics, enterprises can build the technical and operational readiness needed for the next era of quantum-enabled computing.”

“The question is no longer whether quantum computing may deliver value, but rather which problem classes become executable at which stage of hardware maturity,” said Ryuji Wakikawa, Senior Vice President & CTO at SoftBank Corp. “However, we believe progress in hardware must be complemented by equally strong developments in quantum algorithms and the integration of quantum systems with AI and high-performance computing.”

The white paper discusses illustrative scenarios describing how representative applications, technology maturity, and potential market opportunities may evolve over time under stated assumptions. The analysis provided in the paper is intended to provide a conceptual framework for understanding potential market evolution and does not represent financial guidance or forecasts. These analyses are intended to support discussion of future technology development and should not be interpreted as commitments regarding commercialization, infrastructure investment, products, services, or financial performance.

The full white paper is available to download on the SoftBank and Quantinuum websites.

About SoftBank Corp.

Guided by the SoftBank Group’s corporate philosophy, “Information Revolution – Happiness for everyone,” SoftBank Corp. (TOKYO: 9434) operates telecommunications and IT businesses in Japan and globally. Building on its strong business foundation, SoftBank Corp. is aiming to activate the potential of AI across its businesses and drive implementation in line with its “Activate AI for Society” growth strategy. While further growing its telecom business, SoftBank is expanding its AI computing infrastructure and AI and Cloud service businesses with the aim of becoming a provider of Next-generation Social Infrastructure. To learn more, please visit https://www.softbank.jp/en/corp/

About Quantinuum

Quantinuum (NASDAQ: QNT) is a leading quantum computing company offering a full-stack platform designed to make quantum computing deployable in real-world environments. The company has commercially deployed multiple generations of quantum systems built on the well-established QCCD architecture, which it has implemented with novel designs and capabilities to achieve the industry’s highest accuracy levels based on average two-qubit gate fidelity.[1] Quantinuum has active engagements with market leaders across pharmaceuticals, material science, financial services, and government and industrial markets. The company has a global workforce of approximately 700 employees, including top scientists and researchers. Over 70% of its technology team holds PhDs or Master’s degrees. Quantinuum’s headquarters is in Broomfield, Colorado, with additional facilities across the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Japan, Qatar, and Singapore.

For more information, please visit www.quantinuum.com.

Cautionary Statement Concerning Forward-Looking Statements

This press release contains certain statements that may be deemed “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements include all statements that are not historical facts. The words “anticipate,” “assume,” “believe,” “continue,” “could,” “estimate,” “expect,” “intend,” “may,” “plan,” “potential,” “predict,” “project,” “future,” “will,” “seek,” “foreseeable,” the negative version of these words, or similar terms and phrases are intended to identify forward-looking statements. Such statements are based on certain assumptions and assessments made by our management in light of their experience and their perception of historical trends, current economic and industry conditions, expected future developments and other factors they believe to be appropriate. The forward-looking statements included in this release are also subject to a number of material risks and uncertainties, including but not limited to economic, competitive, governmental, and technological factors affecting our operations, markets, products, services and prices. New factors emerge from time to time, and it is not possible for Quantinuum to predict all such factors. Any forward-looking statement speaks only as of the date on which it is made, and, except as required by law, Quantinuum does not undertake any obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

 

[1] As of December 31, 2025.

SOURCE Quantinuum

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