Cherwell Service Management v3.4

Transcription

1 Reference Code: TA001841ITM Publication Date: January 2010 Author: Stephen Mann TECHNOLOGY AUDIT Cherwell Service Management v3.4 Cherwell Software OVUM BUTLER GROUP VIEW ABSTRACT Cherwell Service Management is an IT Service Management (ITSM) solution based on ITIL v3 best practice to help IT functions meet the enterprise-wide mandate to deliver more with less and demonstrate business value as well as maximise the availability of business-critical services. It offers capabilities in core ITIL v3 areas such as Incident and Request, Problem, Change, Release, Configuration, Knowledge, Service Catalogue, Service Portfolio, and Service Level Management. Built from scratch by experienced ITSM industry professionals, the solution provides comprehensive functionality through an intuitive and uncluttered interface to enable even first-time users to derive productivity benefits. Notable aspects of the offering are its flexible delivery model, simple licensing structure, ease of use, customisability, and intuitive design. In Ovum s opinion, Cherwell Service Management is a very competent ITSM offering that should be considered by small enterprise organisations upwards that are looking to improve IT operations through the adoption of optimised ITSM processes and ITIL framework best practices. KEY FINDINGS Provides the core ITIL v3 processes out of the box, with optional Asset Discovery. Good support for customisation and solution scope extension. New functionality includes a Service Catalogue, visualisation, and iphone app. Six ITIL processes are PinkVerified, with six more expected in Offers wizard-driven workflows that can be implemented by business users. One Step feature automates the execution of series of repeated tasks. Lacks visual workflow-modelling capabilities. Priced for mid-market organisations. LOOK AHEAD Future enhancements include visual workflow-modelling capabilities, six additional PinkVerified ITIL processes, telephony integration, and a more powerful self-service portal. V4.0 is expected in Q OVUM Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 1

2 FUNCTIONALITY IT Service Management has evolved beyond the basics of Incident Management (the traditional four Rs : record, route, resolve, and report) with IT functions needing to rise to additional challenges that necessitate the introduction of Service Level, Problem, Change and Release, Configuration, Availability, and Capacity Management. IT also has to adapt customer-facing processes to accommodate the realisation that what was once the IT Help Desk should now be operating as a Service Desk, and appreciate that in this IT-dependent world there are no longer IT issues, only business-affecting issues that the IT function must proactively manage against. Product Analysis Cherwell Service Management is an ITSM solution based on ITIL v3 best practice to help IT functions meet the enterprise-wide mandate to deliver more with less and the need to demonstrate business value and maximise the availability of business-critical services. The solution provides ITIL v3 processes and best practices out of the box through templates and embedded workflows, offering capabilities including Incident, Problem, Change, Release, Configuration, Service Level Management and Service Catalogue. Built from the ground up by experienced ITSM industry professionals, the solution provides comprehensive functionality through an intuitive and uncluttered interface to enable even first-time users to derive productivity benefits. Notable aspects of Cherwell s offering are its ease of installation, configurability, and use, intuitive design, simple concurrent licensing structure, and flexible delivery model. It is built on a Microsoft.NET technology stack and requires a Microsoft SQL Server 2005/2008 database for operation. Six ITIL processes are already PinkVerified with a further six expected to be certified by the Pink Elephant V3 verification scheme in Cherwell s solution is an extensible platform that not only offers service delivery management capabilities but also enables business users to add new functionality through customisable business process templates. This is enabled through what Cherwell calls Codeless Business Application Technology or CBAT. CBAT s scope extends from simple customisations to existing templates by business users through to complex business processes implemented by advanced users with the help of Web services-based APIs for integration with other systems. The intent behind CBAT is the same as with other codeless development technologies and approaches such as Model Driven Development, where the implementation details are handled by the tool. The solution does not however provide a visual workflow-modelling capability, a common feature of other solutions in this category. With the increasing need for optimal performance and availability of IT-driven business services, and the growing complexity of corporate IT environments, it is imperative that organisations formulate and implement governance structures that oversee the creation, deployment, operation, and ongoing improvement of IT services. Such a structure must not only provide strategic governance but must also lend itself to the operational component of ITSM. While the first three volumes of ITIL v3 take a strategic IT governance view, the fourth deals with the ongoing operational management of existing business services. Cherwell Service Management mostly concerns itself with the processes and guidelines from the Service Operation volume of ITIL v3, but also covers processes such as Service Level Management, Change Management, and Knowledge Management from the Service Design and Service Transition volumes. OVUM Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 2

3 The Cherwell Service Management solution also includes a Configuration Management Database (CMDB), a customer self-service portal, and an optional Asset Discovery module that can import configuration data from an existing CMDB. It also integrates with directory servers such as Microsoft Active Directory for user authentication. Of particular note is the solution s One-Step-Action feature that allows support staff to create a workflow for a single process by automating the execution of a series of oft-repeated tasks. End-user organisations can leverage Cherwell s delivery flexibility and licence to deploy the solution on premise, access it on demand as a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) subscription model, or employ it as a managed service. The product is mostly sold via concurrent-user licences, but organisations can opt for reserved licences, which are similar to named-user licences except that they can be transferred to other people in the organisation if required. In Ovum s opinion, deployment and pricing flexibility along with a low cost of ownership and out-of-the-box ITIL best practice-based functionality makes the Cherwell solution a very competent ITSM offering that should be considered by small enterprise to enterprise-level organisations that are looking to improve IT operations through the adoption of optimised ITSM processes and ITIL framework best practices. Figure 1: Cherwell Service Management Solution Architecture Source: Cherwell Software O V U M B U T L E R G R O U P OVUM Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 3

4 Product Operation Cherwell Service Management has a three-tier client-server architecture (see Figure 1). The lower tier contains the solution s repository implemented in a Microsoft SQL Server database. Directly above it is the Microsoft.NET Framework leveraged by the core services layer. The upper layer is the client layer that contains a rich desktop-based client as well as supporting browser and mobile device-based clients. Cherwell supports all commonly used browsers (Microsoft Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, Apple Safari, and Google Chrome) and v3.4 has extended support to the Apple iphone and ipod touch. The middle tier, the core services layer, contains the internal data access layer, the business logic layer, Web-services API, and two sets of services that cater to the rich desktop-based clients and browser/mobile clients. The rich desktop client services set provides access to complete solution functionality through four independent processes that handle application, business process, and event monitoring, and job-scheduling service requests. Functionality for browser-based or mobile device clients is a subset of the rich-client feature set running as a group of mutually independent services on top of the Microsoft IIS server, with the service invoked on a user request according to the user category. These services (based on user category) include Customer Self- Service, Technician, Web Forms, Web Services, and Auto Deploy. Figure 2: Simple ITIL v3 Process Overview Source: Cherwell Software O V U M B U T L E R G R O U P The main capabilities and features of the Cherwell Service Management solution are outlined below. Incident and Request Management Cherwell s Service Desk workflow starts with incident or service request logging. The solution integrates with Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) systems such as Active Directory or an e-directory to pull in user details. Related issues about the incident or known errors/problems can be pulled in via the native knowledge base capabilities using full-text search capabilities. There is also an option to purchase KnowledgeBroker for advanced knowledge management capabilities. The Incident Management pane (see Figure 3) provides details on Service Level Agreement (SLA) compliance, allows support tickets to be easily assigned to teams or individuals, and attaches system or affected Configuration Item (CI) details sourced from the CMDB. OVUM Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 4

5 Problem Management Frequently occurring incidents can be logged as problems and published for the benefit of all IT support staff. End users can also subscribe to known problems if details are published to the self-service portal to automatically generate a new but associated incident. Embedded workflow features allow support staff to track incidents through to problems and their subsequent resolution, which might involve a change request, or be changed to known error/problem status. Change and Configuration Management The Change Management module allows support staff and others to identify the dependencies of the affected CI or CIs to perform change-impact analysis and to assess the risk. It provides granular details about the change such as cost of change, technical details, approvals, releases, and related problems and incidents through a tabbed interface for ease of use. Configuration Management functionality allows users to import data from asset discovery tools and create dependencies and CI relationships. It also presents configuration information such as description, network information, and CI properties to a low level of granularity that can be customised according to need. Figure 3: Example Screenshots Incident and Change Management Source: Cherwell Software O V U M B U T L E R G R O U P Release Management The Release Management functionality enables users to see all release-related information in one place and receive alerts and notifications. With CMDB integration organisations can automate the CI-update process to reflect the current state. Service Level Management The Service Level Management module allows users to document services in detail, as well as design, maintain, and seek customer approval for new services, operational level agreements, and underpinning contracts. OVUM Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 5

6 Service Catalogue and Service Portfolio Management Using Cherwell s Service Catalogue capabilities, an organisation can document its IT services in a complete and consistent manner and make them available for end-user subscription by using Cherwell s self-service portal. Service design approvals are available out of the box and Cherwell s One-Step-Action capabilities can be used to support the process with a customised workflow. End-user self-service requests flow into the Service Desk Service Request module with related analyst tasks added automatically. Clients can choose whether they wish to have line management or similar approvals as part of the ordering process. The selfservice portal can be integrated with third-party product catalogues or procurement software for seamless access to externally provided items. Asset Discovery The solution also offers an optional Asset Discovery module. Cherwell does not offer native capabilities but embeds the InControl Network and Asset Discovery tool into its ITSM solution. Visualization Manager While delivered against a requirement to bring visualisation capabilities to the CMDB, the Cherwell Visualization Manager has been designed so it can be leveraged across the whole solution to bring greater insight into object relationships. Within the CMDB, it can be used for impact analysis with in-view actions such as the ability to ping a server or look at the attributes of a particular CI. Cherwell will add what if analysis capabilities in a later release. Outside of the CMDB, the Visualization Manager can be used to show the relationships between changes, incidents, and problems, as well as the CIs and people affected. Figure 4: Visualization Manager Example Screenshot Source: Cherwell Software O V U M B U T L E R G R O U P OVUM Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 6

7 Cherwell iphone Application Using the Cherwell iphone app, Cherwell Service Management may be accessed via an Apple iphone or ipod Touch. Users have access to visually rich dashboards with the ability to drill down to record-level detail. Incident, Problem, and Change Management approvals and alerts customisable based on a client s requirements; thus extending the reach of Cherwell Service Management to field support and other mobile workers. The solution scales well. While no third-party benchmarking data is available, Cherwell states that a single instance can scale up to 500 concurrent users. Given the vendor s target market with an average deployment size of about 40 concurrent licences, Ovum is of the opinion that the solution is flexible enough to meet the needs of this target user group. Product Emphasis Cherwell states that Cherwell Service Management scales from an SME-class to enterprise-class ITSM solution. It provides functionality closely aligned to the IT Service Lifecycle described by ITIL v3 that is focused on enabling IT support and maintenance teams to reduce IT issue resolution times as well as the overall number of occurring issues. Specific process-based functionality is delivered across Incident and Request, Problem, Change and Configuration, Release and Deployment, Service Level, End-User Self- Service, Knowledge, Request Fulfilment, Event, Service Catalogue, Service Portfolio, and Availability Management as well as optional Asset Discovery. The ITSM solution market has become fragmented, split between vendors and products that address enterprise or SME requirements, niche products versus those that deliver against the core ITIL v3 processes, and by the method of application delivery with the emergence of SaaS-only ITSM solutions. While Cherwell Service Management is targeted at, and is competitively priced for, small enterprises, its high level of customisability and extensibility and its comprehensive functionality delivered through a simple and uncluttered interface also make it attractive to the enterprise market. The addition of visual workflowmodelling capabilities will strengthen the already robust solution. In Ovum s opinion, Cherwell Software Management more than meets the requirements of its target market as a well-rounded ITSM offering. DEPLOYMENT The solution can be deployed easily and does not require third-party resources. While Cherwell usually handles the initial product installation, it states that client IT personnel with basic database experience can handle the deployment internally from that point forward. Solution implementation typically takes about two weeks for basic functionality, with most client organisations initially implementing Incident Management, Problem Management, and basic Change Management functionality before expanding the scope of implementation to cover other ITSM processes. All modules of the solution, except Asset Discovery, are part of the standard offering, so the deployment is modular only in terms of solution scope. Post deployment the solution is not human-resource-intensive. The number of resources required, which is typically less than one full-time equivalent, depends on the degree of customisation. In environments where the product has been implemented with little or no configuration, minimal resources are required. In most cases this will mean only an administrator, with all other responsibilities handled by the end users themselves. OVUM Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 7

8 Most training courses offered by Cherwell are aimed at solution administrators, with classroom-based training available. For other end-user categories, Cherwell provides Web-based training courses every month. It also provides certification courses with varying levels of complexity (administrator, professional, and master level) for solution administrators. Cherwell provides support via an online customer self-service Web site, forums, , and telephone. The solution can be deployed on 32 and 64-bit Microsoft Windows Server 2003/2008 as well as on Windows XP SP3, Windows Vista SP3, and Windows 7 for on-premise deployments. Cherwell Service Management is dependent on Microsoft SQL Server 2005/2008 for operation, and legacy integration is possible via wizardbased data import from external sources or through integrating the solution s repository with other back-end systems. PRODUCT STRATEGY Cherwell targets both horizontal and vertical industry segments with its ITSM offering. The product is aimed at IT support and maintenance teams in mid-market organisations upwards from all industry sectors. It has gained most traction in the education, financial services, technology, and public sectors. Cherwell believes that most client organisations realise a 100% Return On Investment (ROI) within 12 months, and usually realise cost savings over a replaced ITSM solution in terms of ongoing maintenance and upgrade costs. The vendor sells Cherwell Service Management directly and through channel partners, as well as through resellers and partners. iland Cloud Infrastructure, a provider of high-availability managed solutions for VMware-based data centres, is used for the on-demand version of Cherwell Service Management. Cherwell OEMs the Asset Discovery tool from InControl and offers customer Knowledge Paks from KnowledgeBroker that are integrated with CSM Knowledge Management. Cherwell Service Management has a simple licensing structure comprising perpetual reserved and concurrent licences. Licensing for the on-demand version is similar with user organisations able to purchase concurrent quarterly licences. Typically, the licence-to-services split for Cherwell Service Management is 60:40. With the SaaS offering the professional services component accounts for 75% of the initial deal size. Cherwell Service Management is priced for small enterprises and Cherwell charges US$499 per concurrent licence per year for ongoing maintenance and support. This support package includes product updates, upgrades, and new versions, as well as technical assistance on weekdays during normal business hours in the US and Europe. Cherwell supports a given version of the product for 18 months after general availability or until a new release is available, whichever is longer. A major and two minor versions are usually released per year. The next major version (4.0) of Cherwell Service Management is planned for Q and is expected to include an enhanced self-service interface, out-of-the-box integration capabilities with Outlook, and other enhancements requested by customers. OVUM Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 8

9 COMPANY PROFILE Cherwell Software Inc is headquartered in Colorado Springs, Colorado, with a UK/European office in Brinkworth near Swindon. The company, which is privately held, was founded by a team of experienced ITSM industry professionals, and has a rapidly growing employee base. Of the workforce 25% is engaged in development, 10% in administration, 15% in sales, and 50% in service and support functions, with plans to increase headcount in all areas. As a private company, Cherwell does not disclose its financial results. Cherwell has a rapidly growing client base that includes Western Carolina University, Calgary Airport, Bloxx Limited, Oak Ridge Associated Universities, The Weather Channel, Rosetta Stone, and Cherwell District Council. SUMMARY Cherwell is a relatively new entrant in the ITSM space (Cherwell Service Management has been publicly available since 2007) dominated by the larger IT Management vendors at the enterprise level. In recent years, the feature sets of various ITSM offerings have converged to a large extent and demand for ITSM solutions from SMEs has greatly increased. This is a market segment in which Cherwell is now competing against the larger IT Management vendors based on flexibility and simplicity of use, price, and customer service. In Ovum s opinion, Cherwell Service Management is suitable for mid-size SMEs upwards and delivers against some or all of the core ITIL v3 processes depending on customer need. The solution provides comprehensive functionality through an intuitive and uncluttered interface, with notable aspects being its flexible delivery model, simple licensing structure, ease of use, customisability, and intuitive design. The SaaS-delivery option can also remove the hardware and people demands of what is a non-core business activity to enable potentially scarce internal IT resources to focus on the delivery of business-critical services. Table 1: Contact Details Cherwell Software Oracle Boulevard, Suite # 200 Colorado Springs CO USA Tel: +1 (719) Cherwell Software Ltd. Brinkworth House Brinkworth SN15 5DF UK Tel: +44 (0) Source: Cherwell Software O V U M B U T L E R G R O U P OVUM Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 9

10 Headquarters Shirethorn House, 37/43 Prospect Street, Kingston upon Hull, HU2 8PX, UK Tel: +44 (0) Fax: +44 (0) Australian Sales Office Level 46, Citigroup Building, 2 Park Street, Sydney, NSW, 2000, Australia Tel: + 61 (02) Fax: + 61 (02) End-user Sales Office (USA) 245 Fifth Avenue, 4th Floor, New York, NY 10016, USA Tel: Fax: For more information on OVUM Butler Group s Subscription Services please contact one of the local offices above. Important Notice This report contains data and information upto-date and correct to the best of our knowledge at the time of preparation. The data and information comes from a variety of sources outside our direct control, therefore Butler Direct Limited cannot give any guarantees relating to the content of this report. Ultimate responsibility for all interpretations of, and use of, data, information and commentary in this report remains with you. Butler Direct Limited will not be liable for any interpretations or decisions made by you. OVUM Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 10