Service Providers Today

Transcription

1 Service Providers Today How to thrive in a rapidly changing IT environment Written by Dell Software Introduction Challenges and opportunities for service providers today The hosted IT services industry continues to undergo significant changes, and service providers are rapidly evolving right along with it. As Carl Brooks from 451 Research puts it, we are entering a new phase of industrialization for IT. The success of infrastructure providers will largely depend on their ability to automate every facet of service delivery and operations, and make every redundant task an option rather than a necessity. 1 Within the hosting world, dedicated providers are turning physical hosts into functional equivalents of infrastructure as a service (IaaS), while managed hosting providers are adding advanced IT services such as databases, APM and monitoring to complement infrastructure stacks. The new revenue opportunities are significant. Combined, the three segments of the service provider market IaaS, dedicated hosting and managed hosting are expected to expand by 50 percent in two years, from $24.8 billion in 2012 to $37.2 billion in Service providers that understand the evolving demands on their IT systems and the forces driving that change will benefit from new opportunities in this high-growth industry. The changing IT services landscape Across the IT industry, the prevailing delivery model is evolving at a rapid pace. Traditional licensing deployments where customers install, configure and manage their own IT environments on site are quickly fading, giving way to service delivery models where customers leverage cloud-based IT services and pay only for what they use. This changing dynamic, coupled with widespread consumerization of IT and increasing customer demands, has created a challenging new paradigm for today s service providers. 1 Narrowing the Great Divide: The Strategic Response to Cloud. 451 Research, December 2012.

2 When it comes to IT delivered as a service, customers expect superior quality, compliance, security and performance, all at a competitive price. As a result, you must be able to address a range of heterogeneous IT workload challenges, deliver a hassle-free customer experience, and maintain superior service integrity and scalability at the lowest possible cost. Service providers must be able to address a range of heterogeneous IT workload challenges, deliver a hasslefree customer experience, and maintain superior service integrity and scalability at the lowest possible cost. To make this happen, you must be able to: Ensure quality, compliance, security, reliability and performance so address customer objections to IT delivered as a service Onboard customers quickly without service disruption Enable customers to proactively manage heterogeneous environments Scale quickly to meet your customers broad and diversified IT workloads Differentiate services while maintaining a competitive price Meet stringent chargeback and SLA requirements What prospective customers look for in a service provider According to Searchcio.techtarget.com, prospective customers look for two things when choosing a service provider: References Prospective customers check references to avoid only hearing the positive spin. In fact, they often call references from the entire customer list of the service provider. Technology Prospects check under the hood, carefully evaluating the solutions leveraged by the service provider, and making sure that internal systems consist of high-quality, industry-standard technologies. Finding the IT systems management sweet spot In the pursuit of easier management, streamlined operations and additional services for scalability, service providers typically explore two ends of what could be called the IT systems management continuum: Large vendor frameworks Many service providers start by evaluating large vendor frameworks. However, these traditional frameworks quickly prove too complex and expensive for managing specific target markets. These management systems can be described as a mile wide and an inch deep. In other words, broad coverage of IT monitoring and the functionality may be available, but the capabilities for drilling down for more detailed analysis or troubleshooting are often lacking. Figure 1. The spectrum of IT management solutions for service providers 2

3 Specialized vendors At the opposite end of the continuum are vendors that specialize in developing and marketing tools for service providers. But their systems management solutions have their own set of limitations and create concerns as well. In particular, these vendors often focus on only one area, such as monitoring, while many service providers today are seeking a single yet broader solution that enables diagnostic analysis across the full network spectrum, as well as delivering break/fix capabilities. Thus, smaller vendors usually serve a particular niche, but too often lack the breadth, depth and scalability to easily expand service offerings into new and emerging markets. The Dell solution empowering service providers to remain competitive A full spectrum of heterogeneous management solutions Dell delivers a full spectrum of heterogeneous management solutions that enable you to address customers IT service delivery quality, compliance, security, availability, and performance expectations all from a single vendor. These solutions help you differentiate your offerings by streamlining customer onboarding, ensuring scalability, transparency and accountability across multiple workloads, and reducing operational costs while driving recurring revenue. Dell enables service providers to deliver the high quality enterprise IT service that customers expect. By providing proven, enterprise-grade software management solutions across heterogeneous environments, Dell enables you to eliminate the perceived risks of adopting managed services and to position themselves as trusted, capable partners in the eyes of your customers. Dell empowers service providers to: Provide enterprise-grade IT services with the quality, compliance, security, reliability and performance that customers expect Deliver exceptional customer support with maximum service transparency, automation and productivity Manage workloads across heterogeneous environments Drive down support costs while delivering a greater breadth of enhanced services Establish a seamless onboarding approach that ensures uninterrupted service Support aggressive SLAs, integrated chargeback and configuration reporting to demonstrate full accountability Figure 2 illustrates the integrated layers covered by Dell solutions. Together they embody a vision of IT integrated As a Dell service provider partner, you can leverage the full spectrum of our offerings to help customers manage their IT ecosystems. Select the management capabilities that meet the needs of your customers and your business, knowing that you can expand and scale to meet customer and market demands. Figure 2. Dell solutions address the full range of IT needs. 3

4 Only Dell delivers the breadth and depth that service providers need to meet their customers quality, compliance, security, availability and performance requirements. software and systems management that goes both wide and deep to provide a more flexible, scalable and affordable solution for your business all in a monthly pricing model. Nine competency areas As shown in Figure 2, our solutions are grouped across four software and five systems competency areas to help your business deliver on the full promise of technology: Software competencies Systems management Information management Data protection Security Systems competencies Storage Server Networking Cloud services and solutions Desktop virtualization As a Dell service provider partner, you can leverage the full spectrum of our offerings to help customers manage their IT ecosystems. Select the management capabilities that meet the needs of your customers and your business, knowing that you can expand and scale to meet customer and market demands. Domain expertise Dell Software delivers an extensive set of solutions for assessment, onboarding and management. Our customized offerings extend, augment or replace existing tools that might be relatively inefficient, providing powerful coverage for critical IT management needs. This includes domain expertise and capabilities to address targeted IT workloads, such as: Windows workloads, including Exchange, SharePoint and Active Directory Oracle and SQL Server databases Custom and packaged application workloads Operational scalability In addition to domain expertise, our solutions offer operational scalability and service-based revenue potential for: Monitoring, optimization and management of critical infrastructure components Virtual workspace delivery and mobile workspace management Heterogeneous data protection for every critical data workload across physical, virtual, application and cloud environments Security, identity and access management from the perimeter and across the organization to achieve compliance and protect your systems Dell Software competencies management tools aligned to major business drivers Dell s IT management software tools directly address three major areas critical to service provider business: Improved management of existing customers Faster onboarding of new customers to accelerate revenue streams Expanded services to prospects and existing customers Only Dell delivers the breadth and depth that service providers need to meet their customers quality, compliance, security, availability and performance requirements. Our software solutions address: Systems management Streamline management, migration, customization, and protection of Microsoft Windows-based infrastructure, as well as other platforms and enterprise applications Maintain the fastest response times for your physical and virtual applications Easily deploy virtual desktop environments to a wide variety of BYOD endpoints as well as integrate hardware, software and services from one source Simplify capacity management, provisioning, deployment, and conversions in virtual environments. Information management Simplify business intelligence, big data analytics and database management Access, provision, analyze and share data from nearly any source Optimize code, automate maintenance and ensure high availability Accelerate Oracle and SQL Server backup and recovery while dramatically reducing storage requirements Integrate any application with ease Ensure master data is accurate, complete and updated. 4

5 Data protection Safeguard your customers data across physical, virtual, application and cloud environments Ensure continuous, integrated data protection for the applications your customers rely on Protect and preserve data no matter what happens with globally enforced, granular controls over the entire back operations Leverage a worldwide attack identification and monitoring network to protect your customers against viruses, zombies, spam, phishing and other attacks Achieve backup and recovery SLAs, get faster return on investment (ROI) and reduce your customers total cost of ownership (TCO) for data protection Security Prevent intrusions with real-time visibility and superior protection for distributed enterprise networks Simplify security and compliance with access governance, privileged account management, identity administration and user activity monitoring Provide your remote users with secure access to corporate resources anytime, anywhere Protect your customers and their data from advanced persistent threats, cybercriminals, spam, malware and loss Dell Software a tested and trustworthy partner Regardless of the services you deliver to customers, you can take comfort in knowing you are working with a vendor that has a proven track record of innovation and support to ensure continuous improvement to products and services. Dell s approach addressing highvalue targeted workloads Dell delivers a full spectrum of heterogeneous management solutions that enable service providers to address their customers quality, compliance, security, availability, and performance expectations all from a single vendor. These solutions address: Windows workloads Exchange and SharePoint services are viewed as foundational offerings in the managed services market, making quality, reliability, accountability, competitive pricing and superior service critical for differentiation. Dell solutions help service providers manage Windows workloads at the lowest possible per-user cost. Dell s self-service and enterprise-grade Exchange, SharePoint and Active Directory management capabilities enable service providers to address a full range of assessment, migration, operational management and data governance requirements. Oracle database and application workloads Oracle-based workloads continue to represent an elusive market opportunity for many service providers. To differentiate themselves for prospects considering a move to a hosted and managed model, service providers must deliver an extensive set of solutions with enterprise-grade management capabilities a tremendous challenge. Dell s approach to the Oracle stack helps you successfully host and manage Oracle environments. Data protection solutions for Windows, databases and applications Data volumes are growing at percent annually within most organizations, and heterogeneous environments are the norm. To meet growing customer expectations for continuous data protection and maintain a competitive advantage, you need to develop an integrated data protection strategy that encompasses all platforms, applications, data and infrastructure types in both physical and virtual environments. Only Dell delivers the range of solutions needed to provide virtual machine and cloud backups, granular recovery and continuous data protection at a competitive price. Dell delivers a full spectrum of heterogeneous management solutions that enable service providers to address their customers quality, compliance, security, availability, and performance expectations all from a single vendor. 5

6 With Dell, you can deliver IT services at the lowest cost per user for target workloads in both fully managed and customer selfmanaged settings. Desktop virtualization and mobile workforce management The modern mobile worker isn t constrained by a desktop or even a single platform. Service providers must give users power to work efficiently and securely, no matter where they are, which devices they are using, or what platform they are working on. Dell helps you deliver that power. Dell systems and hardware complete management for service providers In addition to a host of software solutions, Dell also provides market-leading hardware for service providers, so you can deliver scalable and cost-effective IT services covering all server, storage, networking and end-user computing needs. With Dell, you can deliver IT services at the lowest cost per user for target workloads in both fully managed and customer self-managed settings. Dell cloud computing combines Dell hardware and software capabilities to improve not only performance, but also the quantity and quality of resources available to run your managed services business. By going beyond the limits of traditional IT infrastructure and data centers, Dell offers you more choice, flexibility and agility from a single provider. Make it your competitive advantage. Dell terms tailored to the service provider business model More than 150 Dell software products are available to service providers on a monthly or quarterly billing basis, making it simple to do business. You also get flexible pricing and billing to suit customers unique business models. Plus, in most cases, you need to manage only one contract and one usage report all handled through a Dell Service Provider partner account manager. This gives you access to the complete product portfolio and the opportunity to use Dell solutions for managing Windows messaging, collaboration and identity management, as well as virtual environments, databases and applications, without incurring the capital expense or extending that cost to your customers. Dell commitment ensuring success far beyond expectations The Dell Service Provider Program has already had a positive impact on several organizations. It provides a strategic competitive advantage by enhancing specialized services, as well as accelerating growth into new markets with new services. Savvis depends on Dell s SharePlex to support high availability of Oracle databases Savvis, a CenturyLink company and a billion-dollar hosted-services provider for enterprises worldwide, relies on Dell s SharePlex to support high availability, reporting, data movement and application integration services for Oracle databases. SharePlex does a fantastic job in helping us deliver on aggressive uptime SLAs, says Brent Juelich, Vice President, Application Services for Savvis. It is ideal for customers who have complex database requirements across multiple datacenters. Dell s industry-leading solution helps Savvis streamline migrations to hosted environments and adopt more aggressive SLAs for uptime. Additionally, SharePlex provides easier and faster replication for complex, active domain databases while reducing customer licensing costs over the long term. Azaleos (acquired by Avanade, November 2012) expands services in Exchange migrations, as well as SharePoint and Active Directory management Dell s OpEx pricing model is helping Azaleos reduce the initial cost of migrating customers to Microsoft Exchange 2007 and 2010 from older versions, according to Chris Teet, vice president of worldwide sales. [Dell] has great tools for migrating Exchange customers, but we always 6

7 had to deal with the capital expense of purchasing licenses, Teet says. With the [Dell] Service Provider Program, the initial cost is no longer an obstacle for us. Azaleos CEO Phil Van Etten agrees. [Dell] enables us to quickly and efficiently migrate customers over to our Exchange and SharePoint managed services, he notes. [Dell] tools mitigate risks for new customer onboarding and migrations, which helps us achieve faster time-to-revenue. Azaleos, known for its Exchange hosting expertise, is also leveraging Dell solutions to expand its business into extended SharePoint and Active Directory services. Learn more To learn more about the Dell Service Provider Partner Program, please visit dell.com/partner/serviceprovider or us at dell.com. Dell s Service Provider Program provides Insynq with access to a comprehensive portfolio of software and hardware to deliver high-value, low-cost services to our SMB customers. Being a long-time Dell, Quest Software and AppAssure partner, we are excited about the program inclusion in PartnerDirect. John Gorst, CEO, Insynq 7

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