Climate change sets up cloud control
A briefing paper on the emergence and future development of cloud-based services
There are some plants in the world that for all their appeal, all their qualities, all the tender ministrations of their owners, simply will not grow and prosper without the perfect alignment of a complex mix of growth conditions. Providers of IT outsourcing and managed services working away from the hothouse of industry in the more temperate climes of legal may well recognize the analogy. For well over a decade, outsourcing tried to take root, a cyclical journal marked by early flourishes and inevitable withering, with no wholesale adoption by either early or late majorities and just one or two sustained successes to covet and trumpet.
But over the last two to three years, things have changed, most notably with providers presenting us with stronger, more compelling varietals to cultivate – it’s not about hosting Microsoft Office or arranging off-site back-ups anymore, it’s about offering complete private network infrastructures delivering layered managed services on a utility basis: Take what you need when you need it and pay only for what you use. It is, in short, a new genus of
outsourcing – and its emergence into the legal light reflects an exciting conjunction of those essential growth conditions.
First, the prevailing wind. Osborne Clark’s recent decision to outsource its ‘middle office' support services, including technology, in a £50million pound deal, prompted one leading commentator to declare his long-held belief in the concept and to wonder if outsourcing’s time had indeed come at last. What was particularly illuminating about the news though was that this was not a knee-jerk reaction to the current economic woes but a considered
strategy initiated more than a year ago. So why the change? Simon Beswick, OC’s managing partner, was quoted thus:
"Having access to a full suite of specialised business support services designed for the legal industry is a critical part of Osborne Clarke's vision of the modern law firm. The aim is to ensure the delivery of a competitive, high quality and flexible service for clients. For OC, sourcing non-legal expertise from one expert supplier enables a clear focus on our legal activities, with the security of flexible business service support and cost stability."
You can see the attraction for the executive level, this return to core competencies without compromising the operational weft and warp of the practice – not to mention the
opportunities presented by a scalable, expansive and highly cost-effective IT delivery mechanism.
Cloud formations
But this wind of change is but part of a wider climate – a climate being shaped by the cloud. “Cloud computing is the way forward” declared Cisco CTO Padmasree Warrior recently. “It can fix CIOs' main problems - how to do more with less while reducing their carbon footprint. Few companies want or need to own all their IT kit, but they do want to choose what they do with their IT and where they do it. Firms will keep control of some business critical systems and those that give them competitive advantage, but will want to seek lowest cost providers for the rest”, she says. The cloud computing model is still evolving but in her vision CIOs will want flexible access to public and private clouds.
Private clouds such as InTechnology’s LANnet, a £110 million cloud networking infrastructure that delivers a range of managed services to over 20% of the UK’s top law firms. But this is not just a panacea for the CIO – it unlocks real possibilities for the whole enterprise.
To understand the full potential of a cloud that gives clients control as well as capability, you first need a helicopter view of today’s conditions:
• Market uncertainty is hindering IT spend
• Long-term strategic IT planning is becoming increasingly difficult • Changes in the economy are happening at a rapid pace
• CIOs know that successful businesses will be ones that react to quickly to moves in the market
• Firms can struggle to finance and implement new IT projects due to the large upfront capital costs and associated business risks
• Employees increasingly require access from anywhere and anytime, thus requiring 24/7 support, which many business struggle to fund
• Geographically dispersed organisations are difficult for centralised IT departments to manage
• A combination of acquisition and organic growth usually means an inconsistent mix of new and legacy equipment
• Instead of IT improving productivity, many businesses are now critically dependent on IT to just function
• Service availability can be impacted by many factors, external and internal • IT services need to scalable, flexible and always available
Bearing all of that in mind, now consider each dimension of the cloud-based managed service solution:
• Managed services are provided on a pay-as-you-use basis
• All IT services and applications are delivered centrally from within the cloud network, not from offices
• Services are delivered consistently to both office and mobile staff
• Services are provided on-demand, allowing IT departments greater flexibility without the need for long term planning
• Availability is increased because the services are an integral function of the cloud network, similar to a carrier infrastructure
• It enables IT staff to quickly and safely deploy new services without employing in-house specialists to install and manage it
• All the customer needs is a telecommunications connection into the cloud network, across which is delivered his choice of layered managed services
• The customer decides who has access to the service and where the service is rolled out to
• The managed service supplier provide the backend infrastructure, including data centres, core network and hardware / software and the ongoing management, monitoring and maintenance of these
• All software and hardware updates and upgrades are includes in the service charges • All the customer needs to do is to set the correct user policy and decide what within
their environment is in scope
• The supplier scopes the service based on the customer’s input and requirements, rolls out the service in full and hands over the operational service to the customer
So in summary, firms can enjoy ‘utility-like’, pay as you go/grow access to a wide range of fully supported services: in InTechnology’s case, these include managed network, back-up and archiving, virtual servers, server and application hosting, hosted IP telephony and mobile services.
Given the current environment, you can see why cloud-based managed services tick so many boxes –
• Customer can increase or decrease their usage of the services at any time and the charges will reflect that accordingly
• Customers can harness the power of advanced technical infrastructure and associated human capital without the burden of ownership
• The supplier takes all the financial risk
• Short-term projects can be delivered without any upfront capital expenditure • New sites and / or changing sites can be seamlessly accommodated without any
upfront capital expenditure
• Development cycles can be catered for by driving up usage during the test phase and scaling down usage once the production system is live
• New business development projects and ideas can easily be tested without incurring any of the normal upfront costs and associated business risks
• All services are delivered by one service delivery team and supported by one support team, with performance governed by one SLA.
Hothousing – the impact of the 21
stCentury Network
There is one final environmental dimension – the arrival of BT’s 21st Century Network (21CN),
the multi-billion pound infrastructure project that will create high bandwidth Ethernet networks nationwide.
Until now Ethernet connectivity has been largely limited to selected urban areas, with coverage based on just 60 points of presence (POPs) in forty metropolitan areas. But the roll-out of 21CN will increase this number to 600 POPs, covering 87% of UK businesses, by April 2009; rising to 1100 POPs a year later providing the option of next generation Ethernet services to 98% of UK businesses.
Richard Quine, InTechnology’s director of product management, says it is difficult to overestimate the importance of this quantum leap in connectivity quality:
“This is undoubtedly one of the most momentous developments for British business in the last fifty years. 21CN utilises open systems based on open platforms, introducing a new era of
choice and increased flexibility for users.
It will enable providers like InTechnology to provide more services to more customers across more areas of the UK than ever before, whilst also allowing us to reduce costs for bandwidth in locations other than metropolitan areas.
For the first time everyone will have equal access to the managed services gird, taking exactly what they need on a pay-as-you go, on demand basis. This gives them an
adaptable, risk-free and hugely cost-efficient alternative to traditional commissioning, and a welcome option when current uncertainty is making long-term strategic IT planning
problematic.”
There’s no doubt that 21CN will be an enriching force when it comes to the development of managed services. While it hasn’t been party to the movement’s early growth, it will certainly accelerate its flowering – as well as encourage a root and branch review of how best to deliver business-class IT in the future.
