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NETWORK WORLD NEWSLETTER: JEB BOLDING
on APPLICATION SERVICE PROVIDERS 11/20/01 - Today's focus: Touched by an angel Dear Wincenty Kaminski, In this issue: * BMC enters MSP market with GuardianAngel * Links related to ASPs * Featured reader resource _______________________________________________________________ TAKE IT OFF-LINE The high-tech industry has always run at breakneck pace. Even a wheezing economy will hardly slow it. In the past year, business theory surrounding technology has been reinvented and redefined multiple times. Check out the latest "must-read" books for technology-related business theories. http://nww1.com/go/ad204.html _______________________________________________________________ Today's focus: Touched by an angel By Jeb Bolding BMC released its GuardianAngel managed service provider offering at Comdex last week. While many managed service providers (MSP) struggle, I think GuardianAngel just might succeed. One of my pet peeves about the ASP industry is the lack of software solutions that offer network, systems, and application management solutions to reveal ASP service levels for customers. Most ASPs monitor their systems in some fashion. However, they rarely publicize that data out to their customers. If they do, commonly that information comes from a homegrown set of tools that report primarily on basic availability information about the hosted applications or systems. This really isn't service level management, though it may purport to be. In fact, the availability and performance numbers that are pushed out to customers through homegrown systems, are probably not all that indicative of true service levels since the solutions are designed by developers who are application experts at their ASP, not systems management experts. So why can't ASPs go out and buy a good management solution that gives their customers a reasonable understanding of ASP system performance? I think there are three things that have inhibited ASPs from making that investment. First, and foremost, is cost. Most independent software vendors create their management solutions from a sales perspective, to be sold into the enterprise space where the purchasers pay a steep up-front licensing cost and then a relatively minimal support fee per year. Since the vast majority of service providers have business models that focus on regular monthly or quarterly payments, they've had a hard time rationalizing their cash flow to purchase a best of breed management product. I suppose that this is the kind of purchase, one might argue, that those high IPO valuations were supposed to cover 18 months ago. Nowadays, spending $1.5 million on a management product (including licensing, deployment, and customization) is out of the question. Another problem is integration. For most ASPs, there simply is no management integration. Whatever applications or systems an enterprise outsources to an ASP, those are treated as islands of management technology, separate from the applications that enterprises manage internally. Even if an ASP has a monitoring and management product deployed, those solutions are not designed architecturally to populate a central console with event and data information, nor transmit information across a wire to a database inside the corporate firewall. Finally, traditional management solutions are designed to give an IT administrator a centralized view of what's going on with their enterprise systems. They're not designed to display customer-centric data to multiple customers who are protected from viewing the event and systems data of other customers. To address many of these problems, MSPs have approached the ASP market need with solutions that are priced based on a subscription service, designed specifically for integrating event and data information across a distributed network, and developed with an interactive Web interface for customer and administrator views. However, MSPs, just like ASPs have had their own troubles and lately there has been consolidation within the MSP ranks. I admit that I've pondered why some of the systems management companies have not offered MSP solutions themselves. It may be culture that prevents them from addressing the needs of extended enterprises and service providers. But with BMC, one of the big management players, launching GuardianAngel, that will hopefully, address many of the infrastructure management needs that service providers have. Most importantly, this service offering is supported by BMC, a company with deep pockets and the ability to stay the MSP course financially, unlike many of its smaller, more specialized MSP brethren. With the larger BMC corporation behind it, I think that GuardianAngel can make a strong go of the MSP space. _______________________________________________________________ To contact Jeb Bolding: Jeb Bolding is senior consultant with Enterprise Management Associates in Boulder, Colo., an analyst and market research firm focusing exclusively on enterprise management. Bolding has 10 years of experience in the network systems industry, most recently with eCollege.com, an ASP for higher education, where he was director of product development. He can be reached at mailto:jbolding@enterprisemanagement.com. _______________________________________________________________ NW Fusion's BuyIT has the IT resources you need! Our directory hosts thousands of qualified service providers. Post an RFP anonymously and FREE, receive competitive bids, begin negotiations, and get your project done right! http://nwfusion.newmediary.com/nww110901nwltr1 _______________________________________________________________ RELATED EDITORIAL LINKS U.S. special forces to outsource net ops Network World, 11/19/01 http://www.nwfusion.com/archive/2001/127511_11-19-2001.html Outsourcing options on the rise Network World, 11/19/01 http://www.nwfusion.com/news/2001/1119carrier.html Breaking ASP news from Network World, updated daily: http://www.nwfusion.com/topics/asp.html Archive of the ASP newsletter: http://www.nwfusion.com/newsletters/asp/index.html ______________________________________________________________ FEATURED READER RESOURCE Network World Fusion's The Edge site Network World Fusion's The Edge is a resource devoted to the advances in service-provider networks that are shaking up the old telecom order. In classic Network World fashion, we focus on the hardware, software and services coming to market - but this time from the vendors targeting legacy carriers, new alternative local carriers, ISPs and application service providers. http://www.nwfusion.com/edge/index.html _______________________________________________________________ May We Send You a Free Print Subscription? You've got the technology snapshot of your choice delivered at your fingertips each day. Now, extend your knowledge by receiving 51 FREE issues to our print publication. Apply today at http://www.nwwsubscribe.com/nl _______________________________________________________________ SUBSCRIPTION SERVICES To subscribe or unsubscribe to any Network World e-mail newsletters, go to: http://www.nwwsubscribe.com/news/scripts/notprinteditnews.asp To unsubscribe from promotional e-mail go to: http://www.nwwsubscribe.com/ep To change your e-mail address, go to: http://www.nwwsubscribe.com/news/scripts/changeemail.asp Subscription questions? Contact Customer Service by replying to this message. Have editorial comments? Write Jeff Caruso, Newsletter Editor, at: mailto:jcaruso@nww.com For advertising information, write Jamie Kalbach, Fusion Sales Manager, at: mailto:jkalbach@nww.com Copyright Network World, Inc., 2001 ------------------------ This message was sent to: vkamins@enron.com
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