Ever since the “Information technology” function has existed, it has been inundated with new trends and capabilities – some of significant value, many that have and will pass into obscurity.   Thanks to current economic conditions, the only new ideas lately that make it are those that demonstrably reduce cost, grow or transform the business, or a combination of all three.  This weaning process is actually a good thing as far too much technology acquisitions have occurred without understanding business basics – resulting in “black eyes” for IT, and the notion that IT is a black hole for company money.  No matter what the technology, IT needs to address many of the most traditional objectives of business (make money, save money, grow customer list, increase quality, decrease lead time, etc).

This article outlines some of our views on the SAAS market, explains our new solution offering in simple terms, and allows the reader to make an informed decision based on the options provided and available.

Current Market for Software as a Service

Service-Now is the arguably the first ITSM vendor to achieve success with a SAAS model.  And we say kudos to them.  Service-now has certainly become the name in the ITSM SaaS industry and we aren’t looking to duplicate the Service-Now model.  Other vendors have jumped into the SAAS market as well, either by re-engineering their applications to be web based and mimic applications originally designed for SAAS delivery.  The important thing to consider is that software is software whether it is licensed or provided as a service.    According to Gartner Group – software delivery is challenging regardless of delivery model.

The fundamental business principles of our licensed solution apply to our Software as a Service solution as well; At ICCM, we believe customers who wish to be self-sufficient should have the tools to do so. Furthermore, we believe scalability and a solutions’ ability to grow and adapt with your business is essential to any investment. 

One of the most compelling reasons that organizations choose to partner with ICCM is the agility and flexibility of the e-Service Desk solution. The architecture leveraged within e-Service Desk allows ICCM to take a radically different approach to the design, build and deployment of ITSM solutions to all others within our marketplace.  Traditional point solutions that people are most familiar with are developed in a rather awkward and dated fashion with a ‘feature function’ approach that often overlooks the complexity of the underlying process flows, interactions and business rules.

Most ITIL consultants and even ITSM vendors will agree that defining your ITSM processes and aligning them to business need is one of the most important steps in adopting the ITIL framework, however once these processes have been defined many find difficulty in how to realize this through an ITSM toolset!  What makes ICCM e-Service Desk truly different and the most innovative solution available today is that utilizing Metastorm BPM as a business technology and building ITIL aligned processes from the ground up allows instant process and business integration within the ITSM toolset.

This ensures that all components are working in an integrated and coherent fashion with a clear understanding of process touch points and the information that is being passed between the various aspects of the solution.

The enabling factor that has allowed ICCM to adopt this pioneering approach within ITSM is the architecture that the solution is built upon; Metastorm BPM.  The comprehensive Metastorm BPM suite of EA, BPA and BPM solutions allowing organizations to drive business and process efficiency throughout all aspects of the organization through from business strategy at the very highest level to executing complex and detailed processes at ground level.

According to Gartner Group (Symposium, 2009);

The main business value of SAAS isn’t necessarily in licensing, but in avoiding new IT hires, extensive training costs, and purchasing infrastructure hardware and software. 

SAAS, ASP, Private, Public, Tenancy…Oh my

It’s amazing how much arguing and debate takes place on LinkedIn and Twitter regarding SAAS vs. ASP, Private vs. Public, Single vs. Multi-tenant, etc.  When what really matters the most to the customer is what business options are available, what does it enable, and what business value is derived from these approaches both now and in the future.  Does it really matter what it is called? 

Gartner Group identifies the following characteristics for SAAS;

• An application owned, delivered and managed remotely by one or more providers;
• Where the provider delivers an application based on a single set of common code and data definitions, which are consumed in a one-to-many model by all contracted customers at any time;
• and on a pay-for-use basis or as a subscription based on use metrics

BPM Technology introduces a very interesting twist to this equation though.  And the virtualization technology ICCM is leveraging for e-Service Desk introduces even more twists – All resulting in more options available to our customers.

Most SaaS based solutions are fixed in function, providing varying levels of “configuration”.  For ITSM, this is usually in the form of categories, statuses, fields, etc.  Process, data and security integration remains a challenge because of this fixed functionality.  The differences between BPM and traditional Service Management solutions is highlighted in a previous blog article The Difference between traditional IT Service Management Applications and a BPM Based IT Service Management Solution.   All of these differences hold true whether you are using our licensed solution, e-Service desk, or our SaaS solution, e-Service Desk live.

Our virtualization technology leverages a new capability recently introduced by our partner, Cincinnati Bell Technology Services.  This virtualization technology, called Virtual Data Center, or VDC, resides on Cincinnati Bell’s N + N redundant network, provides our customer with a private partition in a CBTS data center and appears as a private extension of your network.  You specify and use your own IP addressing and your connectivity options are layer 2 and layer 3 agnostic via private circuit, MPLS, VPN.  As a telecommunications carrier, obtaining direct, high performance connectivity with most of the globe is not a problem.  In fact, CBTS has British Telecom connectivity already direct to the United Kingdom and Europe.  Of course public options exist as well.

As a customer of ICCM e-Service Desk, you will automatically be a customer to the CBTS VDC service.  ICCM e-Service Desk live customers can take advantage of their VDC environment, expanding or contracting not only e-Service Desk, but any server or infrastructure component needed, at a small fraction of the cost. 

Capabilities of ICCM’s Software as a Service Offering

e-Service Desk addresses many of the downsides of traditional ITSM software.  When ICCM decided to create a SaaS offering, we wanted to avoid and address many of the same downsides that Gartner Group has identified with SaaS vendors.   The following outlines how ICCM e-Service Desk live addresses the many issues that Gartner Group has highlighted in regards to Software as a Service;

Avoiding “Shelf-ware as a Service”

Like our on-premise software, e-Service Desk, licensing is simple and reporting is available on usage.  As a matter of fact, many of the analytical tools used for web technology tracking can used to monitor your usage of eSD Live.  ICCM will monitor your usage suggesting changes when applicable.

Different functionality between On-Premise and On-Demand

Thanks to our virtualization technology partner, Cincinnati Bell Technology Services, your instance of e-Service Desk Live can be completely public (Internet based) or private (appear as though it is a part of your data center and infrastructure – within your domain and IP address space).  The BPM technology and process models are identical to on-premise.  Your capabilities to modify processes, integrate other systems, enhance and grow e-Service are no less limited than with an on-premise implementation.

With e-Service Desk Live, Release Management is not dictated by ICCM. 

The common “BPM Technology” that all customers are executing doesn’t change the business rules and logic of your processes.  Just like our licensed software, the paradigm shift BPM introduces with regard to customer ownership of data as well as the processes, is also preserved with e-Service Desk Live.  Your processes are your processes and you can change them when your business requires it, not on a scheduled defined by ICCM.

Security Concerns

With e-Service Desk Live, your virtualized environment is not public (unless you want it to be).  Your data and most importantly your processes are yours, distinct and separate from other customers.  Infrastructure is shared but partitioned and your performance is not impacted by other customers.  The BPM technology that e-Service Desk Live is based on has achieved a number of security certifications within intelligence and defense agencies within the United States Federal Government.

Data Ownership

Like your processes, your data is yours.  The method by which you backup data is entirely up to you.  Since the VDC environment can be part of your infrastructure, it can be setup to backup like other applications within your environment.  Or, you can leverage other backup options available thanks to our partnership with CBTS. The question you should ask yourself is “Is my data even useable if I discontinue my SaaS contract?”.  e-Service Desk Live can be implemented as a blended model (part SaaS, part on-premise), and you can decide to move all data to an owned and existing BPM infrastructure.

Reduced Long Term Cost of Ownership

Customers may see huge short term cash flow advantages with Software as a Service.  Often times, if they take the financial analysis out five years, the cost of ownership may not be as appealing as that of on-premise, locally managed software.  The perpetual annuity imposed by many SAAS providers doesn’t justify itself long term for smaller and medium sized companies and in some cases larger enterprises.  Exclusive SaaS providers are depending on a “Multiplier effect” over the years meaning they will generate more revenue with this model than if they had sold software directly.  In fact, ICCM can structure your contract so that your cost of ownership in fact declines over time, and you can even take ownership of the licenses at a certain date, or continue existing contract.  It’s completely your choice.

On-premise to On-demand integration

 Since the VDC environment can be public, or appear as a secure segment of your infrastructure, all of the BPM based integrations through web services, API’s, database, command line, etc. are available exactly as they are with the licensed software model. 

Conclusion

Considering licensed or on-premise software is not an easy task.  Customers look to SaaS as a means of lowering their cost of ownership, cost of acquisition, and reducing risk.  Perhaps SaaS as a phenomenon has resulted not entirely from innovation in the delivery mechanism of software but as a result of the limited existing software choices and problems in the software industry.  Companies can simply no longer afford the 6-12 month implementation times of traditional, big box service management software. 

Ironically, the value proposition messaging in the industry for SaaS vendors echoes that of BPM Technology; quick implementation times, quicker ROI, no Infrastructure costs.  BPM enables additional value drivers such as a consistent process and model based configuration, scalability and process agility, integration and an unprecedented level of security. 

BPM technology already delivers accelerated value and process enablement at a level unheard of in the industry.  SaaS pushes that capability even further providing our customers with an unprecedented number of options and choices allowing them to leverage the right model, for the right price – to achieve measurable business goals and objectives that can go well beyond IT Service Management.

For a demonstration of this capability, to setup a Proof of Concept, or if you simply want to learn more – contact us at info@iccmco.com, or (800) 651-7408.