Posts Tagged ‘application virtualization’

Can the Cloud Help You Drive Down Business Costs?

Tuesday, March 29th, 2011

There are two ways to increase your company’s revenue and boost the bottom line. You can excel at winning new clients and make additional sales to increase revenues. Or you can cut costs. Ideally, most businesses will look for a combination of the two. Cloud computing can help to accomplish this.

Cloud computing allows you to take advantage of hardware and software as a service. Rather than buying the equipment and making space for a server room – and, of course, hiring an IT staff dedicated to maintaining that equipment – your company can backup data offsite without sacrificing its availability. With a secure infrastructure, password-protected access, and optimized resources in a managed cloud solution, you can be sure that the data you need is available when you need it.

Similarly, with software as a service, cloud computing makes it easy for your staff to access email, documents, data, and reports on the go – all via a secure, web-based login. Whether traveling for a client meeting, working with a team in another location, or telecommuting, the cloud can ensure that your staff are working as effectively as if they were in the office.

Additionally, this sort of mobile access allows company executives and staff to handle everything from inventory tracking to project management to customer relationship management from the office and on the road. Security can be managed easily, and maintaining the equipment doesn’t require additional space or additional staff.

In other words, when you take your business to the cloud – whether for hardware or software as a service (or a combination of the two) – you will find that you are able to increase the access that your staff have to information that they need – allowing them to excel and drive sales. You’ll also discover that your staffing and equipment needs decrease. As a result, you will find that you are able to:

* Maximize the return on your IT investments
* Increase utilization of your current IT technology
* Enhance the lifespan of existing server equipment
* Integrate data storage and access from a variety of platforms

Increasing your company’s capabilities will allow you to keep pace with your competitors. Decreasing costs will allow you to budget effectively; turning to the cloud allows you to devote resources to product development rather than to maintaining your company’s IT.

By turning to the cloud with the help of a solution provider like IBM, you will be able to ensure that your resources are as efficient as possible, reduce the risks of turning to the cloud by relying on a secure infrastructure, and – ultimately – reduce the costs associated with IT at your organization.

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Is Your IT Architecture Prepared for Growth?

Thursday, March 24th, 2011

Growth is something that most businesses strive for. In order to accomplish it, however, you’ll need to have the right systems in place. Having a scalable IT solution like the one NetApp provides is one part of this equation.

Your company’s IT architecture should allow you to:

1. Simplify backups so that you know that your records are up to date, your staff is on board, and downtime is minimized.

2. Support testing and development efforts. Some tools are available for one operating system and not another. Web design work needs to be tested across numerous browsers and on a variety of platforms. Virtualization allows you to create all of the scenarios that need to be addressed on a single machine.

3. Improve storage efficiency with server virtualization so that you are able to use the tools you have rather than adding another server to the rack each time that you need more space or access to additional software.

4. Simplify recovery by ensuring that your data is stored securely and is available when you need it – whether you are in the office, on the production line, or in an airport on your way to a client meeting.

Opportunities present themselves in various ways. Being able to quickly pull up data, run comparisons related to two different approaches, and test products on a range of platforms will ensure that you’re ready to take action – and that you’re making the choices that best support your business goals.

As needs and the demands on your business change, will you be prepared to act? The right IT architecture – and support – will ensure that you’re ready and positioned to grow your organization.

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Four Signs It’s Time for Application Virtualization

Monday, October 25th, 2010

There’s always room to streamline your application management processes. Traditional approaches tend to be cumbersome and time-consuming, and they leave openings for risks such as non-standard software installation and suboptimal access control. Application virtualization solutions such as Citrix XenDesktop and XenApp can be used to remedy many of these problems, and the TCO and ROI cases are well established.

But, when it’s time to present your plan to move to a virtualized application environment to the executive team, you need specifics – it has to be clear that there are direct and tangible benefits to application virtualization that can be realized fairly quickly. Start by looking at your existing operation for indicators that it’s time to virtualize. Here are four to get you started.

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Five Ways Virtualization Makes Your Company More Competitive

Thursday, August 5th, 2010

Storage, server, desktop and application virtualization technologies can streamline datacenter operations and make your business users more effective in the marketplace. The judicious allocation of IT budget to virtualization investments provides an unprecedented level of IT flexibility and agility that has enterprise-wide implications. And with Citrix, you gain an integrated environment, which facilitates faster implementation and streamlined virtualization management.

While most IT professionals tend to focus on the technological advantages, the C-suite will want to know how these tools can benefit the business as a whole. To help you communicate the benefits of virtualization to business leadership, here are five ways that virtualization can make your company more competitive.

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Does Application Performance Put Your Brand at Risk?

Monday, August 2nd, 2010

Fight the initial temptation to think only about customer-facing applications. What happens inside your company can still have an impact on your interaction with the public, making it a contributing factor how your brand is perceived. Slow applications, even those that are only experienced directly by your employees, can result in lost opportunities, substandard customer experiences and a frustration that can drive them to your competitors.

The scenarios are both familiar and predictable. We’ve all spent time on the phone with a customer service rep and heard some version of: “Please bear with me. The computers are just really slow today.” An awkward period follows, consisting either small-talk attempts that fall flat or an uncomfortable silence. For self-service applications, you don’t have to worry about how to keep a customer entertained, but you do risk losing a frustrated customer who has no interest in waiting for a system to respond.

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