[Info-vax] IBM Layoffs

[Kerry Main]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Info-vax [mailto:info-vax-bounces at info-vax.com] On Behalf Of
> Stephen Hoffman
> Sent: 27-Jan-15 7:04 AM
> To: info-vax at info-vax.com
> Subject: Re: [New Info-vax] IBM Layoffs
> 
> On 2015-01-27 11:26:15 +0000, Jan-Erik Soderholm said:
> 
> >>>> On 15-01-26 14:39, Stephen Hoffman wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>>> Hosting VMS, for VMS customers.  This opportunity is pretty
> obvious for
> >>>>> a vendor with licensing rights to VMS and related products,
> >>>>> particularly if the vendor can create and manage pairs of data
> centers
> >>>>> located within range of clustering and HBVS, and preferably on
> separate
> >>>>> electric and communications grids and drainages.
> >
> > Sure, but I specificaly commented to the part that said "outsource to a
> > distant data centre". We have a lot of barcode scanners, PLCs and
> > thermaltransfer label printers. Hard to run in "the cloud".
> >
> > I do not think that we will see a large part of the remaining VMS
> > market move to "the cloud".
> 

"the cloud" is just another name for selective IT Outsourcing. There
are pros and cons. Like most outsourcing models you do not need to 
outsource everything. This applies to ALL platforms.

The typical approach is to look at what is "tactical" vs. what is "strategic".

Backups, User Mgmt, Print/Queue Mgmt, Network and Storage Mgmt,
Patching etc are typically considered tactical and are the usual candidates
for outsourcing.

Governance, Vendor Mgmt, Strategy, Security Policies, App Mgmt are 
usually considered strategic and are seldom outsourced.  If there is 
not a lot of strategic App development going on, then App Mgmt 
might also be a candidate as well.

What you get with outsourcing - offload day to day mgmt of low level
IT management activities, reduction in staff head count in return for a
set monthly OPS charge which appears in a different part of the books.
This can make a company look healthier from a financial perspective
e.g. the often quoted "revenue per employee" statistic.

What you lose from outsourcing - ability to respond quickly to change
(everything is a change request (CR) & anything out of scope requires 
a CR and/or a statement of work if bigger than a CR). This needs 
approval on both sides of a company and is typically excruciatingly
painful. You are also still responsible for any issues as your Cust's still
hold you responsible for any outages that impact them. You also are
dependant on the outsourcer to maintain security - again you still are
responsible for all that happens. You also lose some flexibility to be
more proactive in terms of issues that might impact the business e.g.
more proactive companies will integrate alarms, events into an OPS
Bridge which does smart filtering and sends email/SMS texts to the
appropriate company folks that need to be aware of this. In 
outsourcing world, you would lose this unless you were willing to pay 
big $'s for additional custom integration work to be done. If there is an 
outage, you call the vendor help desk and queue up with everyone 
else.

Here is good example of "the cloud" model not being understood &
what can happen (AWS company went out of business due to lack 
of cloud security and not following IT best practices, like off-site
archives)

http://tinyurl.com/nd9j3v8 
"CodeSpaces.com shut down after a hacker gained access to its 
Amazon EC2 account and deleted most data, including backups"

Whether you call it a cloud or selective IT outsourcing, the pros and
cons are basically the same as they were a few decades ago.

Each company needs to determine whether they consider IT as 
a strategic advantage or simply a necessary cost to be managed 
(read costs cut).

Regards,

Kerry Main
Back to the Future IT Inc.
 .. Learning from the past to plan the future

Kerry dot main at backtothefutureit dot com