Cloud Computing Changes the Managed Services Equation

When it comes time to make a choice as to which platform to deploy for providing a managed service, the shift towards cloud computing may have more impact than most solution providers may realize.

Most managed services platforms were designed with the management of remote servers located on a customer’s premise in mind. But in the age of the cloud, those servers are rapidly being moved into either a data center owned by the solution provider or another facility managed by the hosting provider.

In either scenario, the need to manage servers remotely is sharply reduced because the servers are either managed locally by the solution provider or by the owner of the hosting facility. The only thing that really needs to be remotely managed is the network that provides access to those servers.

According to Steve Goodman, vice president and general manager for the network management business at Quest Software, this shift will change the balance of power among MSP platform providers. Quest markets an MSP Platform called PacketTrap that Goodman says is optimized for managing networks rather than servers. Of course, PacketTrap can also manage servers, says Goodman, but its real differentiation is in its ability to remotely manage networks.

Goodman says that difference will become even more pronounced with the continuing evolution of latency-sensitive applications such as unified communications that wholly depend on access to the network.

There’s no doubt that as cloud computing evolves this trend is having a profound effect on how managed services are delivered. That may or may not require new tools, but as a general rule every time there is a paradigm shift there is usually a requirement for finding new ways to manage that paradigm.