Network Management : Fighting the Downturn

In any organization, connectivity and robust networks act as the linchpins of
a nimble IT set up. Also, a robust network plays an extensive role in the
success of cost-control and business-resilience oriented data center
consolidation and virtualization strategy.

Where enterprises are feeling the heat of today's economic uncertainties,
there is a need to adopt strategies that support business patterns in more
efficient ways. Nowadays, enterprises observe IT as a service and not as an
internal support function. Scalability, integration at various levels, and multi
vendor devices are key areas that companies are looking at.

The network management services furnish a viable and secure architecture for
upbeat remote network monitoring and management of storage networks. And over
the years, its role has grown from providing basic uptime services to providing
integrated service with more emphasis on applications response management.

Interestingly, though the technology bigwigs have stiffened their
pocketbooks, they cannot overlook the need of investing in technologies that
will ensure better returns by improving efficiencies and effectiveness.

With every passing day, there is an appearance of new networking technologies
and newer applications, which are ultimately driving organizations to deploy
networks of a scale and complexity never seen before. Industry analysis show
that there is growing pressure of reducing costs in organizations, and they are
searching for ground-breaking ways of managing networks.

However, surfacing of new technologies also creates a scenario of overlaying
legacy systems. It is crucial to manage network superiority and simultaneously
provide the same level of satisfaction to the consumer. Surviving a downturn
requires companies to go for technologies that best suit their business needs.

Experts believe that enterprises can gain substantial value by entering into
pure process deals instead of a device or man-hour based deal. If companies are
finding it tough to manage their networks, outsourcing services may just be the
right thing.

As per a recent report by Research and Markets, continuously increasing
network traffic, shortage of skilled workers and need to focus on core
activities are the primary drivers of network management services. Factors such
as increased penetration of broadband, increased online collaborations,
e-commerce, and globalization are also driving the demand for these services.

Estimates suggest that currently the telecom industry is spending around $40
bn on telecom operation management systems out of which the share of network
management was over $7 bn in 2007. Other verticals that are major contributors
to this sector are BFSI, banking, finance, securities, investment and insurance.

Experts panel

Alamuri Sitaramaiah, GM, sales, Fluke Networks Gowri Krishna, VP, network design & engineering, Tech Mahindra Gurpreet Singh Kohli, head, gobal networks practice, HCL Comnet P Balaji, VP, marketing & strategy, Ericsson India Sudhir Narang, MD, BT India Sanjay Vig, CEO, Orange Business Services Sanjay Virnave, president, sales, Tulip Telecom Peter Chai, vice president & GM, Asia Pacific, 3 Com Prasad Babu, director marketing/service provider, Juniper Networks

Engineering Vogue

Banking on new engineering and ever-changing business needs, the sector is
steering toward highly integrated management solution sets with insistence on
proactive rather than reactive approach. This would enable customers to deploy
and manage networks based on policies, and also move toward demand computing.

Driving growth for the network management sector will be considerations
lowering and optimizing management costs, offering next generation services,
improving end-user experience of IT and competitive advantage. In addition, more
outsourcing of services will surely help lower costs by aggregating volumes. And
with remote infrastructure management services being offered, the country is
well placed to achieve a high growth rate in 2009.

However, the service provider's challenge would be the consolidation and
better control of a network in order to justify the quick RoI. After all, no
operator would want to take a shot at long term returns in the present stringent
shades.

Some technologies that have made an impression in the market are unified
communications, collaboration, telepresence, performance assurance, routing and
switching management, end point security, multimedia technologies like content
delivery and digital signage, application acceleration/WAN optimization for
improving application response time and reducing bandwidth on WAN links.

In the last few years, the business trends have been outsourcing network
management partially or fully and focus on other value added services. This is
creating new opportunities in network management such as network and application
lifecycle management, end-to-end customer service management, implementation of
process and systems to view the end-to-end network, network management via
remote support system, etc.

If we analyze, outsourcing management services can take place in two ways-on
site and remotely. And to leverage both these options, service providers need to
provide customized business solutions in order to meet customer prerequisites.

Issues in the Long Run

Like the global market, network management systems are largely outsourced in
India. Conventionally, it has not been a focus area as it requires heaps of home
grown and canonical technologies. Also, the inherent price sensitivity of the
Indian market is another area which needs to be dealt with.

However, with the maturity of the market, rising competition, and a focus on
subscriber retention, various players are increasingly realizing the magnitude
of this area. And the practice of working with bare minimum investment is
expected to diminish. From the current market perspective, end-to-end systems
integration and hosted network management services offerings can become very
successful business models in India.

Carrier's network infrastructure represents between a third and half of their
operating costs, so companies spend a lot of time and effort reducing the burden
to release cash quickly. But with traditional cost cutting remedies, carriers
often struggle to balance speed of cost reduction with the retention of critical
business capabilities and future sources of value.

Furthermore, there is an increasing focus on areas that are service centric
such as service assurance or service fulfillment. Increasingly the focus for
network management is shifting from pure 'network management' to more and more
of delivering a complete end-to-end service experience aptly titled 'service
fulfillment'. However, in India this is evolving .

There would be an increased focus on the CIO to ensure the business is
connected and serving the needs of all stakeholders. The growing SME segment
also provides immense opportunity for this sector to flourish. As a result of
the economic downturn, more customers are looking to further reduce costs
through business process improvements and creating new opportunities for network
management services. However, utmost care should be taken by service providers
to furnish customized and centralized solutions.

Jatinder Singh

jatinders@cybermedia.co.in