Managed services evolve as businesses seek higher efficiency

• 2016 Accenture survey shows market readiness for network virtualisation services
• Managed Virtual Services primed to take off in corporate world  

Businesses today are zeroing in on the bottom line like never before. Fortunately, technology advancements and business models enabled by these technologies have given forward-looking companies new opportunities to do so. One of the hot areas at the intersection of business and technology is Managed Services.

It started out with businesses using a third party to remotely monitor and manage their servers and networks. Over time, Chief Technology Officers and other C-suite executives began to value how Managed Services liberated their IT/Network teams from daily tasks like network management and monitoring.

In addition, Managed Services freed up their capital expenditure (capex), allowing their companies to reinvest into business strategy rather than costly infrastructure that would quickly become obsolete with the pace of innovation today.

Having proven its value, the scope of Managed Services soon expanded to include mobile device management, managed security, remote firewall administration and security-as-a-service. Today, this is a model used by over 60% of Fortune 500 companies.

However, just as the tech world never stays stagnant, Managed Services has also undergone an evolution. Enter Managed Virtual Services, the next generation of services that allow businesses to minimise infrastructure acquisition and easily increase scalability and mobility.

The timing is also right for such an enhanced service offering. A 2016 survey conducted by Accenture shows market readiness for network virtualisation services, with the majority of respondents believing that network services will be virtualised and evolve to an “as a service” model within the next three years.

Indeed, the value proposition makes the case for virtualisation a no-brainer:

• Lower costs – opex & capex (reduced number & cost of hardware, software)
• Network and resource optimisation – Outsourced & centralised management
• Flexible – On-demand service, customer portal
• Security – Firewall, DDoS protection, all-in-one solution

Adopters of Managed Virtual Services will appreciate the fact that network functions such as routing, security and virtual private network connectivity will be delivered via software rather than dedicated hardware devices, enabling them to reduce costs further.

To put the lower costs into context, one research house, ACG Research, compared the total cost of ownership of the present mode of operations with the virtual managed service solution for two managed services offerings – cloud VPN service and security service. It found operational expenditure (opex) to be about 78% less for the virtual managed service solution for both offers and that return on investment (ROI) for both was more than 200% over a five-year planning period.

With customers demanding faster and better service, speed to market has become a siren call for businesses trying to meet market demand. The convenience and flexibility of Managed Virtual Services is a significant boon in achieving that aim. For instance, while the installation and configuration of non-virtual services can take days to weeks (subject to hardware availability and distance, with sites outside of major cities taking longer), Managed Virtual Services will be available immediately once the link is provisioned.

Malaysia’s TIME dotCom Bhd (TIME) appreciates and aims to deliver the value afforded by the virtualisation of such network functions to businesses in Malaysia and the region. That is why TIME is leading the way by introducing Managed Virtual Services as a standard market offering, starting with:

• TIME Managed Virtual Router – moves the functions of the traditional router to the cloud, simplifying network configuration
• TIME Managed Virtual Firewall – a network security service that runs in a virtualised environment

This is just the beginning of TIME’s rollout of a steady stream of innovative products into the market, each designed to help its customers be more adaptive, efficient and competitive.

For more information about TIME and its Managed Virtual Services, check out www.time.com.my.