Cloud Providers

Contracts & Workloads

AWS, Azure, GCP, IBM and Oracle are top U.S. cloud providers with global capabilities. They provide legacy Information technology (IT) services that scale and newer strategic features. Multi-cloud use is also increasing. Selecting and optimizing IT services internally and among clouds is key. Our volume buying expertise and technical abilities provide business and IT workload management assistance for internal, internal cloud and in-the-cloud services.

"Enterprise system software is a multibillion-dollar industry that produces components supporting a variety of business functions. IT investments have become the largest category of capital expenditure in United States-based businesses over the past decade." - Wikipedia

Data - one of the Company's most valued assets

We recently heard a report on TV that data is the new oil. Data is also like oil because it is a raw material (electronic) that needs to be structured, stored, refined and made available when needed. It is also a Company's memory to access and glean information. Using the latest technologies, like in-memory databases, also speeds transitions with large MPPs (Data Lakes used for heavy-lifting/big data). Industrial Big Data can be refined using commodity servers at scale for lower-cost-to-insight.

Determining aggerate spend, service performance and proactively making service changes can be a challenge to manage. Also, making a choice to build in-house, cloud on-premise or in-the-cloud. We use a two-tier model, separating contract management and technical aspects.

Managing contracts (Tier one)

Workload Management (Tier two)

Multi-cloud use

Avoid unexpected high bills when using cloud services by planning, budgeting, allocating, monitoring and optimizing performance and spend. Proactive self-management. Change services when needed.

Technology

Technology is the sum of techniques, skills, methods, and processes used in the production of goods or services or in the accomplishment of objectives, such as scientific investigation. - Wikipedia

Alexicon - areas to consider when analyzing and designing a single application or "service." Column on the left is your Company.

Company

Shareholder or owners

Competitors

Mission and Vision

Brand(s)

Strategic advantage(s)

Objectives

Products and Services

Compliance

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

Indicators, metrics and reporting

Plans

Targets

Performance: Revenue, COGS, Expenses, Quality and Value

People

Talents

Skills

Relationships

Requirements, design, implementation and training

Understands and furthers processes

Helps design and define processes, systems, KPIs, indicators and reporting

Provides process and system training

Needs defined and working processes

Likes to learn, perform and be effective

Knows the rules and how to perform

Indicators and metrics

Goals and targets

Motivated

Monitors

Evaluates

Makes decisions

Change management

Continuously improves processes

Process

How things get accomplished

Embedded in work instructions and systems

System Architecture (Company landscape and individual system process)

System model and transformation process

Define

Measure

Analyze

Improve

Control

Standardized process versus work-arounds (avoids two or more processes for same area)

Competitive advantage(s)

Manual, Simi-automated and Automated

Dollars, counts and time durations

Guides consistent quantity and quality output

Systems

Internal and/or External

Users like the system

Users sentiment and use analytics

Meets the business process

Flexible for process improvements

Available and quick

Fosters involvement and use

Ability to transition to newer tools, methods and techniques

Avoids work-arounds

Highlights issues

Provides active performance feedback

Embeds business processes and workflows

System analytics

Cost savings

Return on investment (ROI)


Where will the service reside?

Service

Below are systems that provide a service. Servers can be added physically or virtually to scale (cloud advantage). Commodity servers are used in cloud data centers to reduce hardware costs. The system in the middle is in-house and managed by a cloud partner.

Budget, requirements and high-level design complete.  Now build a service.

Service (car analogy)

The end result of project work to stand-up a single cloud service is illustrated as the car below. Clouds offer services that are configured similar to a car (servers and software). For example, to host one application it requires core and possible parts shown below (servers and software). An individual hosted service ("system") is labeled with an ID like a car VIN. Similar concepts to owning, leasing and maintaining a car apply (contractual relationships, enhancements, maintenance and use).

Once deployed, using and keeping the service running

Users (Drivers)

Customers, suppliers and internal users may use the system and provide feedback by submitting service ticket requests. They can also help during service adjustments, enhancements or changes with IT.

IT Workload Management (Mechanics)

IT has many tasks beyond standing-up a new service. Typically, there is heavy lifting on many systems around data and integrations. More the mechanics of the system to keep data flowing and the system in use and performing (e.g., user response times and usability).

Enterprise Data

Most companies are moving rapidly toward improved application integration, reporting and working on their enterprise data warehouses (EDWs). Visualizations, dashboards and reports “report” data. They all require a grid(s) or chunk-like datasets (smaller the better). Advanced data modeling is a highly-valuable area (a Company’s association model). It is where all the pieces come together for an enterprise data model with fully-managed master data.

Without this done correctly, it can be a bumpy ride. This can cause a driver to pause when needing to take a hard turn or a salesperson needing to present a proposal, customer quarterly review or weekly numbers, quickly. And IT when developing. The better the enterprise data model, the fewer applications, visualizations, dashboards and reports (consolidation and standardization - always working toward). Our company is highly skilled with enterprise data models and their performance. We have worked in environments where tens of thousands of reports exist because of natural EDW growth (adding data sources, dimensions and facts). Evolves overtime.

Accelerated help

Your advantage with Alexicon assisting is 20 years of genuine experience with strategic data models (any EDW we work with). We mentioned a few years back the connection with multidimensional data models and high-dimensional statics. A fully intergraded EDW provides a Company’s Multidimensional Data Model to perform Multi-dimensional Statistics. It has all possible dimensions and facts needed to perform data science computations. A structured data warehouse can drill from the top to needed levels quickly and with accuracy. The same drilling is needed for High-dimensional statistics and other data science computations. For EDWs, users should never experience inaccuracy (1 + 1 = 2.01) when using a system, which is a serious quality issue (like a wrong stoplight).

With data models (data) associated well, IT spends most of their time building needed applications and analytics (avoids point-solutions, workarounds, duplication and unsureness). Main mission is to ensure accuracy, functionality, security and fast click times for users. Most systems are available or online 24/7. IT also needs to coordinate with all parts of the Company and with Suppliers across many systems.

Managing contracts (Tier one)

  • Pre-proposal - Business and Technical Analysis and Fact-finding
  • RFI / RFP - Management, Technical, Performance and Cost areas
  • Evaluation - Point-based system based on ability to perform and overall lowest cost
  • Negotiation - Pricing and Terms & Conditions
  • Award - Volume Pricing and Contract Performance
  • Post-award - Reviews, Usage, Performance, Pricing Plans, Service Level Agreements (SLAs), Budgets and Consolidated/Volume Spend Savings

Workload Management (Tier two)

  • Manual and automated workloads
    • Applications, Installs, Updates, Monitoring, VMs, Containers, ETL, SQL and serverless use
  • System prototype testing (reliability, speed and use)
  • Price Plans
  • Price Cost Analysis
  • Reserved Services (plan ahead)
  • Portability Testing (switching a service or provider)
  • Label or ID Services for reporting
  • Allocate Services to departments or organizations
  • Monitor supplier Service recommendations
  • Optimize Services and spend continuously
    • Adjust, add or remove service
Multiple Services

Consider the number of systems running internally and in-the-cloud at your company. Managing a fleet of cars is similar.  We assist with:

  • Managing Contracts (Tier one)
  • Workload Management (Tier two)

Managing service value and cost.

20 years in technology