White papers
Enterprise software
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Make cloud application deployment a success
Ensure cloud applications deliver the benefits they promise by meeting the challenges they bring to the corporate network
Looking for scalability, manageability and flexibility, enterprises progressively adopt cloud services in SaaS delivery model for standardised applications like CRM (Salesforce), email and collaboration (GoogleApps) as well as conferencing systems. With market players like Amazon, IBM, Microsoft and Rackspace, enterprises can also access virtually infinite computing resources. But cloud applications make a big change on the IT architecture and consumption model - and not every project yields the anticipated benefits.
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Application delivery for next-generation business-ready data centres
The evolving business-ready data centre
All organisations need the ability to make intelligent, timely decisions. SAP Crystal solutions help meet all of your business intelligence requirements on a single information infrastructure while ensuring delivery of the right information to the right users at the desired time.
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Comparison of features by version
Deliver the power of information
Get easy, self-serve information access to reports, dashboards, and search and exploration documents – without causing IT bottlenecks.
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Data is like water: capitalise or capsize
Business discovery for everyone
Data will be as important to improving and sustaining life on the planet in the 21st century as water always has been. CITO Research has unearthed two very different water stories that exemplify the power of Business Discovery for everyone.
Security
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The hidden costs of self-signed SSL certificates
Why self-signed certificates are much costlier
Even when business is booming, smart companies always have an eye on the bottom line. Security is not usually one of the first places companies look to trim expenses, but some IT professionals believe that they can easily lower costs by eliminating third-party Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) Certificate Authorities (CAs) from the budget equation.
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Next generation firewalls for dummies
Making everything easier
With new Internet-based threats being launched faster than ever and increasingly targeting 'firewall friendly' applications and application-layer vulnerabilities, traditional firewalls are becoming less and less capable of adequately protecting corporate networks.
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Better security drives innovation
Building an overall worldwide security system for the long term
Whatever the environment, a CISO must continually help the company take advantage of the benefits of using information.This includes information moving both inside and in and out of the company.
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Best practices for secure enterprise content mobility
Securing mobile devices in the enterprise
To secure mobile devices while enabling employees to share data securely, organisations need a comprehensive and flexible solution for secure enterprise content mobility. A secure enterprise content mobility solution complements Mobile Device Management (MDM) solutions and enables mobile workers to easily share data with other authorised users, while ensuring that data is always secure and IT operations are always compliant.
Business strategy
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Application delivery for next-generation business-ready data centres
The evolving business-ready data centre
All organisations need the ability to make intelligent, timely decisions. SAP Crystal solutions help meet all of your business intelligence requirements on a single information infrastructure while ensuring delivery of the right information to the right users at the desired time.
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A complete entry-level business intelligence solution
Build a solid BI foundation to empower decision makers
All organisations need the ability to make intelligent, timely decisions. SAP Crystal solutions help meet all of your business intelligence requirements on a single information infrastructure while ensuring delivery of the right information to the right users at the desired time.
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Comparison of features by version
Deliver the power of information
Get easy, self-serve information access to reports, dashboards, and search and exploration documents – without causing IT bottlenecks.
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SAP Crystal Solutions FAQs
A comprehensive FAQ guide to SAP Crystal Solutions
Get quick answers to all your questions about the SAP Crystal solutions 2011. Download this FAQ guide to learn about what products will be included in the portfolio; changes in product names, licensing, and prices; compatability issues; and much more.
Grid computing
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Virtualising business-critical applications
A critical first step on the journey toward the cloud
Virtualisation has matured rapidly in just a few years. What started out as a testing and development consolidation tool quickly evolved to being applied to production applications. The latest generation of server hardware and virtualization software offers the reliability, stability, and performance that can address the majority of even business-critical applications.
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Virtualisation: benefits, challenges and solutions
Implement virtualisation without the fear of compromising performance
The majority of organisations have already implemented server virtualisation and most intend to implement additional server virtualisation during the next year. The primary factors driving the movement to deploy server virtualisation are cost savings and the ability to dynamically provision and move VMs among physical servers. There are however, a number of significant challenges associated with server virtualisation.
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Capacity reservation system for virtual & cloud environments
The innovation gap
Virtually every area of human endeavour that involves the use of shared resources relies on a reservation system to manage the booking of these assets. Hotels, airlines, rental companies and even the smallest of restaurants rely on reservation systems to make sure they can optimise the use of their assets over time in a way that balances customer satisfaction and profitability.
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Desktop modernisation
A guide to addressing end-user requirements and IT challenges using VMware desktop virtualisation
On the one hand, there is the need to keep the existing desktop environment efficient, secure and running. On the other hand, there are workforce demands to use new devices and applications, to increase productivity. How can you address both of these requirements? The answer is... Desktop modernisation.
Communications/ networking
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Make your unified communications deployment a success
Deliver the benefits unified communications promise by meeting the challenges they bring to the corporate network
Unified Communications (UC) offer huge opportunities for the enterprise, with benefits including improved productivity, easier collaboration, better customer satisfaction and ultimately, higher profits through more efficient teamwork and competitive advantage. But UC come with their own distinct challenges and not every project yields the anticipated ROI.
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Data centre networking video
Networking for the broadband age
With bandwidth typically sold by other carriers in small increments, increasing your network capacity to keep up with the storage, transfer and accessibility of 'big data' can be easier said than done. Watch this short video, from level 3, to find out how it can be easy to meet your networking needs with without breaking the bank.
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5 reasons your legacy load balancer is failing you
Don't settle for just load balancing
Remember when load balancers just handed off connections among a few servers to improve uptime? Times have changed. If all you are getting out of your load balancer is higher availability then you’re shortchanging your business. With the right investment in an application delivery controller (ADC), you can get availability, scalability, security and even a faster user experience.
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Leveraging the power of video conferencing for business
Best practices for supporting collaboration in the 21st century
The past few years have seen a remarkable change in the way companies do business, and organisations must react to the new way of working to stay competitive in an increasingly global and virtual environment.
Internet/ e-commerce
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Excelling in online marketing
How to effectively attract and convert the best prospects
Today's marketers benefit from an unprecedented amount of data about their prospects and customers, and a seemingly unlimited number of ways to reach out to them. The consistent evolution and sophistication of online channels such as search, social, and mobile present new opportunities to target and engage audiences in ways marketers only dreamed about 10 years ago.
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Increase your e-commerce revenue with continuous application performance management
Attract and retain your customers
It takes only a few seconds for an unsatisfied e-commerce customer to switch to a competitor’s website which impacts both loyalty and revenue. To attract and retain customers, e-commerce businesses need to create a world-class online experience. Customers expect fast, highly interactive, cutting-edge and visually appealing e-commerce applications.
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The fundamentals of IPv6
Migrating to IPv6: series 1
IPv6 is needed to sustain the growth of the internet. IPv4 could in theory be continued to be used and you may be able to work around the address space security limitations of that protocol, but eventually, the cost of staying with IPv4 will outweigh the benefits.
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Video portals for employee engagement
A series of recommendations to help you optimise the use of video
Streaming video is not just a tool for outward-facing communications such as news releases and externally-facing marketing assets. Video can also allow companies to improve internal processes such as corporate communications, learning and development efforts, and onboarding efforts both on campus and remote locations.
Database management
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Drowning in data?
How to manage your growing data mountain
Data is good. But sometimes that's hard to remember, given the deluge of electronic information threatening to engulf businesses. Yet, if managed effectively, the data your organisation generates can represent a vital resource that adds real value to your business and underpins your drive for profit.
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Reduce your data storage footprint and tame the information explosion
The costs of managing unabated data growth
With ever-increasing data growth worldwide, organizations must find smarter ways to store and manage their massive volumes of digital information. IBM Tivoli® storage management software solutions provide you with exceptional value and functionality to maximize your current storage environment and reduce operational and capital costs while improving service and managing risks.
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Struggling with your document filing system?
Five ways an external supplier can help you
Information is a crucial part of any organisation. Mismanaged, it can slow you down and expose your business to security risks, fines and hidden costs. While most people acknowledge that information management is critical, few organisations have the time or in-house expertise to meet today’s needs.
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How to improve access to your records
Why off-site does not mean off limits
Access to the right information at the right time transforms the work place. Mismanaged information can take a long time to find, reducing efficiency and customer satisfaction. The hidden costs of storing and retrieving information are rarely considered but can be significant. With IDC predicting an exponential increase in information, smart businesses should not delay in addressing these challenges.
CRM
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Why deliver extraordinary customer service?
Because it's a 'must' in today's competitive environment
This paper looks at how you can realise the benefits of ensuring great service for your customers.
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4 steps to building loyal and high-value customers
The customer loyalty playbook
How do you identify potential high-value customers and cultivate them to become loyal customers? Here are four steps to help guide your customer loyalty strategy.
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Choosing the best CRM for your organization
Pick the best option for your business needs
As CRM has expanded to encompass elements of collaboration and Web 2.0-style engagement, the software tools to support it have grown and become more diverse as well. Today, buyers have the luxury of choosing from a vast selection of products to help develop and nurture customer relationships. Choice has presented new challenges, however: IT and business professionals must evaluate their options wisely in order to ensure their CRM investments meet their company’s specific requirements.
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IDC Analysis - Improving Organizational Performance Management Through Pervasive BI
Learn more about the 5 key factors which can be directly influenced to increase the diffusion of BI
This IDC Analysis looks at the opportunities and business advantages of pervasive BI within organisations.
Regulatory compliance
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Sending and storing emails
The regulatory regime
The speed and convenience of email have made it the most commonly used form of commercial communication. These features also potentially increase the legal risks for business since without proper tools it is difficult to exercise control over the contents of emails and their generation, use and storage.
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Getting ahead of advanced threats - synopsis
Achieving intelligence-driven information security
In this era of advanced threats, conventional approaches to information security are no longer sufficient. An intelligence-driven approach can deliver comprehensive situational awareness, enabling organisations to more effectively detect and mitigate cyber attacks.
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Managing in the financial services and insurance industries
Five key requirements for CFO's - the key to success
In recent years, the financial services and insurance industries have been continually changing within the global economy, regulations and compliance. As a result of this, traditional ERP systems are no longer seen as flexible and more as time consuming and costly to change.
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Addressing IT GRC
Meet regulatory requirements and reduce operational risk in financial services organizations
Asserting appropriate controls over IT operations helps financial services organizations make sure that systems and networks are running properly and that data is protected against the risk of compromise due to operational failures.
Mobile & wireless
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Moving into a consumer IT model
Take advantage of the productivity benefits of consumerisation while mitigating the risks
This report will analyse the benefits consumerisation offers organisations, look at the best ways to operate a bring your own device (BYOD) policy and advise CIOs on the best business, governance and security policies to implement.
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Creating cross platform enterprise applications from a single source
Mobile strategy
From time to time, the IT Industry has seen the introduction of new technology that dramatically changes the way we interact on a business and personal level.
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The consumerisation of technology
Smart phones in the office - impact, issues and IT
iPads are the must-have fad. Android is the rising mobile platform -- Everywhere you turn, the news is about personal, smart, mobile devices and their impact on business and on IT.
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The economics of networking
Drive efficiency through intelligence and automation
Technology is changing the face of business more quickly with each passing day. Business and technology decision makers are challenged to balance IT resources, business requirements, and user desires. IT is mandated to deliver end-user solutions that increase agility and improve employee productivity without driving up costs. But it is increasingly hard for IT to say 'yes' to their users and stakeholders without sacrificing security or ease of operations.
Storage
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The logic and value of a tiered archive
Tiering across more of the storage hierarchy
The 'storage hierarchy' has been discussed for years and is simply described as putting the right data on the right device at the right time for both data type and for that data's lifecycle requirements. Thus, data moves from one level to another as needed. And it's the 'movement' and 'as needed' parts of that equation that have proven toughest to provide. Discover how the right tiering solution can prepare you for the data deluge heading your way.
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7 simple truths about data tiering
Conventional storage is dead
You've heard of 'big data'. But that phrase sounds tame when you consider the rate at which 'big' is getting bigger. It's startling to hear that 90% of the data in the world has been produced in the last two years.
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Backup and recovery: new strategies drive disk-based solutions
IT budgets and spending patterns
Many firms have made significant investments in their tape-based backup and recovery infrastructure with tape drives, removable media, automation, software licenses and support. In addition, they have invested in people and processes. These investments have made it difficult for firms to change their approach to back-up and recovery.
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Unified storage: one platform for block, file and object
Storage requirements and challenges in a weak economy
Despite the weak world economy, the market for storage subsystems is not showing any indications of slowing down. It shrunk a little in 2009 but fully recovered in 2010 and 2011. The major impact on storage market was the wide adoption of server virtualisation, which accelerated storage networking deployment decisions by many small and medium enterprises (SMEs), and the increased growth of unstructured data in organisation.
Budgets
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Backup and recovery: new strategies drive disk-based solutions
IT budgets and spending patterns
Many firms have made significant investments in their tape-based backup and recovery infrastructure with tape drives, removable media, automation, software licenses and support. In addition, they have invested in people and processes. These investments have made it difficult for firms to change their approach to back-up and recovery.
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5 ways to save on telecommunications in 2012
Add value without involving significant risk or culture change
There is much IT directors can do to further reduce costs this year without having to resort to bleeding-edge solutions or significant culture-change programmes. Download this white paper to find out 5 strategies that can deliver savings and at the same time simplify your organisation. The simple five-point strategy can potentially deliver significant business benefits, at low risk, to your operations during 2012.
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5 steps to successful IT consolidation and virtualisation
Mapping out a successful strategy and how to architect a forward-looking infrastructure plan
There are many benefits associated with IT consolidation and virtualisation, but it can be a very challenging process. It is important to consider all components of an IT consolidation project before embarking on it.
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Why CIOs should look to data deduplication
Reducing storage expenses without compromising data protection
Data deduplication offer benefits to more than just the storage group because they cut data protection capital, facilitate consolidation of distributed backup operations, and slash server virtualization-related storage costs.
Soft skills
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A strategic process for hiring an 'all-star' team
Hire the very best people
There are no shortcuts to good hiring. But with the right process in place, you can have an all-star support team in due course. 'The skills people need to be successful support agents are not always evident from a resume'.
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The ROI and TCO benefits of data deduplication for data protection in the enterprise
Enjoy more reliable backups, more productive IT staff, and reduced costs
For regulatory and business continuity reasons, efficient, reliable data protection is an imperative for every data centre.
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Improve IT staff efficiency while reducing IT costs and improving availability
Maintain peak operating performance across the IT environment
Balancing ever increasing demands in the face of reduced budgets and fewer resources can be challenging for even the most accomplished IT managers.
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How Flexible Are You On Flexible Working?
Realise the benefits
IDC’s latest executive brief examines how organisations should be leveraging ICT more effectively to increase the utilisation and output from their workforce. It explores how organisations are applying flexible working practices, the process they are following, and how they have overcome the challenges they have faced.
Board politics
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Improving and communicating the business value of IT
Return on IT - Selecting critical metrics for business and IT performance
An ROIT roadmap for selecting projects to reduce cost and increase effectiveness.
Outsourcing
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Open source drives innovation in financial services
The benefits of using open source
The shift to mobile applications driven by consumers’ expectations of ubiquitous services combined with the use of private cloud infrastructure is redefining the trajectory of IT investment and the competitive landscape for banks and financial service companies.
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IT systems management buyers guide
Improve efficiency, increase performance, reduce risk and manage growth
IT systems management is more than just monitoring and patching. A complete, proactive and automatic IT systems management strategy can eliminate many of the tedious manual tasks typically associated with IT maintenance, allowing IT professionals to improve efficiencies, increase performance, reduce risk and manage growth.
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Six mistakes companies are making today
Data is your most important asset
Read about the six mistakes small and mid-size enterprises are making, and how to avoid them
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Lean Business Intelligence
Forrester Research
Why And How Enterprises Are Moving To Self- Service Business Intelligence
Desktop & client
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A survival guide to Windows 7
The challenges ahead and best practices for a Windows 7 migration
By February of 2010, just four months after its initial release, Windows 7 had been deployed on greater than 10% of the more than one billion PCs in use worldwide – a milestone it took Vista 16 months to achieve. With the introduction of automation solutions, hardware and software assets can be tracked, configurations can be standardised, and potential compatibility issues can be identified and remediated before being pressured to do so to meet a business timetable.
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A mission-critical virtual desktop environment
Centralise your desktop environment
Virtual desktop environments increase security and simplify management because the infrastructure is in a firewall protected, centralized datacenter that is easily managed by local resources.
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Desktop modernisation
A guide to addressing end-user requirements and IT challenges using VMware desktop virtualisation
On the one hand, there is the need to keep the existing desktop environment efficient, secure and running. On the other hand, there are workforce demands to use new devices and applications, to increase productivity. How can you address both of these requirements? The answer is... Desktop modernisation.
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10 reasons to modernise the desktop
Desktop modernisation is about evolving from the PC-centric mode
In today’s competitive business landscape, users’ needs are continuously changing. No longer is work a place, but rather an idea that is ubiquitous, constant and borderless.
Technology
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The Helpdesk of the future
What does the helpdesk of the future look like?
Customer support is one of those areas of your business where it's surprisingly easy to differentiate yourself.
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Leveraging the power of video conferencing for business
Best practices for supporting collaboration in the 21st century
The past few years have seen a remarkable change in the way companies do business, and organisations must react to the new way of working to stay competitive in an increasingly global and virtual environment.
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Master the 3 stages of video conferencing success
Boost your image
Video conferencing use is growing. In fact, it is expected to grow by as much as 211% before the end of 2013. Better make sure you're putting your best virtual face forward. Video conferencing no longer has to mean 'go to a room with expensive, hard-to-use equipment installed'.
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IT vs. Marketing
Time to kiss and make up
With your company's success depending on technology to an increasing degree, IT-marketing alignment is more important than ever. We expect companies to seduce us with up-to-date technology that serves our needs well, is secure, and functions superbly. And for that to happen, IT and marketing need to pretty much be the best of friends.
Enterprise search
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10 tips for integrating salesforce and non-salesforce systems
Remain flexible and adaptable
More and more companies do not want to be tied to a single business software provider, not even to Salesforce. They want each of the applications they use to provide the ideal function and cost; the term used for this approach is “Best-of- Breed.”
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The impact of data center and server relocation on application performance
A proven strategy for project success
According to analysts, 88% of enterprises are currently in the early phases of either consolidating servers or executing a major data center relocation. These consolidations and relocations bring measurable benefits. For example, they reduce Information Technology (IT) costs, improve business continuity and and help comply with government and industry regulations.
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Deploying your applications in the cloud
Strategies to proactively mitigate performance risk
Corporations worldwide are shifting technology resources and infrastructure to the cloud. These businesses expect to realise gains in operational efficiency and scalability as a result of the cloud's elasticity, and they expect to reduce capital expenditures on IT infrastructure.
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CIO Insights Research Synthesis
Customer Analytics: A leadership opportunity for CIOs to Drive Customer Centricity
Customer centricity is increasingly critical to strategies for corporate growth, elevating the analysis of customer data to a top priority for most enterprises. CIOs and their IT organizations are uniquely qualified to locate dispersed and disparate customer data, create effective analytics tools to interpret that data, and deliver meaningful customer information throughout the enterprise. But as custodians – not owners – of corporate customer data, IT must forge strategic relationships with customer-facing functions including marketing, sales, customer service, business development, and operations in order to develop effective customer analytics strategies, tools, and processes.
Change management
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4 critical success factors of change management
Mastering configuration
Change management's main goal is to ensure that configuration changes, whether planned or unplanned, are made in ways that can benefit your organisation with the least amount of impact on your IT infrastructure and in a cost effective way.
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Aberdeen Report - Analyst Insight
Enterprise Resource Planning and Business Intelligence: When 1 + 1 = 3
As SMEs grow in size and complexity they increasingly turn to Enterprise Resource Planning and Business Intelligence solutions to provide control and visibility.
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Disaster recovery survey report
Symantec EMEA enterprise survey
Doing more with less has been the recent mantra for IT professionals due to flat budgets. Add to that the increased pressures caused by high downtime costs, stringent service level agreements, and the potential for system outages to test disaster recovery plans, and you may think you have a recipe for disaster.
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How to improve disaster recovery for the enterprise
Advanced replication powered by WAN optimisation
Examining the business and technology trends that complicate and increase the cost of enterprise-wide DR planning and the proven benefits of disk-to-disk backup and replication technologies.
The CIO career
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Aligning CFO and CIO priorities
Business agility and value
Forward-thinking organisations are viewing cloud computing as an investment in business transformation, not just a way to cut costs for IT. Thanks to the cloud, CFOs and CIOs are moving beyond the “either/or” discussions that once forced them to make tradeoffs between IT cost cutting and the creation of new business agility and value.
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The changing role of the CFO
Views on IT from the point of view of senior finance professionals
Large organisations are currently seeing 2 trends meeting head-on, the increased financial scrutiny of internal costs at all levels is connecting with new technology solutions that favour services over internal IT provision. Many finance professionals would argue that this technology development offers significant cost savings, but how accurate is their perspective on IT?
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A CIO strategy for enterprise modernisation
A CIO's guide
As the enterprise becomes more or less effective so does IT. Enterprise effectiveness drives or creates the environment for IT to be effective. Only 1 in 10 CIOs perceive their IT organisation to be more effective than the enterprise. Because the enterprise and IT are so closely connected in this respect, CIOs can take steps to raise the effectiveness of both and in the process establish IT as part of the engine that drives enterprise success.
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CIO Challenges
The Best Defence is a good offence
CIOs have never been as business-focused as they are today, often ranking IT investments that contribute to the top-line above other investments. However, despite tightening budgets, CIOs are also investing in future performance.
Supplier management
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Moving forward with innovative ideas
Strategic archiving
In the late 1990s – when no one really thought about Enterprise Content Management (ECM) - Commerzbank had already developed a first draft concept for a company-wide and interconnected archiving system.
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Challenges confronting shared services
Understanding the costs and aligning shared-services resources with business demands
With costs in operating units pared back to the bone, the attention has turned to shared services – in particular, the IT function – which can be as much as 20% of total expenses in certain sectors.
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