ATLAS COMMUNICATIONS
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Has the cloud finally brought the challenge of David v Goliath to a close? asks Richard Simpson, Atlas Communications
avid vs Goliath. It’ s a commonly used metaphor for every small business who has to compete against massive multinationals in their marketplaces.
In the IT industry, which changes at such speed, smaller providers face massive challenges to compete. It’ s the common cycle of invest & renew that all small businesses know, it just seems to happen a bit faster.
With Cloud computing becoming more widely used, the model for selling is changing. Capital costs are moving to rental and we are seeing more direct entry and control from the big players, instead of going through resellers.
Microsoft offer Office directly via Office 365, Google have Google Apps. You no longer have to buy a server when you can rent one on the cloud.
Your local IT provider has to help you migrate to the Cloud and will continue to help when your PC has a problem but their revenue sources are diminished as the global giants push more and into more direct services.
How can small business fight their corner?
In many ways that hasn’ t changed, good niches, great service, local presence and depth of experience still have their place in the market.
Our industry, like many others is seeing the big names exert direct control over pricing and purchasing channels. They own the product, they own the infrastructure and, in the world of Cloud IT, they will have your data when it becomes stored in one of their data centres somewhere in the world.
So, how to compete? Do we seek new spaces? Do we seek to partner more with those giants but have less control over the sales and service process?
After a year of research and market analysis we decided we wanted to own the infrastructure that our Cloud Services were operating upon. In short, we decided to compete headtohead with some of the most familiar names in the business.
The result is that we have become the first independent provider in UK to offer Cloud Infrastructure using Microsoft Azure, one of the leading cloud services in the global marketplace.
So what does that mean?
Applications and data you use to run your business are often stored on the Cloud. Microsoft Azure is one of the biggest players in providing the computing power and data storage for those services. It’ s owned and managed directly by Microsoft
You may well have seen the adverts on TV about its benefits. Now Azure cloud computing power is here, in Northern Ireland, serviced and supported by a local company.
Why do it, why offer what global giants already do?
Many people reading this know that question and know they can do the same things that big players do, but better. The Cloud as a concept has been accepted already but its costs, its risks and any limitations are only starting to become clear now.
We believe that there is still a place for what an SME like ourselves can do to make The Cloud work better, especially if we own and control the key components of the service.
One of the great benefits of sending services to the Cloud is that you aren’ t buying or maintaining expensive server equipment. As a service it can change & grow with you with a lot less fuss. Sounds attractive, but try to work out what it costs to rent many Cloud services, each and every month. Then try budgeting it before you buy it and experience it.
The costs are not just the rental of computing power it’ s the connectivity to
access it. Is it good enough? How much does it cost? It’ s a problem, it’ s unpredictable. Business doesn’ t like uncertainty.
We think there are ways to make the costs more predictable.
Then there is Brexit, aka the ultimate in uncertainty.
Locality of your data is now on the agenda. Data sovereignty and security rules and regulations may well go through change. It’ s possible that working by the rule that data being held within the EU is‘ ok’ will no longer apply. For some businesses it doesn’ t apply already. All a better reason to know where your data is going to be.
There are more advantages we believe can be offered by an SME like us against the big players. In the land of giants, there are still gaps for the smaller player to run through.
Richard Simpson, Managing Director of Atlas Communications. Atlas provides inpremises and hosted Cloud data, network and telephony solutions to businesses across Northern Ireland and are happy to assist you on 028 9078 6868.
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