1076RA Master Brand Scrambles Spotlight User Shift to “Boundary-free” IT

What is Happening? Earlier this week, several trade media outlets reported that Dell was in talks to acquire one of its core software partners, Quest Software. Quest offers solutions designed to “simplify the management of IT across physical, virtual and cloud environments,” according to its website. Regardless of whether or not the acquisition occurs, Saugatuck sees this type of activity as another indicator of two key trends:

Enterprise IT leaders and organizations are looking to traditional, IT Master Brands (“comfort vendors,” as we call them) for ways to manage increasingly-uncertain IT architectures and environments; and
Traditional IT Master Brands are shifting their M&A activity to not only maintain their enterprise presence, but to establish or enhance credibility in a shifting, “boundary-free” IT and business environment.

Why is it Happening? Leading, competitive IT providers constantly acquire and divest other providers, technologies, and services to maintain and improve their competitive positioning. They follow trends based on what they see a critical mass of enterprise customers doing. And what the providers see their customers doing now is not only moving to Cloud, but changing – really, re-architecting – their IT and business infrastructures to reflect changing ways of doing business, and to reflect increasing/changing business opportunities.

As clients of our CRS subscription research services know, Saugatuck believes that the confluence of Cloud, mobility, social/collaborative IT, and analytics mean that businesses and individuals are less encumbered by constraints of time and place, working within an emergent and shifting array of time- and location-independent computing capabilities, creating what Saugatuck calls the Boundary-free Enterprise™ (515RA, Cloud Computing: Shifting Users Out of Boundaries, Vendors into Ecosystems, 15Oct2008).

Enterprise IT leaders and organizations have just begun to research and understand how the realities of the Boundary-free Enterprise alter IT architectures, acquisition, and management. Saugatuck has developed a model of this emergent, malleable Master IT Architecture for 21^st century business and IT realities (1052CLS, Boundary-free Enterprise™: Empowered by the New Master Architecture, 11April2012).

A critical factor for IT leaders in such an environment is the ability to manage the environment while being comfortable enough to outsource aspect of IT and operations that have traditionally been kept in-house. Most want and expect traditional datacenter / infrastructure Master Brands such as Dell, HP, and IBM to step up and deliver increased and improved management capabilities for the new master architecture, so we see Dell boosting its integration and management capabilities (e.g. Boomi, possibly Quest), IBM adding integrated systems and management capabilities into servers (e.g., PureSystems), and HP re-organizing to coordinate long-standing IT management software and services into Cloud-friendly lines of business (Lens360 blog, HP Cloud Update: Solid Strategy and a Top-down Mandate, 10April2012).

Market Impact The new IT master architecture(s) must incorporate flexibility and agility with adequate governance. The effects of the shift toward “boundary-free” business and IT mean the rise of what Saugatuck calls “free range” computing, which has the ability to cause massive disassociation on how, where, when, and by what means “IT” gets done (803MKT, Free-Range Knowledge Work Spotlights IT Dissociation and Future, 30Oct2010). Without an adequate and agile IT architecture – which dictates IT management and operational practices – this results in the dissociative behaviors between IT and the rest of the enterprise, including:

IT organizations are less involved in or aware of IT acquisition and use, because
IT users are less visible to, reliant upon, or involved with, centralized IT organizations; therefore
IT strategy and operation becomes less dependent upon core business, budgeting, spending, and even IT assets

Such behavior makes it more and more difficult (and costly) to not only manage IT, but to enable the agility that IT needs to operate effectively in a boundary-free environment.

The net effect on IT providers is an as-yet-undefined need for improved integration and management abilities. So we can expect to see the emergence of more providers and services that address a wide variety of pieces to the expanding IT management puzzle – which suggests the need for more, and better, “managers of managers” whether delivered as a service, on-premises, or in hybridized forms.

Adding to the potential for confusion is the fact that most enterprise IT and business leaders expect to go through a transitory period between traditional on-premises IT and Cloud-based IT from now through 2016. Figure 1 presents summary data from our most recent global SaaS/Cloud survey.

It certainly appears that hybridized environments are seen as transitional phase toward a Cloud-dominated future. Enterprise executives appear hopeful that more IT and business can and will be moved to Cloud over a very short period of time, with rapid and massive Cloud use growth from 2014 – 2016.

Figure 1: Transitional Period for Hybridized Environments?

Source: Saugatuck Technology Inc.

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Bruce Guptill

Most research firms can explain what happened; some can explain what is happening. Saugatuck Technology excels at understanding both in order to explain what else is likely to occur, and to guide its clients toward the actions that deliver them the greatest business value while enabling the safest business path.
To accomplish this, and to continually improve the value of Saugatuck’s work to clients in a Cloud-obscured marketplace, Saugatuck SVP and Head of Research Bruce Guptill pushes his team to continually re-examine and re-invent the company’s research programs to focus more on the costs, benefits, effects, and value of an ever-changing mix of technologies and providers in different markets.
Guptill’s own technology and business background laid a solid foundation for such a flexible, yet stable, approach to IT research value for clients. His technology research work includes mobility, collaborative IT, telecom, data networking, web commerce, and electronic marketplaces; his research work for enterprise IT and business clients includes return on IT investment, total cost of IT ownership, and business planning for IT. His research and guidance on vendor channel management, market identification and development, and buyer behavior analysis has enabled hundreds of established and startup IT providers to find, enter, and profit from new and traditional markets, while helping to guide user enterprise leaders toward optimal IT procurement and vendor management.
Guptill’s research background includes several years as a VP and research director with Gartner, senior positions with TeleChoice and Robert Frances Group, and editorial work within the IDG companies, including four years as a writer and editor with NetworkWorld. His marketing business focus was honed as VP of marketing for firms ranging from custom development providers to non-IT firms in aviation and other industries. His sales and channel experience started by traveling with a sample bag, then working for IT VARs, then advising telecom and wireless carriers on partner choices, to developing partner programs for traditional and Cloud-based software development firms and ISVs.
Guptill holds an MBA in marketing and finance, and a BA in the psychology and business of mass media communication. He is licensed to fly airplanes, drive boats, and sell houses; he is also a certified baseball coach, serves on the boards of regional civic groups, and is a serial home renovator. Married with three children, Guptill resides on Cape Cod in southeastern Massachusetts, and is a lifelong fan of the Red Sox, Patriots, Celtics, and the University of Connecticut Huskies.

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