There is no doubt about the massive popularity surrounding software-as-a-service, commonly referred to as SaaS. Estimates state that nearly nine of every ten businesses are using some variation of SaaS applications. And the growth is unlikely to slow. Further estimations on the ubiquity of SaaS for cloud-based workloads forecast a dominating three-quarter of the overall market by next year.

With such a consuming presence in the business world today, considering SaaS applications has nearly become a default for any industry. Yet, with such broad expansion comes criticism. The sheer growth of SaaS applications is a testament that they offer clear advantages. But what are the potential downsides of this technological phenomenon?

An organization should be prepared to understand both the advantages and disadvantages associated with SaaS. We examine a few of the most critical pros and cons in this article.

A brief introduction to SaaS

Organizations across industries are transitioning their operations to cloud-based environments. The simplest way to understand computing through the cloud is that this solution relies on storage and access through the internet instead of a hard drive or other types of local storage systems.

This mass-escalation of cloud-based solutions nearly guarantees the continued growth of SaaS software and applications. SaaS is one of three primary categories of cloud computing, utilizing a method of distributing software from third-party providers to customers over the internet.

Typical SaaS models involve the licensed use of an application through subscriptions. This distribution method stands in contrast to the historical use of software-on-premise, installed in the same building as the user. SaaS applications can often include resources that apply to communication, accounting, customer relations, business performance, and numerous other applications.

Examples of popular SaaS providers include Google Apps, Microsoft, Slack, Hubspot, Salesforce, Dropbox, and a long—ever-expanding—list of other purveyors.

Advantages of SaaS

The concept of computation as a public utility goes as far back as the 1960s, with the now-famous statements of John McCarthy. But the rapid increase of SaaS has been enabled by the wide adoption of the internet in the past two or three decades.

This section examines some of the advantages that have propelled SaaS applications.

Adaptable subscriptions

SaaS replaces the purchase of software-on-premise with a flexible subscription model to a customer’s individual needs. Subscriptions paid monthly, quarterly, or annually are the most common. They provide a modifiable and recurring operating expense that can help project budgets based on evolving operating costs.

Reduced costs

Replacing licensing costs associated with the purchase of software with amenable subscriptions fees most commonly results in lower initial costs for a customer. This exchange often allows a company to move its investment into operating expenditures rather than further capital expenditures.

A customer’s decreased reliance on hardware and software is also a reason for lower costs, resulting from the SaaS provider managing IT infrastructure that administers the software.

Less effort to access

Using cloud-based computing, SaaS’s applications require little more than an internet connection, browser, and user authentication. These resources can, in essence, be accessed from anywhere and at any time. Expending less effort to access commonly leads to reductions in cost and increases in productivity.

Ease of scaling

Due to SaaS’s modifiable nature of subscription-based models, a company is supported in maximizing the limits of its budget, with access to the most updated technology and professional services. Subscriptions can be altered to match increases or decreases of a company’s volume, permitting optimized performance and elevated expansion opportunities.

Refined implementation and maintenance

On-premise software resources typically required extensive deployment periods to install software across the entirety of an organization. Effort and productivity are saved when employing SaaS solutions, demanding only a functioning system and the initiation of access while the subscription is active.

Continued management and maintenance are also handled by SaaS, reducing labor and costs. These maintenance efforts also apply to regular software updates that mitigate any bugs or errors in the software.

Disadvantages of SaaS

Given the advantages of employing SaaS applications, an organization is likely to encounter the consideration of adopting these resources. It is critical to regard the potential disadvantages while considering a SaaS provider.

Less control

By relinquishing implementation and management to a third-party, a sacrifice to control over the software solution occurs. An organization becomes reliant on the version of software a provider offers while losing opportunities to make certain customizations for specific operational needs.

Challenges to connectivity

Connectivity relates to potential cloud-based failures or issues with the internet. SaaS functions rely on access to the internet and its cloud sources. Provider outages or unreliable internet connection can result in lost time, lower performance, or productivity challenges.

Security concerns

Cloud-based environments can result in confidential and essential information being store outside the organization’s server. This presents added concerns over this data’s security, which can impact privacy protection and access management—leading industries that work with sensitive data to be skeptical of SaaS services.

Service agreements

The expansion of SaaS has resulted in a diversity of providers who commonly use varying service level agreements. Such agreements can involve matters of data breaches and service failures. Navigating the details of various service agreements is critical to ensuring safety and security, resulting in an expenditure of time and confusion over the potential impact on a business.

Resources

There are many factors to consider with the adoption of a SaaS application. An organization must determine what portions of operations may benefit from SaaS. It must also traverse a substantial and ever-growing population of service providers.

Network Coverage has assembled a set of technology and business solutions to support your organization in maneuvering through this complex and critical environment.

Set up a consultation with Network Coverage for experienced advice and support.

Running a successful business is a challenge, no matter the size of the organization. Whether large or small, companies are a complex set of operations and equations. And to make matters more complicated, the modern business is now smarter than ever before.

Business intelligence (BI) has revolutionized how any organization can use the data it produces to secure knowledge and advantage. Data is commonly generated concerning customer behaviors, operational performance, finances, and numerous other areas. Technological advancement surrounding BI allows a business to harness this data to create awareness that has critical implications for growth.

BI can assist in identifying ways to increase profit or assess the trends of customers. It can also compare data with competitors or shed light on market trends. Data generated using BI can also discover operational issues, track performance, and optimize operations. These technologies can even offer predictions on future success.

Modern business operations now depend on intelligence to strike a competitive advantage. In this article, we examine an understanding of what constitutes business intelligence and how it works.

Why is Business Intelligence (BI) Vital?

A business that operates smarter is more likely to succeed. Even further, BI is quickly becoming a new standard for companies. The question is less often about whether or not a business implements BI; the question is more about the extent to which a business harnesses BI’s power.

BI is essential to modern business for a variety of reasons. With most solutions able to generate data analysis in real-time, a company stands to accelerate their ability to answer customers timely and respond to issues as they arise. A business can mitigate concerns in minutes rather than waiting for the damage to occur. This advantage quickly leads to improved customer satisfaction and refined operational efficiency.

Better intelligence also results in better decisions. BI can extricate facts and transform data into information that can be acted upon and consistently trusted. This ability to access and understand data contributes to more accurate and timely strategies according to trends and patterns in data that can support prioritization and resource allocation.

In the end, faster reporting and more dependable strategizing will increase the ROI for any size business. BI will help companies illuminate and achieve goals while promoting productivity and using data to discover new revenue opportunities.

Business intelligence definition

Business intelligence has been an evolving concept. Early forms of BI involved the information shared between various organizations. As computer technologies progressed, the meaning of business intelligence changed along with it. Eventually, computer-based models for making business decisions led to data being used for insights that could impact the current and future circumstances of a business.

Modern definitions of business intelligence can involve functions that use technology, skills, and applications to inform business decisions based on data. This can include data collection, aggregation, analysis, and presentations that influence how decisions are made within a business environment.

BI has the capacity to use various types of software and services to farm data and leverage it into an awareness that businesses can utilize. Tools employed in BI’s effort can be used for numerous purposes, primarily for strategic action and assessment of a business’s operating status. BI resources can transition data analysis into reports, dashboards, summaries, graphs, charts, maps, and various other presentations. These insights can offer detailed awareness of the state of the business. BI may also refer to a spectrum of resources that provide information for optimizing strategic and calculated business decisions.

Business intelligence examples

Many businesses are underutilizing BI resources. This can commonly result from BI requiring too much manual input. For example, small companies’ common shortcoming is to gather data by manually inputting it into spreadsheets on a cloud drive. Essentially, these cloud drives become a warehouse of data for the business. Such an operation is rarely sustainable for an organization. Data inevitably grows broader and more complex, or an organization’s operations develop into more dynamic environments.

Modern BI tools are designed to efficiently and affordably manage an ever-expanding warehouse of data. These tools are not only easier to work with; they are also more secure and more straightforward to use. Much of the operations with BI technologies can also be automated.

Here are three examples of companies that used BI tools in diverse ways to benefit their business.

REI

As a co-op, REI (Recreational Equipment Inc.) relies heavily on membership. They faced a challenge in tracking membership metrics that involved large amounts of data. Monitoring and analyzing metrics such as acquisition, retention, and reactivation were critical to future strategy decisions. This data impacted deciding whether to further invest in physical retail stores or generate more digital opportunities for their members. The company was also able to gain insight that influenced other areas, including shipping methods, member lifecycles, and product category assortments.

Reddit

Reddit is a social media website that has grown to accommodate over 430 million visitors per month worldwide. The focus of the company on aggregating news and community discussion relies heavily on the tool of BI. They faced a massive amount of data congestion that hindered their access to critical business indicators, such as brands or products mentioned on the platform. BI tools allowed Reddit to push through the blockage to data and capture essential sales growth.

Chipotle

This now-famous American restaurant chain has more than 2,400 locations worldwide. With such a massive scale of restaurants, Chipotle encountered difficulties producing a unified view of their many sites due to insufficient data sources. By incorporating BI tools, they were able to gain a wide-ranging and centralized perspective of all restaurants, empowering them to optimize operations through clear and efficient reporting.

Resources

The benefits of BI resources are broad and essential. A company or enterprise stands to reduce costs, improve productivity, increase security, and ensure critical data is accessible and accurately analyzed.

Implementing and maintaining a set of BI tools for your business can be complicated and require support. Specialists at Network Coverage can assist in this essential and ongoing process.

We provide BI services that include ERP management, data collection and reporting, dashboard development, performance reporting, and various other essential elements for your BI solutions.

For experienced advice and support on designing and implementing effective BI systems, you can explore expert technology solutions for business strategy by setting up a consultation with Network Coverage.

Tips for a Smooth Cloud Computing Transition

You might have heard about “the cloud,” but do you know what it is and how to use it as a business tool? Cloud computing is a great way to save your business money and scale business solutions with the growth of your company.

Unfortunately, transitioning to the cloud can be tough since so many business owners don’t know the first thing about cloud computing. Even if you don’t know much about the cloud, following these tips can help your business make a smooth cloud computing transition.

Understand Your Goals

The first step to ensuring your business makes a smooth transition to the cloud is taking the time to clearly outline your goals with cloud computing. The cloud can be used for lots of different purposes when it comes to business, so knowing what you want to achieve and how cloud computing can benefit your business is important.

Once you’ve decided on your goals, you can start mapping out a plan to achieve those goals. You need to consider what sort of functions and features you need from cloud computing, as well as what sort of infrastructure is best for achieving those goals.

Clearly outlining your goals with cloud computing allows you to focus your transition around those goals. When you design your cloud computing strategy around what you want to achieve through the cloud, your business will have a much better success rate in terms of making the transition.

Choosing a Cloud Platform

Choosing a Cloud PlatformOf course, you also need to choose the right cloud platform if you want the transition to be easy. There is no “best” cloud services provider. Instead, there are a handful of things you should look for when you’re choosing a cloud platform:

  • Scalability: Ideally, you want a cloud service provider who can scale services with your business as it grows. This saves you money early on and ensures your cloud services can grow with your business.
  • Customizability: Good cloud services can be customized to fit your needs, no matter what kind of business you run or how experienced you are.
  • Accessibility: The best cloud services are accessible with no more than an internet connection, meaning team members across the globe can easily access the cloud.
  • Cost-Effectiveness: Cloud computing can already save you money, but looking for cost-effective services is a great way to increase cost savings.
  • Management and Support: Having expert-managed cloud services means less downtime and more help learning to use and troubleshoot the products that are essential to your business.

Choosing a cloud platform based on these factors will ensure you get quality cloud services that are backed up by professionals. This means less downtime and a smoother transition for your business, which in turn means more cost savings.

The Six R’s

When talking about transitioning to cloud computing, the six R’s are often brought up in conversation. The six R’s—rehost, re-platform, refactor, repurchase, retain and remove—are potential cloud migration strategies. Each strategy offers different pros and cons, so it’s important to look at all the options to figure out what’s best for your company.

Rehosting, also known as lift-and-shift, is when you move your existing physical or virtual servers to an infrastructure as a service (IaaS) platform. This is a small step that’s fairly simple, but it can still save your business a lot of money.

Replatforming involves taking your existing solutions and upgrading them to another platform. This is a great way to maintain functionality while upgrading to better cloud services.

Repurchasing is when a company switches to another product, often ending existing licensing. An example of this is switching from a self-run email system to an online email service.

Refactoring is generally the most expensive and involved transition method, but it’s a great way to add features or scale that would otherwise be difficult to achieve.

Retiring is the process of deciding which parts of your IT portfolio are no longer needed and turning them off accordingly. Turning these parts off can save your business money.

If you still need a particular IT service or server, you might want to consider retaining it. This is a good strategy for hybrid cloud deployment.

Prepare for Security Challenges

When you’re transitioning to the cloud, it’s not uncommon to deal with new security challenges. Make sure you know what you’re up against and have a plan of action for detecting, securing, and preventing breaches. Fortunately, a good cloud service provider can help you create a more secure cloud computing environment.

Get Help from the Experts

At the end of the day, there’s a reason you run a business instead of offering cloud services to businesses. You may not be an expert on the cloud, but you can always hire somebody who is. If you’re not sure how to handle the transition to the cloud, how to prepare for security challenges, or even which cloud services you need, consulting with an expert is a smart way to make the transition easier.

Cloud services aren’t just diverse and effective, they also scale with your business and make it easier to operate in the modern world. However, making the transition from physical servers and traditional services to cloud computing can be tough. If you want your business to make a smooth cloud computing transition, Network Coverage can help.

Does Hardware Play a Role in Network & Cybersecurity?

This question used to be one of those “40,000 feet above” questions — it was more of a psychological test rather than an actual security concern. Because when we hear the term ‘cyberattack’, the average person’s mind immediately jumps to sleuths in a dark room pecking away at their keyboards whilst delivering a fatal software blow to their intended victim. And for a long time, that’s exactly how our industry functioned.

For the small business, a basic firewall and some security tweaks were probably good enough. For larger companies, perhaps there was a CDN to help mitigate software access to internal systems and even prevent DDoS attacks. But is that really enough? Are you really protected strictly from a software-centric approach?

What Are Hardware Vulnerabilities?

A hardware vulnerability is a flaw within a piece of hardware that allows malicious users to attack, change, or otherwise affect a device beyond its intended use. This can result in a hacker commandeering many different types of hardware from computers and smartphones to internet-connected smart devices like thermostats and baby monitors.

While most businesses probably don’t have a baby monitor in most situations, the number of IoT devices hitting the market every day is growing exponentially. Statista estimates that at the end of 2018 the number of IoT devices was around 22 million. By 2025, this number is expected to reach an eye-watering 38.6 billion, and that growth will continue to trend upward. While this estimation includes consumer products like smart refrigerators, it also includes business-critical devices like gate controllers and security switches.

With this sort of realization, it’s easy to see that there’s a larger amount of new devices being added to our networks. According to CISA, most small businesses don’t have the capacity to handle the ever-growing amount of cyber threats with many small businesses not evening running basic antivirus scans.

4 Ways to Prevent Hardware Exploits

Change your default password

This hopefully applies to small businesses more than an enterprise entities, but it’s one of the most overlooked and basic networking security procedures that we can take. There are now websites that list a majority of the routers on the market today’s default credentials. If someone really wanted to gain access to your network, from the inside or out, it would only take a few minutes assuming you’ve never changed the default administrative password.

This is especially troubling since ISPs often give the same equipment to small businesses as they do to consumers.

Our recommendation: Change all of your passwords and continue to do so often.

Limit or completely eliminate USB use

This example of network security exploitation is made most famous by high-stakes action movies. An agent sneaks into the office of their target with another operative coaching them on how to plug in a thumb drive to usurp all of their data. And while that makes more good entertainment, the real-world consequences could be devastating.

Kaspersky also reported that there’s no antivirus that can detect malware or the like at the USB controller level, and even a device’s charging port can now be exploited.

Our recommendation: Severely limit or completely eliminate the use of USB devices altogether. A securely networked cloud solution provides more security and is easily managed by your company’s IT team.

Update all hardware firmware

Seldom thought of as a vulnerability spot, the firmware of all hardware components like motherboards, processors, and even smartphones can become an instant breaking point for attackers purposely targeting core-level entry points. The NIST is constantly updating the National Vulnerability Database (NVD) in order to help thwart incoming attacks, but the number of sophisticated methods used by attackers continues to grow.

A recent ransomware attack reported by the BBC, called RobbinHood, targeted the city of Baltimore’s government functions and left 10,000 city government computers locked and disrupted city-wide payments.

Our recommendation: Stay on top of critical security updates for any system that is connected to your network directly or indirectly.

Manage your network out-of-band

Out-of-band (OoB) network management is a method of managing critical network infrastructure from outside of the network to mitigate internal and local network exploitation.

The benefits of OoB are numerous, including emergency access to the remote device in the event that a primary network goes down or otherwise becomes inaccessible. It also allows companies to close off specific sets of data while still allowing access to network devices. A paper from the NSA describes the benefits of OoB by noting that the most beneficial implementations successfully create alternate pathways for network traffic from the operational traffic. In the event of a cyberattack, this can potentially limit the access that the attacker could get and helps to keep user operations overall unaffected.

Our recommendation: Consider OoB implementation at least partly for critical systems if not for your overall networking operations.

Tackling Artificial Intelligence and Security

With Artificial Intelligence making an entrance into our ever-evolving daily life, it is worth taking a bit of time to talk about how security can be compromised when using a virtual machine.

The last year or so has been filled with wild reports from various Alexa users talking about how the device started randomly laughing or even talking back or doing actions that were not requested. This led to many thinking they had stepped right into the middle of a science fiction movie!

According to many social media accounts, Amazon’s Echo would spontaneously laugh, causing fear and confusion among many users.

“I was trying to turn off some lights and they kept turning back on. After the third request, Alexa stopped responding and instead did an evil laugh,” wrote one Reddit poster on a thread about the device. “The laugh wasn’t in Alexa’s voice. It sounded like a real person. My wife was there when it happened, and she is the only person who can drop in. I still get chills.”

Another post in the same thread: “The alarm came on this morning however we had the flu and was miserable,” wrote another Reddit poster in the same thread. “I told Alexa to turn off the alarm and upon the second request, she gave us the most chilling witch-like laugh. It scared the wife and my five-year-old so badly that we unplugged her.”

How Best to Use AI

When companies start thinking about how to get the best use from an artificial chatbot per se, it’s easy to see that this could be useful to save money for the company and time for the caller. If you wanted to cancel a credit card or fill out common forms, this could be something fairly easy and wouldn’t require the bot to have access to a lot of information.

Consider the learning curve of this feature. In order for an AI to learn about data, it has to be exposed to all of the different types of information. A dog could be not only a Lab but a Golden Retriever or a Dachshund, as there are many breeds and sizes.

With that in mind, to handle a large corporation, the data the call center would have access to would be immense. Consider when you call your banking institution. There is information that you give to gain access to your account. Most of the time, we input that information at the beginning of the call to get to the correct department.

Once there, we are again asked to verify other account information, such as addresses and phone numbers. The data can be mishandled by an AI as it could get confused or misdirects where the customer is to be sent. Data could be inadvertently shared with other customers leading to identity theft threats or worse.

The AI would continue to learn and be able to, over time, put all the pieces together, but at what cost?

Cyber Security Issues

Because the AI must have access to a wide range of enterprise data to be useful, it draws cyberattacks. AI systems are unpredictable. There can be malicious actors generating more sophisticated attacks against AI and non-AI targets.

Through repeated testing, a potential attacker can get to know your AI better than you do. If attackers find unnoticed weaknesses or loopholes, they could exploit them. This could lead to data breaches and more.

Not to forget the traditional cybersecurity challenges: 80 percent of successful cyber incidents trace back to poor user practices, inadequate network and management practices, and poor implementation of network architecture.

Sometimes Human is Better

Keeping the human aspect intact with customer service may be something your company wants to focus on until there is adequate security in place to implement the necessary requirements and assurances of having an AI system in place.

AI could possibly change up the strategy moving forward with all types of helpful information, customer service, and automated online or over-the-phone customers, saving time and money for both the business and the consumer.

With responsive and layered defenses in place, good situational awareness, and constant review, a seamless interaction can cut call center volume, reduce HR burden and deliver more effective services.

Security Service Information

At Network Coverage, our goal is to help your company thrive without having to worry about the hassle of keeping up with all security-related issues. We want to help you help your customers by taking that worry off the table. For more information on how we can help, contact us today!

 

Resources:

https://www.governmentciomedia.com/chatbots-ai-security

https://www.reddit.com/r/amazonecho/comments/7gr1zw/what_is_your_creepy_alexa_story/

IT Project Outsourcing vs. Staff Augmentation: Pros & Cons

While some aspects of a company’s IT needs to stay relatively steady such as monitoring systems, data backup, and network management, new or unexpected IT projects can bring a bulk of work all at once. When this happens, many companies have to decide whether they want to outsource the IT project or use staff augmentation to complete the project.

IT Project Outsourcing vs. Staff Augmentation

IT project outsourcing is outsourcing the full project or aspects of the project to an external company while staff augmentation adds virtual resources to the in-house IT team to help manage the workload.

The main difference between IT project outsourcing vs. staff augmentation is who is responsible for project management and who is held accountable for results. In IT project outsourcing, the outsourcing company will manage the project and be accountable for results. In contrast, staff augmentation requires in-house project management and leaves your company accountable for results.

Should I Choose IT Project Outsourcing or Staff Augmentation?

Determining whether to augment your staff or outsource your IT project depends on your current team’s capacity as well as your goals for your project. For companies that have a strong internal IT team and who have reliable, dependable management, staff augmentation may be a good option. Companies often choose this solution when they need to maintain a certain level of control over the project. However, for companies whose IT team already manages a full load and who need a project done quickly and with reduced internal management, IT project outsourcing may be the best bet.

The pros and cons of IT project outsourcing vs. staff augmentation depend on a company’s unique IT situation and project goals. Below, we compare the pros and cons of each.

Pros of IT Project Outsourcing

Companies that have a tight deadline and need to maintain day-to-day core business IT management during the completion of the project may benefit from IT project outsourcing.

– Outsourced project manager. One of the benefits of outsourcing IT projects is that project management is handled by the outsourcing company.

– Requires less training. Unless your company has legacy or proprietary systems, there most likely will be little or no training required for an outsourcing company to complete your project.

– More likely to hit deadlines. With an internal team, deadlines are often more negotiable. However, an outsourcing company’s success depends on reliably hitting deadlines.

– Does not distract focus from core business needs. Since you will not be detracting team members from in-house needs to work on the project, core business IT needs continue to be fulfilled as usual.

– Scales more easily. In times when a project evolves or if more resources are needed than anticipated, it’s often easier to scale using an outsourcing company than staff augmentation.

– Turnover rarely impacts the project. An outsourcing company’s agreement is centered on production, not on which team members are executing the project. This means in the case of turnover an outsourcing company is motivated to fill the position with an internal or external team member as quickly as possible.

– Overcomes lack of internal capabilities. If part of your team does not have the capabilities necessary to fulfill a project, it can often be more cost-efficient to outsource the project than train new skills.

– Decreased management costs. Employees for outsourced IT projects mean no additional management overhead for additional employees.

Cons of IT Project Outsourcing

The main detriments of project outsourcing are that it removes control over the project and often makes it more difficult to integrate with internal systems.

– Less control over the project. Outsourcing IT projects means you have less control over the project. This is because after goals, deliverables, and deadlines are established, the actual execution of the project is up to the outsourcing company.

– More difficult to integrate with internal systems. It can be more difficult to integrate outsourced projects with internal systems. This is because it requires the business to align with the outsourced IT team.

– Smaller projects can be less cost-effective. Outsourcing companies are sometimes less inclined to take on smaller projects or may charge a premium for them.

Pros of Staff Augmentation

Using staff augmentation to fulfill an IT project can be beneficial to a company because it improves control over the project as well as making integration with internal systems easier.

– More control over the project. One reason companies choose staff augmentation over IT project outsourcing is that staff augmentation allows more internal control over the project.

– Flexible deadlines. If your project timeline needs to be accelerated without notice, it is often easier to accommodate this with an internal team than with an outsourced team.

– Better integration with internal processes. Since staff augmentation utilizes your internal team, it becomes much simpler to integrate the new IT project with internal processes.

Cons of Staff Augmentation

One of the main cons of staff augmentation is that it relies in part on internal resources to complete the project. This can increase project costs, management workloads, and can detract focus from your core business needs.

– Higher management costs. Staff augmentation for an IT project means managing the project remains internal. With expanded project needs, this often means increased management costs.

– Can detract focus from core business needs. Staff augmentation blends internal staff members with virtual staff members. Without making additional hires, this usually means your IT team is being pulled away from core business projects.

– Greater training costs. While companies will not have to train virtual staff in technical capabilities when using staff augmentation, there still may be training required to get the employee up to speed with internal processes, tools, and other knowledge.

– Can be more difficult to scale. If there is a change to the scope of the project, it is often more complicated to find or change resources when using staff augmentation.

How Can We Help?

Not sure whether staff augmentation or IT project management is right for your company? Reach out! We are happy to help discuss which option might be the right for you.

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A Comprehensive Guide To Intelligent Software

Managing a business is a constant juggling act of being on top of trends, strategies, and analytics – but keeping track of everything is the most challenging part of the job. Unless you have a data specialist on your board, understanding all the information can be a daunting task.

What Are The Top Business Intelligence (BI) Tools? Data Comparisons, Analytics, And Insights

If you’re on the lookout for programs to help you streamline data and analyze them effortlessly, you’ve come to the right place. In this guide, we’ve handpicked some of the top business intelligence (BI) tools to help you get the insights you need for optimal results.

Why Do You Need Business Intelligence Tools?

In the age of automated systems and advanced technology, analyzing data is a job best left to computer programs. Whether you have a designated IT technician or not, modern business tools ensure that human errors are kept to a minimum. Best of all, they also allow anyone in your team to foresee technical issues, sale opportunities, and solutions for your business needs.

Storing paperwork, excel sheets, and disconnected servings can be a thing of the past. Instead of looking at separate things, business intelligence tools will connect all the dots so you can see a wide range of information in one convenient application. From tracking projects and staff to sales projections and business reports, you can have a comprehensive overview of your company at the touch of your fingertips.

How Do You Find The Right Business Intelligence Tools?

Every business tool is different; while the features and prices differ per brand, they all have the same goal: to make running your business easier than ever. With just a few clicks on your dashboard, you can make side-by-side comparisons, review output, organize schedules, and enjoy full access to visualized data. Depending on the tool you use, you can experience the following benefits for your business:

  • Data visualization for projections
  • Improved processes and analytics
  • Integrated internal systems
  • Easy access to security controls
  • Automated reports and predictions
  • Secure database storage

What Are The Top Business Intelligence Tools?

Before choosing a platform, it’s important to consider what the needs of your company are. From compatibility and flexibility to its operational functions, set aside time to determine what program features will help you reach your goals. There are lots of options to choose from, but we’ll help you make the best choice with our list of the top business intelligence tools!

Sisense

If you want something user-friendly, Sisense makes everything easy to understand and control. This business tool ticks off all the essentials like data analytics, natural language processing, real-time reporting, and embedded analytics. With such a simple interface, managing all departments is possible without any of the hassles. It’s also one of the fastest in terms of processing, so you can expect maximum efficiency at all times.

Dundas

Dundas BI is a web-based platform that allows you to access your information online from any device. It’s the perfect solution for owners on the go, especially if you want to keep track of your company in real-time. This gives you the power to make decisions and plans no matter where you are using its advanced features. Although it has some limitations, it more than makes up for it with easy integration of other applications.

SAP Business Intelligence

Take your business to the next level with the help of AI and predictive analytics from SAP Business Intelligence. This versatile tool boasts software that uses machine-learning technology to assist you in foreseeing issues, trends, and crucial information about your company. You can even customize your dashboard to your liking so you can easily make sense of office and back-end data.

Tableau

When it comes to in-depth data discovery and analytics, Tableau is one of the best in the business. You can pool multiple sources to create a comprehensive overview of your company, and they also offer a variety of products to suit your needs. However, if you want to get more out of their business tools, you should expect to pay a price for their professional services.

MicroStrategy

From high-speed analytics to insightful reports and everything in between, MicroStrategy utilizes various sources and puts them in one, easy-to-use dashboard. Accessible on your computers, laptops, and mobile phones, you can monitor exposures, manage risks, and proactively decide on your next moves. Tracking your team’s schedules and requests will also be more transparent as you receive live updates during business meetings or trips.

Conclusion

From collecting information, analyzing data, and generating new actionable opportunities, there’s no limit to what you can do with business tools! Once you find the right software, you can manifest abstract data into action to help you transform your company from the inside out.

With the best business intelligence tools, you can take technological steps towards boosting productivity, profits, and efficiency with modern-day solutions. Book a free consultation with Network Coverage and we’ll help you elevate your company’s growth with our professional recommendations.

The Priority of Hardware Firewalls for Small Business

Managing expenses is core to any size of business. But it tends to be considerably more critical for smaller companies working from a more limited set of resources. How you decide to expend those resources in a startup or small business has dramatic and vital consequences for your organization’s sustainability.

We understand the challenges facing small business owners when it comes to expenses on network and digital security. You need to know that the cost is justified.

Do the benefits outweigh the potential consequences?

Unfortunately, the dangers associated with our digital security have rarely been higher. Protecting the data that allows us to maintain our small businesses is of the highest priority.

Statistics on cybercrime point to the stark reality that businesses of all sizes face similar security challenges and risk of attack.

In response to this harsh reality, we find it essential to explore a better understanding of hardware firewalls and their role in small business security.

Why hardware firewalls are necessary for small businesses

The numbers on cybercrime are stacked against large, medium, and small businesses. It is common to associate risk only with large corporations or major banks. But the statistics provide a different perspective. Cybercrime is not limited to large operations or significant data breaches. The impact of cybercrime is experienced at all levels.

Forbes released an article in 2019 that revealed the glaring perspective that 58% of all cybercrimes were committed against small businesses. Further contributing to an illumination of the threat, Forbes points out how costly these crimes are for small businesses in particular. The cost associated with recovering from attacks is often too great for companies with fewer resources to survive. An official annual report on cybercrime from Cyber Security Ventures stated that global cybercrime damages are projected to reach $6 trillion per annum by 2021.

Trends often point to small businesses being more frequently targeted. This is mainly due to the assumption that a small business is less likely to be secure—and easier to breach. Collecting valuable information from various smaller sources can be even more profitable for a criminal than focusing on fewer options in large ventures. Many criminals also simply have a number of resources available to them that are better suited to small crimes than large-scale operations.

For further resources on the diverse reasons small businesses are increasingly at risk of cyberattacks, consult this article from the Associated Press or consider a consultation with expert solutions provider Network Coverage Managed IT Services.

What is a hardware firewall?

Understanding a hardware firewall and its contribution to your critical security is a vital step toward making an informed decision for your business.

Let’s imagine that a hardware firewall functions much like the security at an airport. Thirty years ago, this comparison would not have worked so well. Airports were considerably less secured or monitored. Even guests without a ticket to board the plane could accompany a passenger all the way to the gate. Times have changed significantly. It is now a completely foreign idea to think of walking our friend or family to the gate and watching as the plane pulls away and flies off into the sky.

Security checks now stand in the way. No one without the proper credentials or a plane ticket can pass through security. The airport is now divided into two distinctly defined areas. A small portion of the airport is open to anyone, and the rest of it is only available to passengers or staff. This security system has a comprehensive and exhaustive set of rules and technology to ensure that only approved and safe entities are permitted entry.

The same can be said for a hardware firewall. It is a physical device that stands between two distinct parts. These parts are commonly a server and a computer. Understanding the server could be understood as the less restricted area of the airport. In contrast, the computer is the point beyond security.

A hardware firewall will serve as a portal with a set of rules and resources that filter only the passage of approved and safe resources through to the computer. However, extending beyond our airport metaphor, a hardware firewall also monitors resources flowing in the other direction—from the computer (through the firewall) to the server.

Hardware firewalls—such as a router—are complex and powerful tools that also employ software to force all traffic (data) traversing the connection for inspection. The firewall can grant or deny access based on a set of programmable rules.

Core advantages to a hardware firewall

  • Extra support: Hardware firewall products commonly provide support that offers assistance with configuration, troubleshooting, and the ability to make expeditious adjustments.
  • Control over port access: This relates to being able to have nuanced control over the set of rules programmed into the hardware. Laws can govern if anyone can have access, or if access is limited to exclusive parties such as a developer or administrator.
  • Stock rule-setting: A set of default guidelines can be installed that apply to the entirety of traffic that flows through the hardware firewall.
  • Managed traffic: Gain full access to governing all types of traffic that can or cannot reach the server.
  • Free up resources: A hardware firewall can govern a full network of devices connected to it. This allows an opportunity to remove software-based firewalls and free up memory and processor capacity on a device, resulting in valuable space for running a business.
  • Add on a Virtual Private Network (VPN): Hardware firewalls permit the application of a further layer of complex and robust security. Installing a VPN service empowers a business with the security and access management for any critical party with an internet connection—from nearly endless locations. This is a uniquely viable security feature for employees working from home or traveling.

Resources

There are many factors to consider for the security and protection of your small business. An organization must determine what hardware firewalls and security measures will be optimally designed for your specific needs.

Network Coverage has assembled a set of technology and business solutions to support your organization in maneuvering through this complex and critical environment.

Set up a consultation with Network Coverage for experienced advice and support.

Difference Between Colocation & Data Centers

“What type of data center solution is best for me?” This is a common question that many people ask, and for good reason: we need to understand how our data is handled to plan for management and growth. There are various ways to set up your IT infrastructure, but choosing the best option requires planning and forethought about current and future data usage along with company goals. Two common IT infrastructure setups include ‘standard’ data centers and colocation data centers. While sometimes used interchangeably, the biggest differentiators are the level of ownership and required management of server security and upkeep.

What Is Colocation?

Colocation brings different servers owned by several companies that are operated and sometimes managed by a single but separate facility. It’s a popular method that allows a business to have a working data center without the costs associated with a new data center construction. The resources and management of the server(s) located in the colocation are sometimes provided by the IT staff on-site, usually for a contracted fee and time period.

For companies with a larger geographic service area, it’s not uncommon for one company to house multiple servers across different colocations. Colocations are usually, but not always, chosen due to their proximity to the business’s offices.

To make it easier to remember, colocation is a service offered by a data center, while a data center itself is the place where colocation is provided.

Benefits of Colocation

Think of colocation like renting an apartment versus homeownership. The colocation is the apartment, and your server(s) are the tenants. Renting the space and signing a lease guarantees a livable space for a predetermined amount of time. As opposed to homeownership (owning a data center), all or most of the maintenance and management typically required of servers is handled for you. Colocations offer excellent scalability at much lower costs than new construction.

Typically Lower Costs

Colocations tend to be cheaper since businesses are essentially renting space. Additional services may be added to a rental, such as on-site maintenance or the handling of hardware changes. Furthermore, the costs of the physical construction of a data center are eliminated, saving businesses even more money. Colocations also allow firms to avoid electricity, cooling, and security costs like fire, flood, and theft protection.

Less Labor Intensive

Because the core of the infrastructure in colocation is already available, your staff won’t need to perform laborious tasks like cable running or power management. Often, colocations offer hands-on maintenance, though this is an optional service.

Greater Reliability and Uptime

Similar to the benefits of lower costs, using a colocation avoids the need to have redundancy systems, power backup solutions, and ISP and telco vendors.

Mostly Fixed Costs

With some exceptions like paying for hardware changes or repairs, the monthly recurring costs of colocation utilization are highly predictable. This allows businesses to better budget for other priority areas like research and development or marketing.

Better Security

Most colocations are constructed to meet or exceed industry standards, including security measures. This provides physical security benefits of being in an occupied space along with cyber security benefits since colocations typically have state of the art firewalls, DDoS protection, and more.

What Is a Data Center?

A data center is a building that’s sole purpose is to house IT hardware like servers. An on-premises data center could be your servers in a closet or room that handles all your IT needs and requires considerable upkeep and day-to-day management. If you utilize colocation or cloud computing solutions, both scenarios have your data in a data center. The difference is: when you’re using colocation, you own the servers but not the data center; with cloud computing, you lease the servers from the data center.

Which Data Center Solution is Right for Me?

This all depends on your current needs and ultimate goals. For most purposes, cloud computing and colocation are typically the most economical options for most small to medium businesses. For enterprise customers, these may still be viable options, although again, that depends on the company’s size.

A company like Google owns its own massive, globally distributed network of data centers and offers data services like cloud computing as a product to other businesses. But a small app developer or SaaS company would likely benefit from the much lower costs of colocation or cloud computing services.

Scaling Your Business

Businesses usually have the goal of sustainable growth. Part of that growth comes at an expense, and for many companies, the highest costs are labor and IT. Contact us today if your company is looking to scale but unsure which data center option best suits your needs. We’ll help your business develop a sound strategy that places scalability and affordability as a priority.

How Virtualization Reduces Data Center Inefficiency

Technology is often filled with buzzwords that create hype for technology companies and confusion for everyone else. The meaning of terms like ‘the cloud,’ ‘Internet of Things,’ and ‘virtualization‘ isn’t immediately apparent in a contextual way. However, beyond these $10 words is an enormous amount of power and potential to change the way businesses and consumers interact with technology at a core level.

What Is Virtualization?

Virtualization describes the process of running a virtual instance of a computer system in a separate layer from the hardware it’s viewed on. Under ordinary circumstances, this means running more than one operating system on a single computer simultaneously.

Virtualization for the Average Person

Apple recently released the powerful M1 series of chips to power their newest desktops and laptops. Since this is Apple’s silicon, there was initially a scramble to keep Mac users’ applications functioning due to Mac’s previously using Intel-based CPUs; the new system architecture is ARM-based, more similar to an iPhone or iPad rather than a traditional computer. One popular function only available to Intel-based Macs is Bootcamp, a macOS feature that allows users to install a copy of Windows for dual-boot purposes.

What does any of that have to do with virtualization? Well, now that Bootcamp is gone, the popular Parallels virtualization software has taken the spotlight as one of the best ways to run another operating system on a Mac including Windows, Ubuntu, and Red Hat.

The Benefits of Data Center Virtualization

But when it comes to a data center, we’re no longer talking about small-scale efficiency. Virtualization in a data center becomes more fruitful, especially in IT management and overall costs.

The need for server virtualization came about because of an old principle that servers would only be used for one application. The more applications we used, the more servers we’d bring on. But for every server that was being deployed, most were heavily underutilized. To simplify things, the process of virtualization allows us to take a standard server and have it act as the four or five underutilized servers of old by instantly deploying virtual instances of — well, anything. In this low-level example, five servers running at 20% utilization could become one server running at 100% utilization. The four remaining servers could then be used for something else.

Instant Resource Allocation

Another massive benefit of server virtualization is the ability to instantly reduce or increase server resources to any virtual machine within the server without touching physical hardware. This helps to reduce IT labor costs and eliminate excess downtime.

In server virtualization, the primary system is called a host, and each server deployment within the host is called a guest. If a server does require a physical hardware change, the entire host and all of its guests can be deployed to another server and seamlessly connected. This allows the original host to be physically modified without any end-user interruption.

Resources like storage and memory can freely be assigned to each guest as needed.

Instant Deployment

That’s the beauty of server virtualization with resource allocation. But when it comes to adding or removing guests from the hosts, this is when virtualization really shines. Need a new server environment to test an upcoming app? Deployed. Taking that a step further, server instances can be saved and deployed without reinstalling multiple pieces of software.

Virtualization Everywhere

While server virtualization can provide its own immense benefits, other portions of a data center can increase their efficiency, too.

Storage virtualization combines groups of physical storage to be accessible as though they were a part of one individual system, commonly called a Storage Area Network (SAN).

Applications virtualization allows users to use an application so long as they have access to the server. This eliminates the need to install anything on the user’s device.

Network virtualization takes physical networks and combines them into a single virtual network through software. A virtual local area network, or VLAN, functions as a LAN even when the computers aren’t actually near each other. This also grants access to each system’s networking hardware like switches and routers that can be allocated anywhere they’re needed.

Cloud Virtualization

Take everything you’ve just read and apply that concept to the cloud. Cloud virtualization allows users to pick and choose which services and resources they need and scale up or down as they see fit. If users need more storage for application testing but only temporarily, they can scale up their current allotment then scale down upon project completion.

Infrastructure as a Service

It feels like we’re entering Inception levels of deepness here. IaaS allows users to have their entire IT infrastructure — complete with cloud-based servers, network resources, and endless storage options — all in the cloud. This is a pretty high-level of sophisticated hardware that you would never need to interact with physically. All done for you, all thanks to the power of virtualization.

The Power of Virtualization

All told, there are few ways to boost the efficiency of a data center like virtualization. The security advantages of guest insulation to the saving of physical space are just a couple of the bigger benefits. And while virtualization can save a lot of money, it’s also good for the environment, too.