The Growth of Managed Services and Cloud Computing in Ireland

The Managed Services market in Ireland is growing, thanks in one part to the growth in cloud computing. The location of many large data centres in Ireland by big companies such as Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google are also contributing to the growth of Managed Services and is earning Ireland the title of Data Centre Capital of Europe.

Other contributing factors are the desire to reduce costs, to free up IT staff from the daily trudge of IT Support to focus on more efficient IT performance and the expansion of the use of mobile devices in the workplace and a more digitalised environment.

Most important is the ability to scale up and down as business needs dictate. That flexibility allowed in a Managed Services contract and in a cloud computing environment is causing many companies to move from traditional in house IT. As companies in Ireland start to invest in IT again there is more opportunities now for them to redesign how they do business and underpin that move with solid, robust, flexible IT systems and infrastructure. 

Storage is a key requirement for many SMEs and a driver to moving to a Managed Service and Cloud Computing model. Some companies need aspects of on premise and cloud storage depending on their requirement. Managed Services providers need to be cognisant that not one model will fit all and each company should be treated on an individual basis. Trust is an essential part of a good relationship between a transitioning SME and their Managed Services provider. 

The cloud computing movement in Ireland looks set to continue and the future looks bright for clever Managed Services providers who can optimise on the current trend. 

Can outsourcing IT Support to an IT Services Company save you money?

There are a lot of myths around engaging with an IT Services company providing Managed IT Services and IT Support. However more and more companies are adopting the outsourcing model no matter what size and number of users they might have.

The most common myth is that Managed Services is too costly. This is particularly true for the SME market who downgrade IT as a priority and in doing so leave themselves wide open to risk of a security breach and operating at lower efficiencies.  In the long run outsourcing IT Support and IT Services can actually reduce a company’s IT costs by up to 30%. 

Outsourcing IT allows companies to save on salaries for IT staff and reduces the dependencies on the investment in hardware to run business applications, whilst being able to access the latest IT skillset through their Managed Service Provider. Other indirect savings are felt across sales and general administrative costs which are often 5 times that of IT. Thinking of IT Services outsourcing as just a replacement for internal IT costs is ignoring many of the potential cost benefits. 

The advent of cloud computing has seen a growth in outsourcing to an IT Services Company.  The  self-service nature of the cloud environment makes the Software as a Service contract more flexible than those of traditional IT Services outsourcing. Cloud computing offers standardised IT services whereas the more traditional IT Support and Services contract is more customised. 

In summary outsourcing IT Services and IT Support can reduce costs across an organisation. It allows access to the latest skillset and ensures that networks, systems and infrastructure are robust and reliable. Novi focus on productivity, we make sure that the IT set up in all our customer sites are  proactively maintained to guarantee reliability and security. Visit us at www.novi.ie to learn more about our outsourced IT Services portfolio.

Why now is a good time to look for an IT job in Dublin and Ireland

The UK decision to leave the European Union in the recent Brexit vote rocked the business world in Ireland. Whilst nothing is settled yet there will definitely be good and bad knock on effects for all industry in Ireland including ITcompanies. IT companies have been one of the mainstay industries and employers in Ireland and particularly Dublin over the last decade. With Brexit more could choose to locate in Dublin as Ireland becomes the only English speaking country in the single market, already some new IT companies are choosing to relocate to Dublin.

The growth of multinational IT companies in Dublin has led to many EU nationals moving to Ireland to take up positions in IT Solutions providers ranging from Microsoft to Dell and Oracle and the many indigenous IT companies that have seen significant growth and remained steady despite the recent downturn in Ireland. Now many EU nationals based in the UK are considering a move to Ireland as the UK’s departure from the EU may affect their working rights. 

Despite Brexit Ireland has long been an attractive market for IT workers due to the large number of IT companies that have chosen to settle here. IT Solutions employees get access to a wide pool of skills and a varied career path. In return the IT companies particular those that are Internet based such as Amazon, Paypal and Ebay get access to a skilled workforce with many of them having European languages as their first language. This makes them perfect candidates for a pan European based support role for example. 

It’s not only Dublin that has seen an increase in IT companies. More recently Galway and Limerick are seeing an influx of IT Solutions providers choosing to settle there. The coming decade looks set to be a profitable and prosperous one for IT companies and the IT solutions workforce in Ireland.

Why IT resourcing makes sense for businesses in Ireland

During the recession many companies started to outsource elements of their business in an attempt to reduce operating costs. When minding the coffers one of the first areas to look at is staffing costs. Companies began to realise that they could reduce IT staff to minimal and outsource their IT requirements from support and maintenance to project work to an IT Services company. 

ITResourcing Services has become big business in Ireland as companies continue to adopt the outsourcing model despite recent economic recovery. In the IT Managed Services sector it is common to hear of level one, two and three support services each requiring a different set of skills. It is becoming increasingly common for companies to outsource all or some of the more indepth level 2 and 3 support functions. Often retaining the lower level and less costly level 1 support person.

Companies are seeing the cost savings that outsourcing can bring but are also realising that it’s an efficient way to tap into the latest skills and expertise as IT services staff are duty bound to continually update their skill set.  Given the pace that technology moves this can bring significant benefits to a business. Outsourcing the skills also safeguards the future as an IT Resourcing Service can replace at short notice a member of staff who is either sick, on leave or chooses to move on to another company. If a company where to recruit the role internally the skillset leaves with that person, often after heavy investment in training. 

Smart IT Managed Services companies will have IT Resourcing Services in their portfolio to meet the ongoing demand for skilled workers.

Novi understands how the right IT staff can add significant value to overall business performance. For over 20 years Novi have been placing contract and permanent IT Staff in Ireland’s growing companies.

Without IT Disaster Recovery the impact on your business can be fatal

Business continuity in time of unforeseen critical failure can save a business a lot of money and keep their reputation intact. Often businesses don’t buy in to the need for an IT Disaster Recovery plan as they think the inevitable will never happen to them. However, protecting your business and critical data in the event of fire, flood or other disasters is crucial.

The most important decision for a business in relation to an IT Disaster Recovery plan is whether to manage it in house or outsource to an IT Services company. But so far experience has proven that an in house disaster recovery plan is more likely to fail. According to an IDC study, enterprises that didn't outsource lost on average $4 million per disaster incident across a variety of business functions (e.g., sales/marketing, financing, e-commerce). 

For a smaller midsized company an affordable Disaster Recovery service is not that easy to find. The right IT Services company is key. Questions that the company needs to consider are

•   How fast you get access to your data after an outage
• What you personally have to do to make that happen
• What else comes as part of the service, such as temporary access to applications hosted by the    provider

Novi IT Managed Disaster Recovery

At Novi our IT experts work with our customers to understand the business, its systems, infrastructure, data and its dependencies on same. For example, a business may have a remote site suitable for to site to site data replication alongside cloud services, or a single site in which case key applications can be made available in the cloud.

As part of our IT Managed Disaster Recovery service we plan and test the service according to a schedule that suits your business. 

Businesses need to be prepared. Don’t think that disaster won’t happen to you – to do so is to put your business and reputation at serious risk. Contact us on www.novi.ie

How Cloud Computing will save you money

With cloud computing becoming more popular for a variety of reasons it is important that companies learn how to maximise the benefits and reduce the risks. Many experts believe that cloud computing despite documented risks will become the dominant method of running technology into the future. 

Simply put cloud computing allows you to focus on running your business. It not only saves its users money, it is flexible, can scale quickly and as quickly reduce back down and basically allows you do more with less.

So where do these savings happen? Well firstly cloud computing enables organic economies of scale. Server infrastructure is shared across companies meaning you use what you need and lowering traditionally high infrastructure costs. This in turn saves money on power and helps the planet! In a self ran data centre servers are never fully utilised and idle servers use up energy. 

The biggest saving is in IT Resourcing. IT staff are expensive. Not only their salaries but the associated costs of employment mean companies rack up costs on IT Resourcing. Also IT moves on so fast IT staff need continual training. A move to cloud computing allows IT staff to be redeployed to more strategic project work that can push the company forward and enable it to take advantage of new business opportunities. 

Running your own IT you often have to have back up servers in case of failure – again meaning excess spend on hardware that often sits idle.

These costs and the big benefit of reducing IT Resourcing expenses makes a move to the cloud a definite must for small to medium companies who need to put their hard earned cash to work in the best way.