Cisco CloudVerse: a Comprehensive Cloud Framework

Multinational company CEOs are one of the most vocal advocates of the managed cloud services phenomenon. Many have been through the painful process of watching helplessly as their CIO championed the deployment of monolithic ERP and CRM systems -- only to discover that these huge enterprise software projects failed to live up to their promise.

Meanwhile, purposeful line-of-business executives have successfully utilized software-as-a-service (SaaS), with their CEO's support, to break free from the legacy IT platforms and thereby give their employees the business technology (BT) productivity tools that they had hoped for -- or that the power-users demanded.

Forward-looking vendors and prescient BT service providers are now leading the transition to the next wave of productivity-enhancing and cost-reducing platforms. Next year, we'll likely witness increased market activity, as the next chapter of this story unfolds.

In anticipation, Cisco has pro-actively presented its cloud strategic plan and tactical roadmap to both eager channel partners and savvy enterprise customers.

Cisco CloudVerse is a framework that combines the foundational elements needed to enable organizations to build, manage and connect public, private and hybrid clouds.

Cisco CloudVerse combines these key cloud elements -- Unified Data Center, Cloud Intelligent Network, and Cloud Applications and Services -- enabling businesses to realize all of the benefits of clouds: improved agility, better economics, enhanced security and a dynamic, assured experience.

The Cisco Cloud Index, issued last week, forecasts how dramatically clouds are transforming business IT and consumer services. The study predicts that over 50 percent of computing workloads in data centers will be cloud-based by 2014, and that global cloud traffic will grow over 12 times by 2015, to 1.6 zettabytes per year -- the equivalent of over four days of business-class video for every person on earth.

The insightful study suggests that the explosive growth in clouds requires advanced capabilities that allow the data center and network to work together -- to support end-to-end cloud application delivery.

The All-Inclusive Approach to Cloud Enablement

Today, most cloud technologies exist in silos, preventing an efficient, integrated management approach. By integrating the three foundational cloud elements -- the Cisco Unified Data Center with the Cisco Intelligent Network to enable Cloud Applications and Services -- CloudVerse delivers a business-class cloud experience within the cloud, between clouds, and beyond the cloud to the end user.

A large number of enterprises, service providers, and governments have announced that they are adopting Cisco CloudVerse as the foundation of their cloud strategies, including ACS, a Xerox Company; Fujitsu; NWN; LinkedIn; Orange Business Services; Qualcomm; Silicon Valley Bank; Telecom Italia; Telefónica S.A.; Telstra; and Terremark, a Verizon Company. Today over 70 percent of leading cloud providers are using Cisco CloudVerse on their journey to the cloud.

"We're moving to a world where our business customers want to experience services anywhere, anytime on any device. Cisco CloudVerse is architected to help deliver on the promise of cloud by unifying compute, storage and network resources that can be securely and rapidly re-purposed and managed on-demand to meet the needs of different customers or applications. These capabilities are fundamental to the cloud and the Cisco Cloud Intelligent Network is purpose-built to help deliver the security, scalability and flexibility we need," said Kerry Bailey, Terremark, a Verizon Company.

The Three Core Elements of CloudVerse:

Unified Data Center changes the economics of cloud infrastructure by providing a fabric-based platform automating the "as-a-service" model across physical and virtual environments, and designed to scale with business demands by flexibly allocating resources within and between data centers using unified computing and unified fabric. Cisco is also adding new Unified Management capabilities:

Cisco Intelligent Automation for the Cloud is designed to provide automated provisioning and management of data center resources for the delivery of cloud services within and between data centers.

Cisco Network Services Manager is designed to automatically create, deploy and modify physical and virtual networking resources on demand.

Cloud Intelligent Network provides a consistent and highly secure user experience wherever the user is located and across the multiple clouds involved in delivering an application or service. Cisco now adds new "Cloud-to-Cloud Connect" capabilities:

"Cloud-to-Cloud Connect," featuring the Cisco Network Positioning System on the ASR 1000 and 9000 Series Aggregation Services Routersin 2012, will enable dynamic resource identification, allocation and optimization between data centers and clouds.

Cloud Applications and Services enable "as a service" delivery of both Cisco and third-party cloud applications. Several new capabilities are being added to Cisco's Hosted Collaboration Solution (HCS):

Private Cloud HCS empowers enterprises to build their own collaboration cloud using Cisco's validated and tested solution and full management capabilities.

Mobile HCS provides mobile service providers with an easy and cost-effective way to offer collaboration from the cloud, thus extending services from "fixed" devices to mobile phones. For example, providers can virtually connect thousands of mobile users at a company with single-number reach, or enable customers to transition a call from a desk phone to a mobile phone while the call is in progress.

Customer Collaboration makes contact center capabilities more affordable and accessible by adding Cisco Customer Collaboration offerings to HCS. These offerings are available on a limited basis now and targeted for general availability in 2012.

Cisco is supporting CloudVerse with new cloud enablement services, whichcombine Cisco's professional and technical services expertise with those of a broad ecosystem of partners, allowing organizations to accelerate their cloud success and realize the full potential of cloud.

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Redefining Mobility in the Workplace with Cisco Cius

Cisco has introduced the AppHQ -- an application ecosystem built specifically for Cisco Cius that provides new ways to create, manage and rapidly deploy tablet applications in the enterprise.

Cisco Cius, an Android-based tablet created for the enterprise, combines voice, video, collaboration, and virtualization capabilities unlike any other tablet on the market today. With Cisco Cius, organizations can now deliver an optimized tablet with enterprise-grade security, as a natural extension of the enterprise network.

The device provides customers with mobility, centralized manageability, virtual content creation and computing capabilities, and a comprehensive suite of collaboration applications.

AppHQ provides developers with tools and resources to create, test and market applications for Cisco Cius, and allows IT managers to control which applications can be used on the devices. Additionally, companies can create private, custom-branded application storefronts for their organizations where employees can find, publish and procure applications that complement their business environments.

Introducing Cisco AppHQ: A Trusted Source for Business Applications

Cisco AppHQ is a highly secure, cloud-based user storefront that provides capabilities for end users and IT managers not found in other application stores today. Some of these capabilities include:

• Testing and validation: IT managers want to know that applications deployed in their environment are appropriate for the enterprise. Cisco AppHQ provides IT managers and users with a trusted source for applications, ensuring that every application within AppHQ goes through Cisco validation testing, whether developed by Cisco, third-party Android developer partners, or users within the enterprise. The validation process includes interoperability testing both for the application itself and in typical configurations within the device.
• Store-within-a-Store: Enterprises will have a Cisco hosted, highly-secure and private application store within AppHQ. Businesses can customize the storefront, following their corporate branding guidelines, including use of logos, icons and color schemes. Beyond customization, the store-within-a-store is a platform that customers can use to deploy applications efficiently in their organizations.  For example, a financial services company could deploy applications pertaining to their back office operations, such as human resources or payroll apps, and populate those applications on the devices of relevant employees. 
• Empowers IT management: With AppHQ Manager, IT will have the ability to allow (or deny) access to application marketplaces by user role or device and to grant (or deny) access to applications by type, source or category. This unique capability will let IT organizations balance the individual freedom of users with the enterprise-class policies on security and cost efficiency.

"The promise of mobile Unified Communications and Collaboration for decentralized, accelerated decision-making is coming to light with the advent of intelligent 4G LTE networks, the cloud and enterprise tools such as the Cisco Cius. Our sales teams and customers will continue to benefit from cloud-based enterprise apps that help them get the job done from virtually anywhere with greater collaboration and speedier service delivery to their customers," said Mike Smith, vice president enterprise communications, network and mobility, Verizon.

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Enterprise 2.0: Hosted Collaboration Solutions

New cloud-based business technology applications are reinventing workplace collaboration -- to address the needs of forward-looking organizations and their essential employees, in today's more economically frugal operating environment.

Progressive business leaders are breaking down traditional communication silos by creating the environment for key staff to easily connect with peers and readily share information across globally dispersed organizations. How will they be able to fuel this ongoing transformation?

Cisco announced the availability of the Cisco Hosted Collaboration Solution that allows service providers to offer their customers a wide range of collaboration applications -- via the cloud, using a "business technology as a service" model.

The Cisco Hosted Collaboration Solution, which builds on existing hosted Unified Communications offerings, provides customers with unprecedented flexibility in choosing how they deploy collaboration applications throughout their organizations.

"Our customers are eager to put cloud-based unified communications applications to the test. Verizon Business' field trial of Cisco's Hosted Collaboration Solution builds on a proven track record the two companies have established developing and delivering innovative solutions to market, while marking an important milestone on Verizon Business' path to deliver 'Everything-as-a-Service' for our customers worldwide," said Anthony Recine, vice president of networking and communications solutions for Verizon Business.

How On-Demand Solutions Drive Business Agility
The hosted option helps businesses to rapidly deploy collaboration technologies while potentially lowering upfront capital and ongoing operating expenses.

The Cisco Hosted Collaboration Solution gives service providers and integrators the ability to deploy multiple collaboration applications on one server in a virtualized environment and then host those applications for multiple client organizations.

"Delivering our customers the broadest-range and highest-quality hosted unified communications and collaboration services is one of our core businesses. The Cisco Hosted Collaboration Solution will allow us to achieve this goal with an excellent operational efficiency and profitability for our clients," said Paul Molinier, vice president, Unified Communications and Collaboration Business Unit, Orange.

The solution is designed to be run from managed service provider data centers. It's optimized for delivery by the Cisco Unified Computing System, part of the Cisco Unified Service Delivery solution. It's proven to combine the power of the datacenter with the power of the network -- to transform service delivery and build the foundation for cloud services.

Leading service providers will offer one of the most comprehensive collaboration services available and can easily deploy large, multi-customer installations. By using a common infrastructure, providers can potentially save money while delivering their customers a superior user experience -- regardless of the service deployment model (hosted, managed, or on-premise).

"Delivering hosted unified communications and collaboration services is a demanding and complex operation. We're excited to be working with the Cisco Hosted Collaboration Solution, which is designed to simplify operations and deliver services in the most efficient and profitable manner," said Roger Wuethrich-Hasenboehler, executive vice president and member of the board, Swisscom.

Savvy business executives and their IT leaders continue to benefit from the operational efficiencies of out-tasking core business technology applications. They're shifting their internal resources to more strategic initiatives -- while enabling the just-in-time provision of feature rich communications service delivery.

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Managed and Cloud Services Market Study

Cisco and Verizon Business will host a live webcast to unveil new findings from a commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Cisco and discuss new opportunities in managed and cloud services for service providers and enterprises.

Key findings from the market study include:

• Global managed services growth will outpace technology growth in 2010 by more than double.
• The total global managed services opportunity will be $217 billion by 2014.

Join Ellen Daley, Forrester Research vice president; Will Scott, Cisco global director of managed solutions; and Joseph Crawford, Verizon Business executive director of IT solutions, for an online discussion on these major market trends.

Managed and Cloud Services: Opportunities in a Transitioning Market

Date: Thursday, June 10, 2010

Time: 8 to 9 a.m. (PDT) / 11 a.m. to noon (EDT)

Register, in advance, at:
Cisco Verizon Business Webcast

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Better Way for SMBs to Collaborate Online

Do you know, is there a better way for businesses to meet online, present projects, and share calendars and ideas anytime, from anywhere? Are you ready to share your experience?

Small- and medium-sized business owners can compete for a chance to win up to $2,000 in a reward card and a free consultation with marketing expert Guy Kawasaki -- by entering The Better Way Challenge.

The challenge, a video contest presented by Verizon and Cisco, is designed to encourage businesses to use new collaborative tools to maintain their competitive edge in a fast-changing environment.

"Innovation and technology will power us out of this recession," said Kawasaki. "The Better Way Challenge enables entrepreneurs to share their victories and defeats, tips and tricks, joys and pains of running a business. Online collaboration and social media can generate business, and these videos will accelerate the learning process for entrepreneurs and business owners."

Entering the Contest is Easy
Just submit a video of less than three minutes that describes "the most challenging part of getting your whole team on the same page."

Contest participants must either be subscribers to the Verizon Collaboration Center, located at the Verizon Small Business Center, or they may sign up for a free 30-day trial. Entrants whose videos are accepted for judging in the contest will also receive additional free six-month subscriptions.

In addition, any business that signs up for the free 30-day trial subscription will automatically be entered into a monthly drawing for a chance to win a Flip Mino HD Camcorder. As many as 90 camcorders will be given away during the six-month promotion.

Profiling Advanced Collaboration in Action
A panel of judges will select three contest finalists, based on the originality and relevance of their videos. The grand-prize winner will receive their free consultation with Kawasaki via Cisco TelePresence.

The second-and third-prize winners will each receive a reward card for $1,000 and one-on-one consultations with industry experts from the Cisco Internet Business Solutions Group -- which designs innovative processes and strategic plans for businesses.

All three consultations will be tailored to the specific business needs of the winners and focus on ways in which collaboration and online resources can make their businesses more efficient and competitive.

Monte Beck, Verizon's vice president for small-business product strategy, said, "Small businesses need a lot more than e-mail and Internet access to stay competitive. They need to move fast and utilize tools like the Verizon Collaboration Center that can help them grow their businesses, run them more efficiently and, reduce the cost of doing business."

The Verizon Collaboration Center, powered by Cisco WebEx, offers voice and Web conferencing. It enables users to instantly and effectively collaborate with colleagues, clients and vendors in a virtual environment that is accessible from any web browser.

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Culture is Key to Advanced Collaboration

Organizations that deploy the most advanced Internet protocol-based collaboration technologies achieve more than twice the return on their collaboration investment and perform better than their less collaborative peers, according to a thought-provoking Frost & Sullivan market study.

"Meetings Around the World II: Charting the Course of Advanced Collaboration," sponsored by Verizon and Cisco, examines how busy professionals in businesses and government agencies use advanced collaboration tools such as voice-over-Internet Protocol (VoIP), instant messaging or meeting via high definition video or Cisco TelePresence to get their work done.

The study is the first to develop a model for measuring a return on collaboration investment, the Return on Collaboration (ROC) Index. It establishes a progressive impact of deploying advanced Unified Communications and Collaboration (UC&C) technologies on business performance and measures improvements in areas such as research and development, human resources, sales, marketing, investor relations and public relations.

Advanced Collaborators Harness Competitive Advantage
The study also identified emerging business technology adoption trends and attitudes across the globe. Key findings from the study include:

• Businesses and government agencies deploying increasingly more sophisticated collaboration tools -- such as VoIP soft phones, immersive video and fixed mobile convergence -- saw a corresponding improvement in business results relative to the amount invested.
• The overall average ROC score was 4.2 -- meaning organizations received an average return of four times their investment in deploying collaboration technologies.
• The majority of organizations deploying UC&C report they are more successful than their peers compared to those not deploying UC&C (70 percent versus 47 percent).
• Of organizations deploying UC&C, 40 percent plan to increase spending.
• VoIP is leading the way for delivery of advanced communications and collaboration applications.
  

Why Corporate Culture is a Defining Factor
If you're thinking that simply deploying online collaboration tools will deliver results similar to the leaders -- then think again. Your work environment is truly instrumental to success.

How do the Advanced Collaborators attain an ROC score of 6.1? These organizations tend to have "open" entrepreneurial corporate cultures where individuals are accessible, and there's regular cooperation between business units.

"Meetings Around the World II confirms and extends the key findings of the original study and builds on those conclusions. This latest research shows adopting progressively more advanced unified communications and collaboration tools can help organizations achieve a corresponding return on collaboration and improvement across all business functions. This return was most dramatic in the areas of sales, marketing and research and development" says Brian Cotton, vice president for Information and Communications Technologies for Frost & Sullivan.

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Managed IT Enhances JetBlue Business Model

New York-based JetBlue Airways created an airline focused on value, service and style. They've proven to be a trailblazer in the U.S. airline industry. They're also a communication technology early-adopter. JetBlue introduced complimentary in-flight e-mail and instant messaging services on their aircraft -- a first among U.S. domestic airlines.

However, their core competency is centered upon air travel. They out-task the rest to service providers, wherever possible.

JetBlue signed a new, six-year strategic agreement with Verizon Business to manage the airline's information technology ( IT) data center and communications network needs, as well as provide security and IT consulting services.

Built on an IP Network Foundation
Verizon Business will design and manage the transition of JetBlue's existing systems to a new global IT network infrastructure. The newly built Internet-protocol-based (IP) voice and data network will support state-of-the-art airport kiosks, wireless Internet access and an advanced reservation system.

"JetBlue has built a reputation of consistently providing excellent customer service," said JetBlue CIO Joe Eng. "The agreement with Verizon Business to strengthen our IT capabilities is further proof that we are taking the steps necessary to evolve our business to meet our customers' changing needs. With this enhanced IT infrastructure, JetBlue will be even better positioned for the future."

The new converged voice and data network will help support JetBlue's vision to deliver enhanced customer service and better collaborative tools for its employee crewmembers.

Verizon Business will connect JetBlue crewmembers, customers and partners to each other and the Internet. The infrastructure will serve as the foundation to deliver new customer and collaboration services -- including audio, net and video conferencing and enhanced contact center applications that will enable JetBlue's reservations agents to better serve customers.

Securing and Protecting Critical Data
Verizon Business will also manage the transition of JetBlue's data centers to Verizon's redundant managed service centers. In addition, they will manage the critical infrastructure components of JetBlue's internal systems including its data centers, voice and data networks and internal service desk -- ensuring continuous availability and improved resiliency and reliability.

Through its managed security practice, Verizon Business will help safeguard critical company data as well as ensure JetBlue meets strict industry requirements for secure credit card transactions online, over the phone and at the airport.

JetBlue currently serves 58 cities with 650 daily flights. In 2009, the carrier ranked "Highest in Customer Satisfaction Among Low-Cost Carriers in North America" by J.D. Power and Associates.

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Infrastructure as a Service, in Action

A West Chester, PA-based company was searching for IT help, to more effectively and securely distribute confidential and proprietary content to its customers. Enter Verizon Business, with its managed cloud service offering.

Modevity, LLC will use Verizon Computing as a Service (CaaS), an on-demand, flexible solution that allows businesses to harness cloud computing to better manage IT resources and deliver performance and security that supports their growth.

Better Alignment of Financial and Human Capital
In addition to these benefits, Modevity expects to see a significant positive impact on the company's bottom line as a result of embracing this managed cloud service offering.

"We are focused on continuing to grow Modevity in a smart way by making key resource decisions in terms of capital and staffing expenditures," said Tom J. Canova, co-founder and chief marketing officer for Modevity.

"Moving to a virtual environment with Verizon Business allows us to consolidate our existing server hardware and software, and eliminates future purchasing and licensing costs in that area. It also allows us to add more staff in key areas -- all while maintaining consistent, reliable service to our customers."

Complete IaaS Platform Solution
Verizon Business is providing Modevity with a comprehensive cloud-computing environment, supplying server hardware, bandwidth, load balancing, firewall network security, backup and managed services to support the Modevity ARALOC Content Rights Management hosted solution.

Modevity can now rely on Verizon's out-tasked secure and available Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) offering. This frees up Modevity to invest in more strategic product development, research and development, and customer support initiatives.

"With Verizon Business as its partner, Modevity can grow its business strategically while relying on us to seamlessly power its customer applications," said James Geary, vice president of Verizon Business SMB sales. "Our world-class CaaS solution will allow Modevity to drive more value from its computing resources while controlling costs."

A key consideration in the selection of Verizon Business was its flexible delivery model and the ability to pay only for resources consumed. As a SaaS (software as a service) provider for content rights management product solutions, Modevity was keen to work with a partner that had a similar approach, as well as provided the flexibility to grow the infrastructure as its user base and global footprint grew.

According to Canova, "To continue to be successful, we have to keep our customer's software fully functional and reliable 24 x 7. Verizon Business understands this, and in fact, Verizon Business delivers CaaS with the exact same approach we use for our customers. We are confident that in Verizon Business we have selected a cloud-computing leader, and that Verizon Business will serve as a true seamless extension of the Modevity team."

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