What are the benefits of IT as a Service (ITaaS)?

If you want customer-focused and scalable solutions that adapt quickly to market demand, then IT as a Service (ITaaS) may be your answer.

Traditionally, IT infrastructure required a server to be installed on your premises, giving you access to the hardware and applications you need for your business. To scale your data storage and services, you purchase additional hardware and invest in costly upgrades.

Today’s businesses move at an incredible pace, meaning that hardware upgrades can be too slow to keep up with your changing needs. The technology that you used two years ago may almost be redundant, even if it was the best fit at the time.

The reality for businesses is that it is time-consuming and expensive to develop and maintain your IT infrastructure in line with industry best practice. This leads to a situation where your business’s IT environment is inadequately maintained, with unresolved cascading issues, system failure and downtime.

What is IT as a Service?

IT as a Service (ITaaS) is a model that delivers the right amount of hardware, software and support that your business needs, all rolled into a monthly subscription fee. The focus is on innovation, agility and responding to customer and market demands, instead of infrastructure investments and capital expenditure.

ITaaS means that you can outsource your IT requirements to a third party who is responsible for providing and maintaining, all or some, of the following:

• Hardware
• Software upgrades and patches
• IT Support
• Security
• IT governance
• Strategic direction
• Helpdesk and diagnostic services
• Project implementation
• Liaison with vendors
• All other aspects of IT management and service delivery dependent on the inclusions in the service level agreement.

What are the benefits of ITaaS?

Minimal upfront IT investment

As the equipment is financed, the IT cost is an operational expense, and no upfront capital is required. With predictable monthly payments, your finance team can budget with confidence and have transparency with IT costs.

Scalability and agility

Speed is the currency of today’s competitive business environment. ITaaS means that IT responds quickly to changing needs. This contrasts with traditional IT that had long and inflexible lead times. Flexibility means that you can scale up and down as your needs change. Upgrades and downgrades are as simple as emailing a request to your service provider.

Strategic approach

For many decades, IT has been organised by functional divisions such as application development, security, data centre and IT infrastructure. Although this model delivers quality results, it has become increasingly unaligned with business realities.

In order to keep up with changes, businesses purchase Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) products to achieve their objectives. With ITaaS, businesses can take a strategic approach to IT, matching their software, hardware and infrastructure with their business goals.

Customer focused approach

In the classic model, ITaaS is concerned with how to perform functions as cost-effectively as possible. ITaaS focuses on delivering value to the customer and end user. Customer satisfaction, engagement and improved customer service become key indicators.

Essential Tech is a Brisbane Managed IT Service Provider who can assist you with scalable and agile solutions that are ready to meet changing customer and market demands. Contact us today to find out how you can gain a competitive advantage, grow your business and get the IT that suits your business needs.