Are you getting your money's worth from your existing solution?

We’ve all been there. Every time network hardware licenses come up for renewal, all businesses and organizations are faced with the same, age-old question: are we truly happy with what we have? Is our current vendor an accelerator or a brake pedal in our company’s evolution? The latter can be heard more often than not, for a plethora of reasons.

With many big-name networking vendors, one major hurdle on the road to the company’s growth is quite mundane: exorbitant licensing and operational costs that translate directly into reduced ROI. To make things worse, the hidden costs, which often become apparent only after the actual implementation, can quickly spiral out of control, surpassing initial estimations and eating trough the budget, especially in more dynamically-growing environments.

Then there’s the matter of inflexibility. Companies are often forced to pay for additional and (wouldn’t you know it!) pretty pricey solutions just to gain access to some indispensable features and capabilities. What’s marketed as so-called “bundle” options, can be seen as another way to drive more unwanted costs.

High costs is one thing, but what’s even more frustrating and time-consuming (and as you know, time is money!), are the complexities permeating all manner of areas. Let’s take the bewildering intricacy of licensing, for instance. Managing licenses, untangling the convoluted web of terms and conditions, deciphering baffling quotes – all that can quickly drain away the IT team’s time and resources. In some instances, a dedicated resource becomes necessary just to navigate through the labyrinth of vendor licenses and avoid overpaying for more capabilities than the organization actually requires.

Then there is the matter of sheer technical complexity. Many legacy enterprise networks are technically bewildering, taxing to learn, and nightmarish to implement and operate, rendering it very difficult and time-consuming for IT teams not only to manage, but also incorporate key new capabilities like network automation. Proprietary technologies also increase the labyrinth of integration and interoperability, further driving up costs and complexity. Closed ecosystems, no flexibility and no choice force even a small upgrade to become a full-blown infrastructure revamp.

Inexperienced and ever-changing account representatives who are incapable of addressing your concerns effectively. Mixed messages coming from different corners of the vendor’s organization, creating more chaos and confusion when what you actually seek is assistance and staying on top of things… Sounds familiar?

Legacy vendors are not free from unwieldy processes, a pain shared by many companies that eventually become big enough. For the customers, this often means unreliable and overshot delivery times for network solutions, especially when you’re a smaller fish in a big pond. Unless you’re a corporate giant with deep pockets, getting the vendors’ time, attention, or even answers, can prove to be quite an arduous task.

Despite all the difficulties described above, many businesses are reluctant to introduce any changes to their networking solution. And that’s perfectly understandable – when we’ve devoted considerable amounts of time and energy into mastering your complex environment, the urge to stay in the comfort zone is strong. Dancing with the devil you know with all the complexities and compromises that come along with it, can feel more comfortable than venturing into the unknown.

Yet, enterprises are at a tipping point. They can no longer afford the complacency of blindly renewing hardware licenses. The ‘business as usual’ mentality with vendors, relationships, and technologies, once a guiding principle as networks emerged and evolved, is now grossly incompatible with current business needs and financial constraints.

Network is the strategic asset of your organization that creates and enables gateways to better efficiency, productivity, and revenue. And yet, more often than not, they fall short of delivering simplicity, flexibility to adapt to new needs, and that much sought-after ROI businesses desperately need to achieve their goals.

But here’s the silver lining: there are valid alternatives that will lift the burdens off your IT teams and give your enterprise the freedom to reach your goals without skyrocketing costs.

In the next part of the ‘Network Purchasing Guide’: