DELIVERING MAXIMUM VALUE

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW BEFORE MAKING THE SHIFT TO EVERYTHING-AS-A-SERVICE

Everything-as-a-service (XaaS) refers to the remote delivery of tools, technologies, and services over the cloud. Enterprises worldwide are embracing the as-a-service model to boost innovation, flexibility and reduce costs. In addition, it helps to make IT budgets more predictable and eliminates technical debt.

According to a Deloitte report, some companies consider transitioning to a

XaaS model because they can’t afford not to. As more and more customers demand more flexible payment models, the continued viability of many companies, and even entire industries, is being threatened. The report warns that those who fail to at least explore consumptionbased offerings may end up on the path to obsolescence.

“The fundamental benefit of everythingas-a-service (XaaS) is hidden in its business model itself where organisations have greater flexibility to deploy any solutions remotely which can be accessed on demand—i.e., cloud-based usage,” says Manish Ranjan, senior program manager -software and cloud at IDC MEA. “In a traditional IT space, deploying a solution will involve upfront Capex, a rigidconsumption model for products, services and tools used and is considered less flexible and scalable.”

According to the latest IDC MEA CIO survey, the topmost cloud triggers CIOs stated were that cloud is cost-effective and takes less time compared to traditional DC and Co-location. With XaaS, organisations can drastically reduce their operational cost, enjoy a flexible-consumption model paying only for what they use, access new and advanced technology features, and are more agile in terms of scalability.

Paul Hardy, Innovation Officer EMEA at ServiceNow, says the primary driver for XaaS model is customer demand for new or improved services! Traditionally, IT wasn’t very flexible; it took too long for decisions to be made, and as a result, IT was seen to stifle business innovation. “Over the last few years, however, businesses have had to adapt and change rapidly to meet the demand of customers, and it is time for IT to step up and offer the business the types of services they themselves have been using to run IT — services that can be changed easily, provide scalable offerings and that meet or exceed the business and customers’ expectations,” he says.

What are the benefits of everythingas-a-service?

“When an organisation shifts to everything-as-a-service by partnering with subject matter experts, they gain access to the right and requisite expertise as well as the latest technologies, as service providers are continuously investing in technologies, knowledge, and talent,” says Sudhir Menon, VP Product Management & Strategic Alliances, Help AG.

Additionally, the service provider team functions as an extension to the customers if they have in-house experts or operations, giving customers the benefit of having a collaborative model.

Everything-as-a-service also offers predictability, not only from a service

Manish Ranjan

perspective but also from a budget perspective. Customers that utilise a service provider will know what their monthly rental charge is, whereas if they onboarded the technology themselves, they may have to consider unpredictable costs related to operational expenditures, upgrades, and increases in capacity, he adds.

Ranjan from IDC says one of the key business benefits every organisation achieves is the lower cost of ownership - significant cost savings from operating expenses, reduced employment and maintenance cost. With XaaS model, organisations achieve many strategic benefits as it enables them to drive innovation and fuels their digital transformation strategy, improve time to market, expand into new market segments and eventually improve customer experience.

Shaping the future of business

Hardy from ServiceNow says that digital and organisational transformation is now a priority for businesses in every geography and industry. As every product becomes a service, anything-as-a-service will be key to success.

On top of this, all services will have to be agile, transparent, and always-on, allowing people to focus on important business goals, such as customer satisfaction, increasing productivity, and attracting and retaining the best talent.

“This will permit people to do the jobs they love, while the rest is automated using connected XaaS platforms,” he says.

Menon from Help AG says organisations are moving away from a combination of products and services to the flexible consumption-based model of Everythingas-a-Service (XaaS) – a shift that is opening up new avenues of opportunity.

“Nowhere is the shift toward a servicecentric model more evident than in the cybersecurity sector. In fact, 90% of security requirements are expected to be fulfilled through a service model three years from now, according to our State of the Market Report 2022,” he says.

Ranjan from IDC says eventually every business will start leveraging XaaS model to drive their digital journey by leveraging a service provider who will take the responsibility to procure both critical and non-critical IT infrastructure, and have their experts to manage and maintain the services.

“Almost 4-5 years before, cloud discussion was not very prominent in the region; however, given the growing investments within cloud space by some global hyperscalers, CIOs are not only evaluating the cloud implementations but going for some complex cloud migrations as well. The market ecosystem will advance in the future where XaaS will become a central part of the strategic discussions,” he adds.

The transition to a XaaS model is not without its challenges, especially around cybersecurity.

When it comes to anything as-a-service built in the cloud, the critical question is, how are privileged users authenticated to administer that service?, says Aaron Turner, CTO – SaaS Protect, Vectra AI. There are two schools of thought around building highly-resilient identity controls for privileged users in the cloud. First is isolation. Build a separate identity chain that is not subject to the same attack vectors or vulnerabilities that the rest of the organisation’s cloud services may be subject to.

“This approach can result in separation but also leads to additional investments that must be made in detection and response, which in my experience don’t get made. As the result, what began as an isolated highly-resilient design, ends up being an identity backwater with actually more potential for abuse and compromise than if the privileged identities were federated from the start,” he says.

Which leads us to the second approach - federation with enhanced MFA. By federating identities to cloud services through technologies like Azure AD, Okta or Ping, organisations enjoy better visibility into how identities are used (or abused). “But, it is critical that organisations do not allow for privileged cloud identities for services such as backup-as-a-service to be used for daily tasks like reading emails. So, the best approach for federation is a dedicated privileged identity that relies on strong MFA such as a security key,” Turner concludes.

Paul Hardy Sudhir Menon