Your ‘Throat to Choke’ For Cloud Consumption – Cloud Services Brokerage – Is Within Reach

Every company that consumes Cloud services from multiple providers must address a simple multi-sourcing decision: “Who’s throat are you going to choke”?  CSB is not always the answer since many companies can and will consume cloud directly. No problem. But for companies that lack — or don’t want to be responsible for — Cloud-native technology, skills, and methodologies, Cloud services brokerage can help.

A key take-away from our recently published CSB Special Report (subscription required) is that in 2011 there was a proliferation of end-user interest in CSB and IT solutions leveraging CSB. In Cloud Services Brokerage Proliferates we introduce the following research:

• Cloud Services Brokerage Is Dominated by Three Primary Roles — A revised definition of CSB, including a definition of three primary CSB roles
• The Role of CSB in the Cloud Services Value Chain — How the CSB role will impact Cloud users and the $865m IT services industry
• How to Determine When to Use a Cloud Services Brokerage — Is CSB right for you and your Cloud project? We help your sort that out
• How to Evaluate Process Agility and Visibility in Cloud Business Process Services — If your Cloud-based project requires agile processes – you need BPM in CSB
• Emerging Services Analysis: Communications Service Providers as Cloud Services Brokers — Insight on how the CSB role will impact IT services the CSP (Telco) industry
• Who’s Who in Cloud Services Brokerage — Examples of providers leveraging the CSB across a wide range of IT services
• Case Study: Mohawk Fine Papers Uses a CSB to Ease Adoption of Cloud Computing — High-impact, virtual business processes spanning A2A, B2B EC and Cloud
• Case Study: Men’s Wearhouse Finds StrikeIron’s CSB Suits Its Customers — How CSB aggregation enabled Men’s Wearhouse to improve customer loyalty
• Predicts 2012: Cloud Services Brokerage Will Bring New Benefits and Planning Challenges — Predictions on how CSB will impact users, providers and Cloud computing

This new research — published in corraboration with analysts across a wide range of Gartner research communities and core topic areas — builds upon our fast-growing body of CSB research. A complete list with brief descriptions for all the CSB research that we’ve published over the last three years is available here.

Here are some additional year-end 2011 take-aways from this year’s CSB research and our many client discussions:

• Cloud computing overall and CSB in particular is a high-impact scenario that will affect the entire $865m IT services industry.
• The three primary CSB roles are CSB aggregation, integration and customization brokerage, although there are other CSB roles (e.g., CSB arbitrage).
• Proliferating B2B integration modernization projects – which often require investments in new software and skills – are driving adoption of integration brokerage.
• Consumer adoption of the CSB role is proliferating overall, but intermediation is not necessarily required or appropriate for every company and Cloud project.
• The CSB role is rapidly being incorporated into IT services including consulting and system integration, application services, BPO/BPU, and B2B ecommerce.
• Deployment of multienterprise applications – which often requires combined B2B SaaS and integration services offerings – is driving CSB utilization.
• CSB aggregation, integration and customization can help companies to implement innovative  multienterprise processes – e.g., see Mohawk case study above.

In 2011 we sought to further improve our definition and understanding of the emerging CSB scenario and deliver ever more specific and actionable research. In 2012 we’ll continue along this same trajectory – see Daryl Plummer’s latest CSB blog post for some thoughts about where he expects CSB to go in 2012. I’m looking forward to actively pursuing this line of research in 2012 and working with our clients, providers and my colleagues to further refine and deepen our understanding of the CSB phenomenon.