Appliance Deployment Featured Article

Alert Logic is in the business of securing enterprise environments, intrusion protection, vulnerability assessment and other services for managed hosting and cloud service providers. Recently, the company was looking to expand its network security and compliance capabilities, and turned to appliance deployment expert NEI (News - Alert) to make it happen.

NEI was tasked with such objectives as helping Alert Logic maintain its security operations center, using hardware appliances capable of remaining stable and reliable while working in the field, as well as acquiring sufficient platform management and deployment capabilities. Company officials said Alert Logic chose NEI based on such considerations as process, procedure, scale and quality. The company’s close working relationship with Dell (News - Alert) was also a major factor that led to the decision.

The bottom line is NEI was able to help Alert Logic scale its business by about 40 percent, according to Alert Logic officials. Not a bad return. NEI outlined what it saw as the three key areas it was able to address to give Alert Logic the results.

1.    Upfront design of the hardware platform
NEI used a Dell enterprise-class server and worked with Alert Logic to future-proof the platform for app compatibility, NEI officials said, adding that they gave Alert Logic “a newfound ability to do evaluation testing upfront,” allowing the company to “issue ten new software updates within a year, without rendering the existing hardware obsolete.”

2.    Process controls. 
The idea here was to ensure repeatability of output in the field. Alert Logic officials report “far greater flexibility” in how they’re able to sell and deliver products in the field, since with the NEI improvements more than one platform configuration is available at the point of sale. “NEI receives each specific order, assembles the app and provisions the systems with a host name and IP address to ship out the next day,” NEI officials explain.

3. Ongoing visibility into key business processes and support
Naturally first-class support would be a critical part of any project of this magnitude. One example cited in the report is that previously, it took Alert Logic anywhere from three to five business days to replace an appliance in the field. With NEI, according to Chris Tabor, director of service support at the company, “Orders placed before noon ship that day and are on the customer’s premises within one business day.”

Last month, TMCnet reported that Alert Logic announced the appointment of Chris Noell as vice president of product management, responsible for all aspects of product management across the full range of Alert Logic Security-as-a-Service offerings.

“Noell brings to Alert Logic a wealth of experience in risk management and compliance products and services for the enterprise market,” Alert officials said at the time, adding that he most recently served as senior vice president of Product Management with ANX eBusiness, a managed network and security service provider:

“In his new position, Noell will lead product strategy, prioritization and execution to both expand and accelerate Alert Logic's delivery of cloud-based security and compliance solutions.”

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