Verizon unveils remote IT service

Verizon Business last week launched a service designed to manage business customers' server operating systems.

The new option from the enterprise services arm of Verizon is called Remote Internet Protocol Application Management Service Basic, and lets U.S. business and government customers outsource remote monitoring and management of basic IT infrastructure and operating systems, such as Microsoft Windows or Sun Solaris. The service is based on capabilities obtained by the former MCI last summer with the acquisition of Totality, a privately held service provider that offered remote application and infrastructure management.

Verizon Business' new management service is available to customers who house their servers at their own location, at a third-party data center or in one of Verizon's U.S. data centers.

The service includes a portal, named Total View, which lets companies manage, measure, plan and troubleshoot server processes in real time, Verizon says. The Total View portal provides access to a set of performance variables with which businesses can identify and troubleshoot performance problems.

The service checks system operations ranging from process monitoring to file system space management to detect problems and critical conditions that may affect system availability, Verizon says. When a problem is detected, the carrier helps customers manage hardware and operation system issues, including identification, verification, diagnosis, resolution, tracking, escalation and documentation of the problem.

The service also performs functions aimed at standardizing the management of a customer's operating systems, including service, change, asset, patch and configuration management. Customers can use the service's Web-based tools to track service tickets and manage modifications to their infrastructure, the carrier says.

The Verizon Business service also centralizes, standardizes and automates patch management to update a company's servers with the latest software fixes necessary to protect company systems. Customers can supplement this option with add-on services, such as backup and recovery management, in which Verizon Business performs weekly full and daily incremental backups of data; security management, in which the carrier conducts monthly scans to discover known vulnerabilities of network devices; and network management aimed at monitoring, maintaining and managing additional network devices.

All major carriers offer managed network, storage and security services, but Verizon is one of the few, if any, that offer a managed remote IT infrastructure and application service, analysts say. AT&T partnered with Totality before MCI acquired it, and now has partnerships with Accenture and Sun for IT infrastructure and applications management.

In addition to AT&T and its partners, Verizon Business will compete with IT service powers such as Electronic Data Systems, HP and IBM. These companies offer remote application management on a global scale, whereas Verizon does not.

Remote Internet Protocol Application Management Service Basic costs $935 per server, per month.