* RISC Networks runs technology analytics, provides an action plan, and gives competitive context
For an enterprise IT professional, one of the worst circumstances has got to be the inability to pinpoint performance problems. The longer the problems persist, the higher the frustration levels. Toss in some cross-discipline finger pointing, and a bad situation quickly worsens.
Sometimes, you’ve got to call in the big guns.
RISC Networks, a business technology analytics provider, is one such firm. The 3-year-old company has a long client list, including tech vendors such as Cisco and IBM as well as non-IT players such as BestBuy. However, it’s only now officially spreading the word about its analytics software and consulting services.
Last week at Cisco Live 2010, RISC Networks announced Version 3.0 of its Unified Correlation Engine Logic (UCEL), the proprietary analytics software its consulting engineers use to correlate and analyze information gathered from a client’s IT environment. UCEL 3.0 enables engineers to pinpoint specific problems at the device and traffic path level more accurately, and to illustrate the results in an easy-to-read “punch list” of prioritized network management issues, the company says.
In addition, UCEL 3.0 adds more analytics capabilities for Microsoft servers and desktops, including data center virtualization analysis for Microsoft Windows Servers, Windows Server event log analytics and Windows operating system and Office license compliance analysis.
“We’ve got about 250 distinct data sets today, and that number grows monthly,” says Jeremy Littlejohn, chief analyst with RISC Networks.
Virtually everything gets tossed into the mix — data, voice and video traffic, networks, servers, desktops, applications, even printers and other technology, collected by secure appliances RISC Networks consulting engineers deploy on site, Littlejohn says. UCEL, he describes, sits on top of all those data sets, which can be anything from what applications are running on Windows workstations to what queues are dropping traffic in your core switch or edge router or how many latency is on the WAN.
“UCEL correlates all of those so you get a picture of how things are behaving and of the end-to-end experience for the end user in those situations,” he says.
RISC Networks provides fixed-length engagements typically lasting from two to three weeks. It works with clients to identify assets, simulate traffic, do packet inspection and run baseline performance analytics — all with the goal of quickly providing actionable data, Littlejohn says.
Importantly, RISC Networks also is able to provide clients context based on the information consulting engineers have gathered from the roughly 400 engagements they handle each year. This context, of course, goes well beyond what an enterprise might garner from its own hardware or software alone.
“We’re able to tell clients, ‘Here are the issues you’re having, and here’s what the other 399 engagements have had issues with, and here’s what they’ve been doing to correct them,'” Littlejohn says. “They get an understanding of where they are compared to peers or competitors from a technology standpoint, and one that’s broad enough to cover all the different types of technology they might use.Littlejohn is quick to point out, however, that RISC Networks does not provide guidance on technology solutions. Rather, it provides the analytics that will help enterprise IT make well-informed next steps.
Pricing varies by engagement, but the three-week base services module costs $15,000, Littlejohn says. Enterprises can add in additional modules on top of that, say if they want to run synthetic transactions for Web servers, for example, from a published price list. Clients need to purchase the appliance; that is provided as part of the services engagement.
Sometimes, Littlejohn says, enterprise IT executives engage RISC Networks for peace of mind. “They don’t know what they don’t know,” he says. Have you ever held up a project for this reason? E-mail me with your story.
