CA’s New Standardized Services Offerings Help CIOs Achieve Lean IT

By Prne, Gaea News Network
Monday, August 17, 2009

DITTON PARK, England -

- Repeatable Methodology Assists in Delivering Rapid ROI and Maximizing IT Value

CA, Inc. (NASDAQ: CA) announced today the immediate availability of 17 new and updated standardized Services offerings to help CIOs achieve the benefits of Lean IT.

Lean IT is an approach being adopted by IT organizations to optimize performance, minimize cost and maximize value. These standardized Services offerings, including pre-packaged, fixed-price rapid implementations, add to CA Services’ portfolio of more than 70 standardized Services offerings, which are aligned with CA software across all product lines.

“With standardized Services offerings, CA Services is focused on helping customers get maximum value from CA products,” said Richard Sills, corporate senior vice president and general manager of CA Services. “Unlike custom-quoted implementations that may result in longer time to value, CA’s standardized Services offerings provide IT staffs with the experience, best practices and expertise that can ensure a fast and successful implementation, a key element of Lean IT. In addition, many rapid implementations now carry significantly lower prices, resulting in one less challenge for companies in this difficult economy,” Sills added.

“In this economy, CIOs face high expectations for IT service delivery and increasingly complex projects,” Sills said. These demands are exacerbated by severe budget constraints and cost controls.

Standardized Services offerings enable CIOs to optimize the effectiveness of their IT infrastructures at a lower cost by helping to:

- Reduce project complexity and deliver rapid return on investment through deployment playbooks, which contain a repeatable methodology that breaks large, complex projects into phases that deliver value in as little as 60-90 days. They also leverage CA intellectual property distilled from thousands of successful implementations to deliver consistent business outcomes; - Minimize risk by providing up-front planning through CA’s methodology, which is accredited by the Open Group. This reduces the need for changes and facilitates alignment between the customer’s business and IT goals. The use of CA’s best practices helps projects stay on track; and - Maximize customer value by allowing more efficient and flexible use of the customer’s staff. Projects are delivered on time and on budget by teams that include project managers certified by the Project Management Institute and architects certified to Open Group standards. Operational runbooks, education and support prepare customer employees for continued success with CA products.

The standardized Services offerings announced today focus on application performance management, infrastructure management, service management, project and portfolio management, security, and mainframe. In addition to rapid implementations, which are fixed-price, pre-packaged offerings designed to deliver business value quickly, they include solution implementations, which may be tailored to meet the needs of unique environments. They also include assessments, health checks, and expert packs. Full information about these new offerings can be found at ca.com/services/standardizedofferings.

Earl Perkins, research vice president of Gartner, Inc., said, “IT executives believe that an appropriate sign of organizational maturity and the ability to add value to the enterprise is shown when their staffs can measurably reduce risk and costs for complex enterprise IT deployments. To the degree that their staff can reuse historical knowledge and known methodologies, they won’t find themselves reinventing the wheel or delivering solutions via custom approaches. If a vendor can develop consistent methodology and tools in areas such as this, they will have an advantage over their competition.”

Standardized Services offerings for Enterprise IT Management software help customers unleash the capabilities of CA software and maximize its value. The powerful combination of CA’s software solutions and standardized implementation services gives organizations a clear advantage over solutions that do not include standardized implementations.

This principle is discussed in a new IDC white paper sponsored by CA titled “The Business Value of Software Deployment Services.”* The paper, by Elaina Stergiades, describes challenges enterprises encounter when deploying software. The paper states, “The CA Services Deployment Methodology is well suited for customers who need to minimize the risk of deploying software into an already complicated IT landscape. By utilizing the…methodology, these customers can take advantage of the extensive experience and expertise reflected in the detailed program materials and the comprehensive nine-step process.”

In a clear example of the value of standardized Services offerings, in this case a rapid implementation, Jose Garcia Vaquero, Transactional Services corporate manager for Produban, said, “Produban, Santander Group’s IT services organization, which manages service provision for all group banks including Open Bank and Abbey International, sought to provide better services to the customers of an online bank by improving the performance of several applications. Using CA Wily Application Performance Management software, CA quickly and accurately diagnosed the performance issues and demonstrated an effective solution. Then, using CA Services’ rapid deployment methodology, CA Services implemented the solution ahead of schedule and delivered a superior online banking experience to the bank’s customers.”

Commenting on an implementation using a standardized Services offering, NuStar Energy’s I/S project manager Edward C. Olszanowski said, “The CA team was top notch. They took the time to truly understand our needs and provide us with the best solution to meet our business needs. Their execution of the CA Clarity installation and configuration was closely coordinated and their processes are well organized. We were able to install, configure and begin using the system in a month. We had only a few minor issues, and CA was quick to resolve every one of them.”

“Winning organizations prepare to thrive in good times even as they intelligently weather downturns. Lean IT provides a recipe for survival while laying the groundwork for growth. Companies that take a Lean IT approach now to increase efficiency and optimize processes will be well positioned for growth when market conditions improve. Standardized Services offerings can be instrumental in those efforts,” said Sills.

* IDC White Paper sponsored by CA, “The Business Value of Software Deployment Services,” July 2009

About CA Services

CA Services designs solutions and delivers services that enhance business value. With our portfolio of Enterprise IT Management (EITM) products, services and education offerings, CA Services is the leading choice to design and deploy enterprise-class CA solutions. Our professionals’ vast technical knowledge and industry know-how accelerate value from your IT initiatives and maximize return on investment. To learn more about EITM business service integrations and how CA Services can help you assess your IT needs, plan your IT investments and provide training and support to get the most from your CA software investments, go to ca.com/services.

About CA

CA (NASDAQ: CA), the world’s leading independent IT management software company, helps customers optimize IT for better business results. CA’s Enterprise IT Management solutions for mainframe and distributed computing enable Lean IT, empowering organizations to more effectively govern, manage and secure their IT operations. For more information, visit www.ca.com.

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Copyright (c) 2009 CA. All Rights Reserved. One CA Plaza, Islandia, N.Y. 11749. All trademarks, trade names, service marks and logos referenced herein belong to their respective companies.

Simon Burberry and Brad Jordan

ca@chameleonpr.com, +44-20-7680-5500

Source: CA

Press Contacts: Victoria Mitchell, CA, Inc., +1-631-342-3597, victoria.mitchell at ca.com; Kristen Wilson, Blanc and Otus Public Relations, +1-617-451-7360, kwilson at blancandotus.com; E. Brian Harris, CA, Inc., Corporate Communications, office: +1-631-342-6508, mobile: +1-804-815-8377, brian.harris at ca.com

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