Firms now offer 'VPN in A Box' model for SMEs

By siliconindia   |   Monday, 28 December 2009, 15:09 IST
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Pune: While IT-hardware makers like Dell and HP launched specific products for the SME segment early this year, firms like Airtel, Cisco and Microsoft, have now started offering their products on the infrastructure-as-a-service model for SMEs. Airtel, along with Cisco, has launched 'VPN in A Box,' a ready-to-deploy bundle of a managed private leased line port, bandwidth, last mile connectivity and customer premise equipment, reports Economic Times. On the other hand, Microsoft, along with Airtel, Wipro and Global Outlook is running a pilot of a pay-per-use model for knitwear companies, usually SMEs, in Tirupur in Tamil Nadu. The over $2-billion knitwear industry in Tirupur has invited and received bids from top tech firms to develop an ERP software on a pay-per-use model. Sam Elangalloor, CEO, Airtel Telemedia Services told Economic Times, "All large firms have a lot of IT infrastructure and their vendors, who are all SMEs, also need to have a compatible IT infrastructure. However, shortage of funds to make capital investment and the unscalability of the infrastructure restricts IT and connectivity adoption by SMEs. IT infrastructure needs heavy configuration and integration to be done at the customer's end, which is difficult unless the SME has an internal knowledgeable resource. We are strong in connectivity for large enterprises, but we could not have sold the same products and services to SMEs. So came up with the hardware (plus connectivity)-as-a-service model, along with Cisco." Adding to his point, Ravi Venkatesan, Chairman, Microsoft India, maintains that IT should be around when companies want to use it and should be priced according to usage. "Indian SMEs have potential for immense growth, but the challenges before them are equally a fact of life. Relevant technology, at an affordable price, can reduce the threat these challenges pose," he maintained. In Airtel's 'VPN in A Box,' the customer need not understand technology. "The customer has to tell us his needs, we will figure out how and what equipment he will need, configure everything at our end and give him the complete bundle for plug-and-play use, configured for use with whatever equipment he already has. In return, the customer pays only for the operating expenditure, and not for the capital expenditure," said Elangalloor.