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Talking to Customers About Microsoft Business Productivity Online Services (BPOS)

Teaming with Accenture and Avanade Helps Companies Maximize Value in Adoption of Cloud Services

Published March 2010

Abstract

Cloud computing provides an attractive option for CIOs who are looking to empower

workers, reduce costs, and free scarce internal resources to add value in new ways.

For many companies, the Microsoft Business Productivity Online Services (BPOS)

Suite—including Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, Office Live Meeting, and

Office Communications Online—is a strong candidate for starting down the road to

cloud computing.

To support growing client interest in BPOS, Accenture and Avanade are augmenting

their services to help clients evaluate its suitability, mitigate potential risks, ensure a

smooth transition, and maximize business value. The remainder of this document

examines the “How and Why” behind that effort to embrace BPOS, including the

value that Accenture and Avanade see in promoting it as an alternative to traditional,

on-premises implementations of Microsoft messaging and collaboration solutions.

The information contained in this document represents the current

view of Microsoft Corporation on the issues discussed as of the date

of publication. Because Microsoft must respond to changing market

conditions, it should not be interpreted to be a commitment on the

part of Microsoft, and Microsoft cannot guarantee the accuracy of

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Background.............................................................................................. 1

The Lure of Cloud Computing................................................................ 3

A Logical First Step ................................................................................. 5

BPOS: An Overview ................................................................................ 6

Offerings for Information Workers and Deskless Workers .............................. 7

Significant Business Advantages .................................................................... 7

Accenture and Avanade Services for BPOS ........................................ 9

Assessment and Planning Services ................................................................ 9

Transition and Migration Services ................................................................... 9

Operations and Support Services ................................................................... 9

Internal Sales and Delivery Readiness ......................................................... 10

Early Market Traction ............................................................................ 11

Conclusion ............................................................................................. 13

For More Information .................................................................................... 13

CONTENTS

Talking to Customers About Microsoft Business Productivity Online Services (BPOS) 1

Accenture is a global management consulting, technology services, and

outsourcing company. Combining unparalleled experience, comprehensive

capabilities, and extensive research, Accenture’s "high performance business"

strategy builds on the company’s broad expertise to help clients create

sustainable business value. With approximately 177,000 people working in

more than 120 countries, Accenture generated more than U.S.$21billion in

revenue in its 2009 fiscal year.

In 2000, Accenture (then called Anderson Consulting) entered into a $1 billion

joint venture with Microsoft to form Avanade, a business technology services

provider dedicated to using the Microsoft platform to help enterprises achieve

profitable growth. Over the last 10 years, Avanade has grown to several

hundred million dollars in annual revenue, with more than 9,100 employees

who serve customers in 20 countries.

Since the formation of Avanade, the three companies have worked closely

together, drawing upon their combined strengths to help customers achieve

sustainable business value. One such effort started in 2005, when they began

collaborating on the next generation workplace—a strategic initiative that

combines business process engineering with Microsoft software for messaging,

collaboration, social computing, and unified communications to maximize

workforce productivity and drive greater business value.

From a strategic perspective, the next generation workplace shifts how IT

services are delivered from a focus on products and product roadmaps to one

based on business objectives and the capabilities that employees need to

achieve those goals. This enables companies to connect people, processes,

and technology in a way that improves productivity, efficiency, and operational

costs—for example, by helping employees work together more easily,

communicate better across geographic boundaries, and assign work to the

most appropriate location.

“The next generation workplace isn’t just about technology or tools,” says Bob

Hersch, Global Managing Director for the Workplace Technology and

Collaboration Practice at Accenture. “It’s about setting a strategic plan that

aligns a client’s workplace environment to its business objectives, so that the

workplace delivers the greatest value. Service levels and productivity increase

through customized integration of processes and tools, and costs are lower

because hardware and software are configured precisely to business roles.”

Technology components of the next generation workplace are constantly

changing as new ones become available. “Contrary to what the name may

imply, the next generation workplace isn’t about what’s coming in the future,”

says Hersch. “Instead, it’s a conversation with clients about how they can take

BACKGROUND


advantage of the technologies that are available today to lower costs and

increase workplace productivity.”

Toward that end, with growing interest among enterprises in the benefits of

cloud computing, Accenture and Avanade are adapting the next generation

workplace to include the Microsoft Business Productivity Online (BPOS) Suite.

The remainder of this document examines the “How and Why” behind that

effort to promote BPOS as an alternative to traditional, on-premise

implementations of Microsoft messaging and collaboration solutions.


Members of today’s enterprise workforce must remain productive wherever

they are, whenever the work demands. Teams are often virtual and globally

dispersed, forming and disbanding as needs dictate, and include contractors or

employees of other companies. At the same time, business leaders face major

pressures to cut costs, maintain flexible cost structures, address security risks,

and maximize the use of scarce resources—all in the face of rapidly changing

markets, continued globalization, and an always-on business environment.

Cloud computing—the dynamic provisioning of software from third parties over

a network—provides an attractive new option for addressing these challenges.

By allowing companies to access IT-based services such as infrastructure,

development, applications, and business processes over the Internet, a cloud-

based model provides rapid acquisition, low to zero capital investment,

relatively low operating costs, and variable pricing that is tied directly to use.

“Cloud computing’s promise of rapid, pay-as-you-go scalability is immensely

attractive to CIOs who are under pressure to do more with less,” says Aziz

Virani, Executive Vice President of Global Technologies and Solutions at

Avanade. “Companies not only are looking at cloud computing as a means to

cut costs, but also as way of accelerating deployment and freeing internal

resources to focus on adding value in new ways.”

Continues Virani, “Therein lies the lure of cloud computing. A recent survey1 of

more than 500 C‐level executives and IT decision makers shows that

companies around the world are becoming more familiar and comfortable with

cloud computing as a viable model for technology adoption, with huge

increases in those who are testing or have plans to implement such solutions. I

rarely meet a CIO who doesn’t want to understand his or her options in this

area.”

Accenture is seeing the same trend. “Companies are considering cloud

computing because it accelerates deployment, conserves resources, and

provides an attractive option to the up-front investment of capital,” says Hersch.

“However, like any disruptive technology, it poses new challenges as well as

benefits. Clients are curious, but they’re also cautious in that they want to first

understand the economic model, support model, and associated risks.”

1 Global Survey of Cloud Computing, September 2009, Avanade.

THE LURE OF CLOUD

COMPUTING

“A recent survey of more than

500 C‐level executives and IT

decision makers shows that

companies around the world are

becoming more familiar and

comfortable with cloud computing

as a viable model for technology

adoption….I rarely meet a CIO

who doesn’t want to understand

his or her options in this area.”

- Aziz Virani, Executive Vice President, Global Technologies and Solutions, Avanade

http://www.avanade.com/_uploaded/pdf/avanadethoughtleadershipcloudsurveyexecutivesummary833173.pdf


Adds Virani, “Many CIOs understand the benefits of cloud computing, but aren’t

sure where to start or how to make the transition. It reminds me of the

offshoring trend a few years ago, in that everybody wants to know what others

are doing, what’s the first application they should outsource, and how to best go

about it. That’s where Avanade and Accenture can help, and we believe the

opportunity is large enough that we’re making significant investments in cloud

computing.”


With companies looking for a low-risk way to dip their toes into cloud

computing, many CIOs are asking the same question: Where do we start?

“CIients are worried about security, disruptions to users, and maximizing ROI—

all while getting the right capabilities into users’ hands,” says Hersch. “As with

any disruptive technology, to minimize risk and maximize the rewards, potential

new solutions must be evaluated carefully.”

For many Accenture and Avanade clients, the Microsoft BPOS Suite—

Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, Office Live Meeting, and Office

Communications Online—is a good candidate for starting down the road to

cloud computing. “BPOS is a great option for clients that already have in-house

implementations of Exchange Server, SharePoint Server, Live Meeting, or

Office Communications Server,” says Hersch. “It’s even more attractive for

clients looking to implement those solutions for the first time, in that they can be

deployed faster and with lower up-front costs.”

Continues Hersch, “Remember that the next generation workplace is about

helping clients best take advantage of what exists today. Most organizations

are already running Microsoft messaging and collaboration software, or are

thinking about deploying it. The fundamental value of the next generation

workplace hasn’t changed—there’s just a new delivery option, with a different

cost model and some very attractive benefits. And from a solution provider

perspective, there are many new client conversations—and potential client

engagements—that are enabled by that new delivery option.”

Many of the reasons that Accenture and Avanade recommend BPOS for cloud

services are the same reasons that enterprises prefer Microsoft technology for

in-house deployments. “Other companies may be positioning their online

services against BPOS, but those products lack the familiar user experience

and are generally less enterprise-ready,” says Virani. “By far, Microsoft has the

fuller, more robust, and more mature suite. And workers are already productive

with Microsoft software, so there’s no need to retrain them. Finally, software

such as Microsoft Exchange Server was designed for the enterprise, whereas

other online offerings have their roots in the consumer world.”

Virani sees integration as another strong advantage that BPOS provides for

today’s modern enterprise. “BPOS services are based on the same architecture

as in-house deployments of those products, which eliminates the need to

duplicate core IT services and ensures more seamless integration with internal

applications and those of business partners,” he says. “Microsoft .NET is a

proven means of integration across the company’s software stack, regardless

of whether solution components are running on-premises or in the cloud. I can’t

imagine achieving the same level of integration between other services running

in the cloud and a company’s internal, Windows-based systems.”

A LOGICAL FIRST STEP


A set of messaging and collaboration solutions hosted by Microsoft and

delivered via a subscription model, Microsoft Business Productivity Online

Services (BPOS) are designed to give businesses streamlined communication

and collaboration along with high availability, comprehensive security, and

simplified IT management. Businesses benefit from rapid deployment and

always up-to-date technologies, freeing internal IT resources from day-to-day

administration and reducing the need for infrastructure investments. In addition,

BPOS services can be integrated with each other and with on-premises

solutions to enable seamless, standardized processes and workflows.

Key capabilities provided by the Business Productivity Online Suite include:

E-mail and calendar functions. Exchange Online includes advanced e-

mail, calendar, contact, and task management features—including spam

filtering, anti-virus protection, and synchronization of mobile devices. The

service can be accessed using Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 and

Microsoft Office Outlook Web Access, which enables users to access

their e-mail messages using almost any Web browser.

Document collaboration, shared workspaces, and social computing.

SharePoint Online enables users to share and work together on

documents, maintain version control for shared documents, create

intranet sites to manage projects and project workflows, post calendar

information. Users can also take advantage of social computing features,

such as wikis, blogs, podcasts, activity feeds, social and taxonomy tags,

and message boards.

Web conferencing. Office Live Meeting enables users to hold online

meetings with colleagues, customers, and partners in real time.

Participants can convene online to share documents, ask questions, work

on a virtual "whiteboard," and talk to each other during the meeting.

IM and Presence Awareness. Office Communications Online delivers

instant messaging (IM) and presence functionality to enable real-time,

person-to-person communication via text, voice, and video. Workers can

quickly detect a colleague's availability and connect rapidly using a

reliable, security-enhanced IM solution.

The BPOS suite also includes comprehensive support for migration, e-mail

coexistence, and system administration. In addition, BPOS provides an online

Administration Center for importing user accounts, migrating e-mail accounts,

creating distribution lists and SharePoint site collections, and submitting service

requests to Microsoft Online Services Technical Support.

BPOS: AN OVERVIEW


Offerings for Information Workers and Deskless Workers

To support workforce segmentation, BPOS is offered as two different suites:

Business Productivity Online Standard Suite, which provides a full-

featured desktop experience for information workers

Business Productivity Online Deskless Worker Suite, which is delivered

as a Web-only experience for workers who do not require the processing

power and abilities of a full desktop client, such as salespeople in retail

stores, workers on the factory floor, and so on. This provides a cost-

effective means of providing these workers with only the capabilities that

they need, rather than having to take a one-size-fits-all approach.

Significant Business Advantages

Through cloud-based delivery, BPOS provides users with access to the latest

Microsoft messaging and collaboration tools while helping to relieve the burden

of deploying, managing, and maintaining internal systems. Costly deployment

and time-consuming maintenance are avoided, freeing up IT budgets and

personnel for initiatives that can deliver true competitive advantage. Compared

to on-premises deployments, key advantages provided by BPOS include:

Enhanced operational flexibility. Through cloud-based delivery, BPOS

provides rapid deployment and scalability to meet evolving business

needs. Monthly fees are predictable, with the BPOS subscription model

enabling companies to move capital expenditures (CAPEX) into

operational expenditures (OPEX). As a result, internal IT resources are

freed to focus on more strategic work.

Always up to date., Technologies delivered through the cloud always

remain up-to-date as new versions become available. In addition, as new

services and capabilities are introduced, clients can subscribe to them

without major additional investments in training or infrastructure.

Improved capability. Worker productivity is enhanced through a rich,

integrated, turnkey solution for e-mail, instant messaging, social

computing, Web conferencing, and team collaboration. These streamlined

applications improve agility and innovation, with enterprises able to easily

adopt and exploit new services as BPOS continues to grow and evolve.

Security and reliability. Security and data hygiene are enhanced

through multilayer antivirus scanning and spam filtering. BPOS is hosted

at geographically redundant data centers, with Cybertrust and SAS70

compliance. Reliability is ensured through 99.9 percent scheduled service

uptime and supported by a financially-backed service level agreement.


“There are many advantages to BPOS, one of which is that it’s more cost-

effective and financially predictable,” says Virani.

Adds Hersch, ”For many enterprises, what’s even more attractive is that IT staff

are freed from everyday system management—for example, keeping Exchange

Server running and Active Directory clean. BPOS provides a way to offload

those day-to-day management chores so that internal IT staffers who know the

business can focus on new challenges and opportunities.”


To support growing client interest in cloud computing and offer an attractive

hosted option for messaging and collaboration, Accenture and Avanade are

augmenting their service offerings to help clients determine if BPOS is right for

them, facilitate the transformation, and provide extended service management

around core BPOS services—all geared to helping clients maximize business

value.

Assessment and Planning Services

Companies contemplating a move to BPOS must consider several factors up-

front. Assessment services are designed to help companies evaluate the

business case and infrastructure impacts of a BPOS migration and deployment,

helping clients answer questions such as:

How do I know if BPOS is right for my business and my end user

community?

How do I effectively migrate to BPOS while minimizing end user and

legacy application impacts?

How can I get the most from my BPOS investment?

Transition and Migration Services

Transition services help prepare clients and the environment for the integration,

migration, and deployment of BPOS. Those services can include:

Active Directory Cleanup and Standardization, as required to minimize

future issues and simplify the synchronization of the directory with BPOS.

Mailbox Migration, including planning and migration services based on a

phased approach and realistic timelines to rapidly deliver a positive ROI.

Application Migration and Integration—including architectural design,

phased implementation, and application lifecycle management to ensure

effective migration and integration of legacy line-of-business applications.

User Communications and Training, as required to help ensure a

smooth transition to the new BPOS environment.

Operations and Support Services

Operations and service management provide additional, ongoing management

and support capabilities, as may help clients to fully benefit from their new

BPOS solutions. These services can include:

SharePoint Center of Excellence, an Accenture and Avanade-staffed

center of excellence within client organizations, as need to help facilitate

ACCENTURE AND

AVANADE SERVICES FOR

BPOS


the delivery and governance of enterprise portal and collaboration

solutions based on SharePoint Online.

Directory Management—including administration, engineering, and

integration support for a client’s Active Directory, LDAP, or other directory

technologies.

Service Management and Governance, as required to integrate,

coordinate, and enable consistent support across all IT infrastructure

services delivered to clients.

Service Desk support, providing a single point of contact for BPOS-

related end-user incidents or requests—including full level-one helpdesk

staffing, if needed.

Internal Sales and Delivery Readiness

Accenture and Avanade are making major internal investments around BPOS.

“However, the required investment isn’t as large as you may think,” says

Hersch. “When you look at it from a top-down perspective, we’re simply

extending our existing next generation workplace initiative to include both on-

premises and BPOS delivery methods. We’re refreshing our sales campaigns,

augmenting our skills and capabilities, and adapting existing methods,

estimators, and accelerators to support BPOS as well as on-premises

deployment.”

Virani echoes that sentiment, stating that a large part of the effort is in bringing

the Avanade workforce up to speed to proactively sell and deliver BPOS. “We

have hundreds of people who are already experts in the various technologies,

and have been sending those personnel to Microsoft training sessions on

BPOS,” he says. “We believe the business opportunity around BPOS is huge,

so we’re making significant investments and setting concrete goals with respect

to getting the BPOS message out to clients. Of course, we were also early in

getting certified as a Microsoft BPOS Advisor.”

Beyond preparing their people, both companies are enhancing their technology

toolkits to support the delivery of BPOS. “We’ve invested many millions of

dollars over the past years building tools and methodologies to support Notes-

to-Exchange migrations, Active Directory management, SharePoint

architectures, and so on, and we’re currently adapting those tools for BPOS,”

says Virani. “In fact, we’ve just approved the building of an offshore BPOS

migration factory, as a means of doing migration work at scale.”


Accenture and Avanade are already seeing strong interest in BPOS, with client

engagements at all stages of the sales and delivery pipeline. “Some clients are

actively coming to us with an interest in BPOS, and in other cases we’re

bringing the option to them,” says Hersch. “Either way, it leads to the same

options and opportunities. What’s important is that we need to be the first to

have those conversations with clients, before someone else does.”

With BPOS already available in 22 countries2, the sales pipeline is growing

rapidly. Microsoft is tracking BPOS opportunities associated with Accenture and

Avanade in its CRM system, representing more than a million seats. Avanade

is tracking a global sales pipeline of some 30 to 40 enterprise customers, each

with between 3,000 and 70,000 potential seats. Accenture is tracking more than

20 opportunities in the United States alone, representing some 1.3 million

BPOS seats. “Almost every CIO wants to be educated on BPOS, and we’re

actively engaging with clients as trusted advisors,” says Hersch.

Of the BPOS Services, two are seeing exceptionally strong market interest:

Exchange Online and SharePoint Online. “Most companies already run

Exchange Server, and Exchange Online provides an attractive option for

transitioning that existing functionality to the cloud,” says Mark Kashman,

Technical Product Manager for SharePoint Online at Microsoft. “On the other

hand, SharePoint is a great example of how BPOS can accelerate the

deployment of new capabilities within the enterprise. SharePoint Server is the

fastest-growing server product in Microsoft’s history, with more than 17,000

customers and 100 million plus seats—and along with strong interest in

SharePoint comes increasing demand for choice from a delivery perspective. It

typically takes weeks to months for an in-house deployment of SharePoint

Server, but SharePoint Online can be deployed in a matter of hours or days—at

the low cost of just a few dollars per seat per month. Of course, companies that

deploy SharePoint Online today also will benefit from all of the great new

features to be introduced in SharePoint 2010.”

In addition, companies are evaluating hybrid deployments to get the best of

both worlds: appropriate control over their data together with true economies of

scale. “Co-existence of SharePoint Server on-premises and SharePoint Online

2 BPOS services are currently available in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland,

France, Germany, India, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal,

Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

EARLY MARKET

TRACTION


will drive a whole new range of scenarios as customers seek the value of things

like federated search, line-of-business connectivity, data aggregation, and

more,” says Kashman.

Hersch also expects many new BPOS rollouts to be hybrid deployments to

start, with companies transitioning either part of the workforce or a subset of

functionality to BPOS while the rest remains supported on-premises. “Very few

companies are likely to jump in with both feet,” says Hersch. “Most likely,

companies will transition a part of the organization to BPOS, or host e-mail

services in the cloud while continuing to run Office Communications Server or

SharePoint Server internally. In fact, we encourage CIOs to adopt a phased

approach, in that it makes it easier to assess early issues and quantify the

benefits.”

Adds Virani, “Our clients have hundreds of enterprise applications, so they

won’t be migrating to the cloud in a wholesale fashion anytime soon,” he says.

“That said, hybrid deployments are already a way of life, with most clients

already taking advantage of software running outside of the data center. This

plays nicely to the integration advantages that BPOS provides over other cloud-

based services—and to our strengths in helping clients decide what to move to

the cloud and how to integrate those services back into the data center.”


With growing interest among CIOs in cloud computing, BPOS represents a

significant opportunity for Accenture and Avanade to assist clients who are

looking for a trusted advisor to help evaluate its suitability, assist with migration,

and provide ongoing support. “We need to remain market-driven, and there isn’t

a CIO out there who doesn’t want to understand the options around cloud

computing,” says Virani. “BPOS is a great first step toward cloud computing for

many clients and, as such, poses a tremendous business opportunity for us.

However, with opportunity comes accountability, which is why we’re gearing-up

to provide the guidance and expertise that clients have come to expect.”

Adds Hersch, “Cloud computing is a fundamental long-term shift in how

technology services will be delivered in the 21st century. Some may perceive

the investments we’re making in BPOS as a risk, but we believe those

investments are essential to Accenture and Avanade remaining ahead of the

curve—and trusted advisors to many of the world’s leading companies.”

With expertise in business process engineering, migration and implementation

experience, and one of the highest concentrations of Microsoft expertise in the

world, Accenture and Avanade are in a unique position to capitalize on BPOS,

which already boasts more than 1 million seats. “We help clients make

informed decisions in choosing the best, most appropriate capabilities for their

businesses,” says Hersch. “And when it comes to delivery, we’ve completed

more than 20 million mailbox migrations, more than 1,000 Active Directory

implementations, and have vast experience transitioning work from on-premise

to an outsourced environment. Given those strengths and the strong, growing

interest in cloud computing, the decision to embrace BPOS was an easy one.”

For More Information

More information on the Microsoft Business Productivity Online Suite can be

found at: http://www.microsoft.com/online/business-productivity.mspx

More information on Accenture’s Workplace Technology and Collaboration

Practice can be found at:

http://www.accenture.com/Global/Technology/Infrastructure_Solutions/Workpla

ce_Technology/default.htm

More information on Avanade’s BPOS practice and services can be found at:

http://www.thecloudadvantage.com

CONCLUSION

http://www.microsoft.com/online/business-productivity.mspx

http://www.accenture.com/Global/Technology/Infrastructure_Solutions/Workplace_Technology/default.htm

http://www.accenture.com/Global/Technology/Infrastructure_Solutions/Workplace_Technology/default.htm

http://www.thecloudadvantage.com/