Validated Designs: Designed and Tested for Faster, Successful Deployment

As I was leaving home the other day, I noticed a sortie of six Black Hawk attack helicopters flying very low around the area. We live near a military base, so we see a lot of training activity throughout the year. Even though this training and testing can be noisy at times for the neighborhood, they are a must to make military operations work. Missions can be delicate, stressful and full of unknowns, and sometimes the execution is thousands of miles away. In addition, the military relies on partners to get them in and out of the field. The confidence that comes from all that training, testing and partnerships helps the teams scale faster to deployment and, hopefully, a successful mission.

As I think about it, I realize that IT challenges are similar. Naturally customers want solutions that have been tested, are easily deployable and can successfully and confidently get them to where they need to be.

This is where Dell Technologies Validated Designs come in. These are workload-optimized solutions that help organizations scale faster with confidence while improving financial metrics creating pathways to digital transformation. Validated Designs are designed for specific use cases. These integrated solutions have been designed, tested and proven by Dell Technologies’ engineering and solution partners to help speed and simplify deployment of new service and offerings, allowing organizations to achieve both faster implementation and return on investment.

Just as all that prep helps to take the guesswork out of spinning up for a military mission, Validated Designs from Dell Technologies takes the guesswork and stress out of deploying mission-critical modernized digital infrastructure for a customer.

Where can Validated Designs help you leverage solutions that lead to competitive advantage? We have developed a portfolio based on specific use cases for Analytics, AI, HPC, Microsoft, Oracle, SAP, and VDI.

Validated Designs use cases

Analytics: Let’s face it, data is everywhere. The sheer volume of data is overwhelming. Those customers who make sense of all of it and become data-centric can transform how they do business while generating great potential for growing revenue and controlling costs. The hard part is knowing where to start. Dell Technologies Validated Designs for Analytics meets a customer where they are on their journey with solutions that help unlock the value of data and lay the foundation for growth.

Artificial Intelligence (AI): AI can change an organization’s business by giving customers an opportunity to quickly identify trends and patterns that otherwise would be difficult and time-consuming to detect. The knowledge gained can result in changes to product, increased competitiveness, faster go-to-market and more. Validated Designs for AI helps customers achieve a consistent approach to AI to capitalize on the latest technological advances, while reducing the complexity of implementation, gaining faster speed to market and achieving deeper insights, more quickly. As a leader with proven AI expertise, Dell Technologies can help organizations just getting started and those looking to take AI to the next level.

High-Performance Computing (HPC): Customers want results and want them faster. Results that drive the creation of intellectual property with price and performance optimized for better value. As active innovators and collaborators in the worldwide HPC community, Dell Technologies HPC experts know how to get those results. Validated Designs for HPC from Dell Technologies gives businesses scalable, flexible, market-ready solutions built to deliver breakthroughs faster. Power tomorrow’s discoveries with the expertise to bring it all together today.

Microsoft: Data is the true differentiator for businesses. Businesses do not need to simply store data — they need to access, ingest and analyze data, regardless of where it resides. With Validated Designs for Microsoft, businesses can take advantage of next-generation analytics and go behind their data to draw actionable insights. The solutions designed for the Microsoft data platform helps businesses accelerate Microsoft SQL and Azure hybrid cloud modernization journeys with more confidence and less stress, laying the foundation for future success in innovation.

Oracle: Dell Technologies understands the opportunities and challenges in becoming a true, data-driven business. Validated Designs for Oracle optimize Oracle investments making it possible to operate with maximum efficiency, scalability and risk mitigation. Gain control and reduce complexity with a modern Oracle foundation, one that supports traditional and emerging Oracle applications and databases. Validated Designs solutions provide the foundation businesses need to connect data across the Oracle landscape and achieve greater outcomes for the business of today and tomorrow.

SAP: SAP businesses are driven by the power of data and turning insights into action. In order to be ready for the data era, they must build the right foundation. Validated Designs for SAP simplifies the path of digital transformation and the SAP Intelligent Enterprise to achieve faster, more reliable and fully predictable deployment of a strong digital foundation. Dell Technologies’ SAP-certified infrastructure and validate designs enable organizations to shift focus from managing infrastructure to accelerating innovation for better business outcomes.

Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI): VDI empowers the workforce and enhances user collaboration and productivity. These days, much of that productivity can be remote. Remote users are growing and have high expectations for performance and availability no matter where they’re working or learning. Remote work also means that more devices and sensitive data are out of direct IT control, increasing the risk for data theft, virus, malware and ransomware attacks. With Validated Design solutions for VDI from Dell Technologies, customers can streamline design and implementation of solutions optimized for performance, cost-effectiveness and security.

Business Without Boundaries

We thank the men and women of our military for serving our country and keeping us safe. Just as they train and test their soldiers and equipment for mission success, Dell Technologies tests and validates workload-optimized solutions to help businesses scale faster, while saving time, cost and resources. Validated Designs from Dell Technologies speed time to value, enable customers to build with confidence and build business without boundaries. You can learn more about how Dell Technologies can help design your intelligent business here.

Source: delltechnologies.com

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Getting Back to Work With AI for Everyone

Artificial Intelligence (AI) applied in the business world closely correlates to AI-enabled operations and applications which help offload workers to refocus on higher value projects and deliverables. In essence, AI enables businesses to accelerate problem solving, decision making, perception and communications within the business as well as to its workforce and growing customer base.

In the enterprise, AI is rapidly gaining traction and delivering results for many companies, as well as supporting business transformation goals. Deploying the right foundation used to be relegated to specialized hardware and compute, but in recent years has enabled more ways to consume and install cost-effective solutions that tackle AI, machine and deep learning, on two key fronts; training and inferencing.

Read More: DES-6332: Dell EMC VxRail Specialist Exam for Systems Administrator

And now, for many companies, an AI-ready infrastructure is not just in the data center or IT closet. You can now leverage AI, and particularly AI inferencing, at the edge.

Why invest in inferencing

Already, businesses around the globe have jumped on the AI bandwagon, while many other businesses are still coming to terms with what to do with AI within their organization, as well as productizing AI as solutions for their customers. With more AI-enabled applications in use, and businesses already having deployed trained AI models, the next focus is testing those models with real-world customer input. Contact center automation, chatbots and customer-response systems must now deliver a smooth, scalable customer experience, based on the questions from customers. Inferencing plays a large role in “inferring” results based on the data input of the trained model and quickly providing the feedback to a researcher, process stakeholder or customer.

With more technology choices and businesses pushing their requirements to use AI in other areas of their vision, AI is an evolving landscape which can be tailored to different needs and in many environments.

At the edge, other machine-driven data collections, real-time manufacturing and IoT inputs require active decision-making to visualize the data generated in megabytes to gigabytes per second, or faster. Again, the operator needs to infer enough from the data to take the next step.

Finding a home for AI

As AI continues to deliver real results for a business, you now have to consider where and how AI can be deployed in your infrastructure. What AI projects are being kicked off in the organization? What AI solution is right for you? How can AI inferencing at the edge bring increased capabilities for the organization? Does your infrastructure allow you to democratize AI inferencing across all users and environments? What are the best compute and graphics solutions for AI?

Delivering a compute platform that supports AI inferencing starts with a performance-optimized infrastructure, flexible enough to support a range of needs across an organization and its users. Traditionally, the server CPU has led the role of inferencing for these solutions. However, with the server driving applications, as well as performing inferencing, there has been a growing need to offload the CPU from AI and inferencing tasks with NVIDIA Ampere architecture-based accelerators.

The Dell EMC PowerEdge server portfolio enables enterprises and businesses to harness the power of AI and significantly improve inferencing with NVIDIA AI Solutions. The flagship NVIDIA-Certified PowerEdge R750xa server, for example, is a superb, purpose-built platform for AI supporting NVIDIA training accelerators such as the NVIDIA A100 and inferencing accelerators including NVIDIA A30 and future support for the newest member of the inferencing family, the NVIDIA A2 GPU.

With this portfolio and NVIDIA AI Enterprise, an end-to-end software suite for the development and deployment of AI, customers can readily support their AI inferencing projects with an extensive portfolio of NVIDIA-Certified PowerEdge servers available now, along with VMware vSphere integration to deliver and democratize AI foundations across all their users, global workers, data center and edge deployments.

AI now helps you get back to work

Furthermore, with the planned support of NVIDIA A2 into the PowerEdge portfolio, customers will be able to support inferencing needs in the data center and across edge deployments to improve outcomes at those sites and enable faster processing of incoming data. While the A30 serves as the performance inference choice for businesses, the A2 enables customers to deploy inferencing at the edge, meeting lower power requirements and a smaller form factor, which are ideal for servers in edge environments. Dell already deploys several solutions to help customers simplify their edge, across a broad set of industries and use cases that require AI. PowerEdge servers including the XE2420 (which already supports the A30) and the new XR11/XR12 servers help customers at the edge to generate insights on a resilient, cyber-secure infrastructure.

With the tremendous acceleration horsepower offered by today’s GPUs and CPUs, IT has resources to intelligently power multiple workloads and users (via VDI, for example) from their graphics-accelerated servers, while enabling their workers access to graphics applications previously not available to them. Dell PowerEdge servers now support NVIDIA A16 GPUs, enabling a richer and more collaborative experience for 2x more users, as well as boosting streaming media performance. The A16 was designed for accelerated VDI and is supported on Dell PowerEdge servers, starting with the PowerEdge R750xa, R750, R7525, and R7515.

AI-powered infrastructures can help businesses of all sizes develop and drive more value from AI projects, while offloading from the server CPU, to purpose-built GPUs like NVIDIA A2. This technology enables your teams to get back to work on higher value initiatives.

Source: delltechnologies.com

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Leverage PowerEdge to Support Your IT Sustainability Goals

As risks to the environment grow, organizations around the globe have rapidly embraced sustainability goals and programs. They realize that strong sustainability practices are not just beneficial to the climate, but they are also good for business. These programs mitigate the impacts of the climate crisis on the environment but can also boost reputations, enhance operations and even improve financial performance.

At the UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP26) in Glasgow, heads of state and climate experts are gathering to take actions to get to net zero emissions by 2050. Many expect that the conference will lead to additional regulations and requirements for organizations that don’t meet specific levels of standards.

Dell Technologies is committed to being an environmental steward. As far back as 1996 we debuted our Asset Resale & Recycling Services for businesses followed by Dell Reconnect in 2004 and recycling services in 2006. Through these programs and others, we are keeping our products in the economy longer while also enabling the materials to be recycled and reused. By designing waste out of our products and reusing e-waste, we are making strides toward achieving our goals of making our products with 50% recycled or renewable materials.

Our comprehensive sustainability program is based on three strategic approaches; accelerate the circular economy, protect the planet and champion the people who build our products. And, in February 2020 we launched our 2030 Moonshot Goals. As we continue to move from goals and promises to progress and action, we believe technology plays a critical role.

PowerEdge Innovations: Sustainability from Design to End of Life

We have built sustainability into the Dell EMC PowerEdge portfolio, by improving the servers’ designs so they work more efficiently and using sustainable materials in an innovative manner.

Sustainable materials: Dell Technologies’ products include materials like tree-based bioplastic, reclaimed carbon fiber and recycled aluminum. We are also exploring recycled steel and sourcing more closed-loop material from products returned to Dell via our Asset Recovery Services. Today, PowerEdge products contain up to 35% recycled plastic. We are also on track to meet our goal of having the packaging made from 100% recycled or renewable materials by 2030.

Thermal design and cooling: Multi-vector cooling (MVC), Dell liquid cooling (DLC) and our thermal design innovations reduce an organization’s carbon footprint by decreasing energy and cooling needs. The T-shaped motherboard layout in the PowerEdge R650 and R750 allows for improved airflow balancing and system cooling while DLC in PowerEdge servers cools up to four times faster than air.

Power efficiency and infrastructure consolidation: Since 2013, we have reduced energy intensity by 83% in our PowerEdge products through engineering advancements. In our latest generation of servers, we increased our energy efficiency by 29% from the previous one. Also, we reduced the amount of hardware needed to meet an organization’s needs. In 2013, it took six servers to do what is possible with just one server today.

Our commitment and hard work led to 43 PowerEdge servers meeting the high standards of the US EPA’s Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool (EPEAT) and a 3.0 Energy Star rating throughout the portfolio.

Partnering to Improve Sustainability

As organizations strive to adopt IT sustainability goals, the green data center has become a target. But success requires cooperation. Beyond creating strong sustainability practices for our own products and solutions, Dell Technologies can also support our customers wherever they are in their sustainable IT journey. As the digital economy marches onward, data centers have grown larger, more complex and consume vast amounts of energy needed to process the zettabytes of data that are generated.

Today, modern data centers have improved layouts and implement more efficient cooling technology but it’s still crucial to use the right hardware solutions. In partnership with Dell Technologies, organizations can implement more eco-friendly data centers, supported by more powerful yet energy efficient technology, to help safeguard the environment while also lowering their costs.

Dell’s sustainable hardware solutions enable organizations to create more efficient data centers that require a smaller footprint, use less energy, limit the destructive extraction of natural resources and support organizations on their sustainability journeys.

Source: delltechnologies.com

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The Importance of On-Premises Hybrid Classical-Quantum Computing

Quantum computation has the potential to accelerate simulation, optimization and machine learning algorithm use cases. Increasingly, customers tell us they want to consume data and execute classical workloads in private, on-premises environments due to compliance, policy and privacy issues. A cohesive way of exploring quantum computation is through an end-to-end hybrid classical-quantum solution utilizing virtual Quantum Processing Units (vQPUs) for simulation. Hybrid quantum-classical algorithms combine quantum computers with classical computers. They’re expected to power the first useful class of applications for quantum computing, whether in machine learning, optimization, quantum chemistry or other use cases. This, in turn, enables cost effective methods of discovering use cases, upskilling current team members to meet future needs and developing more complete solutions for customers.

Dell Technologies and IonQ recently worked together to test a hybrid classical-quantum platform that leverages our Dell EMC PowerEdge R740xd server paired with IonQ’s simulation engine and quantum processing unit (QPU) to better enable the journey to hybrid classical-quantum solutions. With the platform, classical and quantum simulation workloads can execute on-premises, while quantum workloads, such as modeling larger, more complex molecules for pharmacological development, can be executed remotely on IonQ QPUs. Further, wait time for each quantum circuit execution is reduced significantly by IonQ’s reservation API.

Coupling Dell Technologies’ strength in classical infrastructure with IonQ’s coherence time, gate fidelity and scale enables the QPU to solve more complex problems, allows for better error correction to reduce the time spent using the QPU to solve problems and allows IonQ to run their QPU at room temperature, enabling placement in established data centers without exotic cooling. These specific IonQ benefits, in turn, enable customers to evaluate what approach works best for them to start on their quantum journey.

The key takeaways from the testing include the following:

◉ The Dell hybrid classical-quantum platform integrates seamlessly with IonQ quantum simulation and quantum processing units. Quantum workloads can be developed with vQPUs running on Dell infrastructure and later, seamlessly migrated to be executed on IonQ’s remote QPU with minimal effort.

◉ With IonQ’s reservation API, each quantum circuit, executing from the Dell hybrid classical-quantum platform, does not need to wait for in job-queues and can be injected into IonQ’s remote QPU directly. This capability greatly improves performance to leverage real QPU hardware.

◉ Leveraging the capability through an on-premises infrastructure solution may provide incremental cost efficiency and data privacy. As a result, organizations can train quantum programmers more efficiently and drive to a business-critical use case faster.

Our testing with IonQ demonstrates the power of an end-to-end hybrid classical-quantum solution. We’re finding as quantum hardware, algorithms and hardware continue to evolve, the need for classical infrastructure will accelerate and scale accordingly. This is just the beginning of classical infrastructure with QPUs, creating endless possibilities.

Source: delltechnologies.com

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A Data Science Certification Designed to Meet Your Career Goals!

Data Science is a growing technology with a vast scope and is growing at a swift pace. It is a field that utilizes different technologies and tools to work on data to get valuable insights. The Industry is moving towards Data-Driven, resulting in increasing demand for Certified Data Scientists.

Many Certifications are possible that can make you a Certified Data Scientist. To meet this demand and stay updated, many people are diving into Data Science. This article will give a short overview of Data Science, Data Scientists, and a few Certifications that can aid you to become a Certified Data Scientist.

Data Scientists are Analytical Experts who have knowledge in technologies and work on data to analyze it and obtain valuable insights. Data scientists deal with the collection, analysis, and interpretation of data. Data Scientists work on vast amounts of data and generate hypotheses, and find patterns in data.

To become a Certified Data Scientist, you require to learn the basics of Statistics, have a good knowledge of Quantitative Analysis, have hands-on experience with the data, Machine Learning, and Data Science tools, and one of the Certificate.

The demand for Data Scientists has increased recently, and people are innovating in this emerging technology. Getting a Certification gives you an edge over the competitors. The advantage of Certified Data Scientist is higher, and the trend reveals that Certified Data Scientist earns more. There are various types of Certifications covering from Self-Learning to Course-Based.

There are different Data Science Certifications available to cater to a broad range of audiences. Everyone has an additional option to satisfy their requirement for the people with experience to a new learner.

Data Science Certifications: Establishing Professional Credibility of Data Science Skills

Data scientists, data analysts, and data engineers are among the most sought-after data job roles. Yet, many emerging and experienced professionals do not have the needed skills employers need. This might not look like a new problem, but it is a big one and can be overcome with a data science certification.

When contemplating a career as a data scientist or building on your existing data science skills, making a data science certification is an instrumental piece of paper to have, especially for data science beginners. Many data science certifications within the industry help professionals verify that they have the needed skills and knowledge to benefit an organization.

Data Scientist Career Paths

Data scientists can choose a specialty, and there are many career paths to choose from.

1. Data Scientist

Data scientists work in every part of the data process, from collecting to organizing, analyzing, and interpreting. Data scientists must provide insights to help organizations come up with strategies to meet their goals.

2. Data Analyst

A data analyst is an entry-level job. Data analysts spend most of their days analyzing data and writing tips. They work with existing data and give a summary of sorts that details the company’s performance.

3. Data Engineer

Data engineers work on building data infrastructure and dataset processes that data scientists use for analysis. Think of them as software engineers and data scientists combined. To thrive in the role, you must be fluent in programming languages such as Python, R, Java, and Scala.

Is Data Science Certification Easy or Hard?

When it comes to the level of complexity expected in obtaining a data science certification, If you are the type of person who enjoys looking for patterns in data, it will be interesting for you. Still, if the idea of staring at a spreadsheet sounds like a nightmare to you, it might be a little trickier because the level of interest would not be there.

Many of these certifications need quite a bit of studying and memorization. However, suppose you have already dedicated yourself to a data scientist career. In that case, the chances are good that you have already learned many underlying concepts or worked with software that works on similar principles.

End Notes

To conclude, deciding to undergo a Data Science certification course is challenging. You risk your time and money and hope to build a new career. It is a strong bet if you take the right path and develop your skillset.

The Data Science certification in itself has no value unless the skills complement it. Always study for a course that adds value to your skills and not just the certificate.

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Simplify Microsoft Hybrid Cloud Use Cases with Storage-as-a-Service

Hybrid and multi-cloud strategies make it possible to select the optimal location for your data. However, when data is created, processed and stored on-premises, at the edge and in multiple cloud environments, management can become complex. As organizations seek to leverage data and applications in all these locations, they need solutions designed to streamline management.

Microsoft Azure Arc-enabled data services brings Azure data services on-premises, creating a consistent management experience for applications and databases regardless of where they reside. When combined with SQL Server 2019, organizations can create a hybrid cloud experience that embraces data virtualization while respecting the laws of data gravity. This begs the question then, how can you extend this cloud experience to the supporting, underlying infrastructure foundation while meeting your business’ requirements for a cost efficient, easy to deploy and scalable solution?

As businesses embrace a Microsoft hybrid cloud, their IT organizations need to be prepared with a data management strategy that makes use of and supports all data, structured and unstructured, wherever it lives. Designing and building the right solution — from edge, to private, to public, to hybrid cloud — requires a combination of the right expertise and infrastructure. This is not a one-size-fits-all approach, but a consumable, flexible and scalable approach. It requires Dell Technologies APEX As-a-Service Solutions for Microsoft.

APEX solutions deliver a secure and consistent multi-cloud experience across the entire IT environment with flexible pay-as-you-use models. These solutions and support services are designed to ensure a rapid and sustainable path to delivering hybrid cloud capabilities, including Microsoft’s Azure hybrid cloud.

As a strategic Microsoft partner, Dell Technologies engineering teams collaborated with Microsoft to ensure that APEX Data Storage Services followed the proper Azure Arc validation process for both Kubernetes and enabled data services as defined by Microsoft. Our validated solution gives customers the confidence of knowing we have met Microsoft’s most exacting standards for an enterprise grade hybrid cloud solution.

With APEX Data Storage Services and Azure Arc-enabled data services, managing on-premises Microsoft SQL Server in a hybrid world just became easier. From removing data silos, to consolidated database instances, to enabling more agile workloads, to ensuring the SQL Server based applications performance capacity requirements are met. The APEX Console provides a unified and seamless experience to manage your entire APEX journey, enabling agile IT service delivery by reducing complexity. This intuitive console allows administrators to onboard stakeholders, control access and manage individual privileges, so they have self-service access. It is the single place to subscribe, provision, operate and monitor APEX Data Storage Services workloads.

The challenges of Microsoft SQL Server in a hybrid cloud scenario are significantly reduced with the combination of Azure Arc-enabled data services and APEX Data Storage Services. Get up and running quickly with a 14-day time-to-value objective and do it confidently with Storage as-a-Service designed for 99.9999% availability. APEX Data Storage Services allows seamless scaling of capacity, as well as simple pricing with a single rate for base and on-demand capacity. There is no penalty for the flexibility of on-demand, elastic usage, so it’s easy to plan ahead and optimize your service for performance, capacity and cost.

Learn more about how you can take advantage of these agile and flexible as-a-service digital technologies from a true a leader in infrastructure solutions. Spend less time managing your hybrid cloud infrastructure and more time on driving greater innovation from your Microsoft data estate.

Source: delltechnologies.com

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Planning to Play in 5G? You’ll Need a Bigger Sandbox

At an early age, we learn the importance of playing well together with everyone in the sandbox. Then as we grow older, the number of people we invite into our sandbox grows smaller even as our world grows larger. This new sandbox is familiar, comfortable and secure. But it doesn’t lead to great discoveries or new partnerships.

The future of global communications requires a bigger sandbox and a lot more people in it digging for solutions. The 5G services of tomorrow won’t be delivered by any single company. They will require new partnerships that bring together operators, equipment vendors, hardware and software companies and other businesses to build the next generation of mobile services, from autonomous vehicles to augmented reality.

In order to facilitate this world of 5G discoveries, Dell Technologies has created a world-class sandbox, the Open Telecom Ecosystem Lab (OTEL for short). Open for business since this Summer, OTEL has drawn interest from many of the world’s leading operators, partners and enterprises. Proofs of concepts, collaborative solutions, tests and certifications are happening in OTEL right now.

OTEL exemplifies collaboration, interoperability and trust

OTEL is much more than a meeting place for new ideas and partners. It’s a secure, collaborative environment that brings together some of the world’s smartest companies (and some of the world’s smartest people) to accelerate and energize the creation and adoption of 5G services. Dell is ideally suited to host this environment because we already partner with so many of the world’s leading technology companies in both the enterprise and telecommunications markets.

The cornerstone of OTEL’s environment is collaboration, interoperability and trust built on the modern development, security and operations (DevSecOps) paradigm. Collaboration refers to embracing and evolving open standards, from Kubernetes to Open RAN (O-RAN) and many others. OTEL brings together more than enterprises, operators and vendors; it also brings in the industry standards bodies that are defining the future. Interoperability represents product certifications and solution validations to de-risk the deployment of 5G services, not just on paper, but in real-world production networks. Trust is perhaps the most important ingredient because 5G is poised to become a competitive advantage for many companies. OTEL’s secure environment ensures that partners have the same level of privacy they could expect in their own testing labs. Each of these elements is then integrated together and continuously tested using the latest DevSecOps processes.

Bringing the right products and people together

A collaborative ecosystem is only as strong as its products and people. From the product side, OTEL is open to a vast partner network that includes traditional network equipment vendors, newer companies with software-based solutions, industry consortiums and leading enterprises. But people play an equally important role, which is why Dell has brought together a world-class team of experts that represent what we believe are the four critical skill sets for 5G solutions:

◉ Automation skills that address scalability and accelerate solution development.

◉ Telecommunications network expertise from industry veterans who have led POCs in large telco environments.

◉ Integration and interoperability specialists who know how to build solutions featuring servers, storage, and software from different vendors.

◉ Industry standards advocates who know the telco stack and can ensure that 5G solutions are aligned with the future.

OTEL is already helping 5G Open RAN solutions become a reality. We offer a variety of services today including product certification, solution validation, new service creation and other lab testing activities. From a solution’s testing perspective, OTEL can replicate a variety of scenarios including core, edge and RAN environments. Our goal at Dell is to deliver a best-in-class 5G lab environment without the bias. Even if you’re not using Dell hardware or software, you can still use OTEL to test your solutions in a trusted, secure environment.

Coopetition and the future of 5G

The reality is that no single industry owns 5G. It’s not a pure telecommunications play or a pure mobile play. Enterprises, device manufacturers, network equipment vendors, service providers and software companies will all have a role in shaping the future of 5G. At the same time, they’ll need to work together to create and deliver these solutions even as they compete against one another for revenue share. For this reason, trust is at the center of everything we do at OTEL. Without that trust, you can’t get everyone into the same sandbox to play together. So, bring your imagination and join us in the sandbox of tomorrow. You’ll be amazed what we can build together.

Source: delltechnologies.com

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Of Special Suits and Other Props – Emily the Engineer

Emily Yarid, aka Emily the Engineer, is a Mechanical Engineering graduate of Clemson University. Passionate about (re)creating props, Emily’s come a long way since she built her first Iron Man suit out of foam and hot glue at age 14. She now regularly shares updates on her creations with her followers across TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram.

As a #DellInsideCircle member, Emily is constantly looking to outdo her previous creations and her Dell Precision 5750 mobile workstation and Dell UltraSharp 27-inch monitors play an important role in making this happen. I recently sat down with Emily, to talk about her journey as a creator – both of things and content – and how technology supports her in her work.

Matt: What – or who – inspired you to pursue engineering as a career?

Emily: I always knew I wanted to do something STEM related. My dad is an engineer and had a workshop at home. He was always more than willing to show me how certain tools worked and what they were used for. By the time I was a senior in high school, I was certain I wanted to go into engineering. I had developed an interest in troubleshooting, figuring things out, learning about new materials I could use to build cool things. I also had a physics teacher who encouraged me towards the field when I was trying to navigate what to study at college. 

Matt: How did you get into 3D printing?

Emily: Our makerspace at Clemson University had lots of 3D printers, and I quickly became obsessed. I had always assumed that these printers were way too expensive for someone to own in their home but learned that wasn’t necessarily the case. After printing some smaller things at my university, I decided to purchase one for myself to attempt bigger projects like the Iron Man suit.

Iron Man was particularly fun, because it involves recreating pieces of armor that have to work with one another, move, light up and so on. I look forward to tackling other functional props.

Matt: What attracted you to design stuff based on superheroes?  

Emily: My dad took me to see the Avengers when I was 13, and I became obsessed. The next summer it rained almost every day, so I spent a lot of time indoors and saw some builders on the internet recreating replica Iron Man suits out of foam. I thought I’d take a crack at it and built my first foam Iron Man suit that summer. I was proud of the project but didn’t touch it much until several years later. Fast forward to junior year of college, after learning about 3D printing, I looked back on that project and knew I could do much better if I tried again.

Matt: What role does Dell Technologies play in your work?

Emily: Dell Technologies has played a huge role in my work. My Dell Precision workstation has been an absolute workhorse in helping me do my work while on the go, with anything from light browsing to hardcore modeling. And my new 27” Dell UltraSharp Monitors have already been the biggest help with multitasking, prepping models and more. So far, they have been insanely reliable and I enjoy using my PC setup more than ever.

Matt: What are your five tech must-haves?

Emily: My tech must-haves have changed over the years as my career has pointed more towards 3D printing and content creation. My PC and 3D printers are my top two tech must-haves, for obvious reasons. Without my PC to prep models, and my 3D printer to print, it would be a lot harder to do what I do. Behind those come my phone, microphones and cameras for the sake of content creation!

Matt: Which project are you most proud of and why?

Emily: I’m most proud of my most recent Iron Man suit. I built a suit for a recent convention, and was able to sand, paint, wire, solder, and strap everything together in around 2 weeks. There are things I‘d like to fix, but for the limited time I had I was super proud of how it looked and how mobile it was!

Matt: As a creator, who inspires you?

Emily: Through high school, I enjoyed watching other builders on YouTube and seeing what they could come up with. Around the time I built my foam suit, I began watching the Hacksmith, and have always been inspired by what he and his team have been able to accomplish.

Matt: What advice do you have for engineers who are just starting out?

Emily: Get your hands dirty! Build things, assemble things, disassemble things to figure out how they work, etc. Throughout this hobby, I’ve learned a ton about 3D printing, different materials and how parts work together. What I learned on my own, outside of classes, not only translated to projects I had for school, but also helped me in different areas of work at internships.

Matt: Could you tell us more about your internships?

Emily: My favorite internship was at a manufacturing plant that created parts for cars. I was assigned to a specific line, so I was able to deep dive into that specific area. I learned how to troubleshoot and develop simple tools that may make a technician or operator’s job easier which often required the creation of a physical part. We’d usually relay designs to a workshop, but they were so busy and backed up. So I asked if I could get the materials, cut a part or two and assemble it myself. I was able to ease their workload, get the job done quicker, and gain hands-on experience putting things together, which I enjoyed. I learned a lot from the workshop team about assembling things, and I learned a lot from the engineers and technicians concerning troubleshooting and developing solutions. 

How did you become a video content creator and YouTuber? Do you have any tips for content creators who are starting out?

Emily: I use my experience as a viewer to decide what I record and how I record it. Growing up, I watched a lot of videos about building and creating things, whether it be movie accurate props or a cool functional device. I specifically liked when the video creators weren’t acting too seriously. As the viewer, it was the most fun to watch someone build something when they were having fun. As I started my career on TikTok and YouTube, I’ve taken that into account, and thankfully people have enjoyed it so far.

I’d encourage anyone in content creation, be it builders or others, to just have fun with whatever they’re posting. Chances are, if you enjoy making the video, your audience will enjoy watching it as well!

What’s next for Emily the Engineer?

Emily: As far as projects go, I have a lot of followers requesting a Star Wars related build, so I’ll be looking into that and maybe some smaller functional props. As far as my career goes, I’ve thoroughly loved the content creation scene and getting to share my builds with people in general. Next, I will hopefully obtain a workshop of some sort, so I have space to work on my projects. As of now, I’m operating out of my apartment, so getting a designated space for my work is my next goal.

In the future, if I were able to streamline everything and have all my tools/machines in one place, I would be interested to launch a store to sell prints or designs.

Source: delltechnologies.com

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A Cloud (Road) Map to Treasure

Part 2 of Making the Cloud of Dreams Real

Building a cloud for your business to empower innovation is foundational for staying relevant to your customers. But planning for innovation can be challenging when different business units all need to be involved in the planning process. Is everyone aligned to the same cloud vision? Are stakeholders coordinating what they will need to do to meet the business requirements for cloud?

In my last blog post I talked about the road map to treasure when it comes to cloud adoption and cloud success. I said, “a dream without a plan is just a wish,” when talking about how organizations today are looking to adopt cloud. Many don’t know where to start or what a long-term cloud vision and strategy even looks like.

Indeed, we’re overwhelmed by analysts and pundits (and bloggers like me) espousing the benefits of cloud adoption. Whether you’re reading about future IT budgets or what the next generation of applications will look like, it’s impossible to ignore the impact cloud has had on our industry. Clearly there are business benefits to adopting cloud, but many organizations aren’t sure where to start. Remember, we need a plan, otherwise we’re just wishing. Wishing is great for lottery tickets and sports cars, but when it comes to cloud we need a plan. So where do we start?

Are We There Yet?

Remember long rides in the car when you were a kid? You had no idea how long it would take to get somewhere, the route you were taking or what your parents needed to know in order to get there. Instead, you’d ask the inevitable question, “are we there yet?” over and over again. Cloud strategy is not that different when you don’t have a map to follow. Think of it like following a treasure map to cloud success. If you don’t know where you’re going or how to get there, your organization is likely going to end up spending too much and not truly addressing business outcomes and stakeholder requirements.

Everyone knows treasure maps have multiple X marks along the route until you find the treasure. With each marker you discover you’re one step closer to the end goal. Consider your cloud strategy­­­­­ as a treasure map, but you are in control of what those makers are along the way. You can think of those markers as aligning to the different business stakeholders that will be consumers of the cloud, including application teams, DevOps teams and more. Those Xs can be leading you to an application and data landing zone strategy, business resiliency strategy or other key business drivers for cloud adoption. You can’t skip markers on the treasure map, much in the same way you can’t skip steps along the way towards building a cloud strategy.

Organizations that are adopting cloud without a plan and strategy are not controlling their treasure map. They don’t have those X markers to guide them so they don’t know how to get there or when they’ve arrived. They have no idea how long it’ll take to get to each marker and they’re not sure what they need to do to get there in the first place. The “ready-fire-aim” approach to cloud adoption just doesn’t work and ends up causing organizations to spend a lot of money unnecessarily. It’s like trying to follow a treasure map without a compass.

Study the Map Before you Begin

The beginning of a plan should start with where you are now. When you start a journey in your car and want to know how far or how long it will take to get to the destination, you have to put in your current location. For a treasure map, you have to know where you are in relation to the first X marker. When Dell Technologies Services works with customers on cloud adoption, we typically start with our ProConsult Advisory services which help customers develop a road map to success and a strategy to get there. We use a process called “As-is/To-be” that looks at the current state of a customer’s environment (as-is) and then helps them understand what they want the future state (to-be) to look like. The gap between what an organization can do today and what they want to do tomorrow informs the strategy, goals and objectives for how to get there. Starting with a strategy and road map will show organizations how to get there, how long it will take and what they need to do along the way. No more “are we there yet?”

Find and Align the Pieces of the Map

Remember from my last post when I said “if you build it, they will come” doesn’t work for cloud? Clouds won’t be consumed unless business stakeholders and cloud consumers have their data there first. That means migrate all data and applications to your new cloud, right?

Not quite. When we work with customers our mantra is always – cloud is an operating model, not a destination – as cloud is not always a fit for every application. Just like you need a road map for success for aligning the cloud strategy to the business, you also need to define a strategy for your future state application landing zones. After all, you can’t start a journey without knowing where you are, where you’re going and what the destination will be. Without that destination, how would you know how to chart a course or even know when you’ve arrived? Imagine you’re looking at a treasure map where the line ends at the edge of the first map and you need to align to a second map which represents another destination end point. In this case, it’s your application strategy, a very important component of cloud success. And don’t forget to include flexibility in your application portfolio strategy. Just because an application lines up with a particular landing zone doesn’t automatically mean it will live there forever.

The process of defining your strategy and landing zones serves more than just to inform your future workload placement. You’ll often also end up disproving preconceived notions you may have had about what the future state will look like. The fact is, at times we all hold on to the old way of doing things because that’s what we’re comfortable with and that’s what we’ve known. I should know – I still have a landline phone in my house. For organizations to modernize and transform they need the operational maturity to recognize when change is needed and when the old way of doing things belongs in the past.

Envision a Hybrid Future

We’ve talked about creating a strategy and road map for cloud success and also touched on evaluating your application landing zone to determine where they should run to support business goals. It’s true that some applications are better suited for an on-premises cloud whereas others may make more sense in a highly scalable public cloud. The good news is you can have both with a hybrid cloud strategy.

A hybrid cloud like APEX Cloud Services with VMware Cloud enables customers to have the flexibility of provisioning and consuming resources in their hybrid cloud on-premises while also allowing the consumption of public cloud services using solutions like VMware Cloud on AWS or Azure VMware Solution. These solutions are all based on the same powerful VMware platform, enabling easy workload portability, common toolsets and simplified disaster recovery, just to name a few.

What about native public clouds like Amazon Web Services or Microsoft Azure? Dell Technologies Services can provide the services to integrate your on-premises APEX Cloud Services with VMware Cloud solution with public cloud hyperscalers to enable provisioning to the cloud of your choice. Want to learn more? It’s as easy as clicking here.

You wouldn’t start on a long journey without a map (or GPS on your phone) and identifying the best stopping points along the way to get gas, experience the area, eat and rest. The same is true for cloud adoption. By starting with a customized strategy and road map, you’ll be well on your way to cloud success without having to hear “are we there yet?” from your business stakeholders.

Source: delltechnologies.com

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Making the Cloud of Dreams Real

The transition to consuming IT as a service is accelerating rapidly across all industries. Paying for the services and infrastructure you need when you need it is a game changer for organizations that want to reduce upfront expenditures and ongoing maintenance for the infrastructure they need to run their business. APEX Cloud Services with VMware Cloud delivers this and more, addressing customer’s challenges and helping them achieve their business objectives. This exciting release changes the game for adopting a powerful on-premises cloud platform.

We have a lot of experience working with customers who are adopting their cloud strategy and realizing the benefits as they mature. We’ve learned many lessons on what works, what doesn’t work, and what organizations need to do to be successful in operationalizing their cloud and using it to achieve outcomes.

APEX Cloud Services with VMware Cloud makes it simple for an IT organization to order additional compute, similar to how they would consume public cloud resources. So, how do we bring that simplicity to the business stakeholder?

Cloud of Dreams

If there is one truism about cloud we’ve found over the years it’s that “if you build it, they will come” is simply not true. Many organizations have spent countless hours of effort to create brand new greenfield, sparkling, artisanal cloud platforms and they expect this hard work will be rewarded by consumption. While this is a great start towards cloud adoption, there are other areas organizations need to focus on to drive adoption.

Developers and other business stakeholders of the cloud need their data in the cloud before they’re willing to use it. We help organizations drive consumption of their cloud platforms by migrating data and workloads first. Once these workloads are moved to the cloud, net-new workloads will be deployed there as well.

Batteries Included

Of course, migrating workloads into the cloud on its own is not enough to drive consumption of your shiny new cloud. A cloud is only as successful as the services and functionality that if offers.

Remember as a kid when you unwrapped that toy you had been wanting so badly only to discover the dreaded “batteries not included” message printed on the box? Cloud platforms are not that different. When you unwrap your cloud and take it out of the box, it needs to come with those batteries.

In this case, those batteries include the automations and integrations that your organization needs. It needs to be integrated together such that it meshes seamlessly with the organization’s IT workflow and lifecycle. It needs to have automated services that provide a seamless experience that helps developers and other stakeholders get what they need when they need it. Finally, it needs to have a populated service catalog to enable end-users to start consuming the cloud on day one.

A shiny cloud with blinking lights in the data center and a login prompt to an empty service catalog just won’t cut it.

A Square Peg in a Square Hole

We all know that organizations are not adopting cloud because Gartner says they should or because they read this awesome blog post (though I’ll still believe that’s all it took). Organizations adopt cloud to achieve the agility and flexibility they need to solve their business problems and satisfy their customers. With that said, not all workloads are created equal, and neither are all clouds.

The truth is, it’s best to figure out the right cloud for each application or workload or even set of data. A key benefit of APEX Cloud Services with VMware Cloud is that it has multi-cloud built in, allowing simple workload portability to the customer’s cloud of choice. This allows us to help customers determine the best cloud for their applications and help them get those workloads where they’re best suited to run.

A (Road) Map to Treasure

Most organizations have a goal of adopting and embracing cloud as they know they will need it to meet the needs of their business. But many aren’t sure the best way to get there, which applications they should run in the cloud and aren’t sure where to start. As the saying goes, “A dream without a plan is just a wish.” We can’t wish cloud strategy into being and we can’t wish cloud adoption within an organization.

Dell Technologies Services has developed and honed our process for helping customers create this strategy by using an “As-Is/To-Be” methodology. We help the customers understand what today looks like, where they need to go in the future, and then develop a long-term strategy to get there. We’ve helped many customers develop this strategy and set them on the right path to cloud success.

APEX Cloud Services with VMware Cloud is going to change the game when it comes to the way organizations manage and consume cloud infrastructure. And Dell Technologies Services has the value-added professional services I’ve described here to help customers craft a cloud strategy, drive cloud adoption, and achieve the success they need to meet the needs of their business.

Source: delltechnologies.com

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Take a Guided Journey Through Transformation

In life, we don’t always achieve our goals without some help. We often rely on the guidance of others as we embark on a new journey.

I think about a trip I took to Yellowstone National Park. This had been on my bucket list for some time and I was determined to see wildlife. Not just the bison that everyone sees, but something more extreme, like a bear or a wolf, but I wasn’t sure how to even find one. Everything I read said finding these animals was rare, so we chose a guided tour with an experienced ranger.

We had to navigate some tougher terrain, but I got to see my bear and it was as thrilling as I imagined. The ranger didn’t just get us to the destination, but he also helped make the experience more exciting than scary This ranger knew the park, the places bears frequent, ways to track them and how to maintain a safe distance, all things I didn’t know. As a result, I had an unforgettable trip and the pictures to prove it.

That level of expertise is what businesses rely on to help navigate and lead them successfully through transformation objectives. Organizations are increasingly aware that this deep knowledge and experience is not found within, but through experts that live these situations day in and day out, just like a park ranger in his park.

A recent surveyed IT decision makers and found that 74% can’t meet business demands with only internal resources and 65% don’t have resources to realize their technology’s full value. More and more, these organizations are seeking help from outside experts.

To survive and grow, your business must be relevant to an increasingly demanding and connected customer base. Digital transformation makes it easier, faster and more efficient to do business, with 81% of businesses rating IT innovation as a high or critical priority in the coming year. But you don’t have to do this alone.

Dell Technologies Services has experience from thousands of customers across a wide number of industries around the world, providing technology-related skills and best practices in top priority areas to help businesses achieve objectives and fulfill outcomes. We stop at nothing to help you modernize and realize your technology’s full potential.

Mapping the transformation journey—how we helped a financial services company

We work collaboratively with a business to understand their unique needs, setting timelines and benchmarks to success. In this example, a financial services company has come to us for help.

◉ They face a situation where they are experiencing changing consumer behaviors and economic pressures.

◉ They manage high-value assets for millions who trust them with sensitive data.

◉ Their customers expect access to high-quality information and the ability to make quick transactions.

◉ To stay competitive, and in light of a recent acquisition, they are driven to modernize while still maintaining reliable access to information and customer service with no down-time or data loss.

Let’s dive in to how we helped this business.

Challenge 1: Making time and space for primary storage and data protection solutions

The situation: The company has limited space and needs reliable storage solutions and improved network performance. They must ensure data resiliency to maintain growing customer data. New primary storage solutions have been implemented and now must be seamlessly integrated to maintain high availability.

The solution: Resident engineers are engaged with expertise in primary storage and data protection solutions. They are tasked with helping to optimize the new systems, integrating them into the environment to deliver increased speed and capacity at a lower cost. Additionally, they will help to architect the data center for enhanced data backup, recovery capabilities and reliability as well as to enable data recovery with automation software.

The results: With the help of Dell EMC Residency Services, the company maintains the high availability they need and increases their reliability and resiliency. Key outcomes include 99.9% faster processing and availability

Challenge 2: Day one productivity requires fast, accurate deployment

The situation: An acquisition has increased staff by 22%, requiring additional infrastructure to manage the larger organization. The company requires agile and accurate deployment and integration and seeks help to expertly lead deployment of their new solutions.

The solution: With Dell Technologies ProDeploy the company gets a certified deployment engineer to manage the installation and configuration of hardware and system software, plus around the clock assistance and a single point of contact for project management.

The results: The company realizes agile and accurate deployment that results in a 68% decrease in deployment time. 689 employees are able to be efficiently onboarded with the help of this newly integrated advanced infrastructure.

Challenge 3: New team members need the right technology structure to succeed

The situation: As the company grows, they are driven to modernize through a virtualized organization that will increase internal efficiency and further enhance the customer experience. By delivering a digital organization they aim to inspire collaboration and innovation that will not only ensure talent retention, but also help drive the future success of their business. New systems, including Microsoft 365, Microsoft Exchange Server and Windows virtual desktop, have been introduced and they seek help navigating this change and introducing this seamlessly across the organization.

The solution: A resident expert that is proficient in these technologies is carefully paired to their needs. The resident is focused on workforce productivity outcomes aligned to communication and collaboration, helping the business navigate the best way to introduce the new technology, onboard the employees and set standardized processes.

The results: The company achieves improvement in efficiency and collaboration, increase in technology adoption and utilization and a reduction of complexities with standardized processes

Reaching your destination

In the end, Dell Technologies Services was able to address each of these challenges with precision. This meant implementing intelligent solutions that would enable the best service for their customers, all while maintaining reliability with no disruption to everyday business.

We recognize that every situation is unique, and our services are catered to meeting the particular needs and challenges of each business. This example is just a glimpse into a customer’s specific experiences. Now it’s up to you to realize your own transformation journey with Dell Technologies Services by your side. Let us help you.

Source: Delltechnologies.com

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Driving IT Operational Efficiencies in a Complex Business Environment

In a world where business environments are becoming more complex and constantly evolving, operational efficiencies are continually challenged and stressed. Organizations cannot remain stagnant while striving to become increasingly valuable to their customers. Digital transformation is inevitable and maintaining a healthy and secure IT infrastructure must remain a top priority. However, leveraging a traditional capital expenditure (CapEx) acquisition strategy hinders the ability to quickly address operational inefficiencies. Aged equipment is slower, uses more power, needs more attention from IT staff and the risk of system downtime and security breaches may be higher. Instead of marching forward with the initiatives that bring about transformational progress, IT managers are working tirelessly to maintain systems and troubleshoot problems.

The fundamental role of IT operations management is the administration of technology systems and solutions within the organization. This includes the provisioning of the IT infrastructure, capacity management, performance assurance and security management. It is responsible for alleviating obstacles and increasing productivity while adhering to budgets and cost controls.

In many cases, IT operational efficiency takes a backseat to more visible strategic business priorities. Carrying out digital transformation initiatives brings about tremendous challenges when a robust technology operation is not deployed and maintained. IT managers are constrained by budget and will need to proactively determine how best to acquire equipment that can consistently operate at maximum performance to move the organization forward and mitigate potential failures.

Technology Rotation* from Dell Technologies helps organizations successfully implement operational efficiency.** Companies can accelerate and enhance digital transformation with a planned refresh of assets, thus optimizing productivity and overcoming challenges throughout the technology lifecycle. When rotating, cutting-edge products replace outdated and inefficient technology at a pre-defined time to help ensure the organization is ready for the next wave of innovation.

Avoiding Technology Obsolescence

Utilizing the latest technology is not a luxury. It’s a necessity. Disruptions from obsolete technology that could have been avoided degrades application performance, creates data latency, reduces system reliability and increases maintenance costs.

Organizations can rapidly adopt new technology. This creates an opportunity to focus on innovation by leveraging the latest hardware operating at the peak of its useful life. With Technology Rotation, equipment can be delivered and rotated in more quickly, giving organizations peace of mind knowing they aren’t burdened with running obsolete equipment.

Enhanced Security

Security is a key concern for IT leaders. The risk of unplanned downtime, unauthorized data access and stolen customer information, regardless of the method of attack, has a long-lasting and devastating impact on an organization. With Technology Rotation, current-state hardware and software will promote having the latest security protection installed. These security solutions can be readily updated while deployed, lessening threats from inside or outside the organization. In every situation, ensuring security is paramount and with the latest technology in use, there is greater protection against these security threats. Technology Rotation promotes state-of-the art security protection on current server technology where it’s needed most – during the period of operation and at the technology asset’s end of life through data sanitization and recycling.

Increased Workforce Productivity and Satisfaction

Whether on the road in front of customers or using your systems to design, implement or manage a business deliverable, your workers need to execute. Armed with cutting-edge solutions, Technology Rotation ensures they have the technology to get the job done and, in many cases, in style.

IT staff productivity and satisfaction often increase when they spend less time during emergency situations, fixing and maintaining outdated equipment and redirect their efforts to working on value-added strategic initiatives. Employees can therefore be more efficient and yield higher work performance. In general, employees are happier and more productive resulting in less turnover, which serves as a catalyst for attracting and retaining team members.

Ease of Acquisition and Billing

Technology Rotation streamlines acquisition and billing, making purchasing easy and more efficient. When available, a master agreement combines multiple orders into a single agreement, thus saving time and money. The terms and conditions are negotiated upfront, and payments are spread over time to help retain the organization’s valuable cash.

Dell Financial Services is a one-stop full-service payment solutions provider for hardware, software, peripherals and support for Dell and non-Dell technology. Working with a single source provider for both end-to-end technology and the financing to acquire it saves time and simplifies the acquisition process. There is no need for multiple payment providers.

*All websites referenced in this article are intended for readers located in the United States only.  Readers outside of the United States may access their county’s website by selecting their location from the location menu.  Products and offers may not be available or may vary by country.

**Payment solutions provided and serviced by Dell Financial Services L.L.C. or its affiliate or designee (“DFS”) for qualified customers. Offers may not be available or may vary in certain countries. Where available offers may be changed without notice and are subject to product availability, applicable law, credit approval, documentation provided by and acceptable to DFS and may be subject to minimum transaction size. Offers not available for personal, family or household use. Dell Technologies and the Dell EMC logo are trademarks of Dell Inc. Restrictions and additional requirements may apply to transactions with governmental or public entities. FAIR MARKET VALUE (“FMV”) LEASE: At the end of the initial FMV Lease term, lessee may 1) purchase the equipment for the then FMV, 2) renew the lease or 3) return the equipment to DFS.

Source: delltechnologies.com

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Cost Assurance for Unpredictable IT Challenges

In an ideal world, technology is provisioned perfectly, and IT systems function without a hitch. On the contrary, rarely does a day go by without troubleshooting problems and facing resource constraint issues. IT managers have to squeeze the most out of their existing infrastructure.

The reality is that business today is constantly undergoing rapid evolution with new initiatives driving IT demands. IT operations must have the agility to quickly react to fluid business dynamics. The top down directives from leadership is to run faster, become more efficient and achieve higher performance. Delivery deadlines need to be met while keeping system uptime high and maintaining a 24×7 operation. Having the versatility at your fingertips to scale is golden.

The last thing IT managers should worry about is the concern for billing and invoices when the priority is putting out fires and quickly ramping up capacity. This requires juggling multiple pressing tasks and projects for IT infrastructure to run optimally. The first thing that is top of mind is how quickly can issues be resolved. IT operations cannot afford system overloads and shutdowns. The path to resolution is often to fix the problem now and figure out the cost later. This can be costly. Productivity is paramount. A drop in performance is detrimental to the business. A failure in mission critical transactions can generate loss in revenue and impact an organization’s reputation. Good strategic financial planning can help mitigate potential issues. IT as-a-Service (ITaaS) pay-per use models can offer IT managers the necessary flexibility as well as reduce the risk from lack of cost control.

APEX Flex on Demand** allows organizations to strategically plan for the unexpected and protect against unpredictable challenges by leveraging the 85% buffer capacity billing cap feature.* Scalable technology solutions can be implemented immediately without delay. APEX Flex on Demand is an ITaaS pay-per use model that allows the technology usage and cost to scale up or down based on the business need. The alternative and inefficient approach would be to over provision and idle the equipment until the need arises. APEX Flex on Demand lowers the total cost outcome for peak system needs. Customers have the confidence that they will not have to pay a significant premium for this feature.

What is 85% buffer capacity billing cap? 

The buffer capacity billing cap is a Flex on Demand feature in which customers’ monthly charges for consumed capacity are capped at 85% of total raw or usable capacity. This means that customers who use more than 85% of deployed capacity will not be invoiced for the additional usage. That is the assurance you get knowing you are covered so you can solely focus on running your IT business. APEX Flex on Demand gives you the additional peace of mind by capping total monthly billing at 85% usage of total installed capacity – an offer unmatched by other infrastructure providers.

How does it work?

Dell Technologies works with you to establish the committed capacity you currently need and the buffer capacity you will require in the future. Each month customers pay for their agreed committed capacity and only the buffer capacity that is actually used.

Consumed capacity is actual usage. It is measured multiple times per day and the daily average is used to calculate the monthly average. If the monthly average amount of consumed capacity is greater than 85%, then the maximum charge is applied. There is no limit to the amount of actual capacity that can be consumed (other than the total available).

Which products are eligible?

Eligible products include storage, data protection, hyper converged infrastructure (VxRail, VCF with VxRail, and Azure Stack Hub), converged infrastructure (VxBlock/VxRack), and PowerFlex rack and appliance (storage only).

Get the assurance of knowing that Dell Technologies can help you plan for technology challenges and mitigate unpredictable peaks, burst, and demands. Simplify budgeting and predict cost with the APEX Flex on Demand 85% billing cap.

**Payment solutions provided to qualified commercial customers by Dell Financial Services (DFS) or through Dell Technologies group companies and/or through Dell’s authorized business partners (together with DFS “Dell”). Offers may not be available or may vary by country. Offers may be changed without notice and are subject to product availability, eligibility, credit approval and execution of documentation provided by and acceptable to Dell or Dell’s authorized business partners.  In Spain, solutions are provided by Dell Bank International d.a.c branch in Spain and specific countries within the EU and EEA and in the UK and Switzerland by Dell Bank International d.a.c, trading as Dell Financial Services which is regulated by the Central Bank of Ireland. Dell Technologies, DellEMC and Dell logos are trademarks of Dell Inc.

* Available for eligible products only. Dark site, non-metered deployments, and customers non-compliant with their contract terms are not eligible.

Source: delltechnologies.com

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