New Survey Finds Enterprises are Turning to ITIL & CMDBs as Keys to IT Change Management

Business Wire, May 24, 2005

MCLEAN, Va. -- Enterprise Management Associates' Analyst Lisa Erickson-Harris to Detail Best Practice Findings for Lowering Risk in Today's IT Infrastructure in June 2nd Webinar

Managed Objects, the Business Service Management Company, today released the results of an independent survey commissioned by Managed Objects and conducted by Enterprise Management Associates (EMA) exploring ways to minimize outages associated with planned and unplanned changes in today's complex IT enterprises. EMA Research Director Lisa Erickson-Harris will highlight best practice recommendations for better management of IT infrastructure change based on the findings from a new survey conducted with over 200 IT professionals in a Web seminar on June 2, 2005 at 12 p.m. Eastern Standard Time.

Top line results from the EMA survey show that enterprise IT leaders have made monitoring and managing the IT configuration a top IT priority, with 86 percent reporting an immediate or long-term need to manage it more accurately. IT managers also report they are working to improve IT service management through adoption of process maturity models, with more than two-thirds (68 percent) currently using a standard process model. Of the group using a process maturity model more than half (51 percent) are specifically implementing ITIL - the IT Infrastructure Library model.

"As IT moves from simple silo-based management to more complex services management, the need for a better understanding of issues around IT infrastructure and the impact of changes in that infrastructure have become paramount," said Erickson-Harris. "Better management of IT change and configuration can be accomplished by utilizing process maturity models, implementing CMDBs wisely, and modeling and visualizing both the infrastructure and the relationships between elements."

Among many other key findings, the survey results include:

--Configuration management database projects are underway or will begin shortly - 46 percent of respondents say they have implemented a configuration management database (CMDB) and another 36 percent are planning an implementation.

--Existing CMDBs are updated infrequently - 48 percent of respondents said they update the CMDB monthly or even less frequently; only 21 percent reported updating their information either daily or in real-time.

--Mapping IT relationships and dependencies is a manually-intensive process - only 33 percent reported using software to map relationships between elements in the IT infrastructure.

"Today's IT enterprise needs technology and process solutions that automate topology discovery, speed the creation of a federated CMDB, and accelerate IT process maturity," said Managed Objects CEO Siki Giunta. "Managed Objects has always worked to help the industry navigate IT management trends, and we believe this survey provides practical and realistic best practice recommendations that companies can implement today to improve their IT process maturity."

In support of better IT process maturity, Managed Objects recently released its Business Service Configuration Manager (BSCM) solution which integrates IT service topology information, configuration, and asset data to map complex IT service relationships and formulate a single view of the enterprise via a federated or virtual Configuration Management Data Base (vCMDB(TM)). Combined with data from Managed Objects Business Technology Insight(TM) appliance that discovers enterprise-wide IT service topology information, BSCM acts as a catalyst to help companies accelerate ITIL best practice adoption.

To attend the June 2 Webinar featuring Erickson-Harris, call 1-800-275-6014 or visit the Managed Objects Web site to register: http://www.managedobjects.com/events/EMAwebinar.> Complete data and a white paper summarizing the study's results are immediately available to members of the media by contacting Frank Strong at (703) 287-7819 or via e-mail at fstrong@managedobjects.com.

About Managed Objects

Managed Objects is the Business Service Management Company. Business Service Management (BSM) aligns IT with the business by integrating network, system, application, end user, and business metric information into real-time business service dashboards. Through Managed Objects' BSM platform, companies effectively monitor, manage, and report on the services IT delivers to the business - services like online trading and e-commerce. Consistently acknowledged by the analyst community as best in class, Managed Objects has more BSM implementations in place than any other company. That is why AIB, Auchan, CSC, Credit Suisse, DISA, Fidelity Investments, JPMorganChase, NIH, Progress Energy, Reuters, TIAA-CREF and other global organizations rely on Managed Objects' BSM technology. For more information, visit www.managedobjects.com.