IBM exec explains Big Blue’s approach to cloud professional services

Grazed from TechTarget. Author: Jessica Scarpati.

In a market practically defined by do-it-yourself provisioning, the notion of cloud professional services seems almost like an oxymoron. Professional services come at a premium price, and cloud computing is, in many ways, a commodity. Yet for that exact reason, cloud providers are acutely aware that improving the profitability of the cloud model hinges on finding a way to boost revenue through complementary services.

IBM, recently named a leader in IDC’s MarketScape for cloud professional services, is finding ways to articulate the value of these services to customers across several markets. Ric Telford, the company’s vice president of cloud services, recently spoke with SearchCloudProvider about how IBM has gained that edge…

What separates IBM’s cloud professional services from the competition, and how has the company cultivated this strategy?

Ric Telford: Obviously, a lot of the initial interest in cloud computing as a delivery model was to really focus on optimizing the efficiency and the cost of IT, and that’s very important. But what differentiates IBM is that from the beginning, we’ve looked at this as, "How can this technology and set of capabilities transform businesses?" That is, how can it transform the way people conduct their business, rather than just how does it make them more efficient? When you look through that lens with cloud, you prioritize things that you may not otherwise if you just look at it purely as a technology. That’s the way our professional service teams work…

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