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When you hear the term Blockchain, it likely brings to mind cryptocurrency.  Although cryptocurrency is its most publicized use, Blockchain is not simply a technology for financial institutions.  Manufacturers are also utilizing Blockchain themselves in a number of ways. One of its more innovative applications is in the realm of technology service and support. Digital ledger technology is now delivering a new level of assurance that service providers are meeting their responsibilities outlined in service-level agreements (SLAs).

IBM recently launched a new Support as a Service capability powered by IBM Blockchain and aimed at businesses engaging in digital transformation. By embedding blockchain into their Multivendor Support Services “smart contracts,” IBM can provide transparent, audit-ready transaction data while monitoring SLA metrics and accountability. This process streamlines and automates the billing processes to more closely match the speed and dynamism of the digital business model.

Blockchain – Built in Trust?

The promise of blockchain is that a shared distributed ledger creates a tamper-resistant record of transactions enabling trusted and audit-ready products and services. When using blockchain, trust is delegated to people and even objects such as sensors and monitors that occupy a shared network. If one of these data sources isn’t trusted to perform well, it can be automatically rejected by the other objects on the network, as well as the transaction record itself. In this way, the ledger and its “smart contract” become the foundation of trust.

This ability to preserve trust becomes increasingly important as contracts grow in both size and complexity and transaction data is shared continuously, in near-real time. By time-stamping contract-related events and adding them to a tamper-resistant record, support providers can effectively embed trust into the digital ledger.

Blockchain is expected to become an essential resource for the enterprise to evaluate contract performance, reduce the complexity of billing processes and eliminate unrealizable billing costs due to lack of evidence or an over-delivery of services.

With blockchain now an integral part of IBM’s Support as a Service portfolio, companies can gain the ability to independently verify the activities driving their digital business processes, providing new-found confidence that they are both delivering and receiving exactly what is expected.

Learn More about IBM Multivendor Support Services in the video below:

To learn more about IBM Multivendor Support Services and how they’re using blockchain to ensure delivery of technology support services, please contact Steven Hargis, shargis@cleartechnologies.net.

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Integrated Multivendor Support (IMS) for your Data Center is a service designed to expand the life of your non-IBM server, storage and networking equipment.  Functioning as a single source for your multivendor data center environment, we can offer technical support solutions to fit your needs while helping to optimize system availability, reduce costs and reduce IT complexity.

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]IBM® Hyperconverged Systems powered by Nutanix is a hyper-converged infrastructure (HCI) solution that combines Nutanix Enterprise Cloud Platform software with IBM Power® Systems. The integrated solution targets demanding transactional and cognitive analytics workloads with an infrastructure that is easy to manage and simple to scale. ]Web-scale architecture

IBM Hyperconverged Systems powered by Nutanix bridge the efficiency and performance gaps between enterprise datacenters and public clouds. Nutanix Enterprise Cloud software enables simple management, nimbleness and cost efficiency for open system environments, allowing IT experts to spend more time optimizing performance and extracting insight from applications and data.

Acropolis OS

Nutanix Acropolis delivers software-defined enterprise-class storage, compute and native virtualization services to run nearly any application. It provides feature-rich data services in a turnkey hyperconverged infrastructure solution that can be deployed out of the box in 60 minutes or less. Its distributed file services eliminate the need for standalone SAN or NAS-based storage separate from compute servers – reducing the complexity of infrastructure management.

Prism management

Prism simplifies infrastructure management with one-click operations. Prism provides an end-to-end management solution for virtualized datacenter environments. It streamlines and automates common workflows therefore eliminating the need for multiple management solutions across datacenter operations. With its advanced machine learning technology, Prism analyzes system data to generate actionable insights – optimizing virtualization and infrastructure management.

IBM POWER Architecture

Systems built with the POWER architecture are different by design – engineered at every level to be more powerful and open than competing server designs. POWER8 processors enable 4X more memory bandwidth, cache and threads per core versus x86. IBM Power Systems deliver superior VM density in cloud environments providing a clear price-performance advantage versus x86-based systems for workloads such as MongoDB, IBM Websphere Application Server and EDB Postgres, among others.

Seamlessly scale data across distributed nodes

Individual servers (called nodes) are clustered together in a scale-out topology managed by the Nutanix software stack. Internal physical storage resources from each node are pooled into one large, virtualized distributed file system. Additional servers can easily be added to increase compute or storage capacity dynamically with single-click simplicity.

Contact your Clear Technologies rep today to learn more!

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]For the always on, always available world, a Cloud or Hybrid Cloud strategy is key to maintain a positive client experience, meet service level agreements and combat competitive pressures from other businesses.  However, beyond using applications that are “born in the cloud,” many businesses do not know where to start or have a way of measuring where they are to begin planning for the future.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”6498″ img_size=”full” alignment=”center”][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]It’s all about knowing for sure what you have so you can begin architecting for the future.  Clear Technologies’ Application & Software Assessment will enable your organization to take those steps so the to start or even continue your journey to the cloud.  In addition to cloud and hybrid-cloud enablement, the assessment also aids in critical projects such as data center moves, yearly budgeting, and employee turnover.

Our offering is platform agnostic. Once the discovery process is complete, we will provide you with a table showing all of your applications along with relevant data points for hardware/software capacity & lifecycle planning.

In order to scale, the approach we use consists of both manual and automated discovery. The full meaning of “platform agnostic” is understood. For us it means clients may have platforms we have never seen before. No problem. We’ll get the data points manually the first time and then automate for scalability in the future.

Building your unique baseline dataset is step one. Clear can provide substantial added value through analysis of the raw data:

• Per-application Software Lifecycle Planning
• Server, Storage, & Network Infrastructure Lifecycle Planning
• Consolidation Planning for Virtualization, Containerization, & Cloud
• Granular Policy, Process, Facilities, and Compliance Validation

To begin your journey with a Clear Technologies’ Application & Software Assessment, Get In Touch with us today!

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Author: 

Charles McCane

cmccane@cleartechnologies.net[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

[vc_row css=”.vc_custom_1528235143343{background-color: #002e63 !important;}”][vc_column][vc_empty_space][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_empty_space][vc_column_text]Rapid proliferation of applications and the increasing cost of maintaining legacy infrastructure causes significant IT challenges for many organizations. Complex manual processes and non-integrated infrastructure can’t provide the power, simplicity and speed necessary to meet the demands of the enterprise.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Hyperconvergence offers the availability, performance and capacity needed—while future proofing IT infrastructure and lowering total cost of ownership (TCO). It allows IT operations to be simplified by breaking down traditional silos and allowing storage, compute, networking, and virtualization to be managed with the same hardware, which eliminates inefficiencies and accelerates compute.

Generally, a hyperconverged infrastructure:

• Enables centralized management of virtual environments via a single interface, which decreases labor-intensive activities
• Offers streamlined acquisition, deployment, support and management
• Provides a scalable, building-block approach that is easily expandable

Hyperconvergence, like convergence, eliminates traditional IT management issues by packaging data center services such as server, storage and network and allowing them to be managed in a single application. But unlike convergence, hyperconvergence is a software-defined infrastructure that decouples infrastructure operations from the system hardware and converges them at the hypervisor level into a single building block (thus hyper converged).

HPE SimpliVity is a powerful, simple, and efficient hyperconverged platform that joins best-in-class data services with the world’s best-selling server and offers the industry’s most complete guarantee. With HPE SimpliVity, you can streamline and enable IT operations at a fraction of the cost of traditional and public cloud solutions by combining your IT infrastructure and advanced data services into a single, integrated solution.

What makes HPE SimpliVity different from other solutions?

• Powerful – Modern data architecture that powers and protects some of the world’s most efficient and resilient data centers
• Simple – Intuitive VM-Centric management that streamlines operations and empowers IT generalists.
• Trusted – Recognized market leadership, long-term viability, and best-selling server platform in the industry
• Complete – Single building block combining all IT infrastructure and advanced data services for virtualized workloads

Contact your Clear Technologies sales rep to learn more today![/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_btn title=”Get in Touch” color=”primary” size=”lg” align=”center” button_block=”true” link=”url:https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cleartechnologies.net%2Fabout%2Fcontact%2F|||”][/vc_column][/vc_row]

[vc_row css=”.vc_custom_1528234199294{background-color: #002e63 !important;}”][vc_column][vc_empty_space][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/4″][vc_empty_space][vc_column_text][/vc_column_text][/vc_column][vc_column width=”3/4″][vc_empty_space][vc_empty_space][vc_column_text]

Shu Mookerjee

Hyperconverged Specialist

Clear Technologies

214-755-2070

smookerjee@cleartechnologies.net[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Shu Mookerjee is the Hyperconverged Specialist at Clear Technologies and has been in the role since March 2018. In his role, Shu will be focused on driving new business within the domains of the converged and hyperconverged infrastructure as well as high performance compute and storage. Shu brings a technologist’s approach to clients, understanding and articulating how the latest technology will impact the key performance metrics and mapping I/T innovations directly to the customer’s business goals.

Prior to joining Clear Technologies, Shu was the Director of Technical Sales at StorONE, where he was responsible for developing technical collateral, delivering education to customers and developing the client base. Before that, Shu spent nearly two decades at IBM in various sales, technical and management roles where he worked with such customers as NTTData, Essilor and Oncor Electric.

Shu was born in Mumbai, raised in New Jersey and educated in New York. He received his BS in Mechanical Engineering from Rochester Institute of Technology. He is a purple belt in kung fu, a semi-pro guitarist and an avid video gamer. He currently resides in Dallas, TX with his wife, who wishes he would get a hobby.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

[vc_row css=”.vc_custom_1528233492364{background-color: #002e63 !important;}”][vc_column][vc_empty_space][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_empty_space][vc_column_text]Clear Technologies has partnered with IBM on their Power Systems line of systems since Clear’s founding in 1993.  With over 25 years of experience, Clear Technologies brings the technical support resources that enable the right systems solution for your environment.  Whether you are looking for basic “how-to” support for a single server or a full IBM Platform as a Service Solution, Clear Technologies has the capabilities and know-how to design, implement, troubleshoot and manage all sizes of IBM Power environments running IBM AIX, i (OS/400) and Linux.

Remote Administration

Clear Technologies has a dedicated support team devoted to remotely managing client environments.  Clear’s team of certified-Power subject matter experts can do full environment management or facilitate your current team by adding industry-leading skills to your staff.  We can offer full 24x7x365 support or ad-hoc systems assistance depending on your needs.  Clear’s team of resources have decades of experience with not only the IBM Power hardware but also the suite of products that support that hardware such as IBM BRMS, PowerHA, and more.

Production Hosting

In addition to providing administration of systems, Clear Technologies can also offer IBM Power hosting for IBM i and AIX.  Both large and small environments can take advantage of the scalability, cost savings, availability and security of moving to a hosted environment or cloud.  Clear can offer capacity and utilization based pricing so you are only paying for the pieces of the system you use.  The hosted Power environments we provide are located in leading edge datacenters with redundant networking and connectivity using IBM Power systems on IBM maintenance so you have the peace of mind your production environment is being taken care of as well or better than your company would.

High Availability & Disaster Recovery as a Service

If you would like to keep your production system on-premises due to requirements or regulations, Clear can still offer high availability and disaster recovery target partitions to facilitate your current business continuity plan or for a brand new DR strategy.  Clear has experts on staff in the field of High Availability with leading skills for IBM’s PowerHA and Syncsort’s MIMIX product, as well as skills from other leading High Availability vendors.  High Availability offers the lower RTO and best RPO and we can offer dedicated system resources to give your organization confidence that your data is fully protected.

Restoration Services/Restore Verification

Finally, Clear Technologies’ IBM Power Managed Services offers a thorough but cost-effecitive restore verification services.  Is your DR-strategy fully dependent on tape backups?  Let us test those tapes and restore them to our systems.  We offer restoration services for IBM Power environments to give even our smallest clients reassurance that they can get their business back to work in the event of a downed system.

Clear Technologies suite of Managed Services for IBM’s Power portfolio is flexible to your needs and ready to assist you.  Contact Clear Technologies today to speak to one of our IBM Power specialists and help architect the services you need for the future of your company.[/vc_column_text][vc_btn title=”Get in Touch ” color=”primary” size=”lg” align=”center” button_block=”true” link=”url:https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cleartechnologies.net%2Fabout%2Fcontact%2F|||”][/vc_column][/vc_row]

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]DALLAS–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Clear Technologies, a leading IT solution provider, has been selected as the winner of the Horizon Award for Outstanding Partner Performance presented on April 11, 2018. Clear was selected for this award based on its exceptional performance during 2017.

West and Clear Technologies partner to provide clients with Unified Communications Services such as Cloud Contact Center, Conference & Collaboration, Hosted Voice, and more. Clear began its partnership with West in 2017 and had an enormous amount of success in its first year.

“Communication is one of, if not, the most important piece of any organization. Our partnership with West allows Clear to deliver best of breed products and services, such as those from Cisco, to our clients as a consolidated, fast and competitively priced solution. We are extremely proud to have won the Horizon Award with West and look forward to even more success together in 2018,” said Phil Godwin, Clear Technologies President & COO.

Clear Technologies is a Value-Added Reseller, Managed & Professional Services Provider, and Software Publisher. For 25 years, Clear has worked with clients nationwide to deliver business value through technology.

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[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Managing up, or building smooth, productive relationships with higher-ups, requires understanding and adapting to your boss’s communication and decision-making style. The goal of managing up is to develop a pattern of interaction between your boss and you that delivers the best possible results for your organization (and by extension, for each of you).

The first step in effectively managing up is accepting that every decision in your company is made by the person who has the power to make that decision, even if he or she is not necessarily the right person or the best person to make that decision. If you can influence the key decision makers in your organization, you can make a positive difference.

When presenting ideas to upper management, remember that it’s your responsibility to sell, not their responsibility to buy. A good salesperson takes responsibility for achieving results. While the importance of taking responsibility may seem obvious in external sales, an amazing number of people in large corporations spend countless hours blaming management for not buying their ideas. We can become disempowered when we focus on what others have done to make things wrong and not what we can do to make things right. Focus on contributing to the larger good, not just achieving your objectives. Effective salespeople relate, to the buyers’ needs, not to their own needs, in the same way effective upward influencers relate to the larger needs of the organization, not just to the needs of their unit or team.

Present a realistic Cost-Benefit Analysis of Your Ideas – don’t just sell the benefits. Every organization has limited resources, time, and energy. Be prepared to have a realistic discussion of the costs of your idea. Acknowledge the fact that something else may have to be sacrificed to have your idea implemented. By getting ready for a realistic discussion of costs, you can prepare for objections to your idea before they occur. By making a small investment in learning to influence up, you can make a large and positive difference for the future of your organization.

The accommodations you make help you gain better insight into your boss’s context: his peers, and the combination of organizational and personal objectives he’s trying to meet. The goal of managing up is not currying favor, it’s becoming more effective. Basically, your boss can fire you, but you can’t fire him.

As the subordinate, you may find it difficult to see the ways in which your boss “can be severely hurt” if they don’t receive the “cooperation, dependability, and honesty” they require in order to do their own job. In fact, the relationship is one of mutual dependence. The more thoroughly you understand the goals, constraints, and pressures under which your boss operates, the better you’ll be able to help them succeed. Begin with a discussion of goals and expectations. Most people are not aware of their boss’s needs. Ask them to clarify their top five responsibilities with their boss so that both understand and agree on what those priorities are. That’s a conversation everyone needs to have.

Don’t make assumptions about areas in which you lack information. Regularly seek clarification and updates about your boss’s objectives – concerns and priorities have a way of changing over time. In addition, don’t focus only on organizational goals. Your boss’s personal objectives can have just as much effect on how satisfied he is with your performance.

Pay attention to clues in your boss’s behavior. Observing your boss – paying special attention to their preferences about such things as meetings and modes of communication – offers many clues about how best to interact with them. Learning to adapt to the boss’s preferred way of doing things actually helps you “maintain control of your career. Once you have that skill, you need never feel apprehensive about working for anyone.

Managing the boss is a constant like being in a good marriage. You don’t go around saying you’ve done enough modifying your behavior for your spouse. We’re all in the business of modifying our behavior on a daily basis in relationships that are important to us. But once you and your boss have established a trusting relationship, the time you have to spend managing your boss should decrease dramatically.

Take the survey below to see how well you are doing at managing up:

https://smu.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_0kR35EbmpGQtjcphttps://smu.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_0kR35EbmpGQtjcp

Please enter your name and email at the end. You will receive your results within 24 hours!

All information will be confidential.

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