Posts by Stephen Collins

Digital transformation is not for the faint of heart. In this post, ACG Analyst Stephen Collins discusses why it’s critical for ITOps, NetOPs, SecOPs and DevOps teams to make sure they have the right stuff and are properly equipped for the network visibility challenges they face.

Silos in enterprise IT organizations can inhibit cross-functional synergies, leading to inefficiencies, higher costs and unacceptable delays for detecting and repairing problems. In this post, ACG analyst Stephen Collins examines how IT managers can start planning for now as the first step in moving from silos to synergy.

At that ONUG Spring 2018 event, ACG analyst Stephen Collins moderated a panel discussion on re-tooling IT operations with machine learning and AI. The panelists provided a view “from the trenches.” In this post, Collins shares insights into how panelists’ organizations are applying ML and AI today, each in different operational domains, but with a common theme of overcoming the challenge of managing operations at scale.

The Internet is the wild wild west — and the pace of DDoS attacks is not letting up. But thanks to recent advances in streaming telemetry, network visibility, and Big Data, the good guys are armed with the weapons they need to maintain the peace.

Forward-thinking IT managers are already embracing big data-powered SaaS solutions for application and performance monitoring. If hybrid multi-cloud and hyperscale application infrastructure are in your future, ACG Analyst Stephen Collins’ advice for performance monitoring is “go big or go home.”

While we’re still in the opening phase of the hybrid multi-cloud chess game, ACG analyst Stephen Collins takes a look at what’s ahead. In this post, he digs into what enterprises embracing the cloud can expect in the complex endgame posing many new technical challenges for IT managers.

Fixing a persistent Internet underlay problem might be as simple as using a higher bandwidth connection or as complex as choosing the right peering and transit networks for specific applications and destination cloud services. In this blog, ACG analyst Stephen Collins advices that to make the best-informed decision about how to proceed, IT managers need to be equipped with tools that enable them to fully diagnose the nature of Internet underlay connectivity problems.

Traditional monitoring tools for managing application performance in private networks are not well-suited to ensuring the performance, reliability and security of SaaS applications. In this post, ACG analyst Stephen Collins makes the case for why enterprise IT managers need to employ a new generation of network visibility and big data analytics tools designed for the vast scale of the Internet.

The adoption of hyperscale principles presents data center operators with massive scale visibility challenges. Yet it’s inevitable. In this post, ACG analyst Stephen Collins discusses why operators need to prepare for the inevitable by acquiring and mastering the new tools needed to assure the performance, reliability and security of these applications.

Industry 4.0 is the next phase in the digitization of the manufacturing sector. In this post, ACG Research’s Principal Analyst Stephen Collins looks at the major implications that Industry 4.0 will create for enterprise IT systems, software and network infrastructure, and how to model, monitor and control it all.

While defining digital transformation strategies is a valuable exercise for C-level executives, CIOs and IT managers also need to adopt a pragmatic and more tactical approach to “going digital.” That starts with acquiring tools and building the new skills needed to ensure business success and profitability in the face of digital disruption. In this post, ACG Principal Analyst Stephen Collins looks at how to manage it all.