CASE STUDY
Productizing managed IT services delivery
Client
A global IT infrastructure services provider that helps businesses manage and modernize their systems and services
Services
Platform vision & strategy, user research, digital transformation
Sector
Information technology
Managed services
B2B platforms
Market Context
As digital modernization becomes increasingly complex and critical for business performance, many enterprises struggle to adopt and integrate IT solutions effectively. Our client sought to address this challenge and accelerate digital transformation for its enterprise customers by productizing its offerings - through a unified platform that would simplify the engagement, consumption, and management of IT services for a diverse set of internal and external users. Achieving product-market fit for this new platform required a clarified view of customer needs, market gaps, ecosystem dynamics, and competitive advantages.
Client Challenge
Being a recent spin-off from a multinational legacy technology company, the client faced the challenge of establishing a distinct position in a highly fragmented and competitive market, where the bar for infrastructure self-service is set by the likes of AWS, MS Azure, and Google Cloud. The leadership team needed a cohesive vision, strategy, and capability roadmap to overcome ownership silos, transform outdated processes, and capitalize on valuable productization opportunities throughout the buying, publishing, orchestration, support, and advisory journeys.
Discover
In addition to preliminary market research and competitive audits, we engaged with client stakeholders across sales, marketing, strategy, engineering, and design, as well as key customers and partners. This included in-depth interviews, workshops, and review of existing systems and processes. Our goal was to paint a complete picture of the engagement lifecycle, evaluate the company’s current position, and achieve a holistic understanding of the strategic objectives and requirements for this platform.
Envision
Based on the insights gathered, we identified key user roles, created end-to-end journey maps, and prioritized a series of scenarios to explore in detail. We conducted validation sessions over several design sprints to gather feedback towards the flows, features, and value propositions demonstrated in early prototypes. The goal was to align the organization behind an unified vision for how the platform could drive value for the client’s teams, their customers, and service partners.
Transform
After defining UX attributes and foundational design principles, we developed a comprehensive platform strategy articulating its core value propositions, functionalities, and differentiators. The strategy also encompassed a 24-month competitive roadmap, outlining phased rollouts of key capabilities and prioritized features.
Our Approach
The Solution
This productization effort resulted in the delivery of a scalable, integrated digital solution, connecting the business objectives of enterprise customers with an extensive catalog of enabling IT solutions and human advisory services. Some key features of the platform included:
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A self-serve marketplace to discover, understand, and manage all services, subscriptions, and vendors
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A centralized dashboard to administer, deploy, manage, orchestrate, and use a wide array of services
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AI-driven insights and predictive analytics to optimize operations and prevent issues before they arise
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Personalized concierge support offering real-time assistance and contextual guidance
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A digital framework and engagement toolkit to facilitate collaborative activities across the service lifecycle
The Impact
This strategic initiative laid the foundation for our client’s future growth, strengthening the client’s competitive position as a state-of-the-art infrastructure services provider through a platform truly differentiated within the market.
500+
Global Enterprise Accounts
$1B+
In Annual Cost Savings
The launch of this platform led to positive business impact for a wide range of users, including:
A new level of control & oversight across the entire IT estate
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Reduced cost in monitoring & managing IT infrastructure
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Greater competitive advantage through enhanced business agility and speed-to-market
Improved insights, intelligence & decision-making
Reduced cost associated with downtime and maintenance prevention and better forecasting of IT needs
Increased time to value of deploying new services and capabilities
Greater collaboration & innovation with partners
Increased awareness, understanding, confidence in choosing the right services
Improved ability to generate impactful new products and services