Pune-based Aashna Cloudtech, part of Aashna Group is one of the leading pure play Cloud Service Brokerage (CSB) firm. As the scope of CSB has started gaining ground in India, the company is looking to become one of the first CSBs to launch an IPO on the exchange list by 2020.
Speaking to Channeltimes, Biswas Nair, Managing Director at Aashna Cloudtech explained the role of CSB and company’s expansion plans.
Excerpts from the interview
CT: What is the scope of Cloud Aggregators in India in terms of value and market size?
Nair: In terms of global Cloud Services Brokerage (CSB), markets forecast a growth from $1.57 billion in 2013 to $10.5 billion by 2018. There is currently no specific market research which states the Indian cloud aggregator market size, but it is growing quite rapidly as more and more organizations have become large consumers of cloud.
CSB acts as the intermediary between cloud providers and cloud consumers. It assists consumers in choosing services and offerings that best suit their needs. They may also assist in deployment and integration of apps across multiple cloud service; provide options and a possibility of saving costs by considering multiple competing services from a catalog.
Gartner says 20% of all cloud services will be consumed through these brokerages by 2015. As cloud matures in India, combinations of cloud services will be too complex and untrustworthy for enterprises to handle their integration. Gartner also predicts that as cloud services are adopted, the ability to govern their use, performance and delivery will be provided by cloud service brokerages.
Customers are consuming multiple cloud services in a user-friendly fashion, but bear the complexities of managing multiple service providers. Cloud aggregators make this easier by providing a flexible, open platform to collate a variety of compelling cloud services quickly and cost effectively. In short, we package and integrate multiple cloud computing services into one or more composite services.
CT: How is Aashna Cloudtech growing in this space?
Nair: Aashna Cloudtech has been a pure play cloud solution provider from its inception. It is a pioneer Cloud Service Brokerage firm focused on providing integrated single cloud based solutions which includes ERP, CRM, E-commerce, HR, productivity and storage. The management is experienced in cloud space for 10 years with over 250 projects. Aashna has partnered with NetSuite, Google, Box, Docusign, Silkroad and Workforce among others in its portfolio. We are headquartered in Pune (India) and have global offices in Dubai and North Carolina with 100 staff members.
In the current Indian market place, cloud based solutions have matured and are readily accepted. Companies that are migrating parts of its business to the cloud realize that it’s not a simple task. Working with many cloud service providers at the same time means managing multiple relationships and negotiating multiple contracts, which imply multiple payments, multiple passwords, multiple data streams and multiple providers to check up. This raises questions about how you make such services work together, or how you can unify your efforts so that you can get maximum effectiveness and efficiency.
Aashna Cloudtech as a CSB adds value to cloud services on behalf of cloud service consumers. Their goal is to make the service more specific to a company, integrate or aggregate services, to enhance their security, or add a significant layer of value/capabilities to the original cloud services being offered.
CT: What are the areas that you are focusing as Cloud Service Broker?
Nair: As a Cloud Service Broker, Aashna Cloudtech serves as a single point of contact by aggregating multiple cloud services, integrating then with in-house apps, supporting and customizing them for proper usage within the organization. With a rich experience of over 300 cloud engagements across Asia, Middle East, Europe and North America, Aashna has emerged as a leading cloud service brokerage firm. Aashna focuses on lead technology solutions in the enterprise applications space like ERP, CRM, HRMS, E-commerce, project management, storage, SCM and productivity.
Moreover, Aashna Cloudtech also offers consulting services wherein we do a thorough business need analysis and future growth plans. Based on the result, we subsequently propose a cloud strategy along with the various individual applications.
CT: How the cloud brokerage model works and how profitable business is this?
Nair: A cloud service brokerage serves as an intermediary between the consumer and service provider by aggregating multiple cloud services, integrating them with in-house apps and customizing them to meet your needs.
Gartner Research defines three roles for CSBs: aggregation, integration and customization. An aggregator pulls together multiple cloud services and provides them to the end customer, essentially acting as a reseller. The integration role calls for the broker to link cloud services and on-premise systems, while customization involves the tweaking of cloud services to meet the customers’ needs or creation of applications to run in the cloud setting.
A CSB can make cloud services more valuable as they work closely with cloud providers, get price breaks and attain access to more information about how their service works. In addition, they have a better experience working with multiple providers and across many consumer scenarios. Instead of spending time and money to address these problems internally, consumers can leverage solutions offered by CSBs, which will allow them to focus on other pressing business needs. A viable CSB provider can make this function less expensive, easier, safer and more productive, particularly when they span multiple, diverse cloud services providers.
CT: How do see this space getting traction among cloud partners?
Nair: Traditional partners face challenges with the decline of on-premise solutions sales and hardware dependency. They will start considering leading CSBs like Aashna to partner with and expand new solutions to their client base.
CT: Can you share the key milestones Aashna has achieved in this domain
Nair: We are India’s first and only advanced Cloud Service Broker (CSB) which serves as a single point of contact by aggregating multiple cloud services, integrating them with in-house apps, supporting and customizing them for proper usage within the organization. We have many milestone recognitions in 2014 which prove that we are growing at fast pace with each passing year.
CT: Tell us about your application alliances and how are you planning to grow this
partnership
Nair: Our expertise lies in the space of enterprise applications such as ERP, CRM, HRMS, E- commerce, project management, storage and SCM and productivity. We take pride in the ability to provide tailor-made solutions, leveraging its expertise in smartly distributed worldwide office locations. By liaising in partnerships with giants such as NetSuite, Google, Box, Silkroad, Workforce Software and Docusign, we believe that our team has the perfect combination of the innovative practices of a startup, along with tried-and-tested trust from established partners.
CT: What are your expansion plans for 2015?
Nair: As per Gartner, the future of IT services lies in CSB and the IT service spend on CSB is predicted to be US $100 Billion. Aashna Cloudtech intends to ride on this growth. We also find that many existing system integrators are migrating to a CSB-model, which will add to growth in this space. The future road map is as follows:
▪ To consolidate and grow the Asia & Middle East market which are still at a nascent stage
▪ Increase the sales presence and client acquisition in North America
▪ Expand the professional services team –onshore and offshore
▪ Sustain our revenue and profit margins to re-invest
▪ Plan for an IPO by 2020 to be one of the first CSB’s to list on the exchange