During her speech in Davos on January 26th Ms. Kroes talked about this partnership and several challenges like legal implications, standards, certification and interoperability.

Please allow me to highlight a few of them, and comment on them. Because we at Jitscale feel that a solution for these challenges is crucial for a full fledged European cloud strategy.

All these issues – standards, certification, data protection, interoperability, lock-in, legal certainty and others – are particularly troublesome for smaller companies. They are the ones who stand to benefit the most from the Cloud – but who don’t have a lot of spending power, nor resources for individual negotiations with Cloud suppliers.

True. Possibly… Depending on your cloud service provider. We at Jitscale feel that these are issues that should be addressed by us, not by the client. We do so by offering Service Level Agreement, ISO certification and the flexibility of switching between cloud providers, among others. All written down in a contract that leaves no room for obscurity, of course.

We have already made a start on the regulatory side: the Commission has proposed new rules for data protection in the twenty-first century, including for data in the Cloud.

Excellent. This should be able to raise awareness for the fact that the cloud is in fact a very safe environment. A notion that we need to convey time and again in our conversations and pitches. Which we don’t mind doing, by the way. On the contrary; whenever we present our cloud solutions to existing clients our prospects and address the safety issue, they are always surprised about the measures that are already in place. Especially when we talk to IT savvy people, it’s an instant win.

But we can do more. Look at the public sector. Public IT procurement is large, about twenty percent of the market, but today it is fragmented with limited impact. We can harness this buying power through more harmonization and integration. And, yes, ultimately also through joint public procurement across borders. Why is this important? Because the Cloud sector will listen and adapt, creating benefits for Cloud adoption throughout our economy. For example: more standardized services, new and better offers, cheaper prices. And it is a true win-win: the Cloud market will grow, bringing opportunities for existing suppliers and new entrants. And Cloud buyers, including the public sector, will buy more with less and become more efficient.
Spot on! Nothing further, your honor.

There is and I want to be clear about it: The Cloud Partnership, and indeed our overall Cloud Computing strategy, is not about building a European super-Cloud, neither outright nor by forcing the integration of existing public Cloud infrastructures. Cloud business models, and the set-up of Cloud suppliers’ and publicly-run data centers, should be determined by efficiency considerations on the market.

Great, we’re looking forward to it! And we’d also like to see a definitive solution for the concerns about the Patriot Act, giving the American government the possibility to demand access to European data on US based servers.

Until then, privacy concerns can partly be addressed by introducing data encryption which makes it impossible for your cloud provider to access your data unencrypted. Jitscale also supports European based and -owned cloud providers like CloudSigma if dealing with Non-European cloud providers conflicts with your company policy. So if a certain government requires access to your data, they will have to politely ask your legal department instead of your cloud provider.

We are already talking to potential partners and working on setting up this European Cloud Partnership. No doubt the concept will evolve as more details are fixed. These will be set out, together with other elements, in the European Cloud Computing Strategy later this year. A strategy as a whole to ensure Europe becomes not just Cloud-friendly, but Cloud-active.

Jitscale will continue to take part in the discussions (keep checking our blog entries) and provide you with the best possible service. Have a safe cloud computing day!

Like every good athlete, a successful business is a result of a number of factors: having clearly defined goals, setting realistic timeframes to achieve those goals, stepping outside ‘the norm’ to allow innovation and employing a high level of understanding between the methodology vs. application – which in the business world usually results in a situation of IT vs. ‘The Business’.

But there-in lies the issue for most organizations. IT’s partnership with ‘the business’ needs to be a collaborative one. Like any relationship, interactions within the business are both formal and informal in nature and the most effective collaboration involves give and take from both parties. If well established, the partnership that IT can develop with the business means that risks are taken together when innovating.

The same issues often occur when external providers are brought in. In terms of outsourcing and cloud services most providers come to the table with a ‘menu’ of options, asking you to chose the most suitable for your requirements. This ‘off the shelf’ approach to IT provision has its uses in terms of simple selection processes and potentially reduced implementation times, but it also limits you due to the pre-defined parameters of that product or service provider.

Like the Olympians of the 2012 games, companies around the world are waking up to the realization that to excel in the current climate there needs to be a paradigm shift in not only the relationships we have now, but also how we manage them. IT in particular should no longer be ‘accepting’ a product or service as dictated by the provider but demanding that it is designed and built around personal (business) requirements.

This economy driven ‘power-shift’ has left the traditional service providers somewhat exposed and opened the door to smaller, more agile and more innovative companies such as Jitscale. IT teams worldwide are partnering with Jitscale to fulfill their business needs through a combination of bespoke, scalable, secure & fully managed IT environments. Through this healthy collaborative relationship, both parties are aiming to ensure their growth and prosperity not only in this New Year but next year and beyond for many years to come.

So as we take a moment to reflect on 2011, look forward into 2012 and ultimately all try to emulate the successful Olympians this year, why not take a moment to talk to Jitscale and let us help you reconcile your IT and business needs in order to achieve those goals.

Responsibilities

• Generate new business opportunities to fuel the sales pipeline.
• Develop and execute business plans and sales strategies for the US market to achieve company sales goals and profitability.
• Create and conduct proposal presentations and RFP responses.
• Conduct high level conversations and web-based demonstrations.
• Manage the sales process using SugarCRM.
• Show constant enthusiasm and initiative.
• Monitor customer preferences, collecting feedback and market research to determine focus of sales efforts.
• Assists in the development and implementation of marketing plans as needed.
• Keeping up to date with products and competitors.
• Provides monthly feedback to HQ in The Netherlands.
• Follow company policies, procedures and business ethics codes.

Job Specification

• 5+ years experience achieving sales success, in IT and high end B2B markets, and familiarity with IaaS, PaaS and SaaS technology.
• Customer focused mentality and a winning attitude.
• Excellent sales and negotiation skills.
• Strong understanding of customer and market dynamics and requirements.
• Willingness to travel and work in a global team of professionals.
• Solid computer skills including GoogleDocs, Apple I-works, Microsoft Office and Sugar CRM is a plus.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.

You’ll be office-based, but also spending some of your time visiting customers and the headquarters in The Netherlands and attend conferences, and therefore your job may involve some overnight stays away from home.

About Jitscale

You will be part of a fast growing, high potential and leading organization with worldwide ambition. Jitscale is founded in 1999 in The Netherlands and since 2008 also active in the US. Jitscale is specialized in providing fully flexible managed IT infrastructures, using physical, virtual and especially cloud infrastructures. Jitscale starts from the business prospective of our customers and not from a technical focus. The sales and marketing approach therefore is top-down and this has resulted in a very successful European company, providing services to, for example, multiple large financial-, media-, healtcare- and logistic companies but also governments. Customers of JItscale praise the company for it’s pragmatic approach, the pro-active way how they take care of all the IT responsibilities of the customers and our governance model of contact.

If you like to be leading the company into the United States market and you see yourself in the profile described above, feel free to submit your resume and motivation to careers@jitscale.com

To apply

Please send your resume and motivation to careers[at]jitscale.com

Find more current job openings at Jitscale.

Not so surprising, for knowledge means power and power creates advantages. Knowledge is more than just information. It is a combination of information, experience and skills and you need to know how to use it. Acquired knowledge needs to be made explicit, be shared and discussed.  This can be done in various ways, using the right technological support for instance, thus entering the field of knowledge engineering.

The people behind WikiLeaks know all about this. They use their ‘knowledge’ as a threat and sometimes show proof of the seriousness of the matter. Just before the start of this new year, they made public certain credit card data, including Dutch data.

Yet knowledge engineering did not experience the breakthrough that was predicted by gurus many years ago, certainly not when compared to more visible things such as mobile phones and the internet. However, hidden from the outside world, knowledge engineering systems are being used more and more. Think of the advert cookies at the top of your Gmail page, which are displayed only moments after you sent an e-mail on that particular subject.

At one point knowledge engineering and knowledge management or storage if you will, crossed paths. And in the course of time two forms of knowledge storage were created. First an unstructured, spontaneous database in which knowledge is transferred to the digital world. A great example of this is Wikipedia: this phenomenon keeps on growing, inviting you to share knowledge and make it available to everyone.

‘Wikiwiki’ is a Hawaiian word and means ‘fast’. ‘Wikipedia’: fast information to be used straight away. During the last few years, it has become normal for anyone to be able to gather information and acquire knowledge. Picarta and online encyclopaedias once were only available on university networks, not accessible to the public, but we now have numerous online locations we can use to acquire knowledge. Anyone can access this information, and anyone can add information.

Second, there is an increase in structured locations where knowledge can be acquired, databases that are managed centrally and form the source of business processes. An IT company with ISO certification cannot exist without a wiki page. Without our knowledge base we are nowhere. All information is stored in this knowledge base to ensure that we can display the right information in the blink of an eye, with just one mouse-click, so we can face any challenge.

What will knowledge engineering, the power of having or distributing knowledge, bring us in 2012? I frankly have no idea and I will not be tempted into producing a forecast.

I wish you all the best for 2012. Spread the knowledge!

The strange thing is: when your car is running, your muscles are doing what they’ve been designed for, your washing machine does works and your can take a shower every day you will stop experiencing it as something that is still special, it simply becomes a commodity. These things need to be there and you expect it to work whenever you are in need of the functionality.

When put in perspective of platform management a fully functional and performing platform could easily become experienced as a commodity as well. So whenever a problem does occur it will be perceived as a huge dissatisfier and it becomes the task of the platform management company – us – to take responsibility in coordinating efforts to solve the problem.

This continuous journey is one of our biggest challenges: because we take responsibility of the end of your complete IT chain, we become more visible to whenever there is an incident. Our solution method is based on three simple rules:

1. Solving the problem, no matter what
2. Finding out what the problem triggered
3. Making the invisible visible

Our technical teams and overall approach is fully based on structured and ad-hoc supporting of your  business critical IT platforms, so when there is a problem our times to respond and solve are very important and therefore short.
Parallel to solving the issue we will always do an analysis to the cause so we can find out what caused the incident and what and/or who was the real problem creator is. From multiple perspectives that’s an important aspect in the process. One of them is obviously to learn from situations in the past but during the solving process it is important to know if we are the solving party (and the cause) or assisting the solving party. It creates differences in project management, governance, resource management, consultancy and of course invoicing.

But if you don’t look for the real problem owner, risks could be that multiple parties with different agenda’s are looking into the same problem. And this could end up in a blurry situation: who is in the lead, who decides, who is paying, who provides project management,  who can set priorities, who is setting the time-lines, who manages communication with suppliers etc.

Then, when all problems are solved the other hard part starts over again. Because, similarly to your car that isn’t running anymore or the shower you can’t take whenever you like, these situations can affect you overall perception of that car and shower. By default it should also be affected by the times it does work. From a commercial perspective it is important to raise the awareness about how fantastic it is, when it does work the way you want to. We basically need to make the invisible visible.

All the days that your IT is running smoothly should be celebrated. Even though at Jitscale almost all of our customers have enjoyed an up-time of up to 100% for the last 12 years, we should celebrate that up-time everyday because it is something we are very proud of. And this should not only be from Jitscales perspective, but also from all the other partners in the IT chain, including your own IT department and your customers using the systems.

We try to increase visibility by making graphs about the up-time, focusing also on performance because up-time isn’t the whole story of the customer experience. In addition we try to advise or customers pro-actively about steps to make, parts to upgrade and potential future threats that could happen.
But we’d like to learn from our customers, potential customers and relations, so from you. What do want to hear? What information would you like to be informed about? Which details would you want to see in graphs? What do you not want to see? Are you using the monthly reports for yourself of are you using them to inform others? What do they want to see in there? Please let us know, and we’d love to get that provided to you.

Just like six months before, Zilveren Kruis has the most visited website in the industry. No less than 56% of the respondents visited ZilverenKruis.nl when shopping for health insurance and 18% said that they eventually decided to go for health insurance offered by this provider. The website did particularly well in the Web Image and Reliability categories.

Jitscale CEO Eelco van Beek: “A wonderful score for Achmea. They spent a lot of time and effort improving their websites by carrying out usability tests and taking to heart what their customers had to say. Synergy between findability, reliability, information value and usability is of course vital for health insurance websites, but if the performance is substandard, those parameters are worth nothing. We are therefore very proud to have been able to contribute to this excellent end result by ensuring an outstanding performance of these websites.”

Wido de Vries, Senior Internet Manager of Achmea’s Care & Health Division acknowledges this: “The holiday season is traditionally a crucial period for us. Many consumers are reconsidering their health insurances and that is why it is very important that our websites are available and accessible. Jitscale’s experience in the management of business-critical IT platforms and the accompanying performance optimization have played an important role.”

The event opened with a sobering speech by Gartner’s spokesman. “We are all gathered here together now, but in five years time, no one will remember this security event. In five years time, no one will ask these questions, no one will have these objections, everyone will be a convinced user of the cloud. This is called ‘history repeating’, comparable to the introduction of the credit card, internet payments, personalised email addresses, etc. We have seen it all before.”

Massimo Pezzini then spoke about the lingering sense of insecurity and about finding excuses not to use the cloud. Reasoning based on feelings, not on facts.

Even though the cloud will only continue to grow in the coming five years, cloud based email lags behind. According to Gartner, in 2014 only 10% of all organizations will use cloud based email solutions. The research bureau says this will be because companies have invested a lot of money in good working email solutions, so it wouldn’t be profitable in the short run to (fully) switch.

The editor of CloudWorks does not agree: he claims email as it stands will die out, and in coming years the cloud will perform an increasingly bigger role as communication facility. The cloud is more efficient and therefore saves costs, which will win everybody over.

I enjoy all the clichés that go around during such an event as this one. At the plenary round table session, more than once the obvious was stated. “My main objection is not knowing where exactly my data is stored”, an audience member said. The ICT expert of KPMG present at the table responded: “And in the current situation, you do know where it is? You’re absolutely sure no one has taken any data home, on a memory stick, on an iPad, or any other carrier?”

”But is it safe?” someone else from the audience asked. “In itself a good question”, continued another table guest, PGGM’s CEO of ICT, “but how secure is what you have now, when was its last audit? And your third party, the one that keeps your salary records, are you certain the system they use to produce your pay slip meets security demands? That shocks you a bit, doesn’t it?”

Many questions that deserve attention were raised by people present. The comments mentioned above bring no conclusive answers, but they do put the questions into the right perspective. The point is, these types of questions apply to all situations, not just to cloud related ones.

It’s up to us, as provider, to answer these questions, but even more importantly, to remove uncertainties. Something we already started doing 10 years ago, at the development of hardware platforms for our clients.

Here are some questions we always reflect on:

Problem: Which problems benefit from cloud solutions, and which don’t?

Possible solutions: Which infrastructure do we use? Private cloud, public cloud, combinations, alternatives? What are the chances something goes wrong, and what is the impact? How can we reduce this risk (for example by redundancy, the use of cloud-over-cloud computing) and stipulate it in a contract?

Security: Which data is suitable for the cloud, and which data isn’t? Which BIV code (availability, integrity and confidentiality) is linked to which data?

Integration: How do I integrate the cloud, how does migration work, and what do I need to take particular care of? Who is responsible?

Legal: Recently, there has been much talk about the new privacy acts (Patriot Act, WBP, Escrow, Safe Harbor, Cobit). Which one applies here? Is there existing certification?

Such questions form an excellent point of departure, but, after answering, offer no guarantee the client is convinced of the benefits or impact of the cloud. Cloud Forum XL showed that opinions remain divided on what the future of the cloud will bring. We believe that within five years the cloud is an integral part of IT platforms worldwide, possibly combined with alternatives. One way or the other, we are convinced the cloud is inescapable. By the way, Antony Lye, vice president CRM at Oracle, ventilated a completely different opinion; he does not believe everything will go to the cloud. Gerry Pennel, CIO of LOCOG (London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games) predicts a smooth transition to the cloud will have priority. And although the cloud will strongly grow, he believes the coming five years will see an intermediate phase: coupled platforms.

To our way of thinking, Cloud Forum XL was for 90% dominated by fear of the big bad cloud. Which is really a shame. And a missed opportunity. Questions need to be raised in order to come to solutions (cloud solutions, migration solutions, risk control, and legal compliance), not to feed fears. Because the cloud is really not all that scary.

Due to our rapid expansion to the US, we are looking for a skilled System Administrator for our Orlando office. Our customers are mostly based in Europe and you will be working closely with our Dutch support team.

The job

As a System administration employee you are part of Jitscale’s skilled Project team and your daily tasks consist of, amongst others:

• Daily support of infrastructure and network, searching for new possibilities
• Designing, building and implementing bespoke IT Infrastructures for new clients, as well as working with existing clients to optimize their existing environments.
• Implementation of technical changes on (customer) systems
• Rotating in our 24/7 Support service (company phone)

We don’t limit ourselves by using one technology, but believe in using the most effective solution to fix the problem/objective. We use closed sourced distributions and solutions like Apache, PHP, Postfix, dbmail, Jboss, Tomcat, Websphere, MySQL, IBM, Sharepoint, Postgresql, DB2 and Oracle.

Job requirements

You have at least a bachelor degree (BSc.) and you worked in a similar position before. You are service-oriented, reliable and you have technical as well as analytical insight. Next to this you like to work on complex challenges, while using your constantly growing technical knowledge to come up with the most effective solution. You enjoy sparring with your peers about possible solutions, but are not afraid to make decisions on your own. Above all, your most important personal characteristic is enthusiasm!

Only when you are satisfied we are able to provide our customers with the best possible service. You are stimulated to constantly improve your technical skills and knowledge. Sharing your knowledge among your peers is very important to us and we spend much time in coaching your further development as a System administrator.

What we offer

Of course you will earn a competitive salary including 20 paid vacation days per year and healthcare. Furthermore, we work with the latest Apple soft- and hardware and you will be teaming up with the most knowledgeable and passionate internet platform experts in the world, including team building visits to The Netherlands.

To apply

Please send your resume and motivation to careers[at]jitscale.com

Find more current job openings at Jitscale.

Due to our rapid expansion to the US, we are looking for a skilled System Administrator for our Orlando office. Our customers are mostly based in Europe and you will be working closely with our Dutch support team.

The job

As a System administration employee you are part of Jitscale’s skilled Project team and your daily tasks consist of, amongst others:

• Daily support of infrastructure and network, searching for new possibilities
• Designing, building and implementing bespoke IT Infrastructures for new clients, as well as working with existing clients to optimize their existing environments.
• Building complex database environments
• Being part of new projects, create and design new platforms
• Implementation of technical changes on (customer) systems
• Rotating in our 24/7 Support service (company phone)

We don’t limit ourselves by using one technology, but believe in using the most effective solution to fix the problem/objective. We use closed sourced distributions and solutions like Apache, PHP, Postfix, dbmail, Jboss, Tomcat, Websphere, MySQL, IBM, Sharepoint, Postgresql, DB2 and Oracle.

Job requirements

You have at least a bachelor degree (BSc.) and you worked in a similar position before. You are service-oriented, reliable and you have technical as well as analytical insight. Next to this you like to work on complex challenges, while using your constantly growing technical knowledge to come up with the most effective solution. You enjoy sparring with your peers about possible solutions, but are not afraid to make decisions on your own. Above all, your most important personal characteristic is enthusiasm!

Only when you are satisfied we are able to provide our customers with the best possible service. You are stimulated to constantly improve your technical skills and knowledge. Sharing your knowledge among your peers is very important to us and we spend much time in coaching your further development as a System administrator.

What we offer

Of course you will earn a competitive salary including 20 paid vacation days per year and healthcare. Furthermore, we work with the latest Apple soft- and hardware and you will be teaming up with the most knowledgeable and passionate internet platform experts in the world, including team building visits to The Netherlands.

To apply

Please send your resume and motivation to careers[at]jitscale.com

Find more current job openings at Jitscale.