
Russian Data Center & Cloud Market Update – Addressing Russia’s Data Sovereignty Laws ARE YOU IN COMPLIANCE WITH GLOBAL DATA SOVEREIGNTY LAWS? RUSSIA, TURKEY & OTHERS? If you’re providing services to people in Russia, store some personal data, and are not an airline, you have until September 1, 2015 to move that data to a… Read More »Deadline for Russia’s Data Localization Law
August 25, 2015

Strategic IT Contract Default One of the hottest topics in the wake of the meltdown of the real estate market is the ethics of walking away from an underwater mortgage – which now accounts for 12% of all foreclosures according to Morgan Stanley. Banks and realtors tend to opine that it’s a barbarian practice, only acceptable… Read More »Strategic IT Contract Default – Smart Decision or Dirty Business?
October 18, 2010

Hosting Uptime Assumptions & Mistakes One of the biggest mistakes that buyers make when outsourcing for the first time is assuming that their internal performance standards (usually tuned to “net” server uptime) are what the provider is promising, whereas most of the time what they’re getting is a “gross” site uptime that excludes pre-scheduled maintenance… Read More »Hosting Uptime Assumptions & Mistakes
August 4, 2010

Force Majeure (less secularly known as “Act of God”) clauses are standard contract language and should be included in your data center checklist. Having your data center wiped out by a meteor strike means you’re not getting service credits and there’s not much you can do about it (there are concessions that can soothe that pain,… Read More »Data Center Checklist – Force Majeure Abuse
March 20, 2010

SLA Measurement – Today’s devious device is a playbook page that’s intentionally left blank. Omitting meaningful measurement from IT service Level Agreements (SLAs) or leaving them to the discretion of the supplier can effectively nullify their effect along with service credits of 2%-5% of your monthly bill for a single violation up to 50% or… Read More »Devious Device – SLA Measurement
March 9, 2010
IT Outsourcing Risk In fairness to sellers of IT services, large buyers are not averse to a few power plays of their own and sometimes steamroll smaller or independent providers with onerous contract clauses. One of the most costly (if rare) provisions in relationships where the balance is tipped to the buyer is consequential damages… Read More »IT Outsourcing Risk – Consequential Damages
February 25, 2010

Managed Services Supplier Playbook: Why IT Buyers Should Worry at Budget Time One of the newer trends that came about as the dollar has weakened in the last few years is the prevalence of currency adjustment clauses in contracts with a remote / offshore component. These are typically buried in some appendix along with CPI… Read More »Managed Services supplier Playbook – Currency Risk
February 19, 2010