Exite ICT

What started for Exite ICT as a fun, innovative solution for clients grew into a full-fledged data center. Slowly but surely, it became a company in its own right, requiring significant time, money, and expertise. These were resources that detracted from Exite's core business: being a service-oriented ICT provider. It was time to outsource. The benefits proved to be of great value to Exite's future. "Outsourcing our cloud infrastructure has given us wings."

Robbie, tell us, what was the specific challenge you approached Fundaments with?

Help, I have a data center, how do I get rid of it? Our data center started as an innovative client solution. We saw a growing demand for Private Cloud in the market and thought it would be cool to facilitate this for our clients ourselves. It started small, but before we knew it, we had a full and complex data center with capacity management, power management, lifecycle management, and so on. We increasingly realized that managing and controlling our own data center is a major task. And a risky one, given the monthly cloud contracts and the fact that clients purchase consumption-based resources. We had to grow with client demand, but at the same time, we had no guarantees that hardware investments would pay off. When we were faced with a new investment for our data center, we asked ourselves if outsourcing wasn't a better step.

What was the deciding factor in actually outsourcing your cloud infrastructure?

The client. By going back to our roots, we concluded that outsourcing was the only way to excel in our core business: being a service-oriented ICT provider. The client is always our central focus, and the service we provide must be the best possible. That is where we want to invest our time and money, not in hardware and managing a data center. We also realized that we could no longer compete in the Private Cloud provider division. That there are parties who are much better at it than we are. We realized we didn't want to fight that battle because our expertise lies on the platform, not in the platform. By outsourcing our cloud infrastructure, we would free up more time for our core business and its innovation. We would be able to maximize our talent and thereby make an even greater impact on the client and their development. Once we had this clear, outsourcing was a no-brainer. It was the best choice for our client. And therefore, for us.

How did you end up with Fundaments for this?

We conducted extensive research into Private Cloud providers in the Netherlands. A few parties stood out, including Fundaments. They ultimately stood out to us because they are highly specialized. There is no diffuse proposition for either of us. It is very lean and mean. Fundaments simply says: we are good at data centers, at Private Cloud, and you are good at what happens on the platform. We really liked that there is no competition or rivalry this way, but that you are truly creating something together through co-creation. It turned out to be a perfect match.

Ronald, can you tell us more about the solution Fundaments provided for your outsourcing challenge?

Fundaments provides the IaaS part of our services, or Infrastructure as a Service. They provide the foundation for our services. With that solution, our central questions were immediately answered. Namely: how can we continue the services we already offer our clients in a future-proof way, and how can we properly secure the sourcing of the systems we use for clients.

A clear solution, but transferring the workload of all your clients is no small feat. How did Fundaments win your trust?

Honestly, we found it quite nerve-wracking. You are moving an important part of your service delivery outside your own walls, and that raises a lot of questions and concerns. You wonder, among other things, how clients will react, how it will be perceived in the market, what it means for the people in our own data center, and how our services will remain secured through this new partnership. Outsourcing is truly a big step. Fundaments took the time to answer all those questions on both a technical and commercial level and to alleviate our concerns. From the many conversations, it became clear that Fundaments' ability to think along with us is very strong, that our visions are closely aligned, that they are flexible, that their technical knowledge is extensive, and based on all those things, we expressed our trust in them as a partner.

Your concerns were addressed, but what about the concerns of your clients?

Customers expect stability and performance from the systems they use. If we want to guarantee that sustainably, outsourcing is the only and best option. Our customers supported this message. It also helped that the workload migration would have no impact on business continuity. The migration is fully automated and involves minimal downtime. Furthermore, we schedule it outside office hours, so customers literally don't notice a thing. Above all, we made it clear that our service delivery isn't changing, but that things will look different under the hood. And if anything does change in our service, it's because we have more time and space to innovate and excel . In short: outsourcing brings benefits for the customer, too.

What is a tangible customer benefit of outsourcing to Fundaments?

By using Fundaments' services, we have additional functionalities at our disposal. In the near future, this will allow our customers to scale resources up and down themselves via a self-service portal, among other things. This is processed automatically in the background. Customers no longer have to do any work for this, and neither do we.

What was the biggest challenge in the entire outsourcing process?

Convincing our own employees, and specifically our tech team, why we were outsourcing this part of our service. We took them through this journey step by step and offered them perspective by showing that it marks a new beginning for how services can be delivered within a Hybrid Cloud strategy. We are now using the talents of the people who were working inside the platform to work on top of the platform, helping and advising customers. Because that service is where our strength lies. That is where we want to excel. By outsourcing, everyone can now focus on our core business. Some of the technicians from our data center have since taken on the implementation for our customers within the Hybrid Cloud strategy. The others are working on managing customer environments within that cloud environment. Together, we are working on our mission to be the most service-oriented IT provider in the Netherlands.

Robbie, what does the partnership with Fundaments mean for the future of Exite?

A great deal. Outsourcing our cloud infrastructure gives us wings. Thanks to Fundaments' IaaS layer, we can invest our talent, time, and resources in the things that truly matter to Exite's future. A future I look forward to with optimism in partnership with Fundaments. It is a very pleasant collaboration with a reliable partner. With true professionals. We know our customers' environments are in good hands with Fundaments, and that is worth a great deal to us.

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