Cloud Computing encompasses a broad range of services that are available upon subscription. With several significant developments, evolution and revolution; cloud technology has evolved to encompass Software as a Service (SaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), Security as a Service, and On Demand Services over the Internet, among others. Apart from this, many vendors have seized the term ‘Cloud’ and are using it for products that sit outside of the common definition of cloud. The cloud marketplace is progressively becoming more diverse, and incoherent, at the same time.

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Cloud Cockpit
Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)
Insight

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Executive Summary
Cloud Computing encompasses a broad range of services that are available upon
subscription. With several significant developments, evolution and revolution;
cloud technology has evolved to encompass Software as a Service (SaaS), Platform
as a Service (PaaS), Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), Security as a Service, and On
Demand Services over the Internet, among others. Apart from this, many vendors
have seized the term ‘Cloud’ and are using it for products that sit outside of the
common definition of cloud. The cloud marketplace is progressively becoming
more diverse, and incoherent, at the same time.
In today’s business scenario, the need to buy equipment required to support operations has disappeared.
Storage, hardware, servers and networking components, including the big expenses concerning their
maintenance and periodic upgrade are now the service providers’ problem, with the client paying only
for what they require and when they require the same. This means that the service provider becomes an
extremely important partner, whose professionalism, technical acumen and ability for innovation are crucial.
The focus of this white paper is to provide an insight into the subscription and monetization platform for IaaS
providers.
Introduction
The challenging economic environment has increased pressure on
IT departments to keep costs down. In this changing environment,
businesses prefer not to spend on large, expensive physical equipment,
hardware or servers which are used for different operations. Storage,
hardware, servers and networking components, including the big expenses
concerning their maintenance and periodic upgrade are now the service
provider’s concern, with the client paying only for what they require and
when they require the same.

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Characteristics of IaaS
• Allows for the distribution of resources as a service on
subscription
• Allows for dynamic scaling
• Enables ‘variable cost’ based on utility pricing model
• Includes multiple users on a single piece of hardware
• Facilitates reseller commissions
• Works on Quote to Cash model
Challenges
• Are you delaying the launch of your new service
because your billing system is not ready?
• Are you unable to support new pricing models with your
existing billing system?
• Are you unsure if you are billing the right amount?
• Are your customers complaining about your bills?
• Are you taking more than a month to finish your month
end closing?
IaaS on Subscription Model
In general, IaaS is delivered on a subscription basis which
facilitates the enterprise to shift from the CAPEX model
to the OPEX model. IaaS providers have different kinds of
business processes and strategies to capture the market
share. While IaaS provides massive advantages for situations
where scalability and quick provisioning are beneficial, there
are situations where its limitations may be problematic.
Over the past few years, IaaS has evolved into a full-fledged
industry. Many traditional systems are becoming obsolete
when it comes to IaaS providers’ requirements. The reason
being the paradigm shift in the way these IaaS providers
operate. This also applies to a billing system.
Traditional billing systems are not able to meet the
requirements of Cloud providers. The basic idea, around
which a traditional billing system is built, is the reason they
are not able to cope up with the highly dynamic IaaS Cloud
Industry requirements. However, the right ecosystem can
ensure access to a major share in the market.
Fast Facts
• The cloud computing
marketplace will reach $16.7B
in revenue by 2013, including
the large and well-established
software-as-a-service (SaaS)
category, according to a
research report by 451 Market
Monitor, compared to a
revenue of $8.7B in 2010.
• According to the Cloud
Storage Market-Worldwide
Forecasts & Analysis research
report (that includes Cloud
Storage Gateways, Backup &
Recovery, Data Movement
& Access, Data Replication,
Hsm & Archiving, Security And
Storage Resource Management
Solutions), published by
MarketsandMarkets, the global
cloud market is expected to
grow from $5.6 billion in 2012
to $46.8 billion by 2013, at an
estimated CAGR of 40.2% from
2013 to 2018.
• Cloud IaaS market to grow by
47.8% through 2015.

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The importance of a robust subscription and
monetization platform
In the Cloud eco-system, the major application which
facilitates the service provider to streamline the
business process is a platform that handles billing
and monetization. The requirements of a robust
subscription system are mentioned below.
• Support Quote to Cash model
• Reduce revenue leakage
• Provide different charge models have to be
supported such as recurring & pay as you go
model
• Integrate with traditional, on-premise & hosted
applications to streamline the process
• Enable Reseller commissions
• Enable White Labelling
• Provide MIS reports to make informed decisions
Pain Points of Cloud Subscription Business
• Manage Recurring Billing - not a One-Time Sale
• Usage, Rating, Invoices, Notifications and
Payment Collection
• Managing Scale - managing new and existing
subscribers, Customer Billing Queries become a
challenge as you try to scale your business
• The Need for Analytics - MRR, Churn, Customer
Profitability, Customer Usage
• Subscription Businesses are becoming complex
due to Legacy and New Price Plans
The Importance of a Revenue Management
Module
The collection module ensures automatic generation
of bills and invoices resulting in appropriate payments
being collected from customers; from respective
channel partners through different payment options.
Timely collection of payments will bring in the desired
cash flow into the service provider’s organization.
A robust revenue management module comes with
the below set of features.
• Payment collections from customers in multiple
currencies.
• Credit distribution towards debit instruments, like
pending payments, late payment charges etc.
• Various payment modes such as credit card,
direct debit, bank, ATM, cash, cheque etc.
• Payment processing in near real-time through
integration with interactive on line payment
gateways.
• Identification of customers who are due for
renewals / payments by enabling effective follow
up for on-time collections.
• Collection follow-up stage configuration and
mapping them to pre-defined actions such as
sending reminder messages to hold or disconnect
the subscription.
• Accurate data capture for conducting aging
analysis.
Service Fulfilment
When a customer is paying, he/she/corporate expects
the service to be enabled or on the fly based on the
SLA. This is possible only when the Service Provider
has an efficient Service Fulfilment Solution.
Post the Service Enablement, it is the Service
Provider’s responsibility to keep track of Service,
Usage, Credit Limit, Usage Limit with proper
Reminders and Alarms, which will enable the Service
Provider to up-sell and increase revenue channels.
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Benefits
• Efficient way of bundling and pricing services
• Manage complex pricing schedules
• Unified financial data and operations
• Tailor bill presentment based on customer
preferences
• Automated Revenue management and Billing
• Inbuilt metering and usage tracking
• Pre-integrated payment gateway(s)
• Increase insight into business performance
• Lightweight CRM for handling customer
queries and support

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The Evolution of SURE!
In the Subscription business, our world-class product-
line, SURE (short for Subscription Revolution), is an
experience which has been changing the business
fortunes of our globally spread clients in PayTV,
Broadband and Cloud businesses.
SURE! is one of the world’s leading Subscription
Lifecycle Management software solutions, based on
the methodology of providing a solution spanning
across the spectrum of engagement between the
subscriber and the service provider.
Flexible price plans management
Many IaaS players come up with flexible price plans
to address multiple segments of customers. But this
often complicates the internal process making it
cumbersome. But with its ability to handle such price
plan, one can automate the billing management.
Integration ability
The ability to integrate with various systems using
its industry standard Web Service APIs and offline
integration is important. Apart from this, the ability
to integrate using SURE! Observer Agent Technology
helps integration with any third party system in the
eco-system.
Virtualization platform in your ecosystem
For automating the billing management process,
customer usage details should be provided. But a
manual upload of usage details will again reduce the
efficiency. This led to the automation of activation
of services for a new customer on the one hand
(provisioning) and keeping track of the usage of the
customer (monitoring) on the other. Once the usage
details are procured, the bill can be generated based
on the pre-defined price plans and available usage
details.
Service portal integration
IaaS providers offer My Account or Self Care for their
customers. This allows the customer to view and
manage usage and billing. IaaS providers have also
provided a facility to pay for their utilized services
through a website. SURE! has successfully integrated
various online payment facilitators to support this.
Payment gateway integration
Payment gateway integration has enabled IaaS
providers to collect payments from various methods
like Credit Card, Debit Card and Online Money
Transfer, besides traditional ways. Payments and
collections impact the balance sheet of a company.
Hence, integrating with FAS systems is imperative.
FAS Integrations
Most IaaS activities are metered financial activities.
Updating the financial system manually depending
on a cloud service provider’s transactions will lead to
redundancy. Hence, integration of various FAS with
the cloud service provider is important. This leads
to seamless flow of integration from one system
to another. SURE! manages all this financial and
operational information effectively.
Information management
Single-view screen, which gives a 360 degree
view of all the data, is in vogue. The information
available in the Cloud service provider’s dashboard is
accurate and can be very useful for making informed
managerial decisions.

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SURE! Deployed Solutions
CLIENT: Industry IDC
With more and more business processes and citizen
services operating over the Internet, there is a need
to set up strategic infrastructure that facilitates high
availability, quick scalability, efficient management
and optimized utilization of resources.
Solution Drivers
• Contract Management
• Packaging, Pricing with Promo Codes
• Metering
• Dashboards
• Reports
• Subscription & Billing
• Partner Management & Revenue Settlements
Product Snapshot
• SURE! is a Subscription Management, Metering
& Billing Product developed by Magnaquest
Technologies Limited
• Over 15 years of domain experience
• Global Customer base with presence in more
than 35 countries
• Employees with offices in the USA, India and
Malaysia
Customer Challenge
• Enabling the service in near real-time with server-
level resource management
• Honouring the Service Level Agreements and
Quality of Service as promised
• Monitoring usage and sending usage reminders
to control Revenue Leakages and enabling
Upgrading and Upselling
• Regular analysis of service performance and
creation of new bundles for revenue optimization
Customer Solution
• CPU size and power
• Network bandwidth
• Storage
• Other System Software license usage
SURE! (Billing & Customer Relationship Management)
aggregates customer data, infrastructure usage data,
order details and billing data to improve operations.
Business modules include
• Service catalogue
• Usage metrics dashboard
• Contract management and
• Billing run
Infrastructure providers often use resellers and
partner channels to sell products. SURE! allows
providers to manage the usage and billing aspects of
these relationships.
Solution Overview
SURE! Deployed Solutions
2. Customer Brief
Joyent is a Cloud Computing vendor of ‘Infrastructure
as a Service’ (IaaS). Joyent’s main product is a line
of virtualized servers called Joyent Accelerators.
Joyent’s clients use collections of Accelerators to
power-large scale web sites and web applications.
Joyent provides a more flexible and cost-effective
alternative to buying and running your own IT
infrastructure, while still providing all the security,
cost stability, and enterprise-grade performance of a

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Summary
Earlier generations of billing were complex, they became obsolete; the return on
investment varied widely between companies. In a large number of cases it was not
optimal. The installation did not produce even a minimum level of expected benefits.
Besides this, calculation of the ROI itself posed major problems since many of the end
results of the monetization platform were difficult to measure and quantify.
SURE! billing and monetization platform is intuitive, easier to use and easier to integrate
with third party systems or other enterprise software. The different modules such as
Contract Management, Quotation Management, Partner Management, Flexible Pricing
& Product Management among others enable the service provider to be flexible and
scale up to the market changes which are dynamic in nature. The modules can be added
incrementally. Thus, SURE! provides the service provider with enhanced choice, flexibility
and confidence.
dedicated private data center. Joyent’s clients include
Disney ABC, LinkedIn, Sympathy Tree, Major League
Baseball’s MLB.com, the hit shopping site Gilt.com,
and over 25% of the daily active application usage on
Facebook.
Customer Challenge
With a complex monthly billing cycle, Joyent needed
to efficiently and accurately invoice its customers.
Doing so would help the accounting and billing
department with reduced cost and increased
productivity which in turn helps in the generation of
timely and accurate policy based bills.
Customer Solution
Joyent took a look at a) building an in house billing
solution and b) buying platform services from
vendors. After evaluating the capabilities of SURE! On
Demand Monetization Platform (S-OMP), and other
competitive alternatives, they chose SURE!
The S-OMP
• Collates data from heterogeneous platforms
deployed at Joyent.
• Integrates seamlessly with usage repository and
aggregates the information on an easy to use
dashboard.
• Helps Joyent visualize how customers are utilizing
their business services.
• Provides a detailed view of how specific
customers are using / not using the services.
• Allows modelling of complex pricing and
subscription plans.
• Stores contract terms for billing based on service
usage.
• Integrates with Joyent’s accounting system.
The Benefits
• Saved approximately $200,000 development
expense
• Systematic, intuitive & easy to use, with no need
for extensive training
• Better utilization of scarce resources to value-
added projects & offerings
Client Speak
We are very pleased with the results we have seen
with SURE!’s service. The integration capabilities of
the platform allowed us to systematically migrate.
With the SURE! platform we were able to consolidate
our usage based billing mechanism.” Peter Watridge,
CFO, Joyent Inc.

8. Global Footprint
MALAYSIA
Magnaquest Solutions Sdn Bhd (566396-A)
mqmalaysia@magnaquest.com | +60 3 8318 2964
Magnaquest Technologies Limited
Plot No.1523 & 1524, Road No.12,
Banjara Hills, Hyderabad 500 034
Tel : +91 40 23320220 / 23320975
Fax : +91 40 23370037
mqindia@magnaquest.com
USA
Magnaquest Solutions Inc.
mqusa@magnaquest.com | +14807063444