Krome Cast: TECH-IT-OUT - Enterprise Network Monitoring featuring Paessler PRTG

In this episode of Krome Cast: Tech-it-out, we talk to our IT Network Monitoring Partner, Paessler AG, about their PRTG Network Monitor software; the enterprise network monitoring challenges faced by larger organisations and how their new PRTG Enterprise Monitor tool, and ITOps board, helps to make the role of the enterprise Sysadmin easier! 

In this easy-to-consume technology podcast, we also talk about why you should invest in network monitoring and compare network monitoring tools costs.

This podcast features Krome’s Commercial Director, Sam Mager along with Paessler AG's, Country Manager, UK & Ireland, Martin Hodgson, sharing their insights and some real-world client examples of how organisations are using both custom PRTG sensors and standard PRTG sensors in some innovative ways! 

► ABOUT KROME: Krome Technologies is a technically strong, people-centric technology consultancy, focused on delivering end-to-end infrastructure and security solutions that solve business challenges and protect critical data. We work collaboratively with clients, forming long-term business partnerships, applying knowledge, experience and the resources our clients need to solve problems, design solutions and co-create agile, efficient and scalable IT services.

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Transcript

KromeCast Video Podcast Enterprise Network Monitoring 

SPEAKERS

Sam Mager, Martin Hodgson

Introduction 00:01

Welcome to Krome Cast, Tech-it-out. Hosted by service-centric people first UK technology consultancy Krome Technologies.

Sam Mager  00:011

Welcome to Krome Cast Tech-it-out.  I'm Sam Mager, Commercial Director of Krome technologies.  I'm joined today  on the podcast by one of our vendor partner managers,  Martin Hodgson. He is the vendor General Manager  for UK and Ireland for Paessler AG. Martin, welcome. 

Martin Hodgson  00:28

Thanks Sam,  thanks for having me.

Sam Mager  00:30

To add some context to this conversation, we've been dealing with Paessler for,  I wouldn't put a year on it, but the best part of decade.  Obviously, great product, a very interesting tool, and you're probably aware of this, but we actually came across your product  as a customer.  So we were using, and you'd be more aware of the product, Nagios at the time, which was a good piece of open source software did the job, but was horrendously, was horrendous to operate on a daily basis,  the overhead was kind of  outweighing the benefit of having a  tool that monitors everything reporting on it,  because we had a full time guy just monitoring Nagios,  which is obviously not what you need  out of your network monitoring system.  So we went out to market looked at plenty of products, Solarwinds etc. People like that, and good products.  But this was in the early days of Krome, potentially didn't have the budget for that sort of product,  if I am honest with you, and found Paessler, but actually found that gave us everything  we needed from a functional perspective, to monitor our systems, our infrastructure as a service  platform for our customers. Fantastic.  And it was, you know, but becoming a customer of it.  We saw it and said you know what, we need to take this out and become a reseller of it, and take it out our customer base, obviously, that's, you know, it's been going well for a while now. So I guess that's our, how we discovered you guys.  And obviously, we're clearly fans of it.  If you could tell us a bit more from your perspective, some of the how you've expanded your products and some interesting features that people would be interested in?

Martin Hodgson  02:03

Yeah, sure.  Well, with PRTG, our target customer is the IT Admin, and the target that we set ourselves is simply to make their working life easier.  So we're looking to do a number of things for them, we want to proactively notify them of any issues or problems.  We want to give them insightful, useful data to address their issues, and we want to look for any opportunities we have to reduce their workload.  Now in recent times, we found more and more admins are sharing a service availability dashboard, or a map, as we call it in PRTG parlance, and that's allowing some of the users who are working from home, the ability to see which systems are available for them to connect to. The reason we do this is that it helps users help themselves, which is a massive boost for IT, but also, it really reduces the number of duplicate tickets when users know that there is an outage.  So now you've asked about other vendors, ultimately, the biggest difference between us and some of the other folks out there is that where they have bolt on modules for different aspects of monitoring with PRTG,  we give our customers all of our sensors,  we give them everything.

Sam Mager  03:23

I think that was a real boom for us when we looked at your product is I guess it's you know, you buy a car, you can buy a BMW, but you've got to be willing to tick every box there is to get a car that's worth having.  And then for us, obviously, when Rupert and I  looked at this as owners of the business  and with our CFO, Alex, looking at obviously  the counting the penny side of it,  kind of refreshing to see that that's,  you know, all-encompassing from a license perspective,  there was never a gotcha,  we'd like to add this, we'd like to have that  and there was suddenly an extra line  about a license fee that we had to tick and pay for.  That was a real, for us as a consumer of the product, that was a real big win for us. 

Martin Hodgson  04:03

Yeah, I think one of the things that I'd say, you know, looking back over 2020 is the rapid rate of development of our new sensors, obviously, 2020 was a very challenging year for many businesses. We were able to grow a little which, you know, we take that and we also managed to launch our new product.  Paessler PRTG Enterprise Monitor.

Sam Mager  04:27

Absolutely. Yeah. So that's a good point actually, we're certainly seeing from our side of it, [coughs] excuse me, a bit of a change in our customer base with PRTG.  Traditionally, it's been more the medium-sized enterprise that we've implemented to and supported PRTG in.  But I'd say a higher, larger enterprise customers are using more of the, let's call them, I suppose  'reassuringly expensive', tools that are offer,  but we're seeing a shift, and we're seeing the larger  organisations now, you know, implementing very large,  again, implementing, wrong word, over and over.  We're seeing larger installs of PRTG.  And the number of sensors that we're selling is kind of growing exponentially.  So from your perspective, I guess, it would be good  to understand how you guys, how your tool has evolved,  and how you're able to scale now into the enterprise space,  I suppose where the benefits are with PRTG with those  larger, kind of massive, let's call them, environments.

Martin Hodgson  05:34

Well, when I joined Paessler in 2017, there were a number of customers who said to me that they loved PRTG.  And that's a word I've heard throughout my time, Admins love PRTG.  They love how easy it was to implement and live with.  But they felt that we could do more to help them with the large scale deployments.  And that's pretty much what we did.  So when we introduced Paessler PRTG Enterprise Monitor, we brought in a number of fundamental changes for our customers who needed scale.  So firstly, we removed the link between licensing and architecture.  So customers, where previously they'd been compelled to build fewer, larger PRTG servers to accommodate licensing,  we got rid of that.  So they can build as many PRTG servers as they like with no restrictions, so that their architecture is their own choice.  Of course, that then brings in a problem in itself, which is how do you bring them down into a single pane of glass.  And that's where the ITOps board, the ITOps dashboard, with its simple elegance comes in.  And it allows a user tailored view of the health and the performance at an appropriate level for whoever that user is,  whether that's, you know,  a CXO, or an Engineer,  they get an appropriate level of insight  into the services and the like.  And then finally, one of the, one of the big differences that we implemented was that we allowed  customers to shift over to an OPEX model.  So the Enterprise Monitor product is available exclusively on a subscription basis. 

Sam Mager  07:18

Yes, I think that's, that is the way the software  market is going, but the shifting that capital expenditure  into an operational spend clear advantages  for a lot of businesses, it makes absolute sense to me.  So many of our, as we're seeing, as I say, we're onboarding  a lot more of the larger enterprise clients to PRTG.  And historically, and whilst we've done a good number now,  of the Enterprise Monitoring tool,  have been your standard monitoring tool customers.  But you know, as you as you've alluded to there,  but with, you know, a large growing amount of sensors,  so we need to take them,  and other people that will be listening to this podcast  that are PRTG customers  need to understand how they get themselves from   point A, a standard customer, to point B.  If you can talk us through what does that  upgrade path look like?  And then how does the pricing structure  wraparound look as well?

Martin Hodgson  08:12

Sure. So I think the first thing is, we draw a line in the sand,  which is that a PRTG core, a PRTG instance,  has a recommended cap of 10,000 sensors  as a maximum and that's the the XL1 license.  Now, what we've done, you know with a with a number  of your of your XL1 and multiple XL1 customers,  we've helped them migrate from,  from PRTG Network Monitor up to the Enterprise Product.  Now, because we did that, we broke the tentacles  by breaking that link between the license and the architecture,  they've ultimately got better performance.  And they've been able to reuse all of the knowledge  that they've gained over the years  of monitoring with PRTG  and then leveled up.  Because all the monitoring within Enterprise Monitor  is exactly the same.  But then it's the ITOps dashboard,  and that service level overview that you get.  So commercially, the Enterprise Monitor starts  from a shade under 15,000 euros, you know,  and with a minimum initial subscription  of one year and 20,000 sensors.  But in terms of, you know, existing PRTG customers,  you know, we've always had a very fair upgrade policy.  We like to give our customers as much as we possibly  can of their investment in PRTG back,  and typically I've seen that where we're doing a  three year subscription. They've had, you know,  a fair proportion of their capital costs back.  So, I would encourage them to talk to you. 

Sam Mager  9:52

Thank you. Absolutely.  Yeah, I mean, if you look at just the pricing,  I remember being very pleasantly surprised,  you know, when we did a bake off,  and I've mentioned Solarwinds,  there are a number of others, which people will be aware of,  you know, and you look at the tick boxes or feature sets, etc.  And then you kind of look at the commercial difference on the end,  you know, to be able to for what you offer there for a shade under 15,000 euros,  very compelling.  You know, I think that's the takeaway on that  it's such a good, feature rich tool for the money.  That is why I'm such a big fan, and such an advocate as well.  You know, when you take into the cost saving operationally,  that it delivers you to be proactive.  Yeah. And obviously, now with the added features of Enterprise  and the scalability of Enterprise, it's really,  it's quite compelling as to why wouldn't you  rather than would you, so?  Anyway we're obviously clearly an advocate,  as I said, we've been doing this, crikey, I am trying to  think of the exact date, but it is the best part of a decade,  you know, and some of our customers, people in the channel  will know, people outside the channel may not.  But obviously, you have a direct model, and a channel model.  From Paessler's position, from your position,  obviously being a channel manager,  if you can talk our audience through,  you know, where you feel the importance of channel,  good channel partners are,  and I guess, you know, how you feel Krome,  along with our expertise, and our professional services  wrap around knowledge, fits into your ecosystem.

Martin Hodgson  11:28

Yeah, sure. I mean, as you know,  you're one of our top tier partners.  And indeed, you're one of only two UK partners  certified to resell the Enterprise Monitor platform.  So you know, that's something that you should be very proud of.  And when we brought that product to market,  the intention was absolutely for it to be  fulfilled through our channel.  Our channel is super important to us,  we are a global team of just over 300 people.  And we have 300,000 customers,  and we don't provide professional services.  So it doesn't take too long to see what your contribution is,  you know, we do not sell professional services.  And you can imagine, there's a big difference between  an enterprise class customer who wants a whole solution,  and you know, somebody who simply wants  a transactional business,  because they already know what they need to about our product.  And that's why we have our direct model. 

Sam Mager  12:40

Absolutely. 

Martin Hodgson  12:24

So, but I mean, I love the backstory of that you guys have, the idea of being a customer before you became a reseller.  You and your folks know your onions.  We love what you do with creating the custom sensors.  And you know, for those people who are listening to your podcast,  I have no reservations in recommending you personally.  And the feedback that I've had  from our mutual customers is without parallel,  so keep doing what you're doing.

Sam Mager  12:50

Thank you, you'll make me blush. It comes down to the fact that we really believe in the product.  We do monitor all of our environment,  our hosted platforms, everything is monitored by PRTG.  And we've done some interesting things  with the product over the years, you know, obviously, it's a network monitoring tool.  But it's amazing what attaches to the network these days.  And you know, what you can actually do with it.  We've had an interesting use case, I was talking to,  I shan't name names, but a very large,  higher educational institute in the south of the country.  And I was talking to the team there and they  had other tools for the job that they couldn't see  a place for PRTG at that time,  but I caught the ear of the AV team.  And their pain point was the fact that they  had a huge number of auditoriums,  and they booked these out for people like, the late, Stephen Hawking, to come in and speak at etc,  as a huge revenue generator for them.  And they've instances where, you know, they wouldn't realise  that an auditorium you had a broken bulb and a projector  or whatever wasn't working, until it was kind of go time  and the disruption and disturbances  that caused, it was huge.  The cost implications were massive.  And we did a POC with PRTG there.  I think they dipped their toe in for a few 100 sensors.  In fact, it was the free 100 sensor license,  to prove the case that it would work  and they very quickly became an XL1 than XL5,  you know, literally huge installation,  but it was outside of what people I guess would see, perceive as being the norm,  you know, looking at the AV and, and whatnot.  That's my, well hopefully, my interesting war story.  You've probably [laughter] seen a few, you've probably seen something similar in your time at PRTG.

Martin Hodgson  14:45

Oh, there's, one of the things that we love to hear  is all the unique and interesting ways  that people implement the product.  The one, one of the ones that leaps off the page to me  that I really enjoyed working with was,  with me being a definite nerd,  is the National Museum of Computing at Bletchley Park.  And to, you know, in a single leap go from,  we have the oldest working computer in the world there.  It's a 1950's super calculator for want of a better word.  And it's paper tape based.  And it's obviously super important being so old,  and we monitor it using IoT.  So, you know, from paper tech to IoT, and a single leap. I've read recently about one of the implementations  up in the Nordics, where one of our ISP customers  had written their own custom sensor.  And this one very much appeals to me  because he's created a custom sensor to check  on the weather and sea conditions and PRTG alerts him  when he should book a day off to go fishing for cod! [laughter] That's, that's our sort of sensor.

Sam Mager  15:56

A real world 'Fishing' attack. 

Martin Hodgson  16:01

And then finally, I have to go back to you know, where all this came from, Dirk Paessler,  Dirk's vision is that PRTG can positively impact  on a company's use of energy, amongst other things.  And some time back, we implemented a solar array.  I know lots of vendors have done that.  But being a monitoring company, we didn't just do that.  And we're actively monitoring, you know what, what a difference that's making, and trying wherever we can, to not only make those initiatives to reduce consumption,  but also to monitor and measure them.  So yeah, that's, that's our bigger vision. 

Sam Mager  16:46

I like that, that's good. I see, it's always interesting to I guess, share war stories, and to see how other people are taking a product and then adapting it and use it in versatile and inventive ways.  I guess, you know, you've certainly got a product, which is adaptable.  We can we can push this across most verticals, most industry sectors, and find those unique  and interesting use cases for it.  So yeah, again, I can't say enough about the product, I don't usually shut up about it talking to customers, because it is so useful to help us you know, to find out the pain points we need, especially as a Managed Services provider,  having an install of this is a no brainer,  because it literally tells us, what's up, what's going on,  and our team are on it proactively.  You know, so you make us look good.  Obviously, conversely, we make you look good  by doing our professional services.  But that's a very much a reciprocal relationship.  So yeah, again, huge fans.  Ok, so elephant in the room, how to phrase this?  I'm sure viewers of our podcast, obviously being in the tech industry will be aware that there's been  chat in the press around hackers and vulnerabilities  found in, let's just say, other solutions.  So, I'm not going to dig into details around the who's.  But I'm sure people have questions for you, for your company, around what is Paessler doing,  in response to kind of recent attacks that  you guys have seen?

Martin Hodgson  18:08

I've had lots of conversations in recent time about this.  I mean, we took a step back.  And perhaps that's an insight into the sort of organisation that we are.  We started, we've intensively examined all of our systems, our processes, our protocols, to, first of all rule out any misuse.  But also, I think, more importantly, to discover where we can improve, you know, this is an opportunity for us to take that learning and improve.  We have an internal task force there monitoring all the available information about the attack, you know, it's an ongoing thing, and trying to, you know, as I say, take those learnings.  But let me be very clear, thus far. I hasten to add that there have been no indications whatsoever of an account on Paessler PRTG.  Or that there have been any compromises.  So, but we're, we're not sitting on our laurels. We're taking the threat very, very seriously. 

Sam Mager  19:40

That's good. I'd expect nothing less from you,  and from all the partners that we work with.  I'm just looking at time, I've probably kept you longer than I should.  So thank you for investing the time to join me on the podcast today.  And I really appreciate it.  It's been really good to understand and as I say, how you've advanced and evolved  and where you're going as a company.  Some of the backstory and war stories also they're good to hear.  So thanks for your time today.

Martin Hodgson  19:36

Thanks for having me, bye bye.

Sam Mager  19:38

This has been Krome Cast.  Thanks for joining us  If there is anything you'd likes to cover in future episodes,  please leave that in the comment section it does help us to shape the future content.  Please like, subscribe, and share.  Thanks again for joining us on Kromecast.

Out jingle  19:38

We hope you have enjoyed this episode. For more information or to speak to Krome visit www dot Krome dot co dot uk, spelled KROME, that's Krome.co uk.