Security concerns
The appearance of the first firms in this market has, however, raised doubts about the efficacy of what they offer and the way they offer it. For example, concerns have been voiced by potential customers over security and data ownership. If the business-critical data of an enterprise is being held on the systems of a third party, which company owns that data? The third party certainly owns the disk drives, but doubts have been expressed about whether the SSP's customer owns its own data in all circumstances.
While the SSP remains in business, and the relationship between it and the user firm remains good, there should be no problem. But some potential customers already have fears about what would happen if, for example, the SSP got into financial difficulties. If the SSP went into receivership, could the receiver view the data held on the SSP's disk systems as an asset of the SSP, and dispose of it to the highest bidder? Similarly, could an SSP view the data it holds as a negotiating pawn or financial alternative should one of its customers default in some way, selling the data to a business rival?
On a wider front, there are those who question the need for SSPs at all. ASPs, not surprisingly, see SSPs as trying to take a potentially lucrative part of their business. There is a close relationship between applications and the data that they generate or use, so it could make more sense for an organisation to deal with one outsourcing service provider.
This raises a number of compatibility and availability issues. For example, there will be cases where firms need to view SSP services as an extension of the existing storage infrastructure on-site, so compatibility with the existing systems could be a pre-requisite. With availability, a rapid rise in storage requirements could result in a firm having to use the services of several different SSPs, regardless of whether or not it uses an ASP as well.
However, ASPs are likely to be the driving force of the service provision market if only because they are offering the all-important applications. Indeed the early signs are that the SSPs will end up supporting the larger service providers.
For example, SSP Centripetal has decided to target its services at Internet service providers (ISPs) and ASPs. Only in the longer term will it start selling through the reseller channel.
As might be expected, the disk system manufacturers are also eyeing the SSP marketplace as a new revenue source, due to the pressure on product margins and the resulting trend towards suppliers offering value-added services.
