VWF Technology's mission is to bring clarity to cloud services for small businesses. Our full suite of services are geared to help small businesses understand how they can leverage cloud-based (i.e. off-premises) solutions to augment or replace their current applications and systems.

Cloud-based products bring a myriad of new opportunities to improve the ways you operate your business, protect your data and collaborate (internally and with customers).

They can:

• obviate (or reduce) the need for traditional server/computer rooms
• reduce your need to invest in hardware – and eliminate the need to stay ahead of the obsolescence cycle
• allow your staff to focus on work that truly adds value to your business (instead of spending time managing commodity applications and systems)
• ease integration of mobile devices into your work processes (smartphones and tablets)
• give you better control of your valuable data assets
• improve the way you share information and interact/collaborate – both within your organization and with your customers

VWF Technology is uniquely qualified to help your small business make the right decisions on technology-related investments. Our years of experience with organizations of varying size, industry and complexity combined with our broad knowledge of the technology that is important to your business give us the perspective needed to become one of your trusted partners.

VWF Technology will work with you to accomplish the following:

• identify your business requirements
• assess how your current information technology is meeting your needs
• find the best solutions for your business
• lead you through the implementation, management and support of both cloud and on-premises solutions.

Consider This

Here are some use cases where we’d encourage an evaluation of cloud-based solutions:

• You’re using Microsoft Exchange on a server that you own and manage. You should consider alternatives like a hosted Microsoft Exchange service or Google’s GMail. Both options will eliminate your need to manage the system and periodically upgrade the server to avoid hardware obsolescence.
• You have a file server that allows you to share files among your employees. You should consider a cloud-based file sharing service like Google Drive, DropBox for Business. These solutions make it easier for your employees to access files from mobile devices and when they’re not connected to your network.
• You use e-mail to share documents and collaborate with your customers. These are other good use cases for cloud-based file sharing services. They can give you better control over who can access files and insure that people are accessing the latest version of shared files.
• You are using tape to back-up your servers or workstations. You should consider a cloud-based data protection service. They’re often more flexible (than tape), easier to use (i.e. for restoration) and can be tailored to meet your backup and data retention requirements.
• Your organization uses Microsoft Office but has multiple versions installed (i.e. 2003, 2007, 2010, 2013). Productivity apps are moving to the cloud. You should consider Office 365 or alternatives like Google Apps or Apple’s upcoming iWork for iCloud.
• Your e-mail is hosted at your Internet service provider (ISP). If you are limited to simple POP3 or IMAP access to your e-mail and can’t effectively share calendars within your organization you could consider a cloud-based solution like hosted Microsoft Exchange or Google’s GMail that includes shared calendars and other collaboration-enhancing features.

Let us help you see if any of these use cases apply to your organization and determine if any cloud-based solutions would be appropriate.

Be mindful of dark clouds

We don’t view cloud-based services as a panacea. There are a variety of solutions that are available and you need to make sure that the one’s you choose fulfill your requirements.

Here are some points to consider:

• Your employees may already be using free and/or personal ‘flavors’ of cloud services. If this is the case, they control the data they’re storing (and sharing) on these services – you don’t.
• Don’t risk losing control of information that it vital to your business by allowing your employees to make their own ‘cloudware’ choices. Products like Evernote, DropBox, Google Drive and a vast array of others are excellent productivity and collaboration tools. However, if you allow your employees to use the free/personal licenses for these applications you’ve lost control of your data.
• The wide availability of these off-premises ‘cloud’ services - for things as simple as storage and e-mail to specific line of business applications for your business - makes choosing the right services a challenge. Also, though many services are available for free, you need to be mindful that no- or low-cost solutions are often geared for the home/consumer market and not small businesses.
• You also need to be careful to avoid the temptation to use several free services as you’ll find it difficult to manage your critical business data when it is spread across a medley of storage service solutions. In addition, if you allow your employees to freely use the cloud services of their choosing you risk losing access to data/documents they’ve created if they leave your company.

Our Premise

Adopting cloud-based (off premises) services can:

• improve your business agility (and scalability)
• reduce risk (through data protection)
• give you better control of your data assets
• lower your information technology expenses

Our service portfolio is designed to help you realize some or all of these objectives.