What are you selling?
Hyper-automation software and consulting. The software resides on a small Linux VM you will have to provision, with very modest requirements, between your ticketing system (ServiceNow, etc.) and your infrastructure, whether hardware or software. For installation instructions, refer to the README file for each version.
How Does the Software Work?
Nothing changes from a manager's perspective, except for two aspects:
1) From here on out, you start assigning the work to the automation modules, instead of your administrators. You keep assigning more and more tasks and incidents to the modules you purchased, until all or at least most of your resolutions, installations, provisioning, and maintenance tasks are automated and scheduled.
2) You do this in the same familiar ServiceNow ticketing system. But be careful. The automation modules work hard. They never eat, sleep, or vacation. They don't understand the concept of "good enough". Everything they do will result in the best possible outcome. It will not just be some DBAs' best. It will consistently be the industry's best, thanks to the Best Practices embedded in our automation modules.
How is Your Software Different from Autonomous Databases?
While some current autonomous database software requires less or no maintenance, that "simplification" applies only to one installed instance. True, for a small mom'n'pop shop that plays a significant role. After all, the owners no longer need to maintain their small "Orders" or "Customers" database or be aware of its existence in the Cloud. But in an enterprise with 100,000+ employees, such user-friendliness is of little consequence. To an enterprise, an administrator is the same as a cell to an organism (cells are essential, a cell isn't). On contrary, those autonomous database offering increase the Total Cost of Ownership because of the upgrade, migration and training costs. There are thousands of disparate database systems, hundreds of incompatible technologies from countless vendors, and warring departments, each locked in its own technological and procedural silo. The enterprise is more interested in ensuring that all its diverse personnel, hardware, and software are efficient and flexible to change. That is usually measured by change velocity, governance, and stability. Unfortunately, none of these crucial factors are improved by the current automation offerings. Let's consider an example. Suppose a database administrator completed a given task 10 minutes earlier because of some autonomous feature or an open-loop automated shortcut. Will the admin's manager notice? The answer is a resounding "no". The manager has already been delaying all due dates by a week because his administrators are always busy and need a week to get to them. So, as long as the task is completed within the week, the manager would not notice the 10-minute improvement. But if the same tasks didn't even need to be assigned or opened, the manager will notice. If the work was magically done by itself, 24x7, always under budget and ahead of schedule - that, again, the manager will notice (so will the manager's manager). This is where open-loop automation falls short and closed-loop hyper-automation delivers.
The second factor is organizational: protecting the company from this stubborn technology. Let's keep exploiting the same configuration change script. Let's say the buffer week the manager has given the administrator has passed. Before an employee runs the script, they must attend hours of CAB, JIRA, Agile, Kanban approval meetings. This is another week wasted, on top of the first buffer week. What is worse, it is the same configuration change that is being discussed/approved and executed each time, just a different iteration. This makes as much sense as disassembling your car in your garage after work just to reassemble it again in the morning to drive back to work.
It is an enormous waste of time and effort that could have been used more productively. There is currently no technological solution to this problem of extreme organizational inefficiency (the bigger the company, the worse). We need a method that enables all the disparate departments, teams, technologies, and processes to work in tandem to implement a long-term business strategy. The current Cloud autonomous database offerings don't even begin to scratch the surface of usability there, as they're all open-loop. Asking them to reduce the database software TCO is the same as asking a Burger King restaurant to rid you of your diabetes. They are not set up for that. Selling you a diet salad is the best they can do.
Your Paid License Fees are Astronomical. How Do You Justify Such High Prices?
Our software is unlike any other currently available. It doesn't provide decision support to your personnel. It becomes your personnel, but on steroids. So, along with other things, we base our licensing fees on the amount of time (execution and task management/approvals) this particular module saves an enterprise in the first two years. We charge only 10% of that amount as a one-time licensing fee. There are other considerations, including the effort we have put in so far and will likely continue to invest in maintaining the code in the future.
How is the Free Version Different from the Paid?
There are three licensing versions. The free version is free. You can download it and use it at your discretion. You can modify the code as needed. There is no support, but free forums are available. This version isn't integrated with your ticketing system, password Vault, or any external API. It also lacks premium features, including rollback, delegation, and error resolution. Nevertheless, the free version will perform its basic job correctly, as specified in vendor manuals. Whether it is an export, an upgrade, a refresh, a GoldenGate or DataGuard resync - all of our versions will do an equally brilliant job, whether free or paid. But they are open-loop only in the FREE version, so your administrator will need to kick them off manually, enter all passwords and variables by hand, and track their status and dependencies manually in your ticketing system.
The following table describes features and versions. For a demo please click here. For pricing please visit the Buy page. For a technical description please refer to the Technology page. Please Contact Us if you have questions.
Replayable Closed-Loop Automation Modules, Versions & Core Features
(Click on the table to expand)
 Free/Faster |
 Turbocharge |
 WarpSpeed |
|---|---|---|
ServiceNow Integration
|
ServiceNow Integration
|
ServiceNow Integration
|
| C-L Automation Error Detection: On Error Remediation: Off Delegation: Off Auto-Rollback: Off Best-Practices: Off Federation: Off |
C-L Automation Error Detection: On Error Remediation: On Delegation: On Auto-Rollback: On Best-Practices: Off Auto-SR: Off Federation: Off |
C-L Automation Error Detection: On Error Remediation: On Delegation: On Auto-Rollback: On Best-Practices: On Auto-SR: On Federation: On |
| Free Support 0 Hours, ($199/hr thereafter) |
Free Support 100 Hours, ($99/hr thereafter) |
Free Support Unlimited, Free |