How To Launch A Network Operations Center (NOC)

It isn't easy launching a NOC. Just ask Geoff Green and Laddie Blaskowski. Both worked with Computer Associates' Alan Peters to develop unique NOC solutions for SMB clients in their regional areas.

DataNet1 in Cincinnati, Ohio, began looking for a vendor partner in 1998 to help it remotely manage client networks.

"We found our customers were using us an IT department, especially those that did not have a dedicated IT person," says Green, vice president of DataNet1.

Whenever a service call came in a technician had to go to the client's site. "We were not getting enough hours out of the day...(and) our ability to service all the customers was becoming severely impaired."

Computer Associates took on the task of adapting their enterprise management products to tackle the problem. At about the same time, Laddie Blaskowski, a management consultant in Colorado Springs, CO, was working to help a company called Integra change its business model in much the same way.

The new model brought a new name at the company which is now called Innovative Networks and a new executive when Blaskowski hired on as its chief operating officer. Innovative Networks set up its NOC in a short six weeks.

Consider what you are reading a crash course in NOCs. In this package of linked articles and audio interviews, Green, Blaskowski and Peters discuss the task of setting up a NOC and share their presentations on the subject from CA World, 2000.