Relevance Lab (RL) is a specialist company in helping customers adopt cloud “The Right Way” by focusing on an “Automation-First” and DevOps strategy. It covers the full lifecycle of migration, governance, security, monitoring, ITSM integration, app modernization, and DevOps maturity. Leveraging a combination of services and products for cloud adoption, we help customers on a “Plan-Build-Run” transformation that drives greater velocity of product innovation, global deployment scale, and cost optimization for new generation technology (SaaS) and enterprise companies.

In this blog, we will cover some common themes that we have been using to help our customers for cloud adoption as part of their maturity journey.

• SaaS with multi-tenant architecture
• Multi-Account Cloud Management for AWS
• Microservices architecture with Docker and Kubernetes (AWS EKS)
• Jenkins for CI/CD pipelines and focus on cloud agnostic tools
• AWS Control Tower for Cloud Management & Governance solution (policy, security & governance)
• DevOps maturity models
• Cost optimization, agility, and automation needs
• Standardization for M&A (Merger & Acquisitions) integrations and scale with multiple cloud provider management
• Spectrum of AWS governance for optimum utilization, robust security, and reduction of budget
• Automation/BOT landscape, how different strategies are appropriate at different levels, and the industry best practice adoption for the same
• Reference enterprise strategy for structuring DevOps for engineering environment which has cloud native development and the products which are SaaS-based.

Relevance Lab Cloud and DevOps Credentials at a Glance

• RL has been a cloud, DevOps, and automation specialist since inception in 2011 (10+ years)
• Implemented 50+ successful customer cloud projects covering Plan-Build-Run lifecycle
• Globally has 250+ cloud specialists with 100+ certifications
• Cloud competencies cover infra, apps, data, and consulting
• Provide deep consulting and technology in cloud and DevOps
• RL products available on AWS and ServiceNow marketplace recognized globally as a specialist in “Infrastructure Automation”
• Deep Architecture know-how on DevOps with microservices, containers, Well-Architected principals
• Large enterprise customers with 10+M$ multi-year engagements successfully managed
• Actively managing 7000+ cloud instances, 300+ Applications, annual 5.0+M$ cloud consumption, 20K+ annual tickets, 100+ automation BOTs, etc.

Need for a Comprehensive Approach to Cloud Adoption
Most enterprises today have their applications in the cloud or are aggressively migrating new ones for achieving the digital transformation of their business. However, the approach requires customers to think about the “Day-After” Cloud in order to avoid surprises on costs, security, and additional operations complexities. Having the right Cloud Management not only helps eliminate unwanted costs and compliance, but it also helps in optimal use of resources, ensuring “The Right Way” to use the cloud. Our “Automation- First Approach” helps minimize the manual intervention thereby, reducing manual prone errors and costs.

RL’s matured DevOps framework helps in ensuring the application development is done with accuracy, agility, and scale. Finally, to ensure this whole framework of Cloud Management, Automation and DevOps are continued in a seamless manner, you would need the right AIOps-driven Service Delivery Model. Hence, for any matured organizations, the below 4 themes become the foundation for using Cloud Management, Automation, DevOps, and AIOps.

Cloud Management
RL offers a unique methodology covering Plan-Build-Run lifecycle for Cloud Management, as explained in the diagram below.

Following are the basic steps for Cloud Management:

Step-1: Leverage
Built on best practices offered from native cloud providers and popular solution frameworks, RL methodology leverages the following for Cloud Management:

• AWS Well-Architected Framework
• AWS Management & Governance Lens
• AWS Control Tower for large scale multi-account management
• AWS Service Catalog for template-driven organization standard product deployments
• Terraform for Infra as Code automation
• AWS CloudFormation Templates
• AWS Security Hub

Step-2: Augment
The basic Cloud Management best practices are augmented with unique products & frameworks built by RL based on our 50+ successful customer implementations covering the following:

• Quickstart automation templates
• AppInsights and ServiceOne – built on ITSM
• RLCatalyst cloud portals – built on Service Catalog
• Governance360 – built on Control Tower
• RLCatalyst BOTS Automation Server

Step-3: Instill
Instill ongoing maturity and optimization using the following themes:

• Four level compliance maturity model
• Key Organization metrics across assets, cost, health, governance, and compliance
• Industry-proven methodologies like HIPAA, SOC2, GDPR, NIST, etc.

For Cloud Management and Governance, RL has Solutions like Governance360, AWS Management and Governance lens, Cloud Migration using CloudEndure. Similarly, we have methodologies like “The Right Way” to use the cloud, and finally Product & Platform offerings like RLCatalyst AppInsights.

Automation
RL promotes an “Automation-First” approach for cloud adoption, covering all stages of the Plan-Build-Run lifecycle. We offer a mature automation framework called RLCatalyst BOTs and self-service cloud portals that allow full lifecycle automation.

In terms of deciding how to get started with automation, we help with an initial assessment model on “What Can Be Automated” (WCBA) that analyses the existing setup of cloud assets, applications portfolio, IT service management tickets (previous 12 months), and Governance/Security/Compliance models.

For the Automation theme, RL has Solutions like Automation Factory, University in a Box, Scientific Research on Cloud, 100+ BOTs library, custom solutions on Service WorkBench for AWS. Similarly, we have methodologies like Automation-First Approach, and finally Product & Platform offerings like RL BOTs automation Engine, Research Gateway, ServiceNow BOTs Connector, UiPath BOTs connector for RPA.

The following blogs explain in more detail our offerings on automation.

• Building an Automation Factory
• Intelligent Automation with Pre-built Library of re-usable BOTs
• Automated Patch Management
• Intelligent Automation with RPA
• Automation Led Cloud Migration
• Automate Complex IT/HR processes like User Onboarding & Offboarding
• Automation helps in the time of crisis like COVID-19

DevOps and Microservices
DevOps and microservices with containers are a key part of all modern architecture for scalability, re-use, and cost-effectiveness. RL, as a DevOps specialist, has been working on re-architecting applications and cloud migration across different segments covering education, pharma & life sciences, insurance, and ISVs. The adoption of containers is a key building block for driving faster product deliveries leveraging Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery (CI/CD) models. Some of the key considerations followed by our teams cover the following for CI/CD with Containers and Kubernetes:

• Role-based deployments
• Explicit declarations
• Environment dependent attributes for better configuration management
• Order of execution and well-defined structure
• Application blueprints
• Repeatable and re-usable resources and components
• Self contained artifacts for easy portability

The following diagram shows a standard blueprint we follow for DevOps:

For the DevOps & Microservices theme, RL has Solutions like CI/CD Cockpit solution, Cloud orchestration Portal, ServiceNow/AWS/Azure DevOps, AWS/Azure EKS. Similarly, we have methodologies like WOW DevOps, DevOps-driven Engineering, DevOps-driven Operations, and finally Product & Platform offerings like RL BOTs Connector.

AIOps and Service Delivery
RL brings in unique strengths across AIOps with IT Service Delivery Management on platforms like ServiceNow, Jira ServiceDesk and FreshService. By leveraging a platform-based approach that combines intelligent monitoring, service delivery management, and automation, we offer a mature architecture for achieving AIOps in a prescriptive manner with a combination of technology, tools, and methodologies. Customers have been able to deploy our AIOps solutions in 3 months and benefit from achieving 70% automation of inbound requests, reduction of noise on proactive monitoring by 80%, 3x faster fulfillment of Tickets & SLAs with a shift to a proactive DevOps-led organization structure.

For the AIOps & Service Delivery theme, RL has Solutions like AIOps Blueprint, ServiceNow++, End to End Automated Patch Management, Asset Management NOC & ServiceDesk. Similarly, we have methodologies like ServiceOne and finally Product & Platform offerings like ServiceOne with ServiceNow, ServiceOne with FreshService, RLCommand Center.

Summary
RL offers a combination of Solutions, Methodologies, and Product & Platform offerings covering the 360 spectrum of an enterprise Cloud & DevOps adoption across 4 different tracks covering Cloud Management, Automation, DevOps, and AIOps. The benefits of a technology-driven approach that leverages an “Automation-First” model has helped our customer reduce their IT spends by 30% over a period of 3 years with 3x faster product deliveries and real-time security & compliance.

To know more about our Cloud Centre of Excellence and how we can help you adopt Cloud “The Right Way” with best practices leveraging Cloud Management, Automation, DevOps, and AIOps, feel free to write to marketing@relevancelab.com

Reference Links
Considerations for AWS AMI Factory Design

The year 2020 undoubtedly brought in unprecedented challenges with COVID-19 that required countries, governments, business and people respond in a proactive manner with new normal approaches. Certain businesses managed to respond to the dynamic macro environment with a lot more agility, flexibility and scale. Cloud computing had a dominant effect in helping businesses stay connected and deliver critical solutions. Relevance Lab scaled up its partnership with AWS to align with the new focus areas resulting in a significant increase in coverage of products, specialized solutions and customer impacts in the past 12 months compared to what has been achieved in the past.

AWS launched a number of new global initiatives in 2020 and in response to the business challenges resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. The following picture describes those initiatives in a nutshell.

Relevance Lab’s Focus areas have been very well aligned
Given the macro environment challenges, Relevance Lab quickly aligned their focus on helping customers deal with the emerging challenges and those areas were very complementary to AWS’ global initiatives and responses listed above.

Relevance Lab’s aligned its AWS solutions & services across four dominant themes and by leveraging RL’s own IP based platforms and deep cloud competencies. The following picture highlights those key initiatives and the native AWS products and services leveraged in the process.

Relevance Lab also made major strides in improving Initiative to progress along AWS Partnership Maturity Levels for Specialized Consulting and Key Product offerings. The following picture highlights the major achievements in 2020 in a nutshell.

AWS Specializations & Spotlights
Relevance Lab is a specialist cloud managed services company with deep expertise in Devops, Service Automation and ITSM integrations. It also has an RLCatalyst Platform built to support Automation across AWS Cloud and ITSM platforms. RLCatalyst family of solutions help in Self-service Cloud portals, IT service monitoring and automation through BOTs. While maintaining multi-sector client base, we are also uniquely focused with existing solutions for Higher Education, Public Sector and Research sector clients.

Spotlight-1: AWS Cloud Portals Solution
Relevance Lab have developed a family of cloud portal solutions on top of our RLCatalyst platform. Cloud Portal solutions aim to simplify AWS consumption using self-service models with emphasis on 1-click provisioning / lifecycle management, dashboard views of budget / cost consumption and modeling personas, roles & responsibilities with a sector context.

• Research Gateway
• University in a Box
• Generic Cloud Portals
• ServiceNow based Research Workbench

A unique feature of the above solutions is that they promote a hybrid model of consumption wherein users can bring their own AWS accounts (consumption accounts) under the framework of our cloud portal solution and benefit from being able to consume AWS for their educational and research needs in an easy self-service model.

The solutions can be consumed as either an Enterprise or as a SaaS license. In addition, the solutions will be made available on AWS Marketplace soon.

Spotlight-2: AWS Security Governance at Scale Framework
The framework and deployment architecture uses AWS Control Tower as the foundational service and other closely aligned and native AWS products and services such as AWS Service Catalog, AWS Security Hub, AWS Budgets, etc. and addresses subject areas such as multi-account management, cost management, security, compliance & governance.

Relevance Lab can assess, design and deploy or migrate to a fully secure AWS environment that lends itself to governance at scale. To encourage clients to adopt this journey, we have launched a 10-10 Program for AWS Security Governance that provides clients with an upfront blueprint of the entire migration or deployment process and end-state architecture so that they can make an informed decision

• AWS Security Governance for Enterprises “The Right Way”

Spotlight-3: Automated User Onboarding/Offboarding for Enterprises Use Case
Relevance Lab is a unique partner that possesses deep expertise on AWS and ITSM platforms such as ServiceNow, freshservice, JIRA Service Desk, etc. The intersection of these platforms lends itself to relevant use cases for the industry. Relevance Lab has come up with a solution for automated User onboarding & offboarding in an enterprise context. This solution brings together multiple systems in a workflow model to accomplish user onboarding and offboarding tasks for an enterprise. It includes integration across HR systems, AWS Service Catalog and other services, ITSM platforms such as ServiceNow and assisted by Relevance Lab’s RLCatalyst BOTs engine to perform an end-to-end user onboarding/offboarding orchestration in an unassisted manner.

• AWS & ServiceNow Integration for User Onboarding

Key Customer Use Cases and Success Stories in 2020
Relevance Lab helped customers across verticals with growing momentum on Cloud adoption in the post COVID-19 situation to rewrite their digital solutions in adopting the new touchless interactions, remote distributed workforces and strong security governance solutions for enabling frictionless business.

AWS Best Practices – Blogs, Campaigns, Technical Write-ups
The following is a collection of knowledge articles and best practices published throughout the year related to our AWS centered solutions & services.

AWS Service Management

• AWS & ServiceNow Integration for User Onboarding
• Blog & Demo on AWS & Jira SD Integration
• Blog & Demo on AWS, Freshservice & RLCatalyst Integration

• RL AWS Ecosystem
• RLCatalyst Research Gateway Campaign Page
• AWS Security Governance at Scale

• Blog & Demo on AWS Control Tower adoption
• AWS Security Governance for Enterprises “The Right Way”
• Intelligent SOX Automation
• Automated Patch Management

• Secure Cloud Desktops using AWS Workspaces

• RLCatalyst on AWS Marketplace
• RLCatalyst supports SAML 2.0 with OKTA
• RLCatalyst BOTs Service Management Connector
• How to make your BOTs Intelligent?
• Automation Service Bus – Intelligent and Touchless model

• Blog on Hybrid Cloud Provisioning
• Demo on Infra automation using Terraform

• AWS Scientific Research with RLCatalyst Research Gateway
• AWS Servicenow Research Workbench
• AWS UniBox offering

• Blog on Solving scalability challenges in distributed cloud network and connectivity

Summary
The momentum of Cloud adoption in 2020 is quite likely to continue and grow in the new year 2021. Relevance Lab is a trusted partner in your cloud adoption journey driven by focus on following key specializations:

• Cloud First Approach for Workload Planning
• Cloud Governance 360 for using AWS Cloud the Right-Way
• Automation Led Service Delivery Management with Self Service ITSM and Cloud Portals
• Driving Frictionless Business and AI-Driven outcomes for Digital Transformation and App Modernization

To learn more about our services and solutions listed above or engage us in consultative discussions for your AWS and other IT service needs, feel free to contact us at marketing@relevancelab.com