"We're focusing on small- and mid-sized businesses because all the requirements in an SMB have been seen in larger organizations," said Moegling. "Those larger companies can throw software and personnel at problems, but resources like that aren't readily available to SMBs."
In other words, Moegling said, not only does IBM have experience in delivering such services, but there's no need for SMBs to reinvent the wheel.
The new suite of services, which in the U.S. will cost $40 per seat per month for companies with 100 to 1,000 desktop systems, run off an IBM-owned server that's deployed locally within the customer's network, but managed remotely by IBM. In addition, IBM installs monitoring software agents on each of the serviced desktops.
IBM Desktop Management includes a wide range of service, ranging from automated backups of desktop clients, virus and spam scanning, help desk support, asset tracking, and automatic system patching and updating. The services can be delivered to desktops running Windows 2000 or Windows XP operating systems, although they're hardware-agnostic, said Moegling.
Customers can choose to deploy a subset of the suite's services, with a concurrent reduction in the price per seat that IBM charges.
