The ITAM Review

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Scalable Software Offer Free Cloud Based Inventory for Mid-Market

Scalable Software has announced the release of a free ‘community’ version of their cloud based inventory tool, Asset Vision.

You might know Scalable for their über-forensic on-premise inventory tool ‘Survey’ or their packaging and deployment tool WinINSTALL, bought from Attachmate in 2008.

AssetVision is an agentless discovery and software inventory delivered from the cloud. No agents to install or manage, no server to provision. Scalable claim it covers Windows, Linux, Unix, Virtual systems and network devices.

”Multiple discovery options are included with this zero agent solution and the cross platform OS results have been awesome. The amount of data and information collected by Asset Vision has been extremely impressive especially at the server and infrastructure layer area. The hosted solution Lifeway deployed was easy to implement and had zero impact to our users, network and systems”
Terry Boney, IT Asset & Compliance at Lifeway Christian Resources

Inventory is the first building block of an IT Asset Management practice – so it’s great to see Scalable offering this free resource for small companies. This will enable organizations to start scoping out their environment and gathering intelligence in order to save money, deliver a more efficient infrastructure and provide better service.

No Such Thing As a Free Lunch?

My first skeptical reaction when seeing a proposition such as this is – What’s the catch? As they old adage says “There is no such thing as a free lunch”. But the freemium business model (1% Premium users pay for 99% free users) is popular amongst web-based services these days and there is no reason this should be any different. With no agents or servers to service and everything delivered via the cloud – the service is very… err… Scalable.

Many freemium models operate with the tools you use at home and now they are creeping into the Enterprise – the buzzword is ‘consumerization’.

Scalable are not the first software vendor to offer free inventory, but they are the first that I can recall specifically from the ITAM industry with ITAM heritage aiming at ‘Enterprise Grade’, although unfortunately the free version is limited to 400 devices. A disruptive move from Scalable, I look forward to hearing further ITAM community feedback.

Further info at http://www.scalable.com/

About Martin Thompson

Martin is owner and founder of The ITAM Review, an online resource for worldwide ITAM professionals. The ITAM Review is best known for its weekly newsletter of all the latest industry updates, LISA training platform, Excellence Awards and conferences in UK, USA and Australia.

Martin is also the founder of ITAM Forum, a not-for-profit trade body for the ITAM industry created to raise the profile of the profession and bring an organisational certification to market. On a voluntary basis Martin is a contributor to ISO WG21 which develops the ITAM International Standard ISO/IEC 19770.

He is also the author of the book "Practical ITAM - The essential guide for IT Asset Managers", a book that describes how to get started and make a difference in the field of IT Asset Management. In addition, Martin developed the PITAM training course and certification.

Prior to founding the ITAM Review in 2008 Martin worked for Centennial Software (Ivanti), Silicon Graphics, CA Technologies and Computer 2000 (Tech Data).

When not working, Martin likes to Ski, Hike, Motorbike and spend time with his young family.

Connect with Martin on LinkedIn.

One Comment

  1. Jenitha says:

    The article is very interesting. Thanks for sharing…

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