How hardware-as-a-service can improve your business

Hardware-as-a-service (HaaS) is about more than equipment. It’s about making taking your business to the next level by putting your organization’s hardware needs in capable hands.

Because it’s custom-tailored to your business, HaaS can include a lot of different solutions. It can mean on-site equipment or remote cloud infrastructure. It can mean simple equipment agreements or full administration. The benefits HaaS delivers include cost, maintenance, security, and updates to your hardware, “…the biggest driver of IT budget increases in 2019.” In each of these areas, using HaaS lets the experts handle the equipment needs, while you handle your business needs.

Optimizing costs

As business moves increasingly toward the internet and higher expectations of service, the cost of upgrading and maintaining the infrastructure and systems that are required can be substantial. The combined cost of servers, computers, hubs and one-time upgrade fees can be a showstopper for many small and growing businesses.

In addition to passing on the efficiencies of their volume unit purchases to clients like you, HaaS defrays the cost of a single large upgrade into regular payments and makes budgeting easier. HaaS can also allow companies to effectively achieve redundancy they couldn’t otherwise afford. Keeping your expenses predictable is just the first way that HaaS keeps your business as your top priority.

Improving operational efficiency

Every year there’s an exciting new phone available. Every day we generate more data. Keeping up with the demands of your customers and your business can be expensive. The advantage of HaaS is that your business doesn’t have to undertake the large capital expenses, so you can remain more flexible.

HaaS can change to fit your needs as you expand your staff or your demands for performance. It can even accommodate short-term changes without the long-term commitment that comes with buying your own equipment.

Another benefit that often goes unnoticed is that you don’t have to become an expert in recommending or purchasing all this equipment. You don’t need to know the right brands and models or the secrets to the best pricing. There’s no need to feel overwhelmed by the dizzying array of choices and specs. When the IT hardware experts handle all of that for you, you can focus on running your business.

Maintaining productivity

Downtime can be staggeringly expensive in terms of external sales losses, customer loyalty losses or internal productivity losses. Whether it’s a hardware failure , an integration issue or a cyberattack, when your systems are down, you’re losing money. That’s why it’s important to keep downtime to a minimum through redundancy, testing, upgrades and preparation to free yourself from the unpredictable and expensive break-fix cycle.

But that requires time, resources and expertise you may not have. HaaS outsources that cost and effort so you and your team can turn your attention to your day-to-day business instead of acquiring the skills and knowledge to take care of that hardware internally.

Maximizing network security

Cyberthreats are a fact of digital business. Cyberattacks are growing in severity and complexity and more companies are dealing with data breaches or blackmail from attackers holding data hostage. Even tech giants like Google and Facebook have been victims in recent years.

A data breach can seriously damage your company’s bottom line by harming your customers, threatening your reputation, and resulting in severe fines from government regulators. A rigorous cybersecurity plan is vital, but it’s no small undertaking. Among the most common vulnerabilities with companies of all sizes are outdated hardware and software. But with HaaS, you can rely on your provider to maintain and test your hardware to help keep your business and your customers safe.

Related reading: Learn more about GB Tech managed services