ROI Manager for High Availability Since technology is increasingly integrated into business processes and manual work-arounds are no longer practical, or even possible, enterprise operations are significantly impacted when critical applications become unavailable. The impact of downtime has also escalated with the growth of applications that extend outside the enterprise to include customers, suppliers and business partners. For many enterprises, a loss of critical applications is as serious as a loss of telephones or electricity. Yet, unlike telephones or electricity, critical applications are not a commodity. Enterprises cannot acquire high availability "out-of-the-box"; they must build it into the application architecture, and preserve it by implementing effective processes. To determine appropriate availability investments, enterprises need to understand the consequences of downtime. Understanding these consequences will help determine the appropriate level of investment for both day-to-day operational availability and business continuity. The high availability model identifies the major costs of downtime (i.e., revenue and productivity losses as well as other expenses), over two time periods. (1 hour and 24 hours are the time period defaults, which can be modified by the user). In addition, the model provides a framework for pinpointing the sources of downtime, targeting the areas of potential downtime reduction, and calculating the investment required to reduce downtime, and the resulting payback period and return on investment. Improving network availability may include increased investment in: Monitoring components for availability Implementing redundancy Buying vendor service contracts to reduce time-to-repair Automating processes to reduce operator error Improving availability will help to reduce: Direct loss of revenue and loss of future revenue Revenue loss through failure to meet contractual obligations Productivity loss or overtime costs Damaged reputation, lost discounts or damaged credit rating   Tour Test drive our Investment Planning Tools to better understand how they can work for you.   Use the tool now Contact Information: For more information on Decision Tools for Return on Investment please e-mail DTforROI@gartner.com. Related Services:   Software Alliance Program  Gartner has successfully franchised its software measurement tools and methodologies. Now your professional services organization can leverage these tools and drive additional value to your clients.