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Cisco Enterprise Agreement Saves FinServ Provider $5.5M

About the Customer

Our customer is a multinational financial services provider with $18 billion in revenue and 41,000 employees.

Customer Challenges

Our financial services customer had a large-scale Cisco Service Full Coverage renewal coming up, along with 50+ disparate a-la-carte software contracts across multiple global partners. Nonstandard hardware maintenance coverage and SLA practices had led to an inconsistent TAC experience. Managing disparate contracts with various renewal dates had become a complex administrative burden that put them at risk for cost overages, penalties, and coverage gaps and lowered their Cisco asset ROI.

CUSTOMER REQUIREMENTS

  • Streamline Cisco contract and asset management and gain increased asset control and visibility via managed services.
  • Consolidate disparate Cisco software and maintenance contracts under one enterprise agreement to save money and improve the ROI of their Cisco investments.
  • Establish network standardization for new data centers being built across the world.
  • Protect against OEM price increases and unpredictability.
  • Explore third-party support options for potential cost savings.

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SOLUTION: SOFTWARE MANAGEMENT-AS-A-SERVICE

In partnership with Cisco, GDT experts conducted a Software and Maintenance Lifecycle Assessment across our client’s Cisco assets and met with individual line-of-business owners to determine current and future software needs. GDT compared the comprehensive software need in both a-la-carte and enterprise agreement (EA) buying models to validate the EA’s business case. Once all parties agreed to the software EA, GDT scoped a CX EA to address their maintenance concerns. GDT jointly validated asset and service coverage thresholds with our client and Cisco and provided a second standalone business case to validate the CX EA proposal. GDT also modeled the cost of new data center construction for hardware, maintenance, and software under the current and EA models to provide comparative savings and cost avoidance projections. 

Based on these findings, GDT consolidated all eligible a-la-carte software subscriptions into an EA and created a Services EA attached to the newly formed software suites to adopt EA benefits across their Cisco portfolio. GDT also introduced a software asset manager to help manage our customer’s daily lifecycle activities and reporting, leveraging our GDT Asset Management Platform (GDTamp). This solution provides our customer with end-to-end visibility into their EA consumption, deployment, and True Forward budgeting while enabling comprehensive EA management.

Ultimately, GDT’s custom solution simplified our client’s $22 million annual Cisco spend. GDT addressed all our client’s technical and business concerns, delivered around $5.5 million in savings and cost avoidance, and established favorable business terms for their growing Cisco environment. This was made possible by right-sizing the scope and structure of their current and future needs through Cisco’s EA buying model.

Benefits

$5.5 million in cost savings (~$3.5 million) and cost avoidance (~$2 million)

Streamlined contract management:

  • Replacement of 50+ a la carte subscriptions and disparate end dates with a single software contract
  • One set of terms and conditions for both software and services
  • Replacement of legacy services full coverage contract with a CX EA
  • Lower operational overhead through the consolidation of software and services billing to one partner

Streamlined buying model for future purchases:

  • Three-year price protection across Cisco’s portfolio
  • Future software and maintenance purchases to leverage the enterprise agreement, automatically co-term, and benefit from True Forward, price lock, and multi-suite discounting
  • Annual True Forward event to reconcile any overages

Improved TAC experience with higher service SLAs from Cisco

Network standardization:

  • Named Cisco as the data center/access layer standard
  • Established pricing for planned refreshes to address technical debt
  • Confirmed Cisco as the most cost-effective support option

Software support Image

GDT SOFTWARE & SUPPORT SERVICES

Transform your software and maintenance contracts into strategic enablers that accelerate business outcomes through GDT’s comprehensive buying models, resources, platforms, and lifecycle services.

GDT partners with customers to custom-build agreements that directly support your business objectives and fuel value. You’ll get expert resources, platforms, and lifecycle services to identify the best options for your business needs and expedite time-to-value, control costs, mitigate risk, and streamline operations.

Learn more about GDT Software & Support Services