Alexander Mann Solutions was founded in 1996 to revolutionise the way companies hire top talent — and make the process more professional. Today, Alexander Mann is a global leader in its marketplace, with over 4,000 talent acquisition and management experts partnering with more than 100 blue-chip organisations, operating in over 90 countries.

Alexander Mann had increased its use of Azure significantly within just one year and wanted to mitigate costs. So, the company signed up to Bytes' Cloud Platform Management (CPM) service to gain more visibility and control over its cloud estate and to explore potential cost savings. As the Bytes' team got to work, a range of other IT needs arose at Alexander Mann.

Bytes began by profiling Alexander Mann users to assess their long-term needs and where savings could be made. The Bytes' CPM service also provided an interactive Power BI report (Quantum) that refreshed daily and gave Alexander Mann a granular view of its spending in an easy-to-understand way. 

The Bytes CPM service recommended two ways to optimise spending and Alexander Mann put both into action. Firstly, Alexander Mann took advantage of Hybrid Benefit pricing in an optimal way through quarterly reviews to secure savings, with Bytes providing key documentation and support. Secondly, a commitment to Microsoft's Reserved Instances pricing model helped to save on the long-term costs of virtual machines.

Bytes also brought in experts from its partner eco-system to help in three other areas:

• File sharing on Azure: Alexander Mann was interested in creating an online file share in the front end of Azure with scalable storage but without PowerShell scripts. One of Bytes' lead cloud solution specialists provided expert guidance and explored the options. Bytes' partner PowerOn was then introduced to work on the project.
• Windows 10: Bytes put forward a readiness assessment and introduced partner Comms-care who could provide a premier support contract.
• Endpoint security: Bytes also provided Alexander Mann with McAfee Endpoint Security.

By following Bytes' recommendations, Alexander Mann is set to achieve significant efficiencies:

• Savings of £110,000 on its Enterprise Agreement (EA) Subscription through right-fit licensing of its Microsoft estate
• Annual savings of £24,000 with Hybrid Benefit 
• Estimated saving of £7,000 on infrastructure over 12 months with Reserved Instances
• Additional Windows Server licenses under EA with a 10% discount, saving £1,100

Consultancy from Bytes and its partners also helped Alexander Mann with file-sharing, Windows 10 readiness, endpoint security, and a range of other important areas within its IT infrastructure.