Artificial Intelligence for IT Operations, Q4 2020, report lists OpsRamp as a "Strong Performer" among 11 software vendors analyzed by the firm. OpsRamp, an AI-based IT operations management software company, was named a Strong Performer in The Forrester Wave: Artificial Intelligence for IT Operations, Q4 2020, report, published today. OpsRamp received its highest scores in the criteria of platform, dependency and topology, infrastructure and cloud monitoring, and alerting and reporting, as well as in the strategy category. "Given the advanced automation capabilities, customers are using the platform at enterprise scale for many advanced lifecycle management scenarios," the report stated. "With planned enhancements to core capabilities, OpsRamp will continue to entrench itself as a key tool for operations teams while maintaining a single source of truth for data analytics."

Consider this: when you drive a car, how would you know whether the car needs maintenance? You might look for status indicators like a check engine or change oil light. Similarly, when a pilot flies an airplane, they rely on a multitude of metrics and data to ensure the plane is running smoothly. Managing IT infrastructure is similar in nature. IT Operations Management (ITOM) solutions have been around since the mainframe days.

Ever heard of AI for IT management (AIOps)? It's a burgeoning ecosystem of platforms and products that enhance IT operations by leveraging AI to analyze data collected from various tools and devices. OpsRamp is one of the startups leading the charge in what Research and Markets anticipates will be a $14.3 billion segment by 2025. Raju Chekuri and Varma Kunaparaju cofounded the San Jose, California-based company in 2014 with the goal of developing "service-centric" offerings for enterprises, and their investors evidently believe they've achieved that. Today OpsRamp announced the closing of a $37.5 million investment led by Morgan Stanley Expansion Capital, with new investor Hewlett Packard Enterprise.

The hype has gone off the charts for AI and machine learning tools' potential in IT organizations. Artificial intelligence is not fairy dust sprinkled on a data center, despite the enthusiastic proclamations of many IT operations vendors today. A couple of years ago, AI was the bride atop the wedding cake. It was perfect, with promises to render obsolete errors and out-of-control performance issues.

Artificial intelligence promises to enable machines or bots to take on the heavy-duty work of many parts of enterprises. Now, there are increasingly more initiatives, as well as vendor products, that will autonomously take on the heavy-duty work of information technology departments as well. The automation of IT functions has been evolving for decades, of course -- from job-scheduling systems in the 1990s to self-healing systems introduced more than a decade ago. These days, IT automation goes by many names -- such as autonomous systems, self-driving systems or bots. Lately, more of it is falling under the moniker of AIOps, joining the parade of xOps methodologies, promising to apply AI and machine learning to mechanize, standardize and automate the delivery of IT services.

We are now living in a digital economy. Organizations all over the globe are turning their much of their focus away from producing physical assets, and towards designing and developing digital products and services that either complement or completely replace their physical predecessors. Digital transformation initiatives are at the very top of business agendas across all industries, resulting in big changes and big demands being placed on enterprise IT operations. For many years, high demands have been placed on IT operations teams – and DevOps in particular – to become more agile and proactive so that their businesses can quickly embrace new technologies and practices in order to remain competitive. However, to meet these demands, IT operations has faced the challenge of keeping costs down on the one hand, while dealing with the increasing complexity of operations on the other.