April 2012

SINGERLEWAK SYSTEMS____________________________________________________________

Cloud Computing is a Step Above “Go To My PC”

BUSINESS TECHNOLOGY INSIGHTS____________________________________________________________

The Benefits of Moving Our Lives into the Cloud: It’s Business and Personal

Letter from Partner

CLEARING THE FOG ABOUT THE CLOUD

TAKE I.T. TOTHE CLOUD

Contents

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

PARTNER LETTER2 CLE ARING THE FOG ABOUT THE CLOUD

It’s already Q2 and still, people are cloudy about what “Cloud” means. In light of that, and In our quest to make available the latest thought leadership and market-current information about the values that Cloud computing brings, we’ve got several quick reads for you this month.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

SINGERLEWAK SYSTEMS3 CLOUD COMPUTING IS A S TEP ABOVE “GO TO MY PC”

“Go to My PC” is a product that allows people to sign into their office PC from places besides the office, and is aggressively promoted in the media. This tool may sound like “wow” technology, hold the enthusiasm. In fact, it is the antithesis of what current technology is able to do for businesses.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

BUSINESS TECHNOLOGY INSIGHTS6 THE BENEF ITS OF MOVING OUR L IVES INTO THE CLOUD:

I T ’S BUSINESS AND PERSONALThe risk of losing documents, photos and files on our personal computers and business networks through viruses or hardware malfunctions has become too great and hard to manage.

April 2012

1 | SingerLewak April 2012

April 2012 SingerLewak | 2

PA R T N E R L E T T E R

CLEARING THE FOG ABOUT THE CLOUDBY BOB GREEN, CPA.CITP | PARTNER AND PRACTICE LEADERbgreen@singerlewak.com

CLOUD-BASED SYSTEMS WEBINAR SERIESSEE AVECTRA’S CLOUD EXPERTS AS RELATES TO YOUR INDUSTRY!

Hello Friends and Colleagues!

“Clearing the FOG about Cloud”

It’s already Q2 and still, people are cloudy about what “Cloud” means. In light of that, and In our quest to make available the latest thought leadership and market-current information about the values that Cloud com-puting brings, we’ve got several quick reads for you this month. I authored one that has fun illus-trating a business that is now in the cloud for many things – and one that is not. Rick Mark has also authored an article about how you can avoid disasters by using the Cloud for both busi-ness – and personal.

In addition, we’ve given you references to some upcoming

webcasts that we’re involved with – including some very interest-ing presentations by our business partner – Avectra – for organiza-tions that focus on membership – and retention and value for these members.

Also, it’s been a big month here at SingerLewak. We just announced that Jim Pitrat, currently among our senior partners and member of our Executive Committee,

will become our new Managing Partner effective July 1. Jim takes over from David Krajanowski, who has led the firm for the last 12 years, and, fortunately, like David, Jim is a big proponent of Cloud Computing. Good thing! Also, just today it was announced that our Silicon Valley and San Francisco area Partner in Charge, Harmeet Singh, was recognized as a “Top 40 under 40” by The M&A Advisor organization. We’re doing good stuff all around the state, not to mention Cloud Computing implementations nation-wide.

In December we became business partners with Avectra - a software company that provides internet-based business operation software – meaning, it manages membership services and data, provides for online registration for events, and enables online capabilities for selling memberships and other

“merchandise” for nonprofits and other industries. Upcoming webinars will be posted in future news-letters. For past webinars, go to:

WWW.SINGERLEWAKSYSTEMS.COM

CLOUD COMPUTING IS A STEP ABOVE “GO TO MY PC”BY BOB GREEN, CPA.CITP | PARTNER AND PRACTICE LEADERbgreen@singerlewak.com

“Go to My PC” is a product that allows people to sign into their office PC from places besides the office, and is aggressively pro-moted in the media. This tool may sound like “wow” technol-ogy, hold the enthusiasm. In fact, it is the antithesis of what current technology is able to do for busi-nesses.

The product I’m referring to is still used in many businesses even though it has become outdated. To illustrate, consider what this technology represents... then we’ll look at Cloud Computing, and how it differs:

“My company is not in the IT business but you wouldn’t know it. We actually manufacture shiny widgets for aerospace. With grow-ing competition, globalization of

our offices, and tightened govern-mental budgets and compliance regulations, our profits are lower on every sale. This is compounded by the growth of our IT spending, year over year. It seems that IT is the one department that is immune from cost cutting. It also seems to be an ever-growing fixture in our organization, enabled by the fact that they are not shy about telling us that they are the keepers of all our secrets. My company is spend-ing too much time on maintaining and growing an infrastructure of IT staff and everything that comes with it. From a security perspec-tive, I find it odd that to do my work I have to be tethered by internet to my desktop at the office. This means that my PC has to stay on all night. Where is the security in that?”

Does this scenario sound familiar to you? Should businesses really

be perpetuating outdated tech-nology that assumes the comfort of having all your eggs in one “on a desk” basket called “my PC”?

So, unless you’re in the IT busi-ness, maybe it’s time to consider getting out of the IT business?

“Wow! We all just received bigger bonuses this year. Our CFO told us that even though we’re compet-ing with international companies in the aerospace widget business, our profits have grown this year as we’ve streamlined our processes and improved our governmental com-pliance. We accomplished this in large part due to our cross-depart-ment teams working collaboratively to improve our business. In the course of doing so, we adopted some very prudent technology practices and adopted a wider use of Cloud Computing. Our IT department is less than half the size of what it was last year, and our on-going cost of IT and software maintenance is one-third of what it was last year. What I particularly appreciate is that I’m no longer interrupted by our IT folks doing upgrades to the servers, software or my desktop when I am trying to get my work done. Now I can focus more on my work, worry less about when

S I N G E R L E W A K S Y S T E M S

3 | SingerLewak April 2012

Should businesses really be perpetuating outdated technology that assumes the comfort of having

all your eggs in one “on a desk” basket called

“my PC”?

April 2012 SingerLewak | 4

the next interruption will happen. I love using the Internet to run software that works in my browser and feels like Google, Amazon and other familiar tools that I run on my tablet when I’m away from the office. Recently I was work-ing at home using our new Cloud Computing software tools, and my computer hard drive crashed. Everything was lost except the work I was doing at the time of the crash because the data wasn’t stored on my machine. Everything was there, just as I left it. When I started again from my son’s PC I was able to pick up right where I left off.”

This can be your business. A business with a bottom line that has improved changes to process and technology. Migration to this kind of business model isn’t simple and it isn’t always a happy process; but it is a growing trend among businesses everywhere as improvement, control and better profitability become increasingly important.

Let’s look at facts that help dem-onstrate why Cloud Computing has enabled businesses to become better at what they do and be more profitable at the same time:

1. Businesses that focus more on what they do best are usually better than their competitors.

2. People are connected to the internet all the time, and as a result the lines between being connected to work and to personal matters seem to be blurred. Cloud Computing seamlessly fulfills this need.

3. IT spending comprises costly hardware, vendor products and services, and most im-portantly, IT personnel. As most of these expenditures become more costly, they also involve headaches that im-pact all areas of the business, and thereby take a business’ focus off of its core raison-d’etre.

4. IT is among the most ill-managed areas of most busi-nesses. This is because most CFOs and CEOs are not IT wizards.

5. Cloud Computing - particu-larly in the form of Software as a Service (SaaS) which is software delivered by a pub-lisher via the internet brows-er, is becoming wide-spread, and represents a way to make businesses less dependent on IT, and more focused on its core mission.

6. Using SaaS solutions allows CFOs to budget for the use of technology as they do for rent or electricity. This is be-cause SaaS is paid for based

on how much of it a busi-ness uses, similar to a utility. This falls under an operating expense, or “OpEx”.

7. True SaaS products include software upgrades and main-tenance in the fixed monthly or annual fees they charge.

8. Security is always a concern. In most cases, having em-ployees work from a SaaS environment is safer than the security provided by in-house networks and labor-heavy IT departments. It only takes one rogue internal IT staff to delete all of a business’ con-fidential data, trade secrets, and financial and personnel records.

9. CEOs and CFOs of growing businesses really don’t like to be held hostage by anyone, but frequently they feel this way by their IT leaders. SaaS products can be managed by business managers that over-see their use in a company, rather than the IT depart-ment.

10. Technology should be seen as a way to enable employees to do their work more ef-fectively. True SaaS products are often the most advanced in terms of functionality and beneficial processes for the tasks that they are intended to handle.

11. It is proven that SaaS prod-ucts deliver large company-

This can be your business. A business with a bottom line that has improved changes to process and

technology.

level process and functional-ity such as financial reporting and customer marketing at a fraction of what it would cost to implement and support similar technology in-house on in-house servers.

HOW DO BUSINESSES MOVE INTO THE CLOUD?

We are often asked how a busi-ness should move to the Cloud.

One bite at a time is often the best way, kind of like the “ele-phant-eating” scenario we’ve all heard. We recommend you start with an assessment of what busi-ness processes you most need to manage your business and then determine if there are options available in the SaaS market-place to help you accomplish these processes. Then you should determine if the SaaS options can provide greater functional-ity and benefit, regardless of the technology, in comparison to your existing computing tools. Additionally you should consider the cost of switching to a SaaS solution as it compares to keeping your existing solution. After all of this if you determine that SaaS provides the better options, you may find it is a good time to dip your toes into the Cloud world,

and migrate to a SaaS solution.

All in all, the security of repu-table SaaS products is more often far stronger than the security of software and information that you host in your server rooms.

As you consider how you can im-prove your business’ efficiencies, effectiveness and bottom line, consider how Cloud Comput-ing and in particular, SaaS, can help you get there sooner, more securely, and more sustainably. Cloud is real, it’s popular with employees and it reduces your risk profile in many ways. Most importantly, it allows a business to think more about its mission, and less about IT.

5 | SingerLewak April 2012

All in all, the security of reputable SaaS products is more often far stronger

than the security of software and information

that you host in your server rooms

April 2012 SingerLewak | 6

B U S I N E S S T E C H N O L O G Y I N S I G H T S

THE BENEFITS OF MOVING OUR LIVES INTO THE CLOUD: IT’S BUSINESS AND PERSONALBY RICK MARK | SERVICE AREA MANAGERrmark@singerlewak.com

The risk of losing documents, photos and files on our personal computers and business networks through viruses or hardware mal-functions has become too great and hard to manage.

In March’s article, I discussed some of the easy things we can do in the Cloud to make our lives easier and put those mundane tasks, such as bill paying on au-topilot. Well this month, we get a little more personal – let’s talk data soup! There are lots of things that go into data, of any kind. For instance, a simple report that an employee spends a day putting together, or how about your kid’s Basketball lineup for tomorrow’s game that you spent 2 hours putting together? I don’t know about you, but having to pay to have the employee to rebuild that report a 2nd time - if it somehow was lost or corrupted - is not the way I want my business to spend its capital. And I sure don’t have another spare couple of hours to put together that basketball lineup, but I have to so I now have to MAKE TIME where it wasn’t available before.

Wouldn’t it have been great if I could have that employee recover

that document, or any variation of it, within seconds, versus hours or days? Wouldn’t it have been great if when my home computer crashed, that I could have gone to a library or friend’s house, or even my cell phone, and recov-ered the lost basketball schedule – in seconds? Great isn’t the word really – it’s Why? Why can’t I already do this?

Well you can! Business solutions range in many sizes and com-plexities depending on your indi-vidual and business needs. Also, the level of recovery will also change depending on amount of data, users, locations, etc. This isn’t a quick and simple solu-tion in many cases. For personal storage or document archiving or storage, look into DropBox, IDrive among others. IDrive for instance will save your word,

excel and other documents as you write them and save them – to the Cloud.

So the above are some general and very standard solutions to common problems with data – but what about applications and their data?

Both business and personal solutions are out there and very affordable. You can host your accounting software, CRM and other integrated applications in the Cloud – and get the same recovery and redundancy benefits that you would for other Cloud services.

You can use services like Google Apps – and not have to worry about your general documents, storage, email, etc. – all you need is internet access and you are ready to go. Imagine how much money you DON’T have to spend on a computer that just needs to access the internet to be fully functional? This goes for businesses too – less money spent on servers sure, but the employee computers do not have to be powerhouses anymore either. This can save you large capital dollars.

W W W.SINGERLE WAKSYSTEMS.COM

BOB GREEN bgreen@singerlewaksystems.com

818.999.3924 ext.4659

J IM HART jhart@singerlewaksystems.com

818.999.3924 ext.4656

RICK MARK rmark@singerlewaksystems.com

818.999.3924 ext.4623

SingerLewak is a leading regional accounting services firm in California with offices in Los Angeles, Orange County, Woodland Hills, Monterey Park, San Diego, Silicon Valley and San Francisco. Serving California since 1959, SingerLewak has established a reputation for excellence as professionals with unparalleled expertise in the Accounting and Management Consulting industry. Providing the services of a large firm with a blended environment of practices, industry specializations and particular attention to hands-on service, SingerLewak continues to demonstrate leadership and industry growth year-over-year. Our client relationship approach and industry excellence is renowned.

We are nationally recognized as active community and professional services partners, working among many sectors of the business world. Our core services deliver results whether it’s auditing, accounting, entrepreneurial business services, tax preparation, business manage-ment, SEC filings, transactions, enterprise risk manage-ment, forensic accounting, business valuation, litigation support, or consulting.

THE SKILLS YOU NEED. THE SERVICE YOU EXPECT.

OUR FIRM