Faddom Ltd. provides IT infrastructure mapping and monitoring solutions for hybrid and cloud environments. The company focuses on dynamic, real-time visualization to help organizations manage complex IT systems.
Faddom specializes in network and infrastructure mapping and monitoring. It provides solutions that help organizations visualize and manage their IT environments. The Faddom platform is designed to offer clear insights into data center and cloud resources, improving efficiency in asset management and reducing the risks associated with managing complex IT infrastructures.
Faddom Target Market and Customer Base
Since establishing the Faddom brand, the executive team has polled its customers and the clients that it would like to identify areas for expansion in the capabilities of the platform. Thus, the target market of the company is rapidly expanding as the product evolves.
Target Market
Faddom primarily targets medium to large enterprises and organizations that operate complex IT environments and require detailed visibility into their network infrastructure. Its solutions are ideal for businesses looking to optimize their IT operations, especially those transitioning to cloud-based environments or adopting hybrid infrastructure. Key industries include financial services, healthcare, manufacturing, retail, government, and telecommunications, where infrastructure management and optimization are critical. Additionally, Faddom appeals to IT departments that need to enhance network visibility and mapping to improve security, reduce costs, and ensure compliance.
Customer Base
Faddom’s customer base comprises businesses and organizations seeking automated tools for IT asset management, network mapping, and cost optimization. These include companies with hybrid IT environments that span on-premises data centers, cloud infrastructure, and third-party services. Faddom’s customers are typically IT operations teams, cloud architects, and network administrators who benefit from its real-time mapping and monitoring capabilities. Its clientele may also include Managed Service Providers (MSPs) that manage IT infrastructure for other companies. Enterprises with complex IT infrastructures that need to improve operational efficiency, enhance network security, and optimize cloud spend form a large portion of Faddom’s user base.
Faddom Product Suite
The core of the Faddom’s product suite includes network mapping, dependency visualization, and cloud migration planning. The system can cross platforms without requiring agents, making it easy to deploy and maintain. Below are the key components of Faddom’s product suite.
- Network Mapping Faddom automatically discovers and maps IT assets, showing the relationships between them. It creates a visual representation of servers, applications, and other infrastructure components to give organizations complete visibility into their IT environments.
- Application Dependency Mapping The solution provides detailed application dependency mapping, allowing users to see how different applications and systems interact with each other. This feature is critical during cloud migrations or data center consolidations to ensure that nothing is missed and services continue to run smoothly.
- Cloud Cost Optimization As organizations increasingly move workloads to the cloud, Faddom helps manage and reduce cloud expenses by offering insights into cloud usage patterns. It provides a detailed analysis of costs and resources to optimize spending.
- Cloud Migration Planning Faddom assists in planning for cloud migration by giving a clear understanding of on-premise applications, dependencies, and traffic patterns, helping organizations make informed decisions about which workloads can be migrated to the cloud.
Evolution of the Product Suite
Initially, Faddom’s product was focused on providing network visibility and asset discovery within on-premise environments. As cloud computing became more prominent, Faddom evolved its offerings to include cloud infrastructure mapping and hybrid IT environment visibility. This shift allowed businesses using Faddom to gain real-time insights into both their physical and cloud-based assets, bridging the gap between on-premise systems and cloud infrastructure.
The product suite evolved in response to increasing demand for cloud migration support and cost optimization. Faddom introduced enhanced features for application dependency mapping, specifically designed to make cloud migration smoother and more predictable. They also integrated analytics to provide cost optimization insights for companies using cloud services, a feature that has become critical as cloud spend continues to rise.
Challenges and How Faddom Overcame Them
- Adapting to the Cloud Shift Faddom faced the challenge of adapting its network mapping tools to handle the complexity of cloud infrastructures. Faddom interfaced to cloud platform reporting systems, enabling real-time updates without the need for intrusive software installations. This allowed Faddom to manage hybrid IT environments.
- Scaling for Larger Enterprises Handling large amounts of data and real-time traffic from multiple environments placed strains on the Faddom platform. The developers optimized the software to handle greater data volumes and that enhanced scalability, performance, and speed.
- Cloud Cost Transparency With cloud adoption came the challenge of providing transparency into cloud costs, which can be highly variable and difficult to manage. Faddom added cost optimization tools to its suite, giving organizations detailed insights into how they were using cloud resources and how they could reduce costs. This feature helped Faddom stand out from competitors, as it addressed a growing pain point in the cloud adoption journey.
Flagship Product: Network Mapping
Faddom’s Network Mapping is an automated, real-time view of an entire IT infrastructure, both on-premises and in the cloud. This module gives companies deep insight into their network architecture, including the relationships and dependencies between various systems, applications, and hardware. The agentless nature of the solution makes deployment easier and faster, allowing organizations to visualize their network without installing additional software on endpoints.
Key Features:
- Agentless Discovery: Faddom’s network mapping mines existing system reporting mechanisms to extract live data.
- Real-Time Network Visualization: A live view of all connected systems, devices, applications, and their dependencies.
- Application Dependency Mapping: Visualizes the relationships between different applications and servers, exposing interdependencies within the network.
- Multi-Environment Support: Covers on-premise, cloud, and hybrid IT environments.
- Automated Change Detection: Updates the topology map accordingly when a scan produces different results to the previous report.
- Integration with Cloud Providers: The module integrates with major cloud platforms like AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud.
Faddom’s Network Mapping module is a powerful tool for organizations that need real-time visibility into their IT infrastructure, both on-premises and in the cloud. Agentless design, multi-environment support, and application dependency mapping make it an excellent choice for businesses looking to optimize their network operations, especially in hybrid IT environments.
Pros:
- Fast and Easy Deployment: The agentless approach makes it quick to set up and deploy, reducing the time needed to start visualizing the network.
- Network Traffic Mapping: Provides a view of link utilization.
- Security Monitoring: Changes in traffic volumes could signify an attack.
- Automated Change Tracking: Ensures network maps stay current also highlighting unauthorized or unintended changes.
- Customizable Dashboards and Reporting: The user can add or remove details and set up reports for periodic system snapshots.
Cons:
- Limited Data Transformation and Manipulation: Doesn’t offer extensive data transformation or in-depth analytics on traffic flow.
- No Native Incident Management: Users need to integrate with third-party IT service management (ITSM) tools to automate incident detection and resolution workflows.
- Performance Metrics Focused on Topology, Not Detailed Analytics: No in-depth, performance analytics of individual network components.
Other Notable Products
1. Application Dependency Mapping
Faddom’s Application Dependency Mapping provides real-time, detailed insights into the relationships and interactions between various applications, servers, and IT infrastructure components. It automatically discovers and visualizes these dependencies across both on-premise and cloud environments. This visibility helps identify potential risks, bottlenecks, and performance issues before making changes to the IT landscape. Thus, IT teams can prevent downtime and ensure smoother transitions during migration or updates.
One of the key strengths of Faddom’s Application Dependency Mapping is its ability to operate in real time, ensuring that organizations have an up-to-date view of their network at all times. This feature is particularly useful for hybrid IT environments. While the tool excels in mapping and visualization, it lacks in-depth analytics for application performance, meaning users may need to rely on additional tools for more granular performance monitoring. Nonetheless, Faddom’s dependency mapping greatly simplifies complex IT environments.
2. Cloud Cost Optimization
Faddom’s Cloud Cost Optimization tool helps organizations manage and reduce their cloud infrastructure spending by providing detailed insights into resource usage across multiple cloud platforms. This feature operates in real time, identifying underutilized resources, and supporting informed decisions to eliminate waste. With coverage of AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud, Faddom enables companies to right-size their infrastructure for current and future needs. This also prevents overspending and underprovision.
Faddom detects inefficiencies and provides recommendations for cost savings. This includes identifying idle or underused resources, opportunities for consolidation, and over-provisioned services. The tool simplifies the process of adjusting cloud resources to better fit actual workloads, making it easier for IT teams to implement cost-saving measures without compromising performance. Some users may find that it lacks the more advanced cost analysis or predictive analytics found in dedicated FinOps tools.
Major Competitors to Faddom
1. Device42
Device42 is an IT asset management, network discovery, and dependency mapping platform. It provides real-time insights into IT infrastructure through asset discovery, application dependency mapping, and cloud migration planning. It automates asset tracking and improves IT operations by understanding system relationships and dependencies.
Pros:
- Wide-Ranging Discovery: Device42 excels in discovering various IT assets, both physical and virtual, across a variety of environments (on-premise, cloud, hybrid).
- Detailed Dependency Mapping: It offers strong application dependency mapping, which is critical for migration projects and troubleshooting.
- Extensive Integrations: Device42 integrates well with a range of third-party IT management tools, improving operational workflows.
Cons:
- Pricing: Device42 can be expensive, particularly for small and mid-sized enterprises, due to its pricing model based on the number of discovered assets.
- UI Complexity: Some users find the user interface overwhelming and in need of simplification.
2. CloudHealth by VMware
CloudHealth by VMware is a cloud management platform designed to optimize and manage multi-cloud environments. It focuses on cost optimization, governance, and security, enabling organizations to gain control over their cloud infrastructure and associated costs.
Pros:
- Cloud Cost Management: CloudHealth is highly regarded for its robust cost management capabilities, allowing organizations to optimize cloud spending and manage resources efficiently.
- Policy-Driven Automation: It includes automation tools to enforce policies across cloud environments, improving governance and security.
- Multi-Cloud Support: CloudHealth supports all major cloud providers, making it a valuable tool for businesses with multi-cloud strategies.
Cons:
- Limited On-Premises Capabilities: While excellent for cloud environments, it lacks strong support for on-premise infrastructure visibility, which may be necessary for hybrid environments.
- Costly for Small Businesses: CloudHealth’s advanced features come at a high price, making it less suitable for small or budget-conscious businesses.
3. Turbonomic (by IBM)
Turbonomic, now part of IBM, offers an AI-driven platform that automates resource management across hybrid cloud environments. It focuses on optimizing performance and cost by dynamically adjusting resources based on real-time demand across on-premise, cloud, and virtualized environments.
Pros:
- AI-Driven Automation: Turbonomic excels at automating resource management, optimizing performance, and reducing costs without manual intervention.
- Application Performance Assurance: It helps ensure that applications are receiving the right resources, improving performance and reducing bottlenecks.
- Hybrid Cloud Optimization: It supports both cloud and on-premise environments, making it highly versatile for hybrid setups.
Cons:
- High Cost: Its powerful AI-driven capabilities come at a premium, making it more suitable for large enterprises with complex IT infrastructures.
- Customization Limitations: Some users report limited customization options for specific workflows and use cases.
4. Apptio Cloudability
Apptio Cloudability is a financial operation (FinOps) platform designed to manage and optimize cloud spending. It provides deep visibility into cloud costs, usage, and trends, enabling businesses to maximize cloud efficiency and minimize unnecessary expenses.
Pros:
- FinOps Expertise: Cloudability is highly specialized in cloud cost management and FinOps, making it an ideal tool for businesses seeking to improve their financial accountability and cloud efficiency.
- Comprehensive Cost Analytics: It offers powerful analytics and reporting tools that provide granular insights into cloud spending, helping organizations make data-driven decisions.
- Integration with Cloud Providers: Cloudability integrates with all major cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP), providing a centralized view of cloud costs.
Cons:
- Focused on Cloud: Unlike Faddom, which provides visibility across hybrid environments, Cloudability is primarily focused on cloud infrastructure, lacking broader on-premise management capabilities.
- Limited Operational Focus: While excellent for cost management, Cloudability is less focused on operational insights, such as dependency mapping or network discovery.
5. SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor (NPM)
SolarWinds NPM is a network performance monitoring tool designed to provide visibility into the health and performance of on-premise and cloud network infrastructures. It helps IT teams identify, diagnose, and resolve network performance issues quickly.
Pros:
- Real-Time Monitoring: SolarWinds NPM provides real-time insights into network performance, enabling proactive detection of issues such as latency, outages, and bottlenecks.
- User-Friendly Interface: It is known for its intuitive, easy-to-use interface, making it accessible for a range of users, from small businesses to large enterprises.
- Scalability: SolarWinds NPM scales well for large enterprises and can handle complex, distributed networks across hybrid environments.
Cons:
- Focus on Monitoring: SolarWinds NPM excels at monitoring but lacks deep application dependency mapping and advanced cost optimization tools like Faddom.
- Integration Complexity: While powerful, integrating SolarWinds NPM with other tools in the IT ecosystem can be challenging and may require customization.
Conclusion
Faddom’s product suite evolved from basic network mapping to a wider platform that offers comprehensive visibility and control over hybrid IT environments. By addressing key challenges like cloud complexity, scalability, and cost optimization, Faddom successfully adapted its product to meet the needs of modern enterprises transitioning to the cloud. Its continuous innovation in network mapping, application dependency visualization, and cloud management has helped it stay competitive and relevant in a rapidly changing IT landscape.
