A Powerful Digital Solution for Total Health
McCall Moore
Cisco – Partner Success Story Featuring Athena
In a world where everything is digital and personal health is the holy grail, companies that merge virtual and in-person wellness experiences can gain a big following. That’s the intention behind CureFit, an India-based start-up that combines online and offline platforms to help people achieve stellar health across body, mind, and spirit.
It’s a lofty goal—and to accomplish it, CureFit needed an IT solution that would seamlessly connect its 200+ fitness locations across India with its data-driven app. In a perfect world, that system would be automated, easy to manage, and extremely reliable for CureFit’s health-obsessed customers and technologists alike.
They found just what they wanted through Athena IT & Telecom Solutions—a local tech partner that could not only install but also manage an intuitive and simple system that would meet their every need, now and in the future.
Athena opened the door to a turnkey solution: Cisco Meraki. A 100% cloud-managed IT solution. Meraki is easy to manage and operate with just a few clicks and is equipped to support and store massive amounts of data. Its networking automation ensures that CureFit will not be vulnerable to network outages that could result in business losses.
Meraki also offers greater visibility and security through an easy-to-use online dashboard, where technologists can troubleshoot issues quickly and efficiently – anywhere, anytime. Now, adding branches to the CureFit network takes minutes, not hours or days.
These days, CureFit’s wellness seekers have access to online and offline experiences that support their entire healthcare lifecycle. A dependable IT system stores and analyzes their personal fitness data, generating suggestions on workouts, what to eat, mindfulness meditation, and more. Best of all, ongoing support from Athena IT lets CureFit focus on what they do best: helping people pursue their holistic wellness dreams.
Between healthy intentions and real results, there’s a bridge.
Athena IT & Telecom Solutions: Offering Optimal Solutions for IT and Telecom Infrastructures
The IT and telecom infrastructure market is witnessing a transformation with new factors coming into play, such as network virtualization, cloud-based services, and the integration of heterogeneous networks. The sector handles a huge amount of data and requires high storage capacity which has increased the need of converged infrastructure solutions. The telecommunication industry has been experiencing transformation from recent years with more demand for sophisticated, customized communications services. In this transformative and highly competitive environment, cost effective product and service delivery is of paramount importance as the market focuses increasingly on IP and wireless.
Trying to achieve this objective, most infrastructure solution providers face challenges related to Knowledge Transfer from Principals, Shortage of skilled and certified Technical consultants, and Incapability of large project execution. Athena IT & Telecom Solutions, headquartered in Bangalore, is ahead of them because of its dual expertise in IT and telecommunication domains. The company leverages its expertise to provide end-to-end IT and telecom solutions with proactive support for both IT and Telecom infrastructure through dedicated Network Operations Center (NOC). Athena remotely monitors all the devices under contract and if required it undertakes onsite support too. For medium size clients, the company takes care of manpower deployment to handle the complete infrastructure instead of providing infrastructure support.
The company’s domain knowledge on both IT and Telecom solutions and focus on few principals with commitment helps it to get the best of the solutions and commercials for its customers, thus enabling it to provide optimal solution to its customers. “Cisco has a wide range of products which enable us to provide winning solutions to both startups and large enterprises. Cisco is renowned for product stability and excellent post-sale support. Partnering with Cisco gives us the edge over competition to provide advanced and comprehensive IT infrastructure solutions to our customers,” says Harikrishnan Srinivasan, Founder & Director, Athena IT and Telecom Solutions. The company offers consistent post-sales service to all clients at all times irrespective of the size of client or size of value. The level of expertise deployed depends on the level of complexity of the solutions.
Testimony to the efficacy of Athena’s strong quality process and extensive domain experience is what some of its clients say about the company. “Athena has always been our preferred vendor for years together and we enjoy a great customer experience; their delivery commitment for products and services has always amazed us and they are our valued business partners. We wish them all the best, says Kamalraj Chandrasekaran, Omega Healthcare Management Services.
“Considering the fact that the near future will be dominated by the e-commerce startups and IPV4 to IPV6 conversion opportunities, we are geared up to address these opportunities by building the expertise for both sales and technical team,” concludes Srinivasan.
We don’t believe in tying up with too many principals, says Founder and Director-Sales, H. Srinivasan.
In a world that believes in the more the merrier, Athena IT & Telecom Solutions, a Bangalore-based IT and telecom services provider is an aberration. For one, the company’s Founder and Director-Sales, Harikrishnan Srinivasan, doesn’t believe in scooping out an endless list of principals to show off his product mix.
In fact, for any new account, the entry strategy for the company is through one of its six principals: Dell, Lenovo, Cisco, Riverbed, Juniper, and Fortinet. That’s a bold stand to take for a company that’s barely three years old.
Piggybacking on this strategy, the company today has chosen the road less traveled and has recorded a whopping 100 percent revenue growth. “Every year, we select one product which the team focuses on, gets acquainted with, and then sets out to reach targeted sales numbers. This requires considerable bandwidth and mindshare from the Athena team and that’s only possible if we work with fewer principals,” says Harikrishnan.
But getting there wasn’t easy. When the company started its operations in 2009, the market was on a downward spiral. But luckily for Athena, the same year, Dell was trying to rebuild its channel model in India and was aggressively looking for partners. “We aligned ourselves with Dell and within six months, we could close considerable deals. Our Dell business increased to Rs 4-5 crore in the subsequent years,” says Harikrishnan.
Another reason for its impressive growth is the company’s domain expertise in telecom. This prompted Athena to get into networking and it signed up with Cisco and Juniper. Recently, Athena joined hands with Fortinet for security solutions and Riverbed for WAN acceleration and optimization. This broad spectrum of limited but niche technology provider mix offers the company an end-to-end portfolio of services.
Athena has also launched its ISP division in order to cater to its customers’ telecom needs. Athena, says Harikrishnan, has also invested a 49 percent stake in a company which specializes in engineering software which will expand Athena’s customer base.
Source : http://www.channelworld.in/fasttrack/athena-it-telecom-solutions
Athena IT & Telecom Solutions Pvt. Ltd visions to be a market focused and process centered organization delivering innovative Business solutions
Incorporating a start-up in a dynamic business environment is not an easy task. It demands getting a lot done quickly parallel to the dynamics of the business. It seems easy to chant ‘ We are unique and we help out with almost everything ’, but when it comes to implementing the excellence, this uniqueness itself appears as a question mark over the company’s odds of success. Trying to keep up to the technological shift in the market, countless newbies have emerged and sailed their business voyage on the dynamic and unforeseen waves of the business environment. However, only a few succeed to surf smoothly with their excellence and prowess. One such gem is Athena, a leading IT services and Solution Company specialized in delivering excellence in the form of tailor-made IT solutions to meet specific business needs of its clients. A strong believer in aligning technology with business, Athena is seamlessly delivering great business value to its customers since June 29th, 2009. Perseverance, Integrity, Customer Service, Vendor Loyalty and Team spirit are the core ethics that have been interwoven together to create the soul of Athena and are successfully spearheading the company to new heights. Athena infuses expert consulting and management services created by focusing on the key business metrics to align customers’ strategies to their business goals, thereby enhancing the performance of their business. The company relies on transparency and trust to celebrate a long term relationship with most of its clients.
Creating the differentiator – Delighting clients with its expertise
Customer retention is the key at Athena. Over the years Athena has managed to shine along with its customers thereby becoming an integral part of their functioning. Excellent relationship with the principals has also helped in strengthening their business and generating a lot of clientele who are today part of Athena’s happy family. Athena’s strong adherence to quality processes and its rich experience from managing global clients across various industries & business verticals has been a hallmark and a driving force. The team is backed by a strong quality process and extensive domain experience. Athena offers the entire gamut of world-class IT services and solutions to help its clients design integrate and manage their complex IT Infrastructure. Athena’s core products and services are listed below:
Server and Storage:
- Tower Servers
- Rack Servers
- Modular Infrastructure
- Server JBOD Expansion
- Backup and recovery and data protection
- Software-defined Storage
- General-purpose disk arrays
Networking Products:
- Switches
- Routers
- Wireless
- Wireless and Mobility
- Network Management tools
- Access Points
- Outdoor and Industrial Access Points
- Controllers
Security:
- Next-Generation Firewalls
- Advanced Malware Protection
- Policy and Access
- VPN Security Clients
- Email Security
- Web Security
Data Center:
- Servers – Unified Computing
- Data Center Management and Automation
- Data Center Security
- Data Center Switches
- Hyper-converged Infrastructure
- Storage Networking
- Virtual Networking
Virtualisation Products:
- VM Ware
- Microsoft
- Citrix
Furthermore, this year the organization is concentrating on Hyper converged and cloud based solutions with assistance and training from CISCO and DELL teams.
Expansion Binge & Journey Ahead
The company is working hard as a team to be a market focussed and process centered organization that develops and delivers innovative solutions to its customers. Athena strives to utilize its professionals’ extensive IT experience to deliver professional services for tangible business results. Recently, Athena successfully implemented a USD 500,000 project which involved migrating voice infrastructure from one platform to cisco UCS platform. As per the founder, both technological expansion and geographical expansion will hold the future for Athena. The organization is also looking forward to adopt more advanced technologies and Cloud based solutions this year.
Visionary behind
Athena IT & Telecom Solutions Pvt. Ltd
Mr. Harikrishnan Srinivasan
Founder Director
A veteran holding more than a decade experience in IT domain, Harikrishnan has served many leading names including HCL Infosystems, Tata Communications Ltd with his expertise and skills before incorporating Athena. An MBA degree holder with BE in Production Engineering, Harikrishnan is also delivers his experience as a partner in Iris Communication’s Top Management. During his professional voyage, he has handled top positions counting as Regional Channel Sales Head, Manager-Channel Sales, Associate Manager-Business Solutions and many more.
Creating Milestones and Achieving Awards
Dell India Partner Summit 2013
Harikrishnan, Business Head, Athena IT & Telecom Solutions receives the award for Best Emerging Partner 2012-2013 in the South region from Vikas Bhonsle, General Manager, Preferred Accounts, Dell India and Piyush Pushkal, Country Lead – Marketing and Programs, Dell GCC.
