ANTenna Blog -- Business & E-Business

Cost containment has become the company mantra recently. In response, many small and medium businesses are trying to reign in their runaway IT energy costs. Spiceworks became the latest vendor to try to attack that area, with a new energy management tool, one designed with Intel’s help.

IT devices have become more powerful but along with their new capabilities have come rising energy costs. International Data Corp estimates that for every $1 of computer power a company purchases, it has to spend another $.50 to power it. Consequently, businesses have been on the lookout for tools to provide them with a clearer picture about their energy spending and tools to help them lower that expense.

Spiceworks released a new free software plug-in that allows small and medium businesses to remotely manage power consumption of their PCs, laptops, desktops, and network devices. With the Power Manager plug-in, IT technicians can turn a PC on, so it will be working when users arrive at their desks in the morning. In addition, devices can be automatically powered down when employees leave for the night.

Reporting is a key component with power management, and the new plug-in features a Power Management Dashboard that illustrates which devices are on or off during the day. In addition, a Dollar Savings View estimates how much money a company saves per day and per month form turning off its systems. Spiceworks claimed that if half of its 800,000 users worldwide used the new application, the customers would save $500 million annually.

Spiceworks has delivered a product that provides companies with a basic overview of energy usage. Some companies may desire more sophisticated features, but for the corporation looking to get a quick overview of what is happening with their IT energy and simple steps to curb usage, then Spiceworks may be a good fit.