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APM in the New Hybrid World

APM for Any Infrastructure, Any Application, Any Personae
Ulrica de Fort-Menares

True Application Performance Monitoring (APM) cross-cuts many IT tiers: network infrastructure, physical and virtual infrastructure, databases, mobile devices, etc. An ideal Application Performance Monitoring solution provides visibility over any infrastructure, for any app and any audience.

1. Any Infrastructure – We live in a hybrid world

Enterprises are transitioning to cloud, hybrid WAN and BYOD. We call this the three dimensions of the new hybrid world.


Traditional Enterprise Architecture is in the bottom left front quadrant. Managed applications are typically hosted in the Private Cloud. Many enterprises have managed networks and managed devices such as laptops, desktop, IP phones, etc.

Cloud computing, mobility and BYOD trends are rapidly changing the landscape, driving Enterprise Architecture to the top right quadrant. Enterprises are now consuming SaaS applications that are not managed by traditional IT. The Internet has become a much more stable platform; businesses are migrating their traditional network to the Internet. Users are accessing Enterprise content from anywhere across the unmanaged Internet. Enterprises are also dealing with an influx of unmanaged BYOD devices.

Implications: In this new hybrid world, you will likely have limited visibility of devices, applications and/or networks. Multiple administrative domains will become the new norm. Enterprises need new capabilities to perform fault isolation that span different organizations, groups and service providers. This means a lot of room for finger pointing. We believe modern APM solutions need to address this added complexity with the ability to provide visibility across any public/private network, any public/private cloud for any device.

2. Any Apps – Voice and video have more stringent performance requirements, but yet they are not the main focus of APM solutions today

There is much focus on web performance management in regards to APM solutions today. Voice and video are more challenging data types when it comes to performance and quality of experience. Yet, we do not see as much emphasis from the APM solutions today. Voice and video remain as their own silos from a performance management perspective. Perhaps when WebRTC becomes mainstream, we would see voice and video become a focus of APM solutions.

3. Any Personae – Tools should be capable of collaborative troubleshooting and leveraged by sysadmin, DevOps, network engineers, app developers, etc.

According to a study conducted by EMA, 81% of respondents indicated that cross-domain triage teams were being invoked to tackle application performance issues. The teams combine network, application, database, server, endpoints, etc. Even more interestingly, 66% of respondents indicated that network operators were taking the lead most or all of the time. This can only be interpreted as a need to arm network operators with the tool to succeed in their lead roles. The network is the resource that binds the user and the application together. It seems natural that network operators take the lead role in these challenging cross-domain initiatives.

Despite the pressing need, enterprises are still challenged by the lack of tools that can present a unified picture to meet the needs of these different audiences. There are no shortages of silo tools, but they lack abilities to correlate different data sources to present the unified view.

Key Takeaways

Despite the diversity of APM tools, there is still opportunity for a tool that can be leveraged by different cross-domain teams, different application types and across the hybrid cloud/network world.

Ulrica de Fort-Menares is VP Product Strategy at LiveAction.

Hot Topics

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AI is becoming the operating system of the enterprise. It acts as an invisible coordination layer that understands intent, connects systems, and executes work across complex SaaS environments. Previously, employees had to click through multiple systems — CRM, ERP, support tools, collaboration platforms — to complete a single task. Now, instead of navigating each application manually, they can simply state what they need to accomplish ...

In 2026, the cost of downtime or an outage is no longer just a technical inconvenience; it's a $600 billion wake up call for global businesses. As our digital ecosystems become  more interconnected, each touchpoint introduces new risks and multiplies the consequences when things go wrong. And the data is clear: aggregate downtime costs  for Global 2,000 companies have surged 50% since 2024, reaching a staggering $600 billion ...

Deloitte found that 74% of enterprises expect to deploy agentic AI solutions in the next 24 months. However, the rush to deployment is outpacing foundational work, though. Only 21% of enterprises have fully formed agent governance models in place. The result? AI agents deployed without guidance or governance begin to function as fragmented islands of complexity ...

Cloud spending is no longer viewed as a passthrough IT expense, but as a strategic financial lever that directly impacts innovation capacity, profitability and enterprise resilience, according to the CFO Cloud Cost Optimization Report from Azul ...

As AI moves from generating responses to performing actions, the need for trust increases exponentially. And as organizations enlist AI agents for increasingly sophisticated business processes, trust is going to be the single most important theme for spurring adoption. What can organizations do to build trustworthy AI agents? ...

I've spent a lot of time in the channel, and one thing I keep coming back to is this: a partner program is only as good as what it looks like in the field. Many programs look great on paper, but when a partner is in front of a customer navigating a complex hybrid environment or trying to make the case for AI-powered observability, the gap between what a vendor promises and what it actually delivers becomes very clear, very fast ...

Enterprises today operate in a real-time environment where uninterrupted access to trusted data has become a baseline expectation for users, applications and automated systems. Traditional DataOps models, built on manual effort and human triage, cannot keep pace with this always active demand. AI agents are emerging as the operational backbone, ensuring consistent data availability, reinforcing trustworthiness and enabling a level of scale that manual processes cannot achieve ...

For decades, trust in the digital workplace rested on familiar signals. We trusted faces on video calls, voices on the phone, and emails that appeared to come from people we knew. These cues felt human and intuitive. They anchored how decisions were made, approvals were granted, and access was authorized. AI-powered deepfakes have quietly broken that model ...

Cloud migration was supposed to be a one-way door. For most enterprises, it turns out it isn't. Cloud data repatriation is a real and growing trend. A new survey ... finds that 89% of organizations plan to expand their on-premises infrastructure footprint over the next two years — and 75% have already moved at least some workloads back from public cloud in the past 24 months. The findings point to a broad rethinking of where data belongs ...

Over the past few years, large language models (LLMs) have revolutionized the software industry. Given their ability to excel at multi-step reasoning, LLMs have helped enterprises streamline workflows and adapt to the unknown. However, employing such models comes with sky-high costs, latency issues, and limited flexibility. In the realm of IT operations, it is generally wiser to employ smaller, domain-specific models instead ...

APM in the New Hybrid World

APM for Any Infrastructure, Any Application, Any Personae
Ulrica de Fort-Menares

True Application Performance Monitoring (APM) cross-cuts many IT tiers: network infrastructure, physical and virtual infrastructure, databases, mobile devices, etc. An ideal Application Performance Monitoring solution provides visibility over any infrastructure, for any app and any audience.

1. Any Infrastructure – We live in a hybrid world

Enterprises are transitioning to cloud, hybrid WAN and BYOD. We call this the three dimensions of the new hybrid world.


Traditional Enterprise Architecture is in the bottom left front quadrant. Managed applications are typically hosted in the Private Cloud. Many enterprises have managed networks and managed devices such as laptops, desktop, IP phones, etc.

Cloud computing, mobility and BYOD trends are rapidly changing the landscape, driving Enterprise Architecture to the top right quadrant. Enterprises are now consuming SaaS applications that are not managed by traditional IT. The Internet has become a much more stable platform; businesses are migrating their traditional network to the Internet. Users are accessing Enterprise content from anywhere across the unmanaged Internet. Enterprises are also dealing with an influx of unmanaged BYOD devices.

Implications: In this new hybrid world, you will likely have limited visibility of devices, applications and/or networks. Multiple administrative domains will become the new norm. Enterprises need new capabilities to perform fault isolation that span different organizations, groups and service providers. This means a lot of room for finger pointing. We believe modern APM solutions need to address this added complexity with the ability to provide visibility across any public/private network, any public/private cloud for any device.

2. Any Apps – Voice and video have more stringent performance requirements, but yet they are not the main focus of APM solutions today

There is much focus on web performance management in regards to APM solutions today. Voice and video are more challenging data types when it comes to performance and quality of experience. Yet, we do not see as much emphasis from the APM solutions today. Voice and video remain as their own silos from a performance management perspective. Perhaps when WebRTC becomes mainstream, we would see voice and video become a focus of APM solutions.

3. Any Personae – Tools should be capable of collaborative troubleshooting and leveraged by sysadmin, DevOps, network engineers, app developers, etc.

According to a study conducted by EMA, 81% of respondents indicated that cross-domain triage teams were being invoked to tackle application performance issues. The teams combine network, application, database, server, endpoints, etc. Even more interestingly, 66% of respondents indicated that network operators were taking the lead most or all of the time. This can only be interpreted as a need to arm network operators with the tool to succeed in their lead roles. The network is the resource that binds the user and the application together. It seems natural that network operators take the lead role in these challenging cross-domain initiatives.

Despite the pressing need, enterprises are still challenged by the lack of tools that can present a unified picture to meet the needs of these different audiences. There are no shortages of silo tools, but they lack abilities to correlate different data sources to present the unified view.

Key Takeaways

Despite the diversity of APM tools, there is still opportunity for a tool that can be leveraged by different cross-domain teams, different application types and across the hybrid cloud/network world.

Ulrica de Fort-Menares is VP Product Strategy at LiveAction.

Hot Topics

The Latest

AI is becoming the operating system of the enterprise. It acts as an invisible coordination layer that understands intent, connects systems, and executes work across complex SaaS environments. Previously, employees had to click through multiple systems — CRM, ERP, support tools, collaboration platforms — to complete a single task. Now, instead of navigating each application manually, they can simply state what they need to accomplish ...

In 2026, the cost of downtime or an outage is no longer just a technical inconvenience; it's a $600 billion wake up call for global businesses. As our digital ecosystems become  more interconnected, each touchpoint introduces new risks and multiplies the consequences when things go wrong. And the data is clear: aggregate downtime costs  for Global 2,000 companies have surged 50% since 2024, reaching a staggering $600 billion ...

Deloitte found that 74% of enterprises expect to deploy agentic AI solutions in the next 24 months. However, the rush to deployment is outpacing foundational work, though. Only 21% of enterprises have fully formed agent governance models in place. The result? AI agents deployed without guidance or governance begin to function as fragmented islands of complexity ...

Cloud spending is no longer viewed as a passthrough IT expense, but as a strategic financial lever that directly impacts innovation capacity, profitability and enterprise resilience, according to the CFO Cloud Cost Optimization Report from Azul ...

As AI moves from generating responses to performing actions, the need for trust increases exponentially. And as organizations enlist AI agents for increasingly sophisticated business processes, trust is going to be the single most important theme for spurring adoption. What can organizations do to build trustworthy AI agents? ...

I've spent a lot of time in the channel, and one thing I keep coming back to is this: a partner program is only as good as what it looks like in the field. Many programs look great on paper, but when a partner is in front of a customer navigating a complex hybrid environment or trying to make the case for AI-powered observability, the gap between what a vendor promises and what it actually delivers becomes very clear, very fast ...

Enterprises today operate in a real-time environment where uninterrupted access to trusted data has become a baseline expectation for users, applications and automated systems. Traditional DataOps models, built on manual effort and human triage, cannot keep pace with this always active demand. AI agents are emerging as the operational backbone, ensuring consistent data availability, reinforcing trustworthiness and enabling a level of scale that manual processes cannot achieve ...

For decades, trust in the digital workplace rested on familiar signals. We trusted faces on video calls, voices on the phone, and emails that appeared to come from people we knew. These cues felt human and intuitive. They anchored how decisions were made, approvals were granted, and access was authorized. AI-powered deepfakes have quietly broken that model ...

Cloud migration was supposed to be a one-way door. For most enterprises, it turns out it isn't. Cloud data repatriation is a real and growing trend. A new survey ... finds that 89% of organizations plan to expand their on-premises infrastructure footprint over the next two years — and 75% have already moved at least some workloads back from public cloud in the past 24 months. The findings point to a broad rethinking of where data belongs ...

Over the past few years, large language models (LLMs) have revolutionized the software industry. Given their ability to excel at multi-step reasoning, LLMs have helped enterprises streamline workflows and adapt to the unknown. However, employing such models comes with sky-high costs, latency issues, and limited flexibility. In the realm of IT operations, it is generally wiser to employ smaller, domain-specific models instead ...