The ever expanding and accelerating deployment of electronic business has opened up enterprises and their IT systems to a vast connected community – and to a glut of new risks.

The price to pay for not managing these risks is colossal – an estimated £64 billion in lost revenue across the UK alone.

In the opinion of Aidan Lawes, CEO ITSMF International "The risks IT organisations face are not just about the technology itself, but the way in which they manage all of their complex technology. What's needed is a set of joined-up thinking where the business truly understands the risks … It is not an IT issue – it's a business one."

What happens when serious incidents arise and the expertise to deal with them is not to be found within your own people?

One solution might be to invest in Microsoft's Essential Support.

Jason Kane, IT Infrastructure Manager at CPM, clearly believes it works: "If I was talking to a manager that had doubts about the benefits they would get from Essential Support, the first thing I would ask is, how do they sleep at night?"

Out of 450 medium-sized businesses 66% admit they've experienced failure of their mission-critical systems. The reality is that, with our growing dependency on mission-critical IT systems, such failures – and their gravity - can only increase.

One organisation that is proactively managing risk to pre-empt such catastrophe is Cheshire Building Society.

More and more enterprises are adopting a similar approach.

A single point of security failure across your IT system could bring your organisation to its knees.

In this customer-driven electronic age, security has become the life-support system of your business. Any weakness - whether through employee carelessness, poor procedures or external threats such as viral attacks or hackers - will be ruthlessly exploited.

Here, your peers and industry experts highlight their concerns and offer critical insights on how you can deliver the right level of security and assurance right across your operation.

Risk to enterprise IT systems comes in many guises – with ineffective software deployment to the fore.

Crucially, software failure can cause loss of brand, decreased revenues and productivity, and lead to disastrous outcomes, including serious damage to your business.

Here, we talk to industry experts and organisations that not only regularly tackle major deployments, but protect their customer base by having a well managed, robust software environment.