One platform
for every
service desk.
Covan is an enterprise service management platform that runs on infrastructure you own. One record engine, one company-wide CMDB and its own discovery — every process shares the same data model.
The real cost is fragmentation, not licensing.
Service management usually runs not on one platform but across tools added over years. Each tool brings its own data, its own reporting and its own upgrade calendar.
A fragmented tool stack
Every department brings its own tool, its own licence and its own data model. IT, HR, facilities and customer service run in isolation.
Customisation that blocks upgrades
Every custom field, table and small rule turns into a development project. When upgrades arrive, customisations are retested — and some are lost.
No control over where data lives
In the public sector, finance and defence, data residency, audit trails and network isolation are not negotiable. A cloud-only model does not fit those requirements.
CMDB and discovery sold separately
CMDB, discovery, service mapping and asset management are licensed as separate products. Integration and licence lines grow, yet no single source of truth emerges.
A platform first, products second.
Covan is built as a platform first and a set of products second. A capability built once — an SLA clock, an approval step, a report — is immediately available to every team.
One data model for every process
Requests, incidents, changes, HR cases and work orders share one record engine, so reporting, SLAs, permissions and automation work the same way everywhere.
Customization is data, not code
Nothing a customer configures creates a database table or a code branch, so upgrades never collide with customizations.
Multi-company from day one
A holding can run many subsidiaries, each with its own apps and CMDB, under one installation. Isolation is enforced on every query.
One physical table per record kind.
Every request, incident, problem, change, case, work order, project, epic and sprint lives in the same record store and is told apart by its type. Team-specific fields live in flexible, indexed and searchable JSON columns.
Request
Awaiting approval REQ-000412A request opened from the self-service portal binds to a catalog item; approval and fulfilment run on the same record.
Incident
In progress INC-000422Incidents live in the same record engine, so the SLA clock, escalation and customer survey work without extra integration.
Change
In CAB review CHG-000432A change record reads the affected CIs and open alerts from the CMDB; the risk score is derived from that data.
HR case
Assigned HRC-000442HR cases use the same engine; PII-flagged fields are protected by role and field-level confidentiality.
Work order
On site WO-000452A facilities team opens the work order, links the asset and spare part; asset and CI status update in both directions.
Shared by every app
core- Numbering, history and audit
- Comments and attachments
- Related records
- SLA timers
- Approvals
- Notifications
- Surveys
- Search and reporting
Varies per app
configuration row- Enabled modules
- Statuses
- Fields and forms
- Roles and teams
- Service catalog
- SLAs and calendars
- Workflows and rules
- Menu
What the architecture changes in daily work.
One data model, a shared CMDB and configuration stored as data translate into concrete outcomes for the teams doing the work.
Onboard a new department in hours
A template seeds modules, roles, teams, services and SLAs in one transaction. A new service desk is not a multi-week project — it is a working app the same day.
Upgrade without customisation conflicts
Because configuration is stored as data, upgrades never carry customer-specific tables or code branches. New releases arrive without breaking existing configuration.
One report across processes
Requests, incidents, changes, HR cases and work orders share one record engine. Leadership sees the same metrics across departments in one view.
Tenant, company, app.
Everything in the platform sits in a three-level hierarchy. Isolation is enforced on every query; roles decide which companies and apps a person can reach.
- Tenant — the contract holder; one tenant never sees another’s data.
- Company — a legal unit with its own users, departments, sites and CMDB.
- App — a workspace created from a template in one step, then owned by the customer.
One installation, many companies
isolation on every querySLA compliance · last 12 weeks
%96,4A new service desk from a template in one step.
The template seeds modules, statuses, fields, roles, teams, calendars, services, SLAs, workflows, rules and the menu in a single transaction. From then on the app is the customer’s to change.
Requests, incidents, problems, changes, tasks, service catalog, self-service portal, knowledge and the CMDB view.
Hardware, consumables and licenses; custody history, stockrooms, warranty and two-way sync with CIs.
Alerts from Prometheus, Zabbix, Nagios, CloudWatch, Azure Monitor, syslog, SNMP traps or webhooks; deduplication, correlation to CIs, escalation to incidents.
Customer accounts and contacts, a branded customer portal, cases and knowledge.
Employee cases with PII-flagged fields and HR knowledge.
Work orders, maintenance, dispatch of on-site technicians, spare parts and stock.
Templates are starting points, not boundaries.
Any app can enable any module, and module packs add a whole process as its own menu section. A single IT app can run service management, asset and CMDB, monitoring and agile delivery side by side.
- Every app gets self-service, approvals, SLAs, surveys and reporting without extra work.
- Module packs (SDLC, Project) arrive as their own menu section.
One CMDB the whole company shares.
The platform has its own CMDB, shared by every app in a company, and its own discovery. Apps consume the CMDB; they never own a private copy. 88 CI types, 32 relationship types and impact analysis up to 10 hops.
- Only relationships marked as impact-carrying are followed.
- A CI is counted once, at the fewest hops.
- Retired CIs are skipped unless included.
Your own model. Permission-checked tools.
Agents use the customer’s own model provider: AWS Bedrock, Azure OpenAI, Anthropic, OpenAI, or local Ollama / vLLM. No data leaves the network unless the customer chooses so.
SM Admin
Configuration assistant
Service Desk
Service desk specialist
It runs where your data lives.
On-premises or private cloud. PostgreSQL 17, Node.js and a React web client; a single Docker Compose stack is enough for a full installation. Auditability and data sovereignty are architectural decisions, not marketing.
Tenant isolation on every query
One tenant never sees another’s data; roles decide which companies and apps a person can reach.
Agents are commanded, not scripted
Discovery agents connect with a company token, are approved before receiving commands, verify signed commands and scan only authorised ranges. They can never be told to run a script.
Isolated script sandbox
JavaScript runs in an isolated sandbox with a curated, tenant-guarded API. Configuration rows and code paths never collide.
No data leaves the network
AI agents use the customer’s own model provider. No data leaves the network unless the customer chooses so.
One stack, familiar components.
Roadmap: SAML/OIDC single sign-on, MFA and workforce SCIM. Local and AD/LDAP login with provisioning works today.
ServiceNow’s proven ideas, in your data center.
Covan deliberately keeps many of ServiceNow’s proven ideas: update sets, script includes, dictionary overrides, a flow designer and an identification engine. The differences are in architecture, deployment and cost model.
- CMDB and discovery included; not separately licensed products.
- Configuration packages travel with a full dry-run preview; no instance-specific IDs.
- A young platform: integrations are built per need, with no ecosystem claim.
| Topic | Covan | ServiceNow |
|---|---|---|
| Deployment | On-premises or private cloud | Primarily vendor-hosted SaaS |
| Data model | One table per record kind + JSON | Table hierarchy, real DB objects |
| CMDB & discovery | Included in the same data model | Separate, separately licensed products |
| AI | Your own model, confirmed tools | Vendor Now Assist, add-on license |
The comparison reflects publicly known product structure and is a positioning guide, not a feature-by-feature evaluation.
Which problem are you starting from?
Modernizing a service desk, consolidating a holding on one installation, or meeting public-sector requirements — different starting points, the same platform.
IT service desk modernization
Move from legacy or scattered service desk tools to one platform. Run requests, incidents, problems, changes and the catalog on one data model, with SLAs and reporting managed in one place.
ITSM manager · service desk managerHolding and multi-company consolidation
Many subsidiaries on one installation, each with its own apps and CMDB. The center sees cross-company reporting while every company keeps its own processes and permissions.
CIO · enterprise architectPublic sector and regulated industries
Meet data residency, audit and network isolation requirements without compromise. The installation lives in the customer’s data center, and access and changes stay auditable.
Public sector · finance · defence · complianceSee the platform on your own infrastructure.
A 30-minute demo built around your own scenarios, covering installation requirements, CMDB modelling and a migration plan.