Making business expansion count
Cloud provider boosts European capability with enterprise-grade
data center platform and fully-optimised balance sheet
Customer Name: iland Industry: Service provider Location: Global Challenge
• Cost-efficiently expand European cloud operations to
address needs of growing customer base
• Maximise productivity through automated, repeatable
data centre deployment processes
• Enable rapid scalability and flexibility to address
complex customer use cases
Solution
• Cloud platform based on Cisco Unified Computing
System, Nexus switches and SMARTnet service, all
procured via Cisco Capital Finance Lease
Results
• Increased speed and agility of cloud deployments
• Stretched budget to include support services
• Optimised cost and revenue lines
“As a cloud provider, it really helps if you can defer costs during the infrastructure build-out
phase. The other thing you should do is spread the total cost of the investment to coincide with
customer on-boarding and the arrival of revenue. Cisco Capital is the ideal partner.”
Dante Orsini, Senior Vice President, Business Development, iland
Challenge
Having established a flourishing cloud infrastructure
business with multiple data centers in the United States
and U.K. iland set its sights on enhancing and expanding
its global footprint to address the needs of its growing
customer base. Dante Orsini, senior vice president, business
development, says: “We wanted to strengthen our
European capabilities and saw the U.K. as a natural hosting
and interconnection point. That’s attractive to clients
looking to get into the market as well as organisations
placing importance on data sovereignty.”
The preferred choice for the new data centers was to
discard cumbersome rack-mount servers in favour of an
agile, converged platform. Delivered using a modular pod
design, this cloud infrastructure was based on Cisco Unified
Computing System™ (UCS®) with Fabric Interconnects
and Nexus® switches. The platform offers a compelling
alternative for organisations wanting to rapidly deploy cloud
services, without large upfront investment and lengthy
procurement lead times.
Equally important was a procurement strategy that would
maximise iland’s balance sheet performance and bring
forward service profitability.
Solution
Results
“Having the extra flexibility to include Cisco SMARTnet
was a big advantage,” says Justin Giardina, the iland chief
technology officer. “We were able to complete the high
level design, get the kit and start testing very quickly,
knowing we had full access to Cisco technical support
plus a four-hour hardware replacement service.”
Several months on and with the enhanced London- and
Manchester-based facilities up and running, iland is
delighted with the performance of its Cisco technology.
Giardina says: “We’re particularly impressed with the new
levels of speed and agility. UCS allows us to automate
how we deploy cloud services, so we know we have a
repeatable data center infrastructure every time. And
we’ve not had any problems to date.”
Like its customers, iland has embraced cloud without
exhausting capital expenditure budgets. Taking a Cisco
Capital® Finance Lease allowed the company to spread
the cost of the Cisco® equipment over three years via 10
quarterly invoices. Set up as a Master Lease Agreement
for easy administration, the finance solution postponed
billing with an initial six-month payment holiday. In addition,
it helped iland make budgets stretch by offering a very
competitive interest rate.
In many cases iland operates fixed-price-based contracts
so financial forecasting is accurate and easy to manage.
That level of predictability changes financial models
completely in the world of consumption-based billing. For
example, consider a university that needs to adjust capacity
up and down to handle student intake at the start of the
academic year. In this case, the ability to smooth cash flow
makes a huge difference.
Cisco Capital helped facilitate the company’s business
expansion. Dante Orsini concludes: “As a cloud provider,
it really helps if you can defer costs during the
infrastructure build-out phase. The other thing you should
do is spread the total cost of the investment to coincide
with customer on-boarding and the arrival of revenue.
Cisco Capital is the ideal partner.”
For more information please visit:
www.ciscocapital.com/emea
© 2014 Cisco Systems, Inc. All rights reserved. Cisco, the Cisco logo, and Cisco Systems are trademarks or registered trademarks of Cisco Systems, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the United States and certain other countries. All other trademarks
mentioned in this document or website are the property of their respective owners. The use of the word partner does not imply a partnership relationship between Cisco and any other company. (1003R)
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