CASE STUDY:
IIS KEEPS THEIR CLIENT FROM
GETTING A MIGRATION HEADACHE
MISSION ACCOMPLISHED
IIS KEEPS THEIR
CLIENT FROM
GETTING A MIGRATION
HEADACHE
IIS has worked for six years with a leading seller of online business services
that had been a longtime user of HP hardware products. In 2001, IIS began
the first phase of a major server consolidation effort because the system
running all the core business applications for the client’s largest e-commerce
division had ballooned to almost 40 servers. They included the e-commerce
applications directly generating revenue, the business intelligence warehouses,
the data bases that allowed the purchasing department to cut purchase orders,
manufacturing apps, sales force automations that used Siebold for sales
projections and quotas and the SAP programs that ran their invoicing systems.
The result was increasing instances of overlapping functionality.
In the beginning of 2005, when their latest equipment lease period
was coming to its end, IIS moved the client another step forward in the
consolidation process. It was the ideal time for IIS to evaluate the next
generation of business needs and demonstrate that with the flexible
financing they could negotiate with HP for a new platform offering further
consolidation reduced the costs when compared to maintaining the existing
servers past the warranty period.
There were multiple considerations. The client could:
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•
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leverage the latest technical advances to enjoy faster, more efficient
storage and data processing
consolidate servers further to reduce expenses
lease cutting-edge hardware at a highly favorable price
insure sufficient capacity for projected business needs
avoid maintenance costs now they were past the lease warranty period
IIS achieved considerable savings for the client through the architecture of
the server partitioning, and took on the challenge of configuring three large
HP Superdome servers in just 90 days. A phenomenal amount of work was
done between April 2005 and July 2005 to achieve a successful migration
and rehost these applications on the new platform.
WE ARE KNOWN FOR
OUR STRONG PLANNING
SKILLS TO PROVIDE A
SCALABLE SOLUTION
FOR YOUR LONG-TERM
NEEDS.
Since the critical e-commerce business applications were the heart of the
migration, in other hands it would be a high-risk process since a deployment
failure would literally put the client out of business. One of the hallmarks of
IIS is its attention to the planning process. It is through the pre-production
work that the client can be given the assurance that these applications will
run perfectly on the new platform and that there was a good backout plan to
roll applications to another server if necessary.
A further challenge came in the timing restrictions, the scheduling of the
production work for the core apps could only happen overnight and on
weekends, in the off hours. Partitioning of the less critical servers, such as
those handling development and Quality Assurance (QA) could be done
during regular business hours.
“All Superdome partitions have been successfully moved to the new
hardware we recently acquired through negotiations with HP and IIS with no
unscheduled outages to the businesses.”
Reducing IT expenses while increasing efficiency and capacity.
The result was that the client could move its entire division to three high
performance HP Superdomes with a seamless migration effected by IIS in
just 90 days. It was another example of IIS doing whatever it took to get the
job done.
There were marked efficiencies beyond just the leasing cost of the new
platform hardware compared to the cost of maintaining the older collection
of smaller servers. It now took fewer people to manage just three systems
and less time to process jobs, increased performance saved on personnel
costs. With the escalating expenses of running modern data centers,
the use of floor space was greatly reduced, so the client was saving
substantially going forward by reducing the equipment footprint.
Change within an organization is always problematic. IIS understands the
dynamics of change management at every level and is sensitive to the costs.
It takes a considerable investment of not just money but client personnel to
upgrade the system architecture. Clients appreciate that when IIS puts people
on site they are able to work capably with the technical personnel and the
business owners to minimize the internal man hours needed to run a project.
“The migration is a great success story...IIS should be congratulated for an
outstanding and successful job.”
ACHIEVING THE IMPOSSIBLE OVER AND OVER
AGAIN, ON TIME AND ON BUDGET.
Besides managing large, enterprise-wide projects, IIS works closely
throughout the year with the client’s internal IT staff to offer infrastructure
consulting services. Business units regularly need to bring on a stream of
new applications and databases and IIS architects their integration into the
existing system.
The hallmark of IIS is customer service, and one recent project
demonstrates the level of responsiveness clients receive from every member
of the IIS team. In 2006, there was a sudden rate change instituted by
the United States Postal Service that would affect every customer in one
e-commerce division. There hadn’t been a change in more than three years
and by the time the client reached out to IIS there wasn’t even enough
time to lease the equipment needed to accommodate the urgent need for
increased capacity on a temporary basis.
“At every turn IIS demonstrated intense levels of responsiveness.”
The client was in desperate need for an additional HP Superdome server for
the three weeks it would take to ramp up to the critical 24-hour period when
the rates would change. Every customer in this e-Commerce division had to
call into the system at virtually the same time and the applications and the
hardware had to accommodate an intense surge of activity.
The IIS attitude is always, “make it happen” and they proved themselves to
be nimble in meeting the client’s needs. They loaned hardware to the client’s
Atlanta data center and coordinated the delivery and installation with HP while
responding to myriad last minute changes at all hours of the day and night.
“IIS COMES
THROUGH WITH
FLYING COLORS
EVERY TIME, THE
STAFF IS JUST
CRACKERJACK AND
WE KNOW WE CAN
ALWAYS COUNT ON
THEM.”
Successful deployment of the emergency equipment during the postal rate
change was essential to our client’s business survival and dramatically
impacted the ability of each of their customers to conduct their business.
This was truly mission-critical technology. The level of trust that exists
between IIS and its clients is demonstrated by the fact that IIS set out to
meet this challenge without even a purchase order. Their focus was on
getting the job done, no matter what it took.
“IIS comes through with flying colors every time, the staff is just crackerjack
and we know we can always count on them.”
IIS succeeds through its can-do attitude, its nimble technical teams who
can jump right into a challenge, and its great rapport with the client. They
become part of the client organization during an engagement and are able
to understand both the long-term and the short-term goals from the client
perspective and how to add value.