Partner Solution Case Study
/ / IT Solution Providers Save Time with Assessment and Deployment Solution
Overview
Country or Region:United States
Industry:Software
Partner Profile
CIO-CTO for Hire and Design Enterprises, two IT consulting firms based in Colorado, specialize in providing end-to-end solutions to small and midsize businesses in a range of industries.
Business Situation
Luca Technologies needed to consolidate separate networks and operating systems in its two offices into one location. The company also needed a more reliable, more secure system.
Solution
Luca hired CIO-CTO for Hire and Design Enterprises, who deployed Microsoft®network infrastructure software using the Assessment and Deployment Solution for Midsize Businesses (ADS).
Benefits
Fast, accurate assessment
Faster deployment
Cost savings
More secure infrastructure
Improved productivity / “It only took two hours at each Luca office for the tool (ADS) to run the inventory. If we’d physically done that ourselves, it would have taken… 8 to 23 hours of manual labor with a network of 30-plus machines.”
Blake Ressmeyer, President, CIO-CTO for Hire
IT consulting firm CIO-CTO for Hire provides software solutions to small and midsize businesses. The company was recently asked to deploy new solutions for a biotechnology company that needed to consolidate its various networks and operating systems and wanted a more reliable system with better security. It also required a short deployment time. To help the company reach those goals, CIO-CTO and its partner, Design Enterprises, used the Microsoft® Assessment and Deployment Solution for Midsize Businesses (ADS), a tool targeted at network infrastructure software. Using this automated solution, the two consulting firms reduced their installation time by one-third and saved thousands of dollars in the process. In addition, the biotechnology company now has a standardized, secure, and well-managed network that is easy to maintain.
Situation
CIO-CTO for Hire and Design Enterprises, two IT consulting firms based in Colorado, specialize in providing end-to-end solutions to small and midsize businesses in a range of industries. Both companies are Microsoft® Gold Certified Partners that have worked together on various training and solution deployment projects.
One of the companies’ customers is Luca Technologies, a privately funded energy technology company based in Golden, Colorado. Luca had two separate offices with two separate Linux-based networks, along with various operating systems and different kinds of workstations. “They had things scattered everywhere,” says Blake Ressmeyer, President of CIO-CTO for Hire. “They had an unreliable hosted e-mail server in addition to their Linux/Windows network. They really needed to have more control over their data, which is important in their field.”
In addition, the company’s hardware and software were not up-to-date, which caused regular service disruptions and made the company vulnerable to security problems. However, because of limited funds for outside IT help, Luca knew it needed a cost-effective solution. The company also needed a solution that could be deployed quickly, because it was in the process of relocating to a new office over Thanksgiving weekend 2005.
“We were really faced with a challenge,” says Frank Clark, Owner, Design Enterprises. “We had to deploy a solution in three days, but because they had so many issues we needed to solve, it was a big project for us.”
Solution
CIO-CTO for Hire and Design Enterprises decided to utilize the Microsoft Assessment and Deployment Solution for Midsize Businesses (ADS), a tool targeted at network infrastructure software. ADS automates the deployment of a three-server topology based on the Microsoft® Windows®line of server software, Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 Standard Edition communication and collaboration server, and Microsoft Operations Manager (MOM) 2005 Workgroup Edition. Microsoft partners can also use the tool to help customers such as Luca migrate to Windows Server 2003 from other operating systems, including Linux.
ADS is available free of charge to Microsoft Registered, Certified, and Gold Certified Partners who provide IT implementation services to customers with 50 to 249 personal computers. Partners are required to own licenses for Microsoft Word 2003 Professional and Microsoft Visio 2003 Professional drawing and diagramming software for the computer on which the ADS tool will be installed.
Benefits
The Microsoft Assessment and Deployment Solution for Midsize Businesses enabled CIO-CTO for Hire and Design Enterprises to quickly assess the Luca IT environment, create a professional proposal and planning document, and automate deployment of the recommended three-server topology. The tool also helped the two consulting companies reduce overall deployment time and save money. In addition, the newly installed ADS solution provides Luca with a more reliable, more secure infrastructure that saves time and money that would otherwise be spent fixing network problems.
Fast, Accurate Assessment
Using ADS, CIO-CTO for Hire and Design Enterprises were able to quickly assess the IT environment at Luca and generate a project proposal and deployment plan for server migration. This fast analysis and proposal ability gave the consultants the ability to generate a detailed migration and installation plan. “It only took two hours at each Luca office for the tool to run the inventory,” says Ressmeyer. “If we’d physically done that ourselves, it would have taken a minimum of 15 to 45 minutes per machine. That’s a total of 8 to 23 hours of manual labor with a network with 30-plus machines.”
“Ultimately, this tool helps us quickly deliver accurate proposals to our customers, in addition to finding out precisely what they have at their locations,” says Clark. “It was much more detailed and accurate than any other method we could have used.”
Faster Deployment
Thanks to the fast planning and deployment features of ADS, the consultants were able to deploy the server solution in less than 7 hours. “The setup went flawlessly, and we were able to save a couple days of work just on the server setup time,” says Ressmeyer. “ADS reduced our deployment by at least one-third. Instead of spending our project time loading applications and babysitting the servers, we had more time to spend on other areas.”
Quick deployment time was obviously a major factor for the consultant team, because of the Thanksgiving weekend request by Luca. “We were definitely under a time crunch,” says Clark. “But ADS allowed us to handle it without any problems. We installed the three servers, built the server room, and connected all their systems in those three days. We had no deployment issues at all. We’ll definitely save time for our business in every instance where we use this tool to do a solution deployment.”
Cost Savings
“There’s no question that the tool saved us money,” says Ressmeyer. “With what we bill per hour, if we save four days per customer, that’s a savings of more than U.S.$4,000. We can then pass on our savings to the customer, which is what we did with this project.”
More Secure Infrastructure
In addition to the advantages that ADS has given CIO-CTO for Hire and Design Enterprises, the tool has given Luca a consolidated network and server system that is much more reliable and secure. “We needed an easily maintained system, and that’s exactly what this gives us,” says Kinna McDavid, Database Analyst, Luca. “Domain control is much better for us now. In fact, we have an intern who handles all our maintenance work now. Previously, we had to rely on outside IT help to do that.”
E-mail problems are also a thing of the past at Luca. “By taking our e-mail off the Linux-based service and moving to this solution, we now have more secure e-mail, and we’re using the industry standard products,” says Christie Haas, Vice President, Administration, Luca Technologies. “With the old system, attachments were always difficult to open and remote viewing was also very hard. It’s great not having e-mail disruptions, which were terrible for productivity.”
Improved Productivity
Because ADS enables Luca to operate in a more reliable, more secure IT environment, the company’s employees now have more time available for research. “That’s what the company needs to be spending time on,” says Haas. “And my job is to help our employees—the scientists. When the Linux system went down, it took lots of my time. I spent way too much time trying to fix network issues and working on repairing e-mail problems. We also had to call outside consultants and spend a lot of time and money on fixing things.”
As the company grows, the recommended network topology provides the ability to better manage remote workstations, according to Clark. “The 3-server topology ADS deployed will ultimately enable Luca to grow to whatever size it wants,” says Clark. “The MOM server in particular will really help them out long-term as far as monitoring servers and workstations.”
Assessment and Deployment Solution (ADS)
To downloadADS, visit the Microsoft Partner site at:
This solution is available for free to all Microsoft Registered, Certified and Gold Certified Partners.
Resources
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