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Change management for the data center

“It’s not just about servers or storage or virtualization,” says Barry O’Connell, Director of HP Data Center Transformation Services. “It’s about the whole thing, either because of ‘technology sprawl’ or because the governance processes are broken.” When that happens, he says, “No one controls what’s coming in or how the data center sets standards.”

Competitive conditions also increase the pressure. Costs have to be minimized. Customers demand ‘always-on’ access to services. Relocation may be required to get better pricing for space, lower energy costs, better transportation or telecommunications, or better technology skills. And every enterprise seeks to automate as much as possible, so skilled data center staff can work on service improvement.

Mastering the mix

“There’s a lifecycle customers go through in data center transformation,” says O’Connell. “HP can help at any stage, if they’re starting with a blank sheet of paper, if they’ve done the strategy work and need help designing the new data center, or if they’ve done all that and just need help with the heavy lifting—implementing solutions, reconfiguring hardware, even moving the boxes.”

HP has experienced its own data center transformation. The three-year process embraces data center consolidation, platform consolidation and standardization, and large increases in processing power, storage capacity and network bandwidth. HP has consolidated 85 global data centers into three data center pairs, reduced technology operational spending to two percent of revenue, cut energy consumption by about 60 percent, and halved networking costs.

But the real transformation has come in faster worldwide application deployment and integration of new acquisitions, increased responsiveness, improved quality of service and enhanced business continuity and security.

In addition, HP recently unveiled HP Critical Facility (related article) Data Center Consolidation, and Virtualization services. The new services help customers optimize the use of energy and space, offer them transition support for data center consolidation, and guide them in creating virtual infrastructures.

The big switch

The full potential of data center transformation was demonstrated when Canada-based Mitel Networks, a global leader in Voice Over IP (VOIP) business communications, had to stay ahead of a rapidly changing market. In addition, the looming acquisition of Inter-Tel, a provider of PBX and key telephone systems, was going to more than double the size of the company, promising extra strain if systems weren’t flexible enough to scale while delivering essential services.

Moreover, infrastructure was an increasing drag on the business. It took six weeks to deliver more processing or capacity. The relationship between business and IT was strained and capacity utilization was poor.

“When we acquired servers, we would buy extra capacity to handle expected future growth,” says David Grant, Mitel’s Data Center Manager. “Initially, that extra capacity would sit unused. At the end of the box’s life cycle, we’d ramp down usage again, so once again the server’s capacity would be underutilized. We were essentially wasting computing resources.”

Mitel’s strategy: reduce server count and virtualize. Mitel partnered with HP Services, consolidating from 12 servers to two—and halving the number of processors in the boxes. It also moved to a virtualized environment, adopting HP StorageWorks Enterprise Virtual Arrays (EVAs).

The new architecture has reduced annual operating expenses by $300,000 while reducing staff demand by almost one third. The HP Virtual Server Environment enables Mitel to cut software licensing costs, but also add services without needing new servers. IT governance is now backed up by end-to-end visibility over new services delivered in the virtualized environment.

The company is now well positioned for the Inter-Tel acquisition. “We’re going to be consolidating and integrating the two companies’ infrastructures, essentially transforming our data centers,” Grant says. “It’s the vision we had for our architecture: to be able to handle explosive growth whether through acquisition or increased sales.”

“We have services that will help no matter what a customer’s entry point is,” says John Aiken, HP Data Center Transformation Practice Principal. “We can tell where customers are and what part of the stack is going to give them the biggest return in the short term, but also ensure it’s part of a longer-term vision that transforms what they have today to a next-generation data center.”

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