CHC Scotia
Download: CHC Scotia
PROJECT SPEC
Virtualisation of 35 servers and installation of data recovery system
INDUSTRY
Transport – Helicopters Search & Rescue
Oil & Gas
SIZE
Operating from 30 Countries World Wide
Turnover £122.4m per annum
BUSINESS CHALLENGE
Cost of managing large server estate and time associated with recovery of crashed servers
SOLUTION
Fully virtualise environment using VMware, increase manageability, drive down resource cost and increase speed of recovery for systems
RESULTS
- Increase Manageability of environment
- Decrease cost of resource
- Decrease running costs
- Vastly speed up recovery times
- Operate Greener environment
INTEREST AREAS
Virtualisation / Disaster Recovery
KEY SERVICES
VMware Consultancy / Symantec Consultancy
CORE TECHNOLOGIES
Active Directory 2003
Exchange 2003
"We had read a lot in the press about the benefits of virtualisation but didn't appreciate until fully engaging with Capito, the true value that it gave to our business. Not only have we saved money but we are now running a far more manageable, efficient environment."
Scott Murray - Head of Global Systems & Solutions Europe
Customer overview
CHC are a helicopter company and a world leader in Search and Rescue, rescue training and repair/overhaul. CHC oversees its three operating divisions (CHC Global Operations, CHC European Operations and Heli-One) from its global headquarters in Vancouver, Canada.
CHC Global operations is based in Vancouver, Canada; CHC European Operations is based in Aberdeen, Scotland; and Heli-One is based in Delta, Canada CHC operates a modern fleet of medium and heavy, twin-engine helicopters to support its operations in the UK.
To service oil and gas customers in Scotland, CHC utilizes its principal base in the UK, located in Aberdeen. CHC has access to extensive local support facilities, located around the Aberdeen airport base. The company also has bases in North Denes and Humberside, to support customers in the southern sector of the North Sea; and a base in Blackpool, England to support customers in the Irish Sea. CHC employs a workforce of approximately 460 people in support of oil and gas operations in the UK.
Business need
To improve the resiliency and performance of their IT infrastructure by delivering a more manageable/cost effective environment The major driving factors behind the project are:
- Improve server utilisation.
- Improve DR capability of existing infrastructure.
- Reduce power usage.
How Capito helped
Before the new operating system, CHC ran over 30 servers which is a both resource hungry to manage and expensive. Running several different machines and applications, it was very difficult to pro-actively manage this infra-structure and respond to any issue with the hardware.
By delivering a VMware solution, we were able to vastly reduce the management time required in terms of continual monitoring plus we could pro-actively aggregate server utilization to avoid any one server becoming over loaded. Capito also delivered disaster recovery solution to sit along side VMware – this Symantec solution helped speed up recovery of data.
To ensure that this new system was 100% effective, Capito also specified a suitable SAN infrastructure to host this solution. The design was such that CHC can grow their business safe in the knowledge that their was plenty of capacity to facilitate their own Company growth. Capito engineers helped install the SAN system.
Results
Reduced cost as a result of less resource time allocated to management of servers. More up time due to the proactive VMware solution allowing the IT department to identify and stop an issue before they happen. A single platform to build from with a clear road map of available capacity. Finally reduced costs on hardware procurement and air conditioning whilst vastly reducing carbon emissions. This solution will also enable CHC Scotia to:
- Consolidate existing servers using physical to virtual migration.
- Incorporate the benefits of VMware in their Disaster Recovery and Backup solution.
- Produce an infrastructure that is compatible with future technology roadmaps.
- Benefit from VMware VI3 technologies such as High Availability, Distributed Resource Scheduler (Load Balancing) and VMotion (ZERO downtime server maintenance).