Case Study: How IT Consolidation Added Up to Savings for One City Government

Customer Situation

For one state’s largest city — which also happens to be the state capital and a hub of commerce, banking, government, and education — growing data needs were literally threatening to encroach on other areas of City Hall. Supporting all of city government as well as police and fire operations, the main data center was filled to capacity, forcing IT staff to set up mechanical closets on other floors of the building to supplement the city’s data networking needs. The result was an unwieldy data platform that was increasingly taking up too much physical space and becoming more difficult to manage and maintain.

S1 Solution

S1 IT Solutions proposed consolidating the data network by utilizing IBM BladeCenter to contain the city’s entire IT platform in a smaller space within the main data center. The solution also includes VMware software for creating a consolidated virtual server environment to help the city better utilize its existing data resources.

Replacing nine large server stacks in three locations throughout the building, the IBM BladeCenter solution uses vertical blades within a chassis, resulting in a more compact, three-rack system confined to one area of the city’s main data center. Staged over the course of a year, the implementation involved integrating new blade servers, storage, and networking, as well as upgrading power and HVAC systems.

While the city’s own IT team serviced the solution themselves, they had high praise for the responsiveness and technical assistance they received from the staff at S1 IT Solutions during the implementation.

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