CASE STUDY
NOMAD FOR SCCM UPGRADE
NOMAD REDUCES SCCM RUNNING COSTS BY $9.8 MILLION World’s leading learning company chooses Nomad to operate System Center 2012 Configuration Manager for its estate of 32,000 PCs in the most cost-effective manner, and in the process reduces number of system management servers to just six
Challenge
Solutions
Benefits
The company wanted to standardize globally on the Microsoft System Center 2012 Configuration Manager (SCCM 2012) platform. Until 2013 they had been using SCCM 2007 to provide systems management within its European and Latin American operations for some time, whilst other regions of the business such as North America and parts of AsiaPac
The company identified how Nomad significantly reduces the amount of server infrastructure required to support an SCCM 2012 environment whilst actively maximizes reliability and performance. It delivers further efficiencies in managing software distribution and updates, and Operating System deployment tasks.
By standardizing on SCCM 2012, the company has seen the following benefits:
were either using a legacy Microsoft SMS 2003 infrastructure, or in some cases other tactical solutions.
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The SCCM 2012 design for included integration of Nomad to deliver the full breadth of systems management capabilities to all Windows-based Operating System clients across the company’s global desktop estate.
• Removal of 10 Distribution Points, and avoidance of having to invest in 75 Secondary Site servers. • Acceleration of Windows 7 Migration. • A standardized approach to inventory management, software and OS deployments. • Systems management and maintenance has become faster and easier to manage and control. The SCCM 2012 deployment is part of the company’s greater strategy to enhance its systems management and desktop provisioning capabilities.
NOMAD FOR SCCM UPGRADE
Deploying SCCM 2012 Globally Ensures Robust Foundation to Growth Plans The introduction of SCCM 2012, and creating one global systems management standard, would create the foundation for enabling the company’s greater strategy to enhance its systems management, software license efficiency, and desktop provisioning capabilities to the ‘My Cloud’ strategic environment. It will bring further benefits towards a ‘consumerization’-based approach for delivering desktop services to its workforce and desktop IT estate. Until 2013 the company had been using SCCM 2007 to provide systems management within its European and Latin American operations for some time, whilst other regions of the business such as North America and parts of Asia-Pacific were either using a legacy Microsoft SMS 2003 infrastructure, Symantec’s Altiris, or in some cases other tactical solutions.
“ Nomad ensures there is no disruption to the business when applying patches or processing an OS deployment.” The company wanted an automated, resilient, agile and scalable tool that would enhance SCCM 2012 to create efficiencies in managing software distribution, software updates and Operating System deployment tasks. Therefore the company approached 1E to see whether integrating Nomad into their systems management architecture would achieve these goals. “In our existing environment we had some locations with very limited bandwidth, some with legacy systems and some with no systems management at all,” comments the project manager, “We wanted to ensure there would be no disruption to the business to apply patches and have the ability to process an OS deployment in a fail-safe and automated way.” 1E’s Professional Services team demonstrated to the internal architecture teams how Nomad would work. Nomad’s seamless SCCM console integration, its ability to remove secondary servers, the optimization of existing bandwidth, and speed of software and OS image delivery were all key factors in it becoming the company’s clear choice as the most cost-effective and fastest way to distribute software across its entire PC estate. The demonstration led to a couple of validation workshops testing out the product in an evaluation environment, first in the UK and then in the US. Everything was tracked, tested and it all worked as expected. The project was therefore signed off in early July 2013 and just a few weeks later, the project plan was implemented and Nomad was deployed in earnest.
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NOMAD FOR SCCM UPGRADE
$3 Million Cost Avoidance of Buying and Maintaining 85 Servers About Nomad Nomad is the fastest, most costeffective way to distribute software across the enterprise. It enables software to be distributed anywhere, in the fastest way possible, easily and at any time, while removing complexity from the network and drastically reducing the number of servers needed.
“Without Nomad in our SCCM architecture we would have expected to buy 85 systems management servers,” says the project manager, “However we have now been able to remove the need for all secondary sites and have just six servers in our Data Centers: one Central Administration Site (CAS) in New Jersey, then one primary server per region – in North America, South America, Europe, Australia and India.”
“ Without Nomad in our SCCM architecture we would have expected to buy 85 systems management servers. We have now have just six servers to deploy patches and OS images to all 32,000 PCs across the world.” “I can’t speak highly enough of 1E’s professional services consultants who did a fantastic job on helping us determine the new architecture. We worked really well together and, as one of the key challenges we had was being agile, they proved to be very flexible as well as being extremely methodical and were instrumental in helping us meet our project deadlines,” the project manager comments. Nomad, in removing the need for 85 servers in all, delivered transformative cost savings. The investment avoided in buying these 85 new servers accounts for $856,800 in hardware, software and installation and, when operating and maintenance costs are considered, there is another saving of $264,960 a year – so that for a five-year period the total cost avoidance saves the company a total $3,038,400 (assuming a hardware refresh every three years). Another key benefit is the WakeUp functionality. Out-of-hours business updates and patches were not available before the Nomad deployment and there was quite an overhead to coordinate desk-side visits. With WakeUp’s ability to schedule computers to wake up remotely for software and patching updates, the company is able to make substantial savings of $644,448 annually. Significant savings are also realized from Nomad’s automated patch and OS image distribution. With the company migrating off Windows XP to Windows 7, there’s a one-off saving of $492,891 and, using Nomad’s PXE Everywhere capability, there is an on-going annual saving of $536,360 through PXE remote bare metal builds, completely eliminating the need for couriers or desk-side visits.
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NOMAD FOR SCCM UPGRADE
Standardized approach to content delivery About 1E Professional Services The global team of 1E products and systems management experts have extensive knowledge, experience and consulting expertise. 1E consultants, who on average, have more than six years’ experience working with systems management technologies - with a specific focus on Microsoft System Center Configuration Management - provide knowledge and shared insight and best practices on complex Operating System Deployments, implementing SCCM upgrades and rationalizing software, hardware and information architectures for clients large and small.
The project manager is delighted: “By deploying all the infrastructure to our Data Centers has enabled us to have greater coverage and standardize systems management globally. It is a step change from the previous inefficient and nonstandardized state that we can have a standardized approach to inventory management, software and OS deployments across all regions. “ He continues, “Now it is way easier for us to manage and control, and manageability is a key benefit giving us governance all the way through, not to mention the substantial savings that Nomad brings.” The intelligent bandwidth throttling and usage management enables IT to distribute patches and upgrades during the day, rather than having to wait until end-of-day which helps keep the network’s health and security up-to-date. With Nomad fully deployed, the company is set to make savings total of $9.8 million in capital and operating costs over course of the next five years. By fully integrating Nomad into the SCCM 2012 design, the company gains further benefits by ensuring a rapid deployment of the full solution to the global desktop estate. The project was completed in within an aggressive time line of just a few months. The SCCM 2012 infrastructure was designed and implemented in three months (from July to October 2013), and, by accelerating the SCCM 2012 rollout the company is able to further accelerate its Windows 7 migration and achieve full adoption of the Windows 7 OS in a much shorter time than had been currently possible with existing systems.
About 1E 1E’s suite of disruptive IT operations management tools save billions, solve problems and simplify the management of large, complex IT environments – in record time. Designed with a singular focus to help drive down costs, 1E’s solutions include tools for IT asset management, Windows systems management and BYOPC. Contact us UK (HQ): +44 20 8326 3880
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