Virtualization At Work: Improved Productivity

The basics of virtualization suggest that it's a good fit for any company looking to improve productivity and lower costs � our examination of typical business benefits supports that assessment. But can technologies like data virtualization really improve corporate productivity? Let's put this idea to work.

Calling All Data

Canadian telecommunications provider Telus � which sees almost $10 billion in revenue per year and has more than 12 million customers � needed a way to deliver subscriber data to multiple business units. Existing methods weren't working, since the data in question lived in two unique environments and the combined challenge of finding the right data in a timely fashion and getting it to the right business unit was proving to be a headache. Ideally, this consumer information could help Telus improve targeted marketing campaigns and increase their speed of service, but without reliable distribution, potential productivity was going down the drain.

Meet in the Middle

The specifics of Telus's problem were actually quite simple: two sets of data in different places. One set was on-premises while the other was cloud-based. As a result, performing any kind of unified analytics became a problem since data from both sources had to be managed independently and then linked together before being sent to business units. Even worse, some of this data was duplicated across both systems, leading to unnecessary analysis and avoidable IT costs.

Data Virtualization

Telus chose a data virtualization solution to solve its productivity problem � by making it appear as though all data existed on a single, massive virtual machine (VM) it was possible for the company to quickly find the information needed by business units, avoid duplication and effectively create a single view of data for end users. This �virtual data layer� hid complexity by abstracting data services, leading to improved app development speed and the ability to scale up data warehousing on demand. Ultimately, Telus enjoyed a 50 percent reduction in solution time to market along with 25 percent increased efficiency, all from virtualizing disparate data sources.

Your Use Case

Data is often �siloed� across an organization. In some cases, these silos are simple: on-premises and cloud-based data sets that don't easily interact. For many companies, however, the problem goes deeper � information stored half a world away, in third-party servers or closely guarded by specific business units for fear they'll lose control. Data virtualization offers the productivity solution to this silo problem: don't move your data; instead, change your perception. Using a virtualized environment, the location of your information becomes irrelevant, because logical abstraction makes it appear as though all servers share the same data silo. The productivity of app development, analytics and reporting systems increase across the board, and without a massive price tag.

Want to make the most of your compute resources? ICC has experts ready to support your virtualization. Contact us today and discover the real benefits of going virtual.

-Written by Srijay Sunil