Majenta in Ford's driving seat
Storage specialist wins Innovator of the Month for a disk-mirroring project.
July's Computer Reseller News/Syscap Approved Technology Innovator of the Month proved that you don't have to be big to address the needs of the corporate market.
Automotive systems and storage specialist Majenta Systems has only 30 staff, yet it claimed the award for a disk-mirroring project that it undertook for car giant Ford.
Like most large organisations, Ford is looking for ways to save money on its IT budget and make its systems more secure and reliable.
When it started to look at ways to improve the back-up regime for its engineering systems in the UK and Germany, and provide its team with the resources it needed, Majenta, which had already done some work with the company, was called in to assist.
"We have broken new ground with this solution and used the tools in the way they are supposed to be used," said Clive Stedman, major accounts manager at Majenta.
The system used Network Appliance network attached storage units and an intelligent mirroring software system called Enigma. It consists of a 42TB storage network with 7TB that are constantly mirrored.
No additional wide area network infrastructure or dark fibre was required to link the two locations. Low-cost disks are used as archive resources and data is migrated to ensure that the performance of first-line storage is maintained. The system has replaced one that used tape back-ups.
Steve Kemp, at Ford's engineering support team, explained that Majenta's solution has increased resilience and reduced costs.
"We had five or six different servers and this has removed all of them. There has been a significant cost saving," he said.
"The machine Majenta provided is very cost-effective. It may not be the latest cutting-edge technology but it has done the job for us."
The support and training Majenta provided was also a valuable part of the solution, according to Kemp. Majenta dealt with the initial set-up but then trained Ford's own staff to swap-out disks and provide general maintenance.
This is better than relying on an external resource, he claimed, because Ford is such a large organisation.
"It means minimum disruption for our [internal] customers, and this is especially important as the system is a critical one," said Kemp.
He added that having the engineering data mirrored in this way is reassuring because some of the simulations and models that the engineers run can take several hours or even days to be completed.
Therefore it is important to ensure that the results are stored securely and that previous results can be accessed quickly.
"Backing up to tape takes too long but, with this solution, once it's there it is mirrored and is very robust. It will save us a lot of money," said Kemp.
Majenta also used some creative financing to make the investment easier for Ford. It provided a leasing agreement which means that the manufacturer will not have to start making payments for six months after installation.
This will enable Ford to set up a system that makes proportionate charges on internal customers for their use of data storage.
Colin Barker, editor-in-chief of joint awards sponsor Computing, said that the Ford project is an example of how smaller integrators can provide a valuable service for large firms.
"It sets a good example to other reseller businesses and to large organisations. It's easy to just go to the largest or the best-known supplier of technology, but biggest doesn't always mean best," he said.
"It's often the smaller, more versatile resellers that come up with the most innovative answers to difficult problems."
Lisa Little, marketing manager at co-sponsor IT financing specialist Syscap, added that smaller resellers should not be put off taking on large-scale projects.
"This example demonstrates that, if they deliver something that is of real value to the customer, small resellers can win big business," she said.
"A system of this size would involve a substantial seven-figure investment from the customer, but there is no reason why firms such as Majenta can't go for significant contracts."
ARE YOU A WINNER?
The Approved Technology Innovator of the Month award is sponsored by Syscap and supported by CRN and its sister title Computing.
This year there are 11 monthly Innovator awards and the winners will be put forward as candidates for two annual awards that will be presented at the Channel Awards in November.
You can enter your supplier or your own company for the awards by visiting www.crn.vnunet.com and clicking on the Technology Innovator button.