Technology has the potential to revolutionize the way we do business. But many organizations struggle with IT applications, networks, and infrastructure that no longer meet their growing business needs. With the onset of big data, mobility and cloud, the needs of IT are changing. Meeting the challenge requires finding innovative ways to respond to business needs, with greater flexibility, faster technology innovation and providing greater business value.
Numerous organizations possess complex networks with servers and clustered systems distributed across numerous locations. This leads to a server infrastructure that:
- Is costly to attain and maintain;
- Can be problematic to administer and secure;
- Prevents effective performance of compliance policies and procedures;
- Consumes considerable energy resources; and
- Processes information at a slow pace.
Below are 4 tips to help your organization optimize its IT infrastructure.
1. Simplify your data center
The first step toward a more optimized infrastructure begins with simplifying the existing system. To simplify the data center an assessment of your organization’s IT infrastructure is essential. An evaluation of the IT infrastructure will help eliminate redundancies and any applications that you no longer need or use. An IT infrastructure assessment can help your organization:
Maximize agility;
Reduce license costs;
Increase server utilization;
Enhance return on capital;
Increase operational efficiency;
Minimize total cost of ownership; and
Lessen power and space consumption.
2. Increase utilization with a reduced number of servers
Many organizations waste valuable data center space and storage with an unnecessary number of servers, which leads to increased energy and labor costs. Running your IT infrastructure with fewer servers that are virtualized and more effectively leveraged can have a dramatic overall effect: 60% to 80% reduction in data center space.
3. Simplify the network cabling infrastructure
Maintaining a complex IT network also necessitates the added cost and space generated by accommodating an unnecessarily larger cable hardware infrastructure. By lessening the intricacy of networking and cabling hardware, expenses can be decreased by saving on floor space and unnecessary cable replacement.
4. Automate processes
As your IT infrastructure grows in complexity, your compliance and risk management challenges increase and so do the pressures to reduce headcount and costs. Like many IT leaders, you may be thinking about IT process automation to realize efficiencies, improve productivity, and enable your staff to concentrate on projects that add value to the organization. By automating manual processes, data centers can immediately benefit from improved efficiency. Implementing automation within the IT infrastructure also allows quicker diagnosis of system problems, and improved performance and uptime.
The Litcom approach
Litcom provides technology infrastructure expertise and skilled resources to assist our clients in a variety of technology infrastructure capacities including:
Conducting assessment of server and communication platform, network, and data centres/server rooms
- Litcom’s Technical Architects perform detailed infrastructure assessments and analysis of servers, storage, power, and cooling technologies. We identify weak points and provide recommendations for data center optimization.
Disaster Recovery planning, testing and rollout
- Natural catastrophes and other physical threats to IT are occurring more frequently. Possible risks include major power outages, earthquakes, floods and cyber-attacks. Disaster recovery (DR) is a holistic strategy including people, processes, policies, and technologies. It focuses on restoring the IT systems critical to supporting business functions. If you don’t have a DR strategy yet, we can help you create your own plan for the systems you host or have outsourced. Our disaster recovery specialists can review your environment and propose a mix of resiliency tools that can help you achieve your recovery targets.
Compliance assessment and remediation
- Litcom specialists work with our clients to interpret the regulations or standards associated with their business (e.g. Payment Card Industry [PCI]) and help them figure out what it will take to comply. Once complete, we collaborate with our client to identify pertinent compliance gaps and provide practical recommendations to close those gaps.