Case Study
One of the Leading Banks in UAE Fights COVID-19 with Desktop Virtualization
When the world was shutting down due to Covid-19, how one bank moved all its employees to Cloud VDI to ensure that they safely work from home and in the matter of days. This solution now is the new normal and the long term innovation strategy of this Bank which is 100% in compliance to Security and data regulations which utilizing the full potential of the cloud native platform architecture with highly reduced TCO and improves user experience.
ICE – Concept of Infrastructure Efficiency with Cloud VDI
Within IT Infrastructure management the idea of capital investment cycle’s year of year driving up operational costs was not a new phenomenon. When we start looking at managed options available from public cloud vendors, the ability to segregate and bifurcate the platform based on business function and demanding utmost efficiency from the spends becomes possible. The basic criteria on which platform options are segregated are public or private utilization (based on mode of connectivity, if the service is available via network access like LAN, WAN, VPN etc then this is considered as private traffic or if it is via a published internet access layer then it is public traffic) or consistently or inconsistently consumed Infrastructure. VDI in principle is a private inconsistently consumed solution which with Multi-session eco-system can provide drastic cost savings and operational efficiencies on hyperscale public cloud eco-system.
About Managed VDICE
Intertec’s Managed VDICE is delivered to customers as a fully integrated service reducing the perils of management of end user computing to just hardware support and access to internet access. Intertec’s Managed VDICE option utilizes a combination of Microsoft managed PaaS service – Windows Virtual desktop along with a combination of 3 unique IP-Cosell solutions that are proprietary developments of Intertec along with 4 more partner IPs that allow us to deliver a completely unique value proposition most suited for organizations looking for adherence to Enterprise grade security, Service availability and Data compliance standards, with central management and control.
Available Options
- Managed VDICE with Native VPN Connectivity
- Managed VDICE with Network as a Service over Enhanced Internet Options
- Managed VDICE with Citrix Cloud Management Layer
- Managed VDICE with Hybrid Citrix Management Layer
- Managed Desktop as a Service.
6000 VDI Users Delivered
Performance Delivered
Compliance Delivered
Management Delivered
AS-IS State Analysis – Mid 2019
The customer had 4000 active users running on an On-Premise VDI Architecture on a Legacy HCI eco-system and planned to expand this footprint to 7000 users. The idea of Hybrid expansion into Azure was being considered with the native Virtualization tool for desktop and app player utilizing Azure VMs as a simple Infrastructure replacing the existing HCI architecture along with Azure also being considered as a business continuity platform. The expansion of the primary eco-system was a far fetched idea considering that the concept of a banking user based natively running out of a public cloud platform was unheard of in the GCC region. Intertec Cloud team engaged with the customer in Mid of 2019 with a clear motive to maximize the footprint of the entire user base on Public cloud ecosystem to deliver maximum consumption efficiency utilizing the inconsistent consumption patterns, Multi-session deployment strategy and utilizing auto-scaling capabilities to ensure that maximum cost savings are delivered to the customer.
To achieve this result we started a comprehensive AS-IS state analysis engagement which was our investment into understanding as to how we can deliver comprehensive value around our approach. The topics of our engagement included:
- Understanding the current VDI Setup
- Understanding the Active directory setup and future movement into a Hybrid Platform architecture
- End Point Device compliance and End point management
- Network Connectivity, integration and security
- Existing Data platforms
- Existing Microsoft Agreements and consumption
- Existing Business Functions
- Existing Locations
- Network Bandwidth
- ISP contracts if any
- Intertec Managed Storage Platform on Azure
- Intertec Managed End point , Software defined thin client architecture
- Intertec Managed Network Fabric Architecture
- Intertec Managed VDICE with Hybrid Citrix Option
- Intertec Integrated solution for Express route
Post Covid-19: A Race against time
When the world was hit by COVID-19, a lock down was imminent in March 2020. By this time the bank had invested time and effort with us on understanding and testing the deployment eco-system and were ready to take full advantage of this investment. When the HR requested the IT to ensure that users can continuity to operate to work from home we stepped into action.
On Day one we setup the landing zone in a green field subscription and tenant. We setup the first Storage cluster the Active directory setup, the VPN and the rules and policies. Since then ever 2-3 days we were deploying 1000 user pools into the setup and by day 15 we had 6000 active users 6 storage nodes and a policy and control which ensured that no user or department faced the challenge of unavailability of the service.
During this time the BANK, Microsoft and Intertec worked closely as a single team under lockdown from our homes to ensure that the service is delivered and created a success. All along Intertec controlled the entire deployment architecture, the scope and the policy which was checked and verified on every step of the process by global experts on the pass service.
Post deployment Intertec submitted a host of comprehensive documents to showcase the deployment, the remediation, the change management workflow, and the self-service architecture. Today all the users are managed by Intertec team and it is the new normal projected to be active atleast for the next 3 years in this environment and users even after returning to work or field will continue to use this platform as it improved their performance and ability to work from anywhere.