G Cloud Uk Meetup
Stuart McCaul, Director - EMEA, Basho Technologies
Saving lives, doing
business with
G-Cloud III
Stuart McCaul, Director - EMEA, Basho Technologies
Connect: @_stu_
2nd October 2013
Shhh!
• PR embargo until 8th October
The Big NHS Computer
• Keep a record of non-clinical information about every one who is treated by the NHS
• Allow the NHS to run off the NHS Number
• Keep a record for every prescription made by a GP
• And manage its state changes from Prescribe to Payment
• Keep a record of everyone’s current medication and adverse reactions
• And make it available when clinically necessary
• Over 20,000 integrated endpoints
• Over 500 (complex) messages per second
• A “zero data loss” requirement and a 99.9% availability requirement
The Problem
Failure
Riak – good for what?
• Protecting our data
• Through replication
• Through eventual consistency
• Through siblings
• Consistency of performance of Key-Value operations
• We know how many disk seeks are involved in each operation
• It defers activity to smooth performance
• Scaling by adding more nodes
• Disk space
• Volume
• Commodity hardware
Riak – good for what?
• The replacement Spine
• Can hit greater volumes
• With up to 90% reduction in response times
• With 99th percentile response times at or below
previous average
• .... with <5% of the hardware costs
• This is in part about allowing us to be lazy about fixing
• And making it easier to recover from failure
• Expecting to save over 200 QALY per annum just on
infrastructure
Riak – good for what?
• “In short: using Riak to insure high data availability helps
avoid health risks and in the worst case, patient death.”
- Martin Sumner, NHS HSCIC
The deal
Procurement surprises
• NHS -> DH -> Cabinet -> DH -> NHS
• 9 Signatories on PO
• DH signed G-Cloud form
• G-Cloud / Basho framework agreement was
reviewed by lawyers at NHS and DH
• 2 year maximum contract
• Process took 3 months
Questions?

Stuart McCaul, Director - EMEA, Basho Technologies

  • 1.
    G Cloud UkMeetup Stuart McCaul, Director - EMEA, Basho Technologies
  • 2.
    Saving lives, doing businesswith G-Cloud III Stuart McCaul, Director - EMEA, Basho Technologies Connect: @_stu_ 2nd October 2013
  • 3.
    Shhh! • PR embargountil 8th October
  • 4.
    The Big NHSComputer • Keep a record of non-clinical information about every one who is treated by the NHS • Allow the NHS to run off the NHS Number • Keep a record for every prescription made by a GP • And manage its state changes from Prescribe to Payment • Keep a record of everyone’s current medication and adverse reactions • And make it available when clinically necessary • Over 20,000 integrated endpoints • Over 500 (complex) messages per second • A “zero data loss” requirement and a 99.9% availability requirement
  • 5.
  • 6.
  • 7.
    Riak – goodfor what? • Protecting our data • Through replication • Through eventual consistency • Through siblings • Consistency of performance of Key-Value operations • We know how many disk seeks are involved in each operation • It defers activity to smooth performance • Scaling by adding more nodes • Disk space • Volume • Commodity hardware
  • 8.
    Riak – goodfor what? • The replacement Spine • Can hit greater volumes • With up to 90% reduction in response times • With 99th percentile response times at or below previous average • .... with <5% of the hardware costs • This is in part about allowing us to be lazy about fixing • And making it easier to recover from failure • Expecting to save over 200 QALY per annum just on infrastructure
  • 9.
    Riak – goodfor what? • “In short: using Riak to insure high data availability helps avoid health risks and in the worst case, patient death.” - Martin Sumner, NHS HSCIC
  • 10.
  • 11.
    Procurement surprises • NHS-> DH -> Cabinet -> DH -> NHS • 9 Signatories on PO • DH signed G-Cloud form • G-Cloud / Basho framework agreement was reviewed by lawyers at NHS and DH • 2 year maximum contract • Process took 3 months
  • 12.