Unleashing IT: Seize Innovation, Accelerate Business, Drive Outcomes. All through the Cloud.

Spring 2013
In collaboration with Intel®
Unleashing IT Seize innovation,
accelerate business,
drive outcomes.
All through the cloud.
• Caribbean forecast:
Cloudy and booming
• Taking a business to the clouds
Technology as
cultural change agent
Louisville Gas and Electric and Kentucky
Utilities Energy LLC is breaking through
longstanding behavioral norms to improve
operating efficiency. Page 8

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Cisco Unified Computing System, Cisco UCS, and Cisco Nexus are trademarks or registered trademarks of Cisco and/or its affiliates in the U.S.
and other countries. To view a list of Cisco trademarks, visit: www.cisco.com/go/trademarks. Third party trademarks mentioned are the property
of their respective owners. The use of the word partner does not imply a partnership relationship between Cisco and any other company. (1304)
Experiences
03 Transforming a business, one cloud at a time
Broadridge is taking its behind-the-scenes financial
services business to the frontlines.
05 World-class technology services in paradise
Curaçao Technology Exchange aims to support a
regional business boom with the Caribbean’s first
tier-IV data center.
08 Technology as cultural change agent,
efficiency booster
Louisville Gas and Electric and Kentucky Utilities Energy
LLC is changing behavioral norms to improve operating
efficiency.
10 The foundation for better business decisions
Staples Australia is extending its business intelligence to
customers and suppliers for greater insight and agility.
12 Brokering the cloud
How Virtacore is transitioning from resource provider to
resource broker.
Education Feature
14 Advancing IT capabilities, despite aging
hardware
With BYOD and VDI, Coppell Independent School
District is extending the life of its infrastructure and
saving $1 million as a result.
15 Supporting meteoric business growth
Liberty University’s rise to the top of private, nonprofit
academia happened faster than expected, creating new
challenges and opportunities.
Cover: Eric Slavinsky, CIO of Louisville Gas and Electric
and Kentucky Utilities Energy LLC
Unleashing IT Seize innovation,
accelerate business,
drive outcomes.
All through the cloud.
Spring 2013
Transforming the nature of
transformation
Not long ago, if you asked an IT executive about
transformation, there was a good chance you’d get
a technology-centric response. You’d hear about
consolidation and virtualization, power and cooling,
security and availability.
Today, the responses are different. This edition
of Unleashing IT is all about transformation. Not
technology change, but business change through
the use of technology.
Over time, the nature of transformation has, well,
transformed. Instead of technology advances for
technology gains, companies have learned they can
use IT to reduce costs, create efficiencies, and solve
problems. And many forward-thinking organizations are
finding that opportunities for transformation are much
broader and more impactful.
Broadridge is using cloud technologies to transform
its service offerings and operating model (page 3).
A prominent utility company is breaking through
longstanding cultural norms to enhance the collective
efficiency of its workforce (page 8). Staples Australia
is extending its business intelligence capabilities to
enhance customer and supplier relationships (page 10).
And Curaçao Technology Exchange is transforming the
business possibilities of an entire region (page 5).
In all of these cases, technology is neither the question
nor the answer. It is simply the enabler of business
opportunities, both small and large.
For more information, follow the links inside or
contact Cisco at 1-800-553-6387 and select option
1 to speak with a Cisco representative. We welcome
your feedback on the articles in this publication at
www.UnleashingIT.com
Sincerely,
Giuliano Di Vitantonio
Vice President
Cisco Systems, Inc.
Lisa Graff
Vice President
Intel Corporation
In collaboration
with Intel®

3Seize innovation, accelerate business, drive outcomes. All through the cloud.
(From left) Broadridge CTO John
Gullotta and Vice President of Corporate
Communications Kelly Howard discuss
business transformation
Experiences
How does an established company grow its
business when it already owns a significant
share of the market? It’s a question that
Broadridge, a leading provider of investor
communications and security processing
solutions for more than 50 years, is
currently answering.
“We help the financial services industry and
corporate issuers operate more efficiently,”
says Kelly Howard, Vice President of
Corporate Communications for Broadridge.
“Our solutions help our clients focus on their
core business activities.”
The solutions to which Howard is referring
have historically been of the behind-
the-scenes, back-office variety. But the
company, which processes nearly five
trillion dollars a day in financial settlements
and facilitates more than one billion investor
communications annually, is transforming its
business to be a frontline technology and
solutions provider.
It’s all part of a strategic, multiyear plan
that started with server virtualization,
continued with data center convergence,
and is now moving toward cloud-based
infrastructure-as-a-service.
“We’re still on the journey,” says John
Gullotta, Senior Vice President and CTO
of Broadridge. “It’s a phased approach
to improving our overall IT capabilities,
focusing on creating a platform that
facilitates business change.”
The journey begins
Broadridge started the virtualization of servers
more than three years ago in an effort to
reduce costs and optimize IT resources.
Following a comprehensive virtualization
How Broadridge is taking its behind-the-scenes
financial services business to the frontlines.
Transforming a business, one
cloud at a time

Unleashing IT4
Gullotta shows off
Broadridge’s new technology
infrastructure (left) and the
operations it is fueling (right)
assessment and maturity modeling, the
company identified the need for and benefits
of a fully converged infrastructure.
“We wanted to align our internal teams,
processes, and technology,” Gullotta
explains. “So we extended our server
virtualization efforts to all functional areas
of the data center.”
Utilizing the Cisco®
Unified Computing
System™ (UCS), which is based on Intel®
Xeon® processors, Broadridge now has a
powerful, converged infrastructure that can
be used as a platform for more efficient
technology services—or entirely new ones.
“We’re just now at the point of leveraging our
converged infrastructure to deliver production
services,” says Gullotta. “From an IT standpoint,
we’re ready to deliver infrastructure-as-
a-service through a private cloud. From a
business standpoint, we’re still determining our
capabilities, our processes, our governance
models, and how to extend internal resources
to external customers and partners.”
The company is currently performing a
comprehensive cloud assessment, he
adds, to establish a roadmap that will meet
Broadridge’s business objectives.
Preparing for change
With a unified infrastructure in place, both
Howard and Gullotta indicate there are
countless ways in which it can be put to use.
Exactly how the new environment is utilized
will be determined by Broadridge business
leaders and the markets they serve.
“The financial services industry continues
to undergo significant change,” explains
Howard. “We can’t predict the future, but we
can be prepared to adapt and stay ahead of
the curve. That’s why we’re not investing in a
solution, but rather a platform that is flexible
and able to support the changes to our
business and our clients’ needs.”
“We want to build our capabilities gradually
to determine our readiness, avoid any risks,
and get comfortable with the environment,”
Gullotta adds. “But then we have an
opportunity to extend those capabilities.”
Broadridge is planning to create an internal
private cloud that allows the company’s
business teams to easily provision IT
infrastructure and services. Thereafter, Gullotta
foresees an external private cloud that provides
dedicated services to the company’s client
base as well as new markets and customers.
Partnering with business leaders
While the options are vast and the specific
course of action unknown, one thing is certain:
Gullotta isn’t interested in determining the
strategic direction of Broadridge’s business.
“Business leaders determine the road ahead,”
he says. “We want to build a fast, efficient
vehicle, and then give them the wheel.”
Gullotta is aiming to establish a “Cloud
Governance Council” that brings together
the company’s technology caretakers
with its business leaders. Working
collaboratively, the two sides will define a
set of technology criteria and processes
that support and enable business
initiatives.
“The discussion isn’t about servers; it’s about
technology supporting business capabilities
and scenarios,” Gullotta notes. “We want
the ability to quickly conduct pilot projects,
validate concepts, and deliver new products
and services that push our business forward.
“We have an opportunity to extend our
technology services in new and exciting
ways,” he adds. “This may include big data
analytics initiatives, mobile applications, or
social media outreach. Fortunately, we have
the right platform and capabilities in place to
explore and test a number of options.”
Broadridge has saved millions of dollars
through server and data center consolidations,
and is using those IT initiatives to establish a
converged infrastructure. The potential value
of the converged infrastructure is forthcoming,
with innovative products and services delivered
through a number of channels and initiatives.
“The worst case scenario is a more dynamic,
cost effective, efficient infrastructure,” says
Gullotta. “The best case scenario is new
products and services, new partners and
markets, and new revenue opportunities.”
Complimentary data center analysis
For a custom, comprehensive analysis of the
performance, scalability, and reliability of your
data center, including recommendations for
improvements, visit the Resource Center
at: www.UnleashingIT.com

Curaçao Technology
Exchange CEO Anthony
de Lima aims to support
the business boom of an
entire region
Ideal location and
growing business
opportunity spawn the
Caribbean’s first and
only tier-IV data center.
Hidden beaches, colorful architecture,
pristine reefs, and picturesque plantations;
located in the southwestern corner of the
Caribbean, Curaçao has it all. But it’s about
to get more. Much more.
The island continues to gain prominence
as a hub of international finance and
commerce. And Curaçao Technology
Exchange (CTEX) is preparing to be a key
enabler of the region’s business boom.
“We are building the first tier-IV data center
complex in the region,” says Anthony de
Lima, CTEX Chairman and CEO. “It will be
the most advanced, purpose built, high-
density technology services facility in the
Caribbean and Latin America.”
Three catalysts have converged in CTEX’s
favor: growth in Latin American emerging
markets, advances in cloud computing,
and an auspicious locale.
More business, more
technology needs
Business activity in Central and South
America has been on the rise for
some time. Caribbean nations, at the
commercial crossroads between North
America, Europe, and Latin America, are
experiencing a similar business surge.
Despite this growth, there continues
to be a lack of high-end technology
services. Companies wanting to
conduct business in the region have few
options for storing their data, accessing
advanced technologies, and getting top-
notch support.
Today, the Caribbean doesn’t have an
Uptime Institute-certified tier-IV data
center. They exist in the U.S., Canada,
and Europe, but many regional companies
are concerned with the privacy laws, strict
regulations, and high costs that come with
them. Others are wary of utilizing South
American data centers due to physical
security and political instability.
World-class technology services
in paradise
Experiences

Unleashing IT6
From vision to reality:
De Lima is building the
Caribbean’s first tier-IV data
center from scratch
“Most companies doing business in the
region use data centers in North America
or Europe,” de Lima explains. “But
when you are moving data and running
applications across such distances,
there are often bandwidth and latency
problems, not to mention the high cost of
labor and taxes.”
An untapped island refuge
CTEX was formed in Curaçao not by
happenstance, but through careful
planning and an exhaustive search. In the
island paradise, de Lima and his team
found the perfect location for a tier-IV
data center.
“The island is situated outside the
hurricane belt and major seismic zones,”
de Lima says. “And the data center is
being purpose-built for 100 percent
reliability. It is 197 feet above sea
level, and can withstand a Category
5 hurricane and extensive seismic
activity. Our clients don’t have to worry
about putting their data or technology
operations in harm’s way.”
Curaçao’s connectivity is also a significant
benefit. Six redundant submarine cables
link the island to the rest of the world,
and more are currently being installed;
perfect for reliable, high-speed data
transmissions.
Part of the Dutch Kingdom, Curaçao is
very friendly to international business.
The privatization laws are favorable,
the taxes are low, there are no import
duties on technology equipment, and
the island offers unique benefits for
expatriate employees. A multicultural
populace that speaks English, Spanish,
Dutch, and Portuguese also makes the
island an ideal location for transnational
commerce.
“The location, connectivity, and laws
make Curaçao one of the safest
locations in the world to house critical
information assets,” says de Lima.
Building a world-class data
center
De Lima didn’t want to build any data
center. He sought to deliver a tier-IV data
center with “unparalleled technology
capabilities that enable business to
be conducted in ways never before
imagined.”
Four massive, 57,000 square foot
complexes are currently being
constructed to achieve this vision.
VblockTM
Infrastructure Systems—with
integrated technology from Cisco,
EMC, Intel, and VMware—form the
technical foundation of the company’s
business-class cloud solutions. CTEX
is also utilizing Cisco® Carrier Routing
System (CRS), Cisco ASR 9000 Series
Aggregation Services Routers, and Cisco
Nexus® 7000 and 5000 Series Switches.
“We want to provide customers with the most advanced
data center services and the most secure, reliable cloud
environment in the region.”
Anthony de Lima, Chairman and CEO, Curaçao Technology Exchange

“We want to provide customers with the
most advanced data center services and the
most secure, reliable cloud environment in
the region,” de Lima says. “With a unified
infrastructure that has been pretested and
validated, we can focus on delivering high-
end IT services instead of worrying about
hardware and software details.”
The company will offer world-class
colocation, security management,
archival, disaster recovery, and
managed services. Companies can take
advantage of a private or multitenant
cloud, managed by CTEX or by their own
personnel. Cisco Intelligent Automation
for Cloud software streamlines cloud
provisioning and administration. With
more than a dozen standard server
models, CTEX and its customers can
select their operating system and
configuration of choice, and the software
quickly and automatically provisions the
environments and payment structure.
“We want our customers to focus
on running their business, not IT,” de
Lima explains. “With state-of-the-art
infrastructure and automation tools,
they can access secure, on-demand
services from any location. We’re taking
the guesswork out of configuring and
managing cloud environments.”
De Lima is particularly excited about the
disaster recovery services his company
will offer. In addition to remote data
backup, CTEX has office space—with
server and desktop provisioning, a full
communications suite using Cisco Unified
Communications Manager, and Cisco
TelePresence® capabilities—for clients
who need to keep their business running
during a crisis.
“Our customers need safety and security
for their data, and the ability to scale
up or down quickly and without a lot of
capital investment,” says de Lima. “In
delivering these capabilities, we have an
opportunity to help shape the Caribbean
and Latin American region, and its value
in a global, digitized economy.”
More information
To speak with a Cisco cloud expert about
intelligent automation and ITaaS, contact
us at: intelligentautomation@cisco.com
To hear how others are using Vblocktm
Infrastructure Packages, visit the Resource
Center at: www.UnleashingIT.com
4,652 members. 2,384 companies repres-
ented. 52 local chapters. The Cisco UCS™
user group community continues to grow.
Local chapters meet three to four times
each year to discuss everything about
Cisco UCS, which is based on Intel® Xeon®
processors. Members are able to hear from
their peers and technology experts about:
• Cisco UCS best practices
• Hardware and software roadmaps
• Hot trends and topics
“The community and meetings are entirely
user-driven,” says Patti Garza, UCS
Program Manager for Cisco. “There aren’t
any sales or marketing pitches. It’s strictly
about the technology, created for and by
members.”
Each meeting includes a best practice
presentation from a UCS user, many
include live demonstrations, and members
are often the first to hear of forthcoming
products and solutions.
“Each chapter and meeting is different,
but they are always fun and informative,”
says Garza. “It’s a great way to interact
with your peers, learn new tips and tricks,
discuss technology trends, and get the
inside scoop on unannounced products.”
More information
To locate a UCS User Group
chapter in your area, email:
ucsusergroups@cisco.com
For more information on Cisco UCS,
visit: www.UnleashingIT.com
A growing—and active—community of Cisco®
Unified Computing System™
(UCS) users

Unleashing IT8
CIO Eric Slavinsky works
with Cisco and LG&E and
KU operations personnel
to drive change
Technology as cultural change
agent, efficiency booster
How one utility company
is utilizing analytics,
mobility, and collaboration
technologies to change
behavioral norms and
improve operational
efficiency.
“The tenure of our workforce is 15 to 30
years on average,” says Eric Slavinsky, CIO
of Louisville Gas and Electric and Kentucky
Utilities Energy LLC (LG&E and KU). “And
that leads to a lot of entrenched behaviors.”
When Slavinsky joined the utility two and
half years ago, he sought to reevaluate
those behaviors and find new opportunities
for efficiency. He wanted to solve business
challenges. And he was focused on
enabling his workforce to be productive
anytime, anywhere.
“We wanted to change our business
culture,” Slavinsky says, “through IT.”
Two factors had always been in the way.
First, the company was relying on a host
of manual processes, which dictated
where and how company personnel
could perform their jobs. Second, critical
information was stashed in a variety of
disparate systems, requiring a tremendous
amount of work to pull information
together, and making it nearly impossible to
perform data analyses thereafter.
“To continue providing our customers with
cost-effective electric and gas service,”
Slavinsky says, “we needed greater
transparency, better decision making, and
a more productive workforce.”
For an industry that is often resistant to
change, cultural transformation could not be
forced or dictated. The utility’s operations
teams would need to be included in the
upfront decision making, and empowered in
their day-to-day activities.
“You can’t just push change on people,”
Slavinsky claims. “You need to give them a
sense of ownership and participation. And
then you need to show them how change
can positively impact their job. It’s all about
empowering the business through the use
of technology.”
Utilizing analytics, mobility, and
collaboration
To influence longstanding behaviors and
processes, Slavinsky wanted to create
transparency between internal systems,
services, and employees. That started
Experiences

with data. Giving the LG&E and KU
workforce better access to the company’s
information resources would reduce
the amount of time to answer everyday
questions, conduct routine reporting, and
make effective business decisions.
“In the past, we had a tough time accessing
data, let alone analyzing it,” Slavinsky
explains. “We were still printing out
spreadsheets from different systems, then
manually piecing everything together. It was
slow and rarely provided a comprehensive,
timely view of our operations.”
LG&E and KU implemented business
intelligence software on a new, fully
integrated platform to improve information
access and utilization. Running on the
Cisco® Unified Computing System™
(UCS), which is based on Intel® Xeon®
processors, the SAP NetWeaver Business
Warehouse Accelerator pulls together
real-time information from all of the
utility’s operations systems and provides
sophisticated analytics capabilities.
“The less time you spend searching for and
integrating data, the more time you have to
maximize it,” says Slavinsky. “Our business
intelligence system is cutting the time it
takes to produce monthly reports in half. It’s
eliminating many of the old manual printing
processes. And most importantly, it is
enabling our workforce to conduct analyses
that lead to faster, more informed decisions.”
Those decisions can now be made anytime,
anywhere, thanks to improved mobility and
collaboration capabilities. The utility is using Cisco
Unified Communications Manager and Cisco
mobility platforms to extend the reach of its
applications environment, and deliver consistency
no matter how or where it is accessed.
Through a bring your own device (BYOD)
program, mobility software, and virtual
desktop integration (VDI), operations
personnel can tap the utility’s business
applications from any location, and have the
same experience whether they are using a
tablet, laptop, or personal computer. This
allows them to be as productive in the field
as they are in the office.
“The mobile system is a wealth of
information at your fingertips,” says Terry
Walker, Service Technician for LG&E and KU.
“Every day I logon and use it to view system
maps, create work request maps, find
locations of trouble calls, log inspections, and
any other job that comes my way. It’s made
my job a lot more efficient.”
The company is also utilizing collaboration
tools, such as instant messaging, chat,
and video. LG&E and KU engineering
experts will soon be able to help diagnose
and fix problems remotely, reducing the
time and cost of travel and repairs. The
mobility and collaboration capabilities have
been particularly useful during storms and
outages, when the business must go into
“crisis response mode” and coordinate
large groups of field employees.
“We pride ourselves on superior customer
service, especially during storms,” says
Slavinsky. “Our new computing platform and
capabilities are making us much more effective
and coordinated during outages, and that has
a direct impact on our costs and customers.”
Through advanced analytics, mobility,
and collaboration, Slavinsky is quickly
transforming the culture and operational
efficiency of LG&E and KU. And it’s
working. The utility is one of the lowest-
cost energy providers in the U.S., and has
recently received best-in-class customer
satisfaction ratings among Midwest utilities.
For a custom, comprehensive analysis
of the performance, scalability, and
reliability of your data center, including
recommendations for improvements,
visit the Resource Center at:
“Our business intelligence system is cutting the time it takes
to produce monthly reports in half. And most importantly, it is
enabling our workforce to conduct analyses that lead to faster,
more informed decisions.”
Eric Slavinsky, CIO of Louisville Gas and Electric and Kentucky Utilities

Unleashing IT10
The foundation for better business
decisions
Hardware and software
investments help
Staples Australia move
strategically toward
data transparency for
customers and suppliers.
Be nimble, be agile, take risks, and apply
innovation to how you’re using data in
your business. It’s a fairly ambitious goal,
but it’s one that Garry Whatley, VP of IT
and Business Services, Staples Australia,
believes is a matter of perspective. You
either focus on the risk or you focus on
the strategic advantage. Whatley is a
proponent of the latter.
“Our end goal is to provide information
transparency to our customers and
suppliers, so we can make better business
decisions collectively,” says Whatley. “That
goal drove our transformation program,
where we implemented a new hardware
platform to support a new business
warehouse (BW) software suite. Our
business intelligence vision is very defined,
and we invested in it substantially because
it is strategic to how we’re going to operate
as the business moves forward.”
The value of data access and
analytics
Unlike its parent company in the U.S.,
Staples Australia does not have any retail
locations. It engages with customers
online or through its sales force. In
both instances, sophisticated data
transparency creates an opportunity to
alter business processes significantly.
For a high volume, high data business
like Staples, Whatley believes better data
access and analyses can help drive cost
out of the supply chain and reveal new
business insights.
Staples Australia chose the Intel®
Xeon®
processor-based Cisco®
Unified
Computing System™ (UCS) as the
hardware foundation supporting its
data transparency initiative and SAP
NetWeaver BW investment. The
company also implemented the Cisco
Business Warehouse Accelerator to
amplify the speed of its SAP NetWeaver
Experiences

BW software to drive faster queries,
reporting, and decision making.
The Cisco implementation was
consistent with Whatley’s emphasis
on strategic advantage. As Corporate
Express (prior to the Staples
integration), the company was an
early adopter of many new Cisco
technologies, including IP Telephony
and IP Contact Center as well as
previous iterations of Cisco UCS™.
Whatley wanted to maintain the strategic
commitment to the Cisco relationship.
So was the strategic gamble worth it?
Whatley believes it was. “Both the Cisco
UCS and SAP choices were sound
strategic decisions that I would make
again. In fact, we should have done it
sooner. Our users were frustrated with
performance, and we have reversed
that experience significantly. Now, we
are in a position to not only deliver
performance, but also drive toward our
vision as well.”
The hardware and software investments
have been fundamental in helping
Staples be agile and react to insight
gleaned from the data. For example,
operations personnel can gather metrics
that help rank and compare suppliers
against KPIs and other supply chain
partners. On a monthly basis, Staples
provides the Supplier Performance
Reporting Pack to its suppliers.
Previously, completing those reports
required a significant amount of manual
effort. With automation, Staples can
provide visibility around performance
levels to the more than 300 suppliers in
its supply chain.
In addition, data transparency is
enhancing inventory management.
Staples can calculate daily performance
on KPIs for the purchasing team,
operations team, and the overall business
based on day-to-day order fulfillment
and the company’s “perfect order”
model. The ongoing insight is improving
customer service levels and reducing
inventory holding.
Driving toward its future vision
With the foundation in place, Staples can
contemplate adding new capabilities to drive
its future vision. Mobility is a key priority.
With no retail presence, the company
relies heavily on its sales force to service
corporate and mid-market customers.
Pushing order information and online
reporting to reps while at customer sites is a
primary focus. Executive insight enablement
is also critical. In a high volume, low value
business model, having the visibility to track
the business in fine detail on a daily basis
promotes better business decisions.
In fact, Staples is about to launch a pilot
focused on reviewing and analyzing
customer sales history. Through
advanced analytics, business users
can examine factors including what
customers spend, where they spend,
categories of spend, and which areas of
the business spend more than others.
It is similar to the breakdowns of paper
reports, but the automation enables drill
down, discussion, analysis, and “what if”
scenarios on the fly.
“Clarity in what you’re driving toward is
what enables you to move away from
a risk focus to a strategic orientation,”
says Whatley. “At Staples, we are clear
that mobile intelligence and real-time
analytics represent our optimum data
transparency capabilities. And we have
the hardware and software foundation
to move there confidently—delivering the
value of visibility to our customers and
suppliers for better business decisions
every step of the way.”
Cisco Bridge to SAP HANA Appliance
For a video, whitepaper, and solution
brief about improving your business
intelligence capabilities with Cisco
and SAP solutions, visit the Resource
Center at: www.UnleashingIT.com.

Unleashing IT12
Peruse a list of the top 10 characteristics
to look for in a financial broker and
you’re bound to find “trustworthy” and
“responsive.” When we invest money,
we expect the experts to be quick to
respond to market demands, to take a
holistic view, and to manage our funds
seamlessly.
Compare that to the demands being
placed on today’s CIOs and the two are
increasingly similar. When a business unit
submits a request for compute power,
they expect fast, secure results, and they
want the ability to ‘see’ how their server
environment is performing.
“CIOs are being asked to transition
from being a resource provider to
resource broker,” says Phill Lawson-
Shanks, Chief Technology Officer at
Virtacore, a wholly-owned subsidiary
of IKANO Communications Inc.,
headquartered in Sterling, Va. “That
means they need to adapt to a
new service delivery paradigm that
leverages internal, external, and hybrid
cloud fabrics, where virtual instances
and resource pools are both dynamic
and manageable at an increasingly
granular level,” he says.
As a leading cloud services provider,
Virtacore understands the intricacies
of leveraging IT-as-a-Service (ITaaS)
to reduce capital costs and operating
expenses. At the same time, the
company realizes the need for speed,
visibility, and increased manageability.
Which is why it’s currently in the process
of building a new core infrastructure with
the Intel®
Xeon®
processor-based Cisco®
Unified Computing System™ (UCS), Cisco
Nexus®
and Catalyst®
switches, Cisco
Intelligent Automation for Cloud (Cisco
IAC), and a next-generation hybrid
storage solution from Nimble Storage.
Currently located in Equinix International
Business Exchange data centers in
Silicon Valley, Chicago, Los Angeles, and
Virtacore’s dynamic cloud infrastructure-as-a-service
helps CIOs transition from resource provider to
resource broker.
Brokering the cloud
Experiences

Washington, D.C., Virtacore became the
first cloud service provider to leverage
Equinix Business Suites earlier this year.
It is also among the first to be nominated
to VMware’s vCloud Powered program,
which requires partners to offer on-
demand access to virtual infrastructure
from a public cloud while supporting
application and API portability between a
customer’s internal data center and the
VMware Powered Service of their choice.
The move to a wholesale data center
model coincides with the company’s
migration to Cisco UCSTM
and Nimble.
Together, the two strategies are
giving Virtacore the performance and
visibility it needs to stay ahead of larger
competitors, delivering broker-like
services at an extremely cost-effective
price, says Lawson-Shanks.
“Before we started this migration it
could take up to six weeks to deploy a
customer’s cloud instance. Now we can
deploy within a matter of hours,” he says,
noting that proofs of concept run on the
new core infrastructure in a production
environment, allowing for a simple
transition to a full service contract once
customers are satisfied.
“From our perspective, we’ve gained a
block of resource we can carve up and
deploy any which way we need. From a
customer perspective, they get a real world
experience of what the system is going to
be from soup to nuts that helps to allay any
reservations they may have,” he says.
Two of the first Virtacore customers to
migrate to the new cloud infrastructure
include a large food distributor and a
well-known software provider. Both are
experiencing faster response times—almost
double what they were experiencing
previously—with the added advantage of
confidence. As Virtacore engineer Matt
Tedder explains, the new environment
offers “a single pane of glass” management
view that provides crucial information about
processing speeds, memory, network
availability, and storage, as well as built-in
pre-emptive monitoring capabilities.
“Nimble offers the cleanest user interface
we’ve seen from a storage product,” says
Tedder. “From just a few sets of tabs, we
can obtain a top-down view of everything.”
In the case of the food distributor, the first
application to move to Virtacore’s Cisco
UCS/Nimble platform was SharePoint,
a mission-critical application which is
performing better in the cloud than it
did on a tier-one manufacturer’s blade
infrastructure. For the software provider,
the main advantage is being able to quickly
spin up customer instances with a high
degree of visibility.
“Latency is not an issue any more. It’s
about the performance of the systems,
installing them correctly and managing
them appropriately,” notes Lawson-
Shanks, adding that Virtacore is looking
to capitalize on the scalability of Cisco
UCS and Nimble CS series, as well as
the self-service provisioning capabilities
of Cisco IAC, to support future growth.
“We’re only limited now by the amount
of power our hosting partners can
provide us,” he says.
Complimentary consultation
For more information and to qualify
for a personalized consultation on
leveraging a joint Cisco UCS and
Nimble Storage solution in your data
center, visit the Resource Center at:

Unleashing IT14
“Our hardware,” says Chad Branum,
Executive Director of Technology at Coppell
Independent School District, “typically has a
five-year lifecycle.”
Coppell’s 3,000 desktops and 4,000 laptops
are dispersed among 15 public schools in
Texas. With these hardware systems nearing
the end of their projected lifecycle, Branum
recently found himself in a predicament.
“Using technology to empower our students and
advance our educational model is a part of our
overall strategy,” he explains. “Our administrators
and parent community have always been very
pro-technology, and have consistently pushed
for new, engaging services.”
And yet, like most public school systems,
Coppell is challenged with funding. In a classic
case of needing to do more with less, Branum
had to find a way to modernize his school
district’s technology capabilities, despite a
restrictive budget and aging hardware.
“It’s tough to replace hardware when you
are cash-strapped,” Branum says. “It’s even
tougher to deliver new services and stay at
the forefront of technology-based education.”
But that’s exactly what Branum and his
team accomplished. The first step was
implementing a Bring Your Own Device
(BYOD) program that takes advantage of
students’ mobile computing resources.
“By leveraging our community’s personal
devices, we can extend our computing
services and learning experiences,” says
Branum. “It’s also less for us to buy, manage,
and maintain.”
The second step was making sure all
students have a consistent experience,
regardless of the device through which they
connect to the school district’s computing
environment. To do so, Coppell implemented
a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) using
Vblock™ Infrastructure Packages. “VDI gives
us the consistency we needed across all
devices,” says Branum. “The experience is
the same whether a student is in a library
using one of our desktops, on a field trip using
their mobile device, or at home using their
family’s personal computer.”
The virtual infrastructure is also extending
the life of Coppell’s desktops and laptops
by three to five years. Compared to the cost
of hardware replacement, Coppell will save
more than $1 million over the next five years.
Presidio, a leading technology services
provider, helped Coppell with the VDI
deployment, from proof of concept to ROI
modeling to Vblock implementation. According
to Branum, Presidio kept the big picture in
mind while managing the day-to-day details.
“Working with Presidio has been a lot of
fun,” says Branum. “They are extremely
knowledgeable and took a strategic,
holistic approach to our situation. Together,
we created a five-year plan that solved
immediate challenges and generated cost
savings that can be applied elsewhere.”
With its new virtual infrastructure and cost
savings, Coppell is evaluating the potential
use of virtual courses, online research
programs, flip classroom initiatives, and
technology-based standards testing.
“We want a seamless integration between
technology and learning. The first critical
steps are giving students access to
computing devices, and then delivering a
consistent, engaging experience,” Branum
explains. “Doing so has allowed us to explore
new instructional strategies that were not
previously possible.”
Speak to a cloud architect
To speak with a Presidio solutions
architect about how cloud technologies
can help your business, or to download
cloud-focused white papers, visit:
How Coppell Independent
School District is using
BYOD and VDI to modernize
its infrastructure, and saving
more than $1 million as a
result.
HealthcareAdvancing IT capabilities, despite
aging hardware
Education Feature

How advanced
technology helped
Liberty University
become one of the
nation’s largest and most
successful academic
institutions.
It supports nearly 100,000 students. It
offers 253 programs of study. And it boasts
more than 6,000 faculty and staff members.
Located in Lynchburg, Virginia, Liberty
University is one of the most successful
academic institutions in the United
States. But it only recently reached such
prominence, having experienced meteoric
growth over the past several years.
“We delivered 160,000 credit hours in
2005,” says Matthew Zealand, CIO of
Liberty University. “In 2012, we delivered
over 1.3 million.”
This growth was greater than anticipated,
Zealand admits. Much of it happened
organically, and all of it happened faster
than anyone envisioned.
“Growth impacts everything,” Zealand
says. “More students necessitate more
faculty, administrators, call center agents,
financial specialists, you name it. And that
means more IT systems and services to
support them all.”
Unfortunately, Liberty University’s pre-
existing technology infrastructure was not
designed to sustain such growth. The largely
physical environment was nearing capacity,
struggling to support on-campus operations,
and hindering an online learning program that
was growing 25-30 percent each year.
Online programs fuel
enrollment increases
Much of Liberty University’s dramatic growth
can be attributed to its online learning
program. The increasingly popular online
curriculum now educates nearly 85,000
students in 95 countries, far outpacing the
university’s 12,500 on-campus students.
“Our online learning program is a
business-critical service we provide to
our students,” explains Connie Allison,
Enterprise IT Communication Liaison for
Liberty University. “Any downtime results
in student dissatisfaction and complaints,
and it decreases our ability to maintain and
increase enrollment. We can’t compete if
our online systems are up and down.”
Because a majority of online students have
never stepped foot on campus, the online
learning program must also espouse the
culture and mission of Liberty University.
“We need to maintain consistency in
everything we do, whether it’s on campus
or online,” says Zealand. “This primarily
falls on the shoulders of our technology
systems and services. We can’t proactively
advance our programs, our enrollment, and
our mission when we are reactively dealing
with data center and application issues.”
To relieve data center constraints and support
ongoing growth, Liberty University recently
deployed the Cisco®
Unified Computing
System™ (UCS), which is based on Intel®
Xeon®
processors. Maximizing virtualization
and consolidation, the Cisco UCS™
environment supports all university operations,
from student and financial services to
administrative and call center systems to
classroom and online applications.
“Cisco UCS has given us the flexibility,
scalability, and stability we need to
support our growth,” Allison says. “The
Cisco network management tools allow us
to see and address stress points before
they become problems. We had nearly 10
hours of downtime the semester before
we implemented Cisco UCS, but we
haven’t had any downtime this semester.”
Instead of fixing problems, university
administrators and IT staff can now focus
on opportunities.
“In the past, we spent most of our time
responding to incidents and issues,”
Allison explains. “Now we can explore
and implement new ideas, new student
services, and new university resources.”
This has fostered a second wave of
growth and development, she adds. The
university is in the process of building
a state-of-the-art library, a center for
cinematic arts, and a new baseball
stadium. Already the nation’s largest
private, nonprofit educator, Liberty
University also continues to expand its
online learning curriculum and degrees.
“Enrollment growth places more strain
and demand on everything, not just our
network and application infrastructure,” says
Zealand. “Cisco UCS has helped us relieve
data center constraints, while allowing us to
accommodate ongoing growth and focus
on the future of our university.”
For a custom, comprehensive analysis
of the performance, scalability, and
reliability of your data center, including
recommendations for improvements,
visit the Resource Center at:
Supporting meteoric
business growth Education Feature

Servers based on the Intel® Xeon®
processor E5-2600 product family
At the Heart of Your
Flexible, Highly
Efﬁcient Datacenter
Designed to combine performance, built-in
capabilities, and cost-effectiveness, servers
based on the Intel® Xeon® processor E5-2600
product family are at the heart of today’s
evolving data center.
Brilliantly versatile
Designed to sit at the heart of diverse IT environments:
• Enterprise infrastructure
• Public & private cloud installations
• Storage systems
• Research and High-Performance Computing (HPC)
• Embedded devices
• Workstations
Copyright © 2012 Intel Corporation. All rights reserved. Intel, the Intel logo, Xeon, and Xeon inside are trademarks
of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and other countries.

Unleashing IT: Seize Innovation, Accelerate Business, Drive Outcomes. All through the Cloud.

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