Company: Metafore Technologies
City: Montreal
Province: Quebec
Provide a brief description of the Solution, Service Provided, or Initiative.
Olympus NDT Canada came to Metafore wanting to optimize assets running under Windows XP and to deploy MS SCCM and Windows 7. Metafore assisted Olympus with design, configuration, testing, and deployment of Microsoft’s SCCM. Metafore’s solution allowed for effective management of computing and provided extension capacities to answer the requirements of future business growth.
Describe what makes this Solution, Service Provided, or Initiative original or innovative.
Metafore’s solution was based on Metafore’s and Microsoft’s best practices. It allowed for the creation of a central management site located in Waltham. Roles were required to optimize the bandwidth and the software and Windows 7 deployment speeds were installed at each site. The solution is upgradable. Deliverables: • Installation of the SCCM Servers • Creation of the Windows 7 Image • Deployment of the First Site • Creation of Software Installation Packages With the collaboration of Olympus NDT, they benefitted from a knowledge transfer that was also supported by traditional training. Once the solution was implemented, Olympus NDT was able to: • Use SCCM to deploy windows 7/Office 2010 throughout the environment and across sites • Use SCCM to construct packages for new applications required • Recover the system environment in the event of a server failure or other outage • Use SCCM to deploy minimum 20 additional ONDT applications
Describe the improvement this Solution, Service Provided, or Initiative made to the customer’s sales or revenues. What changed?
Provide evidence of measurable improvements in sales, revenues, cost reduction, etc.
• Reducing administrative overheads and delivering agile services via automation of systems management tasks and providing employees with many self-service features • Consolidating their server, client, and security management IT Infrastructure • Gaining tighter control and visibility over all their Microsoft Windows based or non-Windows based desktops, servers, and mobile assets.
Describe the improvement this Solution, Service Provided, or Initiative made to the customer’s efficiency. What changed?
Provide evidence of how customer efficiency was increased.
System Center 2012 Configuration Manager can help optimize an organization’s hardware and software investments in client and security management. Configuration Manager reduces the administration overhead for many IT teams by automating many administrative tasks, consolidating physical hardware and software licenses, and giving administrators the flexibility to manage non- Windows OS based devices from the same management interface. Moreover, Configuration Manager provides many self-service features in reporting and software deployment that improve end-user productivity as employees now have greater control over their managed systems. Savings can be realized from improved task management features and consolidation of their servers. You can expect further savings in storage power management, space utilization, and cross-platform integration as the organizations mature in their use of Configuration Manager features.
How did this Solution, Service provided, or Initiative improve the customer’s ability to serve its internal and/or external clients?
Provide evidence of the improvement.
The client has access to perform the following: • Improve desktop and security management related IT administration tasks • Consolidate software for desktop and security management • Improve security and reduce operational risk via role-based access • Consolidate server infrastructure • Provide improved end-user experience via employee self-service features • Improve management system performance and scalability • Reporting and Alerts
In what ways does this Solution or Service Provided go above and beyond industry norms and expectations?
Microsoft System Center 2012 transforms the way IT and application services are delivered to an organization, optimizing resources across public, hosted, and private clouds, managed from a single pane of glass. Business users see cost savings and flexibility when they consume IT as a Service—a service that they self-allocate through a portal, that scales up or down according to their needs, and that they pay for based on use. Data center administrators see cost savings by pooling shared resources into a private cloud that serves multiple business users who consume only what they need. Flexibility comes from leveraging hosted and public cloud resources to complement on-premises capacity. System Center 2012 enables enterprises to incorporate private, hosted, and public cloud computing resources while still satisfying their unique business needs. It organizes existing IT assets (network, storage, compute) into a private cloud that is seamlessly integrated with hosted and public cloud services—a hybrid cloud you can manage from a single pane of glass. Heterogeneous support: System Center 2012 enables you to integrate a wide range of technologies into a coherent private cloud Process automation: Makes your private cloud more efficient by building automated workflows for standard processes such as incident management, problem management, change manage¬ment, and release management. Self-service infrastructure: Standardize compute, network, and storage resources into a private cloud fabric that is then allocated to business units using Active Directory. Uses a service catalog that enables application owners to request and consume capacity in self-service mode. Deep application monitoring and problem diagnosis: Deep integration with .NET applications enables developers to pinpoint the root cause of issues down to the offending line of code, enabling faster resolution. Standardized provisioning of application services: Draws on the service-modeling capabilities in service templates so that application owners can repeatedly and reliably com¬pose, configure, and deploy application services to the cloud. Simplified management of applications: Ease deployment of applications to the cloud through Server Application Virtualization (SAV), which removes application dependencies on specific infrastructure.
How does this solution further your customer’s green or environmentally friendly plans?
Power Management in System Center 2012 Configuration Manager addresses the need that many organizations have to monitor and reduce the power consumption of their computers. The feature takes advantage of the power management features built into Windows to apply relevant and consistent settings to computers in the organization. You can apply different power settings to computers during business hours and non-business hours. For example, you might want to apply a more restrictive power plan to computers during non-business hours. In cases where computers must always remain turned on, you can prevent power management settings from being applied. Power management in Configuration Manager includes several reports to help you analyze power consumption and computer power settings in your organization. You can also use the reports to help you troubleshoot problems with power management.