Client story Bioquell: Clean up with a Future-Proof Cloud Solution
By Insight UK / 12 Mar 2019 / Topics: Cloud Data center Storage
Bioquell is a global leader in supplying biodecontamination products and services to hospitals, pharmaceutical companies and bioscience facilities, helping to help keep patients safe. To respond more swiftly to its customers, Bioquell needed to update its IT environment and improve its business continuity.
The Challenge
Hospital infections are a major cause of concern, and healthcareassociated infections affect the lives of one in 25 people admitted to healthcare environments. Bioquell’s decontamination systems eliminate pathogens from hospitals, life science laboratories and pharmaceutical facilities to provide safe environments for patients and staff. With safety at the heart of its operation, Bioquell needed an IT system to support the rapid response service it delivers to customers. “The challenge was that our server estate was ageing fast,” explains Andrew Barr, IT Manager. “We wanted to improve our disaster recovery and business continuity, and consolidate our Microsoft licencing.” With between 25 and 30 servers that were not virtualised, Bioquell was prone to high running costs and unable to make the most of its overall computing power. As a result, it was becoming difficult for the hardware to roll out the applications Bioquell required, which meant that projects and timescales were becoming harder to deliver. As a supplier in a mission-critical sector, Bioquell needed the systems in place to respond to customer needs and keep up with the demands of the marketplace.
The Solution
Having worked with Bioquell for around 15 years, Insight had a deep understanding of the organisational needs, and was able to recommend a solution that has transformed the business’s IT environment. To improve its network efficiency, Bioquell invested in a hyper-converged system from Nutanix. The system consisted of three servers or nodes with software and storage embedded into it, which was all wrapped into one single solution. Virtualisation of Bioquell’s current systems was a key priority, so this was addressed with Nutanix Hypervisor (AHV) to provide a simple, scalable solution. As part of the overall improvements to the network infrastructure, the old switches were replaced with new Aruba switches from Hewlett Packard Enterprises, which delivered added security to the network. Following a smooth implementation, Bioquell now has an up-to-date server environment. The entire system provides the security and resilience needed to ensure that the organisation can maintain high availability and deliver uninterrupted service. With the hyper-converged system in place, Bioquell can now roll out applications more quickly, enabling the customer services department to move away from emails and launch a new support desk within a couple of hours.
