In the first wave of adopting virtualization technology, most businesses have managed to consolidate usage, improve equipment utilization rate, and optimize cost and performance. Now they are facing new challenges, including:

• An improved operational model to support the new technology of virtualization
• The organizations’ ability to transform their current operational models quickly enough to leverage the emerging technologies
• Delivery of cloud services via Internet without compromising security and integrity of business information
• Enabling the new technology (virtualization and cloud) to support operational excellence in the organizations

That’s where CBTS’ Virtualization 2.0 strategy comes in.  Our concept of Virtualization 2.0 is about automating all manual work in virtualizing the environment, expediting the process of compute resource delivery, and breaking the current barriers of network, storage, and infrastructure to deliver on-demand, flexible and agile services.

CBTS’ VDC Enterprise Solution reflects this concept of Virtualization 2.0 and delivers the value it promises. It breaks through operational barriers that inhibit the adoption of optimizing technologies, while maintaining the operational integrity of the enterprise. This solution features:

• Complete Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) model, charged by usage
• On-demand access to private and secure virtual servers
• Dedicated, secure environment based on organization policies
• Enterprise-Integrated Operational ITIL Practices
• Easy-to-use, web-based portal to rapidly configure, deploy and control virtual servers
• Viewable performance statistics for virtual servers

What makes this solution stand out is its ability to perform automated provisioning, which greatly decreases provisioning time to a few minutes instead of hours or even days. Its easy-to-use portal interface also simplifies the task of administrating the environment, enabling seamless and efficient work flow.

Deliver ERP via Cloud

CBTS Cloud Services recently helped a wholesale distribution business achieve high operational performance, cost savings, and immediate return on investment (ROI). Utilizing our world-class virtual data center infrastructure, CBTS helped the customer deliver its ERP system via a public cloud, making the application available quickly and securely to the users anywhere, anytime.

The customer is a wholesale distribution business with multiple retail outlets across the country. When the company upgraded its ordering and inventory control application, it experienced challenges delivering the application to end users quickly and efficiently. Additionally, the company was expecting growth that would require the environment to scale upward as additional outlets came on line.

The customer could invest additional capital in purchasing more servers and boost its network connectivity across its multiple sites. They decided not to spend a large amount of new capital without knowing its future operational needs or when ROI would be realized.

To mitigate financial risk and leverage a flexible, high performance, and scalable application delivery system, the customer turned to CBTS’ cloud services. Hosted in Tier III data centers, CBTS’ virtual data centers offered the exact agile and on-demand features that the customer required. A long-term partner with Citrix, CBTS had extensive experience and expertise to deploy Citrix XenApp, the dominant market leader in virtual application delivery systems.

CBTS allowed the customer to validate CBTS cloud services by selecting one of its retail outlets to test the application environment. The customer then added more locations as the system validated the performance, speed, and agility required.

CBTS now connects the customer’s multiple sites via VPN to the CBTS virtual data center, where dedicated virtual machines have been created to host its application. Utilizing Citrix XenApp on-demand virtual application delivery technology, the application is delivered to the end users instantly and smoothly. The customer pays a monthly utility charge for utilizing CBTS’ virtual infrastructure and Citrix XenApp application delivery services.

Benefits:

CBTS designed an on-demand, flexible, and scalable cloud computing solution to address the customer’s current operational issues and prepare it for future growth. Utilizing this strategy, the customer is able to enjoy the following benefits:

• The application is now delivered to users anytime, anywhere with speed, security, high availability, and performance.
• The application delivery capacity is on-demand, and can scale up or down with the business’ operational needs simultaneously.
• The business avoided upfront capital outlays for additional servers and licenses, mitigating financial risk. By paying a monthly utility fee, the business can take advantage of a fully managed, high performance, and scalable delivery system.
• The business can purchase Citrix XenApp licenses as a utility service by paying a monthly fee per user.

Features:

• The application is hosted in a secure and reliable Tier III data center with complete network, connectivity, power, and cooling redundancy.
• Access to the environment is controlled via a secure portal, requiring authentication against the customer’s domain.
• Citrix XenApp provides users with a familiar Windows-based desktop interface, reducing training and transition time for end users.
• Citrix XenApp delivers proven application compatibility with all types of environments and applications.

Ideal Applications:

• This application delivery model via CBTS’ cloud infrastructure is ideal in any of the following business situations:
• Start-up or midsize businesses that use critical applications distributed across multiple sites
• Businesses that expect growth and the required capacity for delivering their applications to meet business growth
• Enterprises that have specialized applications used by a few internal departments Businesses that want to test a new application with selected users
• Businesses that want to take advantage of the latest computing power to boost productivity, but are capital constrained

CBTS recently deployed standards-based servers quickly, affordably, and fully integrated into the customer’s existing processes for a leading international manufacturer. Customizing the latest virtual data center technology, CBTS shortened the customer’s provision time from 90 days to less than 15 minutes, while integrating the processes from four different operational teams.

The customer is a fortune 50 company with leading products in several industries.  The service division involved in this case is a global technology leader and supplier to the railroad, marine, drilling, wind and mining industries.

The customer had an extensive virtual infrastructure, and was already leveraging the latest technologies. Their challenge was to integrate processes with four different silos—the Server Team, the Network Team, the Storage Team, and the Operations Team. In some cases provisioning for a system took more than 90 days, prior to implementing the CBTS solution. The time from request to deployment was also hindered by an approval process that included several reviews before it could proceed to the next step.

CBTS understands that in order for a private cloud implementation to be successful, the solution has to take on the identity of the customer and completely integrate with the customer’s internal processes. CBTS was able to address the gap between today’s technology and the current software toolsets by leveraging custom-built software as a framework to bridge the customer’s processes into the private cloud.

CBTS Solution Benefits

• Quick network provisioning
• Billing, active directory, ITIL-based operations management and integration
• Archiving, backup, and disaster recovery capabilities
• Customer process adherence and security compliance
• Standards-based VM templates and custom software deployment
• Version control and patch management

Licensing as a Utility Service

Licensing for OS and software is complex. It is difficult and time consuming to figure out, and it changes constantly. CBTS has a solution that alleviates the headache of licensing and offers peace of mind.

CBTS provides a hassle-free licensing-as-a-utility-service model that allows licensing on a per user, per server, or per processor basis. Utilizing our virtual data center (VDC) and utility-based models with Microsoft, Citrix, and DoubleTake, businesses can take advantage these vendors’ licenses on demand.

Delivered through our VDC offerings, this model helps alleviate many complications with licensing. With cutting-edge virtualization technologies, we are now able to offer licenses with flexibility and scalability. This greatly benefits organizations of all sizes and with different needs. It is ideal for those businesses that have an application used by a small group or selective departments, as well as any test or development that may only need to license an application for a short period of time. The solution is a very cost effective option for a small or midsize business that doesn’t want a large capital expenditure for licensing.

This utility service model allows for a monthly budget, which is extremely beneficial for growing businesses. It allows them to save capital for other growth-oriented projects. With this model, all of the upgrades, maintenance and support are all included in the monthly fee.

Currently in our VDC environment, customers are using many different licensing options. An example includes customers that utilize Citrix licenses to present business critical applications to their stores around the country. In this model, licensing is based on per user basis that can grow with the business. If a company starts out using 25 Citrix licenses, it can easily add 25 more with the help of CBTS when their user base grows to 50. This will change the monthly fee, but allows the customers to dictate exactly what is needed for their environment.

CBTS can also license Exchange and Sharepoint servers among others and allow customers to choose the licensing scope that suits their specific needs. CBTS can also monitor these licenses to make sure they are up and running, and reduce down time and any related issues. We also offer management for the servers where the applications and operating systems reside.

CBTS offers many more options to help customers deal with the licensing issue no matter what applications or operating systems are involved. Our goal is to help your business achieve on-demand, scalable, and cost effective computing. Our licensing utility model can scale with your needs, enhancing your operational efficiencies.

On March 10, 1876 as Alex Bell uttered the encoded words "Mr. Watson—Come here—I want to see you," perhaps he knew that someday the network would provide communication and data to the entire world. On August 3, 1876, from the telegraph office in Mount Pleasant five miles away from Brantford, Bell sent a tentative telegram indicating that he was ready. With curious onlookers packed into the office as witnesses, faint voices were heard replying. The following night, he amazed guests as well as his family when a message was received at the Bell home from Brantford, four miles (six km) away, along an improvised wire strung up along telegraph lines and fences, and laid through a tunnel. This time, guests at the household distinctly heard people in Brantford reading and singing.

These experiments clearly proved that the telephone could work over long distances. From an experiment to a practical application, the “cloud was born”. Today, over 130 years later, we can now “see” Mr. Watson, using webcams and digital video codecs, and it’s possible on the same pair of copper wires that Bell used. Distances just don’t matter anymore.

As a systems engineer at CBTS, I feel greatly satisfied to see our customers who become excited when they realize that they no longer need to have PBX systems or servers located on their premises to get the benefits of voice and data communications. We can deliver VoIP as well as complete business-class desktops to them using the public cloud networks (Zoomtown-FiOptics), and they can have the access to the same communications and computing resources at their home offices…just like A.G. Bell all those years ago.