Advantech utilized Nutanix Cloud Platform to improve IT operational efficiency to help speed up management decision-making and become the most competitive leader in the IoT era.
Kevin Lin, manager of Advantech IT division and infrastructure team, said that working with Nutanix to transform their existing IT environment into a hyper-converged infrastructure (HCI) will not only improve IT management efficiency and load efficiency, but also speed up the generation of the group’s sales performance report, shortening it by about 1/3 of the time, while assisting other business groups. Managers can obtain real-time order data on the "BI platform" to assist in decision-making and judgment, and strengthen the agile advantages of corporate operations, which will help Advantech accelerate their vision of a smart IoT ecosystem.
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Since the introduction of Nutanix, only one interface is necessary to manage a wide range of complex content such as storage, network, and node hosts. Nutanix has given us the freedom to expand our IT infrastructure. The performance issues from traditional three-tier infrastructures have also disappeared. In addition, Nutanix has also assisted us in quickly integrating and managing the multi-device requirements of the industrial IoT era. The built-in disaster recovery mechanism allows us to no longer suffer from downtime problems and strengthens our security capabilities to reduce potential IT risks.
Headquartered in Taiwan, Advantech is a global leader in the IoT intelligent systems and embedded platforms industry. In order to align with IoT, big data, and artificial intelligence trends, Advantech introduced a new industrial IoT solution with Edge Intelligence WISE-PaaS to meet the needs of various vertical industries. In order to deepen cooperation with global customers and partners, and accelerate the promotion of industrial intelligence, Advantech firmly believes that investing in IT is one of the key strategies for companies to enhance their competitiveness.
Advantech used a traditional three-tier infrastructure. Over the years, it has introduced a number of cross-brand hardware equipment and software applications. The overall system infrastructure was relatively complex, and it often reached the upper limit of storage capacity and physical space, which made it inconvenient for system expansions. In response to these problems, Kevin Lin said, "After many internal discussions, we decided that Nutanix meets our needs in all aspects.
Advantech tested Nutanix CE for half a year, and explored various functions to fully experience the management convenience of Nutanix HCI. Allen Liu shared, "After completing two POCs quickly, we particularly felt that the Nutanix Cloud Platform has the advantages of rapid remote backup and flexible expansion, which is aligned to Advantech's IT infrastructure planning for the next 5 to 10 years. Therefore, we formally introduced the Nutanix Cloud Platform. I believe it is the most secure investment.”
Among the solutions that use the Nutanix Cloud Platform, Advantech particularly praises Nutanix Flow which provides fine-grained firewall independent settings to a single virtual host by using network micro-segmentation technology. It protects data and applications more comprehensively to ensure that business secrets are not threatened by the internet, strengthening Advantech’s information security management capabilities.
Agile system migration, flexible node expansion and zero downtime
Advantech's introduction of the Nutanix Cloud Platform has reduced the overall conversion time by about 30%. For node expansion, the overall goal can be achieved by direct online expansion with zero downtime. Allen Liu said, "Nutanix is a single-tier horizontal expansion which is faster, more convenient and flexible than a three-tier infrastructure. The expansion does not require downtime to fully satisfy our demand for continuous expansion."
Virtualization recovery point objective (RPO) is shortened by up to 2/3
In the past, when Advantech performed disaster recovery, its RPO could only operate once every 24 hours. After implementing Nutanix Snapshot for data storage and backup. It is now possible for the virtualization to complete the execution cycle with an RPO of once every 8 hours or less without affecting the operating efficiency of the machine.
Single interface management platform to keep track of system status at any time improves maintenance efficiency
Nutanix provides a one-stop management platform to greatly improve IT work efficiency. Allen Liu said, "There is only one word to describe Nutanix's management interface, ‘amazing’. In the past, our three-tier infrastructure had two sets of virtual hosts. Our engineers had to spend a lot of time figuring out which system was faulty. Now, Nutanix integrates hardware and virtual machines to manage the overall IT system status from a single interface.”
Seamless 24/7 technical support and after-sales service to perform painless system upgrades
Nutanix provides complete after-sales service as well as cross-country, zero-day, 24/7 technical support. Allen Liu pointed out that within 3 hours after a request, a customer service response will be obtained. Additionally, the maintenance engineers are proficient in the local language. He emphasized, "We have used so many different brands, but Nutanix's after-sales service support can be said to be our first. Nutanix technical support has helped us upgrade the system to the latest version, which was painless and fully automatic."
Direct investment cost savings of 50% and reduced hardware footprint by 50%
Advantech's introduction of Nutanix HCI and cloud platform reduces the direct investment cost by about 50% compared to the traditional three-tier infrastructure. Furthermore, the hardware footprint of Advantech's data center is effectively compressed to reduce space by about 50%.
"Advantech aims to become a top 10 leading company in global industrial IoT platforms by 2025. Advantech is committed to driving the vigorous development of smart industries, smart cities, and smart service ecosystems, while also promoting the full implementation of smart IoT solutions, and achieving the success of our customer’s partners."
Kevin Lin said that a strong IT infrastructure is needed in order to strengthen the cooperative relationship with upstream and downstream partners in the industry chain and to drive more companies back to Taiwan to invest in business opportunities. The Nutanix Cloud Platform plays this key role, allowing Advantech to master the innovative IT environment, effectively shortening equipment downtime, and minimizing the impact on business operations. By deploying HCI, Advantech has cultivated its agile characteristics, the ability to respond quickly to the market, and has become the most competitive brand in the IoT era.