Infrastructure Optimisation (IO): The Foundations of Dynamic IT
Many organisations today realise the value of technology in driving business differentiation. A lot of the time technology is imperative to increase and improve business performance in today's enterprise environments and thus become a true corporate asset that delivers that business value. CIO's require their IT infrastructure to help advance rather than impede the business. These business needs bring greater pressure and ever increasing demands on IT departments to deliver technically enhanced infrastructures.
The vision of infrastructure optimisation and Dynamic IT is to help customers realise the value in their IT infrastructure investments and to make the IT infrastructures a strategic asset by reducing cost and increasing agility within their organisations.
Many organisations have embraced IO, yet it still surprises me when I speak to customers and how many either haven't heard of IO or have investigated IO but feel it is to much to implement. IO is there to help customers achieve truly optimised infrastructure solutions either as part of implementations delivered internally or through partnerships with system integrators who specialise in IO delivery.
A great IO success story was, when in 2005 The City of Edinburgh Council in partnership with their outsource partner BT used the IO model to embark on a service led engagement to deliver their Smart City vision. The vision will enable the council to make a total saving of approximately £6.4 million over 5 years whilst optimising the IT infrastructure to drive improved application performance and business resilience, achieve more effective partnerships with partners and implement an environment that will enable all citizens to engage more easily with the council.
As Doug Barney, editor in chief of Redmondmagazine and the VP, editorial director of Redmond Media Group says in his article 'Infrastructure Optimization for IT';
"IO is a rich and detailed model, and well worth the time it takes to fully understand it."
IO is always a topic that gets addressed when I talk to organisations about deploying Windows Vista. By introducing a modularised, HAL independent OS, a new file based, non destructive imaging format (WIM) and a new servicing stack, Windows Vista enables organisations to simplify image management and reduce the number of images that need to be maintained. This, in conjunction with using the new deployment tools like the Automated Installation Kit (AIK) and the Microsoft Deployment Toolkit, can help organisations move along the Core IO model in Desktop, Device and Server Management by reducing manual complexity and increasing optimised automation. Many people are still struggling to see the value in moving to Windows Vista in the enterprise. Aside from increased security and compliance (with features like BitLocker Drive Encryption, Windows Service Hardening, User Account Control and enhanced IE 7 and firewall security) and end user productivity (with integrated search, AERO and mobility improvements), the way in which we can deploy and manage the Windows platform really can derive true value in the investment many organisations have already made and optimise their core infrastructure. And by making the investments today to optimise infrastructures to deploy Windows Vista, making the move to Windows 7 could be as simple as making a ‘business as usual’ change control request to the new OS.
To find out more about Infrastructure Optimisation, visit http://www.microsoft.com/io or http://www.microsoft.com/infrastructure/default.mspx where businesses can learn more about IO and even take the self assessment to find out where their are measured on the IO scale. Partners fear not, as http://www.microsoftio.com provides the Microsoft Optimization Partner Resources.
