Reed wins Green Project of the year at the Computing Excellence Awards

On Wednesday evening 5th November, I was privileged and very proud to pick up an award for "Green Project of the year" for Reed at the prestigious Computing Excellence Awards 2008 in London, UK.

This completes a hat trick of awards in 2008 based on our Green computing projects,

A video of the Green Project of Year presentation can be viewed below




<

A full list of the Computing Excellence award winners 2008 can be found here

The Computing Excellence Green Project of the Year 2008 shortlist can be found here

I have also included a copy of our submission to the judges below.

GREEN PROJECT OF THE YEAR SUBMISSION: REED MANAGED SERVICES

Return On Investment ROI

Reed Managed Services delivers managed IT services across the Reed Group of companies at a monthly fee per desktop, across a network of over 4000 IT knowledge based users. The head of IT services is Sean Whetstone.

The decision to implement thin computing was driven by a goal of achieving real reductions in energy consumption from IT; and a separate goal on increased operational efficiencies while improving the quality of IT provision.

The 12 month project delivered clear ROI in key areas: reduced hourly power consumption by 5.4 million KW hours of power; reduced annual IT spend by 20% and delivered greater flexibility and security through use of Wyse thin client terminals, centralised data and applications, consolidated data centre infrastructure and virtualisation software


Innovation

Few other major corporates have chosen to switch from a PC to a thin client computing model on such a large scale. The project saw the complete replacement of all 4500 desktop PCs with a thin computing solution based on Wyse thin client terminals; and new data centre infrastructure based on 64-bit blade servers and virtualisation software.

This change delivered major energy consumption savings and enabled greener working practices for all staff. Previously PCs had to be left turned on 24x7 to allow overnight software patching. With thin clients there is no need for this practice and the changes are applied centrally on Wyse management software. The faster start-up time of the Wyse terminals mean staff switch off their terminals at lunchtime and the end of their working day.

Thin clients delivered other benefits including remote working with staff able to log onto their personal settings at any thin client terminal in any office; and the elimination of local workstation storage and centralised storage of data and applications meant critical information was secure and always backed up.

Reed uses its new thin computing infrastructure to transform how it delivers computer services internationally. With its UK-based central data centre running 24X7, Reed can provide IT services via Wyse thin clients to its Australia operations on the same servers at a time when those servers would otherwise be standing idle because it is night time in Western Europe.


The choice of more energy efficient servers meant lower heat emissions, enabling the data centre to operate at a higher temperature and thus reduce the need for air conditioning.- further helping to cut electrical consumption.


Future Growth

Thin computing model on a large scale makes it much easier for Reed to respond to future expansion nationally and internationally. This was demonstrated when Reed was able to establish a new remote office in Australia in less than four weeks because of the more flexible IT infrastructure available.


Management

Reed recognised that the decision to go for thin computing had to be carefully managed with both the board and staff. A three month trial demonstrated to the board that the solution was easy to set up and manage, in addition to being economic and environmentally-friendly to run.

But Reed’s IT division also had to convince the end-users. “We had a lot to prove: taking away someone’s PC and replacing it with a thin terminal is quite a dramatic move for most people to become comfortable with, and we were expecting a lot of resistance”: said Sean Whetstone, Head of IT Services.

Reed worked in close collaboration with Wyse to implement the solution within as short a timeframe as possible. Reed replaced all of its 4500 PCs in 10 weeks. A swift and smooth implementation helped to win over staff.


Excellence

Within a year of migrating to a thin computing model, Wyse thin computers have helped Reed achieve its goal of significantly reducing its carbon footprint.

In replacing the PCs with thin terminals across all locations, Reed witnessed a dramatic reduction in energy consumption – approximately 5.4 million KW hours of power – one of the main causes of carbon emissions. These, combined with halving the number of storage drives and reducing the number of servers by a factor of 20, have resulted in a 20% reduction in Reed’s annual IT budget.

“Cutting our IT budget by 20% through thin clients, virtualisation, as well as achieving reduced energy consumption is a tremendous result for us,” concludes Whetstone. “Not only have we met our objective to significantly reduce our carbon emissions, but we have also discovered a more cost-efficient way of operating and growing our business, which will continue to reduce our operating costs for years to come.”

Ends