Nationwide storage system speeds up access to data

The ever-present need for companies to have accurate and accessible information prompted UK building society Nationwide to carry out a major review of its storage strategy.

Lynn Banagan, head of IT infrastructure at Nationwide, says the company’s data storage strategy is crucial to its wider success.

‘Our business needs are based on having information in the right place at the right time,’ she says. ‘Storage is a key part of making sure that our staff have access to good quality information and that we fulfil regulatory requirements.’

As Nationwide’s volume of data grew, it became clear that the organisation’s ability to manage storage infrastructure through traditional methods was unsustainable.

‘We were using manual processes – people and spreadsheets – and the costs went through the roof,’ says Banagan.

The company recognised that data storage was an important issue and a budget priority.

But Banagan says the decision to change the way her team worked, and to implement new technology as a result, was not wholly cost-driven.

‘It was more about improving processes and efficiency. The by-product has been that we have been able to deliver an impressive return on the investment,’ she says.

Nationwide took the decision to deploy Onaro’s SANscreen storage service management software in November 2005. The system provides capacity for 850TB of data.

The building society achieved 50 per cent return on its investment in the first week of implementation and a full return on investment within a month.

Banagan’s aim was good value for money rather than simple cost-cutting, and this has been borne out by the improved efficiency of Nationwide’s storage platform.

‘We made some fairly big steps forward within a month,’ she says. ‘We have been able to reuse space that we previously underused or assigned inappropriately, and we are meeting better service levels.’

The new system has made fault-finding easier and quicker, significantly reducing the number of outages.

Banagan has found that better auditing is another benefit.

‘Better reporting is really important when making changes to the system because it means we can now monitor how workers are performing,’ she says.

The system has also saved man-hours in fire-fighting and fault-finding. ‘The outages have decreased because previously there was always an element of human error in the change process,’ says Banagan.

The company decided to undertake a proof of concept before committing to a full rollout.

The pilot went well, and with Onaro’s support the implementation was problem-free. The new software was fully deployed in four weeks.

Nationwide is now working with Onaro on new features. These refinements include site-to-site data replication, and performance modelling to identify bottlenecks and faults.

Banagan is aware that gradual degradation of service can be more detrimental than an easily identified problem, which can be pinpointed and resolved.

Finally, the system has also reduced the burden on Banagan’s IT team. With fewer system failures and less need for fault finding, her staff are able to focus on other tasks.

‘My staff are now free to get on with what they should be doing,’ she says.

Nationwide replacing IT network

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