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Storage Consolidation Pays For State Government

Nearly three years ago, the Michigan Department of Technology, Management and Budget, then known as the Department of Information Technology, announced the completion of a multi-year project that closed 29 separate data centers in state government.  Today, DTMB is announcing the successful completion of a six-month project that has consolidated three massive storage arrays into one smaller and more efficient array.

DTMB's Technical Services Storage Management Section completed the work on the storage arrays, which provide nearly one-third of the state's 4.4 petabytes of storage.  More than 200 servers were migrated, consolidating 280 Fibre Channel ports.  The effort has yielded $567,829 in refunds from the storage vendor, EMC, for unused maintenance in fiscal year 2010.  In addition, more than $1.2 millionin costs will be avoided through fiscal year 2011. 

"This marks a major next step in our consolidation story," said Ken Theis, Director of DTMB and CIO for the State of Michigan.  "In 2007, we consolidated all of our data centers across the state down to just three secured centers, and now we are doing the work within those three centers to make them even more efficient."

The consolidation of storage arrays was completed at the Traverse Bay Hosting Center, one of the three secured centers managed by DTMB.  More than 24 square feet of floor space in the center is now free for other use, while the heating, cooling, and power consumption at the center has been cut by almost half.

Four director class fiber channel switches from two vendors were consolidated into two redundant director switches from a single vendor, cutting the carbon footprint in half. DTMB just began a similar storage consolidation effort in the two remaining hosting centers (the Lake Superior Hosting Center and the Lake Ontario Hosting Center), which has already generated an additional refund of $338,695 in maintenance from EMC. 

"I'm not just proud of the savings and efficiency this produces for us, I am extremely proud of the dedicated state employees on our team that did the hard work," said Dan Lohrmann, Director of Infrastructure Services for DTMB and the state's Chief Technology Officer.  "We are realizing so many of our goals in this project, including standardized and virtual storage, automated tiering, enhanced data protection, and reducing our carbon footprint."

Since 2004, DTMB has migrated 36 aging agency-based computer and server rooms and equipment into one of three secure centers. This consolidation has improved the security, reliability, manageability and availability of critical agency applications. It has saved more than over $19 million and reclaimed 30,000 square feet of office space, earning national awards and recognition for the state.

Michigan consolidated its government technology environment eight years ago, moving 19 separate technology organizations across state government into one single department. The state's consolidated environment makes it possible to complete projects like this storage management consolidation.

(c) 2010, WWJ Newsradio 950. All rights reserved.

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