Insurer aims to cut storage cost

Data management changes could save Norwich Union up to 25 per cent

Norwich Union hopes to cut storage costs by 25 per cent by consolidating its datacentre systems.

The insurance group is moving from 64 EMC Symmetrix storage arrays to 14 EMC Symmetrix DMX systems to improve performance and scalability over the next few months.

The project will enable easier resource management and better cost-control for the company.

Norwich Union will also cut the number of regional servers from 1800 to 600 as it moves from direct attached storage (DAS) to a storage area network (SAN) and network attached storage (NAS) infrastructure over the next two years. Storage utilisation rates will increase from 30 per cent to 90 per cent as a result.

IT service delivery director Paul Fryer says the existing EMC datacentre environment grew to 150Tb due to factors such as disaster recovery requirements, data warehousing and new applications.

'Ensuring data is correctly managed and resides on the most cost-effective platform is a fundamental output of the company's lifecycle management initiative,' he said.

Emerging corporate governance requirements are also a factor. Fryer says that by improving information management, the company can track data and respond quickly to regulatory or unpredictable changes in business requirements.

'We will take account of the current and potential legislative requirements around data storage, retention and production,' he said.

A joint team from Norwich Union and EMC, with additional support from the Network Storage Company, will manage the migration.

The insurer will use EMC OpenScale, a 'pay as you grow' billing system for storage infrastructure to allocate additional resources on demand without requiring onsite technical assistance. It will use EMC ControlCenter software for a central view of its storage infrastructure and to manage performance.

'The management software will give us the ability to control the costs associated with a rapidly growing information environment. By knowing which business units are using what, how fast information is growing and which applications are being used, we can ensure that information is being delivered to the point of need so that our staff can continue to deliver excellent customer service,' said Fryer.