How HPE’s HCI 2.0 Simplifies and Unlocks Agility to Speed Digital Transformation

These are unpredictable times. But that does not mean your business can be put on hold. On the contrary, now is the exact right time to start or accelerate digital transformation. In fact, a recent survey of more than 3,600 small and midsized businesses shows that 51% of SMBs have stepped up their digital transformation investments—and digital transformation is prominent in the plans of 22% of SMBs who report that current crisis has amplified their sense of urgency for an organisation-wide digital transformation.

So you are definitely not alone as you look for ways to power recovery and future growth. To do that, you need intelligent infrastructure to unlock scale through innovation and customer excellence. Because let’s face it, no matter the size of your business, the future belongs to those who use data to differentiate, who understand customers better than anyone else—and who can innovate boldly and quickly.

One piece of the digital transformation puzzle is the need to deploy foundational infrastructure technology that can help you create new market opportunities—faster, cheaper, and more effectively. The way forward? It starts with second-generation hyper-converged infrastructure – HCI 2.0.

First, a brief history of hyper-converged infrastructure

HCI combines server hardware and locally attached storage resources with intelligent software to create flexible building blocks that replace legacy infrastructure. It consists of separate servers, networks, and storage arrays that together enable organizations to take advantage of cloud-like simplicity and scale. You can think about it as an all-in-one appliance that is easy to install and operate.

The first generation of HCI was designed for key jobs and workloads such as data storage, application virtualisation, and application development. The technology allowed businesses to be agile with easily expandable compute, storage and networking resources bundled into a single node. So scaling up infrastructure for things like virtualisation or app development meant just adding another node – and the use of industry-standard hardware reduced over-provisioning and lowered costs.

Now it’s time to take hyper converged even further, faster

In many IT environments today, data is stored and process away from the data center and at the edge. Whether this is surveillance video data for retailers or sensory tags at a manufacturing site, the ability to collect, transcribe, and act on data in real time requires a next-level type of solution. At a time when data drives growth, HPE HCI 2.0 was developed to meet the needs of businesses that need to scale and meet their IT demands today and also 3-to-5 years down the road.

HCI 2.0, exemplified by HPE Nimble Storage dHCI, brings together the best of converged and hyper-converged architectures on a flexible platform with independent scaling of compute and storage. It overcomes the limitations and drawbacks of first-generation HCI with several key innovations.

By disaggregating compute and storage resources, HCI 2.0 makes it possible to scale each independently to maximise efficiency. Shared storage that eliminates the network traffic across nodes means low-latency performance with fewer bottlenecks. What’s more, always-on data reduction eliminates tuning and improves performance, while keeping storage dense. And business continuity is assured through advanced replication for multi-site disaster recovery.

Adding intelligence to hyper-converged

HCI 2.0 incorporates HPE InfoSight monitoring tools that use artificial intelligence to predict and prevent disruptions and provide cross-stack analytics that improve application performance and optimise resource use. The simplicity of HCI and the flexibility of a three-tier architecture are now combined with intelligence. This means your organisation can enjoy the benefits of cloud-like architectures without any compromise on performance, availability, or scale.

Put HCI 2.0 to work for your organisation

If your business is in search of:

  • Faster time to market—with new opportunities to develop new products and services
  • Faster, better user experience—with reduced complexity in IT operations with not tradeoffs or compromises
  • Lower costs—derived from using time and skills more efficiently
  • Time savings—as businesses respond more quickly and effectively to changing conditions by supporting rapid, no-fuss resource
  • Increased productivity—letting predictive analytics help streamline IT operations

Then HCI 2.0 might be the solution for you—one that brings:

  • Simple intelligence—automated and on demand, using predictive analytics to quickly diagnose performance problems and identify the root cause so that you don’t have to
  • Absolute resilience—designed for 9999% availability of resources, so that even three simultaneous drive failures will not bring the system down
  • Efficient scalability—grow compute and storage independently, extended across a hybrid cloud, with industry-leading data efficiency
  • Built-in speed—an install time of 15 minutes from rack to apps plus easy administration from one single dashboard

Power into the future

If you’re a small business, consider how HPE HCI 2.0 can help you accelerate scale through innovation—completely free from vendor lock in and free from mundane frustrations. That leaves you with more time to better focus on innovation and how to scale and grow.

If you’re a midsized business, look to HPE HCI 2.0 to deliver meaningful business value and drive greater efficiencies through smoother, reliable IT processes. The stress meter goes down for you too, knowing you have made a smart investment that can improve ROI.

Learn more about our HPE solutions – https://mjf.ie/solution/infrastructure-solutions/

MJ Flood Technology wins 2020 Calling & Meetings for Microsoft Teams Partner of the Year Award

MJ Flood Technology are delighted to announce that we have been awarded the Calling & Meetings for Microsoft Teams Partner of the Year award at the 2020 Microsoft Ireland Awards. We are chosen out of a field of top Irish Microsoft partners for demonstrating excellence in innovation and delivering market-leading customer solutions built on Microsoft technology.

“We are honoured to accept the award for Teams Calling & Meetings. I’m very proud of our team for their hard work and dedication throughout the year and for delivering some outstanding Teams Calling solutions for our valued customers.” said James Finglas, Managing Director of MJ Flood Technology.

The Microsoft Partner of the Year Awards recognise Microsoft partners that have developed and delivered exceptional Microsoft-based solutions during the past year. Awards were classified in several categories, with honourees chosen from a set of more than 3,300 submitted nominations from more than 100 countries worldwide. MJ Flood Technology was recognised for providing outstanding solutions and services in the Teams Calling and Meetings expertise area in Ireland.

For more information on our Microsoft Teams Calling & Meetings solutions, please contact info@mjf.ie.

Microsoft Azure FAQ

MJ Flood Technology – Microsoft Gold Partner- Guido Marchetti Cloud Lead

What is Azure?

Azure is Microsoft Cloud infrastructure and platform as a service. It allows users to consume IT hardware and software like a utility bill. Well, that is the practical answer. The technologists in us see Azure as a place to make the impossible, possible. If you can imagine it, then Azure will help it become a reality. Its computing like never before.

Is Azure secure?

Yes, security and privacy are built into the Azure platform. Microsoft is committed to the highest levels of trust, transparency, standards conformance, and regulatory compliance with the most comprehensive set of compliance offerings of any cloud service provider.

Will Azure really save me money?

With no upfront cost, you only pay for what you use. Azure provides flexible purchasing and pricing options for all your cloud scenarios, such as the Azure Hybrid Benefit, and offers extensive tools to help manage your cloud spend.

Can I try Azure for free, without any risk of being charged?

Yes of course. Create an Azure free account to learn how Azure works, try products and cloud services, and view tutorials on how to deploy your first solution in 10 minutes or less.  With our spending limit feature, customers who sign up for a free trial, Visual Studio, MPN, or BizSpark offer can use Azure without any fear of getting charged as long as they keep the spending limit feature turned on.

Will Azure work for my industry?

Azure provides solutions for all industries. Bring together cloud services and products tailored for your industry to help meet your specific needs and drive innovation.

I have server licenses. Can I transfer them to Azure and run them on Virtual Machines?

 Yes, through license mobility, if you have SA you can “bring-your-own-license” for all Virtual Machines supported server products except Windows Server

Is there a pre commit?

There is no need for one, you can sign up to Azure as a pay as you go model, or if you prefer a fixed price you can also purchase Reserved virtual instances of machines. This gives you the ability to fix your price for the resources you need.

Is the Cloud more cost effective?

This depends on what you are trying to achieve. In some case yes, it is, in others it might not be. But we will work with you to design the solution that meets your business requirements.

What is the Azure SLA agreement?

Azure has separate SLAs for all services that are generally available, and not in preview.

Interested in learning more about Microsoft Azure?

Speak to one of our experts today, call 01 466 3500 or email sales@mjf.ie

MJ Flood Technology Named Supplier of the Year 2020

From Left: Cathy Mulhare, Elizabeth McLoughlin, Niall Gorman, Gareth Madden & Keith Hanley accepting the Supplier of the Year Award 2020.

MJ Flood Technology has been named supplier of the year 2020. This outstanding achievement was celebrated at the Retail Excellence Awards held in the Great Southern Hotel Killarney.

The Retail Excellence Annual Awards, which were established in 1997 to promote best practice and encourage the highest standards in the Irish retail industry. Since then the awards have grown to become the largest and most prestigious retail awards in Ireland.

MJ Flood Technology is immensely proud to be acknowledged as a leading supplier to the Irish retail sector. We will continue to advise and assist all retailers as they continue to innovate and digitise.

Managing Director James Finglas said “Winning Supplier of the Year is a fantastic acknowledgement of the dedication our team has to supporting the retail sector. Our aim is to continue to provide retailers with the latest technology to enhance their instore experience and to enable them to thrive and grow in what is a continually challenging climate.

Keith Hanley and Cathy Mulhare from MJ Flood Technology at the Retail Excellence Awards.

Are you taking the necessary steps to protect your organisations?

While modern technology offers amazing gains in productivity, you also need to make sure your organisation is protected from increasing security threats. Your organisational data is valuable and needs to be protected. Data breaches are a fact of life, and the costs continue to rise:

  • 4.2 Billion customer records compromised
  • 99 days from breach to detection
  • 17 million is the average cost of a security breach 

Information loss is now the most expensive consequence of cyber-crime.

Wouldn’t you feel more confident knowing your business assets are protected and secure? 

Enterprise Mobility + Security (EMS)

Microsoft’s Enterprise Mobility + Security suite is a full-featured enterprise security solution that includes Azure Active Directory Premium, Intune, Azure Information Protection, Advanced Threat Analytics (ATA), and Microsoft Cloud App Security.

These tools help your organisation:

  • Maintain convenience and accessibility for employees while preventing data loss
  • Control how and when users connect to your network with device & rights management
  • Monitor user behaviour to eliminate threats

Identity and Access Management

Azure Active Directory is Microsoft’s most comprehensive solution for user and identity management.
Azure Active Directory’s features include:

  • Secure trusted connection to applications hosted in the cloud & on premise
  • Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA)
  • Single sign-on for thousands of SaaS apps
  • Centralized management of corporate social media accounts
  • Self-service password management

Device Management

Microsoft Intune is a comprehensive security solution for enterprise device management that includes PC management, mobile device management (MDM), and mobile application management (MAM).
Intune allows your organisation to:

  • Manage all of your PCs and mobile devices
  • Revoke access, remove applications, and selectively wipe company data from devices at any time
  • Remotely enforce mobile device settings such as passcode resets, device locking, and data encryption
  • Protect devices with secure file viewing
  • Control actions on the web, including access to specific websites, with Managed Browser
  • Manage your applications

Data Protection  

Do you know who your confidential documents have been shared with?

From confidential agreements to classified emails, Azure Information Protection protects your organisation by controlling and securing how documents are accessed.

Information Protection is fully integrated with Office 365, Windows Server, and many third-party applications.

  • Granular control over document usage including duration of access
  • Policy enforcement over specific actions and applications, such as copy/paste and print functions in Office
  • Advanced encryption
  • Access logging to track when and where your documents are opened
  • Automatic document classification based on content or metadata

HPE SimpliVity – The Next Generation In Construction Data Management

Lead infrastructure Architect Garrett Wallis sat down with Construction Magazine to discuss the benefits of HPE SimpliVity for the Construction Sector.

What is HPE SimpliVity?

HPE Simplivity is a “hyper-converged” Virtual infrastructure platform. This means that the server, storage, hypervisor and backup infrastructure are delivered as an all-in-one highly efficient, highly effective and highly available platform.  It represents the evolution of infrastructure virtualisation, and transition to a software-defined data centre.

What benefits does it have to offer construction firms?

HPE Simplivity address the challenges faced by many business sectors.  It is:

Simple:  Remove the complexity of procuring and managing many different infrastructure elements.  HPE Simplivity is a fully integrated, pre-configured platform for modern IT infrastructure.

Flexible:  Enable rapid transformation and business agility with a simple building-block approach and a single management interface.

Powerful:  High performance infrastructure in a small foot-print, with the ability to expand easily and non-disruptively as requirements change.

Efficient:  With a compact and simplified form-factor, it requires a smaller data centre infrastructure and lower services costs.

Secure:  Integrated backup brings data backup and protection and rapid recovery capabilities.

For construction companies, HPE SimpliVity adds real value.

It means having:

  • The ability to fulfil new service requirements quickly.
  • Cost effective and predictable cost structure.
  • The power to meet fluctuating workloads. 
  • The powerful yet simple management interface serves to free up IT resources to concentrate on adding real value to the service rather than focussing on day-to-day operations.

HPE SimpliVity working for construction

“As a large contractor, I run my operations from a central office and would have 5 to 20 sites in operation at one time, with people using BIM needing real time access to collaborate on files, drawings and the media. How can SimpliVity help my operations?”

HPE Simplivity is an appropriate platform for any organisation with an on-premises or hybrid IT architecture.  It is a solution for a centralised IT operation, or larger branch office environments.

As a large contractor, running multiple sites, there are a standard set of IT services required to enable management and collaboration on the job.  HPE SimpliVity enables services to be defined once and then repeated rapidly and simply in multiple locations, with services that can easily share, secure and protect each sites IT collateral (file shares, virtual servers, backups, virtual desktops – all the backend IT elements).  A discrete set of services can be instated rapidly for each job and removed/archived at the end of the job.

Used in conjunction with appropriate networking and remote access, it provides a base on which to enable the storage and sharing platform for Building Information Management collateral and processes. Management of those resources is greatly simplified, and the skills needed to gain the most of the investment easily acquired.

 

 

What scale of business is Simplicity suited to?

HPE Simplivity scales from the small business to the large enterprise.  It can add value to the operation of every business, though the economics are most compelling in a business with a requirement for 20 virtual machines or more, or in a business of any size that wants to consolidate and simplify its IT infrastructure.

HPE Simplivity is a modular platform that scales easily with requirements – start small and grow, with a predictable upgrade path, and seamless expansion without compromising business operations.

Can small external sub-contractors be added to the system?

If a small sub-contractor needs IT services but doesn’t have the capability to deliver those IT services independently for a job, the HPE Simplivity platform offers a way to provision services for the contractor, logically isolated for other services.

What savings and efficiencies does SimpliVity offer?

  • Huge savings over traditional infrastructure, and significant cheaper than comparable public Cloud offerings
  • Significant increase in time available for new projects
  • Rapid payback through operating cost reductions and cost avoidance.

Who is using HPE SimpliVity?

Businesses and organisations across multiple sectors and industries use HPE Simplivity to run their organisations – including Construction, Healthcare, Financial Services, Education, Local Government.  No matter what your industry, HPE Simplivity brings the benefit of hyperconvergence to you your business.

How do I get a demo?

Contact Garrett Wallis at wallisg@mjf.ie or 014663500 for more information and to arrange for a specialist to provide more information or a demonstration.