Central Bank of Swaziland boosts IT governance

The Central Bank of Swaziland (CBS) has taken a decisive R3.8-million step toward implementing a comprehensive business continuity strategy, appointing reseller Ingran Africa (Ingran IT) to scope, design and install a storage consolidation and disaster recovery (DR) solution in conjunction with distributor Drive Control Corporation (DCC). The strategy will too enable the bank to uphold stringent corporate governance standards.

CBS acts as a banker to the Swaziland government and the four commercial banks operating in the country. "IT drives of our business processes," explains Benson Dlamini, IT Director at CBS, "and a comprehensive business continuity strategy is essential to ensure our operations can continue uninterrupted in the event of disaster. Our primary concern was that our IT infrastructure was physically housed at a single site. We were also experiencing downtime and slow response times that were affecting efficiency."

CBS released a request for proposal to consolidate storage across its Microsoft and Unix based servers and ensure high availability of business critical systems and applications. A priority was to implement a stable disaster recovery solution that would protect business critical systems at the bank's primary site, and provide a secondary site from which to continue operations.

"We considered a number of solutions, visited live sites and thoroughly assessed solution providers' skills, experience and business sustainability," notes Dlamini. "We wanted a partner that could help us develop a comprehensive DR system and ensure skills transfer, as well as a solution that would not tie us into using a certain technology or software.

"We settled on DCC and Ingran IT's proposal to implement Adaptec's SANbloc and Veritas' Volume Manager as they are proven, cost-effective brands. We believe these non-proprietary open systems will also allow us to easily expand our system to meet future requirements. A deciding factor was the experience and expertise Ingran and DCC brought to the table," says Dlamini.

"DCC and Ingran have worked together for a number of years," explains Jose Coelho, Technology Centre manager at DCC. Ingran has considerable experience in rolling out SANs and had a number of live sites that CBS could visit. Ingran is also the only Adaptec Platinum partner in South Africa. The reseller leveraged DCC's expertise for scoping and designing the architecture but has been solely responsible for execution of the implementation."

Explains Mayur Nanalal of Ingran IT: "CBS was using a general tape backup solution and running both Microsoft and Unix servers. To maximise the investment in the central bank's existing infrastructure, we proposed an overhaul of the servers to stabilise them, streamline throughput and prioritise critical applications. This would be backed up by the installation of a SAN-based storage solution with the addition of management functionality. We selected products that would fit CBS' pocket, as well as meet current and future data and business needs, and enable the implementation of a stable DR solution."

The necessary hard- and software has been installed at CBS' primary and secondary sites and the project is now entering phase two. Says Ingran's Nanalal: "We formatted the servers, reinstalled the applications, and stabilised and synchronised the servers to streamline throughput. This has increased resiliency and data availability significantly. The installation of a Storage Area Network (SAN) ensures that if hardware fails, access to storage is not lost."

Adds Andre Moller, director at Ingran IT: "Veritas Volume Manager was installed, providing easy-to-use, on-line storage management that creates a foundation for SAN environments, clustering and failover, automated management, backup and remote browser-based management.

"Virtualising and centralising storage resources over a SAN reduces administrative overheads immediately and provides a scalable foundation to manage growth. Key capabilities of volume manager applicable to SANs include creation, synchronisation and fail-over to a Remote Mirror while the application remains on-line; and dynamic multi-pathing which provides non-disruptive path-level fail-over and load balancing over multiple Fibre Channel links between a server and storage peripheral.

"Adaptec's SANbloc 2Gb JBOD offers the latest in Fibre Channel network interface technology. Along with accelerated performance in network storage environments, it provides simultaneous transmit and receive operations in full-duplex mode as high as 400Mbps. The SANbloc can be scaled in multiple dimensions, enabling flexible configuration of capacity, performance and functionality," notes Moller.

Phase two of the project includes the implementation of the disaster recovery solution and replication of data and systems to the DR site using fibre or Microwave technology for connectivity. Storage back-ups using tape and disk solutions will be automated. This part of the project is expected to be completed by the end of 2005.

Comments Dlamini: "Ingran IT and DCC have displayed a high level of technical proficiency and have satisfactorily delivered a solution that will provide a solid underpinning for CBS' operations, limit risk and increase efficiencies."

Says Nanalal: "At Ingran, we believe in the whole service, not just the boxes and wires. A key feature of our offering is our technical knowledge and understanding of the often highly complex products available in today's market. This knowledge, combined with our independence, enables us to formulate the best strategy for our customers, recommend and supply the right product to suit their requirements, as well as provide them with the necessary consultancy, support, training and maintenance. We believe we have assisted CBS to set in place a solid foundation that will cater to their current and future needs."