2,762
Devices audited in just 11 days
Our Client
Royal Mail Group is the UK’s designated Universal Postal Service Provider, supporting customers, businesses and communities across the country. They are the only company that has the capability to deliver a ‘one-price-goes-anywhere’, six-days-a-week service on a range of letters and parcels to more than 29 million addresses across the UK. General Logistics Systems (GLS), their European parcels business, operates one of the largest ground-based, deferred parcel delivery networks in Europe.
The Challenge
Royal Mail Group (RMG) engaged Sunspeed to complete a physical hardware audit of their main IT estate, which was spread across ten different Data Centre / Computer Room locations throughout the UK. RMG’s initial estimates where approx. 5,000 devices to be audited. RMG required this information to assist them in their high level planning for their forthcoming relocation and consolidation to a new Data Centre supplier.
As all the equipment was live, and covered by the incumbent’s SLA’s, Sunspeed had to work with a number of restrictions to prevent any breach of service agreement. We had to be escorted at all times, we were not allowed to reach into the racks, and were not permitted to touch any of the equipment.
The Solution
Working in teams of two, Sunspeed’s engineers utilised laptop computers and portable Bluetooth enabled barcode scanners, to create all necessary DCIM (Data Centre Infrastructure Management) information, which resulted in a detailed 12 point asset schedule. In order to reduce any failure due to human error, all the information was cross-checked, and once submitted internally, was subject to another cross-check audit.
The Benefits
The completed asset schedule was a highly detailed asset management tool that allowed the Royal Mail Group to:
- View and manage their IT estate down to the finest detail
- Plan their consolidations and Data Centre Migration project
- Have a working platform to add and record new assets as required