Case Study: CNP consolidates data and accelerates applications with Riverbed Steelhead appliances

CNP Consolidates Data and Accelerates Applications with Steelhead Appliances

CNP is a UK-based building and quantity surveying consultancy with rapid expansion to more than eight offices and 110 staff. Growth exposed network limits: site-by-site Exchange servers, slow and queued file replication over ADSL/MPLS links, backup problems and rising administration costs. The company needed to centralize servers and enable efficient backup and replication without costly leased lines.

CNP deployed Riverbed Steelhead appliances, consolidated Exchange and backup to a Manchester data center, and used NAS plus WANsync for replication. The appliances optimized WAN traffic, allowing transfer and backup speeds to improve 5x–10x and 5x respectively, cutting bandwidth use by about 50%. CNP replicated 80 GB over a 512 kbps link in under a week, removed roughly half its Exchange servers, reduced management and infrastructure costs, and recouped the investment within the first year.

CNP

Richard Seear

Head of IT