From a Microsoft Case Study:
Client: EMS Group
WS2008 Project developed by Insource

International Pipeline Services Company Increases Efficiency and Security

As EMS’s business continues to grow, our Web presence will also increase. IT will have to deploy servers faster and more efficiently. I believe Windows Server 2008 will allow us to achieve these goals.

-- James Glore, Technology Consultant, Insource Technology on behalf of EMS USA

Client Profile
EMS Group is a multi-million-dollar pipeline services company with offices in the United States, Canada, and Mexico. The company needed to be able to operate efficiently around the clock and needed to improve its network security. IT was able to effectively meet those goals by deploying Windows Server® 2008 Enterprise.

Business Needs
EMS’s technology environment consists of switches, routers, and servers in a 100-megabit Ethernet TCP/IP network. A network hub in Houston, Texas, provides connectivity to branch offices via segmented, Virtual Local Area Networks (VLANs) in the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Their Active Directory® directory service domain consists of 45 servers running Windows Server 2003 and is split between corporate and production domains. Between 750 and 1,000 employees use approximately 445 laptops and desktop computers to complete their daily tasks.
A major business requirement for the company was maintaining employee productivity and server availability around the clock. The networks in which the routers, switches, and firewalls reside have been stable, and the company’s metrics generally return 100 percent uptime. The server environment has also been highly stable. However, server availability became an issue with the existing configuration of the servers especially during maintenance of the servers or applications.

Previous partners, responsible for EMS’s IT needs, had not followed Microsoft best practices when deploying new servers. As a result, during maintenance, not only did EMS lose e-mail communication, but remote users could no longer maintain high levels of productivity because the terminal services application was on the same server.

Another primary business requirement was maintaining high levels of security. Defining and implementing policy, roles, and permissions for all users was an ever evolving process that required participation at all levels of the organization.

Finally, EMS had a strong need to maintain a homogenous user environment. Hundreds of users work not only in the office, but also after hours from home. With the growth in the number of users at EMS,, the need to have remote connectivity match that of the office environment was becoming particularly important.

Solution
EMS, with the assistance of its Gold Certified Partner, Insource Technology, deployed Windows Server 2008 Enterprise on one manually built server. The company is using HP Systems Insight Management and Windows® Remote Desktop to manage the server.

Concerned about previous deployments and the downtime they created, EMS’ IT team was particularly pleased with the efficiency of the Windows Server 2008 deployment. The deployment was markedly faster than expected. Initial configuration tasks enabled IT staff to use a central repository to get the server online and joined to the domain efficiently. They were also pleased to be able to configure roles and features without using Server Manager.

Even shortly after deployment, the company was already seeing security improvements. Because of the increased event logging capabilities of the new operating system, IT staff, tasked with monitoring the system, were now able to see attempts to access internal systems from the outside.

The ease of installation was impressive: less than 30 minutes, compared to about an hour for prior versions of Windows Server. When the company later deploys multiple systems, the time savings will be significant. The EMS IT professionals appreciate the ability of Server Manager to perform most administrative tasks.

Benefits
At this point in its deployment of Windows Server 2008, EMS is seeing the most significant benefits in terms of productivity and security. Detailed benefits are as follows:

• Easier server management. The stability and reliability of Windows Server 2008 mean that reviewing event logs and Web server log files takes only 5 to 15 minutes a day.
• Better security. IT professionals can now gather event log evidence of hacking attempts.
• Faster troubleshooting and problem solving. The most important features required to keep the server up to date and running efficiently are centralized, so troubleshooting and daily maintenance are faster.
• More opportunities for planning. The enhanced documentation now available to IT professionals has provided additional information that may help in planning future server deployments.

EMS plans to continue the expansion of the server by adding production Web sites to it. It also eventually intends to move the server into the DMZ perimeter network to further enhance security. A little farther down the road, the company’s goal is to deploy a second server as a VMware ESX server and continue its virtualization plans.

Windows Server 2008
Windows Server 2008, with built-in Web and virtualization technologies, enables you to increase the reliability and flexibility of your server infrastructure. New virtualization tools, Web resources, and security enhancements help you save time, reduce costs, and provide a platform for a dynamic and optimized datacenter. Powerful new tools like IIS 7.0, Server Manager, and Windows® PowerShell, allow you to have more control over your servers and streamline Web, configuration, and management tasks. Advanced security and reliability enhancements like Network Access Protection and the Read-Only Domain Controller option for Active Directory Domain Services harden the operating system and help protect your server environment to ensure you have a solid foundation on which to build your business.