The Zillertaler Gletscherbahn group took a tremendous step forward in increasing its IT infrastructure availability by selecting Scale Computing HyperCore and saving 75% in operational costs.
CUSTOMER PROFILE
The Austrian Zillertaler Gletscherbahn was founded in 1949 as the “Schiliftgesellschaft Hintertux” by eight locals.
Today, almost 40,000 people can be transported hourly to enjoy skiing and snowboarding 365 days per year. Many people from all over the world have been to the top of the Zillertal mountains. The star of the company is the Gletscherbus 3, the highest-lying bi-cable continuous gondola lift in the world. The Hintertuxer Gletcherbahn, Rastkogel Bahnen, Finkenberger Almbahnen, Eggalm Bahnen, Tiroler Zugspitzbahn and Ehrwalder Almbahn all belong to the group. The Zillertaler Gletscherbahn has about 300 employees, with many more during the high season.
Bernhard Kröll, CEO of GiGaNet, stated, “We first heard about Scale Computing at a Lenovo event back in 2019 where Ingram Micro, our distributor, introduced us to the Scale Computing team. Immediately, we were impressed by the Scale Computing HyperCore technology and decided to offer the solution to our clients like the Zillertaler Gletscherbahn.”
IT CHALLENGES
Current systems were expensive and time-consuming to maintain
Business-critical application could not run on the existing current environment
THE SCALE COMPUTING SOLUTION
Internet Of Things - Hundreds of snow machines equipped with IoT devices running software as a virtual machine on the Scale Computing cluster.
Applications - Mission-critical applications run on Scale Computing clusters for a variety of business administrative and operational applications, including ski pass management and payment applications.
Significant Benefits
Savings – It takes 50% fewer hours to manage the infrastructure at the Zillertal Gletscherbahn. As a result of the simplicity of SC//HyperCore and dramatically reduced management time, GiGaNet lowered the monthly managed services bill to the Zillertaler Gletscherbahn by 75%, a huge saving.
Lower initial acquisition cost - To upgrade to a new Hyper-V environment was costly and about 30% more expensive than the Scale Computing environment that was offered.
Updates – Updates were done after business hours. This was not only more costly, but it also took significantly longer and systems were not available during the upgrade process. Upgrading with SC//HyperCore is easy, and just as important, the clusters continued operations and users never experienced downtime during the upgrade process.
Security – This is important to the Zillertaler Gletscherbahn as well. It must keep downtime to a minimum and if something happens, recovering from a security breach is much faster and easier compared to their old environment.
Challenges
The Zillertaler Gletscherbahn used a Microsoft Hyper-V environment running 24 virtual machines on Lenovo servers. Additionally, they used an IBM Storwize SAN with Veeam backup. Maintaining the systems was expensive and time-consuming.
A new Linux-based business-critical application could not run on the existing Hyper-V environment, causing further problems. GiGaNet, the managed service provider to the Zillertal Gletscherbahn, searched for a new highly available and easy to manage IT infrastructure solution allowing them to offer a better service and reduce the cost for their client.
High availability is important to the Zillertaler Gletscherbahn, as the operations must be available all year round. Any maintenance during the day that endangers the continuous operation is a problem. During the high season, a system failure means tourists cannot use or pay for their ski passes, which creates a bad holiday experience. With the Scale Computing solution, continuous operations are guaranteed.
First Introduction
The Scale Computing solution was introduced to the Zillertaler Gletscherbahn by its long-term IT partner GiGaNet. During an event in 2019, GiGaNet spoke with Wolfgang Zugrav, the Business Development Manager Datacenter at Ingram Micro who introduced them. The knowledge level he shared about the Scale Computing HyperCore infrastructure was important for GiGaNet.
Scale Computing demonstrated the SC//HyperCore solution and within 10 minutes showed GiGaNet how its client’s important new Linux application could run as a virtual machine on SC//HyperCore without any problems, something that was not possible with their Hyper-V infrastructure.
This compatibility was an eye-opener for GiGaNet and the Zillertaler Gletscherbahn.
We installed multiple clusters and believe me, based on our experiences so far, the implementation of a Scale Computing infrastructure is the easiest in the industry. Installation is an intuitive process and limited technical training is required to add a new cluster. The simplicity of SC//HyperCore means less maintenance, fewer hours, fewer mistakes and lower TCO.
Selection Process
GiGaNet could not simply upgrade the Zillertaler Gletscherbahn infrastructure as some parts, like the SAN, would no longer be supported. As such, they had to replace the complete environment. GiGaNet and the Zillertaler Gletscherbahn compared Scale Computing HyperCore with a new Hyper-V environment.
The SC//HyperCore solution with new Lenovo servers was more attractive, and it could run the Linux application, something not possible with even a new Hyper-V environment.
While the Zillertaler Gletscherbahn owns the environment, GiGaNet maintains its Scale Computing clusters.
Implementation
It was very easy to move the existing applications to SC//HyperCore. GiGaNet utilized Scale Computing HyperCore MOVE to enable live migration of the virtual machines.
Disaster Recovery Setup With Replication
SC//HyperCore was implemented at the Zillertaler Gletscherbahn headquarters and the Hintertuxer Gletcher Bahnen AG, expecting further expansions.
The current operational clusters are set up with replication to support a disaster recovery scenario. The Zillertaler Gletscherbahn continues to use Veeam for backup.
The way the Scale Computing team helped us, both from a commercial and a technical point, made a huge difference in the beginning. I am very pleased with how Ingram Micro and Scale Computing worked together, allowing us to sell and implement the SC//HyperCore solution with confidence. Our experience with the Scale Computing support team is very good as well. Compared to the support we get from other vendors; Scale Computing’s ScaleCare technical support is very fast and the knowledge level of the engineers we talk to is very high. They know what they’re talking about, and this helps us to identify any issues and provide a solution very quickly.
Applications
The Zillertaler Gletscherbahn runs 24 virtual machines on the Scale Computing clusters for a variety of business administrative and operational applications, including ski pass management and payment applications. Many applications are mission-critical and require continuous availability.
Internet Of Things
The Zillertal Gletscherbahn also sees an explosion of the Internet of Things devices - not only in building management but also on the snow machines preparing the slopes. The Zillertal Gletscherbahn owns hundreds of snow machines. All of these are equipped with IoT devices to manage and provide insight into the activities of the machinery while on the slopes. The software of these IoT solutions runs as a virtual machine on the Scale Computing cluster.
Significant Benefits
Savings – It takes 50% fewer hours to manage the infrastructure at the Zillertal Gletscherbahn. As a result of the simplicity of SC//HyperCore and dramatically reduced management time, GiGaNet lowered the monthly managed services bill to the Zillertaler Gletscherbahn by 75%, a huge saving.
Lower initial acquisition cost - To upgrade to a new Hyper-V environment was costly and about 30% more expensive than the Scale Computing environment that was offered.
Updates – Updates were done after business hours. This was not only more costly, but it also took significantly longer and systems were not available during the upgrade process. Upgrading with SC//HyperCore is easy, and just as important, the clusters continued operations and users never experienced downtime during the upgrade process.
Security – This is important to the Zillertaler Gletscherbahn as well. It must keep downtime to a minimum and if something happens, recovering from a security breach is much faster and easier compared to their old environment.
“For us, one of the big benefits SC//HyperCore is that we can explain how the system works in a very short time. This means new technical engineers quickly build up knowledge about the system, saving us time and money. No expensive training courses are required.”
Next Steps
More and more of the older infrastructures will be replaced with Scale Computing. The Tiroler Zugspitzbahn installed a cluster at the end of 2021. While it is also possible to expand existing clusters with additional nodes, GiGaNet is thinking even bigger. Additional solutions like VDI and CCTV are also seen as an opportunity. It can easily extend existing clusters to run these applications or even have dedicated CCTV clusters that can expand its services across its clients. Especially with the new fiber networks that are installed throughout their region, GiGaNet sees more possibilities for the SC//HyperCore Video Surveillance.