Hong Kong university deploys storage solution

By Enterprise Innovation Editors, Enterprise Innovation | Mar 25, 2009

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The Open University of Hong Kong (OUHK) has deployed the NetApp FAS3140 storage solution to support the rollout of its Centre for Innovation (CFI) initiative. The advanced unified storage system, combined with management software tools, provides a best-of-breed storage and virtualization platform that allows OUHK to implement new intelligent learning programs.

To boost educational effectiveness and prepare its students for the ever-changing business environment, the OUHK has rolled out a three-year CFI initiative that serves as a virtual central mechanism to coordinate and implement OUHK’s innovative learning projects. These projects aim to blend the strengths of distance learning, face-to-face teaching and online learning to enrich the students’<p>The Open University of Hong Kong (OUHK) has deployed the NetApp FAS3140 storage solution to support the rollout of its Centre for Innovation (CFI) initiative. The advanced unified storage system, combined with management software tools, provides a best-of-breed storage and virtualization platform that allows OUHK to implement new intelligent learning programs.</p><p>To boost educational effectiveness and prepare its students for the ever-changing business environment, the OUHK has rolled out a three-year CFI initiative that serves as a virtual central mechanism to coordinate and implement OUHK’s innovative learning projects. These projects aim to blend the strengths of distance learning, face-to-face teaching and online learning to enrich the students’ experiences. The storage solution will support a 24 x 7 knowledge-based information highway for information dissemination and communication and e-learning initiatives that will improve academic practices. These include a next-generation "Intelligent Flexible Learning Model for Open Learning" featuring key components such as an intelligent tutoring system, an intelligent student counseling system and an integrated student support system.</p><p>"The Centre for Innovation will be able to facilitate the conversion of innovative ideas into feasible projects that will help OUHK to develop the infrastructure needed for modern e-learning," said Jonathan Tse, systems analyst, information technology unit, Open University of Hong Kong. "To support the initiative and data generated by its 600 staff and 17,000 students, OUHK realized it would need to optimize its data center operation with new virtualization technologies and achieve the "beyond five nines"<br />uptime goal with new remote disaster recovery architecture."</p><p>The FAS3140 system running Data ONTAP 7G, integrates all the necessary storage functions into a single box, consolidating diverse data sets onto a unified storage platform for central management. It unlocks the full potential of the virtualized servers installed in OUHK’s data center by enabling virtual machine mobility and offloading the work of data protection.</p><p>“We've dramatically improved our storage utilization, reducing the consumption of raw storage, power and cooling. Virtualization technology has reduced our physical storage space by 20 times and we now have a total of 44 Terabytes stored on the new system," said Tse.</p><p>"By deploying the NetApp unified storage solution, OUHK has been able to support the expansion of its teaching practices online without having to implement huge amounts of hardware or bring in additional manpower resources to manage the growing IT requirements," said Adrian Chan, southern region manager, Greater China region, NetApp. <br /> </p></body></html>