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Web First: Nutanix equips Commonwealth treasury with hyperconverged infrastructure

Aims to provide reliable access to critical budget, economic and tax applications, and Government services
Nutanix equips Commonwealth treasury with hyperconverged infrastructure

Nutanix equips Commonwealth treasury with hyperconverged infrastructure

The Commonwealth Treasury has transitioned to a Nutanix hyperconverged infrastructure to ensure it can deliver Australia’s economic framework, including the Federal budget, accurately and on time.

The next-generation enterprise computing company said its hyperconverged technology serves as the platform for the treasury’s core business applications including the Budget Management System (BMS) and other critical economic and tax modelling applications.

The Treasury is now using Nutanix’s Web-scale technology to support its virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) comprising up to 850 endpoints. The company said, in a statement, that by virtualising its applications, the Treasury provides secure, login-based access to all software on any device in or outside the office, delivered by its ‘invisible’ platform that operates and maintains itself.

As the central economic agency within the Australian Federal Government, Treasury analyses and anticipates policy issues with a whole-of-economy perspective.

Nutanix A/NZ managing director, Wayne Neich, said Treasury’s Nutanix-based VDI environment was designed and installed by Canberra ICT services provider, Qirx, which won a tender for the project. Once Treasury’s application and VDI requirements expand, Qirx, in partnership with Nutanix, will work together to maximise the value delivered to Treasury as it scales up.

“Calculating and producing Australia’s economic blueprint is a monumental task that relies on accurate, up-to-date data. With a Web-scale infrastructure supporting its applications, Treasury’s staff can complete analyses, evaluations, reports and assessments uninterrupted,” Neich said.

Commonwealth Treasury chief technology officer, Ricardo Alberto, said to ensure it could continue to operate with its high standard of precision and urgency, Treasury implemented Nutanix to give employees uninterrupted access to its key applications anytime, anywhere and on any device.

“Previously, Treasury could only deliver certain applications on specific desktops, requiring staff to move between various terminals to complete tasks. Meanwhile, mobile employees could only connect to a very limited number of applications while out of office. This inhibited productivity and jeopardised deadlines.”

Alberto mentioned without its various internal systems, and in particular the BMS, it wouldn’t be able to produce the budget.

“With our applications running on Nutanix, our teams have the information they need to inform the budget and other key policy issues. It doesn’t matter whether they are at their desks or travelling, the tools are always there so the job can be done without delay.

“While we had the option of extending our existing storage area network (SAN) capacity to run VDI, the Nutanix hyperconverged route proved to provide the flexibility, performance and accessibility we need, without the huge up-front cost and maintenance requirements,” Alberto added.

Alberto also said in addition to helping Treasury meet its budget and policy deadlines, Nutanix’s ‘invisible’ platform allows its IT department to focus on other projects rather than strain resources on the management of complex SAN architectures.