Client Success Stories
VPN (Virtual Private Networks)
Nationwide firm saves $130,000 in annual costs with project cost of under $50,000 - a return on investment realized in under 5 months...
Orbis developed a custom solution for a transport logistics company with
eight locations across the US - from Los Angeles, CA to
Atlanta, GA.
In the late '90s, all eight offices were linked with dedicated data lines
provided by the local telephone companies. Charges for data access ran
between $1600 and $1800 per location per month - costing more than $150,000 per
year for data access across the company.
Orbis, in partnership with Cisco Systems, deployed a nationwide VPN (Virtual Private Network).
Rather than dedicated (expensive) leased data lines, each location switched to a commodity Internet
T1. Equipment from Cisco allowed secure, encrypted access to all data
systems with a performance increase of nearly 150% and a cost savings of 80%.
In short, the company realized faster data access, more secure communications, and an
ongoing cost savings of $130,000 - nearly 80% of their original
telecommunications cost.
The same system was later used to reduce telephone communications costs by
another 95% for intra-company calls.
Virtual Infrastructure
Banking firm slashes cost of regular hardware upgrades by 50% - reduces risk of crashes and data loss by a factor of 100...
When a local banking firm approached Orbis, they were looking to solve three major problems:
- Reduce the cost of new hardware required every 3-4 years
- Eliminate the risk of system crashes, viruses
- Protect themselves in case of a major disaster
Orbis worked with our partners from HP, Microsoft, and VMWare to develop a solution to all
three problems - at a price less than that quoted by 4 other major IT firms.
Orbis used equipment from HP to reduce the number of servers at the company from 20 to 3.
While these 3 servers were more expensive than your average server, having only 3 cut
$150,000 from the hardware upgrade budget - which required upgrading server hardware every
3 to 4 years.
Next, Orbis used solutions from Microsoft and VMWare to run the required software in such a
way as to eliminate the possibility of down time. If any 1 of the 3 main servers were to
fail, any software systems running on that server will immediately transfer and begin running
on one of the other servers. No downtime, no loss of data.
Further, the ability to run multiple "virtual" servers in one large server allowed Orbis to
design a backup system that completely protects the firm. Even in the event of a total
building loss during a natural disaster, the backup system in place can have all systems up
and running within 24 hours - thanks to Orbis' unique ability to secure standby hardware
from HP at a very low price, and the fact that restoring systems from backup requires no
reinstallation of software.
Small Business - Big Technology
Small business utilizes cutting edge technology with no hardware, software, and no need for expensive upgrades in the future...
A small construction office came to Orbis with a typical problem: their software
vendor was releasing a new update and it required a massive hardware upgrade to
their entire system.
Our client was afraid of the cost of the hardware, the time to transition to the new
system, and the potential for error, data loss, and downtime if there
were problems.
Orbis constructed and delivered a unique solution. We replaced expensive desktop
computers (that are slow and obsolete in two years) with Thin Client data
terminals that require no upgrades, no software, and have no moving parts.
Orbis then used our partners from Microsoft, VWMware, and Savvis to design a "virtual datacenter"
for this small company. While datacenters are thought to be expensive, since we used
virtualization technologies, the cost is very low. It is analogous to owning a warehouse vs.
renting a storage unit - you may only have need for a limited amount of capacity - why build
your own warehouse when you can rent a storage unit for much less?
In short, when the company needs upgrades to their system, we simply make a few phone calls
and they have their increased capacity - no hardware upgrades, no installation of new systems,
no reinstallation of software, and no transition time - which means no loss of access to
critical data.
Rather than spending nearly $60,000 upgrading a handful of workstations and a server, the
company now has all the capacity they need, with better reliability, a built-in backup
system, and the ability to grow their capacity on demand. All this for a fixed monthly cost
that is less than what they spend on phone lines and cell phone service.