A large bank based in Asia launched a new app to provide customers with 24/7 access to its banking services. It became so popular that not only did the bank draw a vast new customer base, it also began to experience significant growth in transaction and data volumes.
The financial institution’s existing mid-range storage system wasn’t able to support the increased demand. The bank needed to find a new enterprise storage solution with higher capacity, better performance, and greater data protection. The system also would need to scale to meet demand for the next five years.
The bank partnered with Hitachi Vantara and developed a proof-of-concept solution using two Hitachi Vantara Virtual Storage Platform (VSP) 5500 and one VSP E9990 arrays connected with Broadcom Brocade G720 and 7810 extension switches. The system is managed through Hitachi Ops Center.
Replication Three Ways
Beyond the improved capacity and performance, the new architecture also had to meet two critical specifications. Regulatory requirements demand that if the main data centers become non-functional, the system will continue to operate seamlessly through the disaster recovery location. The team established a three-way replication configuration using remote replication software.
Hitachi TrueCopy synchronously replicates data between the primary and secondary data centers, and Hitachi Universal Replication asynchronously replicates data to the disaster recovery site.
In addition, the bank mandated that the core banking application must be migrated to the new data storage infrastructure without going offline or disrupting network performance. To successfully achieve this, the team migrated applications in stages. Non-critical applications were migrated to the new storage system first, then more critical applications were transitioned, until finally the core banking application was migrated. At each stage, the applications were migrated on time, with zero downtime, and no impact on performance.
Better, Faster and More Scalable
The Hitachi VSP platform met the bank’s constraints and has been running the core production systems seamlessly since its launch. The three-way replication format has ensured 100 percent availability. The network hasn’t incurred any downtime or performance degradation, and the IT team even has the ability to install patches on the storage controllers without a reboot.
In fact, storage performance has improved. Response times for applications now fall in the sub-millisecond range, five times faster than the 5-7 milliseconds experienced with the prior storage system.
In addition, the Hitachi VSP can grow from four to 15 storage controllers during the next several years. That level of scalability will support the bank’s growing customer base and user demand as it continues its digital evolution.
Image Source: Hitachi Vantara