Leveraging Technology to Enhance Social Services

Overview

Challenge

• Support strategic investment in technology projects that further HKYWCA’s mission with a reliable, scalable and cost-effective infrastructure.

Solution

• Transition from an expensive, end-of-life hyperconverged infrastructure to a multitier architecture powered by Hitachi VSP One Block 24 storage arrays.

Outcome

• Reduce maintenance costs by 50%, boost capacity by 70%, and guarantee 100% data availability to support more than 3M service users.

Challenge

The Hong Kong Young Women’s Christian Association (HKYWCA) is a prominent nonprofit organization established in 1920 by a group of dedicated Christian women. The organization operates over 100 service units across Hong Kong, delivering a wide range of programs that support infants, children, youth, women, the elderly and families, with an annual service attendance exceeding 3M people.

In recent years, HKYWCA has placed a strategic emphasis on investing in technology to improve and innovate the services it delivers. Over the past three years, the organization has rolled out a major new ERP platform, enhancing administrative efficiency and organizational governance. And this year, it has developed a new case management and intervention platform that connects service providers to pre-school institutions and families with young children. These initiatives are a key focus in the annual report of HKYWCA’s Chief Executive, Ms. Yvonne Yeung.

To support these high-profile technology initiatives, it’s vital that HKYWCA’s IT infrastructure offers high levels of performance, reliability and scalability. “Our mission emphasizes community support and empowerment, so our IT strategy focuses on developing systems that enhance communication and outreach to underserved groups,” says Simon Wong, Senior Network and Security Engineer at HKYWCA. “We need a storage infrastructure that can support our business-critical applications, which often require fast data access and low latency.”

At the same time, as a not-for-profit organization, HKYWCA must ensure that its infrastructure investments make effective use of funds and offer a good return on investment. In the past, these considerations had convinced the organization to run its business-critical applications on VMware, hosted on a hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI). However, recent changes to VMware’s licensing model suddenly made this architecture much more expensive, and at the same time, the HCI hardware was reaching an end-of-life. Maintenance costs were high, and the incumbent vendor’s proposals for upgrading the infrastructure did not seem to be a cost-effective option.

Solution

HKYWCA decided to move away from its HCI solution and migrate to a multitier architecture that would allow it to upgrade and scale its compute and storage resources separately. For the storage layer, the organization reached out to its trusted partner Multisoft to help find a solution, and the Multisoft team proposed VSP One Block 24 storage arrays from Hitachi Vantara.

“We chose Hitachi because of their unique 100% data availability guarantee and competitive pricing,” says Simon Wong. “We were also impressed by the large number of customer references that recommended Hitachi’s storage systems.”

For HKYWCA, the key features of the VSP One solution were performance, storage efficiency and ease of integration. Built with fast NVMe drives, the arrays deliver high throughput and low latency, accelerating data processing and delivering a much more responsive user experience. Meanwhile, Hitachi’s adaptive data reduction (ADR) technology increases the effective capacity of the arrays by deduplicating and compressing data by a ratio of at least 2:1. Finally, well-designed integration with HKYWCA’s Veeam data protection software means that backups run more reliably, and restoring data is faster.

The implementation of the VSP One solution was led by Hitachi’s Hong Kong distributor, ACW. As Simon Wong recalls, “ACW provided exceptional professional services throughout the implementation of the new storage system. This ensured a smooth process that made the entire experience seamless and efficient.”

Simon Wong adds, “We would rate Hitachi, Multisoft and ACW as 10 out of 10 for service. Each partner has demonstrated strong technical expertise, providing reliable solutions that meet our needs. Their responsiveness to technical inquiries and issues has been commendable. The level of service and support has been excellent. All three partners have shown a commitment to customer satisfaction, offering timely assistance and effective problem resolution whenever needed. Overall, these relationships have significantly contributed to our operational success.”

Outcome

With the Hitachi VSP One solution running smoothly in HKYWCA’s data centers, the organization benefits from Hitachi’s guarantee of 100% data availability. “VSP One supports applications that are essential for daily operations at HKYWCA,” explains Simon Wong. “Our staff and customers need access to course materials, activity files, databases and web services, and that all depends on our Hitachi storage system.”

As HKYWCA continues to invest in strategic technology projects, the VSP One solution will help the organization manage ever-increasing volumes of data. The new arrays have increased effective capacity by more than 70%, from 70TB to 120TB. Moreover, the platform is already helping to reduce operational expenditure. The annual maintenance costs of VSP One are 50% lower than the previous HCI solution.

Simon Wong concludes, “By ensuring fast, secure and dependable storage, we can effectively deliver services and resources that empower women and support those in need, helping us fulfill our mission more successfully.”