When Civil Manager and Director Jonathan Mumford was put in charge of IT systems at EDC, he made some unsettling discoveries about the company’s technology infrastructure.
He found that the consultancy were using high-end residential solutions rather than a system designed for commercial use; the servers were overdue for replacement; and EDC were paying annual subscriptions to suppliers for software that didn’t work.
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Backing up daily is a business-critical mission, because it’s vital for quick disaster recovery from a natural event, like an earthquake or a cryptojacking event. EDC only had one backup location instead of the usual two. They also had two servers that didn’t sync with each other – one in Auckland and one in Christchurch. The previous IT supplier could never get PeerLock to work. Someone would open a file in one location and it would be different to the same file in the other location. It was a real mess.
Beginning with the backup problem, IT services company CNS offered an immediate fix by allowing EDC to temporarily use their cloud storage. Then CNS moved on to server upgrades in Auckland and Christchurch. While this was going on, the CNS team focused on setup corrections and clean-up work, such as making sure the duplication programme and file locking programme were working properly. They also developed a reliable automated backup solution that mitigated the risk of human error.
The upgrade included a review of work stations and remote working capabilities, as well as disaster recovery through a robust virtual private network (VPN). EDC had been part of the initial response and assessment team for private clients following the Christchurch earthquakes. The ability to continue working when the local office was not accessible was a huge benefit at that time.
Over a period of four years, CNS and Jonathan Mumford have steadily worked through a long list of tasks to complete a total upgrade of EDC’s IT environment. The relationship continues through 24/7 call centre support and regular meetings to proactively identify updates and improvements.
