TLA Win for Midwestern Financial Institution

Based in Kansas City, MO, and home to 3,500 employees, a large Midwestern financial institution was approaching end-of-lifecycle with their current IT infrastructure, provided and serviced by Hitachi. Interested in exploring new options, they knew they needed an infrastructure that could power their critical workloads, which included enablement of wire transfers, HSA transactions and their entire online banking system supporting over $23B in assets.

Engagement

WWT first became acquainted with this customer four years ago in a professional services engagement. As time went by, the customer became more reliant and trusting of WWT, leading to more business opportunities. With a new initiative on the horizon, the customer was looking to make business decisions with as few complications as possible. The objective was to streamline their data center, while creating an environment with more availability, replication and resiliency. In hopes of doubling down on one OEM, they issued an RFP and WWT was top of mind. WWT recognized immediately that approaching the project with a more Dell Tech-focused roadmap presented immediate gains for the customer.

Following the RFP, WWT initiated a proof of concept that demonstrated ease of deployment and validated workload support. From there, WWT worked through pricing and functionality exercises that fit the customer's unique needs, leveraging the customer's existing VxRail infrastructure as further justification to continue down the Dell Tech/VMware path. Finally, WWT went head-to-head with Hitachi in an on-site bake-off that showcased Dell's best-in-class storage solution, PowerMax. 

Solution

A lot of debate surrounded the competing storage products, but the Technology Licensing Agreement (TLA) option, featuring Dell's impressive portfolio of software products for PowerMax and Data Domain environments, along with future licensing capacity, was the deciding factor that ultimately secured the deal. As part of the TLA, the customer could take advantage of volume discounts on additional hardware, like vSan Ready nodes and migration to all Dell laptops from HPe. 

Securing this win isn't the end of the road for the TLA's value-add. Since, WWT has landed a spot in the running for a future Isilon opportunity aiming to support the customer's filing system. This agreement has opened the door for a lot of potential and continued advantage. Furthermore, the collaboration between Dell and WWT paved the path toward delivering a solution that supported business continuity, while still meeting the financial needs of the customer.