Case Study 3: Carlson Companies
Carlson Companies, a private company known for its existence in marketing, business, leisure travel, and the hospitality industries, has over 180,000 employees across the United States. Carlson Shared Services, the Information Technology division, provides services to its internal clients and thus must support a wide range of applications and services. In 2002, the IT division decided to implement a storage area network (SAN) that in turn would meet the six goals established in order to meet the needs of a growing company. In this paper we will take an in depth look at Carlson’s implementation of the SAN by:
1. Assessing how the Carlson SAN approach would be implemented in today’s environment;
2. Comparing the pros and cons of consolidating data on a SAN central data facility versus the dispersed arrangement it replaces
3. Evaluating the issues raised from the Carlson SAN mixture of equipment from a number of vendors and determine the management options for dealing with this type of situation;
4. Justifying the reduction of administration and management of storage networking through Carlson’s IP SAN; and
5. Assessing how cloud computing could be used by Carlson instead of a SAN.
Carlson SAN Approach
The Carlson SAN approach in today’s environment can be assessed by the preparation, impact and benefits obtained by Carlson in using such an approach. Carlson established six (6) essential goals reliant on data and applications that would ensure the IT services provided continued to meet the needs of a growing company. In order to meet those goals, implementing a storage area network (SAN) that “provided a reliable, highly scalable facility to accommodate the increasing demand of its users” (Stallings, 2009) was vital in the potential success. In terms of the positive impact on the business and advantages associated with this approach, Carlson was able to enjoy the lowered cost Ethernet switches, which requires...