15 site Citrix upgrade at Nova Training

The company’s recent success has seen it, and sister firm Staff Select Ltd, increase from a small team of 60 to 185 staff.

This rapid expansion put huge pressure on the firm’s existing network, which relied on just one Citrix server and an ADSL line out of its head office in the West Midlands. Outbound line speeds had been hampering Citrix Desktop sessions and end user experience across remote sites and the business had outgrown the system’s 75 user capacity.

In consultation with leading service, support and solutions provider, Icomm Technologies, the firm resolved to increase network resilience, improve user experience and move away from the risk associated with operating one single point of failure.

A new load balanced Citrix infrastructure has been installed at head office and deployed across 15 sites. It supports remote access for floating staff and assessors with security from a Citrix Access Gateway (CAG) Appliance.

Located close to a BT Exchange, an Ethernet First Mile (EFM) line has been installed to improve outbound internet connection speed and latency at a cost eight times lower than an equivalent internet leased line.

David Bucknall, Operations Director at Staff Select, said: “Fundamentally, our strong growth aspirations have outpaced our existing infrastructure.
“We now have a network in place that not only gives us resilience but also future proofs our business with expansion capacity to support considerable growth going forwards. All members of our team can rely on a high productivity IT infrastructure and use this to help drive the business forward.”