Tintri drives storage efficiency for SQL deployments at RAM global courier service

South African courier service, RAM, is using Tintri storage to unblock its IT performance bottleneck. By using Tintri in its virtualised environment, RAM is ensuring it retains its reputation as a highly trusted and efficient logistics company.

RAM is the number one courier, warehousing, and distribution service provider for thousands of customers across South Africa. With a workforce of over 2,600 employees at 41 hubs, RAM has a name for being a highly efficient and dependable service, using sophisticated track and trace equipment to pinpoint exactly where a parcel is from the moment it leaves, until it arrives in the safe hands of the recipient.

With mission-critical data on the line, RAM’s IT team was battling against poor performance in its virtualised environment. This was despite replacing nodes in its VMware cluster and upgrading from VMware ESX 3 to vSphere 5.1. The company not only has to have everything delivered within a specific timeframe, it also has to keep images of all PODs (proof of delivery forms) on the Internet as well. It stores seven years’ worth of these images online, and they have to be available 24/7. It became apparent that storage was the bottleneck in the environment so when a contact recommended Tintri, RAM made the decision to change.

RAM has installed a Tintri T650 storage array and moved four of its main SQL servers onto the Tintri. The solution allows RAM to leverage Tintri’s application aware technology and optimise the performance of its virtualised environment, even whilst managing intensive workloads. The deployment has also freed up the internal IT team.

Lance Soller, executive head of IT at RAM, explained: “The Tintri units are able to easily handle the heavy load of our SQL environment. I have looked at the IOPS while the Tintri system performs some very IO-intensive tasks. It doesn’t even break a sweat. The old storage systems used to really struggle to accomplish those same tasks.”

Soller continued: “Our previous storage platform required specific skills that were not part of my team’s expertise. In contrast, the Tintri is extremely simple to manage and operate. To create a clone of a VM, it’s almost instantaneous, as opposed to waiting hours for it to be done on the old arrays. With Tintri, I don’t need a dedicated storage admin anymore. Our IT team can be reassigned to more strategic tasks, not just babysitting the storage.”

Claudio Polla, Regional Manager, Sub Saharan Africa, Tintri said: “The RAM project highlights the efficiency, cost effectiveness and powerful features offered by Tintri in a data intensive environment. The deployment has exactly matched RAM’s requirements – it has not only allowed RAM to dramatically boost performance, it has also allowed the IT team to concentrate on strategic activities, rather than getting bogged down in managing the storage.”