VIADUCT LLC - The Bridge to new technology

Technology Assessments provide critical information and details about the existing Information Technology (IT) environment. Generally, the information obtained from an assessment is used for migration planning (proactive) or for corrective action (reactive) to address an unplanned system anomaly or specific business concern.

Standard assessments are:

• Technical Baseline Assessment – designed to inventory and evaluate the existing systems and their configurations
• Security Risk Assessment – designed to evaluate the system security implementation and to identify specific risks and areas of concern
• System Performance Assessment – designed to evaluate system performance and investigate performance issues/concerns

The results of an assessment are documented in an Assessment Report. Each report contains the consultant's findings, recommendations, risks and system configuration details. Priorities are assigned to each recommendation and risk identified. The Assessment Report is reviewed with the customer to determine the next steps. VIADUCT assists the customer in developing the migration plan to move the current environment to the new environment.

Assessments are offered as individual services or as part of larger project engagement.

VIADUCT, LLC uses a 5 step methodology:

Step 1. Initial Assessment
The initial assessment or, “discovery phase”, takes a high level look at the scope of a migration effort and helps the client understand the solutions available and create a vision for the future. It will outline the resource requirements and provide a risk assessment.

Step 2. Full Assessment
A detailed study will be made of the hardware, software and user environments comprising the entire computing infrastructure. A revised risk assessment and a migration plan are developed to address all the steps and resources involved in moving from the old to new technology solution. Every effort will be made to preserve the client's prior investment in their proprietary application solutions and databases.

Step 3. Migration
The development stage where applications and data bases are ported, and unique peripherals for which software must be generated.

Step 4. Validation
The new hardware, operating system(s), applications, networks, peripherals, controllers, drivers and new security systems etc. must all be exhaustively integration tested to ensure their correct operation.

Step 5. Implementation
The equipment will have been staged by VIADUCT staff to efficiently install and bring up the new computing environment. This phase has the greatest impact on the employees and every effort is taken to help them with the transition.

VIADUCT, LLC upgrade methodology; the process always begins with an initial assessment (see IT Migration):

Initial Assessment Recommendations
The risk assessment and recommendation may be that an upgrade is required, for example:

• It may determine that the OS and applications are functioning correctly, but that growth in storage requirements or, limitations in throughput are creating bottlenecks.
• The report may recommend that increasing the amount of system memory will resolve an issue.
• There are cases where just a few elements require an upgrade which can be achieved with minimal impact.
• An issue may be related to an incompatibility between software levels.

Upgrade plan
A more in depth study will be conducted of the hardware, software and user environments creating the problem. An implementation plan is developed and the required resources are obtained. VIADUCT takes extra steps to protect client data during an upgrade or a migration.

Validation
Once the upgrade is complete, the new environment must be tested to ensure that the expected results are obtained.

Back into production
In the final phase, every effort is taken to help the client safely and effectively back into operation.

VIADUCT, LLC can help companies create a technology vision. We will spend time understanding the business requirements, what they have today and where they want to be tomorrow. That's where we can help; we understand where technology can take them, not just tomorrow but into the future.

Some questions to ask:

What business challenges are you are trying to address?
Future considerations

• Budget (Understand then plan)
• Company acquisitions (IT consolidations)
• Local & remote locations (Are you expanding?)
• Number of employees (Are you growing?)
• Business diversification (Adding to your portfolio?)
• Security (Are new security laws creating headaches)

Performance & throughput bottlenecks?

Storage growth and resiliency - (Storage requirements are doubling each year))
Increased graphical requirements (Graphical content is essential today)
Web conferencing and presentations (Can reduce the companies travel budget)
Microsoft or Open Operating Systems (The choice can reduce operating costs)
Is your office workforce mobile (Wireless may make things a lot easier)
Disaster recovery (How critical is your business data)

• What happens to your business if your computers are down?
• Remote failover systems (Do you need 99.99% uptime?)
• Off-site backup storage (Do not keep your data backups on site)

What are you trying to do but don't know how?
Are your customers more current than you?

Our consulting services are designed to help you evaluate and implement business application solutions that are right for your business.

For a company needing to answer the question “What software is the best fit for my business?” VIADUCT engages to understand your company's critical business needs and key objectives and then leverages its experience and knowledge bases to identify solution alternatives (e.g. recommendations) based on your company's unique requirements.

For a company that has selected its business software but needs experienced project management and implementation resources to plan, manage and/or execute the project, VIADUCT offers its services and highly-skilled resources under several different engagement models.

VIADUCT capabilities include, but are not limited to, the following areas:

• Application Evaluation and Selection
• Technical Consulting
• Implementation Planning & Strategy
• Project Management
• Vendor Management
• System Testing
• Data Migration

How safe is your business, is the data secure? Just a simple question but many business owners take it for granted; systems will never fail, someone else is taking care of it. How many companies procrastinate on their responsibility to perform backups to ensure their files, financial records, customer records, vendor records and employee records are safe?

• File storage requirements almost double each year creating an issue where the backup technology cannot handle the size requirements resulting in data loss. Do you have adequate storage space?
• The backup solution in use by a customer may be impractical and too time consuming. It's as simple as finding the right solution, just ask us.
• The software in use by a client may be limited in the size of data it can backup. (This happened to a client and it hung the processes on their system for months and they didn't know)
• The actual restore process has never been tested. (The hardest way to find out is when you need it)
• One company we helped, their backups had NEVER worked even though they appeared to be. (Call us, we can introduce you to the owner of this construction company)

There are many affordable backup solutions available today that can provide fast and effective levels of data security. VIADUCT, LLC can evaluate the entire backup and recovery process to ensure the safety of your business.

The bottom line: DON'T TAKE RISKS. .

Tech Support

The unavoidable subject of technical support. VIADUCT, LLC clients experience a different kind of support relationship, it's more personal and one-on-one, than what others offer. Our approach is proactive with an emphasis is on problem avoidance. We don't expect our clients to know how everything goes together and plays together, that's our job.

Not everything is perfect, even though it should be. How many of us buy a new car and pay special attention to the warranty period. Technology has advanced to the point where the reliability of computer components and peripherals are measured in MTBF's (Mean Time Between Failures) predictions of tens of thousands of hours. The reliability challenge today is a different animal than just a few years ago;

Obsolescence: It's not just the hardware, it's the changes in operating systems, staying current with OS updates, file support changes between application levels, staying current with applications and patches. Another term for rapid obsolescence is “currency”, the challenge of staying current.

Viruses: A subject that must not be ignored. One of our best clients in the Real Estate industry had a system that just was not performing and asked VIADUCT, LLC to investigate. They hold the record at VIADUCT, with over 7,000 viruses, spyware and adware's on a single desktop. There are several excellent Anti-Virus software applications available for all sizes of business, from small to corporate, for desktops and for servers. Some are lower cost than others but the first time a business is shut down and systems lost by a virus is the last time cost is an issue.

Hacker: The first line of defense against a hacker is a firewall. Firewall's come in many shapes and sizes, and range in cost from under $100 up to several thousand. A firewall is like a one way mirror, it allows the users behind it to look out to the internet but only those you want to look in, the ability to look. You can also control where someone on the outside is able to look..

Security

Physical security

• Theft of systems or their contents
• Power loss, brown outs or surges and the damage they can cause
• Overheating, dust, spillage or neglect
• Fire, flood and in our case earth quakes

System Security

• Administrative control
• Password protection, password structure and rotation
• Virus protection
• Spyware
• Adware
• Popups
• Firewalls and encryption

Data Security

• Your company records
• Financials & accounts, tax records, payroll, attorney and accountant records
• Regular file saves
• Regular backup of files
• Offsite backup
• Disk mirroring or RAID
• Remote storage

Employee security

• Personal records and information
• Personal computer files

Customer and Vendor security

• Project files
• Non-disclosure information
• Restricted access especially where your customers and their customers records are concerned
• Litigation protection