AngloGold Ashanti deploys new virtual infrastructure at its to improve performance and disaster recovery capability.

A Data#3 Customer Story ABOUT ANGLOGOLD ASHANTI OBJECTIVE

Headquartered in , South Africa, To implement a new virtual AngloGold Ashanti Ltd is the third largest gold infrastructure solution at the miner in the world measured by production. Tropicana mine site to help reduce The company currently operates 14 gold complexity, improve application mines in 10 countries. performance, minimise costs and strengthen disaster recovery capability.

APPROACH

Replace existing server, storage and backup infrastructure with a simplified IT platform for all virtual workloads to support operations over FUN FACT COMMENTS the next five years and beyond. By 2021, more “The simplified technology BENEFITS than 50% of large stack helps us • A robust, scalable and secure infrastructure that enterprises will use to streamline provides greater capacity, is easier to manage, an integrated risk application and helps reduce risk through lower Recovery Point Objectives (RPO) and Recovery Time solution performance, Objectives (RTO). increase capacity, • Improved application performance and reduced set to provide better complexity to streamline operations, resulting in reduce risk, and efficiency and productivity benefits. decision-making minimise costs” capabilities, up from Adam Wahby, Systems & Infrastructure approximately Specialist, AngloGold Ashanti . TECHNOLOGY 30% today. Cisco server switching Dell EMC PowerEdge servers Dell EMC Unity Storage Gartner (2019), Digital Business Requires Integrated Risk Management. [Online] https://www.gartner.com/smarterwithgartner/digital-business-requires-integrated- Dell EMC DataDomain upgrade risk-management/ Dell EMC TLO Tape Library VMware VSphere The Background Solution Technology deployed included:

• Cisco server switching Headquartered in Johannesburg, South AngloGold Ashanti Australia sought • Dell EMC PowerEdge servers Africa, AngloGold Ashanti Ltd is the third to replace the existing server, storage • Dell EMC Unity Storage largest gold miner in the world measured and backup infrastructure used to host • Dell EMC DataDomain upgrade by production. The company currently the virtual environment. This included • Dell EMC TLO Tape Library operates 14 gold mines in 10 countries. simplifying the technology stack to • VMware VSphere streamline operational processes, AngloGold Ashanti’s two gold mines in improve capability to meet business Australia, Sunrise Dam and Tropicana objectives including RTOs and RPOs, IT Outcome (70%), are located in and reduce costs. and produce approximately 18% of the The new solution deployed at Tropicana group’s total gold production. From an IT perspective, the new mine site addressed and resolved a number solution had to provide a modern, of key IT infrastructure requirements for the The Challenge simplified IT infrastructure platform for company. all virtual workloads to support Tropicana AngloGold Ashanti Australia was operations over the next five years and Firstly, onsite IT personnel now have experiencing challenges associated with beyond. The solution would also need a simplified virtual environment to its virtual infrastructure at the Tropicana to resolve issues relating to operational manage. Workload and processes have mine site, located 330km east-northeast activities such as data storage and been streamlined, and the team now of . backup, disaster recovery, performance, has greater visibility over the system’s monitoring and capacity requirements. operation and performance. This helps The legacy architecture was over five to free up internal resources to focus on years old and consisted of many moving After a comprehensive tender process, more critical IT requirements. parts, creating a great deal of complexity. AngloGold Ashanti selected Data#3 as the preferred partner to deliver this project. Secondly, backup and recovery capability It was also increasingly difficult to meet Data#3 proposed a solution that addressed has improved, helping to minimise risk and critical business requirements with regards all of AngloGold Ashanti’s key business ensure business continuity. The Tropicana to workload performance and capacity, as and technical requirements, and within site now enjoys reliable and predictable well as RPOs, RTOs and Disaster Recovery. budget and time parameters. backups and restores, as well as functional disaster recovery fail-over and fail-back. Overall, the key challenges included: Delivery of the new solution included project management, planning and And finally, the enhanced speed and • Management of the existing design, deployment, data and workload capacity of the new virtual infrastructure infrastructure was complex, time migration, functional and disaster recovery means AngloGold Ashanti Australia can consuming and costly testing, operational product training, onsite optimise performance and scale up to • Risk associated with RPOs, RTOs and knowledge transfer, plus final build and accommodate future growth. Disaster Recovery operational documentation. • Live migration within the virtual environment presented challenges for the existing application • The live workload recovery and rollback process was difficult to perform

AngloGold Ashanti — Data#3 Customer Story Business Outcome Conclusion

The technical benefits of the new solution The new virtual infrastructure deployed at aim to improve application performance AngloGold Ashanti’s Tropicana mine site and contribute to efficiency and is now an integral part of the company’s productivity gains. business.

Maintenance and operational costs are “The simplified technology stack helps us reduced, and internal IT resources no to streamline application performance, longer have to manage complex and increase capacity, reduce risk, and ageing infrastructure. minimise costs,” says Adam Wahby, Systems & Infrastructure Specialist, Reduced risk is a crucial benefit of the AngloGold Ashanti Australia. new environment. Low RPO and low RTO means any downtime is limited. On the back of the Tropicana site deployment, Data#3 has been engaged to Key business benefits include: implement the solution at Sunrise Dam – AngloGold Ashanti’s second mine site in • Improved application performance Western Australia. Data#3 has also been • Reduced risk asked to develop a solution for AngloGold • Enhanced disaster recovery capability Ashanti’s regional office in Perth, plus a • Highly available and robust migration to a co-location facility later infrastructure in 2018. • Better control and visibility • Increased productivity due to freeing up internal IT resources • A future-proofed, scalable solution that can grow with the business

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AngloGold Ashanti — Data#3 Customer Story