Textron Case Study

Manufacturer to Reduce IT Costs by $2.5 Million with

Overview "We’ve reduced storage costs by 80 percent, or $2.5 million, Customer: Textron by moving data into Microsoft Azure using StorSimple, Customer Website: www.textron.com Customer Size: 32,000 employees which helped us meet our targeted IT budget reductions.” Country or Region: United States Industry: Manufacturing—Aerospace David Ginn, Director of Architecture, Textron Information Services, Textron and defense

Customer Profile In response to increasing storage costs, Textron shifted to Textron is a highly diversified company Microsoft hybrid cloud storage based on Microsoft Azure and that makes aircraft, military intelligence products, and industrial and consumer Microsoft Azure StorSimple. By using cloud-based storage, products. The Providence, Rhode Island- Textron will reduce annual storage costs by US$2.5 million and based firm employs 32,000 people in 25 countries. gain rapid and cost-effective storage scalability. Textron has also

Business Situation gained a cost-effective disaster recovery solution that shortens Textron needed to reduce rising storage data access time from 72 hours to minutes. costs and ensure that it was getting the best possible value from its storage budget.

Solution Textron shifted to hybrid cloud storage using Microsoft Azure and Microsoft Azure StorSimple.

Benefits Reduce storage costs by US$2.5 million annually Gain storage scalability Improve data availability Situation options. Because it was an active supplier Founded in 1923, Providence, Rhode to the defense industry, Textron could not Island-based Textron is known around the move to a cloud-only storage strategy world for its powerful aircraft brands, such because of data security requirements to as Bell Helicopter and Cessna Aircraft keep certain data on-premises. However, it Company. But it also makes golf cars, wire could move to a hybrid cloud storage and cable installation systems, turf-care solution. products, automotive parts, and military intelligence products. Textron not only “Two years ago, we wouldn’t even be spans multiple industries, but it is also having a conversation about cloud data known as a pioneer of the diversified storage because it was deemed too risky business model. Textron is a US$12.1 billion for a company in our industry,” Ginn says. company with 32,000 employees. Its global “But with all the advances in cloud network of businesses includes Bell technology and the many companies Helicopter, E-Z-GO, Greenlee, Jacobsen, making the move to the cloud, we began to Kautex, Textron Aviation, Textron Financial, seriously look at putting not only data but and Textron Systems. applications in the cloud.”

Like many companies, Textron is looking Choose FedRAMP-Certified Solution for ways to improve services while lowering After narrowing its search to Microsoft and IT costs. “We had a sizeable IT cost Amazon Web Services, Textron selected reduction to go after—about 15 percent of hybrid cloud storage from Microsoft. The our budget—and we knew that storage was solution was based on Microsoft Azure a large portion of our midrange costs,” says StorSimple cloud-integrated storage, an David Ginn, Director of Architecture, on-premises enterprise storage area Textron Information Service at Textron. network (SAN) from Microsoft that “However, our storage was growing at a interoperates with Microsoft Azure to rate of more than 30 percent a year. Many provide a hybrid cloud storage solution for Textron companies had experienced data primary, backup, archive, and disaster growth because of major projects and recovery. Microsoft Azure is a cloud organic business expansion.” platform that provides on-demand compute, storage, content delivery, and Textron Information Services wanted to networking capabilities from Microsoft support the expanding storage needs of datacenters. the business by ensuring that Textron was getting the best possible value from its “We liked the simplicity of StorSimple,” storage expenditures and that it was using Rowland says. “Amazon’s solution just the most innovative technologies. “We had didn’t have the features and enterprise data that was past its useful life taking up storage capabilities that StorSimple offered, space on all our core storage platforms, nor did it have the level of cloud and on- and we wanted to move this older data to a premises integration that Microsoft cheaper storage solution,” adds Les provided. We didn’t like the idea of piecing Rowland, Chief Architect of Architecture, together different products.” Textron Information Services at Textron. “We wanted to ensure that each type of Another key factor for Textron was the data was stored as cost-effectively as ability to meet industry regulations. Weeks possible.” earlier, in September 2013, Microsoft Azure had become the first public cloud platform Solution to receive a Provisional Authority to The search for a cost-effective storage Operate from the FedRAMP Joint solution led Textron to cloud-based Authorization Board (JAB) for both its

25 infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) and Reduce Storage Costs by $2.5 Million platform-as-a-service (PaaS) offerings. The Annually, Increase Scalability Federal Risk and Authorization By shifting data storage to StorSimple and Management Program (FedRAMP) is a US Microsoft Azure, Textron was able to easily government-wide program that provides a meet its storage cost reduction goals. standardized approach to security “We’ve reduced storage costs by 80 assessment, authorization, and continuous percent, or $2.5 million, by moving data monitoring for cloud products and services. into Microsoft Azure using StorSimple, The JAB is the primary governance group of which helped us meet our targeted IT the FedRAMP program, consisting of the budget reductions,” Ginn says. chief information officers of the Department of Defense, the Department of Textron can also scale storage more easily Homeland Security, and the US General to help IT keep pace with the increasing Services Administration. velocity of the business.

Deploy Hybrid Cloud Storage Improve Data Availability Solution In its previous IT environment, Textron Textron purchased four StorSimple units Information Services performed full and US$300,000 worth of Microsoft Azure backups and then replicated data to its Storage. Microsoft Services Consulting was disaster recovery location. In a disaster onsite to help with the first recovery scenario, it could take 48 to 72 implementation, but Ginn and his team hours to bring systems back online. By were able to do most of the work using multiple StorSimple units in a disaster unassisted. “It was an incredibly easy recovery configuration, access to data is process to set up StorSimple, set up our nearly immediate. Azure account, configure the storage, and bring it online,” he says. “There was no way we could deliver disaster recovery at the size or scale that Textron is using StorSimple and Microsoft Microsoft can,” Rowland says. “”We could Azure as primary storage for all never manage the capital investment or the unstructured data. StorSimple employs a processes that Microsoft has in place. We’re three-tiered architecture whereby it puts happy to let Microsoft innovate and bring more frequently used data on high-speed new datacenter service offerings to the local drives and less frequently used and table so that we can focus on running our older data on less expensive cloud storage business.” (Microsoft Azure).

By the end of 2014, Textron will have about 300 terabytes of data in Azure.

Benefits By adopting a hybrid cloud storage solution from Microsoft, Textron will be able to reduce storage costs by $2.5 million annually and gain storage scalability. Textron also experiences faster data recovery in the event of a server or datacenter failure.

35 Transform the datacenter For More Information The hybrid cloud from Microsoft transforms For more information about Microsoft the datacenter by extending existing products and services, call the Microsoft investments in skills and technology with Sales Information Center at (800) 426- public cloud services and a common set of 9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft management tools. With an on-premises Canada Information Centre at (877) 568- infrastructure connected to the Microsoft 2495. Customers in the United States and Azure platform, you can deliver services Canada who are deaf or hard-of-hearing faster and scale up or down quickly to meet can reach Microsoft text telephone changing needs. (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to: www.microsoft.com

For more information about Textron products and services, visit the website at: www.textron.com

For more information about transforming the datacenter, go to: www.microsoft.com/en-us/server- cloud/cloud-os/modern-data-center.aspx