An essential IT upgrade
Film production is by nature a highly cyclical enterprise: “Depending on how many films are currently in production, the number of users and volumes of data being transmitted can vary enormously, and our IT system has to be capable of absorbing these surges,” explains Alain Delorme, CTO of EuropaCorp. He also underlines the fact that film post-production requires the latest-generation digital tools, particularly when it comes to adding special effects or fast external transfers of extremely large files. EuropaCorp’s IT system was, therefore, in urgent need of modernization.
“Upgrading the entire IT system would have required huge levels of investment,” explains Alain Delorme, “all to buy equipment that would just be obsolete or taking up space in a few years. Switching over to the cloud seemed like an obvious solution, but we needed guidance and support to analyze our practical needs and get the most out of this new solution.”
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A transition orchestrated by Orange Business
“We didn’t have the internal resources to put together an accurate bill of specifications – we needed expert insight to help us paint a clear picture of our practical needs and provide the best possible response,” recalls Alain Delorme. EuropaCorp opted to enlist the services of the experts at Orange Business to orchestrate the transition over to the AWS cloud.
Throughout the duration of the project, Orange Business acted as “director-producer,” identifying and organizing EuropaCorp’s needs so as to define an optimized system architecture. “The objective was to get the most we could out of the catalog services in order to optimize the cost of the solution,” explains the EuropaCorp CTO. “On our own we didn’t have the tools to pull all the right levers at the right moment. The teams from Orange Business were both highly responsive and expertly skilled during each stage of the process.”
Any migration to the cloud needs to be carefully thought out in order to anticipate the company’s actual needs. […] You’re not always going to have sufficient knowledge of the solutions available to oversee this kind of operation, and these are highly sophisticated fields.
Alain Delorme, CTO of EuropaCorp
An AWS cloud solution that brings power and flexibility to the company
Now that the transition is complete, Alain Delorme and his teams can rely on a scalable, flexible solution, capable of meeting the company’s current and future needs. “The AWS cloud can deliver a rapid increase in capacity when demand is high or scale down if we’re going through a calmer phase.” Data is securely stored on the cloud and can now be accessed at any time and from anywhere. EuropaCorp can also rest assured they have access to the latest technological advances in real time without having to worry about updates, since these are handled automatically by the cloud.
Operational and financial benefits
The cloud all but eliminates system reboot times following a shut down. “These reboots used to take between an hour and 90 minutes, which is a huge chunk of the workday! With the cloud, it only takes a few minutes, and access to the IT system is practically instantaneous.”
Thanks to the cloud, EuropaCorp has avoided the steep expense of upgrading its IT system, resulting in financial savings equivalent to a year’s worth of IT budget. “We now enjoy greater reliability, responsiveness and flexibility, all at an identical operating cost to our former solution, especially when you take into account the cost of all the server licenses and maintenance contracts we had to subscribe to.”
Planning and enlisting support for the cloud migration – a recipe for success
Alain Delorme considers that any migration to the cloud needs to be planned and thought out in advance in order to draw maximum benefit from the power of cloud tools and avoid duplicating the existing system, regardless of the size of the structure in question. “Support services are the answer for companies that don’t have enough resources to devote to this kind of project, as was the case for us. But it also applies to companies with robust IT departments: the shift over to the cloud requires getting to grips with alternative concepts and technical solutions. Opening up to external advisors allows you to rely on expertise you might not have available internally.”
1-1.5 hours needed for IT system reboot reduced to mere minutes