Assurity Consulting raised a request for assistance with iTOPS in changing their Internet Service Provider (ISP) across Auckland, Wellington, and Christchurch offices and relocating their Wellington office. Assurity understood their existing ISP delivered several additional services to them associated with wireless networking, the phone system, a managed firewall, and a cloud server.
To provide confidence that provision of additional services had been considered and addressed. To address changes in the network and the implications of these changes for additional services. To relocate the core IT services in Wellington. To provide technical liaison and oversite for the change in ISP. To provide a seamless transition between ISPs, and the migration and management of services, in a tight timeframe, with minimal disruption to business.
As an existing IT provider, we were very familiar with the client’s network and the issues they faced. We discussed the plans to change ISP with business leadership, and potential plans around the services that we knew would also need further consideration. The change in ISPs, had become very time sensitive, as it was tied into the relocation of the Wellington office.
We worked in consultation with the new ISP on provision of some of these additional services. We proposed management solutions to the business for the services delivered by existing ISP that were better suited to delivery by solution specialists. This also provided a clearer demarcation point between iTOPS and the ISP.
We gathered detailed network and server configuration along with building layouts. We used this to plan and create detailed tasks lists to relocate core Wellington infrastructure, migrate secondary server to Microsoft Azure, replace local network switches in Auckland and Wellington, and to implement a new wireless network throughout all offices. We also provided configuration information to assist the ISP in the delivery of an IP VPN for networking sites and with a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) phone system migration. We provided a high-level project plan to the business which pulled together multiple concurrent projects to be completed by the ISP and iTOPS.
We then executed on plans, networking the business to Azure, creating an Azure server and backups, and replicating the delivery of server services. We worked with the ISP to configure local networking and to test the new phone system. We setup switches and wireless access points across three locations and completed a concurrent cutover of all three offices to the new ISP and wireless network. Immediately after this we completed the core infrastructure physical migration for Wellington and provided assistance with desktop level connectivity.
“The team at iTops embraced our challenge and were very proactive in planning our new network before spending the weekend on-site rolling out a new national network structure as well as setting up our new Wellington office. The team were a pleasure to work with and very professional.”
