Laying The Backbone For A New Set-up

Structured cabling is the backbone of any networking platform in the
enterprise segment requiring optimal planning, execution and maintenance of the
system. In the course of the flow of data in the LAN, optimal deployment of
structured cabling solution keeps information on the go increasing the RoI as
well as maintain efficacy in the IT structure.

East India, although not talked about much probably offers one of the finest
examples of structured cabling. McNally Bharat Engineering Company (MBE) is one
of the leading engineering and procurement companies in India engaged in
providing turnkey solutions in the areas of power, steel, aluminum, material
handling, mineral extraction, pyroprocessing and pneumatic handling of powdered
materials. Headquartered in Kolkata, MBE is part of the Williamson Magor Group.
The company has constructed over 300 plants on turnkey basis till March 2009.
Its turnkey construction activities are managed through separate Project
Business Groups that assume responsibility from concept to commissioning.

Recently, the company witnessed an enormous increase in its daily office
operations and was urgently in need of setting up a new office altogether with
an entire set of new infrastructure including IT. "We shifted to a new building.
We took four floors in the building totaling to 1.3 lakh sq ft and needed an
entire new IT platform to work on," said Debanjan Dutta, Senior VP-Corporate
Service, MBE. It all began when the company floated tenders calling for setting
up the entirely new IT infrastructure. It was here that Epitome Networks (EN)
came into the limelight.

Epitome, part of the Eastern Group was looking for a comeback, reviving from
the restructure in the group. With its entire focus on networking, the company
was quick enough to file the tender and meet up with the necessary requirements
outbidding large vendors like Siemens, HCL Comnet, IBM and TechNiche. "We
floated tenders calling for laying the basic cables required in any IT platform
and Eastern Group successfully met the requirements. EN is renowned for its
solutions ability to understand client needs first and then offer solution. I
found the company technologically more advanced than the others offering
reasonable price for the deployment," Dutta added.

Soon the deployment process began and EN began its initial planning phase
understanding client requirements and understanding the environment. "We had the
opportunity to test new technologies and methods keeping client requirement as
top priority. We kept testing compatibility issues and efficacy of the cabling
structure," said Shintu Chakraborty, Director, Epitome Networks.

Estimated to have crossed Rs 1 crore, EN has provided a holistic networking
model in the deployment process. In the initial structure of the deployment, EN
used Cat6UTP cables with 48 ports. Also, amidst the Cat5E backdrop, 48-port
loaded angular jack panel 2U is used.

"We connected the four floors in the office with data and voice support and
kept open additional ports for future incorporation of voice resources. We also
provided inter-rack connectivity in the server room, where 24 ports run from
each of the server racks to the core switch rack ," said Rajarshi Ghosh,
Executive Director, Epitome Networks.

In this landmark project staging the comeback of Epitome Networks, the
company has used Tyco and Cisco products maintaining its loyalty with both these
vendors. Ghosh said, "For big projects, we need to ensure quality products with
a good after-sales support team. In this project, we have used all Tyco and
Cisco products because projects of this size demand good quality products and
support."

In the final stage of the project, EN has now deployed a fiber optic
connectivity accumulating 2487 total data nodes, 2018 voice nodes, face plates
totaling to 114 and quad face plates amounting to 1093. Besides the gigantic
scale of the deployment, EN has also helped MBE secure its LAN network. Using a
secure gateway in an incorporated network environment, EN has made the network
Tier 3 IPV4 ready. With USB and DVD-RW drives centrally monitored and
administered chances of data theft has been neutralized.

"Being a new installation, we expect unexplored connectivity issues to crop
up. Hence, have deployed a dedicated maintenance team for MBE in its new set
up," Chakraborty concluded.

Solutions of this nature are bound to make the client happy and as expected
so it is. Contented with the deployment, Dutta said, "EN has done an excellent
job in setting up our new IT infrastructure at a reasonable price. With 800
workstations already in place, infrastructure is also readily available for
incorporating 300 more and we may expand our office in the near future."

Avishek Rakshit

avishekr@cybermedia.co.in