Digital transformation for insurance: Idaho firm opts for HCI
The technology
Idaho Farm Bureau Insurance has been operating most of its IT infrastructure at its own location, apart from some cloud-based resources such as Microsoft Dynamics 365. But moving more IT assets into the cloud wasn’t feasible. Putting large databases into the cloud “gets pretty expensive,” Waldron said. “It was more cost-effective to go on-premises.”
Data privacy concerns were also an important consideration: “We are risk-averse like most insurance companies,” Waldron said. He noted processor-level vulnerabilities that could let a hacker circumvent a cloud-based platform’s security mechanisms.
The insurer decided to replace its in-house infrastructure with Scale Computing’s HC3 hyper-converged hardware. Idaho Farm Bureau Insurance had been operating its two VMware stacks, a 3PAR storage-area network and a couple of network-attached storage devices. The company also made tape backups, which it stored off-site in a vault.
“We, in essence, got rid of all of that,” Waldron explained.
In place of the VMware stacks and storage gear, the insurer installed 22 Scale Computing 5150 hyper-converged hardware appliances. The two-rack unit devices collectively provided 1.5 peta”They invested to give themselves some headroom for growth,” he said.
The hyper-converged infrastructure (HCI) appliances combine servers, storage and virtualization in a unified hardware package. The appliances run the insurance firm’s core property and casualty system, databases, development and test environment, and business intelligence software among other resources.
In addition, Scale Computing’s appliances have built-in DR features, which get the insurance company off the hook for additional licensing fees and the cost of third-party DR products.