Business issues
BRI’s exponential data and transaction growth prompted the bank to reassess its storage needs to cope with its demanding and changing business. For example, tape backup processes had become a daily chore requiring the handling of more than 100 tapes. Manual batch processing took two hours each for pre- and post-processing, consuming too much time and resources.

Solutions
StorageTek was engaged to upgrade the bank’s entire tape backup process by speeding up backup times and increasing staff efficiency. While maintaining the present system, StorageTek also was asked to develop a new storage solution for the bank’s IBM AS 400 core banking system. This would accommodate the future rapid data growth, both at the data center and at the data recovery center. A PowderHorn 9310 tape library was installed at BRI's primary data centre, together with 28 of StorageTek's access-centric T9840B enterprise-class tape drives. A similar configuration was set up at the bank’s disaster recovery site.

Business benefits
Significantly bolstered business continuity capability with a more-efficient and reliable backup process. Consolidated backup infrastructure to accelerate backup times. Drastic reduction in labor hours needed to administer tape drives. Expanded capacity sufficiently to meet future growth needs.