Infotech Lead Middle East: XS, a provider of Internet-based applications for agricultural clients, selected Dell Compellent storage arrays, PowerEdge servers, PowerVault disk storage, and Latitude laptops.
Since XS, moved to Dell Compellent this year, the company has maintained 99.999 percent storage availability to support the company’s rapid growth and expects to realize an annual cost savings of $500 per deployed workstation and $2,000 per deployed server.
“When we purchased our Dell Compellent array, we got five times the amount of storage for the same starting price as our last SAN,” said Darren Patterson, vice president of technology at XS. “The new Dell Compellent system was 30 percent less expensive due to inherent efficiency than the competitors we looked at and allowed us to take advantage of Dell’s Fluid Data architecture the others lacked at this price point, which definitely helped to seal the deal.”
XS has developed commercially accessible spatial statistics software, AgVeritas that analyzes soil variability, elevation, drainage and the amount of sunlight and provides customers with the information they need to effectively manage their field.
The company also collects more point of sale transaction data than any other service provider, providing its largely agricultural customers with insight and analytics to make educated business decisions on where and what to plant to optimize available farm land.
The Dell infrastructure is critical to supporting XS, Inc.’s big data applications due to its flexibility and reliability.
“As population increases and farm land remains limited, efficiency on the field and in the data center is imperative. When you factor in a drought, it’s even more important to make the most of your resources,” said Patterson. “Dell’s end-to-end enterprise infrastructure, including Dell Compellent, powers efficiency in our data center so our customers can drive efficiency in the fields.”
Dell Compellent storage arrays are fully virtualized and designed to automatically tier, thin provision and optimize data, which was integral in the selection process. The Dell storage solution also reduces management time and risks while rapidly responding to changes in XS Inc.’s business.
Thanks to Dell Fluid Data architecture, XS, is also able to efficiently scale and materially cut costs from the initial purchase to expected TCO savings throughout the system’s lifecycle.
Dell also provides XS with IT infrastructure support. With Dell ProSupport, Dell DPACK and Dell CoPilot, XS, Inc. keeps its business running at peak performance with top-notch support, minimizing disruptions and maintaining a high level of productivity.
