CASE STUDY agreement covered a range of projects that would significantly upgrade Opera Australia ’ s technical capabilities and position it for future growth .
A more flexible , cloudenabled , workplace
The IT strategy put together by Ustun addressed all aspects of Opera Australia ’ s technology requirements , including IT policies and procedures for the organization , the development of a backup and Disaster Recovery capability and a robust cybersecurity plan . Importantly , bringing back innovation to the organization to enable growth was key .
Ustun says that one of the first projects to be completed was a migration from Opera Australia ’ s ageing data center into the Tecala private cloud .
“ Some of our servers were around 12 years old and so it made sense to move our applications and databases to a modern , best of breed platform ,” he said .
Next , attention was turned to upgrading all the company ’ s devices from Windows 7 to Windows 10 . This step was designed to improve performance , increase security and ensure compatibility with new software packages . Tecala then moved on to the challenge of delivering a unified communication and collaboration platform . Tecala led with the replacement of a legacy Avaya telephone system with Microsoft Teams . This significantly improved the ability for staff members to manage calls and route them between locations .
2022 and beyond – a modern era for technology at Opera Australia
The modern era requires a business and people management platform that can take advantage of digitalization in the workplace . It ’ s essential that this modern workplace platform is unified and cloudenabled , provides end-to-end visibility , and is accessible to people working beyond the traditional boundaries of the managed network . Early adopters of these solutions are seeing significant advantages in productivity and cost efficiencies , thereby priming their businesses for growth With Opera Australia now 24 months into its three-year agreement with Tecala , further opportunities for future projects are being identified .
“ Tecala now has a full understanding of our operations and will continue to provide the support we require to keep everything up and running in the years ahead ,” said Ustun .
This year will see Opera Australia roll out its SharePoint and Teams governance project that will significantly improve communication and collaboration between the different people at the organization . Keeping their working environment safe and secure is an on-going challenge , but a key factor in this is end-user awareness training . So along with multi-factor authentication , a CASB implementation , and penetration and vulnerability testing , Opera Australia will be delivering an on-going end-user education project that will keep its people fully informed and supported .
“ It also gave us the ability to have staff working from home during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns of 2021 ,” said Ustun . “ Without this infrastructure in place , we would have been unable to continue to operate as normal during this period .”
The existing company-wide data network was also upgraded to better handle future growth . Existing equipment was replaced with Juniper core and access layer network , significantly boosting capacity and improving application performance for all users .
“ We also deployed a tool that allows the Tecala team to remotely configure and manage user devices ,” said Ustun . “ If a home-based staff member is having problems with their PC , a technician can assess the situation and take the steps needed to get it back up and running .”
To provide additional reliability and security , Tecala has also configured a cloud-based Disaster Recovery capability for Opera Australia . Should an incident occur , core applications and databases can be quickly restored to minimize the impact on day-to-day activity .
Tecala will also be providing an extension of the Opera IT team for special events such as the popular Handa Opera on Sydney harbour . This ensures additional IT capacity is available for the length of the show and provides on-going assistance throughout Opera Australia is a living , breathing example of an organization that ’ s realized the importance of creating a people-first approach to IT . By building trust in IT , providing state of the art IT systems and platforms , and delivering on-going support from a local team of technical experts , Opera Australia is realizing that when you put your people first , they are empowered to show up as their best selves and are supported to maximize their potential and excel in their roles .
“ With Tecala , we now have in place a valuable technology partner who will continue to work alongside us as we deliver future performances ,” said Ustun . “ Its industry-leading technical knowledge and experience will ensure our IT infrastructure remains up-to-date and able to provide the support we require as a vibrant and growing organization .” p
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