IP Address Management case study

Cablecom is the largest cable network operator in Switzerland and provides services for cable television, broadband Internet access and mobile telephony. As of June 2008, the company had over 1.5 million television customers, of which 321,000 made use of the digital service, and 480,000 were Internet customers.

“We needed an off-the-shelf, commercially available solution, designed specifically for managing multiple overlapping IP Address space”

Background

The company has around 1,500 employees and a turnover of more than 1 billion Swiss francs. Cablecom is a national subsidiary of UPC Broadband, the European cable network group of Liberty Global Inc.

Every Cablecom business customer relies on mission-critical network connectivity access for their day-to-day company operations. Should access to their data be interrupted or if any data is lost, millions of Swiss Francs in lost revenue could result.

The Problem

One of the most time-consuming tasks within Cablecom over the last few years has been keeping track of DNS and IP address management for its growing customer base. Cablecom’s 5000 km fibre network depends on 524,288 Public IP addresses and DNS names and 16million Private IP addresses, which are locally managed by Cablecom.

In the past, network administrators in each region were responsible for local IP address management, each using legacy systems. In most cases, this critical IP data was maintained in a number of different unrelated spreadsheets, which offered little visibility into the network as a whole. Management processes and network administration relied on specific individuals spread throughout regions of Switzerland.

Until Easy-IP was implemented as a solution, Cablecom administrators spent countless hours updating the regional spreadsheets whenever a new customer was brought online. The old spreadsheet solution was able to store and find IP addresses, but the search capabilities were limited, scalability was a problem, and the maintenance of the IP space and user data was extraordinarily time-consuming.

The Challenge

Recognizing the importance of effective IP management, Cablecom searched for a solution that would enable them to allow each local office in eight geographic regions to retain administrative control over their own IP address assignments, while still coordinating the entire process corporate wide.

“We needed an off-the-shelf, commercially available solution, designed specifically for managing multiple overlapping IP Address space”

Cablecom realized the tremendous advantages of a centralised IP address management solution accessible from anywhere in the network via a Web Browser. They also understood the necessity of providing their customers with robust query and reporting tools.

“The cost in attempting to implement a software solution ourselves and then building servers around it would have been too time-consuming and costly for us to put into operation”

The Easy-IP Solution

After considering a wide range of alternatives Cablecom decided that the only product that met all of their objectives was Easy-IP. Easy-IP gave Cablecom a high-performance, scalable, multi-user IP Address Management solution that was designed specifically for Network Engineers to keep track of IP Address assignments and subnet allocations.

Easy-IP is engineered around a scalable, low-maintenance, self-tuning SQL database engine that requires no assistance from a dedicated database administrator. IP address assignments and associated customer information are now stored in a powerful, accessible database with searchable custom fields, which easily scales to meet the needs of Cablecom’s growing network. 

“We can now produce customizable IP management reports on any group of devices or customers we choose”

After implementing Easy-IP, Cablecom has expanded its IP address management services to more customers. The company is now able to handle more than twice as many IP address management customers with the same number of staff. The enhanced reporting of IP subnet utilization helps justify additional requests for IP address space with RIPE NCC, as Cablecom continues to grow its customer base.

Results

Because this high level of expertise is no longer required for local IP address management, skilled technical staff are now freed up to focus their attention on end-user application issues.
With accurate machine configurations and automatic IP address assignments, help desk call volume has decreased significantly, even while the productivity of end-users has been boosted dramatically. In addition, the IT department is no longer burdened with the problem of resolving duplicate address conflicts or identifying specific machines where incorrect configuration has created network access problems.

At the same time, IT management tasks have been simplified and overhead costs minimized, through centralization of control for the entire global IP network.

Easy-IP was exactly the solution they were looking for, as it was designed from the ground up for the sole purpose of achieving an integrated, comprehensive IP address management that reduces management time and removes the pain of network administration.

“Our migration to Easy-IP has given us a level of absolute control over our customers’ IP address management needs that we could not achieve on our own”

Cablecom is completely satisfied with their efficient new IP addressing solution, and as a result has extended their contract with Crypton to include all the IP Addressing requirements of the parent company, UPC Broadband Europe.

About Crypton Computers

Crypton Computers is the UK's leading provider of cost-effective, scalable IP network management solutions for Telcos, Service Providers and large Enterprises. Our flagship software solution, Easy-IP, helps network engineers keep track of their IP Address assignments, subnet allocations and network inventory across the entire IP network infrastructure, at a fraction of the cost of traditional IPAM software. Hundreds of network administrators worldwide have downloaded and deployed Easy-IP to manage their IP networks more effectively. Easy-IP customers represent a variety of industries, including Service Providers, Education, Financial, Government, and Healthcare.

To find out more, please contact us at: 
T: + 44 (0) 844 686 9009
E: sales@crypton.co.uk
www.crypton.co.uk