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Education IT

Australian Uni takes bold steps into cloud

By Kelly Ng | 16 March 2010

Curtin University of Technology in Western Australia is deploying a private cloud which will be operational by mid this year. CIO Peter Nikoletatos told FutureGov of the challenges he faces and the rewards he expects from migrating into the cloud.

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Having virtualised a large part of the university’s system infrastructure, Curtin has spent the last year defining its cloud computing road map. The next step of moving into the enterprise cloud, based on the Cisco Unified Computing System, will allow Curtin to provision and upload virtual machines into the virtual private data centre.

“We are finalising the network connectivity this month (March 2010). We have a pilot window that will be used to measure network performance and allow us to ensure optimisation. The cloud trial will have largely been completed by June 2010. We will then focus on further testing some core services,” said Nikoletatos.

Making sure all of its 16 campuses are on board for the cloud transformation is a challenge. Curtin, Western Australia’s largest university, has 43,000 students spread across Sydney, Singapore, and Sarawak in Eastern Malaysia. “While Singapore and Australia has advanced broadband infrastructures, network connectivity is still an issue in Malaysia,” he revealed. “I am planning a trip there in the next few months to see how we can overcome this limitation.”

Migrating into the cloud – especially for large enterprises and the public sector – is a large scale project which can be daunting, admitted Nikoletatos. Organisations have to work on data security, privacy, vendor lock-in and other similar issues. “This is critical for us and that is where partnering with the right organisations is extremely important. Curtin has a long and successful history with Cisco, Optus, Alphawest, VMware, EMC and Microsoft,” he added. “There are statutory requirements that need to be satisfied and they include professional indemnities.”

Despite the challenges, Curtin believes that cloud computing is the right direction to be heading. He is confident that measurable benefits around cost, efficiency and manageability will be achieved.

“Using virtual machines or infrastructure on a consumption basis provides enormous flexibility in terms of pricing and usage, as well as the ability to scale up and down depending on our current computing needs. It enables us to rapidly provision new infrastructure to meet any sudden need for increased capacity. On the flip side, it allows us to scale down infrastructure when it is no longer required. Being able to provision the service ourselves and enact changes as and when we need to makes it even more compelling,” Nikoletatos added. He expects to increase IT staff productivity and business agility through the rapid delivery of services, which will take hours rather than weeks.

By moving away from a capital budgeting process towards a utility model, Curtin can be more confident of operational costs, according to Nikoletatos. “The total cost of ownership will decrease as depreciation costs will not be required in the fullness of time. In addition, we will benefit financially through operational efficiency gains, which result from the economies of scale our strategic partners offer.”