State of the art data center supporting 24/7 emergency hotline

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Client

SOS International

Industry

Insurance

Year

2022

Outsourcing of a data center

A pan-Nordic entity, SOS International is a leader in the assistance industry, providing much-needed help and care to Nordic travellers worldwide. With locations in Norway, Sweden, Finland and Denmark, SOS International handled approximately 1.2M cases relating to health, travel, and mobility issues in 2021.

In 2020, SOS International decided to outsource the hosting and operations of their data center and central applications to an external service provider. SOS International operates round-the-clock, and their emergency hotline is available 24/7.

SOS International had identified a gap between the level of operational maturity in their data center operations and the critical nature of the applications being run from this data center. This necessitated a change, and the decision was taken to outsource the data center to minimize operational risks.

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A solid technical match with a cultural fit

After a thorough selection process, which involved the mapping of the competencies and cultural fit, Netic was chosen along with another service provider for extensive evaluation, which eventually led to Netic being selected as the partner.

Netic was chosen partly due to the technical competencies and level of process maturity surrounding the operations of Netic’s four data centers. Another large part of Netic that was selected was Netic’s new data center in Aalborg, Denmark, which is one of the most energy-efficient data centers in the Nordic Region.

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The main reason for Netic being chosen is that there was - and is - a strong cultural fit between the technical staff at SOS and Netic’s technical consultants.

Benny Gårdbo-Pedersen

Head of Technology, SOS International

The move from one data center to another

How do you move an entire international company’s IT - including applications that mustn’t go offline - from one data center to another? You plan! Luckily, as one of Denmark’s longest-existing service providers, Netic has extensive experience with migrations like these.

The project was anchored in Netic’s project management department, assisted with oversight by Netic’s CEO, Steen Jensen.

This provided SOS International with the assurance that the project was in good hands - also after the migration.

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Netic has an exceptional ability to reach sensible compromises. We don’t always see eye to eye, and there have been disagreements over both technology and processes. Still, time and time again, Netic has demonstrated that they are willing and able to reach a compromise. that can satisfy both parties

Benny Gårdbo-Pedersen

Head of Technology, SOS International

Future perspectives

Netic views its relationship with its customers as a sort of marriage. Long-term relationships, where both parties evolve gradually into tying the knot ever tighter. SOS International considers the relationship in much the same way.

As part of the collaboration with SOS International, future meetings have been scheduled concerning security operations, and other discussions are regularly held.

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We’re going to insist that whenever Netic has new product offerings, for instance within security or container operations, these are shown to us. We’re not going to be investing in staying current in these technologies ourselves, so we need an actively evolving relationship with a partner that does this for us.

Benny Gårdbo-Pedersen

Head of Technology, SOS International

Facts about the solution

  • 1364 CPUs
  • +1200 users