Easynet delivers proactive service to a global customer base with streamlined patch management

Easynet is a global managed service provider (MSP) with more than 20 years’ experience delivering managed services to national and multinational businesses. The company offers an extensive portfolio of network, hosting and unified communications solutions.

The challenge
Cloud and hosting services have long been a cornerstone of Easynet’s business. The company provides managed cloud services to large-scale enterprises, and supports small and medium enterprises with shared hosting services.

In the past, Easynet operated its cloud services through a network of regional hosting businesses. Each of these units took a different approach to maintenance and patching – some using manual techniques and others using a variety of patch management solutions. The lack of uniformity led to inconsistent service delivery and made infrastructure maintenance a time-consuming task.

To drive greater integration, Easynet decided to consolidate regional units into a single, global cloud services business. With this move came the need for a centralised patch management solution, one that would provide better insight into the company’s entire hosting infrastructure and help it adopt a more consistent approach to patching.

Taking control with Shavlik
Easynet launched a search for a powerful patch management solution, which led it to Shavlik. Richard Rustean, Global Head of Cloud and Hosting Services at Easynet, comments: “Most of the solutions we looked at were geared more towards individual enterprises, rather than service providers. What set Shavlik Protect apart was how well-suited it was for a multi-tenant environment: it can be used for both physical and virtual environments, and supports not only Microsoft operating systems but also a huge variety of third-party applications.”

Easynet is taking a phased approach to the implementation of Shavlik Protect. The company has rolled out the solution to an initial group of 100 servers and plans to have Shavlik Protect fully deployed across its entire infrastructure by mid-2015.

“Our plan is to deploy one Shavlik Protect console for each region we serve – in France, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands and UK, and eventually extending to the US and Asia,” notes Richard Rustean.

Streamlining the patching process
Shavlik Protect automates and standardizes patch management across Easynet’s extensive environment. Each month, the company runs a report against its client estates, identifying all updates that need to be implemented. This report is then sent to customers, who are given 10 days to confirm which updates they wish to install.

Using pre-built templates in Shavlik Protect, Easynet engineers can quickly set up a patching schedule, allowing updates to be applied during a fixed maintenance window. The solution patches systems automatically, and then runs a report listing all updates that have been implemented, as well as any issues that require manual remediation.

Richard Rustean comments: “With Shavlik Protect, patching couldn’t be easier. It has massively reduced the time and resources required to keep systems patched and compliant. For example, manually applying updates to individual servers can take around 20 days, depending on the size and complexity of the environment. With Shavlik, we can complete the same level of patching over just two nights; and as the solution is highly automated, engineers don’t need to be working at all hours.”

He continues: “As an MSP, one of the biggest challenges we face is maintaining customer environments – it’s an area that typically requires a lot of day-to-day effort. Having Shavlik Protect supporting patch management takes a huge load off of our operations teams. From a maintenance perspective, Shavlik is really going to help us work more efficiently and free up more time for teams to focus on other work.”

Driving consistent customer service
With Shavlik Protect at the heart of its patch management operations, Easynet can deliver more consistent service to customers and ensure that customer environments are maintained with the most up-to-date patching levels.

Richard Rustean concludes: “Patching with Shavlik Protect has been very quick and efficient, and allows us to be more proactive in meeting customers’ needs. We can ensure that all systems are kept up-to-date with the latest patches and secured against risk, reducing the likelihood of critical issues. Clear reporting in Shavlik also provides a comprehensive audit trail of all patches that have been applied, helping customers prove that their environments are compliant with security standards.

“I would definitely recommend Shavlik solutions to other MSPs: the solution allows us to drive a more efficient and consistent approach to patch management for many different customers across a huge variety of environments. We can deliver proactive, predictable service to customers anywhere in the world, giving them the strong backbone they need to run their businesses successfully.”