Customer Solution Case Study

Telecom Provider Seeks Stable, High-Performing VDI Solution and Saves Costs

OverviewCountry or Region: Republic of KoreaIndustry: Telecommunications

Customer ProfileSK Telecom, part of the SK Group, is a wireless telecommunications provider in South Korea. The company has 50.5 percent market share in South Korea and earned US$13.6 billion in revenue in 2010.

Business SituationThe telecommunications provider needed a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) solution that would help it to maintain high levels of stability and performance, but at lower costs than its existing solution.

SolutionSK Telecom tested Windows Server 2012 with Hyper-V as part of a Microsoft Rapid Deployment Program and plans to deploy the technology broadly for its VDI solution.

Benefits Reliable vendor support Reduced licensing costs Improved disaster recovery

“We achieved the highest performance results with Windows Server 2012 with Hyper-V in combination with Windows 8.”

SK Telecom

Since 2010, SK Telecom has used a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) solution across several of its departments. Although the company recognized VDI as a critical component to its infrastructure—ensuring employee productivity and workplace flexibility—SK Telecom welcomed the idea of switching to a more cost-efficient VDI solution. However, the company was not willing to sacrifice stability or performance for cost savings with VDI. In August 2012, SK Telecom evaluated Windows Server 2012 with Hyper-V and Remote Desktop Services as part of a Microsoft Rapid Deployment Program and was impressed with the results. The VDI solution built on Windows Server 2012 rivalled its existing solution in both stability and performance; is a reliable, standardized solution; and provided the company with an opportunity to reduce licensing costs.

SituationSK Telecom is known for its innovation—it was one of the first telecommunications companies in the world to bring leading mobile technologies, including CDMA, LTE, and high-definition voice solutions, to the market. In addition to providing its customers with access to cutting-edge telecommunications solutions, SK Telecom is also committed to providing its employees with innovative solutions for the work place to help increase productivity.

For instance, in 2010, the company started a pilot project to build a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) where applications and client desktop environments run on a remote server and are delivered to client devices over the Internet. The company primarily uses Microsoft products and technologies across the organization, but it decided to use other products for its VDI solution.

SK Telecom learned a lot during its extended pilot of VDI technology. The company established clear guidelines for stability, performance, and security. It also realized that VDI is more than just technology—it is a composite art that reflects the comprehensive desktop, server, network, and security environments within the company’s infrastructure.

The company ran another pilot project in pursuit of its goal to achieve a “smart work” environment where employees can access corporate resources from any device and any location. That project involved using VDI with integrated document management systems, in addition to using smartphones to access virtual desktops. Although the devices that employees use

and the locations from where they conduct business may change, the pilot project established that the mobile office is part of smart work.

By 2012, SK Telecom established VDI as the standard work environment for employees. It was no longer an experiment in technology, but a solution for a modern workforce. While SK Telecom recognized VDI as an important solution, and a trend among leading enterprise companies, it also realized that achieving a virtual desktop infrastructure solution across the company is expensive. SK Telecom wanted to explore other technologies for its virtual desktop infrastructure.

SolutionIn August 2012, SK Telecom participated in the Microsoft Rapid Deployment Program (RDP) for the Windows Server 2012 operating system so that it could test the next-generation VDI technology before it was released to manufacturing. The company had already proven VDI as a viable and welcomed solution, but it wanted to see if a VDI built on Windows Server 2012 Datacenter could achieve the levels of stability and performance to which the company was accustomed—but at a lower cost. The company did not want to abandon its existing investments, so it decided to test a VDI environment that used its current environment in combination with Remote Desktop Services, which provides session virtualization, and Hyper-V virtualization technology in Windows Server 2012.

SK Telecom worked with SoftNet, a member of the Microsoft Partner Network, to build the testing environment and

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evaluation criteria for the project, which ran for two months through September 2012. The testing environment included three Hyper-V hosts running 40 VDI sessions.SoftNet also evaluated the performance of Windows Server 2012 under separate test cases. For one evaluation, the companies ran the Windows 7 operating system as a guest virtual machine in the existing environment. In addition, for comparison, they ran Windows 7 and Windows 8 in the Windows Server 2012 Remote Desktop Services environment.

For its test cases, SK Telecom wanted to evaluate the way employees perform tasks that are directly associated with their experiences using VDI. For instance, it tested the time it takes to connect to the virtual desktop, browser speed, multimedia playback speed, load time for line-of-business applications and systems, the time it takes to copy files from one location to another, and keyboard and mouse response times. It also measured server performance, including CPU load during file compression and encryption, memory testing, and graphic testing.

The test results exceeded the company’s expectations. “Although the performance was roughly similar to using Windows 7 as the guest operating system in the existing environment, we achieved the highest performance results with Windows Server 2012 with Hyper-V in combination with Windows 8,” explains someone affiliated with SK Telecom. “In some cases, the Windows Server 2012 with Hyper-V environment was superior to the existing environment.”

Although SK Telecom confirmed that the performance of Windows Server 2012 and Remote Desktop Services rivaled that of the existing VDI environment, the company also wanted to test other scenarios for the Microsoft VDI solution. SoftNet recommended five scenarios to test, including the wizard-based configuration for the VDI solution, high-availability configuration, VDI disaster recovery through Hyper-V Replica, user data backup by using the Data Protection Manager component of Microsoft System Center 2012, and virtual machine management over the network.

Now that it has completed the comprehensive technology evaluation of Windows Server 2012, SK Telecom is considering broadening its virtual desktop infrastructure based on Windows Server 2012 with Hyper-V and Remote Desktop Services.

BenefitsWhen SK Telecom deploys Windows Server 2012 with Hyper-V and Remote Desktop Services for its VDI solution, the company will have a standardized infrastructure and a more streamlined process for troubleshooting technical issues. In addition, the company will be able to reduce licensing costs without sacrificing performance, and will improve its disaster recovery efforts.

Reliable Vendor Support Through StandardizationOnce it expands its Windows Server 2012 and Remote Desktop Services environment, SK Telecom will have an infrastructure that is standardized on Microsoft products and technologies. As a result, the company is

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looking forward to more transparency with its technical support. In its current VDI environment, SK Telecom has to check with multiple vendors to troubleshoot issues. For instance, if the IT department can’t isolate a problem, it has to check with each vendor to verify if the issues stem from the operating system or the virtualization solution. If the cause of a problem is not immediately clear, it often takes tedious efforts to determine which vendor SK Telecom should work with to resolve the issue. However, by using a VDI solution built on Windows Server 2012, the company will be able to standardize its server and client infrastructure and rely on one, trusted vendor—Microsoft—for its technical support.

Reduced Licensing CostsSK Telecom has been actively expanding its VDI since 2010 and will continue to do so into the future. Because the company is also growing, finding a cost-effective VDI solution is a high priority—and the company expects that a solution built on Windows Server 2012 will help it reach a lower total cost of ownership. SK Telecom can use Windows Server 2012 Datacenter to meet increasing demand by deploying additional virtual machines, but without incurring additional licensing costs. Unlike other virtualization solutions, the licensing structure available with Windows Server 2012 Datacenter allows the company to deploy unlimited virtual machines on a licensed Hyper-V host.

Improved Disaster Recovery for Business ContinuitySK Telecom is particularly excited about the improved data protection of a VDI solution built on Windows Server 2012 and the Data

Protection Manager technology of System Center 2012. The company has worked to ensure the fidelity of its VDI backup and recovery solution, but it was not completely satisfied with its existing solution—and, in the case of a disaster, work at the company would come to a halt if employees could not access their desktops. However, with Hyper-V Replica and Data Protection Manager, SK Telecom can produce a copy of a virtual machine and provision it to Remote Desktop Services in fewer than five minutes. In addition, user data on virtual desktops can almost immediately be recovered after a disaster. Now, the company is confident that it has a strategic blueprint for automating backup and recovery of its VDI environment, which will help it to ensure business continuity.

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Windows Server 2012Windows Server drives many of the world’s largest data centers, empowers small businesses around the world, and delivers value to organizations of all sizes in between. Building on this legacy, Windows Server 2012 redefines the category, delivering hundreds of new features and enhancements that span virtualization, networking, storage, user experience, cloud computing, automation, and more. Simply put, Windows Server 2012 helps you transform your IT operations to reduce costs and deliver a whole new level of business value.

For more information, visit:www.microsoft.com/en-us/server-cloud/windows-server/2012-default.aspx

For More InformationFor more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers in the United States and Canada who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to:www.microsoft.com

For more information about SoftNet products and services, visit the website at:www.softnet.co.kr

For more information about SK Telecom products and services, visit the website at:www.sktelecom.com

This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.

Document published August 2013

Software and Services Microsoft Server Product Portfolio− Windows Server 2012 Datacenter− Microsoft System Center 2012

Windows 8 Technologies− Hyper-V− Remote Desktop Services

Hardware Dell PowerEdge R510 servers with 2 CPU

and 24 GB memory

Partner SoftNet