Case Studies

Deconstructing a Large Datacenter Network and IT Infrastructure in 5 Days

This client had less than a week to fully disassemble a 400,000-square-foot commercial office and datacenter, and ship all the equipment to their warehouse. They needed a partner who was up to the task.

The Challenge:

This nationwide online advertising client had administrative, sales and IT offices spread out across multiple major metropolitan areas. Due to an expiring lease, the client was closing down one of its larger offices and distributing the staff to multiple nearby locations and to headquarters. Once the staff moved out of the office spaces, the client had limited time to return the space to the condition specified in the lease.

The office was approximately 400,000 square feet located on four floors of a commercial office tower in Dallas, Texas. To meet lease and landlord specifications, the client had to shut down and remove all of its network and office IT infrastructure, including a 100,000 square foot datacenter, from the building spaces. As an added challenge, the entire project needed to be completed in just five days!

What We Did:

Following a site survey and meetings with building management, as well as client office management teams, VIMRO project managers and engineers devised a plan to accomplish the network and IT infrastructure removal within the required five-day period.

By applying the elements of Waterfall Project Management principles coupled with some elements of Agile Project Management, the VIMRO team deployed two operational hands-on managers, three field engineers and five local experienced engineers to the Dallas office and datacenter spaces.

The team broke down the office spaces into manageable quadrants and created a plan for systematic progress through the spaces to ensure that all network and IT infrastructure equipment, hardware and cabling was removed quickly, completely, and all necessary equipment was saved, packed and shipped to the warehouse on time and without damage to the equipment or office property. It was imperative that the network and cabling be removed without disrupting the remaining building IT infrastructure and security systems.

Results:

With proper planning and coordination of team members, The VIMRO staff was able to accomplish all of the following on time and on budget:

  • Removed: 100,000 square foot datacenter, 9 data closets, 24 network racks, 9 server cabinets, over 5,000 Cat5 cable runs, and over 1,000 telco runs via PBX, totaling approximately 250,000 feet of cable
  • Disassembled and removed all network and IT infrastructure from 400,000 square feet of office and datacenter space
  • Met the aggressive time goal and performed all services in under 5 days
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