Technimove TechniMigrate Data Centre Remediation Service

M&E Case Study – Global Retail Client – Full DC Remediation

Introduction

Our Client is global retail company, who are the largest off-price retailer of apparel and home fashions worldwide, who have been delivering goods for over 40 years worldwide. They have 3 large processing warehouses in England, delivering supplies to their main retail shops. One of their large warehouses is located in Stoke, where the current Data Centre provides all IT networking and infrastructure across the whole campus.

Our client’s management have proposed to upgrade the site’s Data Centre infrastructure to provide a future expansion of IT equipment, with additional power resilience to the IT equipment.

Their requirement was to upgrade the Data Centre with a new Schneider Electric Scalable UPS System and racks. The biggest challenge was due to the processing warehouse operating 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, with only 1 available window to shut down the whole campus. All works had to be completed across a period of only 2 days.

The Solution

Technimove were contacted to provide a solution to the client’s request, working alongside Insight as client’s account partners and Schneider Electrics for all materials required for the design.
All parties agreed to the design and solution proposed, where all existing power, UPS’, PDUs and racks would be replaced with Schneider equipment and a full Data Centre remediation would be carried out.

A new scalable 16Kw UPS rack, with additional battery modules, and a new 25mm 5-core cabling to the new provisioned 100Amp 3phase circuit. All existing racks would be removed and replaced with new Schneider NetShelter SX 42U racks, each one fitted with dual rack PDUs fed from the new UPS.

To complete the work, Technimove would create new floor plans and rack layouts, based on the new environment, with the aim of minimising cross-cabling connections. A Physical Audit would be required to record all client devices, including Telco equipment and structured cabling. A full Cable Trace would be carried out detailing each live port connection.

During the remediation work, all equipment would be labelled, removed, and installed, with 2 of the racks to be dismantled. The redundant UPS’, the power feeds running under the raised floor, all data cables and power leads would be removed and replaced with the correct type and lengths. Any redundant or end of life IT equipment was planned to be replaced with new equipment or disposed of.

All fibre and copper structured cabling, would also be removed and relocated into the desired new rack, re-terminated where necessary and tested. The final solution would be a power resilient, clean and future ready Data Centre, which would act as a benchmark and a showcase for all other client’s processing warehouses.

The Result

Once the Design, Physical Audit, Cable Trace and shutdown window scheduling was completed and approved, work commenced in Stoke. All IT equipment was powered down, while all data and power cables were removed, prior to the devices being de-racked. Structured cabling and Telco links were removed and placed carefully under the raised floor. Rack PDUs were then disconnected from the local distribution board and all power feeds removed back to DB. The UPS’ were disconnected from local feeds, and 5-core power cabling was removed. Two of the comms racks had to be dismantled in the room as they would not fit through the doors, then all racks were removed from Data Centre.

The raised floor had to be fully removed to be able to carefully work on the structured cabling and patch panels as a large amount of cable looms needed to be re-routed and re-terminated due to poor installation.

The DC was cleaned and prepared, ready for the all new Schneider UPS, batteries, racks and PDUs to be installed. The UPS rack was built with all power modules, batteries and internal cabling, prior to the clear out of the DC in a provided build area. Technimove engineers mounted all racks as per the floorplan and connected the new 3 phase 100Amp feed from the local DB to the new UPS.

With the new Schneider UPS and server racks installed and mounted together, the copper and fibre structured cabling was re-installed, along with all Telco circuits and devices.

The remaining IT equipment was re-racked as per the client’s racks plans. Technimove engineers installed Cat6a copper and OM4 LC–LC fibre cables and dressed to the appropriate U position, within the cabinet, as per the patching schedule. The Technimove engineers were equipped with various cable lengths and colours to best suit the new design.

The final stage was to install the Schneider monitoring system, including heat & humidity sensors to both front and rear doors, and management connections.
All work was carried out during the COVID-19 lockdown period so the engineering team had to be reduced to observe social distancing and to adhere to TJX and Technimove’s safety guidelines. Technimove successfully managed to deliver the entire scope, handing the environment back to the client within 2 days.

Client expressed his personal satisfaction at the successful completion of the project, as each site has now been fully standardised. The client team were delighted with the quality of work completed by Technimove and were impressed with both the efficiency and expertise of the team throughout the entire project.