The Commercial Director of Lanmedia, Ignacio Manterola, carried out an analysis of the digital strategy and digital transformation in the university environment. A sector with large and complex IT infrastructures to serve numerous students who need different applications and with very specific requirements depending on the specialty they are studying. To simplify deployment, management, maintenance and be able to resolve possible issues in record time, Lanmedia recommends the adoption of a VDI solution. “One of the pillars is the UDS Enterprise broker for virtual desktops and applications, which allows all students and teachers to have access to the applications in the same way they use it at the University.” In terms of hardware, they suggest an infrastructure based on Lenovo technology with hyperconvergence software from Nutanix.
Manterola highlighted the role of UDS Enterprise, which provides “access to virtual desktops and applications from any location and device, at any time, 24×7. Through UDS you can also enable access to the physical local devices remotely. In short, it provides a private cloud with all its scalability, flexibility with great ease of management and without having to worry about security.”
Juan Carlos Hernández, Head of the ICT Service of the University of La Laguna (ULL) explained how they could resolve the transition from face-to-face to online learning in a very short time with UDS Enterprise. “We were clear that we wanted UDS Enterprise to be the broker for our VDI solution. A strong, proven solution that would assure us that behind us, we will have a company with a lot of experience that will provide us with efficient support.” The choice of this software was not accidental. “We already had a subscription for another virtualization solution, and we relied on the VES project of CRUE and RedIRIS,” where UDS Enterprise was chosen as the best technical and economical desktop virtualization solution.
To complete their infrastructure, they chose hardware from Lenovo and hyperconverged software from Nutanix. All of this was recommended by Lanmedia, who was the integrator in charge of designing, implementing, optimizing, and customizing the solution.
The ULL’s on-premise VDI platform is sized for 1,000 concurrent sessions. A figure that, thanks to the versatility of UDS Enterprise, can be easily expanded by deploying as many virtual desktops as needed in the cloud. Besides, it allows enabling remote access to the computers located in the classrooms. “We are providing this type of access to students of Fine Arts or Nautical, who need licensed software that is installed on campus computers, which have GPUs,” said Hernández.
With this solution they serve some 22,000 students, 1800 teachers, and 500 administration and service workers, who can work remotely from any location. They have simplified the management of all their IT equipment to the maximum, which consists of around 2,000 computers spread over some 60 classrooms in 23 different buildings. Now they can perform all installation, maintenance, troubleshooting… centrally through the UDS Enterprise web administration panel.
Among the benefits they have obtained, the Head of the ICT Service highlighted the following:
In conclusion, Hernández commented on several aspects, such as the change in the concept of the classrooms: “now they will have electrical connections with a powerful Wi-Fi so that users can bring their own device“. In addition, he emphasized the “cost reduction by not having to invest in new computers, the 24×7 availability of infrastructures from anywhere and, of course, the increased productivity of the entire technical and administrative staff of the university.”
To learn all the details of the VDI project of the University of La Laguna, do not miss the video of the webinar organized by Lanmedia. You will find the intervention of the head of the ICT Service from minute 12:05 (It’s in Spanish, but you can enable English subtitles):
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