Plan B Selects F5 Networks Continuity Solution

February 1st, 2007: Business continuity means more than just data recovery, so when Plan B Financial Services wanted to ensure continuous online connectivity it invested in an F5 Networks dual ISP networking solution.

F5’s BIG-IP Link Controllers enable online access via two different Internet Service Providers (ISPs), managing traffic between two links to provide not only high performance, but protection against network hiccups and any possible downtime.

Plan B is a wealth management provider with branches spread across Australia and New Zealand. It relies heavily on its online applications to allow its clients and third-party alliances to administer their investment portfolios and report on compliance issues over the Internet.

The company’s Head of Infrastructure, Darren Hathaway, says that Plan B had initially relied on a single ISP for its online traffic but had decided to add an extra ISP to eliminate the risk of downtime, maximise performance and increase flexibility to take advantage of ISP pricing and traffic restrictions.

“Since installing the F5 solutions, management of our Internet connections has improved significantly,” said Hathaway. “We have been able to save on costs by modifying the network infrastructure with the BIG-IP Link Controllers, but the real value to the business is the increased uptime and reliability, because we are always online despite ISP or network failures.”

F5 claims that its BIG-IP Link Controller detects errors across an entire link to provide end-to-end, reliable WAN connectivity. It says it monitors the health and availability of each connection, detecting outages to a link or ISP. In the event of a failure, traffic is dynamically directed across other available links so users and external customers stay connected.

Alphawest recommended the F5’s dual ISP solution to Plan B, with Alphawest Customer Services Manager Ian Clarke seeing it as a good fit for “a company that is continually leveraging technology to improve its business.”

“We went with F5 because Link Controller gave us more advantages in terms of administration, reporting, and flexibility,” says Hathaway. “In fact, it has a number of additional capabilities which we are just now starting to explore.”

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