CASE STUDY | AECOM

AECOM EQUIPS GLOBAL TEAM WITH A VIRTUAL, HIGH PERFORMANCE WORKSPACE TO IMPROVE COLLABORATION

CASE STUDY | AECOM

AECOM EQUIPS GLOBAL ENGINEERING TEAM WITH A VIRTUAL, HIGH PERFORMANCE WORKSPACE TO IMPROVE PROJECT COLLABORATION

CUSTOMER PROFILEListed as one of Fortune’s World’s Most Admired Companies, AECOM

is a multinational engineering firm that provides design, consulting,

construction and management services to a wide range of both public

and private sector clients. AECOM prides itself on turning ideas into

icons, thoughts into actions and imagination into reality – implementing

innovative solutions to the world’s most complex challenges.

Specialising in connecting expertise across services, markets and

geographies to deliver transformative outcomes, AECOM is passionate

about creating a better world and improving people’s lives.

CHALLENGEAs a global infrastructure services firm, AECOM employees work on large,

complex and technically challenging projects and require access to the

same desktop and IT infrastructure but also an enormous amount of

graphics and processing power.

“Our existing IT set up was challenging due to teams in different countries

having varying hardware and software solutions,” explains Richard Atkins,

Global VDI Manager for AECOM. “This often meant teams having to travel

to other sites in order to work on a project together, which wasn’t always

efficient.”

The team therefore decided to look for a virtualised desktop solution that

would provide a more collaborative and agile working environment.

“From an IT perspective we have also received positive feedback from employees, knowing that everyone is working from the same application has created a more trustful and supportive team.” Richard Atkins Global VDI Manager for AECOM

CASE STUDY | AECOM

SOLUTIONRichard Atkins and the team at AECOM turned to VMware, the leader

in virtualisation, and NVIDIA, the world leader in visual computing, to

support the transition to a virtualised IT environment.

Luke Thornton, Global Virtualization Manager for AECOM, had already

conducted a proof of concept (POC) and successfully deployed a small

number of NVIDIA GRID virtualised workstations using the older VMware

Horizon 5.2 platform back in 2013. Following the successful POC and

subsequent production pilot, the business case was put forward by

Nuzrul Haque, AECOM’s IT Director for UK & Ireland and Continental

Europe, and Steve Capper, Global Vice President and Chief Technology

Officer, who helped drive buy-in and, once the investment was secured,

everything was procured through Creative Consulting.

“Being the first project of its kind, NVIDIA and VMware were best placed

in the market to provide what we needed,” said Thornton.

Pat Lee, VP, Desktop Product Management, from VMware added:

“Our collaboration with NVIDIA is effective because it extends

the transformation to high-end workstations and applications so

organisations can benefit from the mobile cloud era and deliver a more

collaborative working environment.”

After thorough consultation with both companies, a decision was made

to run a test phase in India using VMware Horizon 6 and vSphere®6

with NVIDIA GRID™ vGPU™. “We could see how this solution would be

a real game changer for us,” said Capper. “It offered the flexibility and

productivity we needed and enabled our project teams to work and

collaborate with remote teams from any location.”

“Project delivery is so much more effective now as we’re ultimately using a ‘follow the sun model’ says Hindle.

“Work is shared across different locations and everyone involved can access the same information – quality control is a lot tighter.” Chris Hindle Regional Director at AECOM

CASE STUDY | AECOM

RESULTSTo date, AECOM has provided 150 users with access to the virtualised

desktop with staff based in India, the Middle East and the UK. “The

benefits of this technology have transformed not only our IT set up but

the wider business,” explains Chris Hindle, Regional Director at AECOM.

One of the primary advantages of enterprise graphics virtualisation with

VMware Horizon 6 and vSphere is that everyone has access to the same

IT environment and data, enabling multiple users to work on a project

simultaneously, regardless of time zone and geography. “Project delivery

is so much more effective now as we are ultimately using a ‘follow the

sun model’,” says Hindle. “Work is shared across different locations and

everyone involved can access the same information – quality control is

a lot tighter as a result.”

“From an IT perspective we have also received positive feedback from

employees,” says Atkins. Thanks to the virtualised environment everyone

has exactly the same IT set up and if an issue arises it can be fixed

in record time. “Previously it could take a couple of days to fix an IT

problem, now it can take less than an hour. For our engineers this has

reduced the frustration on their end enormously so that they can focus

on getting their job done.”

The virtualised IT environment has made AECOM employees more

collaborative in other ways too. “Knowing that everyone is working from

the same application has created a more trustful and supportive team,”

says Atkins. “Our employees in the UK know that they can pass a project

onto the team in India and be confident that when they pick it up the next

day there will be no issues.”

“We could see how this solution would be a real game changer for us,” said Capper.

“It offered the flexibility and productivity we needed and enabled our project teams to work and collaborate with remote teams from any location.” Steve Capper CTO at AECOM

To learn more about NVIDIA GRID visit www.nvidia.co.uk

© 2017 NVIDIA Corporation. All rights reserved. NVIDIA, the NVIDIA logo, and NVIDIA GRID are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of NVIDIA Corporation. All company and product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of the respective owners with which they are associated.

Hindle added: “We have also created a process that wraps around the

technology to create a 360-degree collaborative experience. We want

to continue to build strong internal relationships so, before we start a

project, the UK and Indian teams meet face to face to receive the brief

and continue to build that relationship remotely over the phone and via

instant messaging tools such as Jabber.”

The technology has also had an impact on employee wellbeing. “We

have seen an improvement in people’s work life balance,” says Hindle.

“Staff are no longer tied to their desks – all they need is an internet

connection and a laptop and they have immediate access to a high-

performing IT environment. So employees can work from where suits

them and they are able to still perform their role.”

Looking to the future AECOM believes that their relationship with NVIDIA

will continue to grow. Atkins says, “We’re working together to constantly

monitor and improve the working environment and we’re keen to roll

this solution out across the wider business.”

> Industry: AEC

> User Profiles: 1GB

> Number of Users: 400

> Applications: Autodesk Revit & AutoCAD

> Server Hardware: Dell

> Server Software: VMware vSphere

> VDI: Horizon View

> Virtual GPU Solution: vGPU