September 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY AARHUS UNIVERSITY AARHUS UNIVERSITY

September 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY Building a New IT Infrastructure at Aarhus University FLEMMING B Ø GE CIO, vice president AARHUS UNIVERSITY

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 3 Agenda Aarhus University in brief IT after the mergers Infrastructural components, the role of the Danish Research Net The organizational challenges Status and next step, questions and remarks

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 4 Aarhus University, a Few Figures More than 10,000 employees Turnover: More than EUR 700 million 35,250 students 1,250 Ph.D. students Among the top 100 in international rankings (e.g. Shanghai) 25% of the public Danish research

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 5 Foundation and Mergers Founded in 1928 – 80th anniversary in merger: Handels- og Ingeniørhøjskolen i Herning (business and engineering) 2007 merger: Danmarks JordbrugsForskning (agricultural research) Danmarks Miljøundersøgelser (environmental researh) Handelshøjskolen i Århus (business school) Danmarks Pædagogiske Universitet (university school)

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 6 Merger: From Single Campus to Multi-Campus

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 7 Result of the Mergers New common graphic identity in 2008 Federation of faculties vs. cooperative organization IT in a poor state No common infrastructure No common use of applications, no ERP Low customer satisfaction

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 8 IT Maturity

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 9 Why Does It Work ? Even as the bumble bee flies … IT works at Aarhus University The task: Build a new foundation for IT without loosing the collaborative strength

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 10 Priority 1 Build a new IT infrastructure Three components Physical network, all major sites Identity management: Employees, students, guest researchers, alumni SOA architecture, service bus

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 11 Physical Network Using the Danish Research Network as an intranet across all major sites Pros High-quality optical fiber network High speed: 10 Gbps Good redundancy solutions Low latency Cons High cost Bundle, core network and add-on services with limited usage at AU Community culture => Risk of delays / loss of milestones

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 12 Network Design

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 13 Status: September 2009 A multi-campus network is part of a large network project including LAN, Wi-Fi, firewalls, admission control etc. A new MPLS core network is implemented Fiber optics are in operation at the old campus in Aarhus The deployment of fiber optics by the Danish Research Network (Forskningsnettet) to all other major sites is delayed

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 14 Organizational challenges Centralized technology calls for centralized work processes Service Level Agreements need to be defined Maintenance and support, centralized or local ? Monitoring the network, errorhandling. Centralized or local ?

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 15 The political perspective Very strong faculties and deans, prefer local IT-departments Ambitious university strategy, strong vice-chancellor demands radical changes Two options regarding the IT-organisation: Build a centralized cooperative IT-department Build strong faculty-IT departments Pay regard to the geographical issues

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 16 The organisational project Establish a cooperative IT-department step by step. Ensure critical mass from the beginning Scope: Infrastructure operations and administrative applications Gain respect using best practices / best processes. Create results Broaden the scope slowly

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 17 Cooperative IT, october 2009

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 18 Where do we go from here ? Complete the infrastructure-projects: Continued deployment of physical network Proof of concept, Identity Managment Complete the merge between IT-departments And choose the best application project….

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 19 Next project…

NORDUnet conferenceSeptember 17, 2009 AARHUS UNIVERSITY 20 Questions and remarks…