Citrix Evaluation Findings & Report

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InterDev | Atlanta – Chicago – Jacksonville 1

Citrix Evaluation

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Executive Summary

InterDev LLC was engaged by the Jacksonville Housing Authority (JHA) to perform a Citrix Environment Evaluation and Evaluation of Third Party Vendor IT Support. An infrastructure assessment is a baseline for success. Testing and analysis of an organization’s current infrastructure performance establishes a point of reference that may be measured against future expectations. Once a baseline is established, an organization can plan accordingly and set more appropriate goals and expectations for any necessary technology projects needed to support a growing enterprise. This evaluation will provide

recommendations for solutions to current issues at Jacksonville Housing Authority and suggestions for better alignment with best practices for the industry.

Evaluation Detail

The following pages break down the important layers of JHA’s current Citrix Environment. 1. Citrix Environment Stability and Reliability.

The overall purpose of Citrix is to provide centralized on-demand application delivery from a datacenter to reduce costs and deliver secure access to Windows application for users anywhere regardless of the device used. The Citrix solution provides for dramatically reduced demand on the IT support requirements by simplifying the delivery of applications via a virtual desktop which can be updated one time and effect each user.

The JHA Citrix servers, domain controllers, and mail servers are housed offsite at the CSX AITC facility. This facility is a managed 24 x 7 facility that is rated at 99.9996% uptime and has been 100% over the past 6 years. This facility is a guarded facility with protection from Mother Nature’s most powerful forces. The CSX location with its high level security, redundancy, and controlled

environment provides for the perfect facility to house the critically important components of the JHA server infrastructure. The current solution is running on five physical HP DL360 of generation 7 and 8 servers. The servers run VMWare ESXi 5.0 as the virtual hypervisor, with Windows 2008 R2 as the virtual guests. The combination of VMWare ESXi 5, Windows 2008 R2 and Citrix 6.5 were the solution recommended environment for deploying Citrix at the time of deployment.

2. Citrix Server and PC Configuration and Deployment.

The App Center JHA-XA65 server controller XenApp version 6.5 operates on a single farm of 14 Citrix XenApp servers, Citrix Web server, Citrix SQL server, Citrix License server, and six data stores

operating across five physical servers running VMWare ESXi.

The applications that are being run in the virtual environment utilized by the Citrix system are Microsoft Office 2010, Adobe Acrobat Reader, Google Chrome web browser, and Microsoft Internet Explorer web browser which is used to access the Yardi system. Yardi is a cloud hosted ERP solution that is accessed via the web browsers. Some users also have access to Adobe Acrobat Professional.

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InterDev | Atlanta – Chicago – Jacksonville 4 3. Network Layout and Design

The JHA network is categorized as a Metropolitan Area Network (MAN) environment where there are multiple locations scattered across a Metropolitan area. Two main sites at 1300 N. Broad St. and Central Maintenance are connected by a direct Metro Ethernet connection and the 1300 N. Broad St. location is connected to CSX AITC via a 100 Mbps direct connection. All other sites are connected through a single Internet pipe using IPSEC VPN tunnels to the CSX AITC location. All Internet web traffic is currently routed only to the 1300 N. Broad St. location and filtered through an Astaro web filter appliance.

4. Citrix Policy Management

Citrix has a subsystem within the XenApp AppCenter that allows for policies to be created separate from the Windows Active Directory Group Policy Management Console. Windows domain Active Directory (AD) Group Policy also provides most of the same functions. In the JHA Citrix environment, the policies are primarily used to allow or prevent the redirection of devices plugged into the local desktop or thin clients. Other policies are used to apply printers to the respective groups based on their location or department. There are also policies in place that define users or groups of users to select pools of available XenApp servers. This also manages the difference between the users that have regular applications deployed and those that have Adobe Acrobat Professional.

5. Systems Management and Monitoring

Systems are managed and monitored by Enterprise Integration (EI), the current third party managed solutions provider. EI provides onsite, full time desktop support to provide the users with desktop, printer, local network, phone, and peripheral support during regular working hours. EI also provides help desk call-in support and a back office network and server infrastructure support which handles the monitoring, server management, and network management which is performed by offsite remote services at the EI facility.

6. Citrix Load Management

Citrix has scalability functions that can range from small workgroup sized environments to massive enterprise level deployments with well over 100,000 connections and hundreds of servers in a geographically dispersed area. The JHA Citrix environment has 14 virtual XenApp servers dispersed between five physical hosts all located at the AITC site. Three of the virtual XenApp servers have been specifically allocated to select groups of users but the rest are openly available to all of the Citrix users for an effective load balance. The JHA deployment balances the 14 virtual XenApp servers between about 170 users.

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InterDev | Atlanta – Chicago – Jacksonville 5 7. Printer and Services Management

The large printer and multifunction devices are strategically located in areas that will properly benefit users in an efficient and effective manner. A significant number of users have smaller multifunction printer devices in offices and other locations that are neither cost effective nor efficient for the purposes of management. InterDev recommends that as these devices not be replaced as they age out of effectivity.

Evaluation Recommendations Report

The following report provides more contextual information and discussion for the areas listed in the previous sections of this document. The additional dialogue and discussion will attempt to clarify issues found and provide more background to issues facing JHA.

1. Citrix Environment Stability and Reliability

The Citrix environment as deployed for JHA meets some of Citrix’s recommended best practices in some areas but there are some inefficiencies that can be resolved. A standard Citrix environment is designed to provide an identical operating environment in areas of 500 or more workstations. These environments are not concerned with the users’ location, workstation operating system, or the hardware that is running the virtual desktop. Citrix is ideal in large call center environments where large groups of users perform an identical task in an identical virtual desktop. The primary

applications in use are the web based Yardi solution, and Microsoft Office 2010. The use of Citrix relieves the complexities of desktop support, patch management, printer driver deployment and management, but adds of layers of complexity and expense to the server back office over that of using full client Microsoft Windows based desktops. The benefits of the Citrix support and licensing model is more evident in larger organizations where support cost can rapidly outweigh the smaller increases in server support and management.

Recommendation:

Of the available options for resolving the existing issues with the JHA Citrix environment, the most cost effective method would be to split the existing single-farm deployment into a multi-farm environment. InterDev recommends the development of a proof of concept project, where moving one physical server from the AITC to be housed at the Central Maintenance location and set it up as a separate Citrix farm. These physical servers are already set to host multiple virtual instances of Citrix XenApp server and can also handle a secondary domain controller and a local printer server as well as the additional components required for a second farm. This would reduce the hops that are required for users to connect to their desktop environments and reduce traffic between Central Maintenance and the AITC location. This would also reduce the network traffic generated by web bound traffic and printing, since the printers will be communicating on the same local network. Furthermore, the web traffic which already routes through the 1300 N. Broad St location will not compete with the traffic coming in from the remote sites through the AITC to 1300 N. Broad St., which is the current network route.

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Some Citrix components can be shared between multiple farms; consequently, it is not necessary to consolidate all servers in one farm to avoid deploying these components multiple times:

 Web Interface - Sharing Web Interface between farms provides central access to

applications published on different farms. (Even though this can be shared, for the proof of concept, the users of the second farm will need to be local users and would not need the web interface.)

 SmartAuditor - With the exception of the SmartAuditor Agent, all components are independent of the server farm. For example, you can configure multiple farms to use a single SmartAuditor Server.

 Citrix Licensing - You can manage multiple farms using one Citrix License Server; however, performance might be affected if you use only one license server for all servers in a WAN. EdgeSight – EdgeSight is a performance and availability management solution that can be used with Resource Manager (powered by EdgeSight) to monitor multiple farms. Note that servers running Presentation Servers 4.5 agents appear as endpoints. Some of the limitations and benefits of the multi farm configuration are as follows:

 Each farm must have its own data store

 Each farm does not require replication

 Applications cannot be load balanced between farms

 Site-based farms eliminate the need to open firewall ports for server-to-server communications

 Multiple farms improve performance over a single farm when server-to-server traffic crosses a WAN link

You can monitor and configure multiple farms from management console. A secondary connection as a failover and using IPSEC VPN connection back to the AITC would provide the equivalent connectivity that the remote sites currently utilize which are providing satisfactory throughput and response time.

A second option would be to introduce the new Citrix CloudBridge tool. This tool delivers industry leading WAN optimization for Citrix. This new tool replaces and improves on the former Netscaler and Citrix Branch Repeater systems and offers comprehensive managing and monitoring of Citrix application deployment, user functionality, and network throughput. The major setback of this solution is that it requires Citrix 7.3 or higher with the latest version being Citrix 7.6 and JHA is still using Citrix 6.5.

The last option would be to remove or phase out the existing Citrix environment and replace it with a combination of Microsoft Windows Remote Desktop Services for connecting to the remote desktop environment and Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager for managing the application versions, workstation deployment, updates, and patching. Windows Remote Desktop

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InterDev | Atlanta – Chicago – Jacksonville 7 Services for Server 2012 R2 accelerates and extends desktop and application deployments to any device, improving remote worker efficiency, and simplifying regulatory compliance. Remote Desktop Services enables virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI), session-based desktops, and applications, allowing users to work anywhere.

2. Citrix Server and PC Configuration and Deployment.

There are existing updates and patches that need to be implemented including Service Pack 3 for XenApp 6.5 which has fixes for functionality and stability. The servers are running on Windows Server 2008 R2 which is 7 years old but are patched with the latest service packs and updates. VMWare ESXi installed is currently 5.0 but there are two different versions of the builds between the five host servers. Newer more efficient and secure versions are available for all of the products. The Citrix XenApp 7.6 system which is the current version with updates that increase security and performance. Windows Server 2012 R2 is the current version of the operating system and has improved performance, security, and compatibility functions for Citrix and VMWare. VMWare has also released ESXi 6.0 which has several performance improvements for processing, networking, and data throughput. The Desktop thin and full client machines are currently running the Windows 7 version of Windows which is one version behind the current version 8, but with Windows 10 coming out this year.

Recommendation:

If the Citrix environment is going to be retained, upgrading the system to the latest versions would help to increase the functionality, speed, availability, manageability, and security.

3. Network Layout and Design.

This is an area largely available for improvement. There are currently three main areas that are in need of evaluation.

1. The Central Maintenance site has the largest amount of issues, complaints, service loss, and noticeable speed problems, with all network traffic, including data, voice, and possibly some security video traffic using a 20 MB direct connection having to go to the 1300 N. Broad St location before either going to the Internet or going to the datacenter location at the AITC. 2. Internet traffic is currently set to only leave by way of the 1300 N. Broad St location through

the Astaro web filter.

3. Print servers are all housed at the AITC and the phone system is web managed with virtual PBX devices at the N. Broad St and Central Maintenance locations.

Recommendation:

The first solution would be to remove the Astaro web filter system entirely or replace it with multiple current web filter appliances. One appliance would be at the AITC to route outbound Citrix

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InterDev | Atlanta – Chicago – Jacksonville 8 traffic from this site and another at 1300 N. Broad St. for non-Citrix or datacenter traffic coming from Central Maintenance and the 1300 N. Broad St. locations.

InterDev’s primary recommendation would be to add a second Internet connection for failover resolution to the Central Maintenance location in the event of connection loss, excessive noise, or signal degradation on the primary fiber connection. This method would involve the addition of a link balancer to monitor the primary connection to 1300 N. Broad St and in the event of signal issues, to redirect traffic though an IPSEC VPN connection directly to the AITC facility.

All web traffic currently funnels through the 1300 N. Broad St location. It is recommended to utilize the content filtering functionality of the existing Cisco ASA 5520 firewall hardware at the AITC, the 1300 N. Broad St location, and a third unit at the Central Maintenance location. This third unit will be added after an Internet connection is installed in addition to the direct connection to 1300 N. Broad St.

Photos from the Central Maintenance site also show that the network closet hasn’t been maintained very well and the physical network media lacks organization. Though this does not necessarily impact the performance of the network, it can become troublesome if cables are confused when tracing and are plugged into incorrect patch panels or switches.

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There was equipment found that is not documented in the network diagram and was unknown to EI located in the environment. This includes a Sprint “Ubee Airwalk” which provides antenna

redirection of Sprint cellular devices and passes the network through the local network. This device provides signal and data throughput to the users of Sprint phones but it is utilizing JHA resources for this traffic. The other device was the old Internet connection gateway which is still connected and till powered on.

4. Citrix Policy Management

The policies configured predominately apply to printer assignments and the ability to add and handle peripherals plugged into the terminals. The existing policies appear to be effective and properly configured.

Recommendation:

No further recommendation is needed at this time.

5. Systems Management and Monitoring

Enterprise Integrations provide system management and monitoring. From the interviews of some of the users, everyone is quite satisfied with the response, professionalism, knowledge, and abilities of the local tech support representative, Raymond Medina. However, the users where not as happy with the Enterprise Integration help desk. InterDev’s experience with the network and server management team was disappointing as the timeliness of response from EI was slow. The response time for our requests were on par with the responses that were given when Evan placed requests on our behalf. There were layers of support staff that each request had to go through and many of the

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InterDev | Atlanta – Chicago – Jacksonville 10 requests had to be made multiple times before a result was achieved. There were server maintenance actions that were also not responded to as timely as they should have been. Recommendation:

The VMWare vCenter has the ability to send e-mail notifications of errors and warnings. These events should be configured to send notifications of events that require action to be performed. One of the servers observed during the evaluation had been in a warning status for about a month and alert status for about a week. If monitoring was proactive and not reactive then EI would have rebooted the server by that time. Since the XA-xx servers are not utilized during the evenings and weekends, they should be scheduled for regular management to keep issues from compounding. Evaluation of the current support SLAs should be undertaken. While there are always technical issues and challenges in a complex technical environment, the responses and resolutions to critical issues should be timely and in sync with contractual Service Level Agreements. The experiences of the InterDev team, the users interviewed and the issue logs reviewed indicate that this may be an area for improvement by EI.

6. Citrix Load Management

This is the one area that has no foreseeable bottlenecks. A properly configured Citrix server is capable of hosting as many as 500 connections. These servers are showing between eight to twelve connections during peak hours. The way the system was initially designed and installed will allow for more connected terminals than there are currently and there will be ample coverage for the users in the event of a server needing to be taken offline for service.

Recommendation:

No further recommendation is needed at this time.

7. Printer and Services Management

The best method for improving printer and service management is to continue on the path that has already been started where the smaller, less efficient, single user multi-function devices are

removed and instead, the users are setup to connect and make use of the large workgroup multi-function copier/scanner/fax/printer machines. Removing the small printers will substantially reduce waste, costs, excess traffic, and maintenance. In most cases, these changes have to come from the top and be made quite clear that those devices will no longer be purchased or replaced after they fail.

Recommendation:

If the smaller printers are going to be retained it would be recommended that print servers be setup at the two primary locations for handling print traffic. This will take stress off of the server farm being used to manage the Citrix environment for the Citrix users, and would completely resolve print issues for users that are not connected to the Citrix environment so that print traffic does not have to route to the AITC before returning to Central Maintenance or 1300 N. Broad locations. This

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InterDev | Atlanta – Chicago – Jacksonville 11 method can be tested for proof of concept using a small selection of users and a retired desktop PC or even a laptop for short term.

Recommendation Summary

InterDev’s primary concern with JHA’s current Citrix environment is its’ dependency on a single

connection to the data center and internet in order to function. There are no secondary connections in place, therefore users are unable to access Citrix in the event of any loss of connectivity to the data center. With the exception of Microsoft Office, the applications used for daily operations are primarily cloud based. In the event of a lost Internet connection, the user’s effectiveness will be greatly

diminished. They may still be connected to Citrix but they won’t be able to perform anything more than basic document functions within the file servers and Microsoft Office. A more robust network design with redundant connections and no single point of failure would be the single most effective change to enact for this environment.

It is InterDev’s recommendation to consider the addition of failover connections for the two primary locations. This additional connection will provide a reliable and continuous connection in the event a primary communication circuit goes down.

The benefits of Citrix are seen in the centralized management of applications, licensing and end-user desktop configuration and control. It is often touted to provide savings in license costs, desktop hardware and software expenses. These costs are more evident in a much larger scale deployment (10,000 seats+) but can be seen proportionally in an organization the size of Jacksonville Housing Authority. Since the majority of the issues discovered in this assessment are “network” related,

remediation efforts should be focused on network connectivity – not the wholesale replacement of the Citrix technology platform. JHA’s investment in Citrix has been effective and it is InterDev’s

recommendation to continue on this path. The benefits gained by the conversion to a full desktop model may not offset the licensing, hardware, and deployment costs associated with the change. The retention of the Citrix environment at this time is recommended over the costly and time consuming process of replacing it with another solution.

Concerning the third party support, our observations revealed slow response times to questions and concerns. InterDev didn’t have access to the current SLA’s between JHA and EI. It is recommended for an evaluation of the current support SLA’s to be undertaken to determine if proper EI response times are being achieved.

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Appendix

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Exhibit C - Internet Traffic Flow

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Addendum 1 – Additional Findings and Notes

During the presentation and while discussing the findings with JHA senior staff, there were four items that we took note of for either follow up, documentation of a known issue that was outside of the scope of this assessment, or to provide additional information on. The four items are as follows:

1. Information on a Wilson cell phone signal amplifier to replace the Ubee Airwalk

For item one, the recommendation was for a Wilson cell phone signal booster kit to replace the Ubee Airwalk. The signal booster kit would work for all providers and provide coverage for a building up to 10,000sqft. This would also reduce the traffic going across the connection from Central Maintenance to HQ generated by the Ubee Airwalk and devices connected to it. Below is a link to additional information for the signal booster kit.

http://www.wilsonamplifiers.com/weboost-connect-4g-x-cell-phone-signal-booster-kit-471104/

2. Information on a Riverbed Steelhead WAN optimizer

Item two is information on an additional recommendation for a Riverbed WAN optimizer. A WAN optimizer can allow better usage of the bandwidth that is being paid for and reduce the traffic that traverses the connection. These units can also be demoed to see if it resolves issues and also provide significant visibility into what traffic is going across the connection and the amount of bandwidth that is being used. This can potentially help to isolate and resolve a problem by pinpointing the application or user that is consuming bandwidth. The link below provides additional information about the product.

http://www.riverbed.com/products/wan-optimization/data-center-CX.html

3. Staff at the presentation reported an issue with a USB check scanner that did not work through Citrix.

Upon further research we came across the following document which describes Panini’s driver policy. Basically, Panini only allows distribution of drivers through their software vendors and the vendors ensure compatibility. Yardi support would be able to provide information on whether the driver for the Panini scanner is twain compliant, if it is it should be compatible with Citrix.

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InterDev | Atlanta – Chicago – Jacksonville 16 4. Documented reported issues with wireless at the Central Maintenance location, which was out

of the scope of this assessment.

Item four is simply documenting an issue that was brought up related to wireless connectivity not working at Central Maintenance. This was outside the scope of this assessment but is being documented if further investigation is needed in the future.

We also recommended a redundant connection at Central Maintenance with a Link Balancer to protect against an ISP outage. One cheap solution that could be put in place quickly as a test or an emergency backup would be to use a Verizon 4G LTE Broadband router with voice capability.

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Addendum 2 – Contract Requirement Clarification

JHA requested additional information and clarification on three areas of the Citrix evaluation. InterDev’s additional details and explanations on these areas are as follows:

1. Evaluate the stability of the Citrix environment compared to other comparable Citrix platforms. In addition to what was provided in the evaluation, JHA requested a comparison of other Citrix “type” platforms. InterDev believes there are two parallel solutions and the comparison details are as follows:

 Microsoft Remote Desktop Services – Recommended for smaller environments since it lacks some of the more robust features that are desired in a desktop virtualization solution. One of the biggest examples is Centralized Management. With Citrix you can use one Console to manage your whole Citrix environment vs. Microsoft requires you to maintain each server separately.

In our experience we find that Microsoft provides basic management, web access, and printing functions whereas within Citrix these functions have more advanced and innovative options and configurations.

Additionally, Citrix can adequately perform in limited bandwidth environments therefore customers who experience frequent drop offs in bandwidth do not experience as many performance issues.

 VMware Horizon – Provides desktop virtualization. This is slightly different than JHA’s current remote desktop solution. The difference between the two is with virtualized desktops each user logs into a discrete virtual machine that is typically running a desktop operating system such as Windows 7 or Windows 8, and with remote desktop, typically multiple users log into a shared platform that is running a server based operating system such as Windows 2008 R2 or Windows 2012. This is not exactly an apples to apples comparison, as it has different licensing requirements, and potentially greater hardware requirements. However, the licensing fees for 170 users starts at approximately $53,000 MSRP.

2. Is Citrix is the best computing option available and the associated pricing is reasonable for the JHA? If not, please recommend other options and reasonable pricing.

 Yes - As stated and discussed in the original report, it is InterDev’s recommendation that Citrix remains the JHA’s desktop virtualization solution. Citrix is the market leader for a low bandwidth remote desktop solution that can reduce desktop management by centralizing administration. Due to the number of remote sites that JHA maintains with remote

employees, a centralized infrastructure is key to efficient management maintenance of line of business applications.

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 Pricing - Currently JHA is paying a monthly Software as a Service (SaaS) fee for Citrix in the amount of $5,326.10. Based on MSRP pricing JHA could feasibly purchase Citrix for approximately $40,800 with a yearly maintenance cost of $8,500 (XenDesktop Enterprise U/D – $190MSRP for initial product purchase + $50 for Software Maintenance). Based on comparable licensing methods such as Microsoft Service Provider Licensing Agreements (SPLA), or even Microsoft Office 365, the monthly fee paid for Citrix SaaS may be a bit on the high end. We do however typically see SaaS fees exceed the purchase price in an 18-24 month time period vs. approximately 8 months. It is possible that this monthly fee includes other Microsoft licensing, but it is simply listed as “Citrix SaaS Agreement” on the invoice. JHA may want look at re-pricing their solution to take advantage of competition on the free market or potentially renegotiate the terms of the contract.

3. Evaluate the cost of the Managed Services provided by Third Party Vendor.

 Managed IT Services:

Due to the wide variety of Managed Service Provider (MSP) offerings today, this is a difficult area to evaluate. However, resources such as the “Kaseya MSP Global Pricing Survey” provide average costs of service offerings from hundreds of MSP’s around the world. It was found that within the United States for 2014, 39% of customers receiving managed services were paying between $51 and $100 per user per month. As shown in the chart below, this was the pricing category that most companies utilizing managed services were paying. Based on the invoice on the following page, JHA is paying $96.59 per user per month which is within price range most companies are paying.

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% < $50 $51-$100 $101-$150 $151-$200 $200

Average MSP Cost / Workstation

2013 - 2014

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 Datacenter Monitoring:

Similar to the managed IT services, there are numerous costing models and plans for Datacenter Monitoring that can both vary depending on the environment.

One approach of looking at the monthly cost for “Datacenter Monitoring” of $6,114.80 is by dividing it by the number of servers (virtual machines) that are running to find the cost per server. This number is $436.77. This cost covers the maintenance and manage of the servers, the virtual hosts, as well as the networking equipment and site-to-site VPN that come into the datacenter. By the contract, all devices at the Datacenter are considered critical and fall into the Priority 1 SLA category for response time and resolution.

An important thing to note, is that this number also includes the cost of the datacenter, which would not be included by most vendors. With most other service providers, there would be a separate line item on the invoice for hosting, as well as a monitoring or management fee.

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InterDev | Atlanta – Chicago – Jacksonville 20 The following table breaks down the monthly contract amounts by user and also shows the yearly costs to JHA.

JHA’S MANAGED SERVICE INVOICE BREAKDOWN Total Monthly

Cost # of Users

Monthly Cost/User

Yearly

Cost/User Yearly Cost Managed Services $16,419.46 170 $96.59 $1,159.02 $197,033.52 Datacenter monitoring 6,114.80 14 (number of servers) 436.77 5,241.26 73,377.60 Citrix SaaS Agreement 5,326.10 170 31.33 375.96 63,913.20 Totals $27,860.36 $163.88 $1,966.61 $334,324.32  Pricing Comparisons

We did find two managed services vendors that provided online calculators for estimating monthly fees based on numbers of computers and servers. Those providers were Helixstorm and Singlepath. Using the plug numbers of 170 computers and 14 servers, the estimated cost for the most complete package offered was $23,816 and $23,160 respectively. It is difficult to determine every item that is included with these service providers without entering into further engagements or taking the “next step” where the MSP would create a tailored solution and a detailed scope of service. Neither of these vendors lists that upgrades or projects are included in Managed service plans but both vendors included 24/7 monitoring.

Typically InterDev does not provide our own pricing in an assessment of services, but in this case a “rough” estimate has been requested. Since the costs for the datacenter are not included, our pricing would be higher than your current services, however projects are included in our

packages. Our base price is typically calculated using $99 per computer or thin terminal, and $399 per server plus $99 for each server backed up. This comes out to $16,830 for desktop management per month and $6,972 per month for the datacenter or server management ($23,802 Total/Month - Datacenter costs not included). It would also be our recommendation that JHA obtain the datacenter space directly to avoid paying any mark up and remove any cost, confusion, or complications if switching vendors.

We would be happy to provide a detailed quote upon formal request or if services are advertised in a formal bid process.

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Addendum 3 – Costing Observation Summary

As stated in the previous addendum, there is no set costing model for Managed IT services and

Datacenter monitoring. The best way for an organization to receive competitive pricing from qualifying vendors is through a formal bid process.

We were however able to take the supplied information from JHA concerning their current cost for these services and run it against our industry knowledge and company pricing. Vendor performance aside, the result of this analysis was that JHA is currently not overpaying for these services. The current amount being billed to JHA is comparable to the amount InterDev and the other vendors we reviewed would charge for these services.

The distinguishable difference between EI’s pricing model and InterDev’s is that EI charges for individual/special projects whereas projects are included in InterDev pricing. This could make a significant cost difference if as part of JHA’s IT strategic planning, multiple projects are identified or if project costs have been significant over the years. It is our recommendation that JHA take this into consideration moving forward.

The SLA’s that EI currently have contracted with JHA need to be compared to the actual service level on a regular basis. This process encourages accountability and better justifies contract costs. As a reference, we created the priority matrix below based on EI’s current SLA with JHA.

Priority Code Description Target Response Time Target Resolution

Time

1 Critical 15 Minutes 4 Hour

2 High 30 Minutes 8 Hours

3 Medium 30 Minutes 12 Hours

4 Low 30 Minutes Defined by 3

rd Party Vendor

5 Very low No SLA No SLA

Further cost and pricing model comparisons can be accomplished in the future but are outside the scope of this current project. Should JHA wish to engage InterDev to perform a more in-depth review and audit we can develop a Scope of Work and proposal for this project.

Citrix Evaluation Findings & Report