McDATA Insures BlueCross BlueShield Data

BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee has selected and implemented McDATA solutions at the heart of its data center.

BlueCross BlueShield said it needed to gain control of its rapidly growing and disparate storage infrastructure in a non-disruptive manner. BlueCross BlueShield chose a McDATA storage area network (SAN) solution that includes McDATA’s 6000 Series Directors, 3000 Series Fabric Switches, 1000 Series Loop Switches and its storage network management software, SANavigator by McDATA. In addition, McDATA said it has partnered with BlueCross BlueShield to assist in designing its long-term storage infrastructure strategy.

“BlueCross BlueShield is committed to problem-free relationships with our customers. We need a reliable IT infrastructure to accomplish that, which is totally changing the way we do business. Our organization is increasingly benefiting from our IT department, and our storage network is key to that transition. That’s why we were so particular when we chose a partner,” said Bob Venable, manager of enterprise systems for BlueCross BlueShield. “We’ve been able to grow our business by 15 percent while at the same time improving corporate efficiency by 40 percent. We’ve done that largely through IT spending, and the partnership we’ve formed with McDATA is responsible for a significant part of that savings.”

Venable said that over the last six years the amount of data traveling through BlueCross BlueShield’s network has grown from 500 gigabytes to the current 46 terabytes, while the manpower necessary to manage that data hasn’t grown at all.