Bank Rakyat tackles network issues with Network Vantage
ConvergenceAsia staff
10/08/2007

Islamic banking has been growing rapidly in recent years, with an estimated worth of US1 trillion worldwide. According to projections from financial analysts, this figure is further expected to increase to approximately US2.8 trillion by 2010.

While experiencing an accelerated growth in their business, many Islamic banks such as Malaysian-based Bank Rakyat are facing the challenge of managing increasing data and information.

Relying heavily on data and information of their clients' banking details and information, Bank Rakyat has to constantly share files to better facilitate transactions across many branches via its wide area network (WAN). With many users in the bank accessing these records constantly throughout the day, the WAN is often hogged by unknown applications.

The constant network issues and uncertainty in the WAN utilisation not only made remote access and sharing of information between branches incredibly slow, it also proved to be extremely costly and inefficient.

The bank, therefore, needed an effective and comprehensive performance analysis tool to help identify the culprits that were slowing down the operation.

Explained Nazaruddin, Manager of IT Infrastructure, Bank Rakyat, "When our WAN wasn't performing at an optimal speed, the IT team realised that it was due to high usage. We needed to pinpoint the culprit that was holding up the bandwidth, before we could proceed to shut it down."

"An alternative for us would be to upgrade our WAN infrastructure. However, the exorbitant costs involved in the upgrade would have been difficult to justify especially without any strong proof point other than slow server speed to support our cause," he added.

As a result, Compuware Network Vantage was introduced in November 2005 at the bank's headquarters at Jalan Tangsi, Kuala Lumpur to help tackle the problem.

The setup consisted of two probes with a repository server. The probes were placed before the core switches so that the traffic passing through the switches could be monitored. With this infrastructure in place, the IT executives are now able to identify which application is the culprit for the hold-up.

With the introduction of the Network Vantage, Bank Rakyat was provided with an in-depth network monitoring system that could uncover business critical information, such as who the infrastructure was serving and what applications demanded the most resources.

"Without knowing which applications were using the network, and when they were active, it would have been a near impossible feat to manage the networked infrastructure to meet with business objectives effectively," said Nazaruddin. "It is essential for IT managers like us to be equipped with a tool that can provide visibility to help ensure that the network is being used for its intended purposes. It is also necessary for us to manage the WAN asset and eliminate any unnecessary usage. With Network Vantage we were able to identify the issue and control it."

In short, he said, Network Vantage helped put an end to the finger pointing by identifying the problem. "Under normal circumstances, it would be near impossible to tell whether the lag was caused by the network or the server. With the implementation, our network problems can now be resolved more quickly, allowing us to offer better service levels for our customers."

Since implementing Network Vantage, Bank Rakyat has managed to narrow down any network performance issue faster, thereby reducing normal operation time by at least 25 per cent. The bank plans to further install servers and applications management at a later stage.

Established in September 1954, Bank Rakyat became a full-fledged Islamic cooperative bank in 2002. It now offers Islamic banking facilities through its team of more than 3,500 employees working across 111 branches throughout Malaysia.

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