Hudson Valley and UAlbany are the first of SUNY's 64 campuses to share IT facilities, an initiative expected to lead to additional shared opportunities.
In recent news, the University at Albany and Hudson Valley Community College (Hudson Valley) have formalized an agreement to share information technology (IT) services and facilities. The two higher learning institutions are actually the first two of the State of New York's (SUNY) 64 campuses to share IT facilities.
And the architect behind it all is none other than FirstLight Fiber. FirstLight will install a dedicated fiber link between the two campuses, allowing the schools to share their IT services and serve as each other’s secondary data centers. By the end of 2013, UAlbany will be set to relocate its back-up physical servers, virtual servers and network equipment seamlessly to the Hudson Valley Community College campus. Following that, UAlbany will provide reciprocal services once the community college’s new data center facility opens in 2014.
Such a decision to share IT services actually derived from the shared services initiative launched under SUNY Chancellor Nancy Zimpher. This smart move is actually driving other educational institutions and similar facilities to look into sharing IT services. Since embarking on this, the SUNY university system has saved over $20 million dollars, a sum of which is being reinvested into growing student and academic services across the SUNY campuses.
What a wonderful and efficient way for universities to save money, advance technologically, and boost student and faculty productivity!
With FirstLight, educational institutions like UAlbany and Hudson Valley Community College are offered a comprehensive portfolio of secure, scalable telecommunications solutions and knowledgeable staff experienced in working in the educational field to support advanced voice/VoIP, multicast, video and distance learning applications for single and multisite institutions.
To learn more about FirstLight’s solutions for education, visit: http://www.firstlight.net/solutions/business-solutions/education/.
