Background Information and Context

Venti Systems is a manufacturer of high-end automotive power modules. The company is based in the west side of Toronto, in central Canada, and has a sales home office in Tokyo, Japan. Venti Systems is in the process of acquiring two other companies: Grandics Corporation, which is also in Toronto (but on the east side of the city), and Konah Power, based in Seattle, in the north-western United States.

Grandics Corporation manufactures electronic components and has a sales home office in New Delhi, India, while Konah Power manufactures powertrains and has a sales office in Frankfurt, Germany.

The locations of all the offices are shown in Figure 11-1.

Figure 11-1. Venti Systems and Its Acquisitions Have a Global Presence

Venti Systems, including its two acquisitions, produces a low-volume, high-value-added product. The company expects to grow both organically and by acquisition.

Currently in North America, Venti Systems has 100 people, while Grandics Corporation and Konah Power have 60 people each. One person is located in each of the India and Japan locations; those two employees work from home. The two-person sales staff located in Germany works from a small remote office.

The current network at Venti Systems, as illustrated in Figure 11-2, includes 10BaseT to the desktops and 100BaseT to the servers. All wiring is unshielded twisted-pair (UTP). The company has one e-mail server and two file serversone for business applications and one for computer-aided design/computer-aided manufacturing (CAD/CAM). A fourth server backs up the business application file server for redundancy. A backup of each server is done daily, and the backup tapes are stored off-site. The network is Layer 2 switched, using Cisco Catalyst 1924 switches and one 2950T-24 switch. Each port on the 1900 switches is attached to only one device; hubs were removed a few years ago. Virtual LANs (VLANs) are not used in this network. One Cisco 2514 router, which includes two 10-Mbps Ethernet interfaces and the firewall feature set, is used for Internet connectivity through a digital subscriber line (DSL) connection of greater than 1 Mbps. No backup Internet connectivity exists.

Figure 11-2. Venti Systems' Current Network Topology

Because the Venti Systems network is Layer 2 switched without VLANs, it has a flat IP addressing scheme. Private IP addresses, in the 10.0.0.0 network, are used, with Network Address Translation (NAT) on the Internet router translating all addresses to the registered address configured on the external Ethernet interface. The external Ethernet interface connects to the Internet service provider (ISP) DSL network, which offers Point-to-Point Protocol over Ethernet (PPPoE) connectivity.

PPPOE

PPPoE capitalizes on two well-known standards: PPP and Ethernet. PPPoE provides connectivity using an Ethernet link for Internet access through a broadband medium, such as a DSL connection or a cable modem.

Venti Systems employees do not tend to send or download much data over the Internet connection, so no performance issues exist there. Internally, however, slow responsiveness has been reported, especially by the research and development (R&D) engineers.

Virtual private networks (VPNs) are used to allow remote employees, including the one working in a home office in Tokyo, to access files and their e-mail. Security is provided by the Internet router and with virus-checking software installed on all devices.

Telephone service is provided by a relatively old private branch exchange (PBX) system.

All three companies use the same CAD/CAM system and a common suite of office applications (for word processing and so forth). Some differences exist in the financial and other business applications used.

The current Grandics Corporation network is similar to Venti Systems' network. The current Konah Power building includes a low-tech industrial-grade network with shielded twisted-pair (STP) wiring, preventing signal attenuation because of electromagnetic interference produced by the heavy machinery. Konah outsources its Internet connectivity, telephone, and e-mail services.

Table 11-1 summarizes the current state of the three companies and their networks.

Table 11-1. Current State of the Three Companies

	Venti Systems	Grandics Corporation	Konah Power
Product	Power modules	Electronics	Powertrain
Location	Toronto-West	Toronto-East	Seattle
Number of Employees	100 (plus 1 in the home office in Japan)	60 (plus 1 in the home office in India)	60 (plus 2 in the small office in Germany)
Main Duties	Office workers and engineering	Engineering	Laborers
Network
Topology	Flat, switched	Flat, switched	Flat, switched
Connectivity	UTP	UTP	STP
IP Addressing	Flat, private	Flat, private	Flat, private
Proprietary Systems/Protocols	NoneIP only	NoneIP only	NoneIP only
Servers	Applications (and another to backup this applications server), e-mail, and CAD/CAM	Applications, e-mail, and CAD/CAM	Applications and CAD/CAM
Redundancy	Application server backup only
Applications	Business applications, e-mail, and CAD/CAM	Business applications, e-mail, and CAD/CAM	Business applications and CAD/CAM
E-Mail	Corporate e-mail access	Corporate e-mail access	Outsourced
Edge Device	Cisco 2514 router with firewall feature set	Other vendor's router with integrated firewall	Leased from ISP
Internet Connectivity	DSL	DSL	DSL
Internet Connectivity Backup
Business Continuity	Application backup automatic. Backup done daily; tapes stored off site.	Backup done daily; tapes stored on site.	Backup done daily; tapes stored on site.
Remote Users (Including International Offices)	VPN to router for e-mail and file sharing.	VPN to router for e-mail and file sharing.	No remote access supported. E-mail is outsourced and file sharing is done through e-mail.
Voice	Old PBX	New PBX	Outsourced Centrex
Security	Virus check and firewall router	Virus check and firewall router	Virus check and ISP firewall
QoS
Network Management	Telnet to devices	Telnet to devices	Telnet to devices