CASE STUDY
Tetra Tech turns to Syntax to build future-ready IT infrastructure
Global firm manages 70,000+ projects across 100+ countries on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure with help from partner Syntax.
Products and Services:
- Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI)
- Syntax Security Services
“What attracted us to the Syntax managed Oracle Cloud Infrastructure was the flexibility to provision resources to meet fluctuating business needs, cost savings from OCI’s scale and licensing options, and added security for safeguarding client and personal information.”
Craig Christenson
SVP and CIO
Tetra Tech
Challenges
Tetra Tech is a leading provider of high-end consulting and engineering services for projects worldwide. With 21,000 associates working together, Tetra Tech provides clear solutions to complex problems in water, environment, sustainable infrastructure, renewable energy, and international development.
For a number of years, the company had been using Oracle E-Business Suite (EBS) to manage financial, project management, and HR operations for than 70,000 projects across more than 100 countries. The entire operation runs on a global single instance of Oracle, giving everybody full visibility across the company, from the CEO to the engineers, through a common portal. Tetra Tech also integrated a number of other third-party apps with the EBS platform, including Kofax, and Dell Boomi.
The business supports all types of work styles, including working at home, in the office, and out in the field. When responding to a natural disaster—or an unexpected business acquisition—Tetra Tech needs to mobilize its teams quickly, and that requires scaling out the organization and its infrastructure at a rapid pace. This can pose daunting operational and IT challenges. “When we scale, we scale like crazy,” says M.A. Haseeb, Vice President of Applications at Tetra Tech. “It’s the nature of our business.”
Solution
To keep its business flexible and efficient, Tetra Tech turned to Syntax, a leading technology solutions provider, global trusted advisor, and expert in Oracle applications and infrastructure. A few years ago, Syntax helped the company migrate its Oracle EBS applications from an on-premises environment to a private cloud managed by Syntax. The successful transition convinced Tetra Tech of the advantages of cloud scalability.
“What attracted us to the Syntax managed Oracle Cloud Infrastructure was the flexibility to provision resources to meet fluctuating business needs, cost savings from OCI’s scale and licensing options, and added security for safeguarding client and personal information.” says Craig Christenson, SVP and CIO at Tetra Tech.
More recently, the two partners charted a new hybrid cloud roadmap that would enable Tetra Tech to take advantage of the added security, scalability, availability, and cost benefits of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI).
“As an Oracle Strategic Managed Service Provider (SMSP), Syntax recognizes the importance of optimization and innovation,” says Marc Caruso, Chief Architect at Syntax. “Our solutions for Oracle Cloud Infrastructure were closely aligned with Tetra Tech’s business needs and we were excited to work with them to realize the unique benefits of this strategic program.”
The New Model
In the new model, Tetra Tech’s most critical Oracle and non-Oracle workloads were migrated to OCI, while some applications slated for retirement or future migration to Oracle SaaS remained in Syntax’s private cloud. Syntax manages the overall hybrid environment, providing the same customer experience across both clouds and the flexibility to scale workloads in OCI as needed.
“Syntax proposed moving the infrastructure and hardware to Oracle Cloud and continuing with the Syntax cloud for certain apps—which absolutely made sense for us,” says Haseeb.
Before starting the migration, Syntax finished upgrading Tetra Tech’s Oracle E-Business Suite and performed an upgrade of the EBS database in advance of migrating to Oracle Database Cloud Service (DBCS). As part of the move, Syntax encrypted Tetra Tech’s database and ensured all of the databases were compliant with GDPR data protection and privacy regulations. With DBCS, Tetra Tech could leverage Oracle Transparent Data Encryption (TDE) at no cost, giving it an added incentive for making the move.
The cloud migration was a success, with Syntax taking just two months to move Tetra Tech’s Oracle E-Business Suite ecosystem, which consisted of more than a dozen applications and 100 VMs, to Oracle Cloud Infrastructure. “It was one of the smoothest implementations we’ve seen,” Haseeb says. “Most of the users didn’t even know what happened over the weekend. It was executed pretty close to perfection.”
Results
Today, Tetra Tech is taking advantage of a more flexible and scalable enterprise IT platform, empowering the business to grow cost effectively in a fast-paced market. Benefits include:
- Greater scalability. With OCI, Tetra Tech ensures that its IT teams can ramp up new servers more quickly than ever in response to rapid organic growth or new business acquisitions. The business is no longer limited to standard Oracle licensing and can now leverage the benefits of subscription licensing for DBCS and WebLogic.
- Financial flexibility. As part of its strategic managed services and licensing program with Syntax, Tetra Tech only pays for the cloud services they use.
- Proven security. Tetra Tech leverages OCI’s proven security technologies to reduce the risk of a data breach and simplify regulatory compliance. “We went for the complete Oracle Advanced Security suite, which came as part of the offering,” says Haseeb. Syntax augments the native OCI solution by adding endpoint detection and response, vulnerability management, and SIEM, all managed through Syntax’s 24 x 7 Security Operations Center (SOC).
- Cost efficiency. Migrating to Oracle Cloud generated a 25% reduction in operating expenses for Tetra Tech, costing significantly less than its previous on-premises environment and licenses.
- High availability. Tetra Tech runs a single Oracle Database
across multiple servers using Oracle Real Application Clusters
(RAC), helping maximize system availability. - Robust disaster recovery. Syntax helped Tetra Tech create a
new cloud-based disaster recover solution using Oracle Data
Guard. - Global support coverage. With Syntax’s teams positioned
around the globe, Tetra Tech could access support services
across time zones around the clock.
Why Syntax
Since 1972, Syntax has been providing comprehensive technology solutions to businesses of all sizes with thousands of customers trusting Syntax with their IT services and ERP needs. Today, Syntax is a leading Managed Cloud Provider for Mission Critical Enterprise Applications. Syntax has undisputed strength to implement and manage ERP deployments (Oracle, SAP) in a secure, resilient, private, public or hybrid cloud. With strong technical and functional consulting services, and world class monitoring and automation, Syntax serves corporations across a diverse range of industries and markets. Syntax has offices worldwide, and partners with Oracle, SAP, AWS, Microsoft, IBM, HPE, and other global technology leaders.
