John Thatcher has always had a strong desire to serve others. It’s what inspired him to enroll in the U.S. Air Force, and later to join the Indiana Office of Technology (IOT) more than a decade ago. Today, as Assistant IT Director, Thatcher leads IOT in supporting the technology needs for the state of Indiana. That includes 92 agencies, with 35,000 employees, doing work that touches all 6.7 million residents of Indiana.
From day one, the goal has been to remove technology inefficiencies and give state employees more time to work with state agencies, improve quality of services, and find innovative new ways to serve Hoosiers. Thatcher has helped IOT achieve this and more by consolidating the state’s legacy infrastructure with Pure Storage, saving millions of dollars in hardware, software, and maintenance costs and countless hours of work.
As a result, IOT has kick-started a digital transformation in the Hoosier State with a strong data storage platform that enables agencies to push the boundaries of what’s expected from state organizations. For leading the way with breakthrough innovations, IOT is the 2024 Pure Storage Visionary of the Year.
Creating Excellent Citizen Service Experiences
Indiana citizens rely on IOT agencies for many reasons: to renew their driver’s licenses, register to vote, manage their income taxes, reserve a campground, connect with social services, and much more. A simple, reliable, and agile data storage platform enables IOT to deliver these high-quality services, all while driving significant cost savings that can be reinvested into further innovation.
The Pure Storage platform supports 90% of the state’s IT infrastructure, driving performance of even the heaviest enterprise workloads. For citizens and the state employees who serve them, that means less time accessing files, uploading aid applications, or filtering through employment opportunities.
Crucially, it also means there are no storage-related service interruptions for state agencies such as social services and law enforcement. Pure Storage is more reliable and requires less maintenance. With the Pure Storage® Evergreen® architecture, upgrades are completely non-disruptive, and the storage technology remains ever modern.
“Our citizens expect a certain level of digital savvy, and the performance and reliability that goes along with it,” says Thatcher. “Pure gives us a future-proof platform that can evolve and scale alongside us.”
Enhanced Protection for Citizen Data
Like other state departments, IOT acts as a steward of its citizens’ personal data. This also makes it a constant target for bad actors.
IOT now has a data protection strategy in place that leverages Pure Storage platform capabilities to keep data even more safe from hackers, natural disasters, or even human error. It has also simplified and accelerated its log analytics, improving its security, compliance, troubleshooting, and overall data observability.
“The people of Indiana trust us with their data, and we take data protection very seriously,” says Thatcher. “We now have a platform that enables us to expand on these capabilities to make our environment as secure as possible.”
Putting the Focus on Innovation
As a result of IOT’s investment, citizens are benefitting from incredible cost-efficiencies. With a single, consolidated data storage platform, the team spends up to 70% less time on maintenance, which means more time to focus on supporting new technology projects.
IOT halved both administrative tasks and annual software licensing fees through the predictability and reliability of Pure Storage. IOT also reduced its flash storage data center footprint by two-thirds. To date, IOT has saved millions of dollars in hardware and licensing expenses—dollars the State of Indiana can invest back into services and technology.
With more resources and time on their hands, IOT can focus more on innovation: better performance, new services, security, and more.
We’re excited to see what IOT will think of next, and how their technical leadership might inspire other government agencies across the country to take advantage of technology to better serve their citizens. Congratulations to IOT for winning the 2024 Pure Storage Visionary of the Year Award.
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