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IT Asset Management Using RFIDAn Xterprise White Paper

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Managing Assets for the Business of ITFinancial Services, Telecommunications, and other companies use IT to deliver unprecedented levels of productivity and service. Support of their continuous global operations requires IT infrastructure—physical, electrical, and HVAC—that has become a substantial component of their physical infrastructure.

As businesses grow more IT-intensive, their IT departments are adopting business methodologies to help them manage IT infrastructure for maximum business value. Running IT effectively as a business may not capture the headlines, but IT Asset Management (ITAM) is becoming an essential tool to keep IT cost-effective.

There are four general software approaches for ITAM:

• IT management plus assets—established IT management suites are adding asset-management features

• Asset management software plus IT—Enterprise Resource Management (ERP) suites now extend asset-management capability to IT

• “Best of breed” niche solutions—new providers offer specialized solutions designed from the ground up for IT Asset Management

• Custom-integrated solutions—new platforms support custom integration of IT and asset management solutionsforflexibilitywitheconomy

The Physical Asset ChallengeAll these approaches face the challenge of tying virtual records to physical objects throughout asset lifecycles, for example during:

• Discovery of assets on arrival or during physical inventory

• Allocation of assets to assigned locations (possibly insideotherequipment),andlater,recurringconfirmationthat they’re still in place

• Change, including movement across perimeters, installation in a different device, or physical reconfiguration

• Reconciliation of physical and virtual attributes of a device, for example physical location and IP address, or physical server or cluster and the virtual machines running on it

IT environments present challenges for each of these physical inventory processes. Growth and obsolescence keep assets in constantflux.Upgrades,consolidationandvirtualization"orphan"some assets and release others for less demanding applications. End-of-life is a special problem, particularly for storage assets for whichdata-protectionrulesdemandconfirmedphysicaldestruction.

IT assets themselves aredifficulttotrack. Designed for interchangeability, most members of an asset class look alike. Valuable components may be hidden within other assets, such as blades or drives within servers. And a growing number of mobile computing and storage components make it easy to compromise physical controls through carelessness or theft.

Costs are high when assets disappear from inventory records: replacement and project delays, plus power, cooling, and space for assets powered up but unconnected to any network. Some asset-management failures carry additional public and regulatory consequences: temporarily misplaced data may require disclosure, andconfirmeddatalossmaymeanlawsuits.

The State of the Art in IT Asset Management: RFIDRadio-frequencyIdentification(RFID)hasalreadybecomethestate-of-the-art in asset-management applications outside IT. Proven in managing sensitive, high-value assets from military hardwaretofineart,thetechnologyofferscompellingadvantagesto link IT Asset Management software with the physical assets themselves.

Active and Passive Tags RFID uses two different tag technologies. Passive tags are compact,cheap"electronicbarcodes":tough,andreadablewithoutpower or line-of-sight access. Their limitations—range and read-only capability—are acceptable tradeoffs for embedded assets likeharddrives.Activetagsare"smarttransponders"withgreaterrange and sensitivity, tamper-resistance, and read/write capability. Larger and a little more expensive, they are ideal for tracking larger high-value assets—read/write capability is the key to bridging physical and virtual domains in fully integrated ITAM solutions.

Both technologies are evolving quickly, and driven by consumer applications, their costs continue to drop.

Architecture and IntegrationConsumer scale economies are also driving RFID support architectures, which are standardizing quickly at moderate price points. Application frameworks such as the Xterprise/Microsoft Clarityplatformhavereducedthetimeandcostofflexiblesolutionsthat integrate across physical/virtual borders. Standard frameworks also help build a growing network of solution providers who can meet even custom requirements quickly and cost-effectively.

RFID Use CasesRFID extends and supplements process and electronic discovery methods, and completely replaces barcodes. RFID technology extends visibility and control of IT assets beyond active networks and across asset lifecycles, avoiding many limitations of earlier methods. Here are just a few use cases for today’s asset-intensive data centers:

• Discovery—RFID tracks even embedded or concealed assets through receiving,installation,upgrade,reconfiguration,andmaintenance

• Recovery—RFIDrecoversoff-network,powereddown,orother"lost"assets,and helps identify connected but untagged assets as a process check

• Maintaining integrity through critical operations—physical asset-management maintains the audit trail during busy upgrade or deployment cycles, even when assets are powered down, misplaced, or substituted

• Confirmingendoflife—physicalassettrackingconfirmsdestructionofthecorrect asset, and can provide video documentation of the event for regulatory compliance (see sidebar).

RFID ITAM BenefitsThefinancialbenefitsofRFID-assistedassetmanagementaresignificant,virtuallyinstantaneous,andlasting.AnRFIDcart’sfirsttripthroughalargedatacentertypicallydiscovers hundreds of thousands of dollars of idle assets consuming kilowatts of power, backup power, and cooling capacity. It is not at all unusual for an RFID project to recover itsentirecostinthefirstfewhoursofdeployment.

Andthebenefitslast:RFIDhelpsorganizationsdeployassetseffectively,andavoid wasting high-performance assets on low-priority tasks. At physical perimeters, RFID helps control loss and theft without physical search, and covers unattended exits with automated video tracking.

RFID technology can also assist with authentication and tracking of backup tapes, andimproveinventoryworkflowmanagementinserviceandrepairareasorthird-partyproviders.

Making Your DecisionMost IT executives are often surprised at the speed of RFID projects—many can be rolled out within weeks, with immediate returns on investment. After a two-day data-center tagging exercise using off-the-shelf components, a major US bank discovered that a full 3% of its server blades were in place and powered up, but unconnected to any network. Integrating physical and electronic discovery led to immediate reductions in capital equipment, power, and HVAC costs, and deferred purchases of replacements.

Chooseasmall-scaleinitiativeatfirst,withthepotentialforquickreturnsinsecurity,utilization,andefficiency.IntegrateRFIDintoyourexistinginventoryprocesssoyoudon’ttry to change too much all at once.

There are some special considerations for RFID projects. First, match your choice of RFID technology to your requirements. Passive-tag technology can handle even fairly complex applications,butyoumayneedtheflexibilityofactivetagsforhigh-valueassets,whereorwhen range of discovery is an issue.

Second, make sure there’s an RFID specialist on the project team. RFID technology and platformsarematureandstable,soyoucanprofitfromapartnerwithRFIDexperienceinstead of climbing the learning curve together. And RFID specialists are integration experts, so they can help you introduce innovative solutions with a minimum of disruption.

ConclusionRFID-enabled IT asset management links electronic and physical asset tracking from purchasing through end-of-life. It offers immediate, substantial returns on investment by preventing loss and theft of valuable assets, recovering misplaced, powered-down or disconnected computing assets, and maintaining the integrity of asset information through critical lifecycle stages. It is a major improvement in IT asset management and substantially boosts the overall quality of managing IT as a business.

End-of-life data protection at Wells FargoWells Fargo & Company (NYSE:

WFC)isadiversifiedfinancialservices

company with $609 billion in assets and

160,500 team members across more

than 80 businesses at 6,000 locations.

Aftersufferingfivehigh-profiledata

breaches in less than two years,

Wells Fargo took aggressive steps to

secure, track and manage its enormous

IT inventory of hard disk drives and

portable computers. The company

engaged RFID solutions integrator

Xterprise to deploy Clarity EAM™

Enterprise Asset Management at

key operational points throughout its

headquarters campus.

Integrated using the Clarity platform, the

solutioncombinesconfigurableRFID

tags, asset-management hardware

and software, worldwide Web access,

integrated analysis and reporting, and

professional support from Xterprise.

Using their new RFID tagging and

Clarity IT Asset Management solution

from Xterprise, Wells Fargo can now:

• strengthencontroloveritshard

drives, laptops and customer

financialdata

• updateITassetinventoriesquickly

and automatically

• reducethetimeandcostoftracking

and reconciling IT inventories

• operateregionaldatacentersin

smaller facilities

• meetSarbanes-Oxleyreporting

requirements

IT Asset Management Using RFIDAn Xterprise White Paper | Jim Caudill, SVP Marketing & Strategy, Xterprise