| 9:15 - 10:15 a.m. |
Morning Blue-Ribbon Panel: Innovative Best Practices from Data Center Rationalization All-Stars
Charles De Sanno
Executive Director, Enterprise Technology, Infrastructure Engineering and Operations, U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
Charles De Sanno
Charles J. De Sanno currently serves as Executive Director for Enterprise Technology and Infrastructure Engineering and Enterprise Systems Operations and Field Development for the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). VA is the second largest of the 15 United States of America Cabinet departments and has an operating budget of over $75 billion. VA manages nationwide programs for health care, financial assistance and burial benefits for our nation’s veterans. Information Technology is a critical enabler in the realization of VA’s mission. De Sanno directs the enterprise technology engineering efforts for systems solutions across the Department, utilizing an interdisciplinary approach to requirements management, design synthesis, iterative testing and the planning and continued analytical support of the lifecycle. VA Enterprise Systems Engineering promotes cost and operating efficiencies by producing standard solutions to the agency that cut across application organizational boundaries. De Sanno is also responsible for the Department’s field and enterprise operations organizations – operating and managing one of the world’s largest IT installed base of systems and IT staff. Responsible for over 6,300 employees in total - including 400,000 desktop computers, thousands of servers, over 175 data centers, as well as telecommunications infrastructure including mobile devices. The United States Government equivalent of a Fortune 10 IT organization.
Previous career accomplishments demonstrate his strong blend of technology expertise and business acumen. Serving as Chief Information Officer for the VA’s NY and NJ Veteran’s Integrated Service Network (VISN) and then, as Deputy Executive Director of Enterprise Infrastructure Engineering, Mr. De Sanno was one of the primary architects and driving forces behind the departments reorganization and centralization of information technology staff and IT governance. He played, and continues to play, an instrumental role in IT strategic and tactical planning, organization, operations and IT infrastructure development and normalization.
Most notably, De Sanno oversaw IT systems and business startup operations in VA’s Northeast Region – Regional Data Processing Center (RDPC), serving nearly one million veterans annually through forty-two VA medical centers and close to two hundred community based outpatient clinics in the states of Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, Ohio, as well as in the District of Columbia. Under De Sanno’s leadership, Northeast Region hospitals have been a recipient of Hospitals & Health Networks’ “Most Wired” award for six of the last seven years.
A native of Brooklyn, New York, Mr. De Sanno began his VA career at the Department’s Brooklyn Medical Center in 1989 as Director of Healthcare Information Systems and Operations. He was immediately charged with migrating VA’s Decentralized Hospital Computer Program (DHCP) from a PDP-11 platform to Digital Equipment Corporation’s VAX platform. In 1990 he was named Director of Systems Operations and Networks for the Brooklyn Medical Center and was appointed lead technical liaison to EDS and Booz Allen Hamilton for the Congressional mandated IHS (Integrated Hospital System) project at Brooklyn. The interfacing of commercial off the shelf (COTS) technologies to DHCP that was undertaken with the IHS project contributed greatly to the evolution of VHA’s current Veterans Integrated Systems Technology Architecture (VistA). VistA is recognized as the largest and most integrated healthcare management system in the world, featuring one of the most comprehensive Electronic Health Records (EHR).
De Sanno was appointed Associate Director of Information Technology (IT) of the New York VA in 1992 and then Director IT in 1994. In 1996, shortly after the formation of the VISNs, De Sanno was appointed Chief Information Officer for NY/NJ VISN 3. During his tenure as CIO, he developed and deployed a Microsoft Windows NT domain strategy framework that was shortly thereafter adopted by the Agency for nationwide deployment. This model is still the basis, in many ways, for the Department’s current Active Directory architecture. De Sanno - in VISN 3 - was the first to design and deploy a network-wide implementation of a robust commercial off the shelf (COTS) messaging solution (Microsoft Exchange) and under his leadership, commencing in 2002 VISN 3 launched consolidation of the network’s VistA and messaging systems along with introduction of a robust continuity of operations (COOP) strategy around dual Tier III data centers. Today, this model is the foundation of the organization’s newly announced Regional Data Processing (RDP) initiative which will collapse and harden VA’s data center infrastructure. To date, this data center collapsing model has reduced the Department’s data center portfolio by approximately 80 centers, with an end state of less than 15 data centers for the Department.
De Sanno serves on the VA Executive Operations Council (EOC), as well as many other national strategic IT steering and business policy committees including the Technology Infrastructure Subcommittee (TIS). Mr. De Sanno sits on the Board of Directors as President of Brooklyn Child Care, Inc., a not-for-profit day care facility at the Brooklyn VA campus. Additionally, Mr. De Sanno holds the Chairman position of the Marlboro Baseball Travel Club, and sits as the Executive Vice President of the Marlboro Little League. De Sanno attended New York University and Polytechnic University, majoring in computer science and systems engineering and currently resides in Marlboro New Jersey, married to Karon and has two sons, Charles Jr. and Nicholas De Sanno.
Bob Otto
Executive Vice President, Advisory Services, Agilex; former Chief Information Officer/Chief Technology Officer, U.S. Postal Service
Bob Otto
Robert Otto heads the Advisory Services division at Agilex. He is one of the most distinguished and highly recognized CIO leaders in government and industry.
Mr. Otto comes to Agilex Technologies after 38 years of federal service with the last 27 years of service at the United States Postal Service where he served as both the Chief Information Officer as well as the Chief Technology Officer for this $75 billion organization. In this role, he led, managed and maintained the Postal Service’s IT infrastructure, provided IT business solutions to support business objectives of the organization, and managed one of the world’s largest technology networks and the world’s largest intranet. During his tenure at the Postal Service, Mr. Otto reduced the overall IT spend by more than $100 million annually while implementing cost avoidance solutions that annually saved another $50 million.
Mr. Otto oversaw a massive consolidation to standardize the entire organization’s systems, implemented Shared Services in IT, Finance, and Human Resources while simplifying their overall management and support. Under his direction, the agency transformed itself by modernizing its infrastructure, web-enabled their applications, refreshed over 200,000 desktops/laptops, implemented computer security and wireless technology, enabled mobile computing through hand held devices, and consolidated over 25,000 servers at hundreds of locations across the country to just 3,000 servers at two IT centers. Before leaving, he implemented virtualization and blade technology reducing servers and costs, saving the Postal Service millions more a year.
Mr. Otto also managed one of the largest email, wireless blackberry and data warehouse services as well as the USPS.COM web presence that annually generates over $500 million in revenue. His organization was the first business to implement a single instance of SAP Human Resources to support over 700,000 postal employees.
Mr. Otto has won numerous industry and postal awards including the Vice President’s Award in 1996 and 2000, the Inspector General Award in 2001, the Board of Governors Award in 2003, and the most prestigious John Wannamaker award in 2007. From 2004 to 2007, his organization was recognized as one of Computerworld’s 100 Best Places to Work in IT. This is an achievement that no other federal, state or industry organization has yet to achieve.
He received his education and training from the University of Virginia, Duke University, and the University of Maryland, with a Master’s degree in Public Administration from American University.
Richard Spires
Chief Information Officer, U.S. Department of Homeland Security
Richard Spires
Richard A. Spires was appointed in September 2009 to serve as the
Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Chief Information Officer
(CIO). In this capacity, Mr. Spires is responsible for the department’s
$5.4 billion investment in Information Technology (IT). He leads and
facilitates development, implementation, and maintenance of the
department’s IT architecture. Mr. Spires is the chairman of the DHS
Chief Information Officer Council and the Enterprise Architecture
Board. He strongly supports the Secretary’s goal of unifying and
maturing DHS – one DHS, one enterprise, a shared vision, with
integrated results-based operations.
Mr. Spires held a number of positions at the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) from 2004 through 2008. He served as the Deputy Commissioner for Operations Support, having overall responsibility for the key support and administrative functions for the IRS, to include Information Technology, Human Capital, Finance, Shared Services, Real Estate, and Security functions. Prior to becoming Deputy Commissioner, Mr. Spires served as the IRS’ CIO, with overall strategic and operational responsibility for a $2 billion budget and a 7,000- person Modernization and Information Technology Services organization. This division is accountable for maintaining over 400 systems that administer more than 200 million taxpayer records and supports more than 100,000 IRS employees. Mr. Spires served for two and half years as the Associate CIO for Applications Development and led the IRS’s Business Systems Modernization program, which is one of the largest and most complex information technology modernization efforts undertaken to date.
From 2000 through 2003, Mr. Spires served as President, Chief Operating Officer, and Director of Mantas, Inc., a software provider that provides business intelligence solutions to the financial services industry. In helping to establish Mantas, Mr. Spires successfully led efforts to raise $29 million in venture funding. Prior to Mantas, Mr. Spires spent more than 16 years serving in a number of technical and managerial positions at SRA International.
Mr. Spires received a B.S. in Electrical Engineering and a B.A. in Mathematical Sciences from the University of Cincinnati. He also holds a M.S. in Electrical Engineering from the George Washington University. Mr. Spires was named a Distinguished Alumnus of the University of Cincinnati’s College of Engineering in 2006.
Though no one seems quite certain of the exact number of Federal data centers, agencies across the Federal government are now more than ever keenly focused on implementing more efficient and effective IT solutions to improve service and performance, as well as to reduce costs, energy consumption, and environmental impacts. What are data center rationalization lessons learned? What kind of opportunities and challenges do agencies need to consider? How can consolidating services lead to increased transparency in spending, and what kind of cost savings and metrics can realistically be expected? How are security concerns balanced with the need for efficiency? Learn best practices and key performance indicators from agencies that are leading the charge.
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| 10:45 a.m. - 12:00 p.m. |
Panel Session 1: Roadmap for the Future - Making Your Initial Data Center Consolidation Plan
The Federal Data Center Consolidation Initiative requires agencies to develop an initial data center consolidation plan by June 30, 2010. Plans must identify potential areas for consolidation and optimization as well as present a high-level roadmap for the transition. Where do server virtualization and cloud computing fit into the big picture? Hear from Federal executives who have completed their roadmap and can offer valuable advice on avoiding potential roadblocks and developing a manageable plan.
Panelists
Mark McCabe, Data Center Regional Manager, Cisco [Moderator]
Tim Jones, Senior Information Systems Consultant, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City
Jake Wooley, Deputy Director, IT Management Office, Office of the Chief Information Officer, U.S. Department of Energy
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Panel Session 2: Taking Stock - Performing an Asset Inventory
The Federal Data Center Consolidation Initiative requires agencies to collect a final asset inventory baseline by July 30, 2010. Building on their preliminary inventory, agencies must provide more detailed information on the scale and size of existing data centers, IT infrastructure assets, and applications. What is the most efficient way to identify redundant resources, determine what to keep and what to consolidate, and how to organize it all? Hear from Federal executives who can offer insight into the best ways to take stock and maximize your application portfolio.
Panelists
Van Ristau, Chief Technology Officer, DLT Solutions [Moderator]
Tom Boyce, Deputy Chief Information Officer, Director, Office of Information Services, Nuclear Regulatory Commission
James Landers, IT Operations Branch Chief, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Department of Health and Human Services
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Panel Session 3: Where the Rubber Meets the Road - Mapping Your Final Data Center Consolidation Plan
The Federal Data Center Consolidation Initiative requires agencies to complete a final data center consolidation plan by August 30, 2010. This plan must take into account budget considerations that will be incorporated into the 2012 fiscal year. How can agencies create a detailed technical approach that encompasses the three main tenants of the initiative - infrastructure utilization, energy efficiency, and cost efficiency? Hear from Federal executives who will discuss how to map out a sound strategy and implement a plan for managing the transition.
Panelists
Doug Bourgeois, Vice President and Chief Cloud Executive, VMware [Moderator]
Zach Baldwin, IT Specialist, General Services Administration
Brian McGrath, Chief Information Officer, Census Bureau, U.S. Department of Commerce
Peter Whitson, Deputy Executive Director, Field Business Operations Services, U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
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| 12:45 - 2:00 p.m. |
Afternoon Keynote: The Future of Data Center Consolidation - Challenges and Lessons Learned from the Private Sector
Introduction and Closing Remarks
Stephen W.T. O'Keeffe, Founder, MeriTalk
Mark Weber, President and General Manager, NetApp U.S. Public Sector
Neiland Wright
Deputy Chief Architect, Department of the Treasury; Former Systems Lead Architect, United Parcel Service (UPS)
Neiland Wright
Neil Wright joined The Department of the Treasury as the Chief Business Architect in February 2010. He works in the Office of the Chief Information Officer and is focused on aligning business challenges with technology. Mr. Wright formerly worked as the System Architect for the National Science Foundation (NSF), Arlington, VA., where he was responsible for architecting solutions and driving implementation for core business applications.
Prior to the NSF, Mr. Wright worked as the System Lead Architect for United Parcel Service, where he managed the Enterprise Employee Portal and Corporate Architecture Consulting groups with the responsibility of forging IT and business alignment across operational divisions. He also worked as a lead architect at Rare Medium, a consulting group specializing in Internet and Electronic Commerce strategy and delivery. Additionally, Mr. Wright served his country as a commissioned officer in the United States Army.
Mr. Wright received his M.S. in Information Systems from Stevens Institute of Technology and his B.S. in Systems Engineering from the US Military Academy at West Point.
President Obama's FY11 Federal budget request outlined data center consolidation as a key tenet of the Administration's new Federal IT strategy to reduce agencies' costs, energy consumption, and environmental impacts. Many world-class corporate giants have been reaping these benefits for years, and many are operating more securely, efficiently, effectively, and economically as a result. How can these benefits translate to the public sector, despite constraints and Federal considerations? Learn how to make the business case for consolidation using these lessons learned, challenges overcome, best practices, and a glimpse into the future from the private sector.
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