ASB senior manager Richard Lockwood reports that greater insight into traffic flows using the Fluke Network’s NetFlow Tracker has saved the ASB Bank thousands of dollars each month (see below).

Lockwood says the Fluke Networks NetFlow Tracker provides a detailed and granular view of traffic flows to and from the bank’s 140 branches and 4550 full time staff. With most branches located in remote sites that have broadband connections of just 2Mbps, Lockwood says it’s vital that bandwidth-heavy applications such as file transfers and video telephony are “prioritised appropriately”.

Since installing purchasing the NetFlow Tracker a year ago from MPA Ltd and Axon, the ASB has been able to better manage its bandwidth allocation, and spend less on connectivity.

So here are the numbers:

The NetFlow Tracker cost $130,000 to install, with an annual support fee of $30,000. Lockwood says the return on investment has amounted to ongoing savings of up to $15,000 a month.

In addition to NetFlow Tracker, the ASB has installed a Cisco WAN Optimisation product to compress data and improve the networks overall efficiency.