Dell/EqualLogic iSCSI SAN Drives Team Lotus

Team Lotus, the Norfolk based Formula 1 racing team, can now build F1 cars 60 percent faster by working with Dell Inc.

Team Lotus is driving innovation from factory to trackside with a
standards-based enterprise and client infrastructure to meet tough
design deadlines and create the most optimal racing car for every event
of the season.

With a place on the grid for the 2010 season only being confirmed in
September 2009, Lotus Racing, as the team was then called, faced the
challenge of setting up a global IT infrastructure to support the
manufacturing of a prototype race car in just three months. Dell was the
solutions provider that delivers a data center and client
infrastructure with round-the-clock support in such a short time period,
and due to its experience working with F1 racing teams in the past,
Dell was the candidate to become the technical supplier to the team.

To offer trackside support, Dell developed a mobile data center for the
team, which collects and processes thousands of megabytes of data from
each lap of a race so engineers can scrutinize details such as tire
temperature and aerodynamics to make adjustments to the cars during or
after the race. Each car has 150 sensors linked to the trackside data
center, and once processed on-site, the data is sent back to its factory
in the UK for analysis using Dell EqualLogic PS6000X iSCSI storage area
network arrays (SANs). The trackside solution is based on a
consolidated data center infrastructure, which is a significant
advantage for Team Lotus, as they are now known, as the hardware is
shipped to all 19 races around the world that make up the F1 season. In
addition, this IT environment is able to operate in a range of
geographical terrains which is critical, as events held in extreme
temperature conditions could affect server performance.

Also key to Team Lotus’ trackside solution are the Dell Precision
workstations, which include the Dell Precision M6400 mobile workstation
and the Dell Precision T7500 tower workstation. These models are
designed for performance on large data sets and complex multi-threaded
applications such as those used for design and engineering of the cars.
With the Dell Precision M6400 mobile workstation at trackside, engineers
are able to move between the pitwall, garage and mobile datacenter
while having continual access to analysis tools.

Off the track, the Team Lotus Dell infrastructure drives the design of
F1 cars through technology such as computational fluid dynamics, which
replicates wind tunnels to improve aerodynamics of the cars. Each race
has a uniquely designed car based on learnings from previous events, and
the Team Lotus engineers depend on Dell to help create these bespoke
cars, which are built from 5,000 hand-drawn components ranging from the
wishbones to the entire chassis. To power these complex processes, Team
Lotus uses a Dell high performance computing (HPC) solution in its
factory consisting of Dell PowerEdge M1000e blade enclosures, Dell
PowerEdge M610 blade servers and Dell PowerEdge R610 and R710 rack
servers, which offer performance as well as memory scalability as the
team grows.

As around one-third of the Team Lotus employees work ‘on-the-go,’
traveling from race-to-race, the group deployed more than 80 Dell
Latitude series notebooks, which offer stability, flexibility and
security with easy manageability and wireless options. Underlying this
deployment are Dell’s Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) offerings including
email continuity, archiving and crisis alerting. For the Team Lotus
office and factory-based employees, the Dell OptiPlex 780 desktops
provide a durable, stable platform with security control and management
capability.

Team Lotus’ entire IT solution is covered by Dell ProSupport
Enterprise-Wide Contract, which provides proactive support focused on
simplifying the IT environment and ensuring uptime and increased
productivity. With a designated Service Delivery Manager, Team Lotus can
rely on a single point of contact, leaving the team free to focus on
driving performance on the racetrack rather than IT. In addition, a
Worldwide On-Site Response agreement provides the team with local Dell
contacts across the world, guaranteeing four-hour response for servicing
and repairs throughout the F1 season.

"Launching our first car in 2010 was a momentous occasion, but with only
weeks to prepare for the season, the pressure was on. We needed a
reliable and innovative technology partner to help get us on the road to
success, and Dell gave us the confidence that we would be able to get
up and running quickly with an end-to-end IT solution that could be
easily deployed and managed. Dell delivered a tailored infrastructure in
record time that was powerful and mobile enough to meet our team’s
specific needs both on the track and in the factory, helping us to
become an Efficient Enterprise and achieve our goal of lining up on the
grid in 2010, which resulted in Lotus Racing becoming the top ranking
new team of the F1™ season," said Bill Peters, Head of IT, Team Lotus

"In a sport where hundredths of a second count, innovative technology
drives significant competitive advantage for today’s racing teams. By
deploying a powerful infrastructure from the desktop to the datacenter,
Team Lotus is able to best perform both on and off the track. In today’s
virtual era, Dell is committed to eradicating complexity and overcoming
challenges through enterprise efficiency for ultimate performance and
we look forward to supporting Team Lotus as they push towards the front
of the Formula 1 grid next season," said Stephen Murdoch, VP & GM
of Large Enterprise, EMEA, Dell.