Roseland, N.J.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Expand Networks (www.expand.com) the leader in WAN optimization for branch office consolidation and virtualization, has been chosen by leading animal nutrition company, Ridley Inc., to assure the success of major IT initiatives, including server consolidation, thin-client computing and bandwidth optimization. Having initially deployed Expand as part of a bandwidth consolidation project, the $200,000 investment paid for itself in just over 6 months. Ridley is now investing a further $180,000 in new Expand technology in order to meet renewed bandwidth requirements needed to support ongoing business growth and strategic IT initiatives, and is set to recoup year on year savings of $250,000 from the deployment.

Ridley Inc. manufactures and markets animal nutrition and health products and is a publicly traded company on the Toronto Stock Exchange. Based on a business ethos of ‘continuous improvement’, it operates from 42 locations across North America employing over 1200 staff. With most locations being extremely harsh and dusty environments, such as feed mills, Ridley embarked on a thin-computing strategy, removing servers and computers from remote locations and delivering server based computing from its central location in Mankato, Minnesota.

Chad Gillick, IT Manager, Ridley Inc. explains, “We recognize the importance of IT in enabling the business to streamline its processes, gain greater efficiencies, increase productivity and reduce costs. Expand’s WAN optimization technology has been a critical enabler in helping us deploy strategic IT initiatives such as server based computing and virtual desktop infrastructure.”

By deploying the Expand solution Gillick has been able to remove expensive desktop and laptop computers at the remote sites and replace with thin client terminals, without the need for costly bandwidth upgrades.

Having looked at competitive offerings from Riverbed and Cisco, Gillick chose Expand because of its superior capabilities in accelerating Citrix and web based traffic. Furthermore, due to the fact that Ridley utilizes a managed WAN service from AT&T, Expand’s WAFS capabilities with QoS, enabled Gillick to tailor traffic flows and dynamically manage bandwidth requirements ‘on the fly’.

Gillick continues, “Not only did we recoup our initial $200,000 investment in just over 6 months based purely on efficiency and productivity savings, we’re also gaining significant financial and operational benefits in other areas. For instance, without the Expand solution we would have needed a 45mbps connection at the central site that would have cost in the region of $26,000 per month. With Expand we were able to reduce this to a 9mbps link costing $4,500, an annual saving of over $250,000. On top of this, it’s enabling of server consolidation and thin client computing, we have managed to reduce our technical refresh costs which were running at $400,000 annually down to $220,000. We believe we will be reaping the benefits of the Expand solution for many years to come.”

Adam Davison, corporate VP sales and marketing, Expand Networks, comments, “We continue to see tremendous traction in the market place for our technology. It’s especially rewarding when an organization such as Ridley Inc., that clearly places a huge emphasis on its IT infrastructure to deliver business agility and competitive advantage, chooses Expand’s solution over competitive offerings. This is further validation of Expand’s technology and demonstrated why WAN optimization is becoming a catalyst and enabler for many of today’s strategic IT initiatives.”

More information on Ridley’s WAN optimization project can be found at: http://www.expand.com/ridleyinc