Enabling IT Resource Self-Service: From VDI to Smart Factories and Executive Centers

As an innovative enterprise in semiconductor display and IoT, BOE operates large-scale smart factories with rigorous requirements for IT infrastructure stability and performance. However, traditional three-tier architectures—characterized by long resource delivery cycles and high O&M complexity—have hindered future scalability. Concurrently, BOE's extensive use of virtual desktops led to slow response times during high-concurrency storage access. Conversely, adopting high-performance storage products presented challenges such as prohibitive costs and limited scalability.

To address these challenges, BOE implemented SmartX ECP, leveraging its advantages in rapid deployment, linear scalability, and unified O&M. The enterprise initially deployed a small-scale hyper-converged cluster (SMTX OS + ESXi + XenDesktop) as a VDI resource pool. Following successful implementation, the system underwent multiple expansions to over 20 nodes, ultimately supporting more than 1,000 virtual desktops.

As usage expanded, BOE extended SmartX ECP from virtual desktop scenarios to CTO and CIO centers, covering diverse workloads such as internal enterprise applications, R&D testing, IoT development, and video conferencing. The solution has been deployed across multiple data centers, providing unified resource support across different regions.

The platform achieves layered management and flexible scheduling of business and R&D environments through clustered hosting. Maintaining existing ESXi operational habits, IT personnel can perform daily management via the SMTX OS web interface, reducing learning costs and O&M complexity. Simultaneously, by integrating with the CMP, resource management has been upgraded to a "self-service application + internal billing" model. This allows R&D teams to request resources on demand and complete delivery for development and testing rapidly. This evolution drives more orderly resource utilization and efficient management, further enhancing business support and collaborative efficiency.

BOE has leveraged SmartX ECP to expand from VDI to diverse scenarios—including enterprise applications, R&D testing, and IoT—across its headquarters and multiple regional offices:

• Enhanced Performance: Eliminated lag during peak VDI usage, with boot times reduced from 5 minutes to 60 seconds, significantly improving the R&D user experience.
• Resource Self-Service: Established a self-service model via the SMTX OS and CMP platform. R&D teams can now request and deliver development and testing environments within minutes, streamlining resource management and resolving previously disordered resource utilization.
• Simplified O&M: Unified management of storage and compute resources through a single interface. IT personnel can focus on VM creation and delivery while utilizing advanced monitoring for trend analysis and forecasting. This architecture supports seamless scale-out and online upgrades while eliminating the need to manage multiple Datastores or migrate VMs across storage pools, enabling intelligent operations.
• Scalable Deployment: Following multiple expansions, the system now supports virtual desktops, IoT, enterprise applications, and R&D scenarios across the headquarters and various branches. The simplified architecture and intuitive management have significantly reduced IT O&M costs for both R&D centers and regional factories.