Infoblox Takes a Complex Environment and Makes it Simple for TiVo

THE CUSTOMER – TIVO

Founded in 1997, TiVo developed the first commercially available digital video recorder(DVR).

TiVo offers the TiVo service and TiVo DVRs directly to consumers online and through third-party retailers. TiVo also distributes its technology and services through solutions tailored for cable, satellite, and broadcasting companies.

Since its founding, TiVo has evolved into the ultimate single solution media center by combining its patented DVR technologies and universal cable box capabilities with the ability to aggregate, search, and deliver millions of pieces of broadband, cable, and broadcast content directly to the television, an economical, one-stop shop for in-home entertainment.

As of October 2009, TiVo has 2.76 million subscribers in the U.S. and offers service in multiple countries around the world.

THE CHALLENGE

Finding a DNS Needle in a Haystack
For more than 10 years, TiVo used a variety of open source products to manage its DDI. The use of these products did not provide visibility into the network and created needless hours of work managing the functions. TiVo’s IT department began looking for a solution to manage their critical DDI network management functions; thereby, allowing them to focus on other aspects of the business.

“Time was not on our side when it came to managing our DDI infrastructure,” says Richard Rothschild, Senior Director of IT Security and Facilities. “Whenever there was a problem with DNS or one of our other core network functions, it was like looking for a needle in a haystack. As a relatively small IT team, we were spending too many hours troubleshooting. After a while, our little bits of irritation became larger and more frustrating and we decided to overhaul our systems.”

Like most organizations, TiVo also manually handled network configuration, change, and compliance requirements. To save time and reduce manual, task-related errors, TiVo was in search of a solution that also included: network change automation and proactive change and configuration management.

THE SOLUTION

Commercial-Grade Core Network Services
TiVo first made the decision to move to NIOS DDI to address its DNS, DHCP, and IPAM needs. The electronics company was primarily concerned with securing, simplifying, and automating the administration of DNS, DHCP, and IPAM. “Managing our core network services used to require endless hours of labor from the IT department,” says Rothschild. “Our DNS would be incorrect on one server and it would take hours and hours to troubleshoot. Infoblox made it easer for us to manage and determine where the issues were. We looked briefly at other vendors, but once we saw the feature set, we knew. We did not need a big bake off with other vendors. This was the solution for us.”

In early 2010, TiVo purchased six Infoblox appliances with Infoblox’s unique Grid technology and network services suite for DNS, DHCP, and IPAM.

Next, with its network rapidly growing and with little to no visibility or automation, TiVo found an answer in NetMRI is a network management product focused on network change and configuration management (NCCM). It enables organizations to automate network change, see the impact of changes on network health, manage network configurations, and meet a variety of compliance requirements.

THE RESULT

Countless Hours Saved Chasing Problems
Using NIOS DDI and NetMRI simplified and streamlined functions for TiVo. NetMRI helped automate a greater share of manual, network-related tasks and procedures, reducing operating expenses. Similarly, NIOS DDI helped with both internal and external DNS and to run services with partners, including Netflix and Comcast, the foundation of TiVo’s business.

Infoblox solutions automated a majority of TiVo’s manual, repetitive processes, such as making device changes, managing IP addresses, or chasing problems with DNS and DHCP services, saving IT staff countless hours of time and effort. “Not having automated, commercial solutions for core infrastructure services can lead to confusion, errors, and lots of administrative overhead,” continues Rothschild. “We love having a system that tells us what we need to pay attention to. Infoblox takes a complex environment and simplifies. It’s like having a personal assistant. We have 100,000 things to pay attention to, but now we are armed with better information automatically collected and analyzed, allowing us to sleep at night and make quick decisions and adjustments when necessary. It’s not often that we come across something this great.”