The American Red Cross Relieves VDI Printing Pains with UniPrint Infinity

TORONTO–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Ahead of their appearance at the VMworld US trade show in Las Vegas, Print Virtualization software provider UniPrint.net Corp announced today the release of their latest case study: The American Red Cross (ARC). With a national network of more than 300 chapters, The American Red Cross is one of the world’s premier charitable organizations made up of workers and volunteers providing humanitarian relief both in the United States and abroad.

The Challenge

The ARC’s IT infrastructure includes more than 20,000 employees and 300,000 volunteers in offices, remote locations, connecting from home, or in the field in disaster zones. In 2015, their End Use Technologies Solutions (EUTS) team began their search for a virtual workspace solution that would give their users access to applications, data, and resources from any location. Immediately, printing was identified as an issue, both due to driver incompatibility being common in VDI environments, and due to the tediousness of Group Policies for printer mapping with so many remote locations and devices.

They were also looking to eliminate hardware and consolidate remote site resources back to the data center, which posed potential bandwidth issues. Additionally, the EUTS team intended on instituting a BYOD (bring-your-own-device) model which would also require a stable print management solution.

The Solution

With their implementation of UniPrint Infinity™ The ARC was able to solve all of their printing challenges with one streamlined solution. The patented PDF-based Universal Printer Driver (UPD) solved the issue of printer driver incompatibility and eliminated the need for repeated and frequent vendor driver updates. Printer mapping issues were also solved with the PrintPAL utility, which allows administrators to implement broad printing policies with only a few clicks.

There was also the added benefit of reduced call volume to The ARC’s third-party service desk. Adam Flowers, Lead Solutions Architect, remarked:

“There was a reduction in helpdesk calls for printing related issues as we made improvements to our environment with UniPrint […] UniPrint saved us lots of time and headaches, and it really made our techs available to deal with higher priority issues.”

Other benefits included the flexibility of BYOD printing, as well as a reduction in bandwidth usage (and therefore a reduction in cost). UniPrint Infinity has not only helped The American Red Cross funnel more resources back into the community, but also helped staff spend less time on printing and more time focusing on making the world a better place.

“The UniPrint Infinity™ suite allows us to adapt to whatever situation our people may be in,” said Flowers. “There’s nothing we’ve been asked to do that UniPrint can’t handle.”

Key Benefits

• Universal Printer Driver (UPD) solves incompatibility issues and reduces helpdesk calls
• PrintPAL technology eliminates the need for mapping through Group Policies
• Reduces overhead cost through printer server consolidation
• High Availability (HA) module provides enterprise wide redundancy and fault tolerance
• Resolves bandwidth issues using PDF compression to compress and encrypt print jobs
• Provides local and remote users with seamless, stable, and secure printing from any device to the nearest available printer

To learn more, check out our video interview with Adam Flowers on how UniPrint Infinity transformed American Red Cross’ IT workflow, and don’t forget to stop by Booth 1724 at VMworld US in Las Vegas Aug. 27-31 to meet the UniPrint team!