Standarising Network Security

The organisation's network infrastructure had evolved over a number of years, accumulating a range of different vendors across different sites. The result was an estate without a standard support model by site, and without centralised reporting for service issues or performance. For an agile business operating across multiple locations, this disparity made every site a slightly different problem to manage, and made it impossible to get a single, reliable view of the network as a whole.

The lack of standardisation also meant there was no established template for smoothly onboarding new locations. Each new office was, in effect, a new design exercise, slowing the pace at which the business could open and expand sites, and introducing the risk of inconsistent security and performance standards from the moment a location went live.

The organisation sought a partner to centralise infrastructure management, enhance visibility, and provide a uniform deployment template for every location — closing down the operational friction of running a fragmented multi-vendor estate and giving the business a foundation it could scale on with confidence.

Formation Tech designed and deployed a single-vendor Fortinet solution across the organisation's network and security estate, bringing every site onto a common platform managed through a single pane of glass.

• FortiGate | Consolidation: A single stack solution encompassing Next Generation Firewall with real-time threat and application awareness, network switch and wireless access points, allowing for simple management and an extended security fabric across the entire site.

• FortiManager | Management: Automation-driven single pane management providing full network visibility, with role-based access for controlled change and audit across the estate.

• FortiAnalyser | Alerting and Reporting: A cloud-based platform to manage, automate, orchestrate and respond, providing complete visibility of the attack landscape, hosting patching, and alert handling configuration to enable close management and proactive response.

Delivered as part of an ongoing managed service, Formation Tech handle the day-to-day configuration, management and reporting across the platform, operating with dual access alongside the customer's own team so that the visibility into the environment is genuinely shared rather than locked behind the service provider.

The organisation now operates with a high-performing network and a secure approach to its infrastructure across all locations. Every site can be migrated onto the same standard platform, with a single-vendor approach to firewall, network and Wi-Fi access, and the configuration and management of that platform is now carried out centrally through a single application. Security policies are also standardised and applied consistently across every point of access, from the wireless to the wired network.

The standardised approach to deploying new locations saves vast amounts of time. The customer now operates with a simple playbook by which it can add and expand offices at pace, with full visibility and dual access for both the customer and Formation Tech as the managed service provider. For an agile, multi-site recruitment business, that combination, speed of expansion, consistency of standard, and shared visibility, is what makes the network and security foundation genuinely fit for purpose.

This case study underlines the common challenges faced by multi-site organisations that employ different vendors across their estates. By adopting a uniform approach and partnering with Formation Tech for the ongoing managed service, the organisation has significantly improved the performance and security of its network, testimony to Formation Tech's commitment to providing tailored solutions to complex, multi-site challenges.