Veritech Corporation is passionate about sagaciously eating one’s own dogfood as a means of providing customer support and solutions and enhancing product offerings, and has been using the Endian Unified threat management (UTM) system in their work environment longer than they have been the Australasian distributors for the product.
Veritech has been using the Endian UTM system on a daily basis for over two years after using the product initially as a customer. They sourced the all inclusive security device which uses open source technology to provide a solution in their own work environment, and after testing it successfully decided it was a product that their customers could benefit from.
‘After commencing our use of the Endian software during UTM trials it was decided that this device which was good enough for us, would be good enough for our customer base. We continue to use the software on a daily basis and as a result are in a position to offer our customers first hand support and service’ commented Senior Network Engineer at Veritech, Gavin Battistel.
Veritech use the Endian software appliance on a dedicated rack mounted HP server in their office. The software edition turns any PC or server into a UTM appliance and offers the same technology that resides in the UTM hardware appliance. At present Veritech use the firewalling, antispam, intrusion detection, DMZ and Virtual Private Network (VPN) functions of the Endian. They do not use content filtering due to the nature of their business, it is not important to them, and they have plans to use the hotspot feature in the future for visiting contractors, and also to quickly connect up visitors to their office.
In addition to using these many features on a daily basis they have other test systems in place for customer testing and support. There are two dedicated hardware units in place, plus two virtual machine environments where they host virtual machines of each version of the Endian systems, which allows them to quickly test and simulate customer environments.
Through the many years of eating their dogfood Veritech Engineer Gavin Battistel believes that it is the customer who is benefiting, not only through heightened customer service and support but also through enhanced product offerings.
‘The team here at Veritech use the Endian day in day out which has provided them with a confidence in the product; there is no guess work when they are providing customer support and they are able to identify and develop better solutions for customer which results in an enhanced product offering’ commented Mr Battisel.
By way of example here is a case of how eating one’s own dogfood has allowed Veritech to develop better solutions for customers, and also contribute to new features which enhance the product offering for the whole customer base.
The Endian UTM devices support the DMZ concept and the Endian concept of a DMZ is a network which has private (hidden) IP addresses. This "private" DMZ is physically connected to the Endian and the Endian protects the DMZ through its firewalling and Intrusion Detection functions. A single public IP is needed on the Internet side (red zone), which uses NAT to hide the private DMZ zone. This is a very common method of connection for small businesses. However, the Endian has a separate DMZ zone which maximises the use of the Endian firewall features.
At Veritech the network structure is somewhat different to the scenario above. Their DMZ has its own set of "public" IP addresses, which are used for Internet services such as DNS, mail and backup. This did not align with the Endian implementation of DMZ zones and Veritech found that in order to use their DMZ with the Endian, they needed to keep the DMZ outside of the Endian which meant that the Endian was not offering any protection to the DMZ.
Staff at Veritech investigated this and worked out a solution where they could use VLANs in the Endian to define the DMZ. In their search for answers they raised the issue with Endian Italy, who responded by adding a new feature in the new release (version 2.3) called "Incoming Routed Traffic" which met Veritech’s needs perfectly. Version 2.3 of the Endian was released in October 2009 and Veritech were able to implement their DMZ structure right away, as well as provide this new enhanced product offering to their customers.
According to another Veritech Engineer, Michael Sartor, eating one’s own dogfood has resulted in benefits for all stakeholders at Veritech.
‘The result of us using these products internally is an improved product for Endian, an ideal solution for Veritech and a new feature for users, a win for all stakeholders’ commented Mr Sartor.
Veritech CEO Livio Mazzon notes that it is important that businesses are careful in this practice to not become complacent or narrow minded.
‘I am aware that there is a risk of businesses becoming narrow minded and losing their creativity when they are eating their own dogfood, and ensure I balance this by keeping up to date and aware of what else is out there and what is happening in the marketplace. My staff and I undertake regular competitive analysis and always ask our customers about our competitors and their products. Our products are interoperable which also allows us to balance this risk’ commented Mr Mazzon.
For details on Veritech Corporation visit www.veritechcorp.com.au
For details on Endian UTM appliances visit www.endian.com
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