DMS selects Pixit Media’s PixStor storage to support expansion

Leading end-to-end digital media agency, DMS has enhanced its technical production facilities with a substantial investment in Pixit Media’s software-defined scale-out storage solution, PixStor. The new central storage system will support DMS’ recent expansion, as it relocated to a new, purpose-built headquarters in London Bridge.

DMS’ new 8000sq. ft site is double the size of its previous headquarters, helping to meet clients increasing demand for high quality content and delivery with a new voiceover booth, multipurpose studio and editing suites. The major investment – including in its technical production facilities – means that DMS is now better equipped to create, manage, localise, distribute and place content, and evaluate its media reach.

DMS turned to specialist reseller, Escape Technology to consult upon and deliver a flexible storage solution that could support this expansion and its growing list of global media and entertainment, sports and lifestyle clients. The DMS technical team chose PixStor as a cost-effective solution that could support its team of 33 Mac edit clients working with a 10GbE infrastructure.

“We chose a PixStor solution because of its flexible nature which means that it can grow alongside our business, allowing us to adapt our production workflows whenever we need to – all whilst keeping a consistent performance,” said Neil Bottrill, digital operations director, DMS.

Simon Briggs, managing director at DMS added: “We have got to the stage of the evolution of DMS where some of our legacy infrastructure was struggling to keep up with the demands being placed on it. We deal with large volume, quick-turnaround promotional assets for film studios, sports organisations and brands, and as our global reach has extended so dramatically in the past 18 months, we needed a storage solution that would not only service this client base and this growth but also deliver long-term scalability. In Pixstor we feel we have found a solution that complements our business both for now and as part of our future strategy.”

The PixStor has 115TB of useable storage capacity and 1.1GB/s of aggregate storage performance for the editors on site, which is guaranteed for the life of the system. Accompanying the primary solution, DMS’ investment includes a second PixStor system installed for disaster recovery, with production data live-synced to the site of the second PixStor on a daily basis.

Andrew Condie, chief operations manager at Pixit Media commented: “Right from the early days of this project it was clear that timescales were tight, and that installing a new central storage infrastructure whilst relocating offices, preserving existing data and providing a seamless transition for the clients, would be a tremendous challenge. As it turned out, no one should have been worried, between our technical installation team and the dedicated guys at DMS, we have been able to deliver a solid platform that meets and exceeds expectation, and also provides an infrastructure that will support aggressive expansion for DMS. We look forward to supporting them in their continued success.”

DMS’ growth follows a number of major projects – the agency recently provided the creative, filming, editing and delivery as the on-the-ground EMEA video content team for the NBA Global Game in London.