Dave Crandall Portfolio

Lycos Asset Portal

We developed the Asset Portal as a means to track equipment and leasing costs. As Lycos grew we opened data centers on both coasts and in Virginia. Equipment was beginning to come off of leases in 1999 and we didn't want to incur fees for unnecessary machines.

The Asset Portal became the interface for all of our equipment tracking. After new equipment was ordered the purchasing manager entered the PO information as well as leasing information before the equipment arrived. Data center managers added to this information by including the row and rack specifics for each machine once it was brought into the cage.

Once we collected all of the data in each data center location, it was imported into the database. The system was then used by Sr. Management to track the bottom line on leasing costs. It was also used by NOC personal to locate machines that were having problems if they needed to be hard restarted. The Asset Portal was also integrated with Tangram software to correlate and collect the asset inventory of individual desktops in each office location. Together with Tangram, the Asset Portal saved tens of thousands of dollars each month.