The care service
A home care service with around 80 care staff. Administration works from the head office, and there are ten permanently established home office workplaces.
The starting position
The ten home office workplaces were connected using VPN client software. Each workplace therefore established the connection itself, over the private internet line of the member of staff concerned, using software that has to run on the end device and be maintained there. A small firewall was installed at the head office.
Connectivity therefore depended on two things that nobody in the organisation controls: a private line and a private end device.
The trigger
Connections dropped repeatedly. Transfers broke off mid-process, and inconsistencies appeared in the data. That is a serious matter when care documentation and billing depend on it and several people access the same data set.
For those affected, it meant duplicated work and uncertainty about which version was current. For the management, it was a situation that would have become worse with every additional home office workplace.
The solution
Each of the ten home office workplaces now has an AIMroute. The device establishes an encrypted connection to the AIMdefense at the head office and keeps it up.
The decisive difference lies in where the connection is established. No longer on the end device through client software, but permanently in the device at the site. The home office workplace therefore behaves like a branch of the company network. The connection stays up regardless of what is happening on the PC at the time, or of whether someone has logged in correctly.
On top of this comes redundancy at line level. Every site is connected via DSL and additionally via LTE. If one path fails, the other takes over. The switchover happens inside the device, not at the workplace.
Implementation
The changeover of all ten sites was completed within six weeks. For the care service it was cost-neutral. The systems are supplied Assembled in Germany.
The result
The dropped connections are a thing of the past. Transfers run through to completion, the data set stays consistent, and performance at the home office workplaces has noticeably improved.
The redundant connection via DSL and LTE absorbs faults on an individual line with no need for anyone to intervene. In day-to-day care work this matters, because documentation cannot wait for an engineer.
For administration this means above all that a home office workplace is no longer a special case. It is a site like any other. One more workplace means one more device, not one more software installation on somebody else's PC.
The care service administers its environment itself. A support contract for AIMdefense stands behind it should it be needed.
"A cost-neutral changeover with real added value. We are very satisfied with the migration and with how straightforward the process was."
— Managing director and owner
Key facts
| Sector | Home care |
|---|---|
| Size | around 80 care staff, 10 home office workplaces |
| AIM products | one AIMroute per home office, AIMdefense on AIMSTRONG at the head office |
| Previous system | VPN client software on the end device, small firewall at the head office |
| Trigger | repeated connection drops, data inconsistencies |
| Architecture | encrypted site-to-site links, redundant via DSL and LTE |
| Sites | 10 home office sites plus head office |
| Support | self-managed with a support contract |
| Project duration | 6 weeks |
More about AIMroute
For the devices available for site-to-site links, mobile fallback paths and industrial environments, please see the Products page.