SKY Perfect JSAT Corporation programs PRTG

SKY Perfect JSAT Corporation programs PRTG to increase customer satisfaction and availability

SKY Perfect JSAT installed PRTG for the monitoring of traffic within its satellite communication services (including WAN/LAN equipment). Prior to PRTG, the organization was using a system which was developed using RRD tool. However, PRTG has replaced pre-existing systems to become JSAT’s main monitoring tool.

The challenge

Satellite links are not only used for TV broadcasting and are critical components to society as a whole, as they are used in enterprise conference systems, special communication lines to depopulated areas and as emergency lines during and after natural disasters, in fact. With this reason, ensuring uptime is so critical, as it has an impact on the entire community. Satellite links were used as a cellular backhaul in Great East Japan following the earthquake and Tsunami in 2011, highlighting how the impact of satellite extends far beyond television. 

Availability is a critical component of delivering high customer satisfaction to JSAT’s users. This is true in the communications and broadcast business and applies both to television and the internet, with viewers able to consume their favorite shows, on the move, via their mobiles. The pressure is on for broadcasters far and wide to deliver stable operations to consumers, regardless of their consumption preferences. 

Under the direction of Naohiro Someya, Technical Operations Team at JSAT sought to understand the impact of the digital divide on operations, whilst also putting best practice measures in place to monitor traffic for disaster recovery – to ensure the network is always available. For some services, the bandwidth is shared and distributed to users. Given the usage and time of day differs between people, visualizing traffic and bandwidth is important to ensure the distribution level and a stable service is delivered to all. In cases of natural disaster and when emergency lines are required, it’s important to be able to react quickly – being able to monitor the system to ensure that it is ready to go when called upon gives the company great confidence.

The solution

Someya explained: “We need to understand bandwidth operations so that we are best placed to design system enhancements. With PRTG, we are able to visualize traffic volume across our channels, which helps us to provision the right systems to maintain high customer satisfaction and stable operation.” 

As such, Someya and his team are using PRTG to monitor user traffic volume, and traffic volume at each server – to understand consumption when multiple users are sharing communication bandwidth. Someya noted: “PRTG is remarkable. It’s been easy to use, install and set up.”

The benefits

JSAT’s specialist satellite communication operations team is enjoying the simplicity provided by PRTG. Firstly, one server is monitoring multiple devices across several areas of the business – relieving the burden on staff. In addition, the team is able to bring together all the data from across the business via the visual graphics, and insights presented within the PRTG dashboards – simplifying the otherwise segmented business operations. 

Someya, added: “PRTG is excellent in terms of its usability compared with other applications. Put simply, it hasn’t had any problems, ever. There are other hard-to-use monitoring systems, that require multiple steps just to see the CPU load on the server and operational response is relatively slow. I would highly advise other companies, regardless of your industry, to take-up monitoring with PRTG and see the benefits of the system, including its visualizations, on your business.”