Law firm takes to the private cloud – plans mobile cloud next

15 Jun 2011

Legal firm Dillon Solicitors has deployed a new cloud infrastructure to facilitate its move to a paperless office to be more innovative and offset future events, such as transport disruption for staff caused by bad weather.

Dillon Solicitors has expanded over the years and employs 25 people at new offices in Nutgrove Office Park in Dublin.

The firm has implemented an IT cloud infrastructure solution to facilitate a move to a paperless office.

“We wanted to encourage our staff to use a fully electronic work solution as their filing cabinets instead of paper documents,” explained Jane O’Brien, office manager at Dillon Solicitors.

“We also wanted to offer our staff remote access due to the bad weather over the last couple of winters.

“Finally, we needed the most future-proofed cloud infrastructure to support our plans,” O’Brien said.

An office in the cloud

Trilogy Technologies implemented a fully redundant virtual private cloud infrastructure based on Microsoft Small Business Server 2011 and VMware platform.

The company also improved Dillon Solicitors’ remote access functionality by leveraging the remote workplace functionality that comes with Microsoft Small Business Server. Trilogy Technologies worked with Opsis to scope out the infrastructure and platform to support Dillon Solicitors’ electronic work solution.

“The new solution has dramatically improved our ability to efficiently handle client documents and eliminate the need for paper files,” O’Brien said.

“We now have the ability to easily locate critical items, as well as create a streamlined environment for the daily workflows. 

“The solution allows Dillon’s employees work remotely from home due to the flexibility and scalability of the solution.

“The private cloud solution allows us to manage our own applications and infrastructure,” O’Brien said.

“With this solution, we do not see any limitations, only potential.”

The next phase for Dillon Solicitors is to investigate the mobile aspects of the cloud for court, which will do away with solicitors carrying files.

Photo: Siobhan Griffin, account manager, Trilogy Technologies; Brendan Dillon, managing director and Jane O’Brien, office manager, Dillon Solicitors

John Kennedy is a journalist who served as editor of Silicon Republic for 17 years

editorial@siliconrepublic.com