Southland Industries Recognized by CIO as One of the CIO 100 Award Winners

IDG's CIO today announces Southland Industries as a recipient of the 2018 CIO 100. The 31th annual award program recognizes organizations around the world that exemplify the highest level of operational and strategic excellence in information technology (IT).

"Every year, we are honored to showcase the technology innovation and business value delivered by our CIO 100 award winners. Each of these companies has achieved notable success in accelerating businesses to the front lines of the digital revolution," said Maryfran Johnson, Executive Director of CIO Programs for CIO Events and the CIO Executive Council. "This year's winners are inspiring examples of how IT leadership, business partnerships and customer engagement can reshape the future."

Southland Industries implemented graphics-processing-unit-enhanced virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) to support resource-intensive 3-D and computer-aided design (CAD) applications for designers in field offices. To provide the performance required to transfer and process large graphical data files, a centralized architecture was designed that minimizes latency by having two dispersed data locations to support all geographies across the country.

"Although VDI has been utilized for many years, the feasibility of using it for graphical intensive workloads has not been possible," said Israel Sumano, Southland Industries' Senior Director, Infrastructure. "After many years of testing various solutions, we now feel comfortable moving our users to a centralized model using VDI as their only design platform."

"I am extremely proud of our IT organization working with our business partners to deliver this transformational and critical business capability," said Linda Smart, Southland Industries' Chief Information Officer. "VDI technology is now integrated into our organization to further enhance collaboration across our offices and job sites."

Executives from the winning companies will be recognized at The CIO 100 Symposium & Awards Ceremony, to be held Wednesday evening, August 15th, at the Terranea Resort in Rancho Palos Verdes.

About the CIO 100

Recipients of this year's CIO 100 Award were selected through a three-step process. First, companies filled out an online application form detailing their innovative IT and business initiatives. Next, a team of external judges (many of them former CIOs) reviewed the applications in depth, looking for leading-edge IT practices and measurable results. Finally, CIO editors reviewed the judges' evaluations and selected the final 100.

About CIO

CIO from IDG is the premier content and community resource for information technology executives and leaders thriving and prospering in this fast-paced era of IT transformation in the enterprise. The award-winning CIO portfolio--CIO.com, CIO executive programs, CIO Strategic Marketing Services, CIO Forum on LinkedIn, CIO Executive Council and CIO primary research — provides business technology leaders with analysis and insight on information technology trends and a keen understanding of IT's role in achieving business goals. Additionally, CIO provides opportunities for IT solution providers to reach this executive IT audience. The CIO Executive Council is a professional organization of CIOs created to serve as an unbiased and trusted peer advisory group. CIO is published by IDG Enterprise, a subsidiary of IDG. Company information is available at http://www.idgenterprise.com/.