Hamid Afzal, Senior Technical Services Consultant

Hamid Afzal

Senior Technical Services Consultant

International Turnkey Systems

Location
Kuwait - Al Farawaniyah
Education
Master's degree, Computer Sciences
Experience
18 years, 4 Months

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Work Experience

Total years of experience :18 years, 4 Months

Senior Technical Services Consultant at International Turnkey Systems
  • Kuwait - Al Kuwait
  • My current job since April 2015
Infrastructure / Cloud Consultant at Panorama Consulting and Business Solutions
  • Kuwait - Al Kuwait
  • October 2013 to March 2015

•Prepare client proposals related to VMware Cloud and infrastructure virtualization, Data center offerings and provide supporting documents.

•Lead internal cloud related R&D initiatives related to service modeling and new offerings in different verticals/markets.

•Develop migration plans and recommend DR solution for the Customers.

•Perform engagement scoping / RA and recommend appropriate solution.

•Asses' clients' server/network/storage infrastructure and IT management processes.

Senior Systems Specialist at Alghanim Industries
  • Kuwait
  • August 2010 to October 2013

Key Responsibilities & Achievements:

Infrastructure:


•Design and implement system requirements for Alghanim Businesses and analyze existing systems. Build and manage implementation plans for projects.

•Planning and implementing upgrades \ migration for the IT infrastructure. Evaluating and studying new product features, implementing seamless provisioning into existing IT infrastructure.

•Responsible for analyzing and implementing new technologies and solutions.

•Responsible for system configuration, installation of operating system and software, Responsible for complete support, upgrades, installation and maintenance of all hardware, software and networking applications, Troubleshooting of different H/W, S/W, OS and Network.


Data Center Virtualization - VMware Design / Implementation:


•Planning / Designing virtualization of 4 SAP (Industrial, Retail, GTRC and Engineering) landscapes . Responsible for maintaining Virtual infrastructure for all the SAP systems.

•Architect virtualization infrastructure to support 250+ virtual machines in a dual datacenter environment including network, storage, and cluster topology.

•Planning / Designing the Virtual infrastructure for Microsoft Exchange server 2010 to support over 6000 Mailboxes.

•Responsible for VMware design, EMC VNX 5700 storage design for VMware, Implementing and configuring VMware cluster, DRS, VMware capacityIQ, VMware vCenter Operations advanced and Chargeback.

•Consolidation of underutilized physical servers to VMWare ESX virtual platform (physical to virtual) and making the hardware available for other physical hardware dependent projects.

•Scoping, planning for the P2V, Physical to Virtual conversion of over 150 Physical server's including Windows 2003, 2008, SLES to Virtual world using VMware converter and Symantec System recovery tool. Plan and execute virtualization of legacy systems.

•Maintaining the Virtual infrastructure in Head Office and secondary site, provide advanced troubleshooting and problem resolution of entire virtual infrastructure.


EMC Storage Design / Implementation:


•Responsible for performing daily operational tasks like Storage provisioning (FC/NFS/CIFS), allocations, zoning mapping and maintaining availability .Managing Brocade SAN Switches DS5100 and DS300.

•Designing and Architecting the solution according to the Business needs, Performing tasks such as designing and creating Pools/Raid groups for the virtual environment.

•Execution of Business continuance and disaster recovery plans, participating in the design and operational execution of storage disaster recovery process.

•Managing EMC CLARION and VNX FC SAN \ NAS infrastructure with the existing servers by evaluating compatibility options for Dell, HP, IBM and Sun enterprise servers.

•Managing EMC VNX, CX4-480 and CX4-120 storages with Mirrorview /s and snap sure replication to the secondary site.

•Planning and implementing DR for the Business critical applications (Retail, Kerridge, Industrial), Failing over and failing back of applications.

HP Blade Infrastructure / Virtual Connect Flex Fabric:


•Deploying and managing HP Blade servers BL460 G1, BL460 G7 & G8, BL680 G7 on a HP C7000 Blade enclosure. Remotely managing the Blade infrastructure using Integrated Lights out management console.

•Designing / Deploying Virtual Connect Flexfabric for the Virtual Environment, Stacking 2 Blade enclosure for High availability .

•Implementing VMware virtual distributed switch with Flex Fabric and configuring server profiles.

Other tasks included managing Suse Linux enterprise servers for SAP databases, Managing virtual environment backup using Symantec Netbackup 7 .

Network Engineer / Systems Engineer at AFiTco
  • Other
  • January 2006 to July 2010

Key Responsibilities & Achievements:

•Installing and Administering Novell Netware, Microsoft Windows, Suse Linux operating systems.

•Installing and configuring Active Directory and eDirectory on Windows, Novell & Linux platforms. Installing & configuring Identity Manager 3 for user synchronization between Active Directory & eDirectory.

•Novell with clustered products like Zenworks for Desktops, Zenworks Configuration Management 10, GroupWise etc. working on GroupWise messaging and collaboration platform which includes installing & configuring GroupWise 6.5 & 7.0 and the client. Creating and managing new users accounts and email.

•System testing, Software product testing and support, IT infrastructure support, management and implementation.

•Implementing SUSE Linux Enterprise 9.0, 9.1 & 10.0 servers, SUSE Linux Desktop and Novell Linux Desktop. Administration of OES Linux with Novell Products.

•Blackberry Enterprise Server installation, GroupWise Intellisync Mobile Server Integration with Novell GroupWise 8.

•Managing Internal Firewall and Email Security system.

•Planning and implementing upgrades \ migration for the IT infrastructure. Evaluating and studying new product features, implementing seamless provisioning into existing IT infrastructure.

During the time in Al-Faris I provided Special engagement and completed Infrastructure Projects for :

Ministry Of Awqaf
Kuwait University
Ministry of Planning
Kuwait International Bank

Education

Master's degree, Computer Sciences
  • at PIMSAT
  • September 2014
Bachelor's degree, Computer Science
  • at Punjab University
  • June 2004

Bayt Tests

English for Business Skills Test
Score 68%

Specialties & Skills

Data Center Architecture
Storage Architecture
Virtualization Technology
VMware Infrastructure
Cloud Computing
EMC Storage
VMware Technologies
HP Virtual Connect FlexFabric
HP Enclosure/Blade Servers

Languages

English
Expert
Arabic
Beginner
Urdu
Expert

Training and Certifications

VMware Certified Professional- (VCP4-DCV) (Certificate)
Date Attended:
May 2011
EMCCA (Cloud Architect) (Certificate)
Date Attended:
October 2012
EMCSA (Storage Administrator) (Certificate)
Date Attended:
February 2011
ITIL V3 Foundation (Certificate)
Date Attended:
July 2010
Certified Novell Administrator (CNA) (Certificate)
Date Attended:
September 2006
Comptia Network+ (Certificate)
Date Attended:
June 2000
EMCIE ( Implementation Engineer) (Certificate)
Date Attended:
September 2012
Novell Certified Linux Administrator (NCLA) (Certificate)
Date Attended:
February 2010
Brocade Certified Ethernet Fabric Professional – (BCEFP) (Certificate)
Date Attended:
March 2014
Brocade Certified Network Engineer – (BCNE) (Certificate)
Date Attended:
May 2014
EMCISA (Information Storage Associate) (Certificate)
Date Attended:
February 2011
VMware Certified Professional – (VCP5-DCV) (Certificate)
Date Attended:
August 2013
Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist (Certificate)
Date Attended:
May 2010
MCSE+Internet (Certificate)
Date Attended:
August 1999
Certified Novell Engineer (CNE) (Certificate)
Date Attended:
November 2006