Belt Railway Company of Chicago is the largest intermediate switching terminal railroad in the United States. They employ over 500 people and operate over 300 miles of switching tracks, allowing them to interchange with every railroad serving the Chicago area. Belt Railway's clearing yards span over 5 miles and 786 acres and they dispatch over 8,400 rail cars every day.

Belt Railway wanted to upgrade their current HP and home grown servers. They needed greater reliability and an effective pathway for future growth. The current servers were not reliable and would go down almost daily resulting in additional management frustration and cost. 

Ted Streit of Belt Railway described his frustration, "I would come in almost every morning to servers that had gone down overnight." 

Belt Railway knew that a new server could help reduce management time and cost while offering a reliable solution. As a current Genisys Group iSeries customer, Belt Railway was happy with the service and support provided by Genisys and IBM. However, Belt Railway’s management team had seen information about, and planned to add, an HP Blade solution. 

Genisys Group proposed the IBM BladeCenter and showed them how it would offer a better, cleaner, and more reliable solution at a competitive price. They provided Belt Railway with documentation and research that clearly showed the IBM BladeCenter as a superior solution to the HP Blade. Among this information was a multimedia presentation comparing the two and highlighting the technology advantages of the IBM Blade solution. 

Furthermore, the cost of a server is small when compared to the management cost over the lifetime of the server. Genisys Group demonstrated to Belt Railway how the IBM Blade solution would help reduce these management costs over the long-term.  

The BladeCenter saved Belt Railway money on the initial purchase and realized ongoing savings in management, power, and cabling costs. The solution has been very reliable and has minimized downtime.

Belt Railway also found the solution easy to manage. Everything is hot swappable and plugged into the chassis. New servers can be added quicker, easier, and for much less money. Overall, it has been a very cost-effective solution.