Sungard Availability Services:
Digital strategy, interim director, two site redesigns

I spent about a year with Philadelphia-area-based Sungard Availability Services, a global provider of managed IT services, disaster recovery, and planning. During that time, I helped the company evaluate, hire, and manage the relationship with iStrategy Labs, a Washington, DC digital agency. I also filled as an interim digital director while we searched for a great leader to fill the role. My manager, whom I met during projects at NetApp, was wonderfully supportive of me and her team.

The driver for the project was a two-phased site redesign. The first phase was constrained by licensing for an older generation CMS but would need to reflect a new brand identity and design system. Phase 2 was an entirely new IA, design system, and responsive breakpoints to allow the content to fit a variety of viewports.

Textual Healing
Like so many IT companies, Sungard Availability Services has great services...yet overwhelmed site users with text and poor navigational and content hierarchy. Given their desire to present simple value propositions to customers in mobile contexts, this would have to change. Moreover, they had to weave a simple narrative to discuss how all of their services fit together. The old site is below. The new site (and future design system iterations) is here. How’s that for a data center refresh?