Lafayette Utilities System reimagined its cyber resilience strategy as part of a broader data center modernization. The goal was to better protect customer information and the physical infrastructure that delivers electric, water and wastewater services to roughly 245,000 residents in Lafayette Parish.

LUS implemented a combination of Dell PowerProtect solutions:

• Dell PowerProtect Data Manager for intelligent, multicloud data protection.
• Dell PowerProtect Cyber Recovery to create an isolated data vault, separated from the production environment.
• CyberSense to apply machine learning and detect suspicious activity that could indicate ransomware or other cyber threats.
• Transparent Snapshots to back up systems with little to no service interruption.

Together, these technologies help LUS:

• Minimize disruption from natural disasters and cyberattacks.
• Keep mission-critical applications protected without impacting performance.
• Ensure critical data is quickly recoverable after an outage, system failure or cyber incident.

By working with Dell Technologies as a long-term partner, LUS has reshaped its cyber resilience posture to better safeguard both customers and community infrastructure.

After moving from legacy data protection software to Dell PowerProtect Data Manager, LUS saw measurable improvements in day-to-day operations and backup performance.

Key outcomes include:

• 80% reduction in daily administration tasks, freeing IT staff to focus on higher-value work.
• Exchange server backup times cut from 4 hours to about 20 minutes, significantly reducing the risk of data loss.
• Backup windows for key applications (Oracle, MySQL, Linux) reduced from 20 hours to under 5 hours, enabling shorter Recovery Point Objectives (RPOs) and more frequent backups.
• Transparent Snapshots improved storage efficiency and allowed backups with little to no service interruption.

These changes help LUS keep mission-critical applications running smoothly while maintaining strong data protection. The IT team can now manage backups more efficiently and respond faster when recovery is needed.

Dell PowerProtect solutions do more than protect data for LUS—they also support smarter operations and better service to the community.

Using PowerProtect Data Manager, LUS powers its Outage Map, a predictive analytics tool that:

• Collects data from multiple systems in real time.
• Helps predict where outages may occur or have occurred.
• Displays a heat map so response teams can quickly see where crews are needed.
• Keeps residents and businesses informed about where outages are and when they may be resolved.

With this data-driven approach, LUS can restore power and services faster and manage resources more efficiently. The operational gains also give LUS the capacity to support mutual aid agreements with other regional utilities, sending electric line crews to at-risk areas such as the Gulf and East Coasts to help restore power after natural disasters.

Overall, Dell PowerProtect solutions help LUS rethink how it protects data, manages outages and supports both local customers and neighboring communities.