It is a national network of ten wholly owned and eight joint venture medical facilities throughout New Zealand. Tony Allwood, IS Solution Architect, Southern Cross Hospitals, says because of its broad geographic coverage, Southern Cross Hospitals need to ensure site survivability, requiring that each facility maintains secure network connectivity if central services were ever lost. Leveraging the flexible Palo Alto Networks Next-Generation Security Platform, Southern Cross Hospitals installed Palo Alto Networks next-generation firewalls at various sites across the country, providing high-performance internet access with full protection against cyber threats, Allwood explains. The platform also enabled the healthcare organisation to retain centralised visibility and control to manage the distributed security network as one cohesive environment.