Securing Digital Transformation

 

Cloudtivity had the honor of supporting AYASA in its journey to digital transformation. AYASA is an automotive corporation with a fifty-five-year history in Ecuador. Importers and distributors of internationally recognized vehicle brands like Nissan and Renault are a leading force in the transportation trade in the country.   

Information technology and security are an important part of their vision, as they strive to become an internationally recognized force in sustainable mobility. Cloudtivity presented a comprehensive approach to AYASA based on their request to move to the M365 platform using Modern Workplace Solutions. With a cadre of MSFT Certified Professionals – including MCSA’s and MCTs – we included a package service that provided 700 seats of which 500 seats are M365 E3 licenses, along with migration services and training for both the Technical Admins and End Users.   

We trained the entire technical admin team during the migration utilizing the MS Course 20347: Enabling and Managing M365. A critical aspect to the overall success of the move to a Modern Workplace is spending time and resources to ensure the End Users are professionally trained. Cloudtivity has developed a custom approach to End User training where we host live, in-person workshops with groups of 3 people per session. During these workshops & training, we cover the key workloads in M365, including Office, Email, Skype for Business, OneDrive, SharePoint, Delve, Yammer, and Teams.   

AYASA is comprised of several departments and divisions which need to communicate frequently with external agencies.   

The following is a recap of a conversation held with Ivan Esparza, AYASA’s IT Manager, and the driving force behind the adoption of M365.   

 

 

Before you adopted M365, Which solution did you use?   

“Before deciding to change to M365, we utilized Lotus Notes, for emailing and chatting. We had Lotus Notes because it is a robust platform with rock-solid security features. We were happy with it, but as the company was moving forward, we felt we needed to evolve and bring new ways of communicating and working together, and so we started considering moving away from Lotus Notes to a platform that offered more than email and chat.   

The idea was to migrate to a more amicable set of applications, bringing new functions and capabilities to our colleagues while at the same time gaining in terms of management ease, by reducing the need for server management, backups, and other demanding administrative tasks that come together with a robust but complex Lotus Notes infrastructure.”   

Why did you choose M365?   

“We reviewed different options and found that M365 reunited the capabilities that we were looking for. Extended support both from the partner ecosystem and from MSFT (support from IBM is extremely limited). Less need for infrastructure management, and thorough integration with existing Office applications. Plus, the fact M365 is entirely in the cloud appealed to us, as we came from a set of tools where infrastructure maintenance and management brought a need for serious resources, both in terms of servers (just for mail we had six servers) and in terms of staff, as we had to dedicate an entire team to manage Lotus Notes.”   

What benefits have you seen with the adoption of M365?   

“AYASA came from Lotus, a set of applications that are difficult to use and not attractive to the user’s eye. Our users did not like working with Lotus Notes. Their mailboxes were constantly saturated. We had only one way to render support, so it made it more difficult to keep our users up and running. However, they were used to utilizing Lotus Notes every day.   

So, we expected that migrating to M365 would be difficult”, said Ivan Esparza. “Much to our surprise, though, adoption of M365 was immediate. Our users jumped into the possibility of doing more, adopting Skype for Business from day one. Usage statistics surprised us, showing increments in internal collaboration of as much as 146%. Access to email and applications soared.  

No more of our executives suffered from VPN (Virtual Private Network) accessibility issues while overseas, and we saw a significant reduction in end support calls. But it did not end there. We have been thinking about upgrading our conference room audio/ video set-ups. Upon adopting M365, and with the introduction of Skype for Business, conferencing became easier and more accessible.   

Colleagues only need to sit in a room, turn on their cameras, and off they go. We are seeing colleagues going to meetings with phones only and using the cameras on their phones to connect.”     

In terms of security, how do you feel M365 aligns with the goals of your organization?   

“Coming from an infrastructure based on Lotus Notes, we still have much to learn to elevate security to the level we had it at with Lotus Notes. Nevertheless, we have found that the balance of security-usability is adequate, allowing our users to benefit from the possibilities that M365 brings while maintaining the level of security AYASA needs to operate with.   

Nevertheless, we are now embarking on deploying more security options, such as Multi-Factor Authentication and Rights Management Services, hence improving on the level of security we offer our end users.”    

What is your level of satisfaction with M365?   

“Extremely high. We have seen an important reduction in terms of end-user support. Plus, a level of adoption we did not expect. Skyrocketing in customer satisfaction, and a spike in collaboration among our users. We are in a much better place and moving forward to a world where email is important, but not the most valuable tool in collaboration.   

As we head into the future, we are seeing more opportunities with M365. The most important of all is the opportunity to take the benefits of Microsoft 365 to our customers. Because taking the benefits of technology to our customers is the goal in AYASA. We are now in the developing stage of a project to utilize Skype for Business to enhance the experience of our customers when it comes to vehicle maintenance. By inviting our service shop customers to join a SfB meeting, we will be capable of sharing with them live what their cars need in terms of parts replacement or service requirements.   

That will take our customer’s service experience to a level of quality not seen before, without requiring additional investments, but by making use of technology readily available.”   

Has Cloudtivity matched your expectations as a partner of MSFT?   

“Very much indeed” claims Mr. Esparza. “Cloudtivity guided us through the process of adoption, providing administration-oriented training for our IT staff, adoption-related material for end-users, and through their own devised end-user adoption program a series of internal marketing materials that made it easier for everyone to get started with M365.   

Along with MSFT FastTrack, Cloudtivity walked us through every aspect of deployment and adoption, simplifying the migration from Lotus Notes to Exchange with a much-reduced end-user experience impact. Their service level left nothing to be desired, and their knowledge of MSFT’s M365 is second to none. But what drove us to Cloudtivity was the fact that it has a self-procurement portal, that will allow us to add or remove users at the touch of a button, also adding new products is at our finger points!   

You see, we have a baseline of users that is covered by our MSFT Products and Services Agreement. But unpracticed users, and even more so those new ones that carry a temporary tag to be procured via the Cloudtivity Customer Portal. By making use of that portal, we will be able to procure new M365 licenses in just minutes, and provision those accordingly almost immediately. Then, when those new licenses are not needed anymore, reducing those is as easy as a couple of clicks while making use of the Cloudtivity Customer Portal. No other partner in Ecuador could offer that. So that is why we chose Cloudtivity as our MSFT M365 supplier,” said Mr. Esparza.   

Cloudtivity is a MS Gold Partner with a strong focus on MS Licensing, Cloud Services, and IT Training. Cloudtivity currently operates in more than 39 islands, covering the entire Caribbean and Ecuador. With offices in Curacao (HQ), Jamaica, Trinidad & Tobago, Ecuador, and Puerto Rico, Cloudtivity has a widespread presence in the region and is known for providing good business value to the area.   

We are a leader in transitioning organizations to a cloud-ready and cloud-savvy enterprise. Our own internal IT is 100% based on MSFT CLOUD (M365, Dynamics CRM, and MSFT Azure). We use the technology we sell, and we are named MSFT’s first tier-1 Cloud Solution Provider. Another aspect of Cloudtivity’s approach worth highlighting is the use of MSFT technology to manage the project from start to finish.   

This approach has made Cloudtivity the partner of choice for customers with a vision of empowerment, and a need for an integrated approach to technology adoption, that includes not only technical support but also a business process-oriented end-user guidance and ongoing, readily available partner assistance. Automotores y Anexos (AYASA) is one of those customers.   

What differentiates Cloudtivity from its competitors is that we provide end-to-end solutions to our customers: Assessment, Training, Deployment, Adoption, and Support. We are not only capable of selling MSFT Licenses and Services, but we have a team of MSFT Certified Solutions Architects, Professionals, and MCTs that provide in-depth strategic and technical guidance to customers and guide them on a path to achieving their desired results. We also heavily stress the importance of customers training their IT Admin Staff and End Users in the various MSFT technologies that they purchase. As a Direct CSP partner, we are also able to provide first-line support to our customers, which they testify gives us an edge.   

Recently we have improved our self-provisioning tool which is linked to MSFT back-end systems where the customer can go online and directly provide its cloud subscriptions. The Cloudtivity Customer Portal makes it easy to gain insights into software spending, provides the ability to adjust the subscriptions, and purchase new cloud products in real-time. Now it is immediately being provisioned and deployed. It is a matter of minutes instead of days, we call it the Cloudtivity Customer Portal. This application is built on Dynamics CRM with the use of Adxstudio.   

The local MSFT office played a pivotal role in the successful landing and implementation of this project. MSFT and Cloudtivity have a very engaging and committed bond from the Country Manager to Technical Engineer and Marketing – we had a tremendous partnership with the whole team to prove the value, sell the solution and successfully implement and drive adoption.   

We are well known for organizing successful demand generation activities and are frequently asked by MSFT to organize events on their behalf and with the full support of the local team. In the past year, we have worked on several marketing activities alongside MSFT to drive the adoption of the Cloud.   

  • Technology Disruption Events (hosted together with MSFT)    
  • Bahamas & Bermuda February 2018 – delivered in partnership with MSFT by Ricardo Agosto, Territory Manager BCBBJ, and Rennex Callaghan    
  • Barbados & Guyana November 2017, delivered in partnership with MSFT by Charmain Galindo, Opportunity Manager West Indies   
  • Suriname September 2017, delivered in partnership with MSFT by Darren Mohammed Territory Channel Manager (Corporate) – Caribbean   
  • Breakfast Briefing – Azure    
  • Jamaica September 2017, delivered in partnership with local MSFT team, Rennex Callaghan, Partner Technical Advisor, and Latoya Duffus, Marketing Coordinator    
  • Corporate Wine Event Tasting    
  • Puerto Rico, in cooperation with the local team by Cristina Fuentes, Partner Marketing Advisor Caribbean Region   
  • Jamaica Biztech Conference – invited by MSFT local team to co-sponsor    
  • Jamaica October 2017   
  • MSFT Summit Innovation    
  • Jamaica March 2018   
  • Trinidad & Tobago December 2017   
  • Monthly webinars around Cloud solutions    

    

  

Problem:    

Big companies using legacy technologies need to modernize their technology business tools but have doubts about the correct process to adopt them in a way that does not affect business continuity during the transition.   

Solution:    

Our highly capable IT Team has the knowledge and experience to ensure the successful transition from legacy business applications to Microsoft 365 suite. Beyond this they make sure customers use the power of modern tools to increase their level of communication and productivity.