Logistics enterprises in the development of information technology today, facing the business development and IT resources mismatch dilemma. Andreani, an IT director at the Argentine Logistics enterprise, delivered a speech at the 2017 Huawei Connect, demonstrating how the Telefonica Open Cloud helped Andreani realize the cloud of business systems and build Argentina's first intelligent logistics system.
"Andreani Logistics Group, founded in 1945, is a delivery services company based in Argentina. Having the largest logistics infrastructure in Argentina, Andreani has developed four key businesses, covering logistics, pharmaceuticals, postal logistics, and real estate, and its business scope also covers Brazil." Gustavo Echenique, Andreani's Director of IT and Processes, introduced the Argentinean logistics leader thusly at the "Business Management Helps Create Streamlined Business Engines" summit as part of HUAWEI CONNECT 2017.
Gustavo Echenique, Director of IT and Processes, Andreani Logistics Group
Sebastian Sarasate, Infrastructure Manager, Andreani Logistics Group
At the summit, Echenique and Sebastian Sarasate ,Andreani's Infrastructure Manager delivered a speech together entitled New Applications of SAP Cloud in Fully Cloud-based Processes of Logistics Enterprises. "Global logistics enterprises are rapidly transforming IT systems into an area that adds value to the business," they said. As a benchmark for innovation in Argentina's logistics industry, Andreani has been actively experimenting with new technologies to promote its IT service innovations.
Andreani has a number of branches across Argentina and is continuously expanding its business scope by building modern eCommerce platforms. With these eCommerce platforms, Andreani provides comprehensive and customized eCommerce solutions for multinational companies, covering the delivery process, warehousing, goods preparation, and product tracing. Andreani serves thousands of customers, including Santander Bank and Hewlett-Packard. However, as its businesses expand, Andreani's legacy IT system struggled to support its growing services. Andreani decided it might have a better chance with the cloud technology.
Andreani was looking for more than a cloud provider, instead seeking a technology partner who could help them design and provide guidance on their technological evolution and cloud transformation. "We were impressed by the cloud technologies, network capabilities, and service response provided by Telefónica and Huawei. That was how we chose Telefónica Open Cloud as our cloud service provider," Sebastian said.
In October 2016, Huawei and Telefónica Business Solutions jointly launched the Open Cloud public cloud service in Chile, Brazil, and Mexico. The service was also introduced to Peru, Argentina, and the United States in 2017. The launch of the service consolidates the cooperative relationships between the two parties in promoting the cloudification of traditional IT enterprises. Based on the cooperation agreement, Huawei provides innovative software and hardware solutions, including servers, storage, networks, and cloud operating systems. Huawei also offers professional technical support for the Open Cloud service.
Sebastian said the introduction of Telefónica Open Cloud public cloud service has addressed Andreani's four service bottlenecks. It assists Andreani in managing resources on a unified platform to improve O&M management experience, removing the difficulty in managing cloud services with different platforms. It provides elastic, scalable services to cloudify Andreani's eCommerce platform. In order to improve user experience of cloud applications, Telefónica builds local nodes to reduce the network delay of Andreani's SAP ERP system, and at the same time meets Andreani's networking requirements for stable MPLS dedicated networks to deal with real-time logistics needs. Moreover, it helps Andreani migrate its warehousing management system (WMS) data center to the cloud. All of these measures reduce the Total Cost of Operation (TCO) and support active-active AZ backup to ensure that services are not interrupted.
The migration was divided into three phases. First, the eCommerce platform was migrated to the Open Cloud system to improve customer experience on black Friday and during other marketing campaigns. Second, the SAP system is being migrated to the cloud to improve their internal experience in developing and production environments. Huawei and Telefónica help Andreani design a disaster recovery environment based on an active-active architecture, resolving the problem of backup and disaster recovery. In addition, OpenStack-based Open Cloud service is to support Andreani's WMS which integrates all mission-critical core systems. By doing so, Andreani can obtain a full Hybrid cloud solution, thereby saving costs.
"Currently, the project is entering the second phase. Andreani is convinced the Open Cloud solution will continue to support its leadership in logistics sector," Sebastian Sarasate said.
