LotusWorks, a provider of engineering, technical and construction management services to the manufacturing and engineering industries, has switched to Google Apps Premier Edition throughout its workforce.
The firm has operations in Ireland and the US and wanted a more reliable email system that would not be impacted by time-zone differences.
“Our legacy system was supported here in Ireland,” said Gary Gilgan, IT manager, LotusWorks. “We decided to look at an alternative after we experienced a serious outage incident in Ireland which affected our business operations in the US. Our email system failed late one evening just as our business colleagues in the United States were starting their day at work. Because it was ‘out of hours’ here in Ireland we couldn’t get the necessary IT support and a day’s work was lost in our US operations.”
The company looked at alternative systems for its 100 workers but found that most options, including an off-site data processing facility, were too expensive.
“We wanted a solution that could be hosted online and when we looked at the options Google Apps for Enterprise ticked all the boxes,” said Gilgan. “It offered us a suite of applications including email, calendar, text and voice calling and documents which increased our productivity and enhanced knowledge sharing capabilities and collaboration within our organisation.”
One of the benefits of switching to a cloud-based platform for LotusWorks was the lack of maintenance and strain on the IT department. “Because Google hosts the service there is no software or hardware to install or maintenance required. Updates to the products or security updates are carried out remotely by Google, often, and as needed, without any inconvenience or action required by us. This removes any headache for our IT team,” Gilgan said.
Google recently signed its biggest ever Apps deal, supporting 35,000 users at support services firm Rentokil Initial. The Telegraph Media Group moved 1,500 workers to Google Apps in July 2008, while the Guardian News and Media Group migrated 2,400 earlier this year and French manufacturer Valeo moved 30,000 workers to the cloud platform.
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In July this year, Google finally brought its Apps platform out of beta in an attempt to make the suite more appealing to bigger enterprises.
