ICA

Issue

How many of us now consider the network, the tools based on it, and the functioning of PCs themselves as on par with other traditionally taken-for-granted services, such as electricity? You arrive at the office, turn on your PC, and everything must work.

Internet unavailability is out of the question: a company downtime, even for a few minutes, is a disruption no one is willing to accept anymore.
A few data points are enough to highlight the importance of Information Systems at ICA. All employees—across the headquarters and branches—and agents throughout the territory have access to the management application through which data on production, distribution, sales, and purchases are processed. The entire supply chain process cannot be subject to interruptions.
The development of the two server rooms, which separately supported all the group’s locations, had been approached in an unstructured manner, and the equipment in use—either at the end of life or end of support—was starting to generate maintenance costs that were too high. And that’s not all.
“The system outages, even just for maintenance operations, caused service disruptions and productivity interruptions.” These are unacceptable conditions for a company like ICA, which is focused on development, research, and consequently, innovation.

Solution

VEM Sistemi proposed an extremely effective virtualization solution that allows all users to be connected to both infrastructures and, thanks to virtualization, no one notices if one part of the architecture goes down. Business continuity is guaranteed.
To complete the redundancy, wired and wireless connectivity devices were installed to ensure system stability and, consequently, operational efficiency in the various production sectors.
“ICA is undergoing strong expansion and may have greater business needs than today,” emphasizes Roberto Rizzuto, IT Specialist.
“Thanks to VEM Sistemi, we have installed a high-performing, reliable, and flexible network capable of supporting all future innovations and choices geared toward new business models or new project developments. Commercial timelines are increasingly faster than those of Information Systems; it’s important to stay one step ahead to provide the most appropriate ICT tools.”
To complete the setup, ICA extended the network to areas dedicated to product storage and handling, with the wireless component enabling computerized warehouse management.
“We installed about 70 Access Points to ensure connectivity both in the campus facilities that make up our locations and in the indoor areas, where an important phase of our production chain takes place.
Operators are equipped with barcode and RFID readers, which transmit data in real-time to the centralized management system via the Wi-Fi network.”
But that’s not all.
“Offices and laboratories—anywhere product movement is necessary—are covered by the network. We will soon activate the remaining branches as well; thanks to the capacity of our infrastructure, there are no availability limits.”

ICA will thus be able to guarantee connectivity to portable devices without any configuration and in total security.
Connectivity in the outdoor areas will also enable the introduction of wireless IP phones and the use of dual-mode mobile phones, which, leveraging the corporate network, will function as internal devices.

Benefits

In addition to meeting reliability needs, the consolidation of the network infrastructure now enables ICA to provide advanced communication and collaboration tools to its users and to consider unlimited services to support business.
Starting with the switchboard, which manages the entire corporate telephone communication system over IP—already in place.

“The benefits of IP telephony for companies like ours—with offices, warehouses across the territory, and branches abroad—are priceless.”
ICA employees and agents can now enjoy the many functionalities of the software switchboard.
“The operator’s console is now virtual: phone calls can be managed on-screen via PC. A button-based solution, given the number of extensions, would have been unfeasible and far less efficient.”
But the advantages don’t stop there: Unified Communication allows ICA to more accurately manage call cascades, response groups, lines, group creation, and—last but not least—the quality of the communication itself.
“The solution proposed by VEM has helped increase communication efficiency both internally and with clients; the number of answered calls has skyrocketed.
We are also planning integration with Skype to equip the company with increasingly up-to-date services.”
All these are additional factors that fully justify the investment in innovation, making VEM Sistemi’s solutions even more advantageous.

“We want to reach any employee, on any device, in any location.
Presence and collaboration will become a way of operating in the company that will evolve our modus operandi, functional approach, and even everyday office life.
Not to mention the time our employees save by communicating more effectively—time they can reinvest in increased productivity.”
Virtual meetings, people collaborating remotely, work tools available online anytime and anywhere: this is already the present.