Case Studies

VCG provides expertise to Japanese manufacturing company

Business Challenge

Privately owned Japanese manufacturing company is one of the largest sushi seasoning manufacturers in the world.

The group acquired the much-loved British brand Sarson’s, Haywards and Dufrais in 2012, and Branston in 2013 to add to its portfolio. It has ambitious plans to expand into the EU and the US and currently operates out of two factories in the UK.

VCG provides desired infastructure

Being an international business means that the organisation has a complexity to its network infrastructure that requires an experienced partner with outstanding technical capabilities to manage and provide the right solution and design from the physical network and locations right to the edge.

Throughout the initiation of the project, there was a need for commercial flexibility as well as a different approach to the network architecture; a different design of the LAN and WAN were specifically required than previously proposed for the transformation project. VCG stepped in and redesigned the network to its bespoke requirements, to provide the desired infrastructure across its geographical locations as the business continued to grow.

Solution

We successfully supplied access points for their network to function

VCG delivered a carefully thought-out migration to Fortinet SD-WAN over twelve months, all while providing Cisco Meraki expertise, including supplying additional switches and access points for the network.

In addition, the security capabilities within the VCG team coupled with the organisation’s thorough understanding of the end-point security and its importance in protecting all business locations ensured the project delivered the most value within its scope and beyond.

As a trusted partner, VCG supports the manufacturing business under a fully managed service contract, which includes hardware and vendor support, proactive monitoring and alerting, and a 24/7 support desk.

Business impact

The transformation project became a critical delivery for both VCG and the business, with outcomes that were going to impact the future of all business operations and digital infrastructure for the organisation.

The business has begun a new, future-ready direction with Fortinet and Cisco Meraki and hasn’t looked back. The new architecture enables them to get far more insight, network reliability, and robustness of all enterprise networking, with an added value of support, security, and edge protection.

In addition to being a Fortinet Advanced Partner and an award-winning Commercial Cisco partner, VCG was able to provide technical audits of their estate, network infrastructure, access points, reporting, proactive monitoring, and WAN and LAN managed service.

Between February 2020 and June 2021, the Japanese manufacturer has undergone a full migration and VCG has delivered a fully managed service with cost savings and efficiency gains. VCG’s approach to project management meant that at every stage in the migration, expectations and timelines were met through an agile approach and a PRINCE2 implementation dividing the project into clear stages, goals, and deadlines.