Case Study

Meeting Aggressive Separation Goals with Xalient’s Agile Approach

Organisation Size

18,000+ People

Country

United Kingdom

Summary

In 2021, the parent company made the decision to divest its UK entity, which was then bought by a venture capital company and renamed. The company hired a new CIO with a remit to set up the necessary technology to bring the company through the separation quickly and successfully: the divestiture needed to be complete by April 2022, with the separation of the business completed by April 2023.

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The focus was centred around the separation of systems, with a multi-million-pound programme of work set in motion.

One of the primary challenges was ensuring business-as-usual continuity during this complex separation and divestiture. Previously, the UK business was using legacy technology that needed transformation. With the divestiture, there was an opportunity to modernise.

Plans were put in place to move from legacy on-premises contact centres to the cloud while modernising other parts of the IT infrastructure, all with an eye on separation deadlines.

To achieve the desired outcomes, the company recognized the need for external help and subject matter expertise. The parent company had a very centralised operations model, so the CIO had a small IT team that needed additional support.

Having previously worked closely with Xalient, the CIO knew Xalient had the team, technical expertise, innovation, and agility required to drive and support this initiative.

The CIO reached out to Xalient as part of a competitive process, and the decision was quickly made to hire the organisation for a short-term strategic separation and modernisation consultancy assignment.

Xalient rapidly crafted a strategy to deliver on the aggressive timelines required. The app stack was migrated from physical on-premises data centre environments to a secure cloud environment in Microsoft Azure.

Under a new SIAM operating model, more than 28 of the company’s suppliers will now be managed via Xalient, who is the prime MSP.

Setting Xalient up as Prime MSP

Xalient was the prime contact for the migration from existing data centres to Microsoft’s Azure cloud service. This involved migrating all applications and resources from physical on-premises data centre environments to a secure cloud environment. Xalient’s skillset led to the team managing more than 28 of the company’s suppliers under a new SIAM operating model.

The company is also looking to agree on a formal service management programme, involving staff moving to deliver the helpdesk service from Xalient’s own Network Operating Centre (NOC). Plans are in place for a Security Operations Centre (SOC) to be delivered as a service via a security operations platform and Xalient.

The CIO commented, “Xalient demonstrated subject matter expertise time and again, becoming our trusted advisors. They are technically competent with sound logic behind their reasoning. We use Xalient as a sounding board, and I regularly talk to the team about what I’m trying to achieve. Xalient was aligned with our separation view and established credibility very early on.”

A Successful Transition

Projects included a move from the current on-premises platform to Genesys, a cloud contact centre platform, and the right-sizing and extension of the company’s use of Zscaler to Zscaler Private Access (ZPA), a cloud service providing zero-trust and secure remote access to internal applications.

Xalient also provided professional and managed services wrapped around these solutions. Additional network security capabilities were implemented, including support for the firewall estate and local and wide area networks. An Aruba WiFi replacement was undertaken across several sites to boost user experiences with fast, easy, and secure enterprise connectivity, centrally managed from the cloud for seamless future SD-WAN implementation. A new instance of the privileged access management solution from CyberArk was also created.

The CIO discussed the value Xalient delivered across the business and its commercial flexibility. This initial programme of work provided a fantastic platform for delivering other services. Future projects include implementing SD-WAN, an identity-as-a-service initiative, a zero-trust strategy, and other technology solutions as the company continues to transform.

X - Pharmaceutical Company Case Study - meeting aggressive separation goals, successful separation

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