Würth
The Würth Group is the global market leader in the development, production, and sale of fastening and assembly materials. More than 400 companies operating over 2,700 branch offices and shops in 80 countries form part of this global family business, which hails from the German town of Künzelsau.
Würth, specialized in the tool and supply sector, collaborates with NetNordic to cover the IBM server environment, storage, and backup, as well as continuous services.
The 24/7 availability of Würth’s applications is ensured by the advanced hardware architecture designed and implemented by NetNordic.
Würth sells and delivers approximately 70,000 stocked products in Finland, and the company’s revenue in 2016 was about 281 million euros.
“NetNordic has renewed our data center environment in terms of storage and backup, and also provides continuous services for the entire solution,” says Würth’s Chief Technology Officer, Markku Sulasalmi.
“Responsibility is now easier to find when one party is accountable for a broader solution. They have solid technical expertise. The entire system is designed so that all devices work well together.”
The renewed data center environment includes, in addition to servers, an All-Flash storage solution, a storage network, and a backup solution.
"We highly appreciate all of NetNordic's expertise."
A Cohesive Device Environment
Würth employs nearly 1,200 people in Finland, and its logistics center is located in Riihimäki. Würth is a service provider that takes care of tools and supplies for industry, construction, and maintenance.
“We deliver products ordered in the morning the next day to our customers nationwide with over 99% delivery reliability. We sell safety equipment, fastening supplies, tools, electrical and battery-operated machines, as well as maintenance and construction chemicals from about 200 Würth Center stores. We also have project centers for large projects, from which we serve contractors,” says Sulasalmi.
Information systems, such as enterprise resource planning, are central to the company’s operations. “Some information systems need to be available practically 24/7. We also require availability and flexibility from NetNordic when securing our operations.”
In the design of the storage and backup systems, response times were evaluated, and load tests were conducted. The implemented architecture provides performance and high availability for Würth’s demanding needs in the coming years. Thanks to advanced All-Flash storage technology, the computing power of the servers can be utilized very efficiently.
“The data center devices work together optimally when the overall system is well thought out. Bottlenecks do not occur in different systems, and the implemented architecture enables the growth of our business,” explains Sulasalmi, who leads the company’s technology team. “To maximize the benefit from the acquired capacity, we use system-enabled features such as snapshots, data compression, and deduplication.”
Visibility Brings Stability
According to Sulasalmi, the renewed architecture has met Würth’s business needs. Fault tolerance and system availability have been at a good level. Würth manages daily operations and maintenance. NetNordic’s task is to support and suggest development paths.
“The renewed environment has met our expectations. The availability of enterprise resource planning has been at a good level. Despite a few disturbances and exceptional situations, the environment has operated without interruption during these times. This partly reflects good planning and a functioning environment. NetNordic’s experts are committed to the functionality of our systems, and there is expertise in various areas. They are easily approachable and do not shy away from tough situations.”
Visibility into the data center environment has improved, and the functionality of the environment can be monitored closely.
“We also want to look to the future. Through deepened cooperation, NetNordic has provided us with monthly reports and regular meetings focusing on reviewing these reports. The reports clearly indicate the status of various systems and where we are headed. This allows us to plan together where we will take the systems in the coming months and years. We can anticipate situations and react in good time before they become urgent. Surprises will not arise. Capacity and performance will suffice for the entire lifecycle of the devices.”
NetNordic offers Würth:
- Design and delivery of a scalable and fault-tolerant data center environment (servers, storage systems, storage network, and backup solution).
- Support as a continuous service for the entire delivered data center solution.
- Monitoring and comprehensive reports on the functionality of the data center environment.
- Technological expertise and consulting in the development of the data center environment.