Exchange Online will be a big help for users to find the work style that works for them since there is no comparison with the existing services in many ways like schedule-sharing.
Sung-Chan Kim, Deputy General Manager, Green Textile Co., Ltd.
190 employees
Headquartered in Seoul, South Korea, Green Textile Co. Ltd. specializes in textile and fashion. Its main customers are Nike and Reebok.
Frequent failures of ASP-based emails, and service disconnection in major business hubs such as the U.S. and Hong Kong led Green Textile to see an alternative for business communication.
Microsoft Office 365 gives both on- and off-site users access to email, instant messaging, and file-sharing services with consistent quality.
Retail and Consumer Goods
Korea
Business Productivity
Korean
Green Textile Co., Ltd is a textile and fashion trade company. Started in 2004 with six employees, by 2012 it had grown to be a small-medium firm where about 190 employees are currently working. In its first year, sales were $3 million, and by 2010, annual revenue grew to $100 million.
The business offices started at the headquarters in Seoul, South Korea and were extended to Indonesia in 2006 and to Vietnam in 2007.The textile and fashion trade business frequently communicates with their primary customers, multinational fashion clothing corporations, about all processes from order to delivery via email. Green Textile had been using email services provided by a domestic ASP service company; however, it was difficult to ensure smooth communications due to frequent failures and disconnections. As the number of employees increased, Green Textile knew it needed to final a better solution.
Green Textile receives production orders and then sends directions to local factories in Vietnam and Indonesia via email. From order to delivery, email provides the connection between customers and Green Textile Co., Ltd. If there is a problem with email, all processes from production to delivery are disrupted. Green Textile couldn’t avoid the tension caused by failures, even when it used email services provided by a domestic Application Service Provider (ASP). Even though they entrusted their communication to a professional service company, they remained concerned about failures because Green Textile’s communication needs are global.
“We’ve used the email services provided by an ASP company for four years. While using this service, we complained of frequent failures; however, there was a bigger problem causing disconnection due to local permission port issues when accessing the service from the US and Hong Kong. These caused interruptions to our business,” says Sung-Chan Kim, Deputy General Manager at Green Textile.
Office 365 lightens the burden of technical support on communication and collaboration sector. Now, in the process of a main backbone system project, IT can focus on that project with a light heart, due to a lower burden for providing technical support for users.
– Sung-Chan Kim
Deputy General Manager
Green Textile Co., Ltd.
User complaints were also weighing on the shoulders of the IT department, especially from expatriate users. This caused Green Textile to implement dual policies regarding emails. Green Textile restricted the issuance of accounts in the domain ‘greentextile.co.kr’ to the headquarters and expatriates dispatched at overseas offices. The email services for local employees were directly built on local servers and managed by an administrator.
Users at the headquarters did not have problems with speed, but mail box capacity was no more than 200MB, so employees complained about the small size of their mailboxes. The company knew it was time to improve its system, and while contemplating alternatives, the IT department at Green Textile heard enticing news: Microsoft was getting ready to release a new cloud service called Microsoft Office 365.
Green Textile collected information about Office 365 in 2010 before its release in South Korea. Google Apps for Business was also a top candidate as an alternative, but it wasn’t enough to satisfy the needs of Green Textile. “From the very beginning, we even didn’t have Google Apps for Business in mind. Because our main systems such as Groupware and ERP are based on the Microsoft platform, Office 365 is the right direction in terms of linkage with work,” says Sung-Chan Kim.
Once the official service launched, Green Textile contracted with Office 365 right away. Microsoft Exchange and Lync Online are the first components to be deployed. The IT department is also testing SharePoint Online to replace the existing file-sharing method.
Prior to launch of the full suite of services, Green Textile gave users a notification about backing up existing emails, and users at domestic and overseas offices backed up their existing mailbox using PST files. With Office 365, there was no user confusion about the transition; it was easy to back emails up since they were already familiar with the Microsoft Outlook client.
Lync Online is being used as a tool for instant messaging within the company. Taking into account that the organization is scattered across two buildings at headquarters, Green Textile created an organizational chart that grouped users based on buildings and floors to put on Lync Online. Based on information of the organizational chart, they set up an instant messaging environment for the company.
SharePoint Online is also a promising service which will have a variety of applications in the future. “We shared files before using existing Network Attached Storage (NAS) devices; however, the IT department is now seeing how SharePoint Online can solve problems such as security issues and accidental user deletions,” says Sung-Chan Kim. After finishing all tests, the company plans to issue accounts to the departments where file-sharing is necessary.
Increased mailbox capacity
After the services switched to Exchange Online, the first reaction from users was about the mailbox capacity. When looking at the figures, its size increased from 200MB to 25GB, more than 10 times its previous capacity—and sending decent-sized documents and files via email is now possible since the attachment limit is also up to 25MB.
“In the past, users frequently backed up emails due to the small mailbox size, but now the capacity is large enough to only occasionally back it up.” says Sung-Chan Kim.
Better access to schedules and files
At Green Textile, many users are interested in scheduling and file-sharing. “In the past, one executive wanted to share his schedule with his secretary, and they shared through Google Apps since the existing email service couldn’t support it. Exchange Online is a big help for users to find the work style that works for them since there is no comparison with the existing services in many ways like schedule-sharing.” says Sung-Chan Kim.
The company expects that file-sharing will also be significantly more user-friendly than with NAS. “In the past, when customers sent an order form in PDF format, our users would move the information to a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet and edit it. If several people needed to edit the information, NAS would support file-sharing, but not manage versions, creating risks like accidental user deletion. On testing SharePoint Online, we found that it is easy to share files and to track changes when collaborating files using Office 2010,” says Sung-Chan Kim.
Frees up IT department for strategic projects
Green Textile’s four IT engineers welcomed Office365. Their mission is to operate backbone systems like ERP and Groupware, and to build systems related to new businesses. With Office 365 on the job, the IT department can now focus on its proper duties.
“Office 365 lightens the burden of technical support on communication and collaboration sector. Now, in the process of a main backbone system project, IT can focus on that project with a light heart, due to a lower burden for providing technical support for users.” says Sung-Chan Kim.
Microsoft Office 365 brings together cloud versions of our most trusted communications and collaboration products—Microsoft SharePoint Online, Exchange Online, and Lync Online—with the latest version of our Office desktop suite and companion web applications for businesses of all sizes.
Office 365 helps save time and money, and it frees up valued resources. Simple to use and easy to administer, it is financially backed by a service level agreement guaranteeing 99 percent reliability. Office 365 features robust security, IT-level phone support, geo-redundancy, disaster recovery, and the business-class privacy controls and standards that you expect from a world-class service provider.
Microsoft Case Study: Green Textile