Provide a brief description of the Solution or Service provided.
Epic Information Solutions provided AgGrowth with Managed Services, Hosted Services, Blackberry Services and a complete Backup Solution. AgGrowth is located in Winnipeg, but also has 14 remote offices across North America, as well 2 Sales Positions in Europe.
Describe what made your Service of the highest quality. Provide evidence of how the service benefited the customer’s business, e.g. measurable improvements in sales, revenues, cost reduction, productivity, lost time due to outage, etc.
In the past year, AgGrowth signed on to a highly involved managed services agreement with EPIC Information Solutions. Not only does this include 24/7 support and managing of their IT infrastructure, but it also involved a complete overhaul of AgGrowth’s internal network infrastructure. The largest portion of the overhaul was the transferring of each of their 14 remote offices to their own servers. Each server was installed with VMware ESX server to maximize space and ensure high efficiency. Each server also comes complete with Kesaya installed, which enables EPIC Information Solutions to both monitor and do maintenance on each of them remotely. It also included the implementation of VPN tunnels, for use when connecting to various sites. As part of this project, EPIC Information Solutions provides remote and on-site support of their infrastructure when possible. If this is not possible, EPIC Information Solutions has partnered with their VTN network partners in other provinces if the issue requires a technician on site. By doing this, EPIC Information Solutions has saved AgGrowth thousands of dollars just because they don’t need to hire an on-site technician to be there at all times. By implementing this solution, each AgGrowth site is able to function independently without dependency on another site, or by being affected by another site. EPIC Information Solutions installed a number of shared technology resources, including implementing VPN tunnels between offices. This enables each site to connect to Made2Manage (software that manages all internal functions such as accounting, manufacturing, inventory, etc) through Citrix, which in turns allows each site to connect to Head Office independently. This has significantly reduced the amount of stress on staff members, as well as the downtime associated with all sites being managed from one location. AgGrowth is an Income Trust Fund company that buys other companies. The way that EPIC Information Solutions has them set up enables their services to expand right along with them. EPIC Information Solutions provides services like Managed and Hosted Services, which include exchange (email) hosting and Blackberry infrastructure. This means there are fewer infrastructures for AgGrowth to manage, which allows them to focus on their clients as opposed to worrying about the infrastructure.
Describe how services were delivered in a timely fashion and/or how response to a crisis was over and above the accepted norm?
Should any of the site servers fail, there is a backup solution in place that replicates data, at the end of each day, from each site back to shared storage at the head office automatically. This means less down time, faster restoration of data, an increase in system up time, and fewer resources affected by a system shut down. Additionally, because of the VPN tunnels, EPIC Information Solutions can do the majority of scheduled and necessary maintenance in the evenings when no one is on the system, or during the day remotely, eliminating travel time. It also means that any crisis can be averted during non-working hours, so that day to day business continues as per usual. All of this saves AgGrowth both time and money because of implementing separate solutions at each office.
Describe how your services go beyond competitors to satisfy the needs of your customer(s). Provide examples or evidence of how your services are the better and why.
As a result of going through this project with AgGrowth, EPIC Information Solutions created their Customer Service Representative (CSR) team. This new resource eliminated the need for clients like AgGrowth to call the technicians directly, and enabled EPIC Information Solutions to properly delegate service calls. This resulted in fewer dropped or missed calls because of missing technicians for various reasons. The CSR team now monitors and delegates service tickets and calls to a variety of qualified technicians, which has improved both service speed and service quality for all clients, regardless of size or issue.
Optional Question: How does this solution further your customer’s green or environmentally friendly plans?
EPIC Information Solutions is a relatively small, locally based information technology company. Being capable of managing the information technology infrastructure of a global company like AgGrowth at this size speaks volumes as to the level of expertise and organization being offered. Being trusted and able to deliver and even excel against global consulting agencies, like EDS and IBM, is unheard of at this level.