we know they know

VIP Industries Ltd builds a stable platform for SAP software with IBM

Overview
The Challenge To improve competitiveness and expand its presence in the export market, VIP Industries Ltd needs to ensure a high level of internal efficiency. A custom-developed application landscape distributed across 20 servers created heavy workloads for developers and infrastructure managers. For business reporting purposes, administrative staff were spending considerable time manually collating data from spreadsheets. The Solution VIP Industries Ltd chose to consolidate and standardize its IT environment, implementing the SAP ERP application on one IBM System p5 520 and three p5-510s. The company also deployed a storage area network (SAN), based on an IBM System Storage DS4300T and IBM tape storage technologies. The Benefits With a single central information system, VIP Industries Ltd gains increased insight into operations, increasing transparency and helping to reduce inventory costs. Eliminating the need to collate and re-enter data has cut manual administrative workload by 80 per cent, while the simpler infrastructure and standardized software are helping to keep maintenance and development costs low. Key Solution Components Industry: Consumer products Applications: SAP ERP 5.0, with sales & distribution, financial accounting, controlling, production planning, materials management, quality management and human capital management applications, SAP NetWeaver Business Intelligence Hardware: IBM System p5 510 and 520 servers, IBM System Storage DS4300T, IBM TotalStorage 3581 Tape Library Software: IBM AIX 5L

VIP Industries Ltd, based in Mumbai, India, is a leading manufacturer of hard and soft luggage for the Asian and worldwide markets. The company operates from more than 20 locations in India, Dubai and Hong Kong, with three main manufacturing plants and 1,500 employees. The company achieves revenues of more than 4.7 billion rupees (US$ 117 million). Having grown to become one of the biggest brands in the Asian luggage market, VIP Industries Ltd is now looking to consolidate and to expand its export operation in other regions. To compete in a global marketplace, the company needs tight control of internal processes in order to keep overheads low. There is also a need for highly granular business reporting, to ensure accurate forecasting and prevent inefficiencies in the supply chain. However, VIP Industries Ltds IT infrastructure had grown organically with the companys expansion, and was unable to provide the level of detail required. The landscape consisted of a set of custom-

developed applications, distributed across 20 servers running Windows

software now has more than 130 users within the company. We wanted a centralized ERP solution that would help spread best practices throughout the company, explains T R Krishnamurthy. SAP is one of the industry leaders in ERP software, and we soon became convinced that the SAP ERP application would provide all the functionality we needed. To support the new SAP applications, VIP Industries Ltd worked with IBM to design an infrastructure based around IBM System p5 technologies. A single p5-520 handles the production workload, while three p5-510s are used for quality assurance, disaster recover and development. VIP Industries Ltd chose this infrastructure to provide maximum resilience at the optimum price point if the production server should break down, the others can take over the workload and keep operations online. This was a more cost-effective option for the company than an architecture based on larger virtualized servers. The IBM System p5 servers offer excellent performance for our SAP software environment, and we are very confident in their stability, says T R Krishnamurthy. Reliability is crucial because these servers support our manufacturing environment any downtime has a direct impact on the profitability of our production lines. Since implementing the new IBM solution, we have definitely experienced greater availability than we did with our previous infrastructure.

The IBM System p5 servers offer excellent performance for our SAP software environment, and we are very confident in their stability Since implementing the new IBM solution, we have definitely experienced greater availability than we did with our previous infrastructure.
T R Krishnamurthy Senior Manager IT VIP Industries Ltd.

NT. Managing 20 servers created a considerable workload for our IT staff, and the custom-built applications were expensive to develop and maintain, explains T R Krishnamurthy, Senior Manager IT at VIP Industries Ltd. Moreover, the integration between applications in different areas of our business left a lot to be desired to gain a clear picture of overall operations, we had to manually collate data in Excel spreadsheets, which was extremely time-consuming. Choosing a new landscape VIP Industries Ltd evaluated a number of different offerings before choosing a solution based on the SAP ERP application, including financial accounting, controlling, sales and distribution, production planning, materials management, quality management and human capital management applications, as well as the SAP NetWeaver Business Intelligence component. The SAP

Meeting storage needs With the introduction of the SAP applications, VIP Industries Ltd has gained the ability to analyze business data in a more granular fashion than was possible before. As a consequence, its data volumes have increased considerably. To meet its increasing data storage needs and provide headroom for future growth, the company decided to implement a storage area network (SAN). The ability to separate storage from data processing makes it far easier to manage our IT infrastructure and align it with business growth, explains T R Krishnamurthy. We chose the IBM System Storage DS4300T as the basis for our SAN because it offers us the ability to scale our storage landscape in a highly cost-effective manner. All the data for the companys SAP software environment is stored safely and efficiently by the DS4300T, and backed up using an IBM TotalStorage 3581 Tape Library. Streamlining business processes The IBM System p5 and SAN infrastructure is considerably easier to maintain and manage than the 20 physical servers that the company relied on previously, so IT staff no longer spend so much time on routine maintenance tasks and can focus instead on adding value to the business. Equally, with the whole company standardized on SAP software rather than custom-built applications, it is much easier to manage the software environment cutting the cost of development.

Workload for administrative staff has decreased by as much as 80 per cent, because there is no more need for collation of business data, adds T R Krishnamurthy. The SAP software provides a single repository for all data, so information can flow through the company in a much more streamlined fashion. In the coming months, the company is planning to introduce the Employee Self-Service and Manager SelfService components of SAP ERP Human Capital Management. The highly scalable IBM infrastructure will be able to support the growth of VIP Industries Ltds IT environment for this and other future projects. This solution from IBM and SAP has provided VIP Industries Ltd with a flexible, scalable IT landscape that offers high performance and excellent reliability while reducing workload for IT staff and administrators, concludes T R Krishnamurthy.
T R Krishnamurthy Senior Manager IT VIP Industries Ltd.

This solution from IBM and SAP has provided VIP Industries Ltd with a flexible, scalable IT landscape that offers high performance and excellent reliability while reducing workload for IT staff and administrators.

IBM Deutschland GmbH D-70548 Stuttgart ibm.com/solutions/sap IBM, the IBM logo, IBM System Storage, IBM System z, IBM System p, IBM System i, IBM System x, z/OS, z/VM, i5/OS, AIX, DB2, Domino, Lotus, Tivoli, Rational and WebSphere are trademarks or registered trademarks of International Business Machines Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both. Intel, the Intel logo, Intel Xeon and the Intel Xeon logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group in the United States and other countries. Linux is a trademark of Linus Torvalds in the United States, other countries, or both. Microsoft, Windows, Windows NT, and the Windows logo are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both. Other company, product or service names may be trademarks, or service marks of others. This case study illustrates how one IBM customer uses IBM and/or IBM Business Partner technologies/services. Many factors have contributed to the results and benefits described. IBM does not guarantee comparable results. All information contained herein was provided by the featured customer and/ or IBM Business Partner. IBM does not attest to its accuracy. All customer examples cited represent how some customers have used IBM products and the results they may have achieved. Actual environmental costs and performance characteristics will vary depending on individual customer configurations and conditions. This publication is for general guidance only. Photographs may show design models. Copyright IBM Corp. 2007 All Rights Reserved.

Copyright 2007 SAP AG SAP AG Dietmar-Hopp-Allee 16 D-69190 Walldorf SAP, the SAP logo, SAP and all other SAP products and services mentioned herein are trademarks or registered trademarks of SAP AG in Germany and several other countries. GK12-4317-00 (11/07)