SMBC uses ReadyWorks to Manage its Most Successful Windows Upgrade

Challenge: One of the largest banks in Japan, SMBC, wanted to upgrade all desktops and laptops across its US operations. The growth of SaaS and Shadow IT meant that maintaining an accurate application inventory was a huge task for the endpoint management team. The need to coordinate thousands of end users across a mixed physical and virtual desktop environment, while also updating all US-based desktops was a daunting prospect. The team wanted a clear understanding of their application inventory so they could certify them before upgrading to Windows 10.

Having experienced challenges when managing a program of this type manually in the past, the team realized that they required a purpose-built system that would rapidly integrate with existing systems and collect and analyze application data. They chose ReadyWorks to reduce delivery costs, manage risk, and accelerate program timelines.

“Understanding our application inventory was a very manual process consisting of pulling data from multiple systems and analyzing the information with spreadsheets. We needed a better system including one that automated communications and scheduling.”

Solution: The firm built an upgrade pilot program to test the Windows 10 new build and used ReadyWorks as the command and control platform. This successful pilot led to the selection of ReadyWorks to manage the production migration.

SMBC was able to:

• Eliminate the equivalent of a year’s worth of labor for one resource.
• Reduce security and compliance exposure.
• Gain an accurate application inventory.
• Use a command and control platform for ongoing management of the Windows environment.

ReadyWorks enabled this through:

• System Integration: ReadyWorks connected to SMB’s various data sources to deliver an accurate inventory of locally and remotely accessed applications.
• Data Intelligence: With accurate, real-time application readiness reports, a reduced project team could analyze data and react rapidly, to manage rationalization programs and to use application readiness to build upgrade schedules and communications plans. Windows servicing reports allowed the team to manage the twice-yearly Windows updates.
• Orchestration & Automation: ReadyWorks enabled the team to automate the application certification process. The user experience was further enhanced by the ability for users to self-schedule their upgrade using ReadyWorks.

“ReadyWorks saved our team at least 1 year of work for a project manager during our Windows 10 migration project – particularly in organizing, managing, and automating the application certification process – and delivered a far better end user experience than previous projects.”