Reference story - Sappi Fine Paper Europe

The Challenge

In August 2008, Sappi Fine Paper Europe started preparing for the acquisition of the coated graphic paper business, M-real in Finland. As of January 1, 2009 – Day One – the IT systems at two paper mills in Finland, one in Germany and one in Switzerland as well as the sales offices would need to be integrated with the Sappi IT infrastructure. To prepare for this sudden expansion, which would mean an additional 1,300 employees,

Sappi created an architectural design of a completely new IT environment. “We did not have access to the paper mills before Day One, nor were we allowed to look at the IT systems and desktops at M-real,” said Dennis de Baar, IT Director at Sappi Fine Paper Europe. “We needed to create a user workspace which would allow our new colleagues to become part of Sappi on Day One, without changing anything in the existing infrastructure at M-real.  During this phase, the new environment would have to be fully web-based and capable of running on desktops that were not being managed by Sappi. After further integration during phase two, the workspace would need to easily scale up to both fat clients and thin clients without changing the look and feel of the user experience while remaining manageable and cost effective.”

The Solution

When the acquisition was approved, Sappi and RealDolmen, a RES Software partner, built a datacenter in Austria, running Citrix XenApp, Enterprise Edition on Window Server 2003 systems. To further optimize IT, application streaming using Citrix application streaming and enhanced printing using Thinprint, were also introduced. All 1,300 new employees were given access to a web-based published and virtualized desktop under the management of RES PowerFuse. The workspace delivered, using the RES Software solution, was used to design a standardized desktop workspace and restrict user access only to essential applications such as SAP, Outlook and a few others. “Our new paper mills’ first orders were processed on January 2 and the first invoice was issued just three days later. Considering the short time frame, everything went very smoothly,” continued de Baar. ”All this was possible without changes to M-real’s local desktops or its network.”  Following this rapid integration, Sappi completely renewed the IT at the new mills. The employees were provided with new desktops: thin clients, fat clients and laptops running a published desktop managed by RES PowerFuse.  This desktop is identical to the web-based workspace used in phase one but now it includes a lot more applications.

The Benefits

The acquisition presented the opportunity of implementing a modern network that could be built from scratch. “We were in a luxury position because the IT at the new mills was entirely leased and outsourced meaning that we had to buy new software, servers and desktops,” added Werner Godaert, IT architect at Sappi. “Although it is difficult to pinpoint the exact savings made by using RES PowerFuse to manage the desktop, we are absolutely convinced that a RES powerfused desktop is the way forward. Cost savings are based on soft factors, which are an important part of the total cost of ownership of PCs. Application whitelists within RES PowerFuse allow us to restrict users when installing applications themselves. It also enables location-dependent applications: some applications on laptops cannot run when connected to the LAN but are allowed when offline.”

In addition, Sappi automated settings in the user workspace, such as Windows´ Group Policy, that previously needed to be configured manually. RES PowerFuse is much faster and easier to manage than traditional solutions. Changing default printers for users, initializing e-mail profiles and other settings can now be done with a few mouse clicks. On the Citrix XenApp site, restricting the number of times a user can start an application also prevents servers hogging resources. “It is all about the user experience, which RES PowerFuse standardizes, creating a responsive user workspace.”

Sappi’s goal is to migrate to thin clients wherever possible, using fat clients only where necessary. Some measurement applications, for example, need dedicated adapters and additional local applications. “For us, the power of RES PowerFuse lies in its ability to deliver exactly the same user workspace to both thin clients and fat clients using the RES Workspace Extender. When streamed applications do not run on the centralized Citrix XenApp environment, it´s easy to stream them to the physical desktop and run them locally,” concluded de Baar.” The RES Workspace Extender seamlessly presents the local application as a subscribed application within the remote desktop. This has enabled us to build a cost-efficient and easy-to-manage workspace delivery solution, based on the best software product available.”

With RES PowerFuse being part of all physical desktops and on all terminal servers, the user workspace is identical on thin clients, fat clients and even on laptops. Based on Sappi's observations concerning the initial PowerFuse roll-out at the acquired m-real paper mills, the project to roll out this new workspace delivery model to the rest of its 3,000 desktops in Europe already has started.

Benefit Overview

• Creates an easy-to-manage, uniform user workspace on all end-user devices
• Restrictions and policies reduce soft (end-user) costs
• Simplifies administration of user workspaces
• Integrates seamlessly with VMware Thinapp, Citrix XenApp and Thinprint
• Enables transparent access to published and locally streamed applications

• RESOURCES
• SOFTWARE DOWNLOADS
• WHITE PAPERS
• REFERENCE CASES
• TECHNOLOGY PAPERS
• PRODUCT INFO
• ANALYST REPORTS
• MEDIA CENTER
• TRAINING
• KNOWLEDGE BASE
• COMMUNITY
• EVENTS
• CUSTOMERS