Server Consolidation

Continued from page: 3

Tuesday, September 06, 2005

Mahindra & Mahindra:  Project Sankraman

Scenario: M&M had a distributed implementation of SAP R/3 since 1997 at different locations. At that time SAP R/3 did not support Indian taxation requirements and auto industry-specific processes. Workaround solutions called 'Mahindra Add-ons or z-programs' were developed by MCL (Mahindra Consulting Ltd). Though these met the requirements, the performance of the system was affected. After they had realized the benefits from ERP, supply chain planning & execution, business intelligence, and connecting partners. The new dimension products (APO, BW) implemented to meet the changed requirements necessitated an upgrade of the R/3 system to version 4.6B. This was done in 2001. The latest in the upgrade until June 2004 was R/3 Enterprise version 4.7. It had better functionality, catered to Indian taxation and auto industry-specific processes (as it used the z-programs). It was then that M&M decided to take advantage of the new and improved technology making way in India. They wanted to do away with the z-programs as the maintenance costs were high and data consolidation was cumbersome.

The distributed environment had inherent problems. Two servers communicating with each other on a gigabit LAN was not possible in a distributed environment. So came the idea of making use of consolidating the system on a single server due to a marked improvement in the communication infrastructure. M&M then went for data center consolidation has already been done at Kandivli with all M&M servers at Worli and all R/3 servers from Nashik, Igatpuri, Zaheerabad and Nagpur co-located at Kandivli data center. 

In order to take maximum advantage of the improved functionality, rectify insufficiencies of earlier implementation, avoid working with sub-optimal work around solutions created in house, do away with delays in consolidation of information and data transfer, and incurring the cost of maintaining around 55 servers (20 Database Servers and 33 Application/DRS servers) with operating difficulties in server wise back up, patch upgrades and version upgrades-M&M decided to opt for server consolidation with fresh implementation of SAP R/3 Enterprise version 4.7. This would implement R/3 Enterprise on a single consolidated server with ease of maintenance on enhanced technology platform, also allowing inefficiency due to z programs be reduced to minimum. To add, no version upgrade would be needed till 2009 for core R/3. This would enable them use the enhanced functionalities on an improved platform with ease of operation and effective data transfer between systems.

Value propositions:
SAP R/3 E 4.7 would provide an advanced ERP base for advanced versions of new dimension SAP products like IS-Auto, SRM, CRM, etc within the organization. With this, they would be able to exploit the new technology platform provided by SAP and effectively meet the business requirements like vehicle sequencing, vehicle tracking, warranty management, etc.

Functionality would improve, especially with respect to India-specific requirements and auto industry specific requirements and rectify the insufficiencies of earlier implementation. As the number of servers will reduce and all of them will be centrally located, the efforts required to maintain the same will reduce proportionately. Facilities management teams can ensure better support in authorization, application of support patches; version upgrades and data backup. The time and efforts currently spent to clear the stuck i-docs from diverse systems would be saved. Consolidation of information and data transfer will be in a single server without any delay with reduced time and efforts in periodic consolidation of information and data flow.

Currently on account of separate servers lot of efforts are invested in consolidation of information and data flow thru 'ALE', data upload, etc. This will get eliminated and integrated data will be available in one server. With its implementation, this is expected to improve data visibility and facilitate decision-making (inventory control, production planning, funds planning etc across the plants/company). Company-wide analytics can now be generated from single consolidated server. This would also result in reduction of time in period closing of accounts on monthly, quarterly as well as annual basis. The benefits that server consolidation brings in by upgrading to R/3 Enterprise include:

• Latest application platform, ie Web Application server 6.20
• Flexible upgrade strategies
• Integration of CIN with standard SAP
• Supports future developments (collaborative infrastructure)

The corporate IT team after study of various options decided to go in for UNIX based servers for its R/3 database. IBM P5 with AIX was chosen after in depth evaluation. M&M also decided to deploy the existing Intel-based servers as application servers with Win 2003. The state of the art datacenter at Kandivli, which has won the best NCPI (Network Critical Physical Infrastructure) award, provided for redundancy of power, network and air-conditioning.

CISCO Routers and switches are used all across the landscape. Leased lines and MPLS connectivity connect all manufacturing plant locations. Spare parts depots; various area sales offices and branch offices are connected by MPLS technology provided by BSNL. While the expected life of the project is 5 years, it took less than a month to get completed successfully. 

With inputs from Krishna H Nabar, Head – Business Solutions, Corporate IT, Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd

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