Toy Store completed migration from IBM Lotus to Exchange Server 2013

On July 15, 2015 the Toy Store group announced end of the first stage of an implementation project of Microsoft Exchange "Toy Store"^[1].

Project Tasks

The safe mail service providing the organization of work with a large number of data and archiving was required for the company. Updating was required by the Lotus system which the company used before transition to products of Microsoft. As a part of the platform a mail service, the calendar and service of instant messages.

Toy Store, 2013

For several years of use, the company exhausted conveniences of service. In addition to lack of an opportunity to consider time zones in the calendar, the company received confusion at meetings, reports and other inconveniences. In addition, Lotus has no opportunities of automatic update.

The company had a choice: update the current license Lotus to the latest version or pick up something else. The solution of Microsoft attracted the company with the number of licenses and technical flexibility.

Sergey Kondarev, the director of the department of information technologies of Toy Store group, told: "Perhaps, "last straw" it is possible to call a case when we had "to dig out" the remote letter literally. The matter is that the flow of incoming correspondence quickly took away all memory of servers, their work slowed down and resulted in incorrect results. We had "to clean" constantly a mailbox – we decided for ourselves that time in half a year it needs to be done somehow to unload servers. But in our work as a time correspondence of year and biennial prescription is necessary. Only one precedent, and we understood that it is time to change something. Before department of IT, there was, in fact, a choice meanwhile to solve the current problems or to move further. But if all of us directed resources to the current tasks, then we could not conform to market demands to the modern company and answer calls of competitors. Taking into account that we are in an active phase of development of retail network of Toy Store across the territory of Russia, our strategy was in to being sprayed and whenever possible to involve professional specialists in the industry, delegating it a part of tasks".

Project Progress

At the beginning of July, 2015 the first stage of implementation of Microsoft Exchange service was completed.

The company transferred service of e-mail to HCloud – a virtual data processing center.

Stage result

According to the Chief information officer Sergey Kondarev, he estimated efficiency of the project perfectly well.

- The flexibility and examination of partners allowed us not only to solve the problems, but also it is essential to save the budget. By the generalized calculations, costs for infrastructure service of solutions of IBM and Microsoft differ approximately by 58 times. Convenience of control of a system, flexibility in setup of jobs, tracking of traffic and permanent monitoring of storage where our data are concentrated – all this allows us to say that we made a right choice. If to speak about elementary processes, then, for example, such simple action as opening of e-mail notification, takes in a product of Microsoft three times less time, than in Lotus. Opening of the application in the letter demands twice less time from the user of Microsoft Exchange, than the user of Lotus will spend, and search of the necessary letter happens in Microsoft eight times faster. Having increased these seconds by the number of employees and daily repeated repeated transactions, we will receive tens of saved hours at the exit. I cannot but note also human relation from colleagues from Microsoft and their attentive relation. Both technical support, and a team of managers – at height, - Sergey Kondarev told.

2016: Project Implementation

On March 10, 2016 Softline announced completion of migration of corporate mail of Toy Store company on the solution Microsoft Exchange.

The fault tolerance of a system is provided thanks to placement of a solution architecture on three servers. For decrease in influence of Microsoft Exchange on the existing customer's infrastructure, in particular, on complex structure of the Active Directory directory a mail system was unrolled according to the scheme of the resource wood: the Exchange 2013 organization is developed in one forest, and accounts of mailboxes are in another.

Important task was also smooth operation of users at a migratory stage. Content of mailboxes was safely transferred from IBM of Lotus Domino to Exchange using the software solution Dell Migrator for Notes to Exchange (MNE).

Result of works

Earlier infrastructure of the mail solution was constructed on the servers located in different branches of the customer. The solution Microsoft Exchange consolidated corporate mail in one DPC that increased its controllability and reliability. The new solution allowed to increase considerably the volume of mailboxes, excluded duplication of data: Lotus Domino used own directory service while Microsoft Exchange addresses the Active Directory. The problem of mobile access to mail which is provided using ActiveSync is also solved thanks to what employees always stay in touch and can quickly resolve the arising issues. The service of calendars does not glitch therefore the confusion at meetings does not arise. Sergey Zharov, project manager of Management of solutions of Softline company

Thanks to migration on a new system we managed to reduce costs for infrastructure service significantly. We also avoided additional expenses using mobile access, now it is possible not to implement the additional software, and flexible approach to acquisition of licenses. Archiving allowed to exclude data loss and to avoid repeated procedures for the optimization of information volume which is stored in mailboxes of users. Sergey Kondarev, the board member - the director of the department of IT of JSC Toy Store

Notes