In today’s dynamic global economy, organizations in nearly all sectors are subject to shifts in the marketplace, experiencing periods of high growth as well as slumps. If your organization is like most, when a downturn occurs, you may start to think about trimming operational expenditures. Often, one of the largest budget line items, aside from personnel, is Oracle licensing, support and maintenance fees.
How can you reduce your spend while still getting the level of support you need to function successfully in a competitive market? Take a cue from ESCO, a division of The Weir Group PLC.
When you know it’s time to switch to third-party support
ESCO has been a leading manufacturer of engineered wear and replacement products for mining, construction and industrial applications since 1913. When global commodities and industrial growth started to decline a few years ago, ESCO decided to reassess its operational expenses. With customers reducing their equipment investments, ESCO Vice President of Information Technology Jim Williamson was looking for ways to cut costs – and Oracle support fees topped the list.
Aside from the high costs, ESCO was having other issues with Oracle support. All too often, Oracle took a long time to resolve issues – sometimes as much as 45 days. And, because ESCO has multiple customizations, the IT team found that just logging service requests became complicated and required workarounds. Complexity and lack of timely resolution bogged them down, and these problems ultimately trickled down to business users. Clearly, it was apparent to Williamson that ESCO was overpaying for support.
Talk to the analysts and your peers
Though ESCO always took a cautious and conservative stance with respect to third-party support services, Williamson did his research and believed that this was the best way to cut IT spend and optimize its Oracle solutions. For Williamson, reputation really matters. After communicating with Gartner and getting positive feedback from current Rimini Street customers, he decided that Rimini Street would be the best fit. “I love companies built around customer service,” he says.
Gain agility by freeing up your budget for strategic projects
Best of all, engaging with Rimini Street has enabled ESCO to do some resource re-allocation.
Now ESCO is in a position to adjust its business goals in the face of a changing global economy. Recently, ESCO has refocused its attention and resources on building a digital catalog and developing new IoT-enabled solutions and mobile apps as part of the ESCO portfolio that customers use to manage their critical assets. Signing up with Rimini Street Support Services for Oracle E-Business Suite 12.1.3 and Oracle Database 12.1.02, has resulted in a number of positive outcomes for ESCO, namely:
- Substantial support cost reduction: A 50 percent savings over ESCO’s previous annual Oracle support and maintenance costs.
- Superior support quality: Faster and more efficient issue resolution and customization support, enabling ESCO’s IT team to spend more time on strategic projects that help drive the business forward.
- Greater flexibility: Increased confidence in the ability to run its current Oracle applications and database for several years, so that ESCO can plan its application strategy for the future at a pace that is comfortable for them – while freeing up funds for strategic growth.
Rather than being burdened by a costly support model that no longer satisfied their needs, ESCO’s decision to align with Rimini Street has streamlined support processes, has provided additional value through support for customizations and has enabled the organization to avoid unnecessary and expensive upgrades and infrastructure changes. Williamson sees no reason to replace ESCO’s ERP solution for quite some time. As he asserts, “right now we are in a sweet spot.”
Here’s how Williamson sums it all up: “After preparing a solid roadmap and clear steps, our transition to Rimini Street was smooth. We now have a primary support engineer, various levels of access by phone or email and weekly conference calls with the support engineers who are working on any active tickets. Our support quality has vastly improved.”
Get more details about how Rimini Street helped ESCO trim their IT spend, improve the quality of support and maintenance for their Oracle solutions, and map out an exciting new path for their business.