For more than a century, Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise (ALE) has served as one of the world’s leading networking, communications and cloud solutions providers, shaping the world of communication as we know it. ALE’s vision to connect people, machines, things and processes through the power of technology, has manifested into a powerful history of creating memorable digital experiences for millions of customers. ALE’s imprint can be found everywhere. For example, ALE’s footprint is visible across the newest Paris subway lines, where our switches enable a multiservice network connecting surveillance cameras, voice announcements and passenger information systems to enhance security and communication.
Behind the scenes, ALE’s IT teams are responsible for ensuring that connections remain strong every day for enterprise clients across the globe. Two of the leaders safeguarding that mission is CIO, Jean-Pierre Roullin, and IT Governance Director, Stéphane Roussotte, who have worked together at ALE for nearly 20 years. They both heavily collaborate with the Senior Director of Infrastructure & Networks, Dnyanesh Samant, who oversees hands-on operational environments.
“ALE was carved out of the larger entity to focus on enterprise needs like communication systems and networking. As a concentrated team, we’re fast-moving, and have the autonomy to lead innovation projects and make impactful changes and improvements where most needed,” Roullin said.
Reacting to Broadcom’s VMware support price hikes
In 2019, ALE began its search for a solution to address the rising cost of vendor support for its Oracle Database system. Rimini Support™ for Oracle Database was selected for its value, quality, speed and unique ERP expertise.
Rimini Street’s third-party software support services provide clients with:
- A dedicated, named Primary Support Engineer (PSE) from a team of PSEs averaging 20+ years of experience, backed by a global team of hundreds of highly experienced engineers and professionals
- Guaranteed SLA of 10-minutes or less for priority cases, delivered on average in less than 2 minutes, from a senior engineer 24/7/365
- Patented and proprietary AI-powered applications to automate case routing and assignment
- Customization support at no additional cost
- No forced upgrades to remain fully supported
- Up to 50% off annual vendor software support fees
Roullin recalled, “We were skeptical by the proposal to halve our support costs yet provide us full service. However, after experiencing the quality of support for Oracle Database, we realized Rimini Street actually had the capacity to help us as an ongoing partner.”
The confidence and strong relationship Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise established with Rimini Street proved critical when the team was determining its path forward with service support for their VMware investments. “After the Broadcom purchase of VMware, there was a huge spike in license costs, so that was a trigger for us to look at other options,” Roullin said. Replacing VMware entirely was an option, but not a simple one. “We looked at moving to another platform, but it seemed easier to stick to what we had with different support,” Roullin continued.
“Around this time, Rimini Street announced a new VMware support offering. It was perfect timing,” Roussotte said. “While the cost escalation served as a catalyst for exploring third-party support alternatives, we knew from our successful, ongoing engagement with Rimini Street that it was a no-brainer to go for it,” added Roullin.
Leveraging Rimini Street’s VMware expertise and commitment
Samant was the first to experience the power of Rimini Support™ for VMware. During a routine vCenter certificate replacement, ALE encountered a critical situation. Initially categorized as a moderate priority incident, the issue escalated when certificate update attempts repeatedly failed, threatening their production environments. “The failed certificate update jeopardized our vCenter operations, risking potential downtime for all virtualized workloads. This could have impacted business-critical applications, disrupted IT services and violated our operational SLA commitments,” Samant detailed. “Time was critical as certificate expiration would have caused complete vCenter unavailability.”
“Rimini Street’s team provided structured guidance starting with test environment validation. When standard procedures failed, they immediately escalated to P1 support and arranged collaborative online sessions. Their engineers worked directly with our team through multiple maintenance windows, including weekends. Through persistent troubleshooting and hands-on assistance, they successfully resolved the certificate update and ensured all services returned to normal operation,” Samant recalled. “Rimini Street demonstrated a genuine commitment to our success, working through complex scenarios in our lab environment and providing proactive guidance rather than reactive ticket responses. This collaborative approach has built even more confidence and trust between our organizations.”
With issues resolved quickly and accurately, ALE’s team has found peace of mind knowing Rimini Street is by their side. “This P1 incident proved their support model works under pressure with direct engineer access, weekend availability and persistent problem-solving until resolution. Rimini Street delivered enterprise-grade support that exceeded our previous OEM experience, demonstrating their unique ability to provide both financial savings and operational excellence,” Samant said.
Fueling the future with a proven partnership
“Rimini Street helps us save a significant amount on people, time and money which allowed us to reallocate budget to innovation and strategic projects that we couldn’t do otherwise, including cloud projects and AI,” Roullin said.
Roullin also noted the advisory qualities of the Rimini Street relationship, where collaboration flourishes with his internal teams and extends to ALE’s contractors. “Our contractors also heavily rely on Rimini Street’s expertise, and I don’t hesitate to reach out when I believe that they can bring expertise or experience,” Roussotte said. “When we made the move to cloud, we requested feedback from Rimini Street on ways to minimize risks. We know that they are always there to help us achieve our business goals, and that’s why this is such a good partnership.”
Samant affirmed, “During our most critical VMware infrastructure challenge, Rimini Street delivered exceptional support characterized by technical expertise, genuine urgency and unwavering commitment.” He continued, “The move to Rimini Support for Oracle and VMware has been transformative for our organization, and we confidently recommend Rimini Street to peers who want quality support for critical systems and deep value that continues to grow over the years.” Roullin confirmed, “Considering the good experience we’ve had, Rimini Street will be at the top of our list for future business needs.”
“Our Rimini Street relationship transcends typical vendor arrangements. It’s a genuine partnership where their team functions as an extension of our IT organization,” Samant emphasized.
Our solutions for Alcatel-Lucent
Receive comprehensive enterprise software support from a proven provider. Whether you need issue resolution, performance tuning or regulatory compliance, you can trust Rimini Support™ to deliver.
With Rimini Support, you gain:
- Support for customizations not covered by the vendor
- The strength and knowledge of hundreds of seasoned engineers on your team, but not on your payroll
- Potential savings of up to 90% of total support costs
Receive comprehensive enterprise software support from a proven provider. Whether you need issue resolution, performance tuning or regulatory compliance, you can trust Rimini Support™ to deliver.
With Rimini Support, you gain:
- Support for customizations not covered by the vendor
- The strength and knowledge of hundreds of seasoned engineers on your team, but not on your payroll
- Potential savings of up to 90% of total support costs
Additional resources
Clients running VMware choose industry-leading support and services from Rimini Street, avoiding costly price increases and buying the time and flexibility needed to determine their future virtualization strategy LAS VEGAS – September 18, 2024 – Rimini Street, Inc. (Nasdaq: RMNI), a global provider of end-to-end enterprise software support, products and services, the leading third-party support […]
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