Mirantis Case Studies China’s Retail Giant Unveils Massively Scalable, OpenStack-Based E-commerce and IaaS Platform

Edit This Case Study Record

	China’s Retail Giant Unveils Massively Scalable, OpenStack-Based E-commerce and IaaS Platform Mirantis

China’s Retail Giant Unveils Massively Scalable, OpenStack-Based E-commerce and IaaS Platform

Mirantis

Technology Category	Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - Cloud Computing Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - Cloud Storage Services
Applicable Industries	Retail
Applicable Functions	Business Operation Sales & Marketing
Use Cases	Retail Store Automation Supply Chain Visibility
Services	Cloud Planning, Design & Implementation Services System Integration
Challenge	Bailian Group, China's largest retailer, faced the challenge of transforming its business model from traditional brick and mortar to omni-channel business to keep up with the rapid growth of online commerce in China. The company's existing IT infrastructure was complex and not conducive to the fast-paced innovation required in the e-commerce sector. Low server utilization, long provisioning times, and high operating costs were impeding the company's growth in the omnichannel sales sector. The company needed a large-scale IT platform that would enable innovation and growth, with fast development, dynamic scaling, uncompromised availability, and low cost of operations. Read More
About Customer	Shanghai-based Bailian Group is China’s largest retailer with more than 6000 department stores, supermarkets, and outlets across 25 cities and provinces. With over one billion annual store visits, the state-owned enterprise has grown to become the nation’s 84th largest company. However, like other fast growth geographies, China’s retail business continues to transform from brick and mortar to online commerce. Mobile phone users in China reached 1.3 billion in 2015, and mobile internet access soared to over 400 million users. This massive mobile and online growth, combined with China’s entrepreneurial culture, brought major changes to the retail industry. New competitors now offer mobile, social and celebrity-based sales models, while established companies launched multi-channel retail that merges e-commerce with in-store services. Read More
Solution	Bailian Group chose to implement an OpenStack-based cloud platform to drive its business transformation. The company selected Mirantis as the vendor to guide their OpenStack platform design and development, impressed by the OpenStack Foundation’s continuous innovation and rich feature releases, as well as Mirantis’ strong IaaS, PaaS, and CI/CD experience. Bailian Group also selected the OpenStack managed services of UMCloud, a joint venture between Mirantis and UCloud. The company built a 20-node MVP using the latest OpenStack distribution and Fuel software to deploy and manage all cloud components. The architecture included Ceph distributed storage, neutron and OVS software defined networking, KVM virtualization, F5 load balancers, and the StackLight logging, monitoring and alerting toolchain. Read More Log in to view content
Contents

Technology Category

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - Cloud Computing

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - Cloud Storage Services

Applicable Industries

Retail

Applicable Functions

Business Operation

Sales & Marketing

Use Cases

Retail Store Automation

Supply Chain Visibility

Services

Cloud Planning, Design & Implementation Services

System Integration

Challenge

Bailian Group, China's largest retailer, faced the challenge of transforming its business model from traditional brick and mortar to omni-channel business to keep up with the rapid growth of online commerce in China. The company's existing IT infrastructure was complex and not conducive to the fast-paced innovation required in the e-commerce sector. Low server utilization, long provisioning times, and high operating costs were impeding the company's growth in the omnichannel sales sector. The company needed a large-scale IT platform that would enable innovation and growth, with fast development, dynamic scaling, uncompromised availability, and low cost of operations.

About Customer

Shanghai-based Bailian Group is China’s largest retailer with more than 6000 department stores, supermarkets, and outlets across 25 cities and provinces. With over one billion annual store visits, the state-owned enterprise has grown to become the nation’s 84th largest company. However, like other fast growth geographies, China’s retail business continues to transform from brick and mortar to online commerce. Mobile phone users in China reached 1.3 billion in 2015, and mobile internet access soared to over 400 million users. This massive mobile and online growth, combined with China’s entrepreneurial culture, brought major changes to the retail industry. New competitors now offer mobile, social and celebrity-based sales models, while established companies launched multi-channel retail that merges e-commerce with in-store services.

Solution

Bailian Group chose to implement an OpenStack-based cloud platform to drive its business transformation. The company selected Mirantis as the vendor to guide their OpenStack platform design and development, impressed by the OpenStack Foundation’s continuous innovation and rich feature releases, as well as Mirantis’ strong IaaS, PaaS, and CI/CD experience. Bailian Group also selected the OpenStack managed services of UMCloud, a joint venture between Mirantis and UCloud. The company built a 20-node MVP using the latest OpenStack distribution and Fuel software to deploy and manage all cloud components. The architecture included Ceph distributed storage, neutron and OVS software defined networking, KVM virtualization, F5 load balancers, and the StackLight logging, monitoring and alerting toolchain.

Impact #1	The OpenStack-based, e-commerce and IaaS platform proved its high availability and seamless switching between control nodes as services.
Impact #2	The IT team successfully completed deep optimization of the cloud platform including F5-based load balancing as a service, distributed Ceph storage, and Murano-based PaaS.
Impact #3	Developer creativity and innovation has increased, with developers now liberated from old processes and benefiting from faster application release cycles.

Impact #1

The OpenStack-based, e-commerce and IaaS platform proved its high availability and seamless switching between control nodes as services.

Impact #2

The IT team successfully completed deep optimization of the cloud platform including F5-based load balancing as a service, distributed Ceph storage, and Murano-based PaaS.

Impact #3

Developer creativity and innovation has increased, with developers now liberated from old processes and benefiting from faster application release cycles.

Benefit #1	Reduced IT costs and faster provisioning times.
Benefit #2	The platform is designed to scale fast and is expected to reach 300 nodes and 5000 VMs in the first phase of a three phase, five-year plan.
Benefit #3	Phase two goals aim to expand the OpenStack platform to 500 nodes across two data centers and more than 10,000 applications by the end of 2018.

Benefit #1

Reduced IT costs and faster provisioning times.

Benefit #2

The platform is designed to scale fast and is expected to reach 300 nodes and 5000 VMs in the first phase of a three phase, five-year plan.

Benefit #3

Phase two goals aim to expand the OpenStack platform to 500 nodes across two data centers and more than 10,000 applications by the end of 2018.

Download PDF Version

Overview

China’s Retail Giant Unveils Massively Scalable, OpenStack-Based E-commerce and IaaS Platform

Operational Impact

Quantitative Benefit