IBM Case Studies Meeting the needs of a growing SAP environment with smart IBM storage

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	Meeting the needs of a growing SAP environment with smart IBM storage IBM

Meeting the needs of a growing SAP environment with smart IBM storage

IBM

Technology Category	Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - Cloud Storage Services Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - Hybrid Cloud
Applicable Industries	Metals
Applicable Functions	Discrete Manufacturing Human Resources
Use Cases	Factory Operations Visibility & Intelligence Predictive Maintenance
Services	Cloud Planning, Design & Implementation Services System Integration
Challenge	Severstal, one of the world’s leading vertically integrated steel and steel-related mining companies, has built one of the largest SAP ERP environments in Russia over the past seven years. The SAP landscape is constantly evolving to meet new business requirements, such as introducing SAP Advanced Planner and Optimizer for supply chain management, and SAP Mobile Platform for anytime, anywhere access to SAP applications. However, introducing these new functionalities, increasing the user-base and gaining deeper insight into operations all come at a price. The volume of data in the SAP environment was increasing rapidly, and performance was beginning to suffer. Severstal was faced with the challenge of designing a storage landscape that would scale to meet its future needs, while avoiding the expense of replacing all its existing storage systems. Read More
About Customer	Severstal is one of the world’s leading vertically integrated steel and steel-related mining companies, with assets in Russia, Latvia, Ukraine, Poland, Italy and Liberia. It has approximately 61,000 employees, and generated revenues of USD13.31 billion in 2013. Over the past seven years, Severstal has built one of the largest SAP ERP environments in Russia, supporting operational processes such as planning, production and plant maintenance for both its mining and steel divisions. The SAP landscape is constantly evolving to meet new business requirements. For example, this year, Severstal introduced SAP Advanced Planner and Optimizer for supply chain management, and SAP Mobile Platform to give employees anytime, anywhere access to SAP applications. Next year, it plans to introduce SAP Supplier Relationship Management too. Read More
Solution	Severstal decided to work with IBM to build a smarter storage landscape. The solution uses IBM System Storage® SAN Volume Controller to create a single virtualized “pool” of storage, which includes Severstal’s existing storage systems and also introduces the IBM FlashSystem V840. Two IBM Real-time Compression Appliance™ solutions are used to compress the company’s data during backup, freeing up significant space previously used for SAP data, Oracle, VMware and the company’s email system. IBM Tivoli® Storage Manager is used to manage the tiering of the storage landscape. It automatically moves older, less important or less frequently accessed files onto lower-cost, higher-capacity storage, as well as managing the company’s backups and restores. The IBM FlashSystem platform’s all-flash array provides extremely high throughput for the data-intensive workloads generated by Severstal’s SAP applications. Read More Log in to view content
Contents

Technology Category

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - Cloud Storage Services

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - Hybrid Cloud

Applicable Industries

Metals

Applicable Functions

Discrete Manufacturing

Human Resources

Use Cases

Factory Operations Visibility & Intelligence

Predictive Maintenance

Services

Cloud Planning, Design & Implementation Services

System Integration

Challenge

Severstal, one of the world’s leading vertically integrated steel and steel-related mining companies, has built one of the largest SAP ERP environments in Russia over the past seven years. The SAP landscape is constantly evolving to meet new business requirements, such as introducing SAP Advanced Planner and Optimizer for supply chain management, and SAP Mobile Platform for anytime, anywhere access to SAP applications. However, introducing these new functionalities, increasing the user-base and gaining deeper insight into operations all come at a price. The volume of data in the SAP environment was increasing rapidly, and performance was beginning to suffer. Severstal was faced with the challenge of designing a storage landscape that would scale to meet its future needs, while avoiding the expense of replacing all its existing storage systems.

About Customer

Severstal is one of the world’s leading vertically integrated steel and steel-related mining companies, with assets in Russia, Latvia, Ukraine, Poland, Italy and Liberia. It has approximately 61,000 employees, and generated revenues of USD13.31 billion in 2013. Over the past seven years, Severstal has built one of the largest SAP ERP environments in Russia, supporting operational processes such as planning, production and plant maintenance for both its mining and steel divisions. The SAP landscape is constantly evolving to meet new business requirements. For example, this year, Severstal introduced SAP Advanced Planner and Optimizer for supply chain management, and SAP Mobile Platform to give employees anytime, anywhere access to SAP applications. Next year, it plans to introduce SAP Supplier Relationship Management too.

Solution

Severstal decided to work with IBM to build a smarter storage landscape. The solution uses IBM System Storage® SAN Volume Controller to create a single virtualized “pool” of storage, which includes Severstal’s existing storage systems and also introduces the IBM FlashSystem V840. Two IBM Real-time Compression Appliance™ solutions are used to compress the company’s data during backup, freeing up significant space previously used for SAP data, Oracle, VMware and the company’s email system. IBM Tivoli® Storage Manager is used to manage the tiering of the storage landscape. It automatically moves older, less important or less frequently accessed files onto lower-cost, higher-capacity storage, as well as managing the company’s backups and restores. The IBM FlashSystem platform’s all-flash array provides extremely high throughput for the data-intensive workloads generated by Severstal’s SAP applications.

Impact #1	SAP response speeds are twice as fast
Impact #2	The salary calculation process has been accelerated from 12 hours to five
Impact #3	Compression frees up to 66 percent more space in the SAP environment

Impact #1

SAP response speeds are twice as fast

Impact #2

The salary calculation process has been accelerated from 12 hours to five

Impact #3

Compression frees up to 66 percent more space in the SAP environment

Benefit #1	SAP response times cut by 50 percent
Benefit #2	Salary calculation process accelerated from 12 hours to five
Benefit #3	Compression frees up 66 percent more space in the SAP environment

Benefit #1

SAP response times cut by 50 percent

Benefit #2

Salary calculation process accelerated from 12 hours to five

Benefit #3

Compression frees up 66 percent more space in the SAP environment

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Overview

Meeting the needs of a growing SAP environment with smart IBM storage

Operational Impact

Quantitative Benefit