While supply chain disruptions have been exacerbated by current macroeconomic conditions, Sunningdale Tech Ltd, a Singapore-based precision plastics engineering company has taken to the cloud to weather evolving global supply chain challenges.
With 17 manufacturing plants across nine countries – USA, Mexico, India, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, China, and Latvia, Sunningdale provides one-stop turnkey plastics solutions for industries including healthcare, automotive, consumer and IT. Through processes such as mold fabrication, injection molding, and precision assembly, the plastic components manufactured have various uses including medical devices for COVID-19 testing, robotics surgery, genome sequencing, and automotive parts such as stereo systems, navigation systems and speedometers.
Benson Ang, Manufacturing Program Lead at Microsoft said “As a leading manufacturer and trusted strategic partner, we believe that digital transformation is key to helping enterprises future-proof their business. We’ve seen impact at scale in the Microsoft Cloud with Sunningdale, as it shaped its culture of collaboration while boosting business productivity. We hope to continue working with Sunningdale to accelerate transformation as we empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more.”
Taking the first steps into the Microsoft Cloud
Sunningdale previously relied heavily on an on-premise infrastructure for its operations, which included incompatible third-party applications. This was compounded by complex licensing, with each app or platform requiring a different license.
Recognizing the inefficiency of hosting critical and sensitive workloads in a disparate environment, Sunningdale sought a consolidated digital platform that would allow it to continue hosting some applications on-premises while ensuring uncompromised costs and security.
Besides hardware and software upgrades, Sunningdale recognized the importance digitalization would play in building an empowering culture by providing employees with the right collaborative tools and resources to work and connect securely, no matter where they were located in the world.
Unlocking success with hassle-free cloud migration
To ensure a seamless transition and migration to the cloud, Sunningdale worked with Microsoft and its trusted partner SoftwareONE. This collaboration allowed Sunningdale to simplify its product licensing management process, so it could now pay for a single software-as-a-service subscription instead of going through different channels and payments for separate software licenses.
Implementation support to help Sunningdale with their migration process was provided by Microsoft FastTrack, a service that helps customers onboard Microsoft cloud solutions and drive user adoption. SAP S/4HANA on Azure was Sunningdale’s pick to ensure maximum operational performance and scalability without compromising capacity, as it could run in both local and cloud environments.
This new cost-efficient solution has given the company flexibility to scale operations based on evolving business needs without impacting costs or capacity. With the cloud transition, on-premise servers in Sunningdale’s headquarters effectively downsized from 94 to 62, which optimized resources and saved costs.
Enabling secure, seamless collaboration in the cloud
As enterprises become increasingly distributed in a world of hybrid work, online meetings and the exchange of business-critical documents and information have become a vital part of employees’ workflow. Sunningdale’s transition to the Microsoft Cloud helped empowering employees to collaborate securely and flexibly in a hybrid world of work.
With its migration to the cloud, Sunningdale can connect its on-premise networks to Microsoft 365 (M365) with Azure ExpressRoute. This enables Sunningdale employees from various locations around the world to collaborate conveniently and efficiently – they can hold meetings online and share files through SharePoint with anyone within the company.
The system encrypts data both at rest and in transit, with technologies including Transport Layer Security/Secure Sockets Layer (TLS/SSL), Internet Protocol Security (IPSec), and Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) which runs regular updates automatically. The security upgrade is in line with Sunningdale’s new focus on security and threat protection as they gear up to service bigger clients.
Stepping into the future of manufacturing
As technology continues to enable change and improve productivity in the workplace, Sunningdale also plans to leverage mixed reality through HoloLens for business visits, so virtual meetings can take place even when participants cannot be present in person. This will allow Sunningdale to develop a wide variety of HoloLens-driven use cases in the future with a combination of Microsoft cloud solutions, including the enablement of smart manufacturing using Microsoft Dynamics 365 Remote Assist as well as more realistic virtual visits. This was made a reality when one of Sunningdale’s engineers conducted a demo for a customer who was unable to travel to the Singapore factory.
To reach its goals, expand its resources and skill sets to increase its expertise, Sunningdale will continue to work Microsoft for both hands-on and online training for its employees.
About Microsoft
Microsoft (Nasdaq “MSFT” @microsoft) enables digital transformation for the era of an intelligent cloud and an intelligent edge. Its mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more.