Diligence and detail ensure a smooth MobileIron migration.

The Organisation

Diligenta is a UK based Financial Conduct Authority (FCA)-regulated subsidiary of Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), the world’s leading IT consulting, services and business process outsourcing (BPO) organisation.

It is the second largest player in the Life and Pension BPO space, administering over 6.5 million open- and closed-book live policies on behalf of its clients.

The Challenge

It’s been an interesting ride for the financial sector. The ill wind that roared through it during the recession, and the aftermath of new and tighter regulation, have also prompted the adoption of new, agile and customer-focused business models for some highly traditional institutions.

Diligenta has been a leader in the transformation, offering specialist business process outsourcing that allows its customers to focus on their core activities.

Migration driven by growth.

But rapid growth always creates challenges of its own, especially when it involves acquisition. Diligenta found itself with a variety of IT platforms to manage and – as far as possible – to integrate.
Having been an early adopter of BlackBerry, the company operated successfully with an infrastructure that incorporated IBM Domino and Notes at offices in Peterborough and Basingstoke, and Microsoft Exchange in Liverpool.

The BlackBerry Enterprise Service 5 (BES5) provided some integration with the corporate environment, but eventually the increasingly mobile nature of working life called for a radical change of approach. Many people were already using their own iOS and Android devices alongside their corporate BlackBerry smartphones and it was decided to adopt bring-your-own-device (BYOD) as official policy.

Proving the case for BYOD.

“This was a key strategic change for us,” explains Guy Harwood, Infrastructure Project Manager for Diligenta. “Migrations of this kind are driven by business need and it was essential to pick the right approach, with solutions that would support our long-term ambitions as a company.”

For this reason, Diligenta subjected the candidate technologies for the mobile elements of the migration to a long and rigorous test.

“We had been using Lotus Notes Traveller for the basics of mobile security,” says Guy Harwood, “however we required an extremely secure solution for the new Corporate owned devices.

“We also needed something more versatile for our BYOD programme, that would accommodate multiple platforms. Although MobileIron looked good, we wanted a strong proof of concept before proceeding.”

The Solution

After several years of growth and acquisitions across the UK, Diligenta had a distributed infrastructure consisting of a variety of legacy systems. These included IBM Domino (Lotus Notes) deployments in Peterborough and Basingstoke, and an Exchange infrastructure in Liverpool.

Having run BES 5, when the time came to unify and integrate the infrastructure, they decided to move to a bring-your-own solution, managed and secured with MobileIron. Appurity provided consultancy and project management for the migration, as well as supplying, installing and configuring the hardware.

Diligenta now has a mobile-optimised infrastructure that supports its multiple sites, as well as the people travelling between them and working remotely.

“Appurity spent time with us on site and guided us through the roll out. The service has been everything you want it to be, with strong technical knowledge and prompt action.” Guy Harwood, Infrastructure Project Manager, Diligenta.

The Result

Working with Guy’s team, we recommended a solution based on MobileIron device and application management technologies. After a long trial, Diligenta rolled out a full deployment, including Sentry servers for the on-premise elements, with device and application management in the cloud.

“Using the cloud has helped to reduce our management overhead significantly,” says Guy Harwood. “It also means that as we continue to grow and acquire new companies, we have an easier path for integrating their systems with ours.”

MobileIron Cloud will allow Diligenta to adopt new features rapidly with each new release of devices, versions and operating systems. It also provides visibility of apps and documents across the mobile estate.

“We have found it very easy to bring multiple devices and apps into the MobileIron environment,” says Guy Harwood. “It’s good with iOS devices in particular; the set-ups are straightforward, encryption is built in, and attachment management is controlled through the software.

“Appurity have been brilliant throughout the project,” he concludes. “They spent time with us on site and guided us through the roll out. The service has been everything you want it to be, with strong technical knowledge and prompt action.”