Scholle had an older, decentralized Novellbased infrastructure that limited communications options, saddled the IT staff with excessive management chores, and frequently failed.

1. Microsoft Infrastructure Optimization
Customer Solution Case Study
Manufacturer Ups Efficiency and Agility, Cuts
IT Costs by $325,000, with New Software
Overview “With the Microsoft business productivity
Country or Region: United States
Industry: Manufacturing—Packaging
infrastructure, we have the flexibility to integrate the
latest Microsoft solutions.… This is a real competitive
Customer Profile
Scholle Packaging designs and
advantage for us.”
manufactures bag-in-box packaging for the Keith Anderson, Manager, Global Network Systems, Scholle Packaging
food, beverage, and industrial markets. The
company employs 1,800 people and has Scholle Packaging is the leader in bag-in-box packaging for the
20 manufacturing plants around the world.
food, beverage, and industrial markets. When Scholle began
Business Situation producing products globally rather than regionally, employees
Scholle had an older, decentralized Novell-
based infrastructure that limited around the world needed better ways to communicate, but the
communications options, saddled the IT company’s older, decentralized server infrastructure was a barrier
staff with excessive management chores,
and frequently failed. to flexible communications and business agility. Scholle used its
Microsoft® Enterprise Agreement to cost-effectively overhaul its
Solution
Scholle upgraded and consolidated its core business productivity and core IT infrastructures. It deployed
infrastructure using Windows Server® modern communications and collaboration software to facilitate
2008 with Hyper-V™, and deployed a suite
of Microsoft® business productivity information sharing and problem solving across the company. Using
software to enhance collaboration. Microsoft virtualization and management software, Scholle avoided
Benefits U.S.$325,000 in hardware and staffing costs while reducing server
More agile responsiveness downtime by 60 percent. Employees are more productive, and the
Faster product design
Hardware cost avoidance of IT staff more responsive to business needs.
U.S.$250,000
IT staff cost avoidance of $75,000
Downtime reduced by 60 percent

2. “Teams wanted to use Situation infrastructure wouldn’t support them. Also,
Scholle Packaging, headquartered in Irvine, because we couldn’t give vendors and
instant messaging, California, invented bag-in-box packaging customers access to our file-shares for
Skype, blogs, forums, (think boxed wine) more than 60 years ago security reasons, we had to use e-mail as a
and has since evolved into a world leader of collaboration method. Management issued a
wikis, video flexible packaging solutions for the food, mandate to reduce time-to-market for new
conferencing, and other beverage, and industrial markets. Scholle has products, and our messaging infrastructure
1,800 employees, 20 manufacturing was slowing us down.”
innovative locations on five continents, and sells its
communication products in more than 60 countries. A richer, more flexible communications
infrastructure could also facilitate work on
methods, but our Novell For years, Scholle was organized regionally, the company’s multiple LEAN initiatives,
infrastructure wouldn’t with each geographical region developing and which required input from staff members all
marketing products for its market. This led to over the world. (LEAN is a manufacturing
support them.” a great deal of duplicate effort and products. efficiency program that seeks to eliminate
Keith Anderson, Manager, Global Network In 2006, management decided to restructure waste from business processes.) Scholle
Systems, Scholle Packaging the business horizontally around strategic LEAN teams hold several weeklong events
business units, each tasked with developing throughout the year where staff members
products for a global market. focus on improving particular processes.
Team members communicated through
E-Mail Messaging Insufficient overseas conference calls, sending
With this horizontal restructuring, teams were documents back and forth as e-mail attach-
suddenly working with colleagues around the ments. Overseas calls were expensive and
world rather than with people in their own involved late-night meetings for many staff
region. It became apparent that the members. Communicating by e-mail was
company’s older Novell-based messaging frustrating with so many parties involved, and
infrastructure provided limited it burdened the messaging system.
communication and collaboration options.
“Basically, all we had was e-mail and Server Downtime Interrupts Business
telephones,” says Keith Anderson, Manager All of the company’s Novell servers were out
of Global Network Systems for Scholle of warranty, and its operating systems and
Packaging. “This wasn’t enough to Microsoft® Office productivity programs were
communicate effectively between plants in out-of-date. The older servers failed
different countries and time zones.” frequently, for 24 hours or longer, which
slowed or stalled production, delayed
Employees experienced huge time lags as shipments, and sometimes upset customers.
they waited for e-mail message replies from Returning servers to service was difficult,
colleagues on the other side of the globe. because Scholle had IT staff in only 5 of its
Engineers spent hours assimilating edits to 27 server locations.
large CAD files that coworkers sent as e-mail
attachments. “E-mail messaging served its “We were reactive in server management,”
purpose, but we needed more than e-mail to Anderson says. “If a server broke at a location
succeed in fast-moving global markets,” with no IT staff, we had to work with the local
Anderson says. “Teams wanted to use instant staff to identify and install needed parts. We
messaging, Skype, blogs, forums, wikis, video also flew IT staff around the world to perform
conferencing, and other innovative server upgrades.” Also, because there were
communication methods, but our Novell no IT staff members in most plant locations,

3. “We looked at Scholle could not securely place domain understand how the Microsoft Infrastructure
controllers there, which forced local users to Optimization model could help Scholle
communications and authenticate over the wide-area network, a employees be more productive and IT staff be
collaboration solutions slow and often frustrating process. more effective and efficient.
from Novell, Oracle, and In addition, many newer business applica- “We looked at communications and
Microsoft, but the tions that Scholle added needed to connect collaboration solutions from Novell, Oracle,
to the enterprise e-mail system for sending and Microsoft, but the Microsoft solution set
Microsoft solution set alerts and providing other e-mail integration offered the centralized, integrated
offered the centralized, services. However, it was time-consuming, management solutions we were looking for,”
and sometimes impossible, to integrate the Anderson says. “Novell’s solutions seemed
integrated management applications with Novell GroupWise like a forced fit and based on old protocols,
solutions we were messaging software; once integrated, the and Oracle’s products solved some issues
new applications were often unreliable. but not all.”
looking for.”
Keith Anderson, Manager, Global Network When the company restructured, the IT staff Rapid, Economical Infrastructure
Systems, Scholle Packaging was asked to do more but not given more Replacement
resources; in fact, IT headcount was cut. Yet Scholle decided to deploy an integrated suite
two full-time staff members were dedicated of Microsoft business productivity
to managing the 18 GroupWise messaging infrastructure products:
servers. “I wanted my people to work on new
solutions that impacted the business, not on Microsoft Exchange Server 2007—
messaging services, which I consider a messaging and calendaring software
utility,” Anderson says. Microsoft Office SharePoint® Server 2007—
collaboration software
Solution Microsoft Office Professional 2007—
Anderson knew that Scholle needed to productivity programs
modernize its communications and Microsoft Office Communications Server
collaboration infrastructure, consolidate and 2007—software that integrates instant
centralize servers, and simplify IT messaging, presence, Web conferencing,
management tasks if the company was to and software-powered voice over Internet
continue to grow. He envisioned a Protocol (VoIP)
centralized, flexible messaging and Microsoft Office Communicator 2007—a
collaboration infrastructure that would give unified communications client that people
global employees plenty of options for use to move seamlessly between e-mail
sharing information. He wanted the core messaging, instant messaging, voice, and
infrastructure to be consistent and easy to video communications from within any
manage, and to offer common functionality— Microsoft Office application
such as user account information, workflows,
and search—that could be centrally Modernizing its business productivity
maintained and reused across multiple infrastructure and replacing the older Novell
applications. servers would require about 25 new servers,
however, which was a significant expense. At
Integrated Productivity Suite that point, PLA introduced Scholle to the
In 2008, Scholle sought the help of Project Windows Server® 2008 operating system
Leadership Associates (PLA), a Microsoft Gold with Hyper-V™ virtualization technology,
Certified Partner in Chicago, Illinois, to better which would enable Scholle to move forward

4. with its business productivity enhancement Unified Communications
with about one-third the expected server Scholle runs Microsoft Exchange Server 2007
expenses. Scholle was able to replace 40 on a cluster of four physical servers in the
Novell servers in 27 locations with 13 new Scholle data center, which provides nonstop
Windows Server 2008–based servers in 4 reliability and easy IT oversight. Scholle
locations. employees now have conveniences such as
shared calendars, which they did not have in
PLA also helped Scholle get the maximum GroupWise, and a far more intuitive e-mail
benefit from its investment in the Microsoft client (the Microsoft Office Outlook® 2007
Enterprise Client Access License (CAL) Suite, messaging and collaboration client). “Training
which gives organizations an easy way to takes no time, because most employees have
license 11 popular Microsoft business used Office Outlook at home, in school, or in
productivity infrastructure programs. Until previous jobs,” Anderson says. “In contrast, it
then, Scholle had only taken advantage of the took a month or more for employees to learn
Windows Server 2003 operating system to GroupWise.” Employees similarly embraced
“It was far more cost- run custom and third-party business Office Communications Server 2007 with no
effective to license applications and Microsoft SQL Server® 2005 formal training.
data management software. “It was far more
these new programs cost-effective to license these new programs With this integrated suite of communications
through the Enterprise through the Enterprise CAL, since we were technologies, Scholle employees now have
rolling out so many Microsoft solutions,” access to security-enhanced instant
CAL, since we were Anderson says. “It also helps us to stay messaging, presence, computer-based Web
rolling out so many current with the latest releases, which has conferencing, and software-powered VoIP.
always been a struggle.” This abundance of flexible communications
Microsoft solutions. It options helps project teams collaborate
also helps us to stay PLA provided overall project management, faster and more easily. For example,
best-practices guidance, help with setting up international design teams can use the
current with the latest virtual machines, assistance in deploying presence indicator to see if colleagues are
releases.” Exchange Server 2007 and migrating online any time of the day or night, to get fast
mailboxes from GroupWise, help migrating answers to questions over instant messaging.
Keith Anderson, Manager, Global Network the company’s directory structure from Novell With just a few mouse clicks, they can add
Systems, Scholle Packaging eDirectory to Active Directory® Domain new people to the conversation and even
Services, and more. “There’s no way that we escalate the conversation to an audio or Web
could have tackled this ambitious project conference.
ourselves,” Anderson says.
“Presence, Web conferencing, and instant
The business productivity optimization project messaging are big home runs with Office
began in January 2008 and ended in August Communications Server 2007,” Anderson
2008. In just seven months, Scholle was able says. “If I get an e-mail message from
to completely replace its companywide someone and see from the presence
business productivity infrastructure and indicator that they are online, I can send
consolidate servers for easier management them an instant message and get an answer
and more flexible response to business without waiting on, or burdening, our e-mail
needs. system. Communication across the company
is much faster now. Also, we had no chat
capability before, because we didn’t want our
intellectual property being discussed across

5. our firewall. With Office Communications so executives can access it anytime, from any
Server 2007, we have secure instant Web browser.
messaging that can be monitored.”
The packaging group created a SharePoint
Scholle is interested in pursuing additional site where executives and upper-level
communications enhancements: replacing its management can collaborate on daily,
branch-office PBX systems with Office weekly, and monthly financial, marketing, and
Communications Server 2007 VoIP; market-assessment information. Participants
integrating e-mail, voice-mail, and fax inboxes are able to post information in real time for
through Exchange Server 2007 unified rapid consumption and feedback, rather than
communications; and implementing Microsoft waiting to discuss it in monthly meetings.
RoundTable™ conferencing and collaboration
devices in branch offices. RoundTable is a Another SharePoint site provides a forum in
video conferencing phone that captures and which the 27 Scholle manufacturing facilities
broadcasts a 360-degree view of everyone in can report quality issues as they arise, rather
a meeting room. RoundTable follows the than sharing them through lengthy e-mail
conversation and broadcasts a close-up of trails and waiting for replies.
the speaker.
Virtualization, Centralized Management
Online Collaboration The company’s business productivity
Teams across Scholle have also embraced infrastructure now relies on 13 physical
Office SharePoint Server 2007 for posting servers running Windows Server 2008
and sharing documents, creating blogs and Datacenter with Hyper-V. To date, Anderson
collaborative Web sites (wikis), sharing has created 143 virtual machines on these
project calendars, hosting discussion groups, 13 servers, which host the company’s
providing contact lists, and more. To date, messaging, collaboration, and file-server
about 120 teams have created their own workloads. Guest servers (virtual machines
SharePoint team sites, and Anderson has running on a host server) run the Windows
moved the corporate intranet to Office Server 2008 Standard and Windows Server
SharePoint Server 2007. All information 2003 Standard operating systems.
across all the SharePoint sites is searchable,
and business users have the ability to control Scholle still has about 20 stand-alone
document-access rights without going application servers that will eventually be
through the IT staff. Scholle uses SQL Server moved to virtual machines. In the meantime,
2005 to store its SharePoint site documents Scholle has connected them to its Active
and data. Directory Domain Services directory structure,
which has made them much easier to
Scholle Corporate, for example, has created a manage. Scholle also found it easy to
SharePoint site where the chief financial integrate third-party applications such as the
officer posts monthly financial reports and Baan enterprise resource planning system
announcements for Scholle executives. with Active Directory and Exchange Server
Previously, this information was sent in e-mail 2007. Anderson was able to use Active
messages or shared in conference calls that Directory Domain Services to create a single
were tricky to organize because of multiple sign-on to all key applications, which
schedules and time zones. Now, the simplifies logon procedures for employees.
information is always online and up-to-date,

6. “I can see from Office In plant sites where there is no IT staff, Using server virtualization, Scholle was able
Scholle uses read-only domain controller to avoid a U.S.$250,000 hardware expense
Communicator that a (RODC) technology in Windows Server 2008 and a $75,000 IT salary. The more reliable
colleague in Brazil is to deploy a Server Core installation of the infrastructure has led to a 60 percent
operating system that hosts read-only reduction in downtime, which further
online, tell him or her partitions of the Active Directory Domain increases companywide productivity.
what I need, and get an Services database. An RODC provides a
security-enhanced way to deploy a domain More Agile Responsiveness
immediate response.” controller in locations that require fast and With its integrated business productivity
Keith Anderson, Manager, Global Network reliable authentication services but cannot infrastructure, Scholle employees are able to
Systems, Scholle Packaging ensure physical security for a writeable distribute and share information much faster,
domain controller. which increases productivity, speeds problem
resolution, and increases overall business
Scholle is deploying several Microsoft System agility. Management has access to fresh
Center data-center solutions to centralize and financial and operational data throughout the
further simplify the management of its server day, rather than waiting for conference calls
and client computers: to be organized. Employees throughout the
company can contact one another over
Microsoft System Center Configuration instant messaging and Web conferencing to
Manager 2007 is used to automate the resolve issues the very same day, or hour,
deployment of operating systems, rather than waiting for meetings or wading
applications, and security updates to through lengthy e-mail threads. Using the
computers in any location, and to easily designated SharePoint site, for example, the
report on the company’s technology assets. manufacturing facilities can react to quality
Microsoft System Center Operations issues in minutes or hours rather than days.
Manager 2007 is used to proactively
monitor the company’s distributed servers. The enhanced productivity infrastructure has
Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine also positively affected the efficiency of the
Manager 2008, planned for mid-2009, company’s LEAN events. Scholle created a
provides easy physical-to-virtual server SharePoint site for each LEAN initiative, and a
migration, virtual-machine performance sub-site for each event under those
optimization, and easier management of initiatives, where all information related to an
both physical and virtual servers. event is stored. “I can see from Office
Microsoft System Center Data Protection Communicator that a colleague in Brazil is
Manager 2007, also to be deployed in mid- online, tell him or her what I need, and get an
2009, will be used to automate the backup immediate response,” Anderson says. “Just
of data on servers in all locations and store as important as the communication time
that data on both disk and tape. savings is the fact that all documentation is
posted on a SharePoint site for later
Benefits reference.” Although LEAN events still last a
With its new business productivity week, participants save two to three hours
infrastructure, Scholle Packaging can quickly every day during the LEAN event. Instead of
respond to global market demands by working late into the night, they finish by 5:00
enabling employees to communicate and P.M. or earlier.
collaborate faster. Ultimately, these
efficiencies will translate into faster time-to- Use of presence, instant messaging, and
market with new products. audio and Web conferencing across the

7. “Our investment in 13 company similarly accelerate reaction times reduce miscommunication, and accelerate
and enrich phone and e-mail conversations. overall time-to-market.
servers running Hyper-V “We can accomplish in a five-minute Web
gave us the processing conference what previously might have taken Hardware Cost Avoidance of $250,000,
hours,” Anderson says. Staff-Time Reduction of $75,000
equivalent of 143 With its use of Windows Server 2008 with
servers, a hardware cost Scholle also has a technology foundation that Hyper-V, Scholle was able to consolidate 40
can accommodate new productivity-boosting physical servers to 13 physical servers, and
avoidance of innovations without extensive development still increase capacity. “Our investment in 13
$250,000.” work. “With the Microsoft business servers running Hyper-V gave us the
productivity infrastructure, we have the processing equivalent of 143 servers, a
Keith Anderson, Manager, Global Network flexibility to integrate the latest Microsoft hardware cost avoidance of $250,000,”
Systems, Scholle Packaging solutions, third-party software, hosted Anderson says.
solutions, and custom applications,”
Anderson says. “This enables the business to Scholle now has a consistent technology
embrace innovation without technology being infrastructure that is easier to manage and
a barrier. This is a real competitive advantage more flexible, making it possible for the IT
for us.” staff to keep headcount stable as it expands
its IT role. “The IT staff was being asked to
Faster Product Design perform more duties with fewer resources,
Improved productivity is expected to have a and we now have an infrastructure that
long-term positive impact on product enables us to do that,” Anderson says. “The
development. “With a more flexible System Center solutions will give us
communications and collaboration additional efficiencies that will enable us to
infrastructure, we’ll be able to get products to proactively manage our infrastructure, avoid
market faster in our new global business problems that used to eat up huge amounts
structure by connecting team members of time, and automate many routine tasks.
around the world,” Anderson says. We will eliminate the work of one full-time
staff person, valued at $75,000, by
Scholle also is already communicating and consolidating our servers with Hyper-V and
collaborating more closely with customers managing our entire infrastructure with
and the suppliers with whom it works to Microsoft software.”
develop custom products for specific
customer needs. Scholle implemented Scholle has not only reduced IT management
federation in Office Communications Server time and costs, but opened up more
2007 so that employees can extend the possibilities for creating innovative business
efficiencies of presence, group conferencing, solutions that weren’t possible, or were cost-
and instant messaging to these external prohibitive, in a Novell environment. For
users. Anderson’s team is now using Office example, Anderson’s staff recently
SharePoint Server 2007 to build an extranet implemented two new hosted solutions and
that will enable Scholle staff to share was able to use single sign-on created with
documents, online discussions, and Active Directory to enable access to those
development schedules with customers and solutions. “This would not have been easy to
vendors with optimized security. Sharing do with Novell,” Anderson says.
drawings and other project documentation on
SharePoint sites will eliminate the need to
send large documents as e-mail attachments,

8. “IT always seemed to be Downtime Reduced by 60 Percent Anderson says in conclusion. “Business users
Scholle now has a highly available messaging would request a new capability or application,
a roadblock to the and collaboration infrastructure that but it was either not possible or would take
business in our old employees around the world use to months to implement. That is no longer the
communicate without interruptions. case. We can now give business users the
Novell environment. We “Unscheduled Novell downtime averaged 50 power to drive the business. Technology is
can now give business hours annually. In the nine months that we now a help rather than a hindrance.”
have been on the Microsoft infrastructure,
users the power to drive we’ve had 15 hours of unscheduled
the business…. downtime,” Anderson says. “We’re on track to
reduce unscheduled downtime by 30 hours
Technology is now a annually.”
help rather than a
When there is a problem, it’s far easier to
hindrance.” take remedial action. “I’m definitely sleeping
Keith Anderson, Manager, Global Network better at night,” Anderson says of his new
Systems, Scholle Packaging infrastructure’s stability. “I have a very high
comfort level from the fact that all servers are
in locations where we have IT personnel, so if
something happens, we can reduce recovery
time from 24 to 4 hours. Or, using
virtualization, we can transfer workloads to
new virtual machines in minutes. It used to
take 6 hours to set up a physical server; now
it takes 10 minutes to create a virtual
machine.”
Future Improvements
Next, Scholle wants to use its intranet as an
integration point for line-of-business
applications and create workflows inside and
around those applications. For example,
different departments could use SharePoint
sites as a central place for completing and
routing forms or spreadsheets. Other
business groups are very interested in using
wikis, blogs, and social networking features
on their SharePoint sites.
When RoundTable is deployed companywide,
Anderson estimates that Scholle will be able
to reduce travel costs by $8,000 in the first
year, with savings increasing by 10 percent
annually.
“IT always seemed to be a roadblock to the
business in our old Novell environment,”

9. For More Information Microsoft Infrastructure Optimization
For more information about Microsoft With infrastructure optimization, you can
products and services, call the Microsoft build a secure, well-managed, and dynamic
Sales Information Center at (800) 426- core IT infrastructure that can reduce overall
9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft IT costs, make better use of resources, and
Canada Information Centre at (877) 568- become a strategic asset for the business.
2495. Customers who are deaf or hard-of- The Infrastructure Optimization model—with
hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone basic, standardized, rationalized, and
(TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234 in dynamic levels—was developed by Microsoft
the United States or (905) 568-9641 in using industry best practices and Microsoft’s
Canada. Outside the 50 United States and own experiences with enterprise customers.
Canada, please contact your local The Infrastructure Optimization model
Microsoft subsidiary. To access information provides a maturity framework that is flexible
using the World Wide Web, go to: and easily used as a benchmark for technical
www.microsoft.com capability and business value.
For more information about Project For more information about Microsoft
Leadership Associates products and infrastructure optimization, go to:
services, call (312) 441-0077 or visit the www.microsoft.com/io
Web site at:
www.projectleadership.net
For more information about Scholle
Packaging products and services, call
(888) BAG-N-BOX or visit the Web site at:
www.scholle.com
Software and Services Microsoft Office
Microsoft Server Product Portfolio − Microsoft Office Communications Server
− Windows Server 2008 Datacenter 2007
− Windows Server 2008 Enterprise − Microsoft Office Communicator 2007
− Windows Server 2008 Standard − Microsoft Office Professional 2007
− Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 − Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007
− Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Technologies
− Microsoft System Center Configuration − Active Directory Domain Services
Manager 2007 − Hyper-V
− Microsoft System Center Operations
Manager 2007 Partner
Project Leadership Associates
This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT
MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS
SUMMARY.
Document published June 2009