The objective was to use SD-WAN to make the network of a department store chain more flexible in order to accommodate new site connections and make it fit for the future in the cloud. With proactive communication, an attractive offer and outstanding expertise, the Sunrise Business team was chosen as the department store group’s long-term full-service provider.
The department store operator’s current corporate network consists of MPLS lines from a third-party provider. In March 2022, the company put out a tender to find a partner to design a new network solution. The requirements were already defined in great detail: the existing network was reaching the end of its life, it needed to be replaced with SD-WAN, and each site required a direct Internet connection and a secure cloud connection. A radical transformation was required and the retailer viewed this as a logical step to prepare for the future.
The group, which runs department stores and supermarkets, also operates restaurants, has physical stores in almost 100 locations and sells products online. The department store chain has around 8,000 employees.
The requirements for the new network were specified right from the outset: an SD-WAN solution needed to ensure that 72 different sites, including the company’s headquarters and two data centres, could be connected flexibly to meet future needs in the cloud and that the connections could be managed centrally. All stores were to be given a local Internet breakout, allowing each site to be connected to the Internet via direct Internet access (DIA). In addition, a dual-access strategy was to be pursued – providing a redundant connection at each site to deliver the highest possible reliability. The solution also had to include public Wi-Fi for the department store’s customers. «The company has a clear vision and a very progressive approach to networking,» says Patrick Vetter, Senior Strategic Account Manager at Sunrise Business.
A local network architecture is essential because data traffic will not be routed centrally via the company’s headquarters in future, and cloud applications will become an increasingly important part of the business. All the criteria set out in the list of requirements suggest an SD-WAN solution. Another factor is that the data traffic requirements, which vary greatly in the retail trade depending on the season, can be balanced more easily with the extremely high bandwidth flexibility that SD-WAN offers than is possible with the existing solution. «All in all, the end-to-end managed SD-WAN solution promises to deliver many benefits compared to the existing rigid MPLS networking,» says Patrick Vetter.
As a full-service provider, Sunrise Business can help customers by providing both business Internet and an SD-WAN networking solution with dual access from a single source. The retailer, which operates stores over a wide geographical area, benefits from the expertise that Sunrise Business has in networking, operations and monitoring, as well as the ability to communicate now with just a single point of contact. This means its in-house IT teams can focus more on their retail business and customer-related IT, while Sunrise Business looks after the WAN network management.
Another big advantage is the fact that Sunrise Business has gained a wealth of retail experience from working on previous projects and is therefore very familiar with the specific requirements of the industry. In addition to its high level of solution and industry expertise, Sunrise Business also offers 24/7 support and high availability of its lines with a «gold» service level (annual availability 99.95%, max. two hours of downtime). These support services are ideally suited to the needs of a retail company. There’s also great flexibility when it comes to the retailer’s bandwidth needs.
Business Internet – high-availability, business-grade Internet lines with guaranteed bandwidth – was chosen to provide each of the company’s sites with its own powerful, independent Internet connection. The SD-WAN solution is implemented with Cisco SD-WAN (formerly Cisco Viptela). The department store chain’s dual-access strategy envisages that all connections should be dual connections, using the fibre-optic lines from two different providers to ensure maximum availability. «However, as this two-provider approach would have made it complicated and expensive to operate and support the system, we’re building the connections ourselves on two different backbones and platforms, and so on two separate transport networks,» says Ariel Hermon, SD-WAN Ambassador and Senior Specialized Sales at Sunrise Business.
With this approach, the customer obtains the complete, redundant connection with one support contact and monthly billing, without needing to rely on lines from third-party providers. «We went this extra mile to provide an integral service that allows every aspect to be self-managed,» says Ariel Hermon.
Having control over all the connections also creates maximum flexibility when it comes to capacity. For example, the bandwidth at individual sites can be changed at short notice if need be. «The bandwidth can easily be adjusted to meet seasonal requirements by changing the licence – this may be needed in the autumn around Black Friday or before the Christmas trade starts,» explains Ariel Hermon. With the current rigid MPLS solution, this requires much more effort and can’t be done at short notice as a router may need to be replaced or a contract amended.
In actual fact, all sites have a 1 Gbit/s connection. The effective bandwidth is limited at each site by the relevant licence. It just takes a few clicks to change the licence in order to increase the data capacity for a specific site. Sunrise Business can respond to fluctuating bandwidth requirements flexibly at any time.
The SD-WAN infrastructure that Sunrise Business manages supports the customer’s security solution, providing a secure connection to the various cloud providers via the Internet. In addition to the systems already used in the cloud, the intention is for the POS systems and inventory system, for example, to be moved to the cloud in the future. At the moment, the data is still hosted in two separate data centres. «The setup of the new solution makes the whole network fully cloud-compatible,» explains Ariel Hermon. All business requirements are met and there’s scope to prioritise individual areas or even individual applications in the data traffic.
The solution for public Wi-Fi traffic is provided separately via Monzoon. This means the data is routed directly via Monzoon. The department store chain is thus getting a retail-specific solution that meets its particular needs.
Technology: Cisco SD-WAN (formerly Cisco Viptela)
Sunrise Business manages all connections. A central dashboard provides the customer with a clear overview of the SD-WAN connections.
Contrary to the customer’s original idea of purchasing the Internet service through an integrator, Sunrise Business proactively offered to guarantee the two redundant connections itself. «As we’re providing a full package and are therefore offering consistent, more extensive support, this optimises the customer’s operations and also helps them make efficiency savings,» explains Ariel Hermon. According to Patrick Vetter, this proactive approach by Sunrise Business was a key reason for Sunrise winning the tender. In addition, the customer really values the close, personal support that the Sunrise Business project team provides; this means that the customer always deals with the same contacts, who work with them throughout the project and also after the project rollout once the solution is in routine use.
All the tender requirements were met and incorporated into the solution that was developed. «We completed all major project milestones, from the tender and proof of concept to the construction of the fibre-optic lines and the failover tests, successfully and on time,» adds Patrick Vetter. «It was well worth taking a creative, personal and straightforward approach, being more dynamic than our competitors and going the extra mile.»
A collaboration that was originally intended for a limited period of time evolved into a longer-term partnership extending beyond the project, and Sunrise Business will be responsible for operating the SD-WAN solution now as well. In addition to the close, individual support that Sunrise Business provided for the SD-WAN project, its many years of experience working in the retail sector also helped Sunrise Business to develop a bespoke, powerful solution and implement it efficiently. This cloud-compatible solution allows the company to continue focusing on the future and meets all business requirements. Having implemented the solution, the customer wants to move more services to the cloud. In addition, a 5G connection from mobile outlet stores to the SD-WAN is planned.