technology


Milking machinery firm rises to the top with cloud transition


For ADF Milking, ensuring all of its staff – no matter where they are in the world – can do business is critical


The fast-growing manufacturing company designs, manufactures and distributes automatic milking machines that take hygiene to the next level. The technologically advanced units protect cows’ health and dramatically reduce the risk of mastitis, which is both painful for the cow and costly to the farmer.


Since ADF’s launch in the UK around 12 years ago, it has gone truly global and with customers in 24 countries, it needs to know its employees can access its systems wherever they are.


So when ADF Milking needed help migrating to the cloud, they turned to Fareham-based IT company Taylor Made Computer Solutions for help.


Tony Solazzo, ADF Milking’s CFO said: “Being connected is important now more than ever before and when you’re a global organisation, that presents its own challenges. In our industry in particular we’re working with a lot of farmers who can often be based off the beaten track. Ensuring our staff who go out to visit them are tooled up in terms of connectivity is a challenge.


“Add to that the fact we have employees working in different time zones across the globe and you can see why an IT system that’s accessible from anywhere is so important.”


ADF Milking’s transition to the cloud had been on the horizon for some time. “It was a huge project and something we’d wanted to do for a long while,” Solazzo said. “We’d been restricted for a number of years, believe it or not due to our internet connectivity being poor at our UK headquarters in Slindon, West Sussex. There was nothing we or Taylor Made could do until circumstances changed and we were able to put in our own leased line, giving access to the faster broadband we’d need to support cloud working.


“Thankfully that came last year and 10 businessmag.co.uk


was incorporated into the cloud solution, including its Sage 200 and Sage CRM systems, which were upgraded in the process. Rather than upgrading to a new server on site, the company moved to Taylor Made’s data centre, a sophisticated virtual server system.


Tony Solazzo


“Now we’re all on one platform worldwide and it’s made a very significant improvement to the way we work,” Solazzo said. “Before, it was far more fragmented and less effective. Now we’ve got one cohesive platform that everyone can see, it works faster, is more robust and our people in different countries are collaborating more than ever before.”


with some very careful planning we set about the transition to the cloud.”


James Chalmers, who heads up ADF Milking’s support at Taylor Made, said: “Businesses large and small are in a rush to take advantage of the cloud and some are diving head-first into solutions without thinking about the bigger picture.


“ADF Milking was the complete opposite and very switched on to the fact that a transition to the cloud is a journey. We were able to work with them to brainstorm exactly what they needed and what hurdles we needed to overcome to get them onto the cloud smoothly.”


All of ADF Milking’s existing software THE BUSINESS MAGAZINE – MARCH/APRIL 2018


Chalmers added: “Being worldwide, ADF Milking is a truly 24-hour business and we’re pleased to see it’s IT operations are now buzzing around the clock. Seemingly simple changes to IT infrastructure can have a huge impact on efficiency and productivity, as ADF Milking has shown. We’re looking forward to working with its team in the coming years to develop that even further.”


To find out more about Taylor Made Computer Solutions visit the website:


tmcs.co.uk


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72  |  Page 73  |  Page 74  |  Page 75  |  Page 76  |  Page 77  |  Page 78  |  Page 79  |  Page 80  |  Page 81  |  Page 82  |  Page 83  |  Page 84  |  Page 85  |  Page 86  |  Page 87  |  Page 88