CLOUD BASED SERVICES FOR SMALL BUSINESSES

Why and how to step into the cloud


In this fast-moving digital age, small and medium-sized businesses and enterprises need to stay up to speed. More and more SMEs are choosing cloud solutions, like Microsoft Office 365, to deal with huge volumes of data, work efficiently, improve security, control costs and minimise risks. The team at Konica Minolta understand the smaller business needs and plans. We are ready to help organisations take to the cloud technology with confidence.

The main challenges in the digital age without a cloud storage solution


  1. Especially small businesses in all industries have to deal with huge amounts of data, arriving through various channels: phone calls, emails, letters, online forms, apps and social media. This flood of business data is challenging for workers.

  2. It might also be a challenge for SMEs to efficiently operate and keep your existing IT infrastructure up to date and running to avoid downtime and negative business impact.

  3. Lack of mobility means that SMEs can't work in real time from any office, on any device. This holds companies back and prevents seamless cooperation.

  4. Other issues faced by SMEs are privacy and security breaches, due to e.g. not patched software. Using cloud security can be delivered to a higher level in many cases than could be provided in house. Especially for SMEs which are not able to allocate sufficient inhouse resources to data security cloud solutions can prevent severe consequences to the business caused by data breaches.


Loss of customers


All these challenges can be answered by flexible cloud-based services that take away uncertainty and put SMEs in control of their data.


How can SMEs small business take advantage of the cloud? 

Today, there are cloud computing services and software-as-a-service solutions for virtually every type and size of business. But small and medium enterprises don't need experience, resources and expertise to take advantage of the opportunities. All they need is the guidance of one of the Konica Minolta consultants for cloud computing. They help businesses to find the tailored answer to their needs.


From simple workflow to automatic invoice processing up to fully managed cloud and data centre services, small and medium enterprises can choose whatever they need. There's also 24/7 support if they want it. By asking Konica Minolta to manage the entire IT infrastructure, businesses can relieve the weight of their operational responsibility and concentrate on doing what they do best. 


Get cloud services that fit your industry, structure and the way you like to work. 

How cloud works - the single point of contact

How cloud works - the single point of contact

More than a cloud provider, Konica Minolta is an experienced guide. It helps small and medium enterprises to identify their needs, with an initial assessment of the situation and implementation of a solution. They can add on 24/7 support and Konica Minolta can also help them through any further development as their company grows. If they have a problem, Konica Minolta finds a solution. Even more flexible as a provider. Thanks to its network of hardware and software partners, like Microsoft, it can deliver whatever businesses might need to release the potential of their business. 


Does a fully cloud-based solution feel too drastic? If it seems like a step too far, Konica Minolta can develop hybrid solutions that bring SMEs some of the benefits of cloud computing and take them along a suitable path. 

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"Businesses are able to become more agile, competitive and resilient, while at the same time freeing their workforce from the burden of inefficient processes"

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Cloud services for SMEs e-book

With the exponential growth in data, and faced by a need to compete in a fast-moving digital age, the decision to stay with outmoded legacy systems can mean that SMEs risk falling behind. With the benefit of a long-term perspective and a deep understanding of our customers’ businesses, Konica Minolta is helping SMEs get up to speed and take to the cloud.

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Simplicity not complexity: Konica Minolta Cloud Print

To enable you to focus 100% on your business, we've developed a complete service that gives you ultimate flexibility when printing and allows you to save money at the same time — without compromising on data security. Always managed your printing environment yourself? Our Konica Minolta Cloud Print offers numerous advantages over in-house management:

Learn more

Bring businesses the benefits of the cloud

A leap forward rather than a step into the unknown

Supporting SMEs as a partner, our consultant can walk businesses through the process and show them which easy-to-use tools can help. Konica Minolta explain how their business can thrive with more cost-efficiency, flexibility and security. Different processes can be integrated into a unified system. It will be robust, reliable and, of course, meet all regulatory requirements. No need to worry about software updates, data security, emergency recovery, cloud storage or backup with a cloud service designed for businesses.

   

   

Mobility feature icon

Enhanced mobility

Customization

Higher Flexibility

icon security

Improved security

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Affordable pay-as-you-use pricing

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Predictable costs

Success story

BE-GE Group logo

A secure and reliable local IT infrastructure with all the benefits and the flexibility of a cloud solution

A secure and reliable local IT infrastructure with all the benefits and the flexibility of a cloud solution

The Be-Ge Group is the world’s oldest manufacturer for suspended driver seats and is among the leading suppliers of seats for buses, forklifts, industrial trucks, forestry and construction vehicles, trucks and railway traffic. The Swedish family-owned group of companies runs operations in Sweden, Denmark, the United Kingdom, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Germany and Belgium.



Reliable operation, availability and data security 

For a manufacturing company and supplier to the automotive industry in particular, ensuring the continuous operation of many different production sites distributed throughout various countries poses certain challenges. The most crucial one with regards to IT: Safeguarding an absolutely reliable operation and securing availability without interruption while maintaining a maximum of data security. 

As a decade-long partner of this manufacturer, Konica Minolta knows its requirements quite well. With the implementation of a holistic, tailor-made IT solution, which can be rolled out throughout all production sites of the Be-Ge Group individual­ly, Konica Minolta is not just delivering hardware and software licenses, but serving the customer as a reliable long-term service partner, helping their personnel to focus their time and resources on their core business. 

From a financing perspective, despite having the solution located on site, Be-Ge is in fact only paying for the resources actually used each month, having the advantage of managed hardware at their production sites without the disadvantages of fixed hardware and software costs. This hybrid cloud solu­tion encompasses all functionalities crucial to the customer like back-up service, disaster recovery protocols and software & hardware updates and upgrades, which are key advantages for Be-Ge to be able to serve their highly demanding custom­ers even better


A single point of contact letting you focus on your business 

As a supplier for the automotive industry, Be-Ge Group has to abide to very strict delivery rules. With timing of production being highly sensitive within this supply chain, missed delivery deadlines entail significant penalty fees. Like many production companies, Be-Ge’s operations rely heavily on on-premise IT. Hence, reliable systems and IT infrastructure close to the production, build the basis for a sustainably successful busi­ness. “Konica Minolta understands our business perfectly. We cannot afford any downtime of our IT systems. To ensure this, they provided us with a cloud solution that is located on our premises but monitored and maintained centrally by Konica Minolta”, says Reza Shahrbani, IT-Manager Be-Ge Sweden. 

Through a single point of contact, Be-Ge wanted to have their complete IT needs covered by one reliable long-term partner who takes clear responsibility and truly knows where to put the emphasis to tailor a holistic solution to their exact require­ments. 

The so-called Remote-Pod concept set up by Konica Minolta provides a redundant on-premise high ability infrastructure as a service (HA IaaS) solution, where server hardware is placed at the production site of the customer for reliable offline on-site access, but is managed externally from Konica Minolta’s data centre – including a full service desk support. 

With monitoring as a service (MaaS) and back-up as a service (BaaS), the Konica Minolta experts are able to constantly monitor and back-up all customer systems at their data centre ensuring a secure operation. In case of a disaster, the customer’s operations can be up and running within a matter of hours at a different location with access to all data needed. The sources of possible IT threats can be detected early and countermeasures can be applied immediately. The package also includes licensing as a service (LaaS), giving the custom­ers full access to the necessary software in the scope they really need it. 


BE-GE Group Reza Shahrbani
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We cannot afford any downtime of our IT systems. To ensure this, Konica Minolta provided us with a cloud solution that is located on our premises but monitored and maintained centrally by Konica Minolta

Reza Shahrbani

IT-Manager, Be-Ge Sweden

Individual site rollout for multiple international locations 

This Remote-Pod solution was developed by Konica Minolta with the concept in mind to be able to roll it out at various in­ternational customer sites of different size individually, without the dependence on a centralised IT or software infrastructure, while still maintaining a homogenous system architecture. Hence, Be-Ge was able to implement Remote-Pods at their nine largest operations in the first step and include further pro­duction sites in individual processes afterwards. For the Be-Ge Group, it is a very valuable asset to know that they can rely on Konica Minolta’s international service and support through their service desk.

BE-GE Group - Reliable IT Infrastructure for 24/7 production

Since the production of the Swedish automotive supplier BE-GE Group depends on IT, their infrastructure needs to be higly reliable and modern. We support them with our extensive IMS (Infrastructure Management Services) experience and enabled our customer to be independent from internet failure through a local cloud solution.

Advantages

Advantages
  • No hardware or software costs for Be-Ge
  • Be-Ge only pays for the resources they use every month

Challenge

Challenge

Cost-effective decentralised cloud solution for a virtual workload with all the benefits of local hardware, which can be placed anywhere in the world

Solution

Solution

Complete package of hardware and software based on a Windows Server 2016 Clustered Hyper V solution with shared storage and monitoring, backup and service desk support from Konica Minolta

Success story

Brettes Paysage logo

Konica Minolta workplace hub takes centre stage at Brettes Paysage

Konica Minolta workplace hub takes centre stage at Brettes Paysage

Security as a priority



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“I can gladly say that Brettes Paysage has been able to rely on a 21st-century architecture ever since deployment! ”

Jérémy Dupuy

IT Manager, Brettes Paysage, France

THE CHALLENGE

A family-owned company, Brettes Paysage fosters trusting relationships with its customers and partners. So when a Konica Minolta sales representative—a long-familiar face in various circles—presented the Workplace Hub concept, the company was keen to hear more.

Security was the deal clincher for Brettes Paysage. The company had previously been hacked three times, bringing administrative activity to a standstill for several days on each occasion.


WHY WORKPLACE HUB

  • A trusted managed IT partner providing rapid and continous support to ensure continual operations
  • Consolidated vendor solution across IT hardware, infrastructure and support
  • One bill, one number to call for support
  • Strong IT foundation for growth with well-designed hardware, user interfaces, dashboards and service support
  • All data is protected and securely stored


THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE PROJECT

Jérémy Dupuy is the IT Manager at Brettes Paysage:

“We signed at the end of February 2020 for installation in June. The integration of the Konica Minolta Workplace Hub provided us with an opportunity to upgrade our office systems.

In particular, we were able to streamline our printer contracts, with just one printer now, and replace an old server that was becoming obsolete. The Workplace Hub really is the perfect tool for a setup like ours.”

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“Everything went as planned in terms of dates. For example, the equipment was delivered on time, prior to the installation date. In addition, we received regular progress updates about the project and equipment delivery. We were unable to benefit from the Workplace Hub during lockdown but colleagues who are still working remotely now have secure access.”

Jérémy Dupuy

IT Manager, Brettes Paysage, France

Solution

Solution

Brettes Paysage benefits from the Konica Minolta Workplace Hub in four main ways:

  • Improved user accessibility to the corporate IT system. “It doesn’t crash.”
  • Tightened security for corporate data, which is now hosted in the cloud, preventing hackers from blocking the IT system.
  • Simplified administration, thanks to a much more agile architecture. “For example, adding a user is much quicker than it used to be.”
  • Modularity: “It would now be easier for us to create an administrative cell at another site that currently only handles production.”

Size

80 to 100 employees 20 users

What

Landscaping/Construction

Where

Bordeaux, France

Who

Brettes Paysage

Success story

Varri Logo

Norwegian importer and distributor varri outgrew Its existing server and chose a cloud solution from Konica Minolta to guarantee stability and security

Norwegian importer and distributor varri outgrew Its existing server and chose a cloud solution from Konica Minolta to guarantee stability and security

Varri imports and distributes climbing and outdoor equipment, with customers in the sports industry, rescue industry and building industry. The company has a wealth of expertise in climbing and fall protection equipment but its original three employees had to depend on a more restricted source of IT knowledge when the company was founded in 2008. “A friend helped me to set up our own server and I was responsible for operating and maintaining it. It was housed in a toilet and a cupboard at various points”, explains founder and owner Marius Olsen. This solution worked fine for many years. The company’s data backup routine consisted of taking a copy home on an external hard drive at somewhat irregular intervals. However, the setup was not without its challenges, particularly as Olsen alone was responsible for all IT operations. “I remember one day when I had finally taken some time off to do a bit of climbing but I had to go back into work to fix the server because it had stopped working. That time the power supply was the problem; another time it was the CMOS battery.” Olsen explains that a new start-up company can probably get away with more than an established organisation. However, as the company grew and employed more people, supplied more products and worked with more suppliers and customers, there came a point when finding more professional IT solutions became necessary.



Choosing HydraCloud from Konica Minolta


“We had to choose between building on our existing setup, investing in better equipment and perhaps employing an IT consultant to operate it, or we could outsource the work to professionals who could guarantee stability and security. We chose a cloud solution from Konica Minolta called HydraCloud. We’ve now been working with it for seven years”, says Olsen.


The HydraCloud solution allows the company’s order systems, accounting systems and everything else to run on servers located in Konica Minolta’s ISO certified data centres in Norway. Varri employees log into these systems via a remote desktop. Varri no longer operates its own servers, and the only IT equipment left in the cupboard is a firewall and network switches provided by Konica Minolta as part of the cloud agreement.


Olsen is especially pleased that this setup has freed up a lot of his time to focus on the core business instead of on technical IT solutions. “I now have more time to focus on our suppliers, customers and markets, and I sleep well at night knowing that all of our IT equipment works properly at all times,” says Olsen.


Marius Olsen, founder and owner, Varri, Norway
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“A friend helped me to set up our own server and I was responsible for operating and maintaining it. When our company grew, we had to choose between building on our existing setup, investing in better equipment and perhaps employing an IT consultant to operate it, or we could outsource the work to professionals who could guarantee stability and security. We chose a cloud solution from Konica Minolta called HydraCloud. I now have more time to focus on our suppliers, customers and markets, and I sleep well at night knowing that all of our IT equipment works properly at all times.”

Marius Olsen

Founder and owner, Varri, Norway

Well-prepared when the company was targeted


Varri has actually experienced first hand how important it is to have a secure setup: It is one of a very large number of companies to be attacked by ransomware in recent years. One Monday morning, the employees discovered that the systems had been hacked. All systems had been locked down and encrypted, and on the printer there was a ransom note from the hackers demanding a hefty amount for unlocking everything again.


“The incident was not too much of a problem for us because a data backup every night is part of the service from Konica Minolta. We were able to roll back to a backup from just a few hours earlier so we were up and running again as normal in just a few hours”, says Olsen.


The incident was a good reminder of how vulnerable Varri was when it was running its own server in a cupboard with an old backup lying around at home on an external hard drive.


“I hardly dare to think about what would have happened if the ransomware attack had happened before we moved to the cloud solution. The backup could have been two weeks old”, he says.

Varri: Outsourcing IT operations to Konica Minolta

The Norwegian company Varri imports and distributes climbing and outdoor equipment and has customers in the sports industry, rescue industry and building industry. The company, which was founded in 2008, has wealth of expertise in climbing and fall protection equipment, but restricted in IT. When the company was founded, a fried of company owner Marius Olsen helped him setting up the server, which was housed in a toilet and a cupboard at various points, and Olsen was subsequently responsible for its operation and maintenance.

Advantages

Advantages
  • Company owner has freed up a lot of his time to focus on the core business instead of on technical IT solutions
  • Varri experienced an attack by ransomware in recent years, but the incident was not too much of a problem because an automatic data backup is done every night

Challenge

Challenge
  • With restricted source of IT knowledge company owner alone was responsible for all IT operations: has to set up their own server and was responsible for operating and maintaining it incl. fixing the server on their own when problems arose
  • Data backup had to be done manually: by taking a copy home on an external hard drive at irregular intervals
  • As the company grew a more professional IT solutions became necessary

Solution

Solution
  • HydraCloud solution:
    • Varri’s order systems, accounting systems and everything else run on servers located in Konica Minolta’s ISO certified data centres in Norway
    • Varri employees log into these systems via a remote desktop
    • No longer operation of own server