Microsoft Office 365Customer Solution Case Study

Finance Portal Saves 40 Percent in Licensing with Cloud Solution

OverviewCountry or Region: GermanyIndustry: Financial services

Customer ProfileBörseGo AG supplies investors with information on financial markets through internet portals and publications, and the conception and development of software, apps, and web sites.

Business SituationBörseGo AG needed a more reliable messaging solution that would integrate with existing infrastructure and allow single sign-on for users.

SolutionCloud-based Microsoft Office 365 provided the availability and security that BörseGo AG required, at a low, predictable monthly cost per user.

Benefits Saved 40 percent in licensing Simplifies administration 99 percent uptime guarantee Integrates with mobile device

Exchange Online offers many functions that make our administrative tasks considerably easier. In addition, mobile hardware can be integrated regardless of the individual operating system.

Christian Ehmig, Head of IT, BörseGo AG

During difficult and volatile financial market phases, it is enormously important for investors to identify suitable entry and exit points for securities investments. Operated by BörseGo AG, the internet portals GodmodeTrader.de, GodmodeTrader.ch, and BoerseGo.de keep investors up-to-date with transparent financial information.

The company also supplies economic news and financial analyses to banks, financial services firms, and operators of other finance portals. In addition, BörseGo AG develops software solutions ranging from simple charts to more complex applications for real-time chart analysis, chart signal calculation, and portfolio management. In addition, BörseGo AG also designs and builds complete web pages.

SituationNews bulletins released by BörseGo AG are researched and written by the company’s own editorial team. As is common in an editorial office, there is always busy email traffic, as documents are often exchanged with external colleagues and financial services firms. BörseGo AG had used Microsoft Exchange Server 2007—operated by a hosting partner—for email, scheduling, and contact management. “The partner’s system was not always stable, however; and sometimes there were problems with the address books,” recalls Christian Ehmig, Head of IT at BörseGo AG. Ehmig began searching for a new partner. Since Exchange Server and Microsoft Office Outlook remained the company’s first choice, the question arose whether to select yet another hosting partner, or to approach Microsoft directly.

This was primarily an issue of supported functionality. In any case, the new solution needed to allow for synchronization with the internal Microsoft Active Directory, which contained user data on all company employees and their respective access rights. If the identity system of Exchange could be synchronized with Active Directory, then they could store access rights only in Active Directory, because Exchange would automatically be updated.

This synchronization also allows for another option. If the identity system of Exchange is linked to Active Directory, it can recognize when an employee has signed on to the system. If that staff member then accesses their mail inbox, Exchange also immediately grants access without the need for a separate password. This is commonly referred to as ‘single sign-on.’

SolutionBörseGo AG eventually decided on the direct Microsoft path. “Microsoft Exchange Online allows use of the Active Directory Federation Services for both single sign-on, as well as synchronization of user data with Active Directory,” explains Ehmig. “This would have been impossible with a [our previous] hosted provider.”

Exchange Online is a component of Microsoft Office 365, an online service which unites familiar Microsoft Office applications with email, calendaring, collaboration, and communication solutions. Microsoft SharePoint Online provides document and information management for collaboration between separate work teams. Meanwhile, Microsoft Lync Online always ensures solid communications with its instant messaging, audio and video calling, and web conferencing via PC. For client access, Office 365 offers the always up-to-date office management suite Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2010, with Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and OneNote, as well as Office Web Apps.

The price of the services, hosted by Microsoft itself, starts from €5.25 per user, per month for small companies, while the complete package is available from €25.50 per user, per month for medium and large enterprises. Microsoft guarantees 99.9 percent uptime, as well as a high security standard at its computing centers, which are SAS70 type II and ISO 27001 certified.

BörseGo AG still harbored some concerns regarding data protection, because a step into the cloud environment also meant giving up sole data sovereignty. “We had Office 365 researched thoroughly, and in the light of the security measures Microsoft

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has in place, we felt that our data was well protected in the computing centers,” says Ehmig.

Eventually BörseGo AG ordered 82 licenses from the Office 365 E3-suite (which also contains Office Professional Plus 2010) for €22.75 per user, per month, and 31 licenses for Exchange Online standalone. Microsoft partner Utilitas assisted in the implementation. “We chose Utilitas because the company has specialists who have already implemented more than 75 projects revolving around Office 365,” says Ehmig.

BenefitsSince deploying Office 365, BörseGo AG has realized savings in cost and administration time, and improved integration with staff smart phones and other mobile devices. Says Ehmig, “Exchange Online offers many functions that make our administrative tasks considerably easier. In addition, mobile hardware can be integrated regardless of the individual operating system.”

Saved 40 percent in licensing costs”This new solution significantly reduces our licensing costs,” Ehmig asserts. “The Office 365 E3-package includes Microsoft Office Plus 2010, and we are able to save approximately 40 per cent in licensing cost.”

Simplifies administration Since Exchange Online synchronizes with Active Directory, BörseGo AG now only has

to manage one set of access rights. “This saves us a lot of administrative work, and we can be certain that Exchange receives the correct access rights data from Active Directory,” Ehmig explains. Employees also now only need one single password for computer and mail access.

“Office 365 offers even more options than a provider, and is easier to configure to our needs,” Ehmig says. “For example, we can define individual policies for spam and virus protection and manage the sign-on data for several accounts in one profile.”

Integration with mobile devicesThe Outlook Web App enables mobile access to mail and calendar. “Our staff uses smart phones with Apple iOS, Android, and Blackberry operating systems, and also develops apps for these devices,” says Ehmig. “Thanks to the interoperability of Office 365, we can integrate all these end-user devices.” Ehmig also asserts that even the archiving of mails for a full ten years—as required by law—is assured with Exchange Online.Microsoft Office 365Microsoft Office 365 brings together cloud versions of our most trusted communications and collaboration products—Microsoft SharePoint Online, Exchange Online, and Lync Online—with the latest version of our Office desktop suite and companion web applications for businesses of all sizes.

Office 365 helps save time and money, and it frees up valued resources. Simple to use

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For More InformationFor more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers in the United States and Canada who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to:www.microsoft.com

For more information about Utilitas GmbH products and services, visit the website at: www.utilitas.net

For more information about BörseGo AG products and services, visit the website at: www.boerse-go.ag

This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.

Document published February 2013

Software & ServicesMicrosoft Office 365

Microsoft Exchange Online

and easy to administer, it is financially backed by a service level agreement guaranteeing 99 percent reliability. Office 365 features robust security, IT-level phone support, geo-redundancy, disaster recovery, and the business-class privacy controls and standards that you expect from a world-class service provider.

For more information about Microsoft Office 365, go to:www.office365.com

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