LIQ increases agility and security with Google Cloud VMware Engine
About LIQ
LIQ is a company present throughout the consumer relationship journey, with a human outlook and all-line approach (on- and offline: retail, in-person, voice, and digital service). By creating customized, smart, and simple solutions for brands and their consumers, the company turns customer service into a unique customer-relationship experience.
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Contact usAfter adopting the service, the organization obtained positive results, from storage cost savings to faster document processing.
Results
- Processes the biggest document volume in its history
- 60% savings in overall infrastructure costs
- 90% runtime reduction for the pricing process
92% reduction in storage expenses
LIQ is a 20-plus-year-old customer experience company specializing in customer relationship management (CRM). With an all-line (on- and offline) focus, it creates smart solutions targeting several audiences together with its customers. It uses technology and multichannel formats as tools for that purpose, aiming to be recognized as the best alternative for companies wishing to progress in their relationship with their consumers and their complete journey.
As it noticed the impact caused by its services and confirmed a 60%-plus revenue increase in 2020, LIQ opted to start a new investment cycle. The company wanted to update its 600 servers, reduce its idle processing capability, and ensure a flexible structure, independent from physical space.
“We needed to update and modernize our data center, meet new business demands in an agile, secure way, and keep our service up and running during any necessary operational changes. We discussed all this and, based on surveys we conducted, it became clear to us that partnering with Google would make a lot of sense.”
—Nicolas Ramirez, Head of Technology and Innovation, LIQStreamlined migration, an ally for detailed planning
After defining what it wanted, the company noticed that the best alternative would be to migrate its on-premise data-center environments to the cloud. Among the available tools in the market, Google Cloud VMware Engine was the solution that best met LIQ’s requirements due to its potential functional improvements and comprehensive support throughout the migration journey.
In its data center, the company was using solutions from VMware, a company providing software and cloud-computing and virtualization services to create virtual machines. Google Cloud VMware Engine lifts and shifts VMware-based apps to Google Cloud in an easy, streamlined way, without altering apps, tools, or processes, with every license and feature required for operations.
From the beginning of LIQ’s project with VMware Engine, collaboration between the developer teams was essential as they outlined every phase, mapped the company’s apps, and understood internal interdependencies and flows. Only then did they start planning, in alignment with customer processes at all times, to maintain uptime. This led them to split the process into three stages. During the first, completed in May 2021, 180 servers were migrated.
In a later stage, which lasted only three months, the company migrated 80% of its business apps and 50% of its information environments from a total of 600 servers. Its current challenges include completing the migration of critical and informational systems. Telephone customer service, encompassing a large data volume and over one million recorded interactions per month, will be migrated after that cycle.
Perceived advantages and future plans
“The process is still ongoing, but we have already achieved surprising results, such as a 94% decrease in incidents in the apps hosted in the cloud, a 60% total infrastructure cost reduction compared with two years ago, and a 92% savings rate for storing historical data.”
—Nicolas Ramirez, Head of Technology and Innovation, LIQThe new infrastructure has provided tangible benefits. LIQ also began processing its largest document volume ever, cut recurring costs by 30%, and managed to complete its pricing process 90% faster. As the engineering team was familiar with VMware’s VCenter technology, which they continued using through Google Cloud’s solution, there was no need to invest time or money to develop new skills or specific training.
LIQ still faces challenges ahead. It has begun tackling one of them, app modernization, with support from VMware and Google Cloud. The initiative’s goal is to restructure the information department and develop microservices to reduce the dependence on large-sized infrastructures demanding fixed costs. This will be completed in a year, according to estimates.
“LIQ is looking for providers that are more familiar and involved in this cloud infrastructure and microservices. The company wants to explore artificial-intelligence APIs to ensure harmonious customer service, a line of business that is only possible with the cloud.”
—Nicolas Ramirez, Head of Technology and Innovation, LIQTell us your challenge. We're here to help.
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About LIQ
LIQ is a company present throughout the consumer relationship journey, with a human outlook and all-line approach (on- and offline: retail, in-person, voice, and digital service). By creating customized, smart, and simple solutions for brands and their consumers, the company turns customer service into a unique customer-relationship experience.