The Gokongwei Group, one of the largest conglomerates in the country, has announced that it has completed the migration of its entire technology infrastructure to Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform.
The mammoth undertaking was one of the biggest migrations of its kind by any Philippine-based company, with various business units under the group such Universal Robina Corporation, Cebu Pacific, Robinsons Land, and Robinsons Bank taking part in the initiative.
The conglomerate actually started its migration in 2018 with a data center modernization project that saw JG Summit Holdings migrate its main data center in the Philippines to the cloud.
To carry out the project, the Gokongwei Group sought technology partners ePLDT, Infosys, and Microsoft. The migration was formally completed at the end of 2021.
ePLDT, the ICT arm of PLDT Enterprise, provided the colocation services at its VITRO Data Center, which enabled the Gokongwei Group to host its IT infrastructure in a robust data center facility.
“On behalf of PLDT Enterprise, we thank the Gokongwei Group for trusting us to be part of their end-to-end digital transformation journey through our VITRO Data Center colocation services,” said Jojo Gendrano, FVP and head of PLDT and Smart Enterprise.
Indian tech firm Infosys was crucial in both formulating and executing the Gokongwei Group’s transformation strategy. This involved migrating various data centers across multiple business units into a single unified Microsoft Azure-based platform and upgrading the group’s SAP ERP system to SAP S/4 HANA.
“We are delighted to collaborate with the Gokongwei Group in their digital transformation journey. Our expertise in digital technologies backed by decades of experience in navigating the business landscape will definitely bring in a lot of synergy, that will help them realize their vision of long-term digital transformation,” said Karmesh Vaswani, executive vice president and global head consumer for retail and logistics at Infosys.
Sandy Gupta, vice president of sales, marketing and operations at Microsoft Asia Pacific, said the transformation project elevated the company into “an enterprise of tomorrow, which is crucial as the digital and traditional economy continue to be on a growth trajectory”.
When the pandemic hit, the Gokongwei Group said it was ahead of the curve. Through collaboration powered by Microsoft 365, their hybrid workforce was able to ensure business continuity.
Moving forward, the Gokongwei Group said it is working to use artificial intelligence to drive monitoring and operations control and bring it closer to its goal of becoming the first digital conglomerate in the Philippines.
