Volvo Case Study

Judge how Volvo Car Corporation integrated the cloud infrastructure into its networks

Swedish car giant Volvo is rolling out Microsoft's Business Productivity Online Suite over the next three years as part of its ongoing commitment to Cloud Computing. The agreement, which includes IT services such as-email, messaging and collaboration tools for Volvo Cars' employees, has been signed in the light of changes in ownership in the company. (Lauchian, 2010) “We're in the process of moving away from the previous owner, which is Ford, into a new ownership relationship, and we have to replace all of our collaboration tools,” said Rich Strader, CIO at Volvo. “I think the benefit we see in the Cloud is we're really a car company. So we're different than Microsoft in that we don't have software as our primary business. Our primary business is building premium vehicles, and selling them and marketing them. So, we want to focus our attention on that.”

Strader said that moving to the Cloud brings with it multiple benefits. “The Cloud offers a way to get services that are very attractive to us that we would otherwise have to build ourselves,” he explained. “By not building them ourselves, we can take the IT resources we have and put them on things that are differentiators for the Volvo car company.  “Another benefit is that it's instantly global, right? So, any of our offices anywhere in the world and any of our expansion can immediately take advantage of the Cloud. They don't have to wait for us to build infrastructure or to pipe it into a local area, we can just start using it.”

Explain how Volvo Car Corporation transforms data into knowledge

Volvo integrates product configuration, warranty, and vehicle diagnostic data to support technical and business analyses throughout the product lifecycle. The ready availability of current, quality-controlled data is transforming decision-making processes throughout the organization, with beneficial impacts on quality, warranty...