Fashion specialist s.Oliver rolls out End-User Experience Management

s.Oliver, a popular German fashion brand which also owns the Comma, Q/S and Liebeskind fashion and accessories labels, is using Nexthink to gain comprehensive insight into the health and performance of its IT infrastructure. Operated by ZIS Leutek monitoring software, s.Oliver’s IT control center is enriched with Nexthink client analysis data, enabling an integrated IT business process overview.

At the core of Nexthink’s analysis is consistent data from all client connections, which are assessed and visualized in real-time. This enables a quick and complete insight into the performance of the company's IT from an end-user perspective. The company is thus also prepared for future IT-dependent projects such as presenting merchandise in a virtual reality environment.

The identification and location of IT problems is no longer a difficult issue for the company – regardless of whether their clients connect using applications, devices or websites. This helps significantly in identifying and accurately locating emerging IT issues at an early stage – which speeds up support and minimizes unproductive phases. Slow booting, sluggish print jobs, or application crashes that previously impacted employee satisfaction and work time can now be proactively addressed and resolved in the shortest possible time. The further spread of disruptions is also prevented by automatic alerts sent to administrators, driving prompt intervention.

Integrated IT management reaching individual overseas locations
s.Oliver analyzes around 5,000 clients with the help of Nexthink, including both digital work stations at the company's head office in Lower Franconia and IT endpoints in widespread trade locations and overseas. "We divided our IT installation over two engines: an internal one in Rottendorf and an external one. This contains, for example, Asia, the showroom clients, as well as our points of sale at individual locations, such as retail clients", explains Steffen Zeiss from the Operations Control department at s.Oliver. "Our implementation partner, Consulting4IT, actively supported us."

According to Stefan Schmitt, who also works in the Global IT department, trouble-free IT is vital for his company, because of the intense time pressures that surround wholesale: "Buyers including individual retailers and the large warehouses usually come to the showrooms monthly, often on strict deadlines. We therefore cannot allow any delays – IT must always be reliably available for customer data maintenance, order processing and so on", he emphasizes.

Nexthink significantly contributes to this efficient Digital Experience Management, as no lengthy, manual search processes have to be set in motion in the event of abnormalities or anomalies at the client end. Possible causes of performance problems no longer need to be searched for individually on devices, servers, networks or applications. "Instead, analysis of connection data immediately creates transparency and shows whether it is only one client that is affected or entire groups or departments. This saves a lot of time, money and stress", explains Schmitt. “Furthermore, the software used here in the field of analytics enables comprehensive license, bandwidth and hardware management to immediately identify unused resources, bottlenecks or uneconomical legacy equipment.”

Proactively manage data-based IT and intervene immediately where necessary
In terms of the technology itself, Digital Experience Management is implemented via a small piece of software installed in each client. The Nexthink Collector collects connection data, makes it available in real time and also compiles historical data. Nexthink Finder analyzes the data, displays it on individual dashboards and makes the IT health status visible to those responsible for IT almost immediately. This enables rapid intervention and managed "self-help" processes, protecting IT resources and avoiding frustration among users. The engage function within the solution opens up a direct route to immediate user feedback.

Nexthink also supports upcoming IT-based activities at s.Oliver: "In the near future, we will be faced with the challenge of launching a digital merchandise presentation application in the showrooms using virtual reality. Reliable measurement is a necessity for this: Is a client's performance sufficient to run specific software? Does it function long term and at peak times? We are answering these and similar questions with Nexthink", explains Zeiss.

"Problems can be proactively detected with Nexthink without users having to report a fault. This saves time and a great deal of irritation and leads to an improvement in the overall infrastructure", adds David Griffiths, Vice President Central Europe & Middle East at Nexthink. "We are very much looking forward to being able to support s.Oliver in this."