WD-40 eases network friction

WD-40 needed a secure, resilient, and scalable network to support its ambition for a global SaaS-based application strategy. Since 1953, WD-40 has become known as ‘the can of 2000 uses’, with household staples known for their effectiveness in fighting rust and corrosion. The company has grown to offices in 13 countries and has annual revenues of more than $400 million and was looking for ways to transform its operations for the 21st century. 

As part of its cloud migration strategy, WD-40 needed to implement quicker and more reliable connectivity to business-critical services, than its legacy MPLS technology or the public internet could provide.  The network also didn’t support the performance requirements of applications like Skype or Microsoft Teams, and their incumbent provider was unable to deliver on requested improvements or address the numerous outages reported. 

WD-40 set out an aggressive deployment timeline, and despite the impact of COVID, they were able to hold to their plans, smoothing the transition to a fully-managed network that delivered on WD-40’s goals of flexibility, reliability, change management, and performance.  Security was also a key consideration, and by working with Aryaka, WD-40 was able to create a foundation for adoption of a SASE architecture.

“Migrating networks is never a straightforward task but doing so in a pandemic was doubly challenging” said Jeff Longley, Systems Administrator at WD-40, “We needed to be able to run both the networks in parallel to ensure we could test network performance of the new network, before switching over, whilst maintaining the day to day working of the business. Aryaka’s managed networking and security capabilities made it the perfect partner.”

To help the SaaS-based application strategy, WD-40 was also looking to leverage technology to improve efficiencies in the workplace and enable a more flexible culture. Using collaboration technologies to reduce travel across Europe, a decision made in the effort to keep employees safe during the pandemic. Aryaka offered the most complete package. 

“WD-40 is one of the world’s best-known household brands and we are thrilled to solve a critical problem that their legacy providers weren’t able to. Together we formed an innovative partnership that just works,” said Ian McEwan, Chief Revenue Officer at Aryaka. “Migration is never easy, but Aryaka is committed to making the process as painless as possible for all of its global clients. At some point in everybody's life you need WD-40. It’s great to know WD-40 needs Aryaka.”

After launching Aryaka’s managed networking and security service, WD-40 saw immediate improvements in their network performance, enabling them to use services they had previously not been able to leverage. Now, WD-40 is prepared for any future expansions into new geographies thanks to the flexibility, cost, and ease of adding new sites and bandwidth with Aryaka. 

“The real-time insights on data and traffic that we’re seeing for the first time is providing us with a greater understanding of how the network is being utilized. The network management portal is simple and easy to use, and support, if needed, is also very quick to respond,” says Jeff Longley. “We now have the tools and insight to do continual service improvements and thanks to Aryaka we also have a service that can rapidly adapt to those changes.”