Gekko Group is an innovative hotel and restaurant brand that prides itself on treating its guests to unique experiences. Its design-driven hotels, restaurants and residential concepts set the scene for exclusive moments and unforgettable encounters. Yet underpinning it all is a rock-solid IT infrastructure. Why? Because Gekko’s staff can only devote themselves fully to guests’ experience if all its IT services are running smoothly. At the same time, the cost of administrative processes such as check-in and payment needs to be as low as possible.
Gekko Group has been expanding in Germany since 2016. During this phase, it has acquired a number of hotels and restaurant operations together with their legacy IT structures. That was a challenge, as Marc Engler, Managing Director of Gekko Group, recalls: “It gradually gave us a colorful bouquet of IT systems, each of which was administered and managed locally as an on-premises solution.”
Each hotel used several computers, servers and back-up systems for which monitoring and maintenance added up to a lot of work. That in turn made it harder to satisfy the strict compliance specifications that apply in the franchise space. “Since each establishment was different, we had no way to implement applications strategically,” Engler notes. “As a result, we didn’t even bother introducing applications such as CRM systems in some cases, although the guests would have benefited.” To make processes as efficient as possible for staff and guests alike and lay the foundation for the opening of more new hotels going forward, it was thus necessary to consolidate the IT infrastructure.
FocusNet Technology consolidates IT processes in a cloud infrastructure
To get the job done, Gekko Group turned to VMware partner FocusNet Technology. For a previous hotel opening, the same IT service provider had handled hosting for the IT infrastructure and taken care of cloud operation. Given the success of this project, Gekko Group thus decided to entrust FocusNet Technology with cloud transformation for its entire IT infrastructure.
“We are having our cloud services run on VMware because that gives us a whole software stack that is very well integrated and runs stably,” explains Michael Fittler, CIO of FocusNet Technology. Products such as VMware vSphere, VMware Cloud Director, VMware Cloud Director Availability and VMware NSX are therefore deployed to keep Gekko Group’s processes running smoothly.
In a two-year project, FocusNet Technology gradually migrated the client’s individual locations to its cloud. With no interruptions to regular hotel operations, new hotels were hooked up directly so that they could operate within the cloud infrastructure. During this transformation, FocusNet Technology centralized IT administration and all IT services across the individual locations. It was also necessary to take the associated systems off premises and instead have them fully virtualized within the cloud infrastructure. The IT service provider modeled file shares, interfaces and hotel-specific services as virtual machines, running them as services in the cloud.
Reliable cloud operation delivers seamless guest experiences
The outcome of this transformation is reliable, low-maintenance IT operation. FocusNet Technology now oversees Gekko Group’s IT systems and takes care of all IT project management. Every aspect of administration, security and maintenance of the cloud infrastructure and the IT services that run on it is now in the hands of the service provider. That leaves Gekko Group free to focus its full attention on looking after its guests. “Our job is giving people a good time, not managing IT services,” Engler says. “That’s why we chose to work with FocusNet Technology, who are now making sure that our infrastructure is standardized and runs impeccably.”
Consolidated cloud management ensures that IT systems run securely and without interruption across all the Group’s hotels. It also saves time on system updates, and the centralized infrastructure can be protected more efficiently than the decentral on-premises solutions used in the past. As a result, it is now easier for Gekko Group to satisfy the strict compliance requirements that apply in the franchise space. At the same time, the scalability and predictable cost structure afforded by cloud operation prepare the ground for further hotel openings in the future.
The cloud paves the way to further growth
Since migrating to a cloud constellation, Gekko Group has also benefited from greater flexibility and more reliable financial planning, as it can now do the math based on operating costs rather than the cost of capital. Meanwhile, capital expenditure has been virtually eradicated at the individual locations. Since FocusNet Technology is now managing cloud operation, the Gekko Group no longer needs any internal IT resources. Similarly, the time saved on maintenance works frees up capacity to concentrate more on fulfilling its role as a host – and on specifically improving workflows. The result? Gekko Group can now provide its guests with a higher standard of service and can get innovative ideas implemented faster.
The Group plans to continue working with FocusNet Technology in the future. The setup now in place has proven its worth over the years and is easy to scale, so there is now nothing to stand in the way of further hotel openings. “FocusNet Technology knows exactly what we need and what steps must be taken before a hotel opens for business,” Engler says. “Conversely, we no longer have to worry about scaling the IT infrastructure while a hotel is up and running.”
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