Mazda Motors Logistics improves agility by migrating IT to Oracle Cloud

Mazda’s European automobile distributor moves databases and VMware environments to Oracle Cloud VMware Solution and Oracle Exadata Database Service.

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“Lifting and shifting our virtual machines to Oracle Cloud VMware Solution on OCI allows us to manage our own infrastructure on top of cloud-based bare metal. We maintained the ability to operate our environments the same as we did on-premises, without disruption or modifications.”

Leander Dierckx, Cloud Domain Lead, Mazda Motor Logistics Europe

Business challenges

Since 1968, Mazda Motor Logistics Europe (MLE) has been responsible for quickly and efficiently distributing cars and parts throughout Europe. Headquartered in Belgium, MLE also offers financial and IT services to both Mazda Motor Europe (MME) and all of Mazda’s national sales companies across Europe. With the goal of modernizing its IT infrastructure to accelerate innovation, MLE evaluated options for exiting its data centers and moving its VMware and database environments to the cloud.

Why Mazda chose Oracle

Mazda Motor Logistics Europe wanted to operate and manage new cloud environments the same way as it had on-premises, with as little modification as possible. It tested that goal by successfully implementing disaster recovery on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI). The combination of Oracle Cloud VMware Solution and Oracle Exadata Database Service gave MLE the confidence that it could move its on-premises production workloads to the cloud, knowing that application customization and database compatibility would be preserved.

Mazda Motor Logistics Europe now runs 85% of its IT on OCI and has closed two data centers.

Results

MLE consolidated its Oracle on-premises customer experience, sales, transportation management, and Oracle E-Business Suite applications—along with third-party business-critical applications—without business disruption on 12 nodes of Oracle Cloud VMware Solution. Its virtual machines now run at scale in OCI, sustaining the ability of VMware administrators to troubleshoot and remediate issues via a direct connection to an ESXi host and vSAN clusters and to control policies for patches, updates, and upgrades as they had before. The migration of business applications to Oracle Cloud VMware Solution increased Mazda’s agility and responsiveness to fluctuating demands.

The company also migrated its 80 Oracle Exadata Database environments to OCI, while retaining the same high performance and availability it experienced on-premises while reducing administration. The consolidation of databases in OCI helped to ensure data management information is available quickly and easily. Having all data in one place also increased the company’s productivity and efficiency and facilitated compliance with data laws and regulations. Since closing its two data centers in Frankfurt, 85% of Mazda’s IT now runs on OCI.

Published:June 25, 2024

About the customer

Mazda Motor Logistics Europe is responsible for distributing cars and parts to European customers.  Founded in 1968 and located in Belgium, it also offers financial and IT services to members of its parent company.