VR Group boosts cloud application performance and reduces costs

Building a faster, more agile cloud network

Finnish-based travel, logistics and maintenance service company, VR Group, created an agile digital infrastructure leveraging software-defined interconnection to improve cloud application performance and reduce costs.

Envisioning IT modernization 

VR Group wanted to replace its legacy corporate network, which had become increasingly complex and cumbersome, requiring manual operation and maintenance that drove up costs. The company needed to provide fast, reliable access to business operation applications on Microsoft Azure for its employees and customer-facing applications (travel reservation, logistics and maintenance systems) on AWS. Its architecture team set out to improve the performance, scalability and resiliency of its hybrid multicloud interconnectivity and to better control escalating costs. 

To meet these goals, VR Group designed a modern, dynamic network backbone that simplified its hybrid multicloud architecture and eliminated the need to backhaul cloud traffic to its corporate data center. 

Optimized, agile and resilient digital infrastructure 

Working with Equinix and Cisco, VR Group’s architects evaluated different deployment options and selected the optimal solution for its needs. By harnessing Network Edge services and Cisco virtual cloud routing, the company was able to build an optimized, agile and resilient digital infrastructure with low-latency access to AWS and Azure clouds. 

Network Edge, paired with Equinix Fabric software-defined interconnection, provided the company fast and secure, redundant connectivity to Microsoft Azure and AWS clouds in Amsterdam and London. This helped VR Group accelerate users’ access to its business applications and transportation services, greatly improving the internal and external user experience. Vendor-agnostic Equinix Fabric and Network Edge also establish a foundation for deploying other cloud and SaaS platforms and virtual network functions (VNF) capabilities, such as SD-WANs and firewalls. 

VR Group also leveraged Equinix Fabric to enable private interconnection between AWS and Azure services and its Helsinki data centers, which were directly and securely connected via Equinix Metro Connect®. Equinix Internet Access provided reliable access to the public internet. The company’s active-active redundant business continuity and disaster recovery (BC/DR) environment provided the network resiliency it required to keep all of its apps and services running smoothly for its internal and external customers. 

Performance optimization, sustainability and cost savings 

By replacing its legacy backbone network with a more agile and scalable virtual network across its hybrid multicloud architecture, VR Group optimized its application performance and user experience through high-speed, low-latency interconnectivity to AWS and Microsoft Azure clouds. It also simplified network management and increased resiliency, eliminating the risk of outages that would have interrupted employee and customer access to mission-critical applications and services. 

As a result, VR Group gained a flexible, future-proofed digital infrastructure with lower network costs. An additional benefit to VR Group building its infrastructure at Equinix is that sustainability is core to both companies’ businesses, and both take a energy-efficient approach to their operations. 

“Equinix helped us lower our latency when accessing cloud apps and services by 100x, which greatly improved our user experience,” says Markus Niskanen, Head of Architecture, VR Group. 

Benefits

Faster application access 

Leveraging Cisco virtual routers on Network Edge and Equinix Fabric®, cloud application performance improved 100x due to the proximate connectivity to AWS and Microsoft Azure with single-digit latency (1–5 milliseconds). 

Less network complexity

VNF-based cloud-to-cloud peering and cloud interconnectivity can be dynamically configured in minutes, rather than weeks or months. 

Seamless resiliency

Dual-port connectivity via Equinix Fabric and redundant VNF devices provided greater network resiliency than legacy networks, eliminating network outages. 

Lower costs 

Physical networking equipment and connection costs were reduced by a minimum of 60% by deploying an optimized, dynamic digital infrastructure. 

Supporting sustainability 

Equinix and VR Group are both committed to meeting environmental sustainability goals and global initiatives. VR Group’s sustainability work is based on the UN Sustainable Development Goals. The company is committed to the Finnish government’s ambitious goal of making Finland carbon neutral in 2035 and carbon negative soon after.