HJ Heinz Company has become the first organization to number crunch its data both ‘in memory’ and across the globe, after hiring a migration specialist for its maiden cloud voyage.

The food giant used Virtustream’s xStream to create a platform as a service (PaaS) environment on which SAP’s HANA in-memory database system could analyse masses of data quickly. The company’s ‘in memory’ cloud system ran across its computing resources in 40 different countries.

Heinz’s first foray in cloud computing has seen it roll out SAP HANA globally and, according to Heinz, ahead of schedule. Heinz said the exercise will give it a granular, real-time visibility into company performance, which it can budget for on a consumption-based billing model.

Bean-maker turns bean-counter

As a result of its pioneering SAP HANA in the cloud, Heinz claimed it can enjoy a 50 percent improvement in response times for its SAP production environment. Virtustream says the experiment showed that its managed service can offer SAP up to 65 percent cheaper when delivered as a managed service in the cloud.

Global brand Heinz has struggled to integrate disparate sources of data from multiple business intelligence platforms in different locations. Meeting this challenge would allows its SAP enterprise resource planning systems to harmonise purchasing, create efficiencies and boost sales.

The cloud has created the potential for unifying them on a single system. Heinz investigated how service providers could create both instant detailed overviews of data and the flexibility of payment in using expensive computing resources. SAP’s HANA – which uses expensive in memory techniques for fast number crunching – offered the raw computing power to create the desired instant insight. Virtustream’s cloud service allowed it to be delivered on a pay per use basis, according to Davor Brkovich, Heinz’s director of global technology operations.

“We needed to process more information in greater detail and the cloud offered a simple way to manage this on a global scale,” said Brkovich. Virtustream made it seamless and secure across 40 countries, he said.

“We now have greater visibility into key performance trends, the ability to identify problem areas and quickly optimise sales strategies by data across multiple local markets.”