Heavy equipment provider Anderson Equipment Company (Anderson) is transforming its workplace with increased productivity, stability, and security through a multiphase migration to the cloud. A provider of heavy earth-moving, forestry, and mining equipment, rentals, and services in the eastern US, Anderson began working with technology consultant Cloudforce in 2019 to migrate business operations and employees to the cloud rather than continuing to rely on its on-premises datacenter. In 2023, Cloudforce helped Anderson migrate 220 employees to Microsoft Azure Virtual Desktop in six months, and Anderson employees are impressed with the new system’s speed, security, and performance. The small IT staff has tripled its productivity, and Anderson sees its collaboration with Cloudforce as a long-term partnership at the center of its IT success.
Migrating an 88-year-old family-owned business to the cloud may seem impossible, but when heavy equipment provider Anderson Equipment Company (Anderson) decided it was time for a digital transformation, it found a true partner in technology consultant Cloudforce. Anderson is in the midst of a multiphase cloud migration with Cloudforce and recently migrated all 200-plus employees who use its technology to Microsoft Azure Virtual Desktop within six months.
Ongoing support from Cloudforce has helped Anderson’s IT staff to nearly triple its productivity, and employees across the board appreciate the new system’s speed. Sales staff benefit from simplified but secure logins that give them more time to focus on selling. As Anderson prepares for the final stage of its migration, its senior leadership has come to see Cloudforce as more than just another vendor; Cloudforce employees feel like a part of Anderson.
Cloudforce is an invaluable partner. I can’t tell you how much I respect the company, the people, and their skill sets.
James Corrao Director of IT, Anderson Equipment Company
Headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Anderson rents, sells, and services heavy earth-moving, forestry, and mining equipment from Maine to West Virginia. Its staff includes office workers, salespeople, and service technicians working all over the region. Anderson’s leadership recognized that upgrading its existing IT infrastructure, centered around an on-premises datacenter, would allow the company to better support its 19 office branches and maximize productivity and revenue.
“We used an on-premises virtual desktop interface that was all hosted in our Buffalo, New York, datacenter,” says James Corrao, director of IT at Anderson. “When the Buffalo datacenter went down, so did the entire company. Our employees would be unable to sell a part, put time on a work order, or tell customers when their machines are coming.”
Anderson began working with Cloudforce in 2019 to deploy Microsoft 365 apps throughout the company. After a short pause, Anderson was ready to move forward with the next phase in late 2022, migrating its employees to Azure Virtual Desktop. Moving virtual desktops into the cloud was a key step in Anderson’s journey to migrate its on-premises datacenter, and the company was eager to continue working with Cloudforce. “Cloudforce is an invaluable partner,” says Corrao. “I can’t tell you how much I respect the company, the people, and their skill sets.”
Anderson needed to migrate 220 employees, including remote staff and service technicians who rarely visit office branches. Cloudforce developed a customized plan to migrate employees within the requested project time frame of six months. Cloudforce helped build the networking foundation that would house Anderson’s cloud infrastructure and securely connect to each branch office. The companies worked together to test, pilot, and push the solution to Anderson’s production environment. As with every migration project, Cloudforce’s efforts to fully understand Anderson’s operational needs, along with careful planning and piloting, ensured a flawless migration with limited to no impact on production.
Anderson anticipated that employees would log in and out of Azure Virtual Desktop throughout the workday, so Cloudforce streamlined the process of session host deployment with Microsoft native scaling tools. With this approach, Anderson optimized its cloud costs while ensuring that employees always have an available session host. Anderson’s IT staff is equipped to administer the solution because Cloudforce provided training and knowledge transfer sessions.
Maintaining a robust security posture is a top priority for Anderson, and Cloudforce delivered. “I have been so impressed with the security we have around everything from biometric scanning and multifactor authentication to device management,” says Corrao. “Cloudforce has been so valuable in making our presence in the cloud rock-solid secure, and that is worth its weight in gold.”
I have been so impressed with the security we have around everything from biometric scanning and multifactor authentication to device management. Cloudforce has been so valuable in making our presence in the cloud rock-solid secure, and that is worth its weight in gold.
James Corrao Director of IT, Anderson Equipment Company
Anderson’s on-premises virtual desktop interface required expensive vendor licensing as well as a robust datacenter footprint for the virtual desktops. By migrating to the cloud, Anderson is fully using its existing licensing with Microsoft, enjoying cost savings compared to its on-premises infrastructure, and improving its employee infrastructure. Using pooled session hosts, Cloudforce consolidated Anderson’s existing virtual desktop interface environment of one session host per user to a shared desktop experience. This reduced the required session hosts from over 200 to under 20.
Anderson employees enjoy the increased platform stability. An outage in Buffalo no longer shuts down the entire company, and Anderson’s IT staff can focus on strategic needs instead of maintaining infrastructure. With ongoing support from Cloudforce to identify and mitigate anomalies, the IT staff that previously completed five value-added projects in a typical year can now finish roughly 15, tripling productivity. As IT issues arise, Anderson knows it can reach out to its contacts at Cloudforce and receive a quick response.
Employees across the board are realizing productivity gains with simplified but secure logins and quick network access. As employees migrated to Azure Virtual Desktop, they were impressed with the system’s speed and performance. For remote sales and service staff, biometric scanning for logging in saves time. “A remote employee can log on 10 or 15 times a day,” says Corrao. “If you save one minute each time you log in, by the end of the year that can add up to substantial savings for each salesperson and technician.”
The final stage for Anderson will be migrating its on-premises datacenter fully to the cloud, a project it is already working on with Cloudforce. Anderson’s senior leadership believes that a stable and secure IT infrastructure is at the heart of a good company and provides a competitive advantage in the marketplace. Through Anderson’s cloud migration and strong relationship with Cloudforce, this medium-sized company is able to make swift IT changes for better performance.
After four years, Anderson sees Cloudforce as more than just a business partner. The equipment provider trusts Cloudforce’s recommendations because of its successful track record and almost personal investment in Anderson. “Cloudforce has as much pride in what we’ve built at Anderson as our own employees,” says Corrao. “They are more than just a business partner; they’re viewed as pseudo employees of Anderson and will be for a long time.”
Cloudforce has as much pride in what we’ve built at Anderson as our own employees. They are more than just a business partner; they’re viewed as pseudo employees of Anderson and will be for a long time.
James Corrao Director of IT, Anderson Equipment Company
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