About Dr. Agarwal’s Eye Hospital

Dr. Agarwal’s Eye Hospital specializes in treating eye conditions such as cataracts; glaucoma; corneal problems such as ulcers, inflammation, and thinning; and retinal issues such as degeneration and detachment. The business operates 62 hospitals in cities across India and 14 hospitals in 8 countries in Africa, including Zambia, Nigeria, and Ghana.

Industries: Health & Social Care

Location: India

Founded by the late Dr. J. Agarwal, Dr. Agarwal’s Eye Hospital, headquartered in Chennai, India, operates 62 hospitals in cities across India and 14 hospitals in 8 countries in Africa, including Zambia, Nigeria, and Ghana.

According to Dilip Ramadasan, GM-IT, Dr. Agarwal’s Eye Hospital, the business is the second-largest network of eye-care hospitals globally and aims to provide the best eye care in the world.

“We have focused on service over the last couple of years and decided to completely revamp back-end operations such as information technology and finance,” says Dilip.

“Realizing our vision involved moving to a completely new infrastructure that could deliver the scalability, agility, and performance our evolving application stack required.”

Replacing Aging Desktop Hardware and Applications

The business placed particular emphasis on upgrading its aging desktop fleet and traditional productivity applications.

“When I arrived in 2015, we only had 35 hospitals and all of them were using desktops that were five years or older,” Dilip says. “These desktops were due for replacement within the following six months to a year, so I had an ideal opportunity to upgrade our capabilities and address issues such as excessive support costs and resource requirements.”

For example, if a desktop at a hospital in a remote location experienced a problem, Dilip had to dispatch one of his technology team members to fix the issue. This could take up to five days, while the employee whose desktop was underperforming or failing often needed to wait until the fix was applied before resuming work.

Three Criteria for Improvement

When evaluating options to enhance the hospital’s information technology environment, Dilip applied three criteria: increasing revenue, increasing efficiency, and reducing costs.

Dilip elected to replace the traditional desktops and applications with Chromebase devices running Google Chrome and G Suite applications. “This option aligned perfectly with our efficiency and cost criteria,” he says.

The business started a four-month pilot of Chromebase devices with G Suite in October 2015 at four newly-opened hospitals.

“We wanted to see how users would react to the Chromebases running G Suite compared to the traditional desktops and applications,” he adds. “A large component of the project entailed educating users about the benefits of G Suite applications such as Google Docs and Sheets.”

Chromebases Running G Suite Deployed to 600 Users

Dr. Agarwal’s Eye Hospital has completed the deployment of Chromebases running G Suite to 600 users. This group comprised team members who needed to access a billing application or a human resources management system and doctors who needed to access patients’electronic medical records.

“My desktop total cost of ownership fell by up to 70% when I deployed these devices,” Dilip says.

With G Suite running on Chromebase devices, Dilip has been able to resolve many desktop support issues remotely, minimizing the need to send support team members to distant locations.

“The number of support tickets we used to process on the desktop computing side has fallen by a full 80%,” he says. “As a result, I’ve been able to cut the number of desktop support team members from eight to three and redeploy them to server and application management and support.”

Dilip cites Sheets and Google Drive as the G Suite applications most beneficial to the business.

Sheets enables hospital team members to share important cost and revenue numbers without having to attach multiple versions of spreadsheets to emails, while Google Drive facilitates collaboration by enabling the team members to store and view shared documents.

“Team members are able to spend more time on core activities rather than on picking up numbers and sharing them with regional managers,” Dilip says.

The business also uses Google Vault to protect management data held in emails and help ensure compliance with legislative requirements.

Google Cloud Platform Products Under Evaluation

Dr. Agarwal’s Eye Hospital is evaluating extending its deployment of Google Cloud Platform products to Google BigQuery and Google Data Studio.

“We are looking to add a business intelligence layer over applications running in other cloud environments, and Google potentially provides an option to do that,” Dilip says.

“This layer would enable us to analyze electronic medical record data to increase our understanding of patterns such as how a particular disease affects an individual across various stages of life and what types of interventions would deliver the best results.”

“Google has introduced the flexibility we need to reposition our engineers as needed, improved the relationship between the information technology team and operations teams, and given the information technology team greater confidence in resolving issues,” adds Dilip. “We will be continuing to scout for opportunities across Google platforms to increase our revenue and efficiencies while decreasing our costs.”

More than 3 billion users stay in touch, share ideas, and get more done together in Google Workspace, across apps like Meet, Chat, Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides, and more. And starting today, we’re rolling out a new version designed to help people bring the apps they know and love to use in their personal lives to their work life. The new Google Workspace Essentials Starter Edition is a no-cost solution for business users looking to enhance teamwork and unlock innovation with secure-by-design collaboration. With Essentials Starter, we’re making it easy for employees to choose their own productivity tools and bring modern collaboration to work.

Work easily and securely within your current environment

As the world of work continues to evolve in unprecedented ways, secure collaboration—at speed, at scale, across platforms, on multiple devices—has never been more important. Essentials Starter helps employees and their teams break down silos and work together in new ways, even if their organization still relies on legacy productivity tools that weren’t built for the hybrid era of work. There’s no need for a new email address, file conversions, new plug-ins, or desktop software. All of the tools in Essentials Starter will work quickly and easily within your existing environment. And because we designed Google Workspace to operate on our industry-leading cloud foundation, Essentials Starter provides encrypted and secure access to files, helping keep users safe and their information private.

How Essentials Starter works

1. Sign up with your work email for a no-cost Essentials Starter account. No credit card required and there’s no limited trial period.
2. Invite teammates to collaborate using Google Docs, Slides, Sheets, Chat, Drive, and Meet.
3. Unlock innovation with new ways of working with immersive, virtual meetings, and by storing, sharing, and collaborating on 100+ file types, including Microsoft Office, without the need for file conversions.

Collapse the boundaries between people, places, and timezones

In our recently commissioned hybrid work global survey with Economist Impact, when workers were asked what was most important to realize the benefits of hybrid work, their number one choice was “new technologies that allow for time and location flexibility.”*

Google Workspace was born in the cloud and designed for maximum flexibility; to be used from the location and device of your choice. Google Workspace brings chat, files, meetings, and your favorite apps into an intelligent hub so you—and your team—can connect, create, and collaborate from your PCs, tablets, and smartphones, across locations and time zones.

Modern collaboration capabilities

Using the cloud-first approach of Google Workspace, teams can:

• Experience modern collaboration without the burden of version control or email attachments. Brainstorm, build presentations, and glean insights from data using Google Sheets, Slides, and Docs.
• Host secure video meetings to bring everyone together in one place. Conduct one-to-one video meetings (unlimited) and immersive team meetings (3-100 people; up to 60 minutes in duration each).
• Real-time messaging with Google Chat. Share quick updates, files, and high-fives across the team with Google Chat, from one-to-one messages to larger group conversations.
• A dedicated place for team collaboration in Spaces. Spaces are tightly integrated with Google Workspace tools like Chat, Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides, and Meet, providing a better way for people to engage in topic-based discussions, share knowledge and ideas, move projects forward, and build communities and team culture.
• Access work content securely from your devices. With 15 GB of storage in Google Drive, you can store, share, and access work content from your mobile device, tablet, or computer, and Drive for desktop can enable you to sync files and folders to your PC or Mac. Your Drive storage limits remain separate across your personal and Google Workspace Essentials Starter user accounts.
• Work with existing tools without file conversions. Store, share, or co-edit 100+ file types, including Microsoft Office documents and PDFs without the need for file conversions.
• Easily manage your team of collaborators. Add and remove team members effortlessly using a simple dashboard.

Over the past two years, organizations around the world have relied on Google Workspace to reimagine how work happens and enable modern collaboration across their teams to unlock innovation. During a time of enormous uncertainty, our customers have launched game-changing products, reached new audiences, accelerated lifesaving research, and digitally transformed their own customer experiences. Along the way, they’ve used Google Workspace to empower their employees—across homes, offices, and on the frontlines—to connect, create, and collaborate in powerful new ways. And starting today, with Essentials Starter, employees can make the switch from legacy productivity tools and experience the difference with Google Workspace.

Get started today.

^{* Economist Impact survey commissioned by Google in October 2021. The most popular answer when workers were asked about the most important condition needed to achieve the long-term success of hybrid work models was based on 42% of 1,244 respondents.}

FM Logistic provides its international customers with complete logistics solutions that cover everything from warehousing and handling, to transport and distribution, co-packing and co-manufacturing, and supply chain optimization. Operating in 14 countries including France, Russia, Poland, India, Vietnam, Brazil, and China, FM Logistic supports its clients by offering specialized services across a number of markets including consumer goods, retail, cosmetics, and health.

“We are in the process of transforming all our tools and integrating new solutions to be able to work faster and more efficiently. Two main IT priorities are mobility and openness, in terms of working from anywhere and being able to interact with other information systems.”

– Communication Manager, FM Logistic

As a business that has existed since 1967 and in 2018 achieved a turnover of €1.178 billion with 9.5% annual growth, FM Logistic is always looking to help secure the company’s position within an evolving sector. To better serve its customers, FM Logistic decided to launch an innovation project in 2017 to transform the internal digital tools of the company and replace its intranet, email, and productivity software. The company looked for an integrated solution that would enable more collaborative ways of working and bring its international operations closer together. The company found that implementing G Suite and LumApps social intranet was the perfect combination.

“We are in the process of transforming all our tools and integrating new solutions to be able to work faster and more efficiently,” says the Communication Manager at FM Logistic. “Two main IT priorities are mobility and openness, in terms of working from anywhere and being able to interact with other information systems.”

A global transformation

For large international companies with global operations, implementing a single integrated solution to enable collaboration across regions while respecting regional variations can be a real challenge.

“We have 26,000 employees spread across a broad geography, with a variation in cultures and technological maturity. There was an aspiration to work in collaboration, but the necessary tools were not in place,” says FM Logistic’s Communication Manager. FM Logistic looked for a solution to enable new, more collaborative work practices, which were flexible in terms of usage and that, most importantly, would work as part of an integrated solution.

To do that, FM Logistic worked with Google Partner Devoteam G Cloud to implement G Suite alongside the LumApps intranet portal. It took six months to complete the migration of 7,000 accounts, with employees accessing the Business or Basic G Suite edition according to their needs. “Before, with our physical infrastructure we found ourselves buying additional hard drives as we ran out of storage,” says the Technical Project Manager at FM Logistic. “That’s no longer a problem, and we can tailor access depending on whether or not employees need unlimited storage .”

“It’s a real advantage to be able to access your account from any device and work from anywhere. Hangouts Meet has been really transformational in that respect: it has reduced the need for travel significantly, even in the few months we’ve been using it so far.”

– Communication Manager, FM Logistic

“We followed Google’s G Suite migration advice and had early adopter ambassadors in every country. By the time we got around to the final country, very little input was needed as they were ready to go!” says the Technical Project Manager. “Many of them were already familiar with the product, so it was very intuitive. Our feedback surveys gave a satisfaction rating of almost 4.5 out of 5 in relation to the transition. We also had significant executive support, with two members of the executive committee on the steering board. That really helped the project to move quickly.”

As a result, employees were quick to understand the benefits of the new system. “It’s a real advantage to be able to access your account from any device and work from anywhere. That was clear from the start,” says the Communication Manager. “Hangouts Meet has been really transformational in that respect: it has reduced the need for travel significantly, even in the few months we’ve been using it so far.”

LumApps: a fully-integrated enterprise hub

One of FM Logistic’s main reasons for choosing G Suite was the seamless integration with LumApps’ intranet portal. LumApps adds value to G Suite, thereby boosting and sustaining employee adoption. FM Logistic chose LumApps to create a hub for its enterprise, where everything is centralized from internal communications to business apps.

“We didn’t want a patchwork of solutions, we needed a platform that worked as an integral whole,” says the Technical Project Manager. “With LumApps, employees access the intranet using their Google authentication and can access all their G Suite tools through the intranet. Moreover, LumApps is Google native, so the integration is seamless and we know that it will evolve to accommodate any changes that might take place.”

“The main advantages we see are communication and knowledge sharing,” says the Communication Manager. “With LumApps, all 26,000 of our employees are now able to access the portal in their own language and access local news.”

For the next step, FM Logistic is considering integrating social communities so that employees can express themselves and be more engaged in the corporate culture.

Supporting digital maturity

Thanks to Drive, employees can now work from wherever they are, and are able to work more efficiently and more collaboratively. “From an administrative point of view, users can benefit from automatic updates, so there is less pressure on the IT department,” says the Technical Project Manager. “And we’re seeing many innovative uses of the tools to work in more efficient ways: many services have gone paperless with Forms, so less time is wasted; commercial agents are using Drive to work together on tenders simultaneously; and with Sheets, tasks are automatically sent from the team manager’s file to employee’s Calendar.”

“G Suite and LumApps are the first step of our digital transformation, in terms of collaboration and moving into the cloud. We have real confidence in our partners LumApps and Google, and we’re investing in those relationships for the long-term benefit of the company.”

– Communication Manager, FM Logistic

Now, FM Logistic wants to further support its employees in exploring all the tools G Suite has to offer. “We are embarking on a second phase to give our employees the skills they need for advanced uses of Docs, Sheets, and Forms,” says the Communication Manager. “It’s a learning curve, but it’s key to our goal of transforming our everyday processes.”

“G Suite and LumApps are the first step of our digital transformation, in terms of collaboration and moving into the cloud. We have real confidence in our partners LumApps and Google, and we’re investing in those relationships for the long-term benefit of the company.”

Established companies in any industry, including telecommunications, often take a cautious approach when it comes to adopting new technology. This is true of any technology and especially of tools used across entire organizations and at all levels—like collaboration and communication tools. I joined Optiva Inc. as its Chief Marketing Officer in August 2018, and right off the bat I faced the need for cloud-based productivity and collaboration tools like Google Workspace (formerly G Suite), which was new to me. 

Optiva was in the midst of making an organization-wide change to implement Google Workspace productivity and collaboration tools. Employees at that time—at Optiva and across other organizations I used to work with—primarily collaborated by attaching documents to company emails and meeting their colleagues in office corridors. Meetings were almost always in person or via phone. These processes were inefficient and contributed to version-control confusion and decreased overall productivity. They were also based on our pre-COVID world.

Today, Optiva is a fully remote-first organization, and our employees use all the tools in Google Workspace. Collaboration has increased dramatically, surprising even initial skeptics. Occasionally we still encounter resistance from new employees who are used to a different way of working. This is logical, but more often than not, they thank us later, and many have told me that they see the value for their productivity and the entire organization’s collaboration. 

Google Workspace has become a real advantage, especially for a global company like Optiva with employees across the world and in so many different time zones. Instead of waiting for team members’ availability to review or collaborate on a document, wasting time coordinating who works on the latest version, or who is the “owner” of a deck, employees can open a document, view new changes, and add updates, even when others are working on the same document in parallel.  

Google Workspace promotes business as usual during COVID-19

The combination of Optiva’s remote-first policy and Google Workspace collaboration tools proved a welcome addition during the challenges posed by COVID-19. Optiva was ahead of the curve of remote working policies in the telecommunications industry and in the software industry as a whole, so when the work-at-home orders went into effect in March last year, Optiva’s business charged ahead without missing a beat.

Google Meet has helped us maintain a strong corporate culture during this challenging time. For example, we constantly use video conferencing, which has been a great way to see the entire team and get a real sense for how each employee is doing—professionally as well as personally. Using Google Chat allowed us to keep in touch with everyone across our global teams. It helps us ensure that everyone feels secure and can work during this challenging time. Also, we have continued to create new teams with employees all around the world. If we attempted to onboard or train them using conference calls or emails, the experience wouldn’t be the same. Meet has helped us develop the strongest teams possible, faster, and much more effectively. 

We also use Google Workspace tools to cross-train employees on tasks and processes in departments outside their own. That way, if one of our employees has to be out of the office unexpectedly, the company benefits from full business continuity. To make this possible, various teams and departments documented their specific processes, held training sessions on Meet, and recorded them so any employee could access them on demand.

Many struggled in the early days of the self-quarantine orders, especially when it came to the sudden need to select and deploy new technologies for remote collaboration and, more importantly, to keep supporting their customers. We were fortunate that our business was unphased—and we owe a lot of this success to Google Workspace.