MANILA, Philippines, May 20, 2008 - Stolt-Nielsen Philippines, a top offshore services company and a pioneer in the aquaculture industry, has completely overhauled its network infrastructure and put in place technology from Cisco. The network upgrade will enable Stolt-Nielsen to increase its operational flexibility and use the network as a platform to accelerate the delivery of applications and support evolving business requirements.
At the heart of Stolt-Nielsen's network is the Cisco® Catalyst 3750 Series Switch, a line of enterprise-class stackable multilayer switches that provide high availability, security and quality of service to enhance the operation of the network. Its innovative unified stack architecture provides industry-leading stack management, redundancy and failover.
"The comprehensive upgrade of our network is in line with our overall office renovation. The aesthetic and technological transformation of the Stolt-Nielsen facilities has done wonders for our employees' daily operations. We now have a visually appealing workplace and a more capable and robust network system," said Ricardo Sacay, training computer administrator at Stolt-Nielsen.
Another reason for the network migration is the recent transfer of Stolt-Nielsen's worldwide accounting transactions to the Manila office, making it the accounting hub of global operations. "We receive hundreds of scanned receipts from all over the world daily. We used to have a difficult time processing large incoming files. Since the network upgrade, this has become very manageable," Sacay added.
Stolt-Nielsen currently uses 18 switches spread throughout the four floors of the Stolt-Nielsen main office in Makati City. Cisco Aironet® wireless access points provide mobility in the four floors.
"The Cisco Catalyst 3750 Switches provide Stolt-Nielsen with the foundation on which it can deliver services in the future such as unified communications. The network has truly become a platform to enable the company to realize its business objectives in the coming years," said Luichi Robles, country manager of Cisco Philippines.
Stolt-Nielsen celebrated its 25th year of operations in the Philippines last year. It handles ship operations and manning requirements of the entire Stolt-Nielsen fleet with docks located in more than 50 ports worldwide. Its two main headquarters are located in London and Rotterdam. The Manila office deploys 1,500 seafarers annually. Stolt-Nielsen has 130 state-of-the-art parcel tankers that carry millions of tons of cargo.
