Plan for today, prepare for tomorrow

If you were to take a trip around some modern farms, mills or production sites across Europe, there’s a very good chance you’d stumble upon a solution made by the MSK Group – a manufacturer of high-quality plastic components, mobile machinery and smart cabins for a range of industries, including construction, mining, agriculture, forestry, and material handling. In fact, the company is a key supplier of advanced components for Volvo wheel loaders and Valtra tractors, among others.

The family-owned corporation based in Ylihärmä, Finland has been in business for more than 70 years now. And it definitely has an appetite for more, as evidenced by the most recent acquisition of new production plants and warehouses in Germany and Slovakia.

Just like with virtually any modern manufacturing company, network plays a vital role in the day-to-day operation of MSK Group.

“It’s basically everywhere, we’re using it across the entire corporation, including factory floors, offices, and even some outdoor areas where it supports the functioning of forklifts, to give you an example”, explains Jarno Kankaansyrjä, IT specialist at MSK Group. “So yes, we are pretty dependent on the network, all our operations rely on it running smoothly”.

But more often than not, growing business imposes certain challenges for the IT department. To keep the consistency and drive efficiency of the network for all six business subsidiaries, MSK Group has been steadily modernizing its infrastructure for several years now.

“The overarching goal is to have the same infrastructure in all of our locations: Ylihärmä and Lapua in Finland, as well as Döbeln in Germany and Sabinov and Lipany in Slovakia”, adds Ville Ahola, ICT Manager at MSK Group. “We’ve been addressing that for some time now by gradually modernizing our switch base and expanding our wireless network capabilities. It was important for us to have reliable solutions that would support our goals and needs both for the time being and in the long run”.

MSK Group’s history with Extreme solutions actually dates back to 2009 and it probably wouldn’t have unfold if it wasn’t for the advice of one of the most experienced engineers in the Extreme Hero program.

“I went there (…) to have a discussion about what they would need and provide my technical point of view. I came to the conclusion that for them, Extreme would be an excellent fit”, says Jari Koivula from Westcon Group Nordic & Baltic.

Ever since then, the company has been consistently replacing the legacy Cisco and HP switches with subsequent models from Extreme.

“Summit X350 series were the first ones to be deployed. I think we installed 18 of them at first, some are even still in use today”, says Jarno Kankaansyrjä. “They’re very reliable devices. Despite the harsh conditions that are typical for a manufacturing environment, we had zero problems with them during all these years”.

Today, MSK Group is slowly replacing the older Extreme equipment, as well. For example, 2020 saw the upgrade of the data center infrastructure in Ylihärmä, which is now running on Summit X440 and X590 core switches, using EAPS ring topology to connect subsidiary production plants, including smaller site in the city of Lapua. The same goes to the network infrastructure at the recently acquired locations in Slovakia and Germany.

“First and foremost, we need our networks to be reliable. It's easier to maintain and make sure that all our operations will run without problems, if we can integrate and harmonize our infrastructure”, says Ville Ahola. “We have already done a lot of work over the last couple of years in that regard and I think those Extreme solutions have played a big part in that. Our aim is to finish the modernization cycle next year”.

Reliability of the network equipment is one thing, but when you’re using a mix of older and newer devices from various vendors, there’s also the question of managing your infrastructure in an efficient, consistent, and cost-effective fashion.

To tackle that challenge, MSK Group decided to implement ExtremeCloud IQ – Site Engine. The solution not only extended cloud management to third party and non-cloud native devices that were still in use – it also helped the IT team avoid a costly and resource-intensive modernization project in one go.

“Site Engine allows us to support those old switches and I must admit it's pretty good. It allows us to easily manage all the MLAG and EAPS links and takes configuration backups and that kind of work from our shoulders. There's also a nice 360° map overview covering the entire network, so it's easy to see what's going on in there”, Jarno Kankaansyrjä admits.

Many organizations are still connecting their distributed locations with expensive, dedicated multi-protocol label switching (MPLS) lines, which is a highly resilient but quite costly and slow to install connectivity option. For now, the recently acquired sites in Germany and Slovakia are connected with the HQ in Finland via MPLS connections, but that may change sooner rather than later.

“After we finish replacing the outdated equipment in all of our locations, the next step will be solidifying secure user-to-application connectivity and connecting our workers to cloud-based resources via the Internet”, Ville Ahola explains. “We are pretty much prepared to leverage SD-WAN technology to connect our remote sites in the near future”.

MSK Group’s modernization project also covered wireless networks. The IT team in Finland came to a conclusion that it was high time to replace the obsolete infrastructure which was also built on devices from different vendors. Based on the positive experiences with new switches, in 2021 Ville Ahola and his colleagues decided to gradually deploy more than 100 new access points from Extreme: AP350C and AP460C. Why these particular models?

“Both models are perfect for demanding industrial and outdoor environments. We’re talking about dust proof devices, capable of running in some of the harshest weather conditions like -40°C”, says Jari Koivula from Westcon Group Nordic & Baltic, who advocated the choice. “Also, we wanted to leverage the Wi-Fi 6 efficiencies, AI/ML capabilities and smart management functions that come with the cloud”.

Cloud-based network management is not always the primary choice when it comes to manufacturing companies – some businesses hesitate in transiting to the cloud due to certain security concerns and reservations. MSK Group, however, is not one of them.

“Our company is implementing a cloud-based ERP system which of course is more dependent on the wireless network. We expect to see more mobile devices and location-based services on the production floor in the near future, so getting the network infrastructure cloud-ready was our major goal”, Ville Ahola explains.

That is why MSK Group chose to implement ExtremeCloud IQ platform.

“ExtremeCloud IQ is a clear upgrade from the previous solution, which only had on-premise controllers. It's very simple to onboard the access points, we can create new network policies and upgrade processes with much ease, using nothing more than a smartphone”, Jarno Kankaansyrjä admits. “Earlier, the network tended to be unreliable and APs required rebooting on a fairly regular basis. That’s not the case anymore. Also, it’s worth to mention that our own IT team in Finland managed to deploy the wireless network basically by ourselves”.

With the implementation of Extreme management solutions and hardware, both on the Ethernet and wireless side, MSK Group’s network infrastructure is now ready to move fully to the cloud.

“When it comes to the network, we don't have any obstacles on our journey. In three years, most of our services will be in the cloud and I feel we are well prepared for that move”, says Ville Ahola. “The biggest priority for us though, is to have a reliable network which works everywhere, no matter where you roam at the site. It's basically all that matters, both today and in the future, and we have achieved that and many more”, the ICT Manager at MSK Group sums up.