Custella empowers logistics planners and field technicians with MySQL Database Service, shortening application response time by 20%.
Business Challenges
Custella offers scalable field service and transport management solutions for companies of all sizes to clients worldwide. The company's flagship product combines two modules: Field Service Management (FSM) which helps companies with real-time location tracking and job order processing, and Transportation Management System (TMS) which handles the logistics of planning, executing, and optimizing shipments.
Custella was launched in Malaysia at the beginning of 2020, having the pressure to deliver high-quality services on its shoulders from the start. Gradually, the company's presence in the market grew, acquiring clients with operations in Brunei, Australia, Singapore, and Malaysia. However, even if application performance was mainly satisfactory, the company's activity was not challenge-free.
To deploy its solution, Custella was using a popular cloud hosting provider for infrastructure hosting and another common database provider as a database. Within months after launch, Custella started facing scalability issues with the database . This was reflected in the overall performance of Custella's software suite with increased server response times Clients had continuously communicated high expectations with regards to responsiveness and reliability, regardless of the wide range of functions and features.
Combined with the performance issues of the database, and the lack of in-depth monitoring features, the system did not have the capabilities to provide real-time insights, limiting Custella's capacity to take actions to improve database uptime and service quality.
Strengthening the security aspect of the database was another challenge Custella needed to tackle. In addition, working in an open-source environment made the task of ensuring the security of all stored data a complex one.
Stemming from these challenges appeared the need for an enterprise-grade and established cloud database services vendor to provide credibility to clients regarding the security, scalability, and reliability of Custella's applications.
Business Results & Metrics
Migrating from the legacy database to MySQL Database Service resulted in substantially increased the availability of Custella's application and allowed it to function faster, rendering it more reliable and secure, while giving customers 24/7 access to the information they need.
Quantifiable results did not take long to show. The response time of Custella's applications has shortened on average by 20%. This is critical for clients whose enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, customer relationship management (CRM) systems, and helpdesk applications work complementary with Custella's software suite. A client's system captures and sends orders to Custella and subsequently receives information back for inventory checks, invoicing, warehouse team hours, and reporting among others.
The page load time of Custella's applications has improved on average by 15%. This represents a major benefit for field representatives and drivers who have now faster access to information such as historical visit records or shipment data.
Custella also benefits from end-to-end data security with MySQL Database Service, compliance with privacy regulations and data protection laws across the world, and simplified database monitoring and administration through MySQL Enterprise Monitor.
With MySQL Database Service on Oracle Cloud, Custella can scale computing and storage capacities as the company continues to grow. "The scalability of MySQL Database Service is much higher than the original database and cloud hosting provider. Now, when there are spikes in usage, the servers scale up seamlessly and provide us with the needed performance," adds Andrew Thomas, Managing Director at Custella.
Partnering with Oracle also opened new business avenues for the company. "Oracle is a global leader in the IT space. We know that we can rely on them. More and more leads are converting into clients because they are convinced by the fact that we are operating on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure," says Andrew Thomas.
Why MySQL Database Service
MySQL Database Service was Custella's preferred choice as it is scalable and easily gains customer confidence, particularly given the reliability and security of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure. Custella's IT team also found the MySQL database architecture much easier for streamlining the process of managing multiple servers.
"And the outstanding tech support from MySQL and Oracle was critical during and after the migration phase. It helped us deploy the solution with ease on OCI and focus on making the most out of the adjacent benefits," explains Hari Prashanth.
Implementation
After evaluating various database service providers, Custella initiated a proof of concept with MySQL Database Service. The project lasted for three months and convinced Custella that MySQL Database Service was the right answer to achieve its goals.
The MySQL team helped conduct training to assist Custella in the onboarding process. The team also provided guidance on the product profile and best practices on the architecture, helping Custella with decision-making and accelerating implementation. "It was a smooth transition process from our previous environments to MySQL Database Service. And this was key to giving us confidence," concludes Hari Prashanth.