Success Story: Retail

CompuCom has worked with numerous retailers to help them maximize the value they derive from their IT infrastructures and achieve business objectives.


Partnering with Microsoft to Leverage Desktop Deployment Best Practices

The Client
Founded in 1986, Office Depot provides office products and services to customers in many countries via distribution channels that include retail stores, direct mail, contract delivery, the Internet, and B2B electronic commerce.

The Challenge
Office Depot needed to certify more than 500 applications on Microsoft XP and implement a hardware and software deployment to 7,000 seats throughout North America in a six-month timeframe. It also wanted to reduce its risk and exposure while driving down costs but limited resources were available to meet the aggressive timeline: 70% of its budget had been consumed on only 30% of deliverables.

Measurable Results
CompuCom and Microsoft helped Office Depot achieve these results in three months:

• Increased IT alignment with customers’ business needs
• Enabled software compliance
• Rapidly provisioned desktops and notebooks locally and globally
• Increased the satisfaction of end users
• Significantly lowering costs of deployment by saving time

The Solution
Office Depot engaged us to help manage its desktop deployment program. We later developed strategies for application readiness and rapid deployment of desktop images, using Microsoft’s Business Desktop Deployment (BDD) solution, which features user state migration tools like the Operating System Deployment (OSD) solution and a feature pack for Systems Management Server (SMS). The tools enabled Office Depot to rapidly re-image and deploy its systems over the wire, greatly reducing deskside visits. CompuCom and Microsoft also enabled a “zero-touch” installation process for end users.

The Results
Office Depot’s IT team’s experience, CompuCom’s consulting expertise, and Microsoft’s technologies merged to rapidly deploy a secure, managed architecture across its organization—in three months. The new, secure, managed environment has enabled:

• Standardization and tighter controls of security and software
• Increased IT alignment with customers’ business needs
• Software compliance
• Rapid provisioning of desktops and notebooks locally and globally
• Increased end user satisfaction
• Reduced headcount and speedy deployment, which lowered overall costs