Tooling Systems Company Positioned Well
for Future Growth with Modernized Technology 

 CasTool Tooling Systems

Customer

Castool Tooling Systems is Canadian-based company with its head office located in Uxbridge, Ontario. Established in the early 1980’s, Castool manufactures tooling systems for die casting and extruding light metals serving primarily the automotive, aircraft, industrial and construction industries. Castool employs over 160 people, with plants located in Canada, Thailand and soon Morocco as it continues its global expansion with clientele in 55 countries. Castool is owned by parent company, Exco Technologies, a Canadian publicly traded company on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSE).

Challenge

In 2019, Castool found itself in need of assistance to re-design, re-architect and implement new technology in each of their Canadian and Thailand offices.  Castool’s IT team were finding their aging systems inefficient, difficult to manage and lacking the agility and flexibility required to keep up with the pace of business.  They truly were looking for a more modern approach to technology that would enable their IT team to better support their business as they continued to expand globally.  

Castool needed to identify a solution provider who possessed the proper IT solution skills, expertise, and ability to execute under tight timelines and limited budgets.  They also required a provider with the willingness and capability to support their growing needs beyond the Canadian border.

Selection Process

Castool has always exercised a stringent IT service provider selection process that includes consideration of at least four or five competitive vendor proposals.  They maintain a strict set of requirements and measure each provider uniquely for each major IT project. 

As with all customer projects, Sentia’s Pre-Sales Solution Engineer analyzed data collected during the  information gathering phase, prepared configurations ensuring compatibility and ended by negotiating, on behalf of Castool, extremely attractive pricing across the many vendors involved to ensure Castool’s budget would be stretched as far as possible.  Sentia then presented their comprehensive ‘IT Modernization’ proposal to Castool for consideration.

In the end, Sentia’s broad subject matter expertise coupled with their team’s willingness to go above and beyond for client needs subsequently resulted in the selection of Sentia being chosen to partner with to help modernize Castool’s IT environment in both Canada and in Thailand.  

“Sentia’s professionalism, deep analysis, consultative approach & knowledge of Castool’s environment and quality of services have been the key driving factors as to why we partner with them the most,” Mr. Wei says. “We are at our best when we partner together.”


“Sentia’s professionalism, deep analysis, consultative approach & knowledge of Castool’s environment and quality of services have been the key driving factors as to why we partner with them the most. We are at our best when we partner together."

- Shawn Wei, IT Administrator
CasTool Tooling Systems


Solution

Any time a project extends beyond borders the logistics and risks increase considerably however with an experienced team behind Castool they had confidence that our recommended solution would deliver value and give them peace of mind, greater productivity and a platform that would support their future needs.

The scope of the project included the following key technological components:

  • A complete modernization of Castool’s storage architecture which included the deployment of the IBM Storwize SAN storage for improved data protection, availability, and ease of management for storing the company’s sensitive data
  • Lenovo x86 servers to upgrade the aging compute environment and making it more highly available through virtualization and clustering
  • VMware to improve management, business continuity and resiliency 
  • Sentia professional services to architect, configure & implement the entire solution

Sentia’s discovery phase involved a pre-validation process to confirm that the existing environment in Thailand would be able to sustain the new infrastructure being shipped to Castool’s plant. Sentia organized the shipping of all components of the new solution to Thailand.  Once delivery was confirmed, Sentia’s lead Solution Engineer, along with Castool’s Canadian IT Manager, made the 13000+ km journey to Thailand, to collaborate with CasTool’s Thailand team and implement the proposed solution.  This was all accomplished in under 10 days. 

In the end, Sentia was able to deliver a high value solution with a high degree of risk and complexity on a limited budget and tight timeline.  

“What made Sentia’s expertise stand out was their tailored approached to developing customizable solutions to meet Castool’s budget and overall expectations,” Mr. Wei emphasized.

Castool now enjoy a modernized technology solution with the flexibility to scale to either a public, private or hybrid cloud when the time is right. 

Highlights

  • Castool increases availability, responsiveness and flexibility
     
  • Castool forges deep partnership and trust with local Canadian service provider
     
  • Castool positions itself strategically for future growth and expansion on-time and on-budget
     
  • Amplified trust in Sentia with support above and beyond expectations throughout the duration of the project
     

Download the Full Story [PDF]

 

OUTCOME

  • A complete technology makeover enabling Castool to streamline business operations nationally and internationally and maintain quality standards in a cost-effective way.
  • A robust hybrid cloud solution – resulting in a highly elastic and scalable DR and business continuity solution with significant cost reduction.
  • From maintenance to innovation – Gave valuable time back to Castool’s team to focus less on IT maintenance and more on business growth and development.

 


Sentia can deliver the same quality of support and service to your business. We offer consultative expertise, support, and administration in the following areas:

  • Managed IT Services
  • Backup/Recovery, DR Services
  • Data Center Infrastructure
  • Network and Security, Cyber Security
  • Microsoft O65/Exchange
  • VDI, VMware
  • Cloud Resource Management

MISSION

Smart people simplifying
technology for amazing results.

VISION

To eliminate the pain and
complexity of technology

VALUES

Customer First      Expertise & Reliability
Integrity & Trust   Teamwork & Partnerships