Toys"R"Us Asia Empowers Staff & Ensures Business Continuity with Remote Workplace

As a thriving and responsive business, Toys"R"Us Asia was quick to react when conditions around COVID-19 made it clear that maintaining continuity would require rapid operational changes.

In partnership with SoftwareONE, the company initiated a project to provide staff with remote application access by quickly establishing an Azure Virtual Desktop system. In just one week, testing started for users in Hong Kong. In week two, more than 250 users were added across Asia Pacific locations.

The solution enables remote capabilities using personal laptops or desktop computers and now provides users access to applications as if they were in the office.

Toys“R”Us is Asia’s leading retailer of toys, games, leisure equipment and educational products, as well as baby essentials using its Babies“R”Us brand. Headquartered in Hong Kong, the company operates over 470 stores with more than 10,000 team members across Asia, including Brunei, mainland China, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan and Thailand – and licenses more than 85 stores in the Philippines and Macau.

Toys“R”Us (Asia) Limited operates as a separate legal entity and is financially independent from all other Toys“R”Us current or former operating companies around the world.

As the severity of the COVID-19 crisis became apparent, management at Toys"R"Us Asia raised an alert to provide remote working capabilities for company staff. However, only a small number of staff were already equipped with company laptops and Virtual Private Network (VPN) access to essential systems. Without enough laptops to share with staff, the IT team needed an effective alternative that could be quickly implemented to protect the safety of staff while maintaining business operations remotely.

Fortunately, Toys"R"Us had a long-established IT services relationship with SoftwareONE before the emergence of COVID-19. In consultation with SoftwareONE staff, a proposal was quickly developed to establish a Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) using Microsoft Azure. The solution would enable remote capabilities using personal laptops or desktop computers to provide users access to applications as if they were in the office.

It was essential to get the VDI system up and running quickly to maintain business continuity. Toys"R"Us set the implementation schedule for two weeks or less.

“We wanted to speed up the process to enable the remote office capabilities. With help from SoftwareONE experts, we implemented our VDI start in a week and began testing with about 30 users in Hong Kong. In week two, we rolled out to more than 250 users across Asia Pacific countries.” Carment Fung, Regional Head of IT, Toys”R”Us Asia

Now, the system is giving remote users access to backbone business applications as if using an in-office computer. Toys"R"Us and SoftwareONE will continue working together to create a second phase VDI that will build a standard protocol for application access.

• Microsoft Azure Virtual Desktop established in just two weeks as an effective alternative to protect the safety of staff while maintaining business operations and communication with customers remotely.
  
• Remote application access rapidly enabled for 250 users across ten Asia Pacific countries.
  
• Phase 2 VDI is now in process to create a standard application access protocol template.