Reference
growth strategy in IT as well:
IT-HAUS creates synergies and increases IT security
Since its foundation in 1971, the KÖHL Group has developed from a small electrical company into an internationally active technology company. At the production sites of KÖHL s.à r.l. POWER DISTRIBUTION SYSTEMS in Luxembourg, modern power distribution systems for medium and low voltage as well as complex control systems are developed, planned, produced and installed for customers on site. The company has made a name for itself on the market with its customers in the fields of power plants, oil & gas, chemicals, industry, data centers and above all in the semiconductor world for safe switchgear. koehl-sarl.eu
LUXELEC Building Technology SA is a valued partner for building technology - from energy distribution, electrical installation, heating, ventilation and air conditioning to security and communication technology. As a specialist for networked solutions, LUXELEC Building Technology SA offers a full service: from consulting and planning to implementation and installation to maintenance and servicing. luxelec.lu
Both companies are independent and linked via a family holding company as a joint parent company.
Added value for the customer
"With the project management by IT-HAUS was I was very satisfied. With the conception of the carveins were my ideas were taken into account. The increased security requirements were implemented professionally. Also the technical implementation, includingusive the E-Mail migration in the ongoing business operations, wentwent smoothly. I will also be happy to work on future gladly work together with IT-HAUS ."
Management Summary
As part of their growth strategy, the companies have set themselves the task of creating synergies in IT operations and increasing IT security.
With the support of IT-HAUS GmbH , LUXELEC's IT environment was brought up to the established standard of KÖHL s.à r.l. POWER DISTRIBUTION SYSTEMS and the two environments were more closely interlinked (carve-in). This included creating a central Microsoft Active Directory structure, migrating all LUXELEC mailboxes to Exchange Online and creating a standardized, user-friendly and secure multi-factor authentication for users for all central applications (including VPN dial-in).
Today benefitthe companies from synergies in the administration and increased IT security.
Project environment
Plant construction is facing major challenges. A shortage of skilled workers, supply bottlenecks and price increases for the required materials are putting profitability to the test. At the same time, customer demands are increasing. Instead of planning and supplying a single system, customers expect integrated solutions including related services.
In order to meet these challenges, the Group has grown over time and has also expanded its portfolio. The individual companies continue to operate independently. Accordingly, the IT landscapes of the individual companies have also developed independently of each other. However, in order to reduce the administrative workload, the aim is to achieve greater standardization of the IT environments and intelligent integration of the individual environments without giving up the independence of the companies.
With this strategic objective in mind, KÖHL turned to IT-HAUS as a partner who had already supported both companies in a wide variety of IT projects in the past. Specifically, the aim was to harmonize the IT environment of LUXELEC Building Technology SA with the IT standards of KÖHL s.à r.l. POWER DISTRIBUTION SYSTEMS. Key elements of this standard include a common Active Directory structure, the use of Microsoft 365 Business Premium as a central platform for email and information exchange (including CodeTwo Email Signatures for central control of email signatures) and the use of Watchguard AuthPoint as a comprehensive solution for multi-factor authentication for VPN dial-in.
With these premises in mind, IT-HAUS developed the concept for the future IT landscape and then planned and carried out the technical implementation.
Project details
Sophisticated conditional access rules are used to secure user logins in the Microsoft Cloud. For example, Entra ID makes it possible to prevent devices that do not belong to the company from logging in from the outset, which provides effective protection against frequent attacks.
Conditional Access was also used to enforce the mandatory use of multi-factor authentication for Microsoft 365. The Microsoft Authenticator app is used for this, as well as call or SMS as alternative login methods.
As the majority of users already had hardware-based tokens to secure VPN dial-in via Watchguard AuthPoint, this solution was also standardized for both companies. Automatic synchronization of user accounts from Entra ID to Watchguard AuthPoint avoids the separate maintenance of user accounts. Users always use identical access data in both places - even after password changes in Entra ID. This reduces the workload for end user support.
The next step was to migrate the mailboxes from the Exchange server hosted externally by LUXELEC to Exchange Online. For this purpose, an Exchange hybrid deployment was first carried out before the user data was migrated department by department to Exchange Online. Finally, the Microsoft Exchange Server was uninstalled so that no more costs would be incurred for its hosting in the future and the effort of regularly importing updates would be eliminated.
Project success
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