Screen to Screen better expresses Face to Face amid the lockdown. Doesn’t it? This week I was, face to face, sorry, screen to screen with a leading Pune industrialist from Automation and Robotics business.
Serious R&D, Brilliant Engineers, Latest Design Software, and Patents differentiate them from others. Global Customers for their World-Class Products mandate business continuity. I had an interesting conversation with him on how they are continuing their business amid the lockdown.
Here are the excerpts.
My Question:
Pune was subject to much earlier lockdown than national lockdown. Are you able to continue your business?
His Answer:
We are more in design than in manufacturing. Our design unit caters to Oil, Gas, Aerospace, Defense, IoT, Chemical, and Pharma industry world over. The majority of customers are not under lockdown. If we are not able to continue our design services business, we will be out of business. When the government announced the lockdown in Pune, I was worried. I had to deal with five difficult challenges. Fortunately, we have overcome these challenges, can continue our business, thanks to BLACKbox and your team.
My Question:
Interesting, what was the first challenge, and how could you overcome that?
His Answer:
It was chaos. The first challenge was, how would our design engineers be able to work? They use superfast workstations loaded with expensive software. How would they be able to share data and collaborate from home?
Your team identified this challenge and, confidently advised us to transport those design workstations to engineers’ homes. They solved one level of the problem. This move equipped our design engineers with their powerful machines and licensed software. Your team configured a secured VPN to give access to our data to engineers. BLACKbox VPN server is serving the need for sharing and collaborating on the data. It worked but left me skeptical.
My Question:
If my guess if right, is it the second challenge which left you skeptical? What was it?
His Answer:
Yes, precisely. It was like I was handing over my fortune and destiny to my engineers. If they copy it or share it with my competitors, I would be left competitively vulnerable. That would even expose me to huge liabilities arising out of Non-Disclosure Agreements I signed with my customers. Your team assured me of the level of Information Security on those workstations. USB ports were blocked or allowed for inward only data transfer. Only the enterprise email system (with tight vigilance) was accessible on workstations. It restricted the Internet on these workstations to limited useful websites. This progressive step led to another level of challenge.
My Question:
Interesting, please go on, describe the third challenge.
His Answer:
Our design engineers have a genuine requirement of unrestricted Internet as a resource. We can’t afford to restrict their Internet access to workstations. At the same time, it can lead to leakage of my data over the Internet during unrestricted Internet. Your team calmly explained the technology which isolates enterprise data when the Internet is available to the user without any restrictions for the research purpose. It gave full freedom to my engineers. It also assured me of the safety of my data. It was not the end of my skepticism. I was concerned about the fourth challenge.
My Question:
You are unbeatable, please go on, describe the fourth challenge.
His Answer:
While working from home, users copy data on workstations and further work on the same. By policy restrictions, data is safe from leakage for theft. They spend hours on their data. How will the backup of data happen? Your team introduced your DCDR technology. It takes silent backup of the data on workstations over the Internet without allowing any intervention by the user. I was mostly relieved. This exercise left me with a fifth challenge.
My Question:
We are almost there. Please describe the fifth challenge.
His Answer:
Besides design engineers, we have other users. They use ERP, word, excel, pdf, and PowerPoint. They have computers (laptops or desktops) at home. Your team explained the concept of the BLACKbox duo. I also went through a video on your website. It creates an enterprise zone on an employee’s personal computer. Enterprise zone is subject to all data security policies. I understood that VPN and data files could be accessed only inside the enterprise zone. I was more concerned about being able to use ERP and tally applications. Your team explained the one-for-many feature of BLACKbox. It allows access to applications inside the enterprise zone.
I am glad we are not helpless in this lockdown. We are working at full steam. Our employees are productive. There is no compromise on the security of our data. We never thought of the Covid19 situation when we invested in BLACKbox. It neutralized our sufferings in these difficult times.
My Note of Thanks
Thank you for your candid inputs. We are glad that our team could help in these difficult times. We hope that you are using our signature features to prevent data loss from deletion, ransomware, disaster, and prevent data theft through USB, Email, and the Internet.
Good luck,
Best Regards,
Vishal Shah
Founder and CEO,
Synersoft Technologies Pvt Ltd