Wells Fargo Auto Finance Group

Success Story

NetWare 6 offers Wells Fargo Auto Finance Group increased functionality without the need for additional IT personnel.

Overview

Wells Fargo, a diversified financial services company, provides banking, insurance, investments, mortgage and consumer finance services. With $222 billion in assets, the organization serves 17 million customers and 104,000 team members through numerous distribution channels, including 5,130 stores and the Internet. Wells Fargo Auto Finance Group, a department of Wells Fargo, offers fast, convenient and secure online auto financing and insurance to its customers.

Challenge

The Auto Finance Group's business challenge was twofold—to better equip its users with the tools and resources needed to perform their work responsibilities and to simplify infrastructure management to ease administrative burden. The organization wanted anytime, anywhere accessibility to corporate and industry data and resources for its remote user base, increasing overall user productivity. In addition, the Auto Finance Group sought to alleviate administration issues through streamlined processes and enhanced desktop management and software distribution.

The financial services company's search for a solution with unsurpassed technology to help change the way it does business led the organization to Novell.

Novell solution

"No other offering can match the security and functionality of NetWare 6. Features like iFolder, iPrint and Portal Services will change the way we do business, significantly increasing employee productivity and simplifying administration."

Rowdy Van Cleave
Vice President of Network Operations
Wells Fargo Auto Finance Group

The Auto Finance Group selected Novell NetWare 6, including Novell Cluster Services, iFolder and iPrint, as the crux of its innovative solution, which also leverages eDirectory and ZENworks for Desktops.

"We chose Novell technology because of its stability," said Rowdy Van Cleave, vice president of Network Operations, Wells Fargo Auto Finance Group. "eDirectory has been around for years and provides the ideal environment for any application. NetWare 6 is built on this heritage and brings unparalleled functionality to the industry, presenting future opportunities and endless possibilities for our organization."

Prior to implementing the NetWare 6 solution, remote access was a complicated and time-consuming task, often requiring users to perform several tedious steps to access or retrieve data and business-critical resources. Based on Novell eDirectory, NetWare 6 Web-enabled functionality will allow the Auto Finance Group to offer anytime, anywhere access to corporate and industry data and tools through any Web browser.

To prepare for its NetWare 6 implementation, the Auto Finance Group is currently testing Novell Cluster Services, which will help to streamline server usage and maintenance, while eliminating data loss and system downtime.

iFolder will improve employee remote connections, allowing users secure, stable access to files and documents. Whether at home, work, on the road or at remote offices, iFolder will grant Wells Fargo users the same level of accessibility, security and flexibility, significantly increasing their productivity. Moreover, any changes or updates made to files are automatically synchronized, ensuring the most current documents are accessed.

Based in Novell Distributed Print Services (NDPS), iPrint, the next phase in the evolution of printing, will enable the Auto Finance Group to send documents to printers that extend across multiple networks and operating systems. By leveraging Internet technology, including the industry-standard Internet Printing Protocol (IPP), iPrint will allow users to connect to appropriate printers and print to any remote location.

In its effort to further ease administration issues, the Auto Finance Group selected ZENworks for Desktops for its outstanding desktop management and software deployment capabilities. With offices spread from California to Minnesota, the organization utilizes ZENworks for Desktops to remotely distribute applications to its numerous workstations.

Results

With NetWare 6 still in implementation, the Wells Fargo Auto Finance Group anticipates significant results in employee productivity, by providing anytime, anywhere accessibility to needed industry data and resources as well as decrease in administrative burden.

"This Novell solution has been a substantial benefit to our users and infrastructure administrators. Our biggest return has been the ability to offer more services and resources without increasing our IT staff by even one headcount," Van Cleave said.