Like a breath of fresh air: ACCO drives data analysis with AWS and SoftwareOne

ACCO Engineered Systems

ACCO Engineered Systems is one of the largest Mechanical Contractors in the United States, responsible for the design, fabrication, installation and maintenance of HVAC, plumbing and other mechanical systems for a variety of markets including: commercial office space, medical/healthcare centers, manufacturing plants, entertainment, retail, telecommunications, education, data centers, high rise residential and more.

ACCO has found success by evaluating overall system performance, ease of installation, reliability and long-term energy consumption costs, and how these variables relate to owners needs. Through innovative engineering, comprehensive design solutions, consistent work quality, and qualified maintenance; ACCO confidently delivers the best possible solution.

As a Mechanical Contractor, ACCO has a long history and culture of using data extensively to provide the most value-added, cost-effective solutions.

Consolidate and secure data

We’re experiencing such large growth, it’s really important for the company to consolidate and secure our data, then use our data to help deliver better services to our customers.

– Gabe Cortina, Director of Data and Field Services, ACCO Engineered Systems

Consolidation

Centralising and securing data, both structured and unstructured, from across the organisation and establishing data governance

Operational efficiencies

Facilitating secure access to relevant data to drive operational efficiencies, beginning with sales and marketing and extending to expedient reporting and decision-making across the organisation

Predictive analytics

to support high-quality products and meet customer needs now and in the future

If air quality is compromised, it can create chaos. In a hospital setting, it can be bad for patients’ health. So, if we can understand that a part might be failing, we can get there and replace it before it does fail.

– Gabe Cortina, Director of Data and Field Services, ACCO Engineered Systems

With a strong belief that data insights and predictive analytics can help drive company growth and increase operational efficiencies, ACCO turned to Amazon Web Services (AWS) and AWS Premier Tier Services Partner SoftwareOne to build an AWS data lake and data governance capabilities.

Leveraging SoftwareOne expertise and Amazon Web Services

Previously, ACCO implemented its own custom enterprise resource planning (ERP) software to centralise the data. Still, the reporting tools were difficult for users, and customisations made updates much harder. Between sales, marketing, and operations, they needed data analysis that could work with multiple systems, legacy systems, and unstructured data at any scale. It was a tough ask, but AWS and SoftwareOne offered the platform, tools, and expertise to build a data lake or centralised repository to address ACCO’s needs.

• AWS provided a highly integrated platform to allow ACCO to connect diverse applications and data stores between departments, and with Amazon Marketplace, even third-party services could be easily accessible.
• SoftwareOne leveraged its Migration Acceleration Program (MAP) expertise, following a three-step process of assessment, mobilisation, and migration to establish the AWS data lake. Sticking with the core AWS Lake Formation tools meant that ACCO did not have to worry about integration, could leverage all of the AWS training available, and would avoid needing other hard-to-find skill sets.
• Amazon QuickSight, a cloud-scale business intelligence (BI) service, would allow data to be tagged, shared, and analysed on the same platform.
• With AWS Glue, a serverless data integration service for predictive data analysis, ACCO could use the data proactively to address customer HVAC system concerns before they happen.

Internally, ACCO Software Engineer Lead, Artin Eivazi, collaborated with the team responsible for standardising processes across business units, getting their buy-in to their own data governance. The team brought a deep understanding of the data that would be critical to successful data consolidation.

With Amazon Web Services and the help of SoftwareOne, we can continue growing, confident that our clients will receive the quality air and service they deserve.

– Gabe Cortina, Director of Data and Field Services, ACCO Engineered Systems

Because ACCO was building a new capability – and with such an essential task at hand – SoftwareOne needed to see how well the previously-constructed in-house solution fit the well-architected framework for maintaining secure, reliable, performant, cost-optimised, and operationally excellent applications in the AWS Cloud. The well-architected review and remediation provided a comprehensive analysis of ACCO’s framework as a whole, identifying opportunities for ACCO to remove any skill set gaps by implementing Amazon Web Services.