Fujitsu Costa Rica Reduces Costs, Increases Innovation Using Amazon Connect

Fujitsu offers a comprehensive range of information technology products, solutions, and services from eight global delivery centers. The on-premises contact center solution at one of those delivery centers, Fujitsu Costa Rica, required customized scripting and communication with external vendors for areas like call recording and omnichannel reporting, but integrating these separate solutions cost the company additional time, effort, and money. In 2018, Fujitsu Costa Rica initiated a proof of concept to migrate its on-premises contact center to a cloud solution that would provide additional features and a different approach to service. The goal was to consolidate its operations into a centralized solution from a single vendor that would cost less, be more scalable, and have a more robust set of features.

The company considered several alternatives before selecting Amazon Connect, comparing factors like ease of use, cost, scalability, support, and innovation. “Of all the tools that we analyzed, AWS provided the best overall package comparison,” says Alex Sanchez, head of cross–global delivery center networks for Fujitsu. The initial proof of concept migration transitioned around 20 customers and 200 customer service agents to using Amazon Connect.

After that proof of concept, Fujitsu Costa Rica presented a business case to senior executives that showed the cost savings and increased capabilities of using Amazon Connect and received approval to expand the project to migrate an additional 400 customers and about 5,000 agents to Amazon Connect in 9 months through AWS MAP. Throughout the process, the company sought to build a team to support and manage the new infrastructure. Fujitsu Costa Rica needed additional expertise and a larger workforce to transition smoothly, which it received through AWS MAP and by using AWS Enterprise Support, a concierge-like service that offers 24/7 technical support to help organizations achieve outcomes and find success in the cloud. “Having access to the AWS Enterprise Support team, so that we could have a companion in this journey, was fundamental for this change,” says Sanchez. “We wouldn’t have been able to accomplish this migration if it weren’t for that support.”

After migrating to Amazon Connect, Fujitsu Costa Rica saw a significant reduction in cost compared to its former on-premises solution. Using standard, centralized technology across the global delivery center, the company also reduced onboarding time for new customer accounts from 2–3 months to 1–2 weeks. Fujitsu Costa Rica was able to realize these cost savings faster through AWS MAP support. “Participating in AWS MAP helped us accelerate innovation and the onboarding of new accounts and regions,” says Sanchez. “The support from different architects, managers, and sales representatives from AWS helped us get new regions and businesses using Amazon Connect so that they could start experiencing the same type of savings for the global project.” The company anticipates that these cost savings will continue to increase as it migrates additional global service centers and expands its use of AWS services.

Fujitsu Costa Rica also saw improvements in the scalability and reliability of its contact center by using Amazon Connect. Previously, outages or increased call volume that exceeded the capacity of its infrastructure would result in long wait times for customers or dropped calls. Using Amazon Connect, the company can scale up and down based on its needs, providing a better experience for callers. Fujitsu Costa Rica was also able to adapt quickly because its solution was able to scale to support 95 percent of its employees working from home during the COVID-19 pandemic. “With traditional telephone systems, it’s very difficult to support working from home because you need to factor in the bandwidth needed for agents to take calls, the number of concurrent agents, and the number of calls over a virtual private network,” says Sanchez. “Using AWS was a success factor for our response to the COVID-19 pandemic because we were able to support employees working from home using Amazon Connect without having a significant impact on our infrastructure.”

Alongside the migration, Fujitsu Costa Rica also implemented new features. For example, if there’s a major incident, customers can hear updates before talking to an agent, which saves time on the phone for both the customer and the agent. If there are long wait times, customers can choose to receive a callback rather than waiting on hold. “The new features we’ve implemented have helped improve our customer satisfaction,” says Sanchez. “We’ve reduced the need for customers to wait on the phone because they have alternative channels to get a solution.”