Severn Trent Water chose Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 over upgrades to IBM Lotus Notes and its intranet to centralize content management and standardize collaboration tools. This is expected to speed publishing of more current content to its intranet, encourage greater innovation through new social networking tools, and spur cultural change around centralized content management and collaboration. The results so far include improved efficiency in content publishing and review processes, as well as time savings that can be redirected to boosting content quality.

1. Customer Solution Case Study
Utility Gains Productivity, Innovation from
Content Management, Collaboration Solution
Overview ―We’re excited about the new social networking tools
Country or Region: United Kingdom
Industry: Utilities in SharePoint Server 2010. These tools mean better
sharing of information. Better sharing of information
Customer Profile
Severn Trent Water, active from mid- saves time and money, and furthers innovation.‖
Wales to the East Midlands in the
Zuzana Lee-Emery, Strategy and Architecture, Severn Trent Water
United Kingdom, is a major water and
sewerage services supplier to more Severn Trent Water wanted its information to flow as smoothly
than 8.2 million customers. The
company employs 5,600 people.
as the water it delivered daily to millions of customers in the
United Kingdom. Its existing systems had grown organically over
Business Situation
Severn Trent relied on email and
time; now it was time to adopt a single, strategic direction. For a
decentralised data stores for content new content management and collaboration platform, the
management and collaboration,
resulting in lengthy and expensive
company chose Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 over an
business processes. update to its IBM Lotus Notes deployment and aging intranet,
Solution
based on WebSphere. The results: the company’s intranet is
The company chose Microsoft expected to publish more content more quickly, while saving
SharePoint Server 2010 over upgrades
to IBM Lotus Notes and its intranet,
editors time that they can use to boost the quality of content.
based on WebSphere. Collaboration tools will foster greater innovation. And the new
Benefits
technology supports a broader drive to modernise the ways that
 Speeds publishing of more, and employees use and share information.
more current, content
 Encourages innovation
 Spurs culture change on content
management and collaboration

2. ―We wanted one place Situation says William Hewish, Chief Technology
Some things flowed quickly at Severn Officer at Severn Trent Water. ―That
for employees to go to Trent Water, and some things didn’t. information was located in various
systems around the company. Much of it
see all the information What flowed well were the high-quality was in SAP—a manager’s workload lists,
that was important to water and sewerage services that the for example—so we wanted employees
company provides to more than 8.2 to have an initial view of all of this
them.‖ million households and businesses from information, and then easy, direct access
mid-Wales to the East Midlands in the to the documentation and details behind
William Hewish,
Chief Technology Officer, United Kingdom. Those services include it, whether it was in SAP or elsewhere.‖
Severn Trent Water the daily provision of almost two billion
litres of drinking water—enough to fill Some of the company’s information
more than 1,000 Olympic-sized issues were more basic. ―We had
swimming pools. Severn Trent Water also significant numbers of documents mailed
processes around 2.7 billion litres of around the company and to external
wastewater daily. partners,‖ says Jeff Hart, Corporate
Information Manager at Severn Trent
What flowed less well was something Water. ―That meant massive volumes of
that might not immediately be email, duplication of documents, and a
associated with a provider of water and lack of version control. Documents were
sewerage services: information. But hard to find, unless you already knew
information of all sorts needed to flow where to look. This put a strain on our
just as smoothly. That information infrastructure and resulted in a
included customer communications; significant loss of time for our employees
documents shared or jointly authored by as they searched for documents.‖
employees; exchanges with contractors
and consultants engaged on company The company also experienced inefficient
projects; and company news workflow around documents and
disseminated over the intranet. processes. For example, news stories
destined for the company’s intranet front
Employees managed content and page could go through six reviewers
collaborated primarily through email before being posted. Relying on email
attachments, file shares, IBM Lotus Notes for this process meant delays until each
databases, and an IBM WebSphere– reviewer in turn got to his or her inbox.
based intranet. The technologies on There was no central, always available
which Severn Trent Water relied were document to which all reviewers could
heavily customised, making upgrades go.
costly and time consuming. Nor did they
readily integrate with the company’s These issues had an impact throughout
recently-deployed SAP enterprise the company. ―The way we’ve
resource planning system. traditionally worked with information
made it difficult to collaborate, for
Severn Trent Water found it difficult to example, to publish news stories quickly,‖
realise one of its central visions for its says Hewish. ―We didn’t track the review
information systems. ―We wanted one process, so we didn’t know where a story
place for employees to go to see all the was in that process. Reviewers had to
information that was important to them,‖ bend their schedules to the process,

3. ―Once our employees rather than being able to review stories Office SharePoint Server as a central
at their earliest opportunity.‖ document repository.
are comfortable with the
Solution The standards and procedures
Ribbon interface in By 2009, Severn Trent Water was ready management team, for example, had
Office 2007, it will be a for new technology to enhance content content management and collaboration
management and collaboration, and needs that focused on developing and
simple matter for them support the flow of information. But maintaining the company’s standards
which technology? The company knew and procedures. That team tested
to begin using that centralising content management whether an out-of-the-box Office
SharePoint Server 2010, and standardising collaboration tools SharePoint Server deployment could
would require a technology that was provide a shared area for all up-to-date
which operates with the both more powerful than its current standards and procedures owned and
environment, to serve the full sweep of managed by Water and Waste Water
same interface.‖ the enterprise, and more flexible, to Services, all stored on one system in a
Zuzana Lee-Emery, encourage user adoption and change the central location and using standard
Strategy and Architecture, current corporate culture. Severn Trent templates.
Severn Trent Water didn’t see that the upgraded versions of
its current technologies would meet The results from the standards and
these requirements. And that wasn’t the procedures management team and
only concern. others at Severn Trent Water was
consistent: Office SharePoint Server
Apart from its SAP deployment, Severn required little if any user training, no
Trent Water had traditionally used IBM customisation, delivered fast and reliable
technology. But over the previous two performance, and improved business
years, it had implemented a new processes.
strategic direction toward Microsoft
technology. The company wanted to Severn Trent Water decided to make
gain the benefits of easy training and SharePoint technology the platform for
use, lower costs, and greater enterprisewide content management and
interoperability among solutions that collaboration, including a centralised
come with using Microsoft software. portal to replace the existing intranet,
Could the Microsoft-centric strategy and new departmental websites to
work for content management and replace the email-and-file-share tradition
collaboration? for sharing information. Collaboration
across departments—not just within
Severn Trent Water conducted a pilot them— could now occur. It was now
test in which a handful of teams early 2010, and time for Severn Trent
throughout the company worked with Water to make another decision. With
Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007, the imminent product launch of
which was the current version of the Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010, the
Microsoft content management and company decided to move directly to
collaboration software at the time. The this latest version of SharePoint
goal was as basic as the use of the technology.
technology: to see if longstanding IBM
Lotus Notes users could easily adapt to ―Our adoption of SharePoint Server 2010
will bring very specific advantages to us,‖

4. ―With many of the says Zuzana Lee-Emery, Strategy and Water, one of the teams working with
Architecture, Severn Trent Water. ―For the technology is responsible for
administrative tasks I example, we are also upgrading to producing news stories for the
Microsoft Office 2007. One of our goals company’s intranet. There, the first
supervise being handled has been to encourage user adoption of reviews of SharePoint Server 2010 are
automatically or by the new technology by providing an positive and focus on the team’s ability
intuitive, consistent user interface. Once to use the software to boost efficiency in
business units, I will be our employees are comfortable with the content management.
Ribbon interface in Office 2007, it will be
able to spend more time a simple matter for them to begin using ―We had a variety of systems before, and
focusing on the quality SharePoint Server 2010, which operates no tools for content management,‖ says
with the same interface. We see it being Ethan Black, Intranet Manager and Editor
of the news articles we easier for them to generate and post at Severn Trent Water. ―Now, with
web content using the new interface in SharePoint Server 2010, we will be able
publish.‖ these two products.‖ to do what we couldn’t before. We’re
Ethan Black, looking to a brighter future.‖
Intranet Editor and Manager, The company’s first-phase rollout of
Severn Trent Water SharePoint Server 2010 will focus on The company’s brighter future includes
content management, with additional the creation of sites for, and managed
capabilities being rolled out over another by, the business units, rather than by the
12 months. internal communications team or IT staff.
The result will be the faster and fuller
Severn Trent Water also expects to publishing of content that employees
deploy Microsoft Exchange Server 2007, need to do their jobs.
which will enable it to decommission its
Lotus Notes–based email system. The corporate intranet will operate more
efficiently, as well. With SharePoint
―Our broad technology plan calls for us workflow, version control problems and
to reduce technology complexity by review delays will be eliminated, shaving
aligning ourselves with the Microsoft an hour off the time to approve a typical
strategy and roadmap for collaboration story. Content will post in real time
and communication,‖ says Hewish. ―That instead of the next day—especially
will reduce our costs while preparing us important when staff need to be
for the future.‖ informed of breaking news at the
company. The editor will set up
Benefits SharePoint technology to pull
With its ongoing rollout of SharePoint departmental content directly into the
Server 2010, Severn Trent Water expects intranet front page without requiring
to gain more and faster publishing to its manual intervention. By using SharePoint
intranet, collaboration to help spur editing and formatting tools, Black will
innovation, and momentum for its save about 15 minutes per article—
campaign of cultural change. totalling anywhere from 45 minutes to
several hours a day, depending on the
Speeds Publishing of More Current number of articles to be posted.
Content
In this early phase of the deployment of Black intends to make the most of that
SharePoint Server 2010 at Severn Trent time saving. ―With many of the

5. ―People will use email administrative tasks I supervise being employees at Severn Trent Water will use
handled automatically or by the business SharePoint Server 2010 to work together
more selectively. They units, I will be able to spend more time productively. For example, Black, the
focusing on the quality of the news Intranet Editor and Publisher, sees his
will work together more articles we publish,‖ he says. ―I’ll also take group of 35 contributors tripling in size
effectively. They will be on more of a mentoring role to the because authoring tools that are easier
contributors to the intranet, helping to use can be used by more people.
willing to give up their them to create more focused articles that
hold reader interest.‖ Even traditionally one-way
personal or communications, such as the weekly
departmental data stores Severn Trent Water will also see articles on the company written by
efficiencies elsewhere. For example, tight Severn Trent employees, will be
for centralised stores.‖ interoperability with the SAP transformed into tools for two-way
environment will make a SharePoint communications that engage more of
William Hewish,
Chief Technology Officer, Server–based portal an ideal way not just the company’s staff.
Severn Trent Water to access intranet content, but also to
directly access, work with, and complete ―These articles will likely be recast as
SAP content and processes. blog posts with the comments feature
enabled at the end of the entries,‖ says
Encourages Greater Innovation Black. ―That will make it possible, for
Employees at Severn Trent Water will example, for conversations between the
have new collaboration and social chief executive and employees on crucial
networking tools for working together issues to begin on the front page of the
more effectively, further promoting intranet, within hours of the initial
innovative thinking. Those tools will posting. Employees will see that the
include wikis, blogs, and discussion intranet is a two-way communications
boards. platform through which they can get
involved in what happens here. That’s yet
By having limited access to the content another spur to innovation.‖
management and collaboration tools,
external partners will be able to work Spurs Change on Content
more closely with Severn Trent. This will Management, Collaboration
help engineering and other projects The campaign to modernise the way that
come to fruition more quickly and give employees use and share information at
the participants additional time to work Severn Trent Water encourages a shift
more innovatively. from email and decentralised
repositories and toward standardised,
―We’re excited about the new social centralised ways of doing business. This
networking tools in SharePoint Server campaign precedes the deployment of
2010,‖ says Zuzana Lee-Emery. ―These SharePoint Server 2010 but its adoption
tools mean better sharing of information. is providing added momentum to the
Better sharing of information saves time cultural change effort.
and money, and furthers innovation.‖
―As we roll out SharePoint Server 2010,
Greater involvement of the business employees will have a viable—and
units in publishing intranet content is preferable—alternative to email and to
just one example of how more of the various content management schemes,‖

6. For More Information says Hewish. ―We expect the result to be Microsoft SharePoint Server
For more information about Microsoft that people will use email more 2010
products and services, call the selectively. They will work together more Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 is the
Microsoft Sales Information Center at effectively. They will be willing to give up business collaboration platform for the
(800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the their personal or departmental data enterprise and the web.
Microsoft Canada Information Centre stores for centralised stores because we
at (877) 568-2495. Customers in the will provide a content management For more information about Microsoft
United States and Canada who are platform on which they can rely. SharePoint Server 2010, go to:
deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach SharePoint Server 2010 will help to make www.microsoft.com/sharepoint
Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) our cultural change campaign a success.‖
services at (800) 892-5234. Outside the
50 United States and Canada, please Avoids Costly Upgrades
contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. Severn Trent Water didn’t adopt
To access information using the World SharePoint Server 2010 to reduce costs,
Wide Web, go to: but that has become an additional
www.microsoft.com benefit of the deployment.
For more information about Severn The company originally obtained its
Trent Water, call +44 (0)121 722 4000 Office SharePoint Server licenses to build
or visit the website at: team sites to replace existing Lotus
www.stwater.co.uk Notes applications. As planning was
underway for the company’s intranet,
Severn Trent Water executives realized
that they could use those same licenses
to build the intranet on Office SharePoint
Server.
―The tremendous savings we saw in
choosing SharePoint Server 2010 over
the alternatives available to us could be
just the beginning,‖ says Lee-Emery. ―The
continuing savings we expect to see, in
productivity and business process
efficiency, could well meet or exceed our
savings to date.‖
Software and Services Hardware
 Microsoft Server Product Portfolio  HP DL380 2 Way, 2x Quad Core Xeon
− Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 X5540 computers
This case study is for informational purposes only.
MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR
IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.
Document published August 2010