A bookseller on the same level as the online giants

Some traditional booksellers, including Osiandersche Buchhandlung GmbH, did not allow themselves to be fazed by these challenges, but instead developed their own strategies to tackle the sector’s online giants: They combined the benefits of bricks-and-mortar book selling, such as personal advice in a local store, with the advantages of online retail. In the areas surrounding its stores, Osiander even delivers its books by bicycle courier, making the process carbon-neutral and free-of-charge. However, all of the retailer’s success is based on an efficient, stable goods management and storage system. At Osiander, this system is run on Oracle databases, which used to encounter performance problems time and again. Hoping to solve these problems once and for all, the bookseller approached Trivadis.

Using the Oracle Virtual Machine (OVM), we consolidated the databases in a virtual environment, which meant we were able to separate them from the other systems. This enabled us to prevent reciprocal effects and the resulting crashes and drops in performance. A support agreement provided additional protection. The database experts from Trivadis have held overall responsibility for operations since spring 2020. After its Oracle database administrator left the company, Osiander decided to contract an external service provider for its Oracle services.

By virtualising its Oracle databases and applications, which are so critical to the company’s business, Osiander is able to make better use of storage, network and computing resources. This leads to increased stability and availability of the Oracle environment, including the ERP and storage system. Converting the environment provided a long-term solution to the performance fluctuations – not a single service ticket has been submitted in relation to this problem for three years. However, the changes have not only improved the system’s performance, executing the Oracle databases in OVM also presents Osiander with significant benefits related to system scalability and availability. And ever since Trivadis has been responsible for operations, proactive monitoring and regular database checks and maintenance have helped to secure the operating status. Osiander receives ongoing analysis reports that record the current system status and provide transparency. The decision to virtualise and outsource operations has also allowed Osiander to cut costs significantly. The stability of the goods management and storage system is critical to Osiander’s business. With support from Trivadis, the traditional bookseller is well equipped to continue to take on the online giants.