The UK’s largest property services company, Countrywide’s five business divisions can guide you through the property-buying journey, from finding a property to offering financial, surveying and conveyancing services en route to completion. There’s also a lettings division that links landlords with prospective tenants via some of the 1200 agency offices. This rapid growth, and the fact that the five divisions operated as independent silos, meant a reorganisation was required to reduce costs, increase efficiency and drive Countrywide forward into its third decade.

CIO Ivan Brooks realised that what was needed was a group-wide IT department, cutting out duplication between the siloed divisions and moving towards a single centralised IT organisation backed up by a common data centre and single data network. The tender for the data network was won by Virgin Media Business. Brooks consolidated information assets into a single data centre, and the combination of these two moves have put Countrywide in a position to save almost £1 million at once and plan further efficiencies across the IT function.

Source: CIO

Here for full article