Essentra is a leading global supplier of essential components and solutions, based in the UK. Previously, Essentra sold its Filters and Packaging divisions – two of its three core divisions. Its remaining Components division now forms the entirety of Essentra.
The Challenge
To facilitate the successful divestment of the Filters and Packaging divisions, Essentra needed to split the entire organisation’s M365 environment accordingly. A Challenge Statement was presented to Surveil, outlining the need to segregate the divisional data by M365 product or service at different stages.
The Surveil team was also tasked to establish if there was a case for upscaling the organisation’s M365 licences from Microsoft 365 E3 to Microsoft 365 E5.
The Solution
Once onboarded, Surveil had visibility over how the divisional areas were intertwined, as well as the resulting complexities and inaccuracies. The Surveil team started listing out critical information for the project team and tagging the services to build an understanding of how complex the service would be to migrate (size, quantity of permissions, count of files, comingled items). This allowed the team to conceive of a solution, recommending to Essentra that users’ Entra IDs were updated retroactively with their correct company to allow for greater clarity and efficiency when segregating divisional data. Surveil’s Smart Tagging capabilities would then be leveraged to apply the tagging and segment the data as needed.
The Surveil team then built a methodology for the core M365 applications to start tagging services towards divisions (something not possible in M365), and with the groundwork completed, it was time to execute Surveil’s Smart Tagging process. As Essentra had confirmed all users’ Entra ID, Surveil could be confident in achieving 100% Smart Tag accuracy. As a methodology and the foundation work had been developed and implemented, Surveil was easily able to segregate all M365 core services that needed to either be migrated or identified and put forward to the business for further investigation.
Furthermore, Surveil helped identify which Power Platform services were currently being used, by whom, and how much usage was occurring; this was critical to the project team to understand the amount of work required by the migration team efforts.
Results
In rolling out the Smart Tags, the Surveil Team highlighted over 300 ‘user accounts’ that had licences but were not classified as employees by HR. This meant there were over 300 accounts with licences that Essentra did not know about but for whom licences were currently being paid. While numerous explanations for the user accounts are possible, Surveil identified the most plausible as a mix of administration accounts, service accounts, shared mailboxes, leavers, and unknown users. Accounts from each category were highlighted with their licence assigned, last login date, cost, and any other relevant information.
Almost 300 Accounts were classified as ‘Group Users’ – users that previously worked across the organisation – though as the Group functions were being segregated into three separate companies, these users had to be further assigned by division i.e., Components users, Filters users and Packaging users. The Surveil team highlighted these accounts to the IT team with their licence assigned, last login date, cost, and any other relevant information, ready for reallocation into one of the three divisions.
Essentra also upgraded from M365 E3 to the M365 E5 suite, capitalised on savings through Surveil’s optimisation engine, and allowed billing to occur via a FinOps approach i.e., billing country of operations by site. By the end of the project, Essentra had almost no Amber or Red accounts with licences, as each site and country became responsible for their IT costs.
Outcome
By partnering with Surveil, Essentra was able to optimise its M365 licensing and achieve significant operational efficiency during the divestment of its Filters and Packaging divisions. Surveil’s Smart Tagging capabilities played a critical role in segregating divisional data with precision, ensuring that all M365 services were correctly allocated and identified. This approach allowed Essentra to better manage its user accounts and unnecessary licence costs and streamline its IT spend.
Moreover, the comprehensive audit of Power Platform usage gave Essentra a clearer picture of the effort required for the migration, while the upgrade to M365 E5, driven by Surveil’s optimisation engine, enabled Essentra to capitalize on cost savings. Billing accountability was successfully transferred to individual sites and countries through a FinOps model, reducing financial ambiguity and aligning IT expenses with operational divisions. By the end of the project, Essentra had a more efficient and transparent licensing structure, positioning the organisation for long-term sustainability and cost control.