Whirlpool deepens Google Cloud partnership with SAP off-premise migration plan

Whirlpool is moving its SAP systems and data to the Google Cloud as part of a global push to bolster its business agility and improve the sustainability of its operations.  

The home appliances manufacturer is a long-standing Google Cloud customer, having relied on the tech giant’s Google Workplace online business productivity suite of products to aid communication and collaboration between its staff since 2014.

The company has now confirmed that it plans to expand its use of Google technologies even further by redeploying its enterprise-wide SAP environment in the firm’s public cloud environment.

The move is being undertaken to ensure Whirlpool employees can access SAP systems and data from wherever they are in the world, with several line of business units set to benefit from this change, the company said.

“Today, Whirlpool relies on SAP for many aspects of its business, including supply chain management, manufacturing planning and internet of things [IoT], enterprise resource planning [ERP], finance, customer relationship management [CRM], and more,” the company said in a statement announcing the move.

“Bringing these business-critical systems onto Google Cloud provides the company with an environment that ensures maximum uptime, provides global access to applications with very low latency, and empowers the company’s teams of data analysts to derive maximum value from its business data.”

In addition to the SAP system migration part of the project, Whirlpool will also be able to tap into the elastic and scalable cloud compute capacity offered by Google, and has signalled its intention to tap into the firm’s wider artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning and data analytics portfolio too.

Dani Brown, senior vice-president and CIO at Whirlpool, said one of the driving forces behind its decision to expand its partnership with Google is the sustainability of its cloud platform.

“Whirlpool Corporation is committed to reaching zero emissions by 2030 and turning to Google Cloud’s clean infrastructure for our global business systems and applications is a step forward toward that goal,” said Brown.

“We are excited to strengthen our strategic relationship with Google Cloud to empower our employees with cloud productivity solutions, and to ensure that our most critical business systems and applications are delivered securely, efficiently and sustainably.”

Google Cloud president Rob Enslin said the company is looking forward to supporting Whirlpool as its digital transformation plans continue apace.

“Whirlpool Corp is creating a foundation for future growth with a forward-looking, cloud-first approach to its critical SAP systems, while maintaining a strong commitment to sustainability,” he said.

“We’re proud to expand our strategic collaboration with Whirlpool and will continue to support the company’s digital transformation across all of its global operations.”