The MOTORMOBIL Ford dealership was founded in 1978 in Marchtrenk and now consists of 8 locations in Upper Austria. The approximately 300 employees are dedicated to “everything to do with cars” and are competent contacts for all motor vehicle industry topics. The portfolio includes new cars, commercial vehicles, young and used vehicles, leasing, financing, insurance and a mobility guarantee that makes customers mobile in every situation. With the exclusive “Ford4you All-inclusive package”, all maintenance for the next five years is included. The legendary Mustang is also offered in addition to the complete Ford car and commercial vehicle model range.

Digitisation has long been part of daily business

A distinction must be made between the digitisation process on the manufacturer and dealer side. Due to the many systems running in parallel, “the focus is on permanent monitoring of the entire chain to be able to react quickly if something is not running correctly,” says Gerhard Lochner, IT Manager at MOTORMOBIL. This is the only way to avoid downtimes or even failures. With all the progress made possible by digitalisation, one should not forget the necessary personnel effort at many interfaces. The GDPR takes up a fixed part of this to meet the legal requirements. The implementation requires understanding and often also forbearance on the part of those affected: “Despite all the progress, the paperless office is still a pipe dream,” Gerhard Lochner sums up.

The IT runs around the clock and never takes a break – supporting this, IKARUS also provides a daily report. The motto for Gerhard Lochner in the IT area is: 
“Never lose the overview!“

Basically, secure IT environment

“We are in a very safe environment”, Gerhard Lochner states. But this statement alone is already threatening: “As soon as you have the impression that you have thought of everything, new challenges arise that can deviate from the ‘script’.” New concepts and adaptations have to be introduced, and security solutions have to be coordinated to implement them precisely. Examples of this can be found in the WLAN area and in the data volumes, which have multiplied. For this, well-known network components are used to protect against dangers or threats. “However, one must not forget that every single machine in the network is exposed to a basic danger, which can already start with a simple or unwanted email,” Gerhard Lochner concludes.

IKARUS AV solutions have been successfully in use for over 6 years

“In our search for a reliable AV solution, we came across IKARUS on the recommendation of our A1 supervisor, Mr. Pointecker. After a short, convincing test phase, we decided to use this software throughout the companies’ entire group. In the meantime, we have been using the IKARUS AV software for more than six years and the new cloud.security since last September.”

“We are very satisfied with the product, the customer service from A1 and IKARUS is excellent – no questions remain unanswered,” says Gerhard Lochner, expressing his satisfaction with the cooperation.

Should it nevertheless be necessary to contact the hotline in an emergency, “we appreciate having an Austrian partner where experts are directly available to solve problems quickly with the least possible downtime. This applies to A1 as well as to IKARUS,” Gerhard Lochner concludes.

… from everyday life

If you take a closer look at today’s email situation alone: “Who would have thought that spam levels average between 60 and 80 per cent? Occasionally, this number also rises above 90 per cent, provided that email attacks take place. The effective virus count, on the other hand, is rather negligible. But even if the percentage is below 1 per cent, it could still pose a major threat.”

“IKARUS cleans and cleanses the mailboxes automatically so that unwanted emails are not delivered to the user and provide us with the best possible protection,” Gerhard Lochner states and concludes: “Thanks to IKARUS, no internal system resources are taken up either.”