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Highlights
Streamlined processes, reducing downtime and enhancing service reliability.
Prompt notification and faster resolution times during incidents.
Greater visibility and accountability in incident response actions.
Scalable incident management solutions that flexibly adapt to evolving company needs.
Enhancing global operations at Sony Interactive Entertainment with Everbridge xMatters
Sony Interactive Entertainment, renowned for its innovative gaming experiences, relies heavily on robust operational support to ensure seamless performance of its PlayStation Production Network and gaming studios worldwide. Ben Narramore, Director of Global Operations at PlayStation Production Network, spearheads this critical aspect of Sony’s operations. With over 25 years of experience in operations, Ben brings a wealth of knowledge to his role, leveraging various tools and technologies to optimize operational efficiency. One tool central to Sony’s operational strategy is Everbridge xMatters.
Challenges
Previously, Sony Interactive Entertainment was using different incident management tools including PagerDuty, Splunk Oncall, and manual calling that they felt lacked the advanced features and flexibility they needed. For example, PagerDuty required people to log in to multiple tools that were redundant, and they were looking for an option that was more concise, streamlined, and user-friendly.
PagerDuty and Splunk Oncall did not offer a streamlined platform and their alert systems were outdated and inefficient. Moreover, they were not scalable for large organizations. At one point, there was an outage in their network, but PagerDuty and Splunk Oncall did not alert them of the issues, and they lost valuable time and revenue. This caused them to start looking for other options.
They switched to Everbridge xMatters because it offered better customization options, seamless integration with their existing systems, and improved support for their evolving requirements.
There were three primary challenges Sony Interactive was dealing with prior to Everbridge:
• Outdated operations management: Many operations teams at Sony Interactive Entertainment were behind in terms of tools and processes. There was a need to modernize their operations management practices to keep up with the demands of their global operations.
• Communication and collaboration: There was a lack of effective communication and collaboration tools for managing on-call rotations, paging, and coordinating teams during incidents.
• Need for improved support: Sony needed better support and responsiveness from their operations management tool provider to address their evolving needs and challenges effectively.
Everbridge xMatters is the first step to operating globally. It’s the first thing you need to be able to manage your rotation, manage your paging, and manage your teams and operations.
Solutions
The Everbridge xMatters team demonstrated key support and responsiveness to Sony’s needs, including holding regular meetings to discuss progress and address concerns, ensuring that Sony’s evolving requirements were met effectively. Everbridge xMatters provided specific solutions to address their issues:
• Flow Designer integration: Flow Designer makes it effortless to automate. The integration of Everbridge xMatters with other essential tools like BigPanda, ServiceNow, and Slack enabled automation, incident management, and seamless communication across global teams. Flow Designer’s ease of use was key to setting up a total of 11 integrations that were critical to Sony’s business.
• Modernized operations management: Leveraging Everbridge xMatters, Sony accessed modern tools and capabilities that streamlined and enhanced their operations management practices, empowering them to efficiently oversee their global operations.
• Effective communication and collaboration: Through Everbridge xMatters, Sony gained access to a suite of tools facilitating the management of on-call rotations, paging, and team coordination during incidents, fostering improved communication and collaboration among team members.
Sony Interactive Entertainment has been using Everbridge xMatters for over six years and Everbridge xMatters has significantly improved Sony’s incident response times and overall communication during critical incidents. The primary use case for Everbridge xMatters is managing on-call rotations and automating notifications during incidents and outages. It has also enhanced team collaboration and coordination, leading to more efficient resolution of issues.
Impacts and benefits
Sony Interactive Entertainment has used Everbridge xMatters to bolster their efforts in safeguarding
and enhancing the gaming experience for users worldwide. By optimizing communication and incident management processes, Everbridge xMatters ensures seamless multiplayer gaming, efficient pre-purchasing mechanisms, avatar customization, and team coordination. This streamlined approach not only fosters a thriving gaming community but also directly contributes to Sony’s bottom line, with the PlayStation network generating billions in revenue.
Additional benefits of the Sony Interactive Entertainment/Everbridge xMatters relationship include:
• Improved incident management: Everbridge xMatters enables the company to streamline their incident management processes, allowing them to quickly identify, escalate, and resolve issues. This has resulted in reduced downtime and improved service reliability for their customers.
• Enhanced communication: The platform facilitates effective communication among teams during incidents, ensuring that the right people are notified promptly, leading to faster resolution times and reduced impact on operations.
• Increased visibility and accountability: Everbridge xMatters provides teams with greater visibility into the status of incidents, including who is responding and what actions are being taken. This has increased accountability and allows for better tracking of incident resolution progress.
• Scalability and flexibility: As a scalable and flexible solution, capable of adapting to the company’s evolving needs, Everbridge xMatters ensures that as the company expands, their incident management capabilities can scale accordingly without sacrificing efficiency.
• Cost savings: By optimizing incident management processes and reducing downtime, Everbridge xMatters helps helps the company minimize the financial impact of service disruptions. This results in cost savings for the company in terms of reduced revenue loss and operational expenses associated with incident resolution.
In addition, Sony Interactive Entertainment is happy with the customer service and support provided by Everbridge xMatters. The customer support team is responsive to Sony’s needs, provides timely assistance whenever required, and is proactive in addressing any concerns or issues that arise.
As Sony Interactive Entertainment continues to innovate and expand its gaming ecosystem, Everbridge xMatters remains a cornerstone in ensuring unparalleled operational excellence.
