Microsoft Cloud supports the digital transformation

Salzburg AG continues to develop into a digital technology company and is undergoing digital transformation. It is of great importance to test new digital business areas, markets and pilot projects.

The myflexbox is one such pilot project. The digital locker solution adds another practical service to Salzburg AG’s portfolio and is an important building block in the development of smart city solutions. The myflexbox was designed and developed to be cloud native. In cooperation with Microsoft Austria, numerous advantages were achieved for the development of the new business model and the digital transformation of Salzburg AG continues to progress.

Customers can have parcels conveniently delivered to the myflexbox. It is also possible to hand over or store items, valuables and products to third parties transparently and at any time. “The aim of the new service is to save all users time, stress and unnecessary journeys and thus also have a positive impact on the CO₂ balance,” explains Leonhard Schitter, CEO of Salzburg AG, and continues: “The versatile application possibilities of the myflexbox include the service for end customers at public locations, the employee service for companies and institutions, the citizen service for municipalities and the tenant service for housing developers.”

The myflexbox is a new, digital business model and opens up new opportunities for Salzburg AG. “Digitalization is advancing in leaps and bounds and we as a company are right in the middle of the action. New technologies are springing up and developing rapidly, paving the way for the next development,” emphasizes Schitter, adding: “These new technologies should no longer be seen merely as support for business processes, but rather as an opportunity to redesign organizations and processes in order to keep up with the rapidly changing market.”

myflexbox is a cloud native application

The changes brought about by digitalization mean that companies have to adapt with agility. It is important not just to react, but to act in order to be able to help shape things. This requires not only adapting organizational structures, but also the software to ensure flexibility. myflexbox was therefore developed to be cloud native, which means that all applications were tailored for use in the cloud right from the design stage. “The myflexbox application makes consistent use of the services provided by the Microsoft Cloud and is based on microservices. These provide the functions and services required for myflexbox on a distributed cloud platform. The microservices are loosely coupled and can be operated on different servers and at different locations. They often work completely independently of each other and only provide a single specific function,” explains Lukas Wieser, Product Owner of myflexbox at Salzburg AG.

Advantages of cloud native

The cloud native approach gives the developers of myflexbox a high degree of flexibility, efficiency and agility. The myflexbox application is partitioned into several smaller parts, so-called containers. These can be created, automatically tested and deployed independently. This results in a high degree of automation in the provision of cloud-native applications. This reduces the risk of human operating and configuration errors and increases the availability of services or applications. “This means that changes and updates can be made in small steps without having to touch the entire application every time,” says Wieser. Thanks to the cloud-native approach, the myflexbox application does not require a specific operating system or hardware. The distributed cloud platform also increases the availability of applications and services, as no specific hardware or local IT infrastructure is required and it can be scaled with the number of users. This means that the Microsoft “Azure” cloud provides exactly as much computing power as is required for the number of current users. This means that there are no capacity bottlenecks or unused overcapacity at computing locations.

Digital transformation with Microsoft Azure

The cloud is at the heart of digital transformation. It enables completely new and disruptive business models. What makes it special: Thanks to its scalability and flexibility, every company, regardless of size and industry, can benefit from it – the technology is democratized. “Digitalization doesn’t stop at anyone, especially not at energy and infrastructure service providers,” says Robert Rosellen, Enterprise Commercial Lead at Microsoft Austria, about the collaboration. “Microsoft has long been much more than just a technology supplier. Thanks to individual consulting, we can offer a cloud tailored to Salzburg AG’s business process. With the right solution, the company itself becomes a platform for digital offerings that provide added value for its own customers.”