Westbridge Foods

Overview

Chances are, if you or someone you know has tucked into a ‘finger-lickin’ good’ chicken dish from a popular fast food outlet, you’ve already been served by Westbridge Foods. In fact, across the UK and through major supermarkets, vast numbers of people enjoy food every day thanks to Westbridge. 

Based in Worcestershire, Westbridge specialises in sourcing, development and supply of poultry products and prepared foods. It’s part of a group of companies including CP Foods UK and The FoodFellas, and with its headquarters in Thailand, this little-known group operates on a big scale – meaning Westbridge’s IT must do the same. 

Looking after that IT is Ben Yapp, Group IT Infrastructure Manager, who led Westbridge’s response to a systems outage in July 2024. Ben stated he was pleased with Wavenet’s response to the incident, he shared his experiences of Wavenet’s help, as well as the partnership overall, for this case study. In doing so, he was joined by Wavenet Account Director, Marcos Alexandre De Melo who worked closely with Ben and Westbridge. 

I’ve been at Westbridge for about ten years and am now responsible for about 250 users, and I’d say one thing that keeps me awake at night is making sure all our IT is set up and configured correctly to protect us from external threats. Attention to detail is really important to me – and so I need an IT partner that’s an extension of our team and one that takes care with the fine details. 

Ben Yapp

Group IT Infrastructure Manager, Westbridge Foods

Situation

Ben is part of a small team – he has a colleague also looking after Westbridge’s IT infrastructure, and one other colleague who focuses on Westbridge’s MRP and ERP systems. So for Ben, the partnership with Wavenet is crucial to keeping Westbridge’s IT running smoothly.

This combination – a partner that works as an extended IT team that takes meticulous care in all they do – came to the fore on 19 July 2024, when a global configuration update led to an outage affecting Windows systems, including those used by Westbridge. 

“We have a repacking facility in Newmarket that was affected, so I got in touch with Wavenet at about quarter to six that morning for help getting our systems back online,” said Ben. 

“I first spoke to Danny Miles who said he’d call me back in about ten minutes – which he did – and the plan was for me to focus on our VMs, while Wavenet would work on our Microsoft Azure setup. Of our 60 servers, we’ve got 38 servers running on it.” 

Westbridge’s MRP system is hosted on Azure, meaning the company’s barcode scanning and labelling systems had stopped working, affecting inventory and order processing management that, in turn, may have prevented the supply of products to Westbridge’s customers. And, given that the products in question are food, such delays could have had serious health and safety implications, leading to the spoilage of perishable goods. As a result, the clock was ticking and Westbridge needed immediate help. 

“Working with Wavenet, we quickly found 18 of the 38 servers were affected,” explained Ben. “It was only by about 10pm that day that there was an official Azure resolution from Microsoft, but Wavenet had found a workaround by about midday, so we actually didn’t lose an entire day to the outage – we got back up and running much more quickly.” 

“There was more to do over the following days and one of the things that really stood out for me is that the incident happened on a Friday, but Wavenet carried on working with me over the weekend. There was a real team spirit to roll up our sleeves and get this sorted, which was awesome. And Alex Benkins – the technical lead at Wavenet – was brilliant.” 

Solution

From Wavenet’s perspective, working with Westbridge entails more than the reactive support involved in the outage – it’s about being proactive, too. 

Through its CyberGuard arm, Wavenet is Westbridge’s Security Operations Centre, or SOC. The CyberGuard team monitors Westbridge’s systems 24/7/365 to detect potential threats before they even become full breaches.

Another way Wavenet helps is with PEN Testing, Ben adds, “We regularly do this to identify any vulnerabilities – again, this is another example of Wavenet’s proactive approach and our complete trust in them.”  

Yet, at the same time, it’s about more than the technology, explained Marcos – it’s about Wavenet’s people and culture. 

“Ben’s talked about Wavenet being approachable, and that’s a core part of our culture – that we’re readily available to our partners, and when we do respond, we know what we’re talking about. We’re here to give a quick response that’s also grounded in expertise and experience – not all IT support companies can offer these things.” 

“Then there’s the adaptability aspect of our culture,” added Marcos. “For example, Westbridge uses a system called CyberArk and while we could offer our own comparable services in that respect, we completely recognise that this is the platform Westbridge has chosen to use, so we make it work at our end so we can always help Westbridge, even where CyberArk is involved.” 

“Every single client has different needs so we don’t take a templated approach. The Wavenet team will adapt and create processes to match those needs.”

For Ben, along with the qualities described by Marcos, Wavenet’s attention to detail is a key benefit – and not just in the sense of the outage described above. 

“I’m someone who triple checks configurations,” explained Ben. “I want to make sure the right boxes have been ticked or not ticked, because not taking care over these details can have serious repercussions.” 

“It was clear during the incident that Wavenet takes the same approach – but it goes further back than that, right to when I first started working with them. I can tell they know what they’re doing when they’re setting something up, or fixing it.” 

Along with this attention to detail, Wavenet also keeps an eye on the bigger picture. They take a proactive approach to the support of those customers who have their Azure managed service. One way they do so is through regular service review sessions with Ben, keeping Westbridge informed about best practices and updates from Microsoft ahead of industry developments. 

Ultimately, for Ben and Westbridge, and Marcos and his colleagues at Wavenet, it all comes down to working as a partnership – and one that, for Ben, goes beyond the incident. 

“Due to company takeovers and mergers, Westbridge’s partnership with Wavenet goes further back than my time working with them,” said Ben. “But it was towards the end of 2021 after my previous employer became part of the Westbridge group that I first worked closely with Wavenet, on a major cloud migration project into Microsoft Azure. It became obvious to me then through this project that this is a real partnership.” 

“And today, I have a few key contacts at Wavenet and through that, I know if it’s a standard issue, I can email them – but if it’s a major issue, I know that I can call them, get straight through to someone, and rely on them if we have an issue that needs to be quickly escalated. Everyone there is always very willing to help.” 

Wavenet’s managed service

Wavenet’s partnership with Westbridge entails the following areas: 

Wavenet Cyber Guard Security Operations Centre

• Endpoint Detection & Response (EDR) 

• Managed Detection & Response (MDR) 

• PEN Testing 

• Security Information & Event Management (SIEM) 

• Managed Firewall Services 

• Cyber Essentials Plus Certification 

Other Wavenet Services

• IT Support 

• Azure Infrastructure Management 

• Microsoft 365 Management 

• Patch Management 
• Backup & Disaster Recovery 

If you’d like to find out more about how Wavenet could help your business with the areas covered in this case study – or you’d like to speak to Marcos then get in touch at enquiries@wavenet.co.uk.