Timeline: Aventis' Exchange Server 2000 Global Migration

Computerworld - Fall 1999
Hoechst Marion Roussel Inc. and Rhone-Poulenc SA merge; Aventis formed.
Combined companies had:

• 55,000 users in 50 countries.


• Nine e-mail systems running on 181 Exchange 5.5 servers (40 routing servers).


• One GroupWise e-mail server.


• A Windows NT backbone with 11 account domains, 150 resource domains, two Domain Name System servers and two Windows Internet Naming Service servers.


• A 22-server test lab constructed by the messaging group replicating six real-world domains; Windows 2000 and Exchange 2000 testing begins.

• Active Directory infrastructure established through in-place upgrades of domain controllers to Windows 2000.

• Last account domains migrated to Active Directory.


• Backbone upgraded to Windows 2000.


• Exchange Server 2000 migration began at Frankfurt and Kansas City, Mo., pilot sites.


• Exchange Conferencing Server set up in Frankfurt in pilot.


• Backbone routers reconfigured to support multicast.

• Active Directory Connectors installed and connection agreements started to be established with Exchange 5.5 servers at each location.


• Kansas City pilot site went live with first Exchange 2000 deployment; 4,000 mailboxes on 11 servers consolidated to four Exchange 2000 servers.

• WAN routers began to be reconfigured to support multicast for videoconferencing.

• Outlook Web Access servers rolled out in Frankfurt.

• Tokyo cut over 3,500 mailboxes.

• All WAN routers reconfigured for multicast.


• SecurID authentication added for Outlook Web Access users.


• Frankfurt cut over 8,000 mailboxes.


• Conferencing server rollout completed; all routers enabled for multicast.

• Croix de Berny, France, the largest site, cut over 13,000 mailboxes.

• U.S. headquarters in Bridgewater, N.J., migrated 6,000 mailboxes to Exchange 2000.

• When the last sites cut over, Aventis will have consolidated to 179 Exchange Servers (139 user servers and 40 connector servers), despite adding 40 new sites. It will have a single account domain, pharma.aventis.com, and approximately 130 domain controllers worldwide.