Toyota drives identity security transformation

SailPoint helps Toyota drive identity and business transformations

Not since the early 1900s has the automotive industry experienced such a period of tremendous change. Today, the very notion of what constitutes an automobile is evolving dramatically as automobiles become connected, automated, shared, and electric. “I believe that the more automation advances, the more the ability of the people using it will be put to the test,” wrote Akio Toyoda, president and board of directors member at Toyota Motor Corporation.

While that increased level of automation and connectivity means increased reliance on cloud computing, artificial intelligence, networked devices and sensors (IoT), and data — it’s people who are at the center of it all. That’s something Tomas Rollo, owner of Toyota enterprise architecture at Toyota Motors, Europe, knows very well. Rollo explains how pivoting from a car manufacturer into a full-fledged mobility provider requires brand new products and services and new business processes that must be implemented to support the new business model. Most notably for Tomas, that means strong identity capabilities.

“We understand that identity management means giving the right people the right access at the right time. For us to succeed, it is essential for our pivot to becoming a mobility company,” he says. Toyota Motor Europe oversees the European wholesales, sales, and marketing of Toyota and Lexus vehicles, parts, accessories, and manufacturing and engineering operations.

Toyota’s identity journey: SailPoint crucial to success

Rollo and the Toyota identity team appreciate how Toyota’s transition from an automobile manufacturer to a full-fledged mobility provider — and all of the new products and services offerings that will be developed with that transformation — demanded a robust identity platform capable of delivering far more than just provisioning and account management. The Toyota identity team needed to streamline their user lifecycle process, automate manual identity and access management processes, and streamline regulatory compliance requirements with identity governance and data oversight.

Such enhancements in their identity management program would remove costly manual processes and prepare Toyota’s business-technology systems for its future. As Rollo explains, Toyota’s identity team had to contend with a considerable amount of manual labor with which they had to contend. This included manual ticket creation, waiting for approvals and reviews of access requests, and approving, or not approving, one-off access requests. “We wanted to automate these processes to improve the consistency of our data,” Rollo explains.

That automation is essential in the face of the increased consumption of cloud services and applications and IoT and other endpoints. And it’s just one of the ways SailPoint Identity Security for the cloud helps enterprises like Toyota become more effective and efficient and manage the risks associated with their business-technology systems, and provide identity teams the comprehensive visibility they need into of each of their digital identities, entitlements, systems, data, and cloud services.

With SailPoint, Toyota reached their initial identity management goals. Toyota has streamlined the entire user lifecycle process, automated away their manual processes, and successfully met regulatory compliance requirements.

Identity security and future plans

Rollo explains that while Toyota has succeeded in improving and automating their identity management processes and managing their movers, joiners, and leavers, there is much more to do. “What awaits us is trying to measure and go higher,” says Rollo. That means further automating account requests, implementing role-based access control, and improving the processes around certification and re-certification campaigns.

Rollo knows there’s quite the road ahead, but the team, along with SailPoint, are more than ready for the challenge. Upcoming actions include firming the ownership of access roles and ensuring certain people are responsible for various levels of access entitlements.

Rollo and the team are also looking forward to continued AI and machine learning advancements. “When it comes to machine learning, and the ability to actually spot patterns and identify patterns and the data using machine learning, I think that’s going to help us tremendously. It’s going to save us quite a lot of effort,” Rollo says.

That’s just one example of how, with SailPoint, the Toyota identity team will not only be able to continue to mature and optimize their identity management program but also leverage identity security to help Toyota succeed in the years ahead as it transforms itself from a global automobile maker to a global provider of mobility services.