Check out three corporations who invested in steady, holistic modernization with outstanding success.
In my final two blogs, I explored what modernization actually means, what it takes, and why it issues for improvements like AI. Then, we walked via an efficient modernization method knowledgeable by the Forrester Utility Modernization Guidelines.
So, what does profitable modernization seem like in the actual world? Let’s check out three corporations who invested in steady, holistic modernization with outstanding success. You’ll see how these organizations not solely applied steerage from the Forrester Utility Modernization Guidelines within the brief time period, but additionally how they plan to maintain making use of these ideas for steady modernization.
Sapiens reduces downtime whereas growing agility
Sapiens, an insurtech firm serving over 600 insurers throughout 30 international locations, confronted a well-recognized problem. Their legacy apps had develop into a barrier to scale, since all their administration teams, safety, and monitoring have been put into place earlier than they moved to the cloud. To resolve this, Sapiens knew they needed to embark on a holistic modernization undertaking that tied collectively technique, processes, and know-how to help their current wants and future ambitions.
Forrester Guidelines #1: Technique. Although their goal was easy, it wasn’t easy. “Our fundamental aim on the outset was to be updated with our know-how stack,” mentioned Michael Mirel, Head of Cloud and DevOps Middle of Excellence. “At first, it was IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service). We shortly realized that microservices are the place we have to be by way of merchandise.”
After defining their aim, Sapiens set a plan to infuse AI into their workflows. Log Analytics in Azure Monitor enabled them to evaluate the supply of their providers (for instance, by measuring variety of service calls). From there, Azure Monitor Utility Insights helped them higher perceive how their apps have been behaving and alert them to any anomalies, an method that wouldn’t have been doable with their on-premises methods alone.
Forrester Guidelines #2: Course of. Sapiens established a Cloud Middle of Excellence and a chosen crew to assist their complete group embrace modernization. The command heart helped information their modernization journey and infused a transformative mindset all through their every day operations.
Forrester Guidelines #3: Expertise. Sapiens began out with conventional IaaS digital machine consumption. Modernization moved them to being a heavy shopper of Azure Kubernetes Service with direct entry to Microsoft’s product crew. And adopting Azure Arc introduced collectively their patching and monitoring dashboards and safety administration instruments in a single pane of glass.
As a result of insurance coverage is a tightly regulated sector, Sapiens additionally sought a strategic accomplice that put trendy safety on the forefront of their choices. They determined Microsoft Safety was the perfect match to assist guarantee cloud safety and compliance with international laws. Microsoft product groups additionally supplied focused help to repeatedly enhance Sapiens’ merchandise proper alongside alongside their very own builders.
Steady modernization. Sapiens achieved their preliminary targets—however they’re nonetheless not completed. After migrating prospects from knowledge facilities to the cloud, they then launched a long-term modernization undertaking guided by their Cloud Middle of Excellence. Mirel explains why. “We need to break down the partitions and supply extra self-service to our customers and higher service to our prospects consequently,” he says. “If I’m an end-user, developer, tester, or product supervisor, I ought to be capable of spin up one other check atmosphere and launch through the night time as a substitute of being depending on DevOps or IT and having to attend a number of days.”
Altogether, Sapiens’ considerate modernization method has helped them cut back downtime, improve agility, future-proof the group, and supply higher service to each their engineers and prospects. “We’re coping with the most important insurance coverage corporations on the planet which are taking our software program as a service, however we additionally must interoperate with the prevailing ecosystems of those corporations,” displays Mirel. “Because of Azure Personal Hyperlink, we will join cloud to cloud in a single click on, which lowered deployment efforts by 50 %.”
Coles will get AI-ready and improves the shopper expertise
Main Australian retailer Coles grappled with assembly the altering calls for of their prospects. They observed consumers anticipated to seamlessly swap between channels (bodily shops, their cell app, and web site), and Coles needed to enhance this physical-digital expertise via modernization.
Forrester Guidelines #1: Technique. To create a seamless procuring expertise, Coles wanted to first create a seamless growth expertise. Their groups had to have the ability to make steady, nimble app updates to maintain tempo with shifting buyer preferences. To that finish, Coles outlined a method that stored engineers knowledgeable on what they have been setting to perform and why, so they may make choices that have been aligned to their widespread aim. After launching their journey, Coles often checked their progress with insights from buyer knowledge to make sure their work was efficient.
Forrester Guidelines #2: Course of. Coles additionally took a tough take a look at their processes. Azure DevOps helped streamline workflows by enabling fast change integration for brand new options in channel apps. Then, they started monitoring (and proceed to trace) their progress by measuring construct time and different KPIs. Anton Vishnyakov, Senior Engineer and Supervisor for Platform Engineering, has seen a distinction. “As an alternative of doing six-week releases, we now do weekly releases. And the construct occasions now take roughly 10 to fifteen minutes, in comparison with what was once a few hours.”
Forrester Guidelines #3: Expertise. To modernize their tech, Coles first recognized Microsoft as a strategic innovation accomplice. They knew Microsoft’s extremely collaborative engineering course of was well-suited to steady innovation, and Microsoft Azure might assist replace their stacks to restrict know-how sprawl. Azure enabled quicker deployments whereas nonetheless delivering a safer and secure web-based expertise for purchasers.
Extra particularly, options together with Azure Cosmos DB and Azure Kubernetes Service helped Coles get buyer insights throughout channels to additional refine their operations. Once they have been prepared to show these insights into significant product updates, they may then use Azure App Service to check them earlier than launch. All of the whereas, Azure API Administration ran within the background to assist Coles hold safety on the forefront of each stage of the method.
Steady modernization: Since embarking on their journey, Coles has solely deepened their relationship with Microsoft. Microsoft groups and choices are serving to them repeatedly refine their operations, resulting in larger Azure providers ROI and a seamless, well-orchestrated buyer expertise throughout channels.
Because of their considerate modernization method, Coles is now AI-ready, they usually’re already utilizing analytics and AI to foretell stock distribution, optimize employee scheduling, and extra. Coles’ engineers are additionally capable of shortly combine new product updates to handle points and add new options, a profit that’s not misplaced on Patrik Mihailescu, Senior Engineering Supervisor, Net. “We’re going to be shifting to every day deployments within the subsequent six to 9 months and positively with the Azure tooling, that’s going to be tremendous key in enabling us to go even faster.” They’ll additionally safely create these adjustments by testing them independently with Azure App Service earlier than they’re deployed, serving to keep safety and compliance.
Credit score Europe Financial institution NV improves safety and streamlines the event course of
Credit score Europe Financial institution NV confronted a broader modernization problem, their quickly ageing on-premises infrastructure. Although the financial institution serves practically a million prospects globally, their IT groups usually discovered themselves ready on {hardware} deliveries and continually managing on-premises complexity. It was time for a brand new method.
Forrester Guidelines #1: Technique. Recognizing the necessity for holistic modernization, Credit score Europe Financial institution NV outlined a plan to completely reshape their infrastructure, beginning with changing their on-premises methods with the cloud. The cloud would streamline duties for his or her IT crew and allow scalability, since groups would not want to attend on {hardware} or spend time configuring advanced, dated methods. Then, they turned to their workforce. Modernizing offered a serious studying curve for the financial institution’s IT groups, so that they developed a plan to upskill staff on cloud ideas.
Forrester Guidelines #2: Course of. Credit score Europe Financial institution NV additionally wanted to revamp their processes and measure success. They paid shut consideration to their buyer onboarding time all through their modernization, and ultimately discovered that they’d lowered it from three days to 9 minutes. “We now provide a contemporary, partaking digital banking platform,” says Ulaş Ergin, IT, Digital Banking, and Software program Structure Division Supervisor. “Every thing has been revamped for smoothness and pace, making the entire banking expertise extra satisfying.”
Forrester Guidelines #3: Expertise. When launching their tech transformation, Credit score Europe Financial institution NV wove in safety from the beginning by selecting the Microsoft Azure cloud. As a pacesetter in safety and compliance with built-in instruments for monetary providers, Azure might assist them handle their delicate knowledge in accordance with industry-specific laws. They then tackled their aged infrastructure with Azure Kubernetes Service, a managed container orchestration platform. AKS helped simplify their operations and pace up growth, leading to smoother useful resource administration and a extra environment friendly atmosphere arrange course of.
Steady modernization. Credit score Europe Financial institution NV continues to find new alternatives within the cloud. They’re utilizing Azure Cognitive Companies to enhance the safe dealing with of buyer ID photographs and are repeatedly releasing new options and merchandise. Subsequent, they’re turning their consideration to GitHub Copilot to rework their in-house banking system.
Now, Credit score Europe Financial institution NV’s safety is stronger than ever, since migrating to the cloud enabled them to undertake digital, mobile-based gentle tokens and biometric authentication. They’ve additionally improved their buyer expertise and even launched new providers like real-time foreign currency trading, which might have been unattainable on their previous system. “Buyer suggestions has been overwhelmingly constructive,” displays Berkay Çavuşoğlu, Program Supervisor. “Our company prospects famous that the system’s efficiency is quicker.”
The financial institution has additionally accelerated their growth cycle by easing the system arrange course of and administration with Azure. Azure handles many on-premises duties behind the scenes, equivalent to upgrades and safety patches, so builders can deal with extra strategic duties. “We not must handle the underlying infrastructure, which significantly lowered the operational pressure,” displays Teoman Sevinç, DevOps Specialist. “Previously, if we needed to make updates to our surroundings, it might disrupt our non-production setup. However with Azure, managing and organising environments is streamlined, which positively impacts our growth life cycle.”
Are you prepared to start out your modernization journey?
With that, we’ve wrapped our weblog sequence on utility modernization—however identical to modernization isn’t completed, there’s at all times extra to be taught. For those who missed them, revisit my earlier blogs within the sequence on the fundamentals of modernization and the main points of an efficient modernization method.
Don’t neglect to additionally learn the foundational texts that guided our work: the Forrester Consulting Utility Modernization Guidelines that Microsoft commissioned, and the Forrester Consulting research Unlock Aggressive Benefit with Utility Modernization. It’s also possible to take a look at the next sources: