DaimlerChrysler South Africa, a subsidiary to the global leader in the automotive industry, needed to reduce annual operating costs of its mainframe-based systems while maintaining service levels. The backbone of DaimlerChrysler's network of dealerships is the parts supply chain management system, making sure that the right parts are available for service technicians at the right place and at the right time so that customers' service needs are taken care of as quickly and efficiently as possible. Historically, these mission- critical systems had always run in production on a mainframe environment that the management team perceived to be both costly and cumbersome. DaimlerChrysler chose to migrate these systems off the mainframe to UNIX, reducing costs, improving response times and increasing competitive advantage.
TLeading the Evolution
CASE STUDY: DAIMLERCHRYSLER SOUTH AFRICA
MIGRATING MISSION-CRITICAL
APPLICATION ACHIEVING OVER
50% COST SAVINGS AND
IMPROVING SERVICE LEVELSCASE STUDY | DAIMLERCHRYSLER SOUTH AFRICA
MIGRATING MISSION-CRITICAL APPLICATION ACHIEVING OVER 50% COST SAVINGS AND IMPROVING SERVICE LEVELS
OVERVIEW MigrationWare, based in Cape Town, South CHALLENGE Africa and application modernization As a subsidiary to the global leader in the To reduce annual operating costs experts, Micro Focus, to handle the COBOL automotive industry, DaimlerChrysler of mainframe-based systems while and CICS side of this complex move to South Africa is concerned with process maintaining service levels. keep the parts flow moving throughout the improvement and cost reduction wherever dealer network.and whenever possible. The lifeblood SOLUTION of DaimlerChrysler's network of 100 THE CHALLENGEdealerships in South Africa is its ability to Micro Focus StudioT In October 2003, DaimlerChrysler decided provide first-rate service for its customers. that significant cost savings could be Micro Focus Server T The backbone of all of the 100 service achieved by migrating its mission critical departments is the parts supply chain systems onto a contemporary low cost management system, making sure that platform and in the process remove the BENEFITS the right parts are available for service mainframe. It was no small task as the Substantial savings in annual technicians at the right place and at the application is a combination of COBOL right time so that customers' service needs hardware/software costs and and Natural, both utilizing the ADABAS are taken care of as quickly and efficiently other related expenses of over 50% database and is accessed by 1700 users, as possible. Historically, these mission- typically 500 of them at any time. This Response times and performance as critical after sales support and supply chain covers the DaimlerChrysler SA internal users good or better than the mainframe management systems had always run in based in three different locations around production on a mainframe environment Increased competitive advantage South Africa, in excess of 100 dealers' sites that the DaimlerChrysler SA management throughout South Africa, and links into their team percieved to be both costly and principal suppliers based in Germany, the cumbersome. United States and Japan. With more than Looking to make better use of their IT one million lines of COBOL code and 7,000 infrastructure, the South African based Natural programs, SPI Consulting knew arm of the automotive giant turned to they had a complex job on their hands to specialist migration and systems integrators move from the existing Model R34 (70 MIPS) SPI Consulting, based in Pretoria South mainframe running OS/390 to the target Africa, to move their existing after sales IBM System p (4CPU) server running AIX 5.2.support, parts distribution and supply chain The greatest challenge to the re-hosting management system from the mainframe to migration is that the COBOL and Natural the more open and extensible IMB Systemp parts of the application are designed to Servers running AIX. As the parts supply interact with the same user on the same chain management system was complex terminal. This is not supported directly in nature with applications written in both on AIX because each technology expects Natural and COBOL, SPI Consulting engaged exclusive control of the user's terminal. With the services of systems migration experts
"Our business is very competitive and we are always searching for innovative ways of utilizing technology to help us reduce costs and improve our margins while providing better service levels. By re-using our mainframe applications on a more cost effective platform, we have exploited the significant investment made in these systems over the last decade rather that throwing it all away and starting from scratch or implementing an expensive packaged application solution that would not have provided all of the essential functionality our business processes rely on today."
Dave Burke, CIO, DaimlerChrysler South AfricaCASE STUDY | DAIMLERCHRYSLER SOUTH AFRICA
MIGRATING MISSION-CRITICAL APPLICATION ACHIEVING OVER 50% COST SAVINGS AND IMPROVING SERVICE LEVELS
the help of MigrationWare and Micro Focus, Server. Micro Focus ... [download for more]
