Here are three firms that invested in steady, holistic modernization with exceptional success:
I concluded my previous blog series by examining the significance of modernization in relation to advancements like AI, highlighting its core meaning, the necessary prerequisites, and the importance of embracing this transformation for meaningful progress. Using a data-driven approach informed by Forrester’s expertise, we embarked on a strategic modernization journey.
In reality, profitable modernization manifests as a harmonious convergence of technological innovation and sustainable business strategies. These organisations have already successfully implemented the principles from the Forrester Software Modernization Guidelines, and you’ll see how they intend to continue leveraging these best practices to drive long-term innovation.
SAPIENS enables organizations to significantly reduce downtime, thereby fostering greater resilience and increasing operational efficiency.
As Sapiens, the leading insurtech company, operated across 30 countries and served more than 600 insurers worldwide, it faced a pressing challenge that demanded attention. As their legacy applications evolved into a hindrance to scalability, it became increasingly evident that the siloed administration teams, security protocols, and monitoring systems, all initially designed for on-premise infrastructure, were no longer adequately equipped to support a cloud-based strategy. To successfully evolve, humans recognized the necessity for a comprehensive modernization initiative that harmoniously integrated technology, methodologies, and expertise to address present needs and future aspirations?
Despite the simplicity of their objective, it proved to be a challenging endeavor. “Our primary objective at the outset was to stay current with our technological expertise,” said Michael Mirel, Head of Cloud and DevOps Excellence. Initially, the shift began with IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service). As it became clear, embracing microservices was the strategic move for our merchandise operations.
Following the establishment of their objective, Sapiens devised a strategic plan to successfully integrate artificial intelligence (AI) into their operational processes. Enabled companies to assess the effectiveness of their operations through metrics such as service call volume. By leveraging the cloud-based solution, we empowered users to gain a deeper understanding of their app’s behavior and promptly notified them of any irregularities, an approach that would not have been feasible using solely on-premises software.
The Sapien collective created a Cloud Heart of Excellence, selecting a specially designed team to facilitate its entire community’s integration into the digital era. The ‘command’ middle facilitated the sharing of information, enabling a transformative mindset to permeate daily operations throughout their modernization journey.
The earliest iterations of Sapiens leveraged traditional Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) models to deploy virtual machines. As a result of modernization efforts, they transformed into a major customer of Microsoft’s products, enjoying direct access to the company’s product development team. By integrating their patching and monitoring dashboards with safety administration tools into a unified interface, organizations can streamline operations and enhance overall system visibility.
Given the tight regulation surrounding insurance coverage, Sapiens actively sought out a strategic partner prioritizing cutting-edge security in all decision-making processes. Determined that they were one of the best matches to assist in guaranteeing cloud safety and compliance with international regulations. Microsoft’s product groups offered targeted support to continuously improve Sapiens’ products in tandem with their own developers.
Although Sapiens had reached their initial milestones, they still have unfinished business. Following the successful migration of clients from on-premise knowledge facilities to the cloud, the organization embarked on a comprehensive modernization initiative, spearheaded by its Cloud Heart of Excellence framework. Mirel explains why. “To provide enhanced customer convenience and elevated client satisfaction, we aim to eliminate barriers and offer more self-serve options.” “As a stakeholder in software development, whether end-user, developer, tester, or product supervisor, I believe it is essential that I can quickly spin up another test environment and deploy with ease, without relying on DevOps or IT teams and waiting several days.”
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By adopting a considerate modernization strategy, Sapiens has successfully reduced downtime, enhanced agility, ensured long-term viability, and delivered superior services to both its engineers and customers. “We’re collaborating with the largest global insurance providers to deliver our software-as-a-service, while also ensuring seamless interoperability with their existing ecosystems,” says Mirel. “Thanks to this innovation, we can seamlessly integrate with other clouds at the touch of a button, resulting in a 50% reduction in deployment efforts.”
As part of its digital transformation, Coles will become AI-ready to enhance customer experience.
Australian supermarket chain Coles struggled to address. Customers expected a seamless transition between shopping channels – brick-and-mortar stores, mobile apps, and websites – prompting Coles to invest in upgrading its omnichannel experience through digital modernization.
To deliver a seamless procurement experience, Coles initially aimed to develop a seamless growth strategy. Their teams needed to possess the capability to deliver swift and agile app updates, thereby keeping pace with the ever-changing preferences of their customers. To achieve this, Coles advocated for an approach where engineers were well-versed in the objectives they aimed to accomplish and the reasoning behind them, thereby enabling informed decision-making consistent with their overall goals. As Coles embarked on their journey, they regularly reviewed their progress, leveraging buyer insights to optimize their efforts and ensure maximum efficiency.
Coles undertook a thorough examination of their operations. Streamlined workflows by seamlessly integrating changes to bring forth innovative features in channel applications. They then initiated a monitoring process, tracing progress through the measurement of construction timelines and key performance indicators. Anton Vishnyakov, senior engineer and supervisor for platform engineering, has noticed a discrepancy. Instead of doing six-week releases, we’ve transitioned to a more agile approach with weekly deployments. Now, the construction instances require around 10-15 minutes, a significant reduction from the several-hour process of yesteryear.
Coles partnered with Microsoft to accelerate its technological modernization efforts, designating the technology giant as a strategic innovation partner. By recognizing Microsoft’s collaborative engineering approach as a catalyst for consistent innovation, they could potentially leverage it to consolidate their technology infrastructure and curb the proliferation of disparate systems. Azure enabled faster deployments while still providing a safer and more secure web-based experience for customers.
Especially, the integration of options together with analytics enabled Coles to gain valuable customer insights across various channels, thereby further refining their operations. Before showcasing the key enhancements, teams can leverage these insights to review and refine their work prior to launching the updated products. While all necessary measures were taken behind the scenes to ensure safety was paramount at every step of the process.
Coles has since strengthened its partnership with Microsoft, solidifying their bond through continued collaboration. Microsoft’s groupings and selections enable continuous refinement of their operations, yielding enhanced Azure business returns on investment (ROI) and a streamlined, harmonious customer experience across all touchpoints.
Thanks to a thoughtful approach to modernisation, Coles has transitioned into an AI-enabled business, leveraging analytics and artificial intelligence to inform stock distribution, optimise staff scheduling, and other key processes. Coles’ engineers excel at seamlessly integrating new product updates to address specific issues and introduce innovative features, a testament to the expertise of Patrik Mihailescu, Senior Engineering Supervisor, as he leverages his team’s capabilities to drive business growth. “We plan to transition to daily deployments within the next six to nine months, leveraging Azure tooling to significantly accelerate our pace. To ensure a seamless process, we’ll also conduct thorough testing of new adjustments before deployment, guaranteeing the highest standards for security and compliance.”
Credit Score Europe Financial Institution NV enhances security and optimizes the process flow.
As Credit Score Europe Financial Institution NV faced a multifaceted modernisation challenge, its. Despite serving nearly a million global clients, the financial institution’s IT teams consistently found themselves struggling to keep up with hardware deliveries and wrestling with on-premises complexities. Time had come to adopt a fresh approach.
As recognition of the imperative for comprehensive modernization grew, Credit score Europe Financial institution NV embarked upon a strategic initiative to overhaul its technological foundation by migrating its on-premise systems to the cloud. By migrating to the cloud, an organization can seamlessly manage IT responsibilities, thereby freeing up its team to focus on strategic initiatives rather than worrying about hardware maintenance or outdated software configuration. Subsequently, they shifted their focus to their employees. The shift to modernization posed a substantial learning curve for the financial institution’s IT teams, prompting them to devise a strategy to enhance employee skills in cloud computing concepts.
To boost efficiency and gauge performance, Credit score Europe Financial institution NV sought to overhaul its procedures. By dedicating meticulous attention to the customer onboarding process during their digital transformation, they were able to dramatically reduce the timeframe from an initial three days to a remarkably swift 9 minutes. “According to Ulaş Ergin, Manager of our IT, Digital Banking, and Software Program Structure Division, we currently offer a modern digital banking platform.” “All the puzzle pieces have been reworked to ensure a seamless and streamlined experience, resulting in enhanced satisfaction throughout the entire banking journey.”
As Credit score Europe Financial institution NV embarked on its technological metamorphosis, prioritizing security from inception, it wisely opted for a cloud-based infrastructure. As a leader in safety and compliance, Microsoft Azure empowers financial institutions to efficiently manage their sensitive data while adhering to industry-specific regulations through its integrated instruments. To revitalize their outdated infrastructure, they leveraged a cutting-edge managed container orchestration platform. By streamlining their operations with AKS, the organization was able to accelerate its growth, resulting in more efficient resource allocation and a more sustainable work process arrangement.
Credit Score Europe Financial Institution NV pursues innovative cloud-based solutions. The company is leveraging innovative technologies to bolster the secure handling of customer identification images, consistently introducing fresh features and products. Next, they are focusing on revamping their internal banking infrastructure.
Credit Score Europe Financial Institution NV’s robust security posture has been bolstered by its successful transition to a cloud-based infrastructure, which has allowed for the seamless integration of cutting-edge features such as mobile-based tender tokens and advanced biometric authentication methods. To enhance their customer experience, they have successfully implemented innovative features, including real-time foreign currency trading, a capability that was previously unimaginable on their legacy platform. “Berkay Çavuşoğlu, Program Supervisor, notes that buyer suggestions have been ‘overwhelmingly constructive’.” “Our clients are impressed by the system’s impressive speed and efficiency.”
By leveraging Microsoft Azure, the financial institution has expedited its growth trajectory through streamlined system configuration and simplified administration processes. Azure simplifies and streamlines many back-end tasks, allowing developers to focus on more strategic initiatives and elevate their overall productivity. “As a result of automation, we no longer need to manage the underlying infrastructure, significantly reducing operational stress,” said Teoman Sevinç, DevOps Specialist. Before this point, making changes to our environment would invariably interfere with our non-production configuration. With Azure, we effortlessly streamline environment management and organisation, thereby fostering a direct positive impact on our growth lifecycle.
Are you ready to embark on a path of innovation and transformation?
As we conclude our series of weblogs on utility modernization, it’s clear that the journey is far from over – there’s always more to learn and discover in this ever-evolving landscape. If you haven’t already, revisit our previous blog posts within this series. and .
Additionally, don’t forget to study the influential research reports that underpinned our efforts, including the comprehensive studies conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Microsoft. You also can try the next sources: