Leading Global Bank Saves Big via Syncsort Network Management Takeout of “Net” Vendors

With Syncsort Network Management, this bank saves an estimated $75M per year

This leading global financial institution with over 30 million customers faced twin resource problems of too-high costs and multiple expensive vendors (NetView, NetMaster, etc.) straining IT human resources and budgets. Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) over the past several years brought together diverse IT
environments, applications and tools to be managed.

As is common in the M&A-heavy banking and financial services sector, new leadership naturally looks lower costs and IT is always at the top of the list. With a topline goal of saving $75M, a consolidation of IT divisions to reduce the duplicate/similar operations (and products performing the same function) was
an obvious choice. A massive IBM footprint growing faster in size and cost than seemed appropriate positioned the mainframe as ripe for immediate examination and action within the larger cost reduction effort.

An upcoming new procurement cycle drove the timeline but the need was there and management didn’t want another year of multiple people manning multiple different green screens to essentially do the same thing.

Considering the future and knowing the intensive testing tasks that are (and will continue to be) part of the operation, the IT leads also hoped the green screen could be replaced or at least augmented with a graphical user interface to better serve this important function and the people who manage it every day.

Clearly, having Netview, NetMaster and other duplicative products running in parallel in the same IT organization wasn’t resource efficient, so evaluating the best of those solutions on which to standardize was logical. The desire was also there to enhance functionality while doing a long overdue consolidation
of vendors that would minimize future staffing requirements and free up scarce and valuable mainframe resources immediately.

Of course, validating that the migration would be secure and minimally disruptive was paramount to the team. Getting all Network Management (TCP / SNA), in one place was a requirement but simplicity via a web-based graphical user interface was very high on the wish list.

After exploring the incumbent vendors as consolidation options, the bank chose to also include Syncsort Network Management in the “bake off,” based on performance record, feature set, and rock solid reputation for ease and security of migration.