HSBC has cut the average time it takes to
analyse the effect of making changes to its legacy software
applications from seven months to seven weeks after deploying
software to automatically track data dependencies between
applications.
As well as saving time, the application portfolio management
software from Micro Focus helps the bank to assess the risks
involved in offshoring maintenance work on its 250 mainframe
applications.
Dave Dawber, senior systems manager at HSBC, said there was a
need for older IT applications to be adapted. However, as
development work on legacy applications had often not been well
documented, the process of making changes was slow and complex.
"Because we did not know precisely which systems used which
applications, we were frightened to make changes without knowing
the side effects," he said.
Dawber said manual information gathering had typically taken up
to seven months, but the Micro Focus tool quickly gave the bank
access to detailed audit information.
"Without this picture, HSBC could not easily decide which
applications were worth offshoring, whether they could be managed
properly once offshored, or the side effects of one application
being offshored on another," said Dawber.
He said gaining a more transparent dashboard view of IT
applications was also helping the bank to transfer offshore the
knowledge required to manage applications.
Since deploying
Micro Focus' Enterprise View software, HSBC has moved the
maintenance operations of half of its legacy applications to India,
bringing it closer to a targeted annual reduction in IT costs of
10%.
The ability to carry out audits more quickly has also freed more
than 30 development staff in the UK to work on new projects.
Phil Murphy, principal analyst at Forrester, said HSBC's
approach was more efficient than most firms, which use the same
staff for new development and maintenance.
"In these organisations, development staff must set aside new
project work to fix maintenance issues as problems arise. Switching
between tasks takes time and effort and breaks project momentum,"
he said.
HSBC bridges the
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