Cloud Services

Insights from Greg Hodgkinson, Prolifics CTO and IBM Lifetime Champion 

IBM’s Cloud Paks provide the perfect delivery platform for us as a digital engineering company, where we aim to simplify the complex solutions our customers need. We partner with IBM – again and again – with proven business outcomes on Cloud Paks for customers across retail, finance and healthcare – guiding their journeys all the way from proof-of-concept (PoC), through implementation and into production.  

We are the experts in taking on-prem, traditional IBM platforms to the cloud. Need to move from IIB to ACE? We’re the best! We have a dedicated expert migration factory that gets them onto ACE and to the cloud with Cloud Pak for Integration, with a step-wise approach that is low-risk, and a skilled offshore team to bring low-cost. You’ll find that we know the Cloud Paks – for Data, for Integration, for Business Automation – inside and out, from big picture to hands-on-keyboards. IBM footprint continues, in the cloud! 

What’s next? As the Paks grow, so do we. We’ve a recent PoC success with IBM Cloud Pak for Watson AIOps, proving the proactive automated anomaly detection with a customer’s own systems and data, reinforcing the value in their terms, and getting them to commit to a pilot rollout. Let us do the heavy lifting to prove out the business case for your prospects! It’s all part of what we do as an IBM Platinum Business Partner. Connect with us and we’ll be happy to share Cloud Pak success stories – and get ready together for your next customer.  

gregory.hodgkinson@prolifics.com 

Statistical Analytics System (SAS) is software used for data analysis. It’s the most widely used data science platform across the globe, so if your organization uses it, you’re in good company. However, SAS is a legacy environment that many organizations find problematic. As with any mature legacy system with tentacles wending their way through an organization’s operating systems, a SAS environment requires a great deal of upkeep — to operate properly, it must be updated and upgraded frequently, which requires purchasing a lot of licenses, and that results in a high cost of ownership.  

How Do You Reduce Your Reliance on SAS? 

What executives often don’t realize is that there are not only many cloud platform options, but plenty of migration paths, all of which have their own benefits and levels of cost savings.

Different Migration Paths 

• Replatform: This migration path requires very few changes to an organization’s existing legacy code. Instead, systems are simply redeployed to a new platform. Some businesses might choose this method as a proof of concept before undertaking a more complex migration method. It also could serve as a migration’s first phase, before shifting to a second.  
• Refactor: In this migration path, a system’s general functionality is not altered, but legacy code is translated to the Python programming language, and technical debt, which is created when development decisions prioritize speed over design, is reduced. An organization may choose to stop at this point, or refactoring can be a step on the path toward total replacement.  
• Replace: For a migration that implements a total platform replacement, legacy code is fundamentally rewritten in order to optimize and modernize an organization’s systems and allow them greater ability to innovate. This option requires decision-makers to take part in a Design Workshop, which helps them imagine the possibilities a modern platform would allow and choose the landscape that would best serve them.  

Regardless of the path you choose, however, two things are evident: thorough testing is imperative, and Python must be the programming language used to build the new platform. 

Why Does the World Love Python? 

Python is an agile, sophisticated and robust open-source programming language widely used for data science, and it is the most downloaded one in the world. Dr. G opines that it is above and beyond SAS in data science, and he believes that any organization considering a move to modern cloud architecture has to make Python part of the equation. “The reality is that Python is eroding legacy scripting languages, like SAS,” he said. “These legacy scripting languages evaporate because they’re islands — they are not a part of an integrated system.” 

Because it doesn’t require licenses and allows users to pick and choose only the pieces of code they need, Python offers the flexibility and cost savings that legacy scripting languages can’t.  

Let Prolifics Take Charge of Your Migration 

Prolifics takes cloud migration, which seems to many organizations an insurmountable task, and breaks it down into a series of simple steps that will help your organization reach its modernization goals.  

• Download the Prolifics Agile Migration (PAM) process manual, Prolifics’ business-sensitive approach to cloud migration 
• Schedule one of our customized workshops — we offer a range of workshops that can do everything from help you dream of the possibilities that modernization offers to educate your team on how to effectively use the new operating system 
• Have our experts walk you through the process 

Connect with us at solutions@prolifics.com. 

Who Is Dr. G? 

Michael L. Gonzales, Ph.D., (Dr. G) is Prolifics’ chief data scientist and an active practitioner in the IT space with more than 30 years of industry experience. He specializes in the formulation of business analytics that give competitive advantages to global organizations. Dr. Gonzales is a successful author, industry speaker, published researcher and lifetime Mensa member. 

About Prolifics

As kids (okay, and as adults too), we’d gaze at the shapes of clouds in the sky and talk about what they looked like to us. Today, in a technology context, the shape of your cloud takes on a whole new, and much more important, meaning when you’re talking cloud migration.  

Whether you’re leaving your on-prem systems behind, or looking to jump from your current cloud set-up, you need to take a hard look at your prospective new cloud homes. Make sure you compare the qualities and benefits in each cloud provider, so you get the combination that’s right for your business goals – not all clouds are created equal.  

Here are seven things to think about when you’re gazing at the tech clouds and contemplating migration: 

1) Cost. As compared to on-premise, cloud saves you big money on hardware, maintenance and related infrastructure (like climate-controlled rooms). It also frees up IT staff to do more important work. Yet, among the big cloud service providers, things like optimized computing pricing; per second pricing; and available commitment discounts vary, as do data storage and movement costs. While these charges may seem similar on paper, you could save tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of dollars based on choosing the right cloud platform for how your business runs. 

2) Scalability. Clouds are certainly scalable. But make sure you only pay for what you need; and know whether you have to purchase access or pay a scheduled fee to scale up or down. 

3) Availability and redundancy. What’s the cloud vendor’s uptime guarantee? A 99.95 percent guarantee still means about ½ a workday down in total over a year. But – do uptime guarantees come with any additional costs associated with redundancy? Does it cost you more to get to 99.99 percent?   

4) Security and Access. What’s the provider’s approach to security? Have there been any breaches? What enhanced measures are in place? On the flip side, can you access your data at any place (e.g., remotely), method (e.g., mobile) and time?  

5) Compliance. Similar to security, does your provider meet all needed provisions for government regulations, like privacy regulations or PII protections? Especially consider the compliance regulations or certifications most important to your industry and company. 

6) Compatibility. Again, not all clouds are created equal. There could be compatibility issues with operating systems, apps, image formats – issues you need to know about before you choose your provider, not in the middle of a migration. 

7) Lock-in. You may have felt locked-in with your aging on-prem systems or the cloud set-up you’re looking to leave. Don’t let it happen again. Does the provider have high fees for data transition or transfer? Is there a claw back of those original commitment discounts? Know your exit strategy so the next move isn’t a surprise mix of costs and difficulties. 

So, keep your eyes skyward and if you need help finding your right cloud shape, feel free to connect with us at solutions@prolifics.com. 

About Prolifics  

Prolifics to Help Bring Hybrid Cloud Capabilities to Clients in Any Environment

ORLANDO, FLA., March 1, 2021 – Prolifics, a global digital transformation leader is proud to announce that we now can help enterprises manage their applications across multiple cloud environments with IBM Cloud Satellite. IBM Cloud Satellite, now generally available, enables clients to run IBM Cloud services on any cloud, on premises, in multicloud environments or at the edge – all delivered as a service. This flexibility will help bring cloud capabilities to where client data resides, in the environment of their choice, while focusing on consistency, user experience, and security.

With its open architecture, IBM Cloud Satellite builds on IBM’s deep industry expertise and can help enterprises across a variety of industries including telecommunications, healthcare, banking, insurance, travel and transportation, transform into digital-first organizations. The need to modernize mission-critical workloads is intensifying.  According to a recent IBM Institute for Business Value report, 74% of CEOs interviewed during the COVID-19 pandemic believe cloud computing will most help their organization deliver these results over the next 2-3 years. We see a cornerstone of this transformation is in edge computing. The continued proliferation of edge devices is expected to shift the amount of data that resides at the edge compared to within central data centers. As this transition takes place, IBM Cloud Satellite is designed to bring cloud services to where clients’ data already resides — and help them bridge to where they want to go. 

Prolifics is part of IBM’s ecosystem of partners fueling hybrid cloud deployments by helping clients modernize applications and manage workloads on infrastructure ranging from bare-metal to multicloud and everything in between using Red Hat OpenShift, the industry’s leading enterprise Kubernetes platform. IBM Cloud Satellite is engineered to give clients the flexibility to bring their applications to environments where their data resides while leveraging the security of IBM Cloud.^[1]

Satya Bolli, Prolifics Chairman & Managing Director, said, “Modernizing applications to enable our clients to become faster, more agile, and more creative is what we do.  Deciding the right platform for the right application workloads is a critical part of the equation.  We see IBM Cloud Satellite as a game changer for our clients who want an enterprise grade option to bring the convenience of a cloud experience into the control of their own data center.”

Greg Hodgkinson, Prolifics Chief Technology Officer, said, “In the Prolifics Innovation Center, we’ve crafted more than 20 of our solutions using OpenShift and the Cloud Paks as our solution platform, ensuring flexible deployment models and simplified operations across cloud infrastructure. These solutions span verticals such as healthcare and banking, and horizontals such as data science, Hyperautomation, data privacy, DevOps and testing. IBM Cloud Satellite can help us deliver this solution platform as a service across an infrastructure of our client’s choosing, enabling us to roll out our solutions with Cloud Paks quicker and more efficiently. We believe this will improve availability to users, free-up capacity in our client’s operations team, and lower long-term cost of ownership.”

For more information about Prolifics’ role with Cloud Satellite, read IBM Cloud Satellite a Game Changer for Managing Cloud Services.

About Prolifics

Prolifics is a global digital transformation leader with expertise in cloud, data and analytics, DevOps, digital business, and quality assurance across multiple industries. We provide consulting, engineering and managed services for all our practice areas at any point you need them – giving you fast, complete solution delivery experiences that you will find nowhere else. Whether it’s initial advising and strategy; design and implementation; or ongoing analysis and guidance, Prolifics will help you take charge of your digital future. Visit prolifics.com.

_{^[1]Based on IBM Hyper Protect Crypto Service, the only public-cloud enabled FIPS 140-2 Level 4-certified Hardware Security Module (HSM). FIPS 140-2 Security Level 4 provides the highest level of security defined in this standard. At this security level, the physical security mechanisms provide a comprehensive envelope of protection around the cryptographic module with the intent of detecting and responding to all unauthorized attempts at physical access.}

We’re proud to share the news! Prolifics is an IBM 2020 Beacon Award finalist in two categories – “Outstanding Hybrid Cloud Solution” and “Blockchain-Supported Interoperability for Healthcare solution.”

“IBM is proud to recognize Business Partners who strive to enhance client experiences, drive business growth, and change the world…The IBM Beacon Award recognizes Business Partners worldwide who use IBM products and technology to create outstanding solutions and spark innovation,” states IBM on their site announcing this year’s award winners.

IBM, on the company’s website announcing this year’s award winners

Prolifics Open Banking SaaS Solution Recognized in Outstanding Hybrid Cloud Solution Category

The Prolifics UK Innovation Lab originally implemented the solution for a large British banking organization and has since implemented it at multiple major banks in the UK.

Recent Open Banking initiatives in the UK and the EU’s PSD2 are changing how banks, their customers and third parties access, share and secure the customers’ financial information. These regulations reflect customers’ desires for digital access and self-serve functions for financial products and services, as well as ownership and portability of their digital financial accounts and transactions across providers.

Prolifics sees these initiatives, along with similar ones in the US, Middle East, Australia and Asia, as opportunities for financial organizations to reinvent themselves as more open, responsive, customer-centric and partner-friendly. Our Innovation Through Open Banking solution offers:

• Securely exposed, open APIs for use by both the business and third-party organizations
• A robust SaaS API management platform, leveraging IBM’s leading cloud, API, and integration products
• Access to a preconfigured sandbox environment built on IBM Cloud/SaaS software, enabling rapid testing of integration points
• A dedicated Prolifics managed services team that helps manage post-deployment complexities, freeing the organization to focus on customer service and future innovation

The solution provides a quick win and a quick path toward compliance with the new regulations. With the solution in place, the client can rapidly build a secured API marketplace, generating new products and services and adding new features to current offerings.

As similar initiatives arise elsewhere in Europe, the UK and around the world, this solution can be quickly adapted to meet those requirements. It is also a good fit for banking organizations seeking to innovate business practices in an open banking, API-centered model. But the base solution isn’t restricted to Banking – Prolifics has also extended the underlying IBM solution to provide capabilities for other industries such as Open Insurance and FHIR for Healthcare.

Prolifics Blockchain Solution Recognized in Blockchain-Supported Interoperability for Healthcare Solution Category

Prolifics Blockchain Solution is a product of our Innovation Center. Recognizing that blockchain will be a highly sought-after technology, the Innovation Center drew on our healthcare expertise to create demonstration scenarios for the healthcare industry. Blockchain benefits for healthcare include a unified, secured view of data across disparate healthcare entities, provisioning of information necessary for patients to make informed decisions, and overall streamlined claims processing. In short, the outcomes of this solution lead to improved revenue cycle management along with enhanced patient relations.

The solution is currently being leveraged within the healthcare industry to build a blockchain network across multiple business units. This solution will deliver a variety of benefits to the involved organizations, including real-time transparency, customer-centricity, cost savings and business agility.

While the healthcare industry is our immediate focus for this innovative blockchain solution, it is directly applicable and viable across multiple industry segments.

To learn more about Prolifics, visit our website at prolifics.com.