Peter Havart-Simkin, senior vice president, strategic development

NetManage, the Cupertino, CA-based global software company that provides solutions for integrating, Web enabling and accessing enterprise information systems, feels strongly about the issue of legacy modernization and extending the value of insurance firms’ mainframe systems. We discussed these issues with Peter Havart-Simkin, senior vice president, strategic development, who joined NetManage in 1998 as senior vice president, worldwide marketing.

Peter, true or false, mainframes will continue to power businesses and the disparate processes they have long captured in COBOL are not obsolete?

True. The processes ‘long captured in COBOL’ are still, in most instances, a company’s core applications and systems of record, a mix of old and new. In most corporations, core mainframe applications are generally rock solid, high performance, high reliability services subject to stringent SLAs. While not obsolete in terms of the capability they provide, they can be accused of being obsolete in terms of the technology, hardware and software they use.

To get the best value firms are evaluating their platforms, deciding what applications should reside on a mainframe no matter what language they are in, and what applications could move to other platforms where the time vs cost vs resources vs skills vs ROI economics equation delivers better results.

Mainframe migration, is it a binary function?

No, it’s not and there are five different scenarios starting with, the mainframe is here to stay. Second, some business processes are being moved to contemporary packaged applications, ERP systems such as SAP. Third, applications are being retired as new applications on other platforms are developed and deployed. Fourth, the SOA approach and Web enablement of apps allow your mainframe processes to be presented as services. Fifth, the mainframe will be phased out and all applications will be moved to other platforms where the economic equation is better.

None of these suggests wholesale overnight switching. In reality, even option five could take three-to-five years for larger installations, probably not less than a year for smaller ones.

Is there anything preventing firms from leveraging the equity of the investments they’ve made in building and maintaining their mainframe?

No, particularly if companies go down the service-oriented architecture road. In these days of ‘leverage your assets’, there are more options available than ever to bring ‘legacy’ apps into more modern architectures. The process is also much faster, more reliable and less skill and resource sensitive than even two years ago.

To many customers, wholesale migration from a mainframe is not an option. Migration of certain applications, even the majority, may help more than continuing to run most or all core applications on the mainframe. But obviously, this leaves some applications still there. Even if this remnant of applications will be phased out over time, there are many good solutions supporting the co-existence of old and new.

How can firms begin to extend the operational effectiveness of their existing applications, platforms, databases, and supporting technologies?

By rejuvenating their existing systems. They can update the interfaces to existing applications or Web-enable them by adopting new services-oriented solutions, including SOA, where the business processes within the applications on the mainframe are represented as reusable components using standards like Web services. These services can be consumed by a wide range of new applications, thus extending the life of the existing mainframe-based systems.

How does NetManage work with customers?

We can offer solutions ensuring new and old worlds co-exist if they want to migrate off the mainframe. We can migrate some applications now and keep some until they in turn get replaced or their usage dies away. We can also migrate some off the mainframe and let others remain permanently, allowing the customer to build new agile composite applications that incorporate old and contemporary application business processes on a strategic basis.

For more information, visit www.netmanage.com.