CUSTOMER SUCCESS: Central Technology Services Supports Major U.S. Bank’s IT with BMC Software

Charged with running the technology that supports Central Bancompany, one of the United States’ most successful regional banks, Central Technology Services (CTS) relies on Business Service Management (BSM) solutions from BMC Software (NASDAQ:BMC) to maximize mainframe investments and delay costly updates.

CTS uses BMC MainView products to provide a central point of control to monitor and manage across multiple computing environments, including z/OS®, CICS®, DB2®, IBM® WebSphere® MQ and Linux®. BMC’s Control-M workload automation solutions give CTS a single way to automate job scheduling across platforms and systems. Control-M notifies the IT staff about issues that could interfere with timely batch processing. That enables them to reduce risks and increase efficiencies.

By using the monitoring performance of the BMC MainView solution, CTS was able to delay costly upgrades and save $475,000.

"In the past, we upgraded the mainframe every 24 to 30 months,” said Jerry Kolb, manager of systems and operations at CTS. "The automation we put in place with BMC MainView and BMC Control-M allowed us to delay upgrades to the mainframe for three years. And when we finally upgraded this year, it wasn’t because we needed to add capacity. It was because we wanted to update our technology.”

Ten years after implementing the BMC MainView solution to monitor mainframe performance, CTS has applied the solution in several environments, including BMC MainView for z/OS, BMC MainView for DB2, BMC CMF MONITOR, BMC MainView for CICS, BMC MainView for Websphere MQ, BMC MainView AutoOPERATOR for CICS and BMC MainView AutoOPERATOR for z/OS.

By automating manual processes and reducing downtime, BMC MainView solutions enable CTS to get maximum value from its technology investment. The BMC MainView Alarm Manager solution automatically triggers alarms when incidents occur, and BMC Alarm Manager passes alerts to BMC MainView AutoOPERATOR, which opens incident tickets and notifies the staff by email and pager when they need to take action.

With the use of the BMC Control-M solution, batch processes are completed on schedule, which contributes to higher reliability. When problems arise, BMC Control-M notifies staff immediately so they can intervene to meet critical deadlines. BMC Control-M Enterprise Manager gives the staff a single view into the entire environment so operators don’t have to struggle with different interfaces.

Automation has reduced the burden on the scheduling staff so that CTS can manage a growing number of processes without adding personnel and without working off hours. For example, an important automated clearinghouse process runs late Sunday night of each week. In the past, a staff member had to dial in to start the job manually. The process is now automated with BMC Control-M, which enabled CTS to eliminate two hours of Sunday staff time.

CTS uses BMC Control-M across multiple platforms, including z/OS, Linux and Windows applications, to simplify scheduling and maintenance. The BMC Control-M solution also helps CTS respond to requests from auditors. For compliance, CTS must be able to demonstrate that jobs run consistently and reliably, and that staff members are notified if a job fails. Automation of scheduling and alerting through Control-M enables the staff to show that adequate controls are in place.

"When you take care of customers, they’re going to come back,” Kolb said. "And BMC does a good job of taking care of customers. When we call with a problem, we get help right away. The executive briefings keep us informed and give us an opportunity to mingle with other customers. And, finally, BMC’s continued investment in developing the solutions assures us that we’ve picked the right partner.”

Business runs on IT. IT runs on BMC Software.

Business thrives when IT runs smarter, faster and stronger. That’s why the most demanding IT organizations in the world rely on BMC Software across distributed, mainframe, virtual and cloud environments. Recognized as the leader in Business Service Management, BMC offers a comprehensive approach and unified platform that helps IT organizations cut cost, reduce risk and drive business profit. For the four fiscal quarters ended September 30, 2010, BMC revenue was approximately $1.96 billion. Visit www.bmc.com for more information.

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