06
Sun, Oct
2 New Articles

Information Availability Solutions Earn High Marks for Financial Services

High Availability / Disaster Recovery
Typography
  • Smaller Small Medium Big Bigger
  • Default Helvetica Segoe Georgia Times
Regardless of the reason for an outage, downtime impacts the ability of a financial institution to deliver on its service promise. Customers are literally cut off from accessing the institution's brand. Studies show that a financial services firm might lose millions of dollars for every hour of downtime. While a small community bank might incur a much smaller downtime cost per hour, proportionally it can have the same effect on the institution's bottom line. Many financial institutions cannot function without computer support for even a few minutes, and a catastrophic data loss would severely cripple its long-term survival. An information availability solution—software that ensures optimum availability and access to your data, applications, and networks—can mitigate and even eliminate these risks entirely and deliver other benefits as well:
  • Lower the cost of doing business by eliminating downtime for planned IT maintenance.
  • Protect business relationships with customers, partners, and suppliers.
  • Meet service-level agreements (SLAs).
  • Ensure compliance with government and financial regulations.

Consequences of Downtime: Count the Ways

Any planned or unexpected downtime in the bank's IT environment has the potential to cause both short- and long-term costs with far-reaching consequences. So how much does downtime cost your business? The answer may not be as obvious as you think. IT outages can unleash a procession of consequences that are both direct and indirect, tangible and intangible, short-term and long-term, immediate and far reaching. These costs include the following:

IT Outage Costs
Tangible/Direct Costs
Intangible/Indirect Costs
Lost transaction revenue
Lost business opportunities
Lost wages
Loss of employees and/or employee morale
Lost inventory
Decrease in stock value
Remedial labor costs
Loss of customer/partner goodwill
Marketing costs
Brand damage
Financial penalties and fees
Driving business to competitor
Legal penalties
Bad publicity/press

Downtime also negatively impacts customer satisfaction levels, internal productivity of employees and decision-makers, and the organization's ability to comply with government regulations such as Sarbanes-Oxley, USA Patriot Act, Gramm-Leach-Bliley, Basel II, and a host of other governmental regulatory requirements.

To determine how much an hour of unplanned downtime will cost your institution, you need to ask a series of questions regarding the real-world impact it will have on your customers, your partners, your employees, and your ability to process transactions:

  • How many transactions can you afford to lose without significantly impacting your company? For a bank, this is very often zero.
  • Do you depend upon one or more mission-critical applications, such as F/X, ATM, or CRM software?
  • How much revenue will you lose for every hour your critical applications are unavailable?
  • What will the internal productivity costs be for the loss of available IT systems and applications?
  • How will collaborative business processes with large business customers, securities firms, financial partners, and others be affected by an unexpected IT outage?

It's All About Recovery

For each application or combination of applications that comprise a critical business process, you should determine both a recovery point objective and a recovery time objective:

  • Recovery point objective (RPO)—At what point in the data stream do you need to recover information, or more simply put, how much data can you afford to lose? Often this depends on the application; for example, a customer-facing application such as a demand transaction system will have a much higher RPO than a back-office application.
  • Recovery time objective (RTO)—How long can your systems be down? How long should it take you to recover your applications and data? Again, this is often application-specific. A financial organization should have a priority list of critical applications and a corresponding RTO for each.

To measure the true cost of downtime and determine your recovery objectives, consider the totality of the all the people, processes, and business implications that will be affected by an IT outage. In addition, you'll want to identify how delays and latency in information delivery and accessibility can impact your bank's strategies and business functions:

  • Risk and compliance—Ensuring regulatory compliance, enabling effective training, identifying and reducing risks to business processes, enabling banking industry initiatives
  • LendingEmpowering a mobile workforce (in office and field), displaying new product offerings, providing real-time access to credit and rate information, supporting producers with on-demand accurate information, eliminating silos of lending information through consolidation, etc.
  • Marketing and branch management—Generating revenue, developing products/services, managing the go-to-market process, targeting growth segments, improving customer satisfaction, enabling business intelligence, etc.
  • Operations—Multi-channel management, refresh and transformation, core banking
  • Productivity and process improvement—Web services, BPM and business process transformation, Check 21, revenue opportunities, electronic payment, payment hubs, etc.

Information Availability: Your Choice Depends on Your Objectives

Financial institutions of all sizes—from global powerhouses to small community banks—have cost-effectively protected themselves from the loss of time and money due to downtime with an information availability solution. Depending upon their capabilities, IT infrastructure demands, and RPO/RTOs, financial institutions can implement information availability in several different ways, including replicating data to a secondary server to maintain continuous application availability or frequently backing up data to a server at a remote location for disaster recovery in the event of a total facility loss at the production site.

Information availability should provide the optimum uptime that's right for the business, which could include one or more of the following options:

  • Practical Availability—Provides readily available access to and protection of transaction and business data with RTOs and RPOs in the range of hours. By performing frequent data backups to a secondary server, this type of software solution provides smaller banks with the ability to significantly reduce any planned downtime and efficiently recover from an unexpected outage without the loss of large amounts of data or days or weeks of labor restoring the production environment. When the backup server is placed in a remote location, it also serves as a cost-effective disaster recovery solution.
  • High Availability—Delivers continuous uptime with zero data loss so your applications and business data are always available when you need them, whether that's a 24x7 workweek or a 12x5 or 23x6 business environment. A backup server with a current replica of your application environment is always available to failover or switchover—on demand or automatically—to replace your production server with an RTO of seconds to minutes and an RPO of zero. High availability dramatically reduces the risks and costs of business interruptions and can also act as a disaster recovery strategy when the backup server is placed in a remote location.
  • Multi-Platform Protection – Because separate business-critical applications may be running simultaneously (and interdependently) on different operating systems, some organizations require a multi-platform information availability solution. For instance, today's banks rely on Windows applications as well as applications running on everything from a System I server to a Linux server. All need protection at varying levels from unplanned outages to keep the business functioning and reduce the risk of lost revenue and productivity. Some information availability solutions vendors today can provide specific solutions to either run on those separate platforms or use the powerful capabilities of one server type (such as the System i) to protect all of these multiple OS applications running on the same servers.

For Financial Services, Uptime Is Money in the Bank

Let's look at one real-life example. For one leading provider of financial services for brokerages and auditing firms, high availability is the foundation of its business. This organization manages transactions to national exchanges for major brokerage firms and provides hosting services for major auditors by running critical applications that ensure compliance with the SEC. Any downtime resulting in unavailable applications or data could trigger a major crisis for both stockbrokers and the auditors who monitor them.

The company guarantees its clients continuous availability to their applications—and faces costly penalties and the loss of customer confidence when it cannot deliver. The solution this firm deployed uses the capabilities of a leading-edge high availability software solution to ensure applications and data are available to clients 24x7. By switching from production to a remotely configured backup server on demand or automatically during an emergency, the firm is able to meet its stringent SLAs and have confidence it will continue to meet them every trading day.

Utilizing real-time replication of data, applications, and system objects—even for its custom applications—the high availability solution constantly monitors system functions and even automatically switches users to a backup in case of sudden production system failure. If unplanned downtime occurs, a backup environment is ready on a moment's notice to assume the full business volume required by customers.

Is It Time to Invest in Availability?

An information availability solution provides significant benefits to small and mid-sized businesses by minimizing the risks and consequences posed by unexpected IT outages:

  • Lowers the risk of significant costs to business such as lost revenue, lost productivity, legal penalties, and brand damage caused by unplanned downtime
  • Protects business relationships with customers, partners, and suppliers by ensuring that applications and data will be available to satisfy their needs and unique schedules
  • Enforces SLAs by maintaining predictable RTOs and RPOs in the event of an IT outage
  • Enhances ROI on existing resources by assuring they will be available to generate revenue and support business processes
  • Ensures compliance with government and trade regulations by securing email and record retention requirements and protecting the availability of business data and reporting processes
Bill Hammond
Bill Hammond directs Vision Solutions' product marketing efforts for information availability software solutions. Hammond joined Vision Solutions in 2003 with more than 15 years of experience in product marketing, product management, and product development roles in the technology industry. As director of product marketing at Vision Solutions, Hammond is responsible for product positioning and messaging, product launches, and marketplace intelligence for the company's high availability, disaster recovery, systems management, and data management solutions. 

 

 

BLOG COMMENTS POWERED BY DISQUS

LATEST COMMENTS

Support MC Press Online

$

Book Reviews

Resource Center

  • SB Profound WC 5536 Have you been wondering about Node.js? Our free Node.js Webinar Series takes you from total beginner to creating a fully-functional IBM i Node.js business application. You can find Part 1 here. In Part 2 of our free Node.js Webinar Series, Brian May teaches you the different tooling options available for writing code, debugging, and using Git for version control. Brian will briefly discuss the different tools available, and demonstrate his preferred setup for Node development on IBM i or any platform. Attend this webinar to learn:

  • SB Profound WP 5539More than ever, there is a demand for IT to deliver innovation. Your IBM i has been an essential part of your business operations for years. However, your organization may struggle to maintain the current system and implement new projects. The thousands of customers we've worked with and surveyed state that expectations regarding the digital footprint and vision of the company are not aligned with the current IT environment.

  • SB HelpSystems ROBOT Generic IBM announced the E1080 servers using the latest Power10 processor in September 2021. The most powerful processor from IBM to date, Power10 is designed to handle the demands of doing business in today’s high-tech atmosphere, including running cloud applications, supporting big data, and managing AI workloads. But what does Power10 mean for your data center? In this recorded webinar, IBMers Dan Sundt and Dylan Boday join IBM Power Champion Tom Huntington for a discussion on why Power10 technology is the right strategic investment if you run IBM i, AIX, or Linux. In this action-packed hour, Tom will share trends from the IBM i and AIX user communities while Dan and Dylan dive into the tech specs for key hardware, including:

  • Magic MarkTRY the one package that solves all your document design and printing challenges on all your platforms. Produce bar code labels, electronic forms, ad hoc reports, and RFID tags – without programming! MarkMagic is the only document design and print solution that combines report writing, WYSIWYG label and forms design, and conditional printing in one integrated product. Make sure your data survives when catastrophe hits. Request your trial now!  Request Now.

  • SB HelpSystems ROBOT GenericForms of ransomware has been around for over 30 years, and with more and more organizations suffering attacks each year, it continues to endure. What has made ransomware such a durable threat and what is the best way to combat it? In order to prevent ransomware, organizations must first understand how it works.

  • SB HelpSystems ROBOT GenericIT security is a top priority for businesses around the world, but most IBM i pros don’t know where to begin—and most cybersecurity experts don’t know IBM i. In this session, Robin Tatam explores the business impact of lax IBM i security, the top vulnerabilities putting IBM i at risk, and the steps you can take to protect your organization. If you’re looking to avoid unexpected downtime or corrupted data, you don’t want to miss this session.

  • SB HelpSystems ROBOT GenericCan you trust all of your users all of the time? A typical end user receives 16 malicious emails each month, but only 17 percent of these phishing campaigns are reported to IT. Once an attack is underway, most organizations won’t discover the breach until six months later. A staggering amount of damage can occur in that time. Despite these risks, 93 percent of organizations are leaving their IBM i systems vulnerable to cybercrime. In this on-demand webinar, IBM i security experts Robin Tatam and Sandi Moore will reveal:

  • FORTRA Disaster protection is vital to every business. Yet, it often consists of patched together procedures that are prone to error. From automatic backups to data encryption to media management, Robot automates the routine (yet often complex) tasks of iSeries backup and recovery, saving you time and money and making the process safer and more reliable. Automate your backups with the Robot Backup and Recovery Solution. Key features include:

  • FORTRAManaging messages on your IBM i can be more than a full-time job if you have to do it manually. Messages need a response and resources must be monitored—often over multiple systems and across platforms. How can you be sure you won’t miss important system events? Automate your message center with the Robot Message Management Solution. Key features include:

  • FORTRAThe thought of printing, distributing, and storing iSeries reports manually may reduce you to tears. Paper and labor costs associated with report generation can spiral out of control. Mountains of paper threaten to swamp your files. Robot automates report bursting, distribution, bundling, and archiving, and offers secure, selective online report viewing. Manage your reports with the Robot Report Management Solution. Key features include:

  • FORTRAFor over 30 years, Robot has been a leader in systems management for IBM i. With batch job creation and scheduling at its core, the Robot Job Scheduling Solution reduces the opportunity for human error and helps you maintain service levels, automating even the biggest, most complex runbooks. Manage your job schedule with the Robot Job Scheduling Solution. Key features include:

  • LANSA Business users want new applications now. Market and regulatory pressures require faster application updates and delivery into production. Your IBM i developers may be approaching retirement, and you see no sure way to fill their positions with experienced developers. In addition, you may be caught between maintaining your existing applications and the uncertainty of moving to something new.

  • LANSAWhen it comes to creating your business applications, there are hundreds of coding platforms and programming languages to choose from. These options range from very complex traditional programming languages to Low-Code platforms where sometimes no traditional coding experience is needed. Download our whitepaper, The Power of Writing Code in a Low-Code Solution, and:

  • LANSASupply Chain is becoming increasingly complex and unpredictable. From raw materials for manufacturing to food supply chains, the journey from source to production to delivery to consumers is marred with inefficiencies, manual processes, shortages, recalls, counterfeits, and scandals. In this webinar, we discuss how:

  • The MC Resource Centers bring you the widest selection of white papers, trial software, and on-demand webcasts for you to choose from. >> Review the list of White Papers, Trial Software or On-Demand Webcast at the MC Press Resource Center. >> Add the items to yru Cart and complet he checkout process and submit

  • Profound Logic Have you been wondering about Node.js? Our free Node.js Webinar Series takes you from total beginner to creating a fully-functional IBM i Node.js business application.

  • SB Profound WC 5536Join us for this hour-long webcast that will explore:

  • Fortra IT managers hoping to find new IBM i talent are discovering that the pool of experienced RPG programmers and operators or administrators with intimate knowledge of the operating system and the applications that run on it is small. This begs the question: How will you manage the platform that supports such a big part of your business? This guide offers strategies and software suggestions to help you plan IT staffing and resources and smooth the transition after your AS/400 talent retires. Read on to learn: