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Success story · Mission-critical infrastructure
A top-5 bank in Colombia extends its core banking capacity with on-demand compute and an opex model
Redsis consolidated the bank's IBM Power on-demand capacity into a single pool, expanded its IBM DS8884 storage and delivered the entire solution under an operating lease with IBM Capital. The core banking platform was covered through January 2022, with no disruption.
Client
Top-5 bank in Colombia by assets
Industry
Banking
Location
Bogotá, Colombia
Solution
IBM Power CoD · IBM DS8884 · IBM Capital
Service line
Infrastructure & financing
The client
At the time of the project, the client ranked among Colombia's five largest banks by assets. Headquartered in Bogotá with roughly 4,900 employees, it was the Colombian subsidiary of an international banking group, serving millions of retail, business and corporate customers through a nationwide network of branches and ATMs.
Its core banking system runs on IBM i on IBM Power servers, connected to an IBM DS8884 enterprise storage system. That platform carries every deposit, payment and loan the bank processes, so running short on capacity is not an option.
The challenge
The on-demand capacity on the bank's IBM Power servers had been budgeted to be fully consumed by August 2020. But starting in November 2019, business requirements pushed daily production consumption from 32 to 56 cores, and usage kept accelerating.
- Compute at the limit: planned capacity would run out ahead of schedule.
- Saturated storage: the DS8884 was close to 90% full, and writes per second were already above the recommended guideline.
- Limited room to grow: the storage system had little headroom for organic business growth and new projects.
- A moving timeline: changes to the bank's regional consolidation strategy meant the platform had to stay in service through January 2022.
Before and after
Before
Capacity about to run out
Consumption up from 32 to 56 IBM Power cores, DS8884 storage near 90% and writes above the recommended threshold.
Today
Dynamic capacity on an opex model
A single CoD pool for IBM Power, an expanded DS8884 and a 12-month operating lease, with coverage through January 2022.
The solution
After several rounds between the Redsis team, IBM specialists and the bank, Redsis designed a solution that brought capacity, storage, services and financing together in a single proposal:
Negotiating processor, memory and storage growth together, combined with the operating lease, gave the bank better commercial terms with no new capital investment.
- IBM Power Capacity on Demand (CoD): on-demand activation of processor and memory resources on the IBM Power servers, extended through January 31, 2022 and consolidated into a single pool allocated to each server as needed.
- IBM DS8884 expansion: more capacity and more I/O operations to support growth over the period.
- Implementation and migration: Redsis services to implement and migrate the enterprise storage behind the core, connected to Power servers running IBM i.
- CoD management from the CAC: administration of on-demand capacity through the Redsis Customer Service Center (CAC).
- Operating lease with IBM Capital: the entire solution was delivered on a 12-month opex model.
Results
Through January 2022
Core compute and storage extended to support the regional consolidation, with no disruption.
Dynamic capacity
CoD resources activated as business peaks demand and allocated to each server from a single pool.
Opex model
A 12-month operating lease, with no new capital investment.
- IBM Power Systems CoD
- IBM DS8884
- CoD management from the CAC
- Storage migration
- IBM i
Why Redsis
With more than 25 years delivering infrastructure to Latin American banks, and as an IBM Platinum Partner, Redsis knows IBM Power, IBM i and IBM enterprise storage in depth. That lets us go beyond hardware: we design the right mix of capacity, services and financing, and support the client in day-to-day operations from our Customer Service Center.
Is your core running out of capacity?
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