- The project to modernize on-premises applications in mainframe environments to Microsoft Azure – without the need to modify the existing COBOL code – also provides a 10% increase in terms of speed.
- The first area that has already completed the transition is the Professionals area, which allows the network of more than 1,000 collaborating and proprietary centers in Spain to enjoy greater agility in their administrative and care work, without users having to perceive the migration.
- The project has been developed by Microsoft Consulting Services and Raincode, which provides compilers and tools to modernize ASISA’s legacy systems with an agile and secure transition.
ASISA, the leading healthcare company in Spain, with more than 2,200,000 policyholders and 10,000 doctors, has launched a major project to modernize its on-premise host applications as part of its digital transformation plan. Until now, the insurer has been running its applications and interfaces in a mainframe environment, which historically has been associated with high maintenance costs and limited possibilities for the evolution and integration of new technologies.
«We were at a point where our capacity for innovation at the technological level was limited by the technological infrastructure that served our network of professionals and more than 1,000 collaborating centers throughout Spain. Microsoft and Raincode have been able to offer us a solution that eliminates a major bottleneck, while at the same time achieving a significant reduction in operating costs and an improvement in speed, which has an impact on the experience of associated professionals,» said Jose Antonio Alonso, ASISA’s IT Director.
The modernization of the Professionals area application, with its transition to a cloud model, was a major challenge due to its development in COBOL. The essential requirement of not altering the code outside the mainframe environment marked the collaboration between Microsoft Consulting Services and Raincode, a partner specialized in the modernization of legacy systems. Raincode’s architecture modernizes legacy applications from the core system through migration and integration into Azure, without the need to change any lines of code. Thus, by keeping applications updated, optimized and deployed in the cloud, it has been possible to preserve their development while greatly improving performance and flexibility.
The result has been a complete and smooth transition, which opens the door for ASISA to move the rest of its business applications to the Microsoft Azure cloud, achieving savings in operating costs that will reach 90% once the process is completed.
The road to innovation
The Microsoft cloud provides ASISA with solid support in terms of cybersecurity and regulatory compliance, with certification of compliance with the high level of the National Security Scheme. Microsoft’s commitment to regulatory compliance applies to all areas: both in terms of protection measures, operational and organizational measures, as well as in the area of governance and data residency. In this sense, the opening of the new Microsoft data center region in Spain will also help ASISA to continue its innovation in a secure and efficient way.
In addition, the modernization undertaken by the insurer will also enable it to benefit from other key aspects to continue its digital transformation. These include a significant reduction in the time to deploy new features, thanks to the accelerated delivery provided by Azure DevOps; improved scalability, availability and performance, with full control by ASISA; technological simplification, which reduces silos between technology teams; or a defined approach that allows cloud applications to maintain their functionalities, with no downtime or impact on the business.
According to José Antonio Alonso, ASISA’s IT Director: «The go-to-production on Microsoft Azure and the performance of the platform for professionals have exceeded our expectations, achieving a 10% improvement in terms of speed: a figure to highlight, considering that historically mainframe environments have been considered the fastest in the management of critical processes. On the other hand, despite the complexity of the operation, the deployment has been carried out in an exemplary manner, so that users of the Professionals application have only noticed an increase in its agility.»
About Grupo ASISA
Grupo Asisa is the largest private health group in Spain. Comprising a group of more than 70 companies whose activities are grouped into three areas (insurance, healthcare and other non-healthcare activities), Grupo Asisa is owned by the largest Spanish and European healthcare cooperative, Lavinia S. Coop, which is wholly owned by Spanish capital and currently employs around 10,000 doctors.
The Group is led by ASISA, an insurer founded in 1971 and offering health, dental, life, accident, death, pet and travel insurance. It also has its own extensive healthcare network led by the HLA Hospital Group, which includes 17 hospitals and 36 multispecialty medical centers with reference units in state-of-the-art treatments, making it the largest Spanish hospital group owned by an insurance company. Grupo ASISA’s own healthcare network is completed by almost 110 clinics specializing in dental, ophthalmological, hearing and assisted reproduction treatments, etc.
Quality, innovation and care are the pillars of Grupo ASISA’s healthcare model, conceived as a non-profit healthcare system that reinvests surpluses in improving its human and technological resources, modernizing its facilities and training its professionals.
Grupo ASISA employs more than 6,000 professionals and leads projects related to healthcare and health management in a dozen countries in Europe, Latin America, Asia, North Africa and the Middle East.
About Raincode
Raincode is the largest independent compiler company in the world, based in Brussels, Belgium. Founded in 1998, Raincode specializes in language processing, software compilation and migration, and actively develops and markets a number of advanced products and solutions in its capacity as a cutting-edge innovator. Raincode offers the tools and services necessary to rehost even the most complex mission critical mainframe workloads to cloud native architecture, ensuring all migrations are non-transformational. Raincode has provided compilers and tools to modernize legacy systems for over 20 years, with a strong focus on the mainframe as the quintessential legacy platform.
