Published on 07-Feb-2012
"WebSphere Cast Iron Cloud integration empowered IT to complete a complex project quickly. We gained fast time to value from the integration itself, and it freed IT resources for more strategic work." - Global manufacturing company
Customer:
Global manufacturing and technology company
Industry:
Industrial Products
Deployment country:
United States
Solution:
Cloud Computing, SmartCloud - Foundation
Overview
A diversified global manufacturing and technology company headquartered in the United States that offers a wide range of products and services.
Business need:
To maximize business efficiency, the company needed real-time visibility of the shop floor across its global manufacturing sites.
Solution:
The manufacturer chose IBM WebSphere® Cast Iron® Cloud integration to provide a cloud computing solution to connect the many manufacturing sites, providing needed visibility into the company’s on-premises applications.
Benefits:
The IBM WebSphere® Cast Iron® Cloud integration solution helped the manufacturer achieve fast time to value, lessen the need for specialized IT integration skills and reduce the total cost of ownership (TCO) of integrated applications by 40 percent.
Case Study
IBM WebSphere Cast Iron Cloud integration accelerates completion of “11-week” project in 10 days
With approximately 127,000 employees and more than 200 manufacturing locations worldwide, a diversified global manufacturing and technology company headquartered in the United States offers a wide range of products and services. The company serves industrial, commercial and consumer markets through its network power, process management, industrial automation, climate technologies and tools and storage businesses.
Challenge
To maximize business efficiency, the company needed real-time visibility of the shop floor across its global manufacturing sites. This included the ability to view supplier receipts in a timely manner, see reports of manufacturing progress and receive immediate verifications of products shipped. Accomplishing this required a standards-based solution that would enable integration among numerous incompatible applications and systems, including the mainframe. The estimate to complete the integration was 11 weeks.
Solution
The manufacturer chose IBM WebSphere® Cast Iron® Cloud integration, which provides preconfigured integrations for hundreds of leading enterprise and cloud applications. By using a “configuration, not coding” approach to application integration, the solution improves IT productivity by eliminating the need for custom programming and deep middleware expertise.
These capabilities worked well in the integration project. The solution relied on cloud computing to connect the many manufacturing sites, providing needed visibility into the company’s on-premises applications. Postintegration, the solution links the company’s distributed shop-floor systems in real time. Shipping verifications from the mainframe travel to manufacturing systems, and warranty information routes back to the mainframe. Further, real-time error notifications are possible across the entire manufacturing base. The integration project took only 10 days, 87 percent faster than the estimated 11 weeks.
Benefits
· Achieved fast time to value from the “configuration, not coding” approach to application integration
· Lessened the need for specialized IT integration skills, freeing resources for more strategic work
· Reduced the total cost of ownership (TCO) of integrated applications by 40 percent
For more information
To learn more about WebSphere Cast Iron Cloud integration, please contact your IBM representative or IBM Business Partner, or visit: ibm.com/castiron
Products and services used
IBM products and services that were used in this case study.
Legal Information
© Copyright IBM Corporation 2012 IBM Corporation Software Group Route 100 Somers, NY 10589 U.S.A. Produced in the United States of America January 2012 All Rights Reserved IBM, the IBM logo, ibm.com, WebSphere and Cast Iron are trademarks of International Business Machines Corp., registered in many jurisdictions worldwide. Other product and service names might be trademarks of IBM or other companies. A current list of IBM trademarks is available on the Web at “Copyright and trademark information” at ibm.com/legal/copytrade.shtml Other company, product or service names may be trademarks or service marks of others. The information contained in this documentation is provided for informational purposes only. While efforts were made to verify the completeness and accuracy of the information contained in this documentation, it is provided “as is” without warranty of any kind, express or implied. In addition, this information is based on IBM’s current product plans and strategy, which are subject to change by IBM without notice. IBM shall not be responsible for any damages arising out of the use of, or otherwise related to, this documentation or any other documentation. Nothing contained in this documentation is intended to, nor shall have the effect of, creating any warranties or representations from IBM (or its suppliers or licensors), or altering the terms and conditions of the applicable license agreement governing the use of IBM software. References in this publication to IBM products or services do not imply that IBM intends to make them available in all countries in which IBM operates. All customer examples described are presented as illustrations of how those customers have used IBM products and the results they may have achieved. Actual environmental costs and performance characteristics may vary by customer.