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Achmea's Digital Transformation: Boosting Performance with SAP HANA on Azure
Technology Category
- Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - Virtual Private Cloud
- Wearables - Virtual Reality Glasses, Headsets & Controllers
Applicable Industries
- Cement
- Construction & Infrastructure
Applicable Functions
- Product Research & Development
- Warehouse & Inventory Management
Use Cases
- Construction Management
- Infrastructure Inspection
Services
- Cloud Planning, Design & Implementation Services
- System Integration
The Challenge
Achmea, a leading insurer based in the Netherlands, was on a mission to become an all-digital insurance provider. However, several of its business-critical workloads, including its data warehouse and fraud management applications, were hosted on an aging SAP HANA appliance on external on-premises infrastructure. This infrastructure was reaching its end-of-service date, and to continue operating on-premises, Achmea would have had to make a significant capital expenditure to replace the hardware. Additionally, to stay up-to-date, the company would have needed to refresh the entire platform and infrastructure every four years. The company's aim to become the digital insurer for the Netherlands by 2025 meant that continuing with physical hardware did not align with the company's overall strategy. Achmea's on-premises systems were running on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications, a successful operating system deployment that the team wanted to continue to use. Therefore, they needed a cloud solution and a provider that would work effectively with its existing infrastructure.
About The Customer
Achmea Holding N.V. is a leading insurer based in the Netherlands. The company is on a mission to become an all-digital insurance provider by 2025. Achmea is building a cloud strategy that aims to deliver flexibility, scalability, and speed across the business, with less intensive lifecycle management requirements for its IT team. The company prioritizes innovation and is always aiming for the latest technologies. Achmea's business-critical workloads were hosted on an aging SAP HANA appliance on external on-premises infrastructure. The company's Linux-based infrastructure was powered by SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications.
The Solution
Achmea decided to migrate to Microsoft Azure and sought expertise from SUSE, a member of the Microsoft Partner Network, for help with the migration. Using SAP HANA Certified Virtual Machines on Microsoft Azure, Achmea began its transformation by shifting three vital and data-hungry applications into virtual machine–based Linux Enterprise Server instances: its SAP Business Warehouse on HANA, fraud management, and contact center applications. The process began with a detailed testing and development phase. SUSE and Microsoft helped Achmea test likely failover scenarios, including running extra application servers to determine if the virtual machine–based Linux instances could cope with the volume. The team completed the initial migration in a single weekend, which included a multi-node SAP Business Warehouse on HANA scale-out deployment on Azure virtual machines using standard SAP tools and the team’s proof-of-concept architecture. The company’s SAP applications are deployed using SUSE Pacemaker Clusters and SAP HANA System Replication within Azure Availability Zones, which provide high availability and resilience to datacenter failures, with a recovery point objective of zero and near-zero recovery time.
Operational Impact
Quantitative Benefit
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