If a natural catastrophe strikes, it is imperative for reinsurer Swiss Re to act quickly. What is the extent of the damage? To find out, its 12,500 employees at 70 global locations need reliable data to be available at the touch of a button. For this purpose, Swiss Re relies on the Swisscom Cloud. Swisscom delivers infrastructure, a development platform and run-time environment, databases and IT service management from a single source. The service includes: Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), Database as a Service (DBaaS), a comprehensive integration layer, service management and self-service portals. The introduction of private infrastructure and platform services (IaaS and PaaS) is a first step towards the provision of a hybrid cloud offer for Swiss Re.
Swisscom operates the infrastructure on the Private Enterprise Cloud – a highly secure variant of the Swisscom Cloud for the operation of traditional infrastructures. The Enterprise Cloud has an ultra-modern architecture with which services can be made available and invoiced automatically. Infrastructure as a Service permits Swiss Re to flexibly adapt its storage space and processing power to resource requirements. “Our role as an internal IT provider is changing. We are increasingly acting as a service broker and integrator for business and want to provide services that have optimum cost efficiency,” explains Manfred Kaufmann, Head of IT Shared Production Services at Swiss Re.
For this reason, IT at Swiss Re will be getting a high-performance, high-availability and cost-efficient IT infrastructure from Swisscom. The reinsurance group will also continue to be agile and flexible in response to rapid technological developments.
Swiss Re will be developing new solutions in the Swisscom Application Cloud. Swisscom uses modern software design methods, such as the functional breakdown of software into loosely coupled, cloud-native microservices that can all be scaled horizontally and adjusted easily. Swisscom also uses Cloud Foundry, the industry standard for cloud-native open-source platforms.
In addition to enhanced business agility and technological accuracy, data storage in Switzerland for its critical applications was also a key factor for the reinsurer. The cloud is operated in Swisscom’s ultra-modern data centres. The project phase runs to the end of 2016 and will gradually transition into operation. In addition to Switzerland, Swisscom will be offering its cloud services from global locations as well in future – initially from Hong Kong and the US. According to Marcel Walker, Head of Cloud & Datacenter Services at Swisscom: “Both sides benefit from the technological exchange and are on the cutting edge of developments as a result. We are supporting Swiss Re’s IT Shared Production Services in the transformation to service broker and integrator.” With the provision of IaaS and PaaS from the Swisscom Cloud and the continuous expansion of cloud services in future, IT Shared Production Services is making a key contribution to the digital transformation of Swiss Re.
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