IBM Sterling and Z® Systems

Over the last five years, the volume of data exchanged between businesses has grown at an annual rate of up to 50%, with no sign of the trend changing.  55% of Internal and external system integration is accomplished through file transfer. Many large enterprises have hundreds or even thousands of file transfer endpoints with hundreds of other businesses.

In high-performance, high-stakes operating environments, file transfers must be conducted in a secure, reliable, and precise way to ensure data delivery to the intended applications that underpin critical business operations. From the transfer of check image files and insurance claim records to credit card transactions and disaster-recovery synchronizations, business operations depend on secure file transfers.

IBM z Systems running z/OS is the most reliable large platform in the world. Many production shops only IPL their system once or twice after installing a new z/OS release or applying maintenance. These LPARs are constantly challenged with software in various states of development. This degree of reliability is the envy of most other platforms, including HP Nonstop.

IBM Sterling products form part of the B2B Data Transfer ecosystem and are leaders in the Data Exchange segment.  z/OS is at the heart of the data transfer ecosystem of the IBM Sterling suite. The suite integrates z/OS with public and private clouds and with object stores. The IBM® Z platform is a solid base of large IT systems due to its reliability and scalability.  z/OS is a critical component in many eco-systems: hosting mission-critical applications and delivering extreme performance in a highly secure manner.

IBM STERLING

The product suite includes Connect:Direct, Control Center, and Sterling Secure Proxy to power data exchange, which is reliable, performant, secure, visible, governed, centralized, and makes the best use of technology.

• Reliability. The products are resilient, enabling data transfers to complete on time, even in the face of imperfect conditions. Especially in the financial services industry, data transfers are subject to Service Level Agreements (SLAs). A penalty for violating an SLA can be six figures in US dollars.
  
• Performance. The products make full and efficient use of the resources provided to them.
  
• Security. Access to the products is controlled by strong authentication and authorization, and the data being transferred is strongly encrypted. They support multiple overlapping security features. Security is essential: the cost of a security breach can be in the millions of US dollars, and it is hard to put a price on the engendered loss of reputation.
  
• Visibility. Full detailed and summary visibility into operations is provided. Operators are alerted when a problem occurs.
  
• Governance. Government, industry, internal and licensing standards can be applied and enforced.
  
• Centralization. Configuration and maintenance applications take place from a centralized location, allowing a small staff to manage the data transfers for a whole enterprise.
  
• Technology. The latest technologies and best practices and applied.

IBM Sterling Connect:Direct was designed specifically for point-to-point transfers of high-value, high-volume and large data files. Connect:Direct, a component of the IBM Sterling Secure File Transfer (SFT) solution, allows organizations to automate the exchange of data between mission-critical applications in a central, modern, and user-friendly application. It provides script-based automation, scheduling, and alert notifications.

CONNECT:DIRECT ON Z/OS

The IBM-Capgemini product partnership enhances IBM’s product portfolio to meet customer expectations and performance objectives. It enables product capabilities into new geographies, platform ecosystems, and deployment models to enable clients’ digital transformation and help them succeed in the cognitive era.

Connect:Direct on z/OS demonstrates the power of the IBM-Capgemini partnership. It provides clients with a range of demanding product capabilities.

• IBM Sterling Connect:Direct for z/OS ensures more reliable movement of files, from batch integration and movement of large images or catalogues to synchronization with remote locations. It provides automated scheduling, checkpoint restart and automatic recovery to help ensure predictable, assured delivery of files.
  
• IBM Sterling Connect:Direct for z/OS ensures High performance by handling your most demanding workloads, from high volumes of small files to multi-gigabyte files.
  
• IBM Sterling Connect:Direct for z/OS ensures security by supporting industry standard encryption technologies. It is highly secure and has no reported breaches across three decades of commercial usage. The solution’s cutting-edge encryption, granular configuration, and extensive logging help enterprises accelerate readiness for security, regulatory, and industry requirements including those necessary for compliance with Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX), FIPS-140-2, Payment Card Industry (PCI) and HIPAA.
  
• IBM Sterling Connect:Direct for z/OS provides full visibility of all operations and files transfers by its extensive statistics feature. It provides alert notifications for 24×7 unattended operations. It also eliminates the need for manual intervention in data delivery, improving employee productivity and increasing confidence that downstream business processes will not be delayed or negatively impacted.
  
• IBM Sterling Connect:Direct for z/OS helps its customer Govern with Confidence. Customers can view and manage all Connect: Direct deployments in near real-time across your distributed environment for continuous audit and improved governance and compliance. It provides end-to-end support for Licence Governance to comply with Regulatory compliance and issues alerts over expiration of Licenses.
  
• IBM Sterling Connect:Direct for z/OS provides centralized management and monitoring of large-scale, distributed IBM Connect:Direct server environments. It enables you to enhance operational productivity and improve the quality of service for IBM Connect:Direct file transfers and activities in your environment from one central location. IBM Sterling Connect:Direct offers multi-platform implementations tailored according to business need. It provides  a feature called CD PLEX environment, where a centrally hosted manager has the capability of managing all other connected IBM Connect:Direct server configurations.
  
• IBM Sterling Connect:Direct for z/OS ensures the uses of the latest and best technologies like supporting the latest industry-standard encryption suits and protocols.