JUNE 2020CIOAPPLICATIONS.COM8IN MY Viewet's face it, we all have it and probably don't want to talk about it: legacy technology. It's running our core business, and it is seemingly too unwieldy or too complex to replace. Every organization in existence has legacy technology. American Fidelity Assurance Company (AF) is no different. However, our business leaders chose to deal with it. Just how legacy was our legacy technology? To give you some perspective of our challenge, AF has been writing software since the 1960's, some of which is still running. We had a significant amount of legacy technology, and it became imperative for us to transform to stay competitive in our market. So what did we do? Several years ago, AF undertook the monumental task of eliminating legacy technology from our organization. More than 75 applications were identified as legacy, and the aggressive plan developed to solve the problem was a combination of purchased and in-house developed technologies. To date, 40 systems have been replaced, and the last, and largest, implementation to complete our overall transformation is well underway.Ultimately, two key Oracle solutions were identified as part of our overall legacy modernization program: PeopleSoft and Oracle Insurance Policy Administration (OIPA). These two systems consolidated over half of the systems that needed to be replaced. PeopleSoft replaced all systems related to financial reporting and was implemented in 2014. OIPA will be implemented in five releases with the first scheduled for later this year. Our legacy system replacement will simplify complexity of system architecture, reduce data redundancy and improve availability, and will streamline and/or automate many business processes.With the implementation of PeopleSoft and OIPA, our organization had the following key take-aways. Know what you are looking for. It's unrealistic to believe that any vendor solution can fulfill all organizational A JOURNEY OF LEGACY MODERNIZATIONLDIANA BITTLE, CIO, AMERICAN FIDELITY
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