Baloise Bank’s Avaloq migration to Oracle Exadata Cloud@Customer
Baloise Bank, part of the Helvetia Baloise Group since the merger of Helvetia and Baloise, migrated its Avaloq core banking system to Oracle Exadata Cloud@Customer with dbi services. The goal: lower operating costs, reduce technological risk and adopt public-cloud-like operating models inside a private cloud.
Challenges faced by Baloise Bank
The existing platform had reached the end of its technological lifecycle. Continuing to operate it would have required significant investments and exposed the bank to growing operational and technical risks. The situation was made more demanding by Avaloq’s tight integration with Oracle technology: significant portions of the business logic are implemented in Oracle PL/SQL, so a straightforward switch to an alternative platform was not feasible. The bank needed a future-proof solution that addressed both the technological requirements and the dependencies of the Avaloq core banking system.
Beyond the technology, Baloise Bank also had to rethink its business processes and operational workflows. The objective was to make optimal use of the native features of Oracle Multitenant and Oracle Exadata while meeting the high demands for cloning, deploying and managing databases in a complex Avaloq environment. This called for technical adjustments as well as a revision of established processes to sustainably improve efficiency, automation and operational reliability.
Solutions
The group decided to implement Oracle Exadata Cloud@Customer as an on-premises cloud solution within its private cloud. This gave the bank access to Exadata Database Services and cloud-based operating models while leveraging the group’s existing architecture and infrastructure. The approach also met the bank’s stringent requirements regarding data residency, compliance and information security.
To minimize risk, a proof of concept lasting several months was conducted in a dedicated test environment before the production migration. All relevant application and operational scenarios were thoroughly tested, open issues were identified and documented, and specific measures for subsequent production operation were defined.
For the migration itself, dbi services used the Oracle Zero Downtime Migration (ZDM) tool. ZDM enabled a largely automated and controlled transfer of the databases to the target platform. Comprehensive validation mechanisms, standardized migration processes and a controlled switchover kept operational disruption to a minimum and ensured a high level of security.
Results
The migration process was custom-tailored with Oracle ZDM to manage the platform change and the database architecture change simultaneously, while the legacy system was decommissioned in a controlled manner and placed into read-only mode. Because Avaloq did not support a cluster architecture at the time the architecture decision was made, a single-instance topology was implemented and the necessary adjustments were made in Avaloq.
Another key outcome is a new cloning concept: the bank can now create the required database clones at various points in time and use them specifically for testing, analysis and error correction.
Added Value
With Exadata Cloud@Customer, Baloise Bank benefits from the advantages of a cloud solution while continuing to store its data in its own data center and private cloud. This is particularly important given strict security, compliance and data residency requirements.
The introduction of the multitenant architecture creates a modern technological foundation and enables simpler, more efficient operational processes. In addition, the cloning concept for end-of-day and post-end-of-day processes has been fundamentally revised.
Migration phase and preparation for the cutover weekend
Following a preparatory phase lasting several weeks that included extensive testing, the long-planned cutover weekend was carried out successfully. After an operation phase of approximately 20 hours, the dbi services teams completed the migration process.
Key milestones achieved during the cutover:
- Migration of the systems to a new data center,
- Transition to the Oracle container database architecture (Oracle Multitenant),
- Adaptation of the application interfaces to the requirements of the new data center and cloud integration,
- Replacement of the previous NetApp “Thin Clone” technology with native Oracle Exadata Sparse Clones.
The project provides a modern, future-proof foundation for the continued operation and ongoing development of the Avaloq platform.
