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Sustainable mainframes for critical financial market infrastructure

An insight into the SIX and Atos collaboration
 


At a glance

Atos supports the SIX Group with secure and reliable mainframe service management, ensuring long-term operational continuity of a mission-critical financial information system despite talent shortages.
 


Outcomes

  • Business continuity for a mission critical mainframe application
  • Mitigated operational and talent risk in a highly competitive Swiss market
  • High availability and reliability of critical financial infrastructure
  • Sustainable skills modelled with Atos’ Mainframe Academy
 

By partnering with Atos, SIX ensured continuity and reliability for a highly critical mainframe service, while addressing the long-term skills challenge in a resilient and sustainable way

Markus Thomann
Head IT Infrastructure & Operations, SIX Group Services AG

Client Challenge

Assessing risks: Securing mission critical financial infrastructure

SIX operates the infrastructure for Swiss and Spanish financial centers, catering to a broad international client base. It provides its customers with historical stock price information through a unique in house application, running on IBM z/OS mainframe technology. This system is a critical component of SIX’s financial information services.
In 2022, it faced a shortage of qualified talent in the Swiss market, accentuated by the retirement of many experienced mainframe engineers. This posed a potential risk to the long term maintenance and reliability of its essential infrastructure. To proactively mitigate this risk, SIX sought a trusted partner to take over service management and ensure continuity.

 

Solution

A structured transition and sustainable service model

SIX appointed Atos to manage the mainframe service, and deployed a team of their own experienced mainframe experts to assist Atos’ team of skilled engineers across Switzerland, Germany and Poland.
A structured transition, based on robust governance and the Atos Program Management Methodology (APPM), ensured seamless knowledge transfer and continuity of operations. One of the key differentiators in this was Atos’ Mainframe Academy, developed in collaboration with local universities. The Academy provides a continuous pipeline of skilled mainframe specialists for the future.

 

Business Benefits

Reduced risk and long-term operational stability

Leveraging its local and nearshore expertise, Atos ensured reliability, availability and stability of SIX’s critical infrastructure. The partnership goes beyond a traditional service-provider relationship, driven by strong interpersonal collaboration and shared objectives.
By eliminating the need for an in house mainframe talent pool in a highly competitive market, Atos enables SIX to focus on its core role as a leading financial market infrastructure provider.

Why Atos

Atos combines deep mainframe expertise, proven governance models and a sustainable skills strategy. Through its Mainframe Academy and blended local/nearshore delivery model, Atos helps financial institutions like SIX mitigate operational risk while ensuring long term reliability of mission critical systems.

>> Learn more about how Atos is reinventing the mainframe to be agile, cloud connected and future-ready: https://atos.net/en/services/cloud-and-modern-infrastructure/modern-mainframe