Why Hire IBM iSeries Consultants for Enabling AS400 Integrations

For many modern enterprises, IBM iSeries acts as the core business system. It can’t be denied that iSeries is one of the most robust enterprise platforms around today but the scope for synchronization and data integrations is highly challenging. In other words, integrating iSeries systems with other enterprise solutions and data sources remains a constant challenge for business users. Indeed, enabling smooth integration with external sources is the key to achieving digitization that enterprises seek to stay competitive.

Another challenge is that many organizations using iSeries are short of RPG experts and enabling traditional point-to-point integrations using in-house specialists impacts the performance and productivity of enterprise apps. Hence, it is ideal that enterprises can team up with an offshore IBM iSeries consulting company. This way, enterprises can get access to seasoned AS400 integration specialists, who can effectively implement AS400 integrations. An expert with expertise in third-party integration can accomplish the task in a cost-effective manner.

Why Hire iSeries Consultants

In general, iSeries consultants can effectively create a reliable blueprint for AS400 systems integration by analyzing existing data dependencies, IT state, third-party applications, and business objectives.

Unlike in-house IT experts, iSeries consultants do not follow traditional point-to-point legacy system methods to enable integrations. Since the P2P integration approach requires experts to code in multiple languages while integrating multiple applications. Besides, this method is usually time-intensive and results in data siloes.

Some of the time-efficient approaches for enabling AS400 integrations by iSeries consultants include:

• Creating Custom Integrations - Many enterprises prefer to run mission-critical apps on the AS400 ecosystem. Undeniably, there is a constant need to scale enterprise apps at regular intervals. Hence, consultants help businesses to build custom integrations from the scratch based on specific needs. One of the crucial benefits of custom development of AS400 integrations is the long-term cost efficiencies they offer. With minimal coding changes, enterprises can maintain the integration easily.
• Pre-Built Connectors – By leveraging IBM iSeries integration platforms, AS400 consultants can enable integrations quickly using pre-built application connectors. Such connectors usually accelerate app processing speed and enable services and data from AS400 Systems to be presented via a reusable API.
• Implementing APIs - This is the most effective way of integration since it provides tangible advantages including lesser costs and a greater user experience than other approaches. APIs (Application programming interfaces) implementation enables experts to upgrade AS400 Systems without massive capital expenditure. Besides, enterprises can ensure safe data exchange from their iSeries database to critical applications without modifying the source code itself.

Common Business Applications Integrations With AS400 System

By hiring AS400 integration experts from a recognized consulting company, enterprises can future-proof the iSeries ecosystem and ease their digitization journey. With deep expertise in creating and organizing integration flows, experts can connect any type of on-premises and Cloud-based applications, databases, and processes.

1. iSeries Database Integration

Integrated data is especially beneficial for enterprises that run legacy AS400 Systems. When an enterprise’s database is integrated with AS400 systems, organizations can elevate their app performance. Besides, collecting app data and converting it into a usable format take considerably less time and allows for incredible insights, real-time intelligence, and agility. Other benefits of iSeries Database integration include:

• Data Consolidation: - By centralizing the database, addressing data movement and transformation needs become easier for AS400-running enterprises, for instance, when upgrading legacy applications or transitioning to new environments.
• Enhance Analytics – Business users can access, queue, or extract data from the Operational System (AS/400) and then alter and deliver it to end-users in the form of reliable analytics.
• Coordinate Data Services - Launch all runtime data integration functionality as data services to ensure accuracy and speed.

2. iSeries CRM Integration

Today, enterprises want to provide a true omnichannel experience (mobile, social, communities), including self-service to their end-users. Therefore, it is crucial for enterprises to integrate legacy IBM i Systems with their active CRM systems.  Integrating with a robust CRM platform like Salesforce or Microsoft Dynamic 365 can provide an ecosystem of solutions and functionalities that allow enterprises to analyze what their end users expect from them.

Moreover, a legacy system like AS400 possesses outdated security protocols. Hence, it becomes much riskier for enterprises to store critical app data and too expensive to secure and maintain. On the other hand, by integrating AS400 System with a CRM system like Dynamics 365, enterprises can get access to Microsoft’s Common Data Model. This allows enterprises to connect all AS400 application data and processes together and eliminates data silos. Integration experts from the right AS400 consulting company can effectively connect AS400 Systems with standard CRM platforms including Salesforce, Dynamics 365, SAP, and others.

3. iSeries BI Integration

Importing data from AS400 Systems into any BI tool is not an easy task. By considering the AS400 server and module, certain packages and security patches must be installed. To overcome this time-intensive task, AS400 integration experts use pre-built connectors for BI tools like Power BI, Pentaho, and Cognos from the IBM integration platform. By incorporating pre-built connectors, enterprises can have real-time updates that combine data of all types into a solely unified source of truth. This allows app administrators or business users to make informed decisions based on the detail they receive from the data, thereby facilitating data-driven decision-making culture.

Summing Up

Certainly, organizations looking to scale their AS400 ecosystem should enable integrations. Hiring integration experts from an offshore company is an effective way for organizations to improve AS400 infrastructure and meet their market expectations. Through meticulous planning of the integration approach, experts can ensure smooth synchronization across different platforms with minimal interruptions.