Tata Consultancy Services, the country’s largest exporter of services, said it has successfully implemented a cloud transformation of Malaysia Airlines, making it the world’s first full-service airline to migrate fully to the cloud.
Cloud transformation refers to the replacement of packaged software — which is installed at users’ computers — by a single copy or instance at a centralized location. This software is then accessed by the company’s employees from their various offices using the Internet or other networks.
The move simplifies the IT architecture, while saving a huge amount in terms of operating and maintenance costs.
TCS said it helped Malaysia Airlines move its entire range of nearly 200 applications running mission critical Commercial, operations and corporate Systems to the Microsoft’s cloud platform Azure.
Malaysia Airlines has seen a 50% drop in costs and an 80% improvement in productivity for core applications, it said.
Application delivery times accelerated from days to hours in some cases and the move ensured enhanced security and compliance capability and reporting, it said.
20% of the workload has been kept on a ‘private cloud’ and 80% on ‘public cloud’, which are shared by multiple companies in addition to Malaysia Airlines.
“We set out with an ambitious goal to digitally transform core IT operations to an as-a-service model, to achieve a quantum leap in cost savings, scalability, efficiencies, agility, and other key factors,” said Tan Kok Meng, Chief Information Officer at Malaysia Airlines.
“TCS has been an integral component of our success in our shift to cloud, serving as trusted partner throughout the journey. I am proud to say that together, Malaysia Airlines and TCS have created a solution that helps position Malaysia Airlines as a leader in digital capabilities that ultimately deliver a better customer experience.”
“The cloud transformation project is the latest evolution in the relationship between Malaysia Airlines and TCS, a relationship that has consistently grown since the first 5-year agreement was signed for IT Infrastructure services in 2010,” TCS said.
Despite obvious benefits for customers due to improved efficiency and lower costs, cloud migrations also mean less revenue in the longer term for outsourcing companies like TCS, which would otherwise have got customization, maintenance and deployment contracts for packaged software.
However, companies like TCS expect that as the cost of software becomes less, it will make it affordable to a larger set of customers, thus expanding the market. As a result, even as a the money paid by an individual client becomes smaller, the number of clients itself would become much bigger and compensate for the change.