Categories
Digital Transformation Platform Migration & Modernization

What’s the Difference Between an Implementation Partner & a Digital Transformation Partner?

Implementing new technology in your business can be a daunting task, but it’s essential for staying competitive in today’s digital landscape. However, simply implementing new technology is not enough to ensure success.

Think of implementing new technology without a strategic business plan like building a house without a blueprint. Sure, it looks nice and shiny on the surface, but it won’t function well in the long run.

That is why a strategic business plan that leverages your technology is essential to achieving your business objectives and maximizing your return on investment (ROI).

What does an implementation partner do?

When it comes to implementing new technology, the focus is typically on the technical aspects, such as installing and configuring so that your IT department can work through the basics or customize it accordingly. This is important since a successful implementation ensures that the technology is working as it should.

However, it’s not enough to stop there. Every business wants to get the most out of its money, especially if they are investing heavily in technology. This is why many businesses are asking, “What is a technology strategy?” 

What is a technology strategy?

A technology strategy is a comprehensive plan, often referred to as a technology roadmap, that defines:

  • The technology direction of the organization
  • The resources that will be required when configuring current or installing new software
  • Overall business actions that need to be taken to achieve the desired outcome.

It helps you to understand how the technology can be used to achieve specific business objectives, and identify areas where it can be applied to drive innovation and improve efficiency. 

Without a strategic plan, you may miss out on valuable opportunities to improve your business and impact your ability to stay competitive in the marketplace.

What is a digital transformation partner?

Digital transformation is a big buzzword. Companies want to be cutting-edge, they want to stay competitive, and they want to see a return on their investments. A digital transformation partner can help you with identifying and developing a strategy to fully leverage the technology to achieve your business objectives and maximize your ROI. 

They partner with you to help you understand the impact of digital technology on your overall business operations and create a comprehensive plan for how your technology can align with your business objectives. Digital transformation companies believe that software implementation is just a tiny part of the process, and that alone isn’t enough to be profitable in the long term.

Should I use an implementation partner or a digital transformation partner?

It depends. Implementing new technology is important for staying competitive in today’s digital landscape, but it’s not enough to ensure success. 

Depending on your unique business requirements, or if you have a technology roadmap already in place, an implementation partner may be the best option. However, if you don’t have a strategic digital roadmap in place, and you are looking to maximize your ROI for the long term, having a digital transformation partner may be the best solution. 

Don’t know which path to take? Download our checklist to find out if your business needs an implementation partner or a strategic digital transformation partner.

Categories
Green Irony News

Green Irony Revive: A New Offering to Help MuleSoft Customers Experiencing Failed Deployments & Flawed Integration Architectures

Green Irony has launched Revive – an offering tailored to help MuleSoft customers whose business objectives have been derailed by failed deployments and flawed integration architectures. This launch is a response to significant market feedback.

“Unfortunately, we’re seeing a large install base of MuleSoft customers where low-cost partners did not set them up for success. This is highly disappointing to us since we’ve always seen MuleSoft as a strategic platform that lets customers invest in solving digital transformation’s top technology problem: scalable systems integration. The approach of throwing under-skilled labor at a platform like MuleSoft without a foundation is counter-productive, and many customers have paid the price and missed high-level business goals because of it.”

– Aaron Shook, Founder & CEO of Green Irony 

Aligning with MuleSoft CONNECT 2022’s themes of innovation and driving business outcomes, Revive’s purpose is to rescue customers struggling to thrive and realize the full potential of their MuleSoft investment. The Revive program leverages state-of-the-art artificial intelligence to quickly identify all APIs within an enterprise’s IT environment and diagnose issues to quickly get customers back on track. 

Through the Revive offering, Green Irony’s team evaluates the customer’s existing architecture, utilization of MuleSoft capabilities, development best practices, and upcoming roadmap to maximize the use of Anypoint Platform with architectural patterns that meet business objectives. 

“Anypoint Platform is not a magic wand. Its true power lies in giving companies the ability to design APIs more strategically to align with business goals. By using artificial intelligence, Revive lets us quickly diagnose what went wrong and make recommendations for how we can get back on track. We’re very excited to help this underserved segment of the MuleSoft customer base realize their original visions of scalable, API-led integration fueling greater business agility.”

– Aaron Shook

Revive deliverables include a distillation of Green Irony’s findings through a platform assessment and an in-depth implementation plan that includes budget, resourcing, and timelines required to meet business objectives.

To learn more about Green Irony’s expertise, Revive, and other service offerings, visit greenirony.com.

Categories
Digital Transformation Platform Migration & Modernization

How MuleSoft Creates a Composable Enterprise as an Extension of Your Core Business Applications

Staying neck-deep in integrations is not sustainable. A recent MuleSoft Connectivity Benchmark Report found that 98% of businesses are currently using APIs, yet 88% said that integration challenges are hindering their digital transformation efforts

With different approaches to tackling the challenges of modern-day integration scenarios, we’ve updated our popular whitepaper, The Value of MuleSoft Anypoint Platform, and added a new comparison case study: Adapt vs. Adopt: How MuleSoft Creates a Composable Enterprise as an Extension of Your Core Business Applications.

Adapt vs. Adopt: The Value MuleSoft Anypoint Platform whitepaper provides a perspective on build vs. buy from a lifetime of engineering experience into integration and middleware challenges that enterprises face today. The new case study provides even more depth into the value of investing in MuleSoft Anypoint Platform showcasing data that breaks down the total cost of ownership and impact on project velocity of adopting MuleSoft Anypoint Platform vs. adapting an existing API infrastructure.

Adapt vs. Adopt: A Comparison Case Study

It compares the journey of how two businesses, with identical requirements, addressed their integration challenges and the impact on corresponding feature rollouts. 

The comparison of the two approaches reveals how using MuleSoft resulted in:

  • 54% cost savings in the initial stages of API platform initiatives 
  • 32% cost savings for developing and deploying new APIs

Adapt vs. Adopt Whitepaper: Full Content Breakdown

  • Introduction
    • Why You Should Care About Integration
    • Green Irony Engineering & the Evolution of Integration
  • The Technical Landscape
    • The Dollars & Cents of Integration
    • Current Techniques & Challenges
    • Microservices, APIs & the Application Network
    • Project vs. Product & the Full Software Development Lifecycle
  • Bring Your Own Mule: Why Can’t I Just Build It Myself?
    • Reinventing the Mule
    • Advantages of Buying the Mule
    • Agility & Ability to Address Business Needs
    • The MuleSoft Approach
  • Staff & Expertise Needed to Execute
    • Skills Acquisition
    • Separation of Duties 
  • Total Cost of Ownership
  • An Adapt vs. Adopt Case Study: How MuleSoft Creates a Composable Enterprise as an Extension of Your Core Business Applications

Download this whitepaper to learn the benefits of leveraging MuleSoft AnyPoint Platform to manage the entire API lifecycle and extend your API infrastructure across your enterprise.

Categories
Platform Migration & Modernization

Solving the Most Critical Data Problem for Insurance Carriers

In our webinar, How to Improve Insurance Risk Calculations with Data Integration, our CEO & Founder, Aaron Shook, and Director of Strategic Services, Ron Reed, review the data interactions required to estimate risk, the pitfalls of a standard approach to calculating policy risk, and the strategic solution to keep your business profitable and competitive within the marketplace.

As carriers continue to pursue their digital transformation, addressing this problem is foundational to the success of those critical investments. Here’s a high-level overview of the scenario and the importance to long-term profitability. 

The Legacy Approach to Accessing Third-Party Data is No Longer Viable

For most carriers, the policy management system is the center of their universe where all third-party data is plugged directly in via point-to-point integrations. However, this legacy integration approach for connecting data from vendors like CoreLogic, TigerRisk, and more directly into your policy management system is not scalable. 

According to Aite-Novarica, more than 75 data providers serve insurers and that list continues to grow. Yes, you heard that right— 75. 

What are some hidden business costs of the standard approach?

      • Drastically increased project timelines and risk to enhance, modify, and/or swap third-party data services
      • Larger underwriting labor cost
      • Decreased agent satisfaction
      • Increased outage times
      • Higher total cost of ownership

Why make it more challenging and take longer to swap third-party data providers? Without the ability to quickly and seamlessly access the best data to power your risk calculation, the profitability of each policy is at risk. 

How to Maximize Profitability: API-Led Integration Strategy

Operational support and flexibility are the core to any successful IT organization. So what’s the solution to help your insurance business maximize profitability and competitiveness in the marketplace? An API-led integration strategy.

By leveraging an API-led strategy:

      • Underwriting can have a more trusted relationship with IT to enable new risk model capabilities with integrations that are faster and less risk to your business
      • You control the access to third-party and internal data
      • You have the ability to scale and consolidate your risk capabilities as you add new products and offerings- enabling the utmost flexibility in all areas of your business

Solving the Most Critical Data Problem for Insurance Carriers

Your third-party data and its application must not be locked into your policy management system. Risk assessment requires data and the ability to take control of that data as new providers become available and customers demand more personalized experiences. Our on-demand webinar, How to Improve Insurance Risk Calculations with Data Integration, dives into the challenges of this scenario , and how an API-led data integration strategy can help. If you have questions or want to discuss your integration challenges, contact us today.