LBBW Luxemburg

Sun SPARC Server Solution and the Solaris 10 OS Help Luxembourg Bank Cut IT Costs and Support Growth

LBBW Luxemburg, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Landesbank Baden-Württemberg (LBBW), is one of the largest banks based in Luxemburg. Founded in 1978, the bank employs about 220 people and is acting in the domains of Private Banking, Treasury, Debt and Capital Markets. In 2007, the bank’s balance sheet total amounted to €14,756 million.

Customer Challenges

Migrate to a new banking application
Increase computing power and performance
Reduce expenditure on IT
Move to a single IT solution provider
Create a flexible infrastructure for future growth

Solution

Sun Professional Services helped LBBW Luxemburg design a high-performance infrastructure based on Sun SPARC Enterprise servers and the Solaris 10 Operating System. By choosing Sun, the bank has reduced IT costs and implemented a flexible environment for a new application that brings products to market faster.

Business Results

Implemented new Avaloq system successfully
Decreased server footprint by 60%
Reduced cooling costs
Gained a single supplier for all its IT needs
Deployed scalable infrastructure for cost-effective growth

Products and Services

Story Details

LBBW Luxemburg, a subsidiary of the Landesbank Baden-Württemberg (LBBW) bank headquartered in Stuttgart, Germany, sought a formula for reducing costs and supporting growth. The bank prepared a short list of ingredients that included migrating to a new banking application called Avaloq— which had been helping a number of other banks drive growth—and moving to a single IT supplier with cost-effective solutions to lower expenditure.

Historically, the company maintained relationships with multiple IT solution providers. The major ones were with Fujitsu/Siemens, whose PRIMEPOWER servers supported the main banking environment and an Oracle database, and Sun, whose Solaris 8 Operating System delivered all applications. The company also had a relationship with Symantec, which provided VERITAS Storage Foundation Standard software.

" We recognized that by standardizing on Sun technology the bank could deliver its key objectives of reducing costs and supporting continued growth. "

— Jean-Luc Raskin, Head of the IT Infrastructure Unit, LBBW Luxemburg

After assessing the IT solutions of Fujitsu/Siemens and Sun, the bank decided to standardize the Avaloq server platform on Sun hardware and software. Jean-Luc Raskin, head of the IT Infrastructure unit at LBBW Luxemburg, says, “We took into consideration local service and consultancy support as well as hardware flexibility, and we decided that the best solution was to transfer everything to Sun.”

Sun Professional Services designed a scalable infrastructure based on four Sun SPARC Enterprise M5000 servers featuring eight dual-core SPARC64 VI processors and running the Solaris 10 OS and Solaris Cluster 3.2 software. The servers support both production and development environments for Avaloq. They also deliver the production and test areas for the Oracle database and a general IT testing environment. The design also featured Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 servers with Solaris Cluster acting as a data transfer component. The Sun StorageTek 6140 array also enhanced LBBW’s existing backup infrastructure by extending the staging unit.

After a successful review of the local technology vendors, LBBW Luxemburg launched a full implementation program in line with Sun's plans. By deploying the Solaris 10 OS, the company could take advantage of the software's built-in virtualization features, eliminating the need for proprietary software licenses and thereby saving money. Says Raskin, “Because Solaris 10 includes excellent storage management with Solaris ZFS, with built-in functionality, we no longer have to buy Veritas licenses.” Today, the company is using Logical Domains (LDoms) with Solaris Cluster for partitioning servers, so it can deploy multiple instances of the Solaris 10 Operating System on a single Sun machine.

Today, the SPARC Enterprise M5000 servers are delivering 60% greater performance than the previous server solution and supplying the computing power necessary for a cutting-edge banking environment. Raskin comments, “Compared with our previous banking application, Avaloq is a lot more demanding. For example, the new application uses 35 databases, whereas the previous application used just 10. By implementing M5000 servers, we gain mainframe-class computing and an incredibly scalable architecture.”

The Sun hardware and software solutions are also helping cut IT expenses. For instance, the new Sun architecture has consolidated the banking environment from three server racks to one, saving space and reducing cooling costs. “Sun has helped LBBW Luxemburg meet its IT objectives. In the 18 months the company and Sun have worked together on this project, a climate of trust has been established, and we feel this is a real partnership,” says Raskin.

LBBW Luxemburg is protecting its IT investment and ensuring continued high performance with SunSpectrum Gold Support. As part of the service, the bank’s IT team receive online and telephony support 24x7 and emergency on-site assistance. The new Sun architecture has established a cost-effective model for enterprise-level computing that LBBW Luxemburg can rely on in the future as the bank grows. “We have built a very flexible architecture that will be able to meet our IT needs for years to come,” concludes Raskin.