Atlantic Blue Cross Care: Scalable Solutions with Sun

Atlantic Blue Cross Care, a leading health insurance provider in Atlantic Canada, worked with Sun to successfully integrate its disparate information technologies, streamline offerings, and deliver Web-enabled services. Using J2EE technologies, Sun developed a platform that created improved interaction between Blue Cross's clients and employees and paved the way future growth.

Overview

Atlantic Blue Cross Care is a leading health insurance provider in Atlantic Canada. With roots dating back to 1943, Atlantic Blue Cross Care provides health, dental, travel, life, and disability benefits to nearly one million group and individual subscribers across Atlantic Canada, as well as group clients in Ontario and Quebec. The company also provides hosting services to clients such as the Nova Scotia Department of Health and Veterans Affairs Canada.

To efficiently support its growth, the company needed to integrate its disparate information technologies, streamline offerings, and deliver Web-enabled services. After researching various options, Atlantic Blue Cross Care decided to integrate its systems into a multi-tiered model using Java2 Platform, Enterprise Edition (J2EE platform) technologies. Additionally, a new tier of Internet services would be developed. By employing the J2EE technology framework and adding a robust corporate Internet presence, the company could leverage new and existing systems to help consolidate offerings, increase customer interaction, streamline development cycles, and cut costs.

Web-enabled vision helps maintain a competitive edge

Before embarking on its new information technology initiatives, Atlantic Blue Cross Care operations were driven by approximately 100 heterogeneous servers that spanned several locations. The computing architectures included both mainframe and client/server designs. Employees and customers accessed the systems via a client/server interface or a TN3270 connection. There was no avenue for unified system access or administration.

Atlantic Blue Cross Care decided to integrate its systems and services into a Web-enabled model. By doing so, the company could dramatically change how it interacted with customers and employees. For instance, subscribers could use a Web browser to inquire about benefits or claims. Service providers would be able to submit claims electronically. Insurance agents and brokers might access drug summary screens, rate information, and other bulletins. After researching various options, Atlantic Blue Cross Care decided to leverage existing systems by integrating them into a multi-tiered, Web-enabled architecture using J2EE technologies. "The Java platform is Web-based, so it is the ideal technology to support our Internet vision," says Don McPhee, director of technical services, Atlantic Blue Cross Care. "The platform employs industry standards, supports scalability, and integrates well with third-party solutions."

Two existing Sun Fire 280R servers and one Sun Enterprise 220R server would drive a unified system interface in the architecture's top tier. An existing cluster of two Sun Enterprise 4000 servers, a Sun Enterprise 3000 server, a Sun Enterprise 450 server, and numerous third-party systems would host over 200 GB of information in the architecture's bottom tier.

Fifteen Sun Fire 280R servers and three Sun Fire V880 servers—running IBM Web Sphere, Lotus Domino, and Oracle9iAS applications—were purchased to support new Internet services in the architecture's middle tier. For instance, custom Java technology enabled services would include portals, HTTP services, proxy services, LDAP services, and security services including single sign-on.

"Because of its space in Web technologies, the Sun server platform was the obvious choice for our Internet solution," explains McPhee. "Sun offers a lot of great support services and marketing initiatives. The independent vendor support on Sun technologies is also excellent."

Integrated system and services support new opportunities

Atlantic Blue Cross Care engaged a third-party Sun service provider to train employees on the Solaris Operating System and Sun hardware configurations. "The transition to using Sun technologies was fairly smooth," says McPhee. "But we invested in training to make sure our staff was brought up to speed quickly to support both our strategic and mission critical system objectives. We are now looking at more classes, especially as new software comes out and employees are hired. Several of our people are also interested in pursuing Sun certification, and we hope to have a few employees certified by next year."

As development efforts continued, Atlantic Blue Cross Care realized it made sense to join the Sun Service Provider Elite program. "We were first interested in the program from the discount perspective," explains McPhee. "We get excellent pricing as a Sun Service Provider. However, there are many other benefits. We can earn credits for Sun training. There's access to best practice and technical information not available to the general customer. The marketing arm of the program offers many initiatives, including the sale of our services by Sun."

With its Internet vision soon to be realized, the company is well positioned to address new goals. "We are looking at server consolidation in conjunction with our Internet strategy so we can support our business requirements using a very cost-effective, robust infrastructure," notes McPhee. "We are evaluating mid-range Sun Fire servers, Sun Dynamic System Domain technologies, and Sun consolidation services to help support our strategy. Other goals include an online document management solution, a new disaster recovery plan, enhanced load balancing between the Moncton and Dartmouth locations, and additional business system databases that will run on systems such as a recently purchased Sun Fire V480 server."

McPhee continues, "We are extremely pleased with the support we have received from Sun, the availability of applications that can run on the Solaris Operating Environment, and Sun's presence in the UNIX platform marketplace. We have fairly aggressive growth plans over the next couple of years. The fact that we can offer Web-enabled services positions us very well for expansion. As our Internet presence grows, we can make it easier for clients to interact with us, while we streamline operations, enrich our service offerings, and cut costs at the same time."