BMC Software: Mainframe Users Gearing Up Now to Capitalize on Economic Recovery

Mainframe computer users have been leveraging the economic slowdown to retool and innovate in advance of the return to growth that will come with economic recovery, according to the results of BMC Software’s (NYSE:BMC) Annual Worldwide Survey of Mainframe Users.

The fact that the mainframe remains popular among enterprises because of its security, management, reliability and compliance capabilities is old news. BMC’s annual mainframe survey has reflected that basic sentiment for the past four years. Even in the current economic climate, almost half of the respondents continue to project increases in their software spending, with the bulk of the remaining respondents projecting flat spending into the next year.

BMC Survey Uncovers Top Priorities in IT

This year’s survey found the top priorities for IT in the next year are application modernization (34 percent), disaster recovery (31 percent) and server virtualization (28 percent); indicators that mainframe users have high hopes for the platform’s role coming out of the downturn. In large sites, 47 percent of respondents indicated MIPS growth reduction as a top priority, followed by 35 percent citing reduction or elimination of unplanned outage events, pointing to a desire to increase cost efficiencies in the environment. Meanwhile, BMC is positioned to help customers prepare themselves now for the growth that is anticipated. With the recent acquisition of managing middleware specialist MQSoftware, BMC added to its application portfolio by offering integrated messaging and monitoring management across mainframe and distributed environments. BMC Backup and Recovery for IMS and BMC Recovery Management for DB2 tools are leading options for protecting mainframe data from disasters. BMC also is a leader in virtualization management, especially for cross-enterprise IT environments.

Canadian telecommunications giant TELUS views the mainframe as a critical part of their IT infrastructure and an important platform to deliver their business services. “We have to run our business effectively, and first and foremost that means running IT efficiently,” said Brad Palmer, director of Western Canada IT services at TELUS. “BMC mainframe solutions allow us to automate our operating and reporting capabilities that support our z/OS and z/Linux systems, which helps us reduce labor costs and better deliver services to our end users. Additionally, we are continually looking for ways to manage our MIPS growth, and BMC is playing a leading role in this effort.”

With this year’s survey, BMC asked specific questions about the effect the economic downturn was having on mainframe users. In addition to finding that users remain committed to the platform and are retooling in preparation for growth, the survey also found that more respondents believe corporate management is more open to the mainframe due to pressures imposed by the poor economy. That’s a key finding because respondents also reported continued pressure on IT organizations to improve productivity and cut costs. For example, large committed users are very focused on MIPS growth reduction. The cost of a general purpose processor and its software could be as high as $7,200 per MIPS, which makes offloading work to a specialty processor that costs only $200 per MIPS the right choice in the current economy.

BMC MAINVIEW products like BMC CMF MONITOR can automatically shift MIPS usage onto zIIP specialty processors, reducing overhead and freeing up additional workload. Additionally, one of the fastest-growing ways to reduce peak MIPS usage is to tune the SQL used for DB2 applications. By using BMC SQL Performance for DB2 software, customers can reduce CPU usage in some DB2 applications by more than 50 percent and delay costly processor upgrades.

Users in Europe, Middle East, Africa and Asia were also positive in their outlook for the future of the mainframe, despite slightly lower expectations for increased mainframe spending in those geographies.

Other key findings of the survey:

Expectations for MIPS growth, while less than what was reported in prior years, remains high with more than 56 percent of respondents expecting to grow and more than 75 percent of large shops expecting to grow
Two-thirds (67 percent) of respondents have completed or are in the process of aligning their mainframe and distributed environments
After a slight decrease last year, concern about staff skills in applications, operations and systems management again increased (4-5 percent)
65 percent of surveyed companies reported that their IT-related energy consumption is under greater scrutiny than the previous year

BMC Answers Survey with New Cost-Cutting Solution

Customers also depend on BMC for the latest in mainframe innovations. With today’s announcement, BMC is announcing BMC Capacity Trending Advisor, a solution that accurately forecasts capacity trends to eliminate costs associated with over-provisioning.

BMC’s Capacity Trending Advisor solution is the only one to provide customers with an interactive and automated workflow process and ensures that mainframe, distributed and virtual resources are leveraged to their optimal potential. This solution will help companies plan for the economic recovery by enabling them to efficiently provision their IT environments, thus freeing up resources which can tie up millions of dollars in capital.

“Hearing directly from our customers and other mainframe users gives us great insight into their thoughts and priorities so we can give them the best tools to run their businesses efficiently,” said Bill Miller, president of Mainframe Service Management at BMC. “These results clearly indicate that the mainframe remains a key tool for users and that it will play a big role for the growth they’re anticipating when the economy turns around. To help our customers, BMC will continue to introduce more cost-cutting solutions like Capacity Trending Advisor as we are committed to lowering our customers’ mainframe costs and delivering on their business services.”

Mainframe Survey Background

More than 1,500 global mainframe users participated in the BMC survey, now in its fourth consecutive year. More than one-half of companies surveyed have revenues in excess of $1 billion.

The survey pool was comprehensive and definitive, that included pre-qualified respondents from across the mainframe industry. Participants provided insight into questions focused on the current and future state of the mainframe. Responses were then analyzed using standard statistical practices. For a link to a summary report of the findings go to BMC Mainframe Survey 2009.

For additional information please visit:

BMC Backup and Recovery for IMS

BMC Recovery Management for DB2

BMC Virtualization Management

BMC Capacity Trending Advisor

BMC SQL Performance for DB2

BMC CMF MONITOR

BMC Middleware Management

You can also follow news and announcements from BMC on Twitter: @bmcsoftware

Business runs on IT. IT runs on BMC Software.

The most demanding IT organizations in the world rely on BMC Software across both distributed and mainframe environments. Recognized as the leader in Business Service Management, BMC’s comprehensive approach and unified platform help IT organizations cut costs, reduce risk and drive business profit. For the four fiscal quarters ended June 30, 2009, BMC revenue was approximately $1.88 billion. Visit www.bmc.com for more information.

BMC, BMC Software, and the BMC Software logo are the exclusive properties of BMC Software Inc., are registered with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, and may be registered or pending registration in other countries. All other BMC trademarks, service marks, and logos may be registered or pending registration in the U.S. or in other countries. All other trademarks or registered trademarks are the property of their respective owners. © Copyright 2009 BMC Software, Inc.

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