Meezan Bank Ltd., the largest Islamic bank in Pakistan, is using Oracle Exadata Database Machine to cut the close of business time by 30 percent. Meezan Bank was also able to reduce their data center footprint by running their core banking database on Oracle’s flagship engineered system.
The bank was using third-party software for its core banking application and in order to keep up with its fast-paced growth it needed to upgrade its hosting platform. Meezan Bank wanted to enhance the reliability and performance of its technology platform, which had increased its operating expenses due to rising licensing cost and the price to performance ratio on the previous hardware was significantly higher.
The organization opted for Oracle Exadata Database Machine, a purpose built, highly optimized integrated platform for running the Oracle Database. Exadata features database-aware intelligent storage and workload-optimized algorithms that run Oracle Database faster, more reliably and with greater security than other platforms. As a result, the operating costs and total cost of ownership of Exadata is significantly lower than alternatives.
By successfully deploying its core banking database on Oracle Exadata, the bank has been able to significantly lower its software licensing requirements and shrunk its close of business time by 30 percent while using 30 percent fewer cores. Moreover, the bank has lowered its administrative efforts by reducing the data center footprint and managing the hardware and software end-to-end using a single Oracle Enterprise Manager console.
“We needed a highly available and high performance platform to host our core banking application supporting our rapid business growth and branch network expansion while keeping administrative tasks and operating expenses to a bare minimum,” said Faizur Rehman, CIO, Meezan Bank Ltd. “Oracle Exadata Database Machine is the platform that has provided us with the required scalability at a reduced total cost of ownership with return on investment expected in just three years.”
“Banks in Pakistan are increasingly adopting Oracle Exadata Database Machine to run their core banking applications and experiencing significant performance enhancements,” said Waqas Hashmi, country sales director – technology business, Oracle Pakistan and Afghanistan “Meezan Bank reaping benefits from the engineered system is yet another testament to the value that Oracle Exadata Database Machine delivers to organizations and helps them stay ahead of competition.”
The account was won by Oracle in April 2015 and went live in February 2016. The implementation was jointly managed by OraTech, a Platinum-level member of the Oracle PartnerNetwork, and Oracle Advanced Customer Support, who were actively involved in every phase of the project. Both organizations paid close attention to details during the planning which enabled the smooth and seamless migration to Oracle Exadata. The bank did not encounter a single hiccup during production cut-over and all its services were functional 24/7.
