Introduction
Organizations throughout the world continue to use the mainframe to serve customers and conduct business. Included in this group are Fortune 500 companies spanning the financial, insurance, and retail industries, as well as government entities challenged with serving their constituents. And while most people don't realize how much the mainframe touches their lives, statistics show its reach is wide ranging. Speaking in a Forbes article, Pat Toole, a one-time General Manager of System z (now “IBM Z”), said “Today more than 70 percent of enterprise data resides on a mainframe and 71 percent of all Fortune 500 companies have their core businesses located on a mainframe.” He also noted that “92 of the top 100 banks use the mainframe to provide at-your-fingertip banking services to their customers.” In addition, according to SHARE past president Janet Sun, “Nine out of the top 10 global life and health insurance providers process their high-volume transactions on a System z mainframe.”
Just as the mainframe continues to play a significant role in how businesses and government agencies manage transactions, so do the key components of the mainframe like CICS®. According to IBM, “There are 1.1 [million] CICS transactions every second, every day. Compare this to only 59,421 Google searches every second, globally.” That's every second.
Due to its importance, Enterprise Tech Journal often reviews the state of CICS usage by conducting a survey aimed at IT professionals. The survey explores the usage, challenges, and the future of CICS based on the experience of people working in this area. Provided in three parts, this H&W report presents the 2015 survey results and discusses the significance of the data in relation to today's CICS environment.
This first part of the report looks at results related to the importance of CICS and its current usage. The report also explores trends compared to previous years and examines whether past predictions regarding the direction of CICS came true.
The CICS outlook today
The 2015 survey included questions related to how CICS functions, its importance, and its role in serving the business.
Assessing the importance of CICS
The survey aimed to explore the relationship between CICS and respondents' business-critical applications. The majority of respondents (62 percent) said that more than half of their businesscritical applications are used online through CICS. Overall, the largest percentage of respondents said that 51 to 75 percent of their business-critical applications are used online through CICS.
However, there were some differences by Industry. While a third of Financial Services & Banking respondents said 51 to 75 percent of their business-critical applications are used online through CICS, an even greater percentage (38 percent) of respondents chose 75 to 100 percent.
The largest percentage of Government respondents (32 percent) also said 75 to 100 percent of their business-critical applications are used online through CICS. And in Insurance, 70 percent run more than half of their business-critical applications online through CICS, which is higher than the overall average.
Online CICS usage has actually gone up slightly over the past three years. In the 2012 study, 54 percent said they used more than half of their business-critical applications online through CICS, compared to this year's 62 percent.
How current do organizations stay?
The majority of respondents were running one of the latest releases of CICS. A full 60 percent were using CICS 5.1 or 4.2, while another 13 percent were using the most recent release, which was 5.2. (CICS 5.2 had been available only for four to five months at the time the survey was conducted.) A decent number — 18 percent — were still using CICS 3.x, and another 3 percent were using an even earlier version.
When considering industry, respondents from Insurance and Financial Services & Banking most frequently said they were running 5.1, while Government respondents were most likely to say 4.2.
Most shops — 53 percent — are upgrading their version of CICS between 6 and 18 months after the new release becomes available. Another significant percentage — 31 percent — don't upgrade for 18 months or longer after a new release. Just 5 percent stated that they run the latest version minus 1, regardless of timeframe.
The availability picture
Regarding response time, an overwhelming majority — 95 percent — said their CICS applications were responding quickly enough. When exploring the amount of time CICS applications were available, most shops (66 percent) said it was “About right,” although 22 percent admitted “Time needed to increase.”
Business issues driving need for additional availability
Almost everyone who chose “Time needed to increase” said business issues were driving it. The business issue for 75 percent of these respondents was the “Increased need for access to CICS applications from PCs and mobile devices, or as part of a web service.” Another 63 percent of respondents identified an “Increase in current business or opportunity to take on new business, both of which would mean a greater number of transactions.” And, more than 42 percent said “Opportunities to expand to more time zones.” (Respondents could choose multiple answers.)
Batch, application architecture hindering availability
Of those who said “Time needed to increase” as the result of technical issues, the top two reasons were “Scheduled batch” (71 percent) and “Application architecture issues” (65 percent). Again, respondents could choose multiple answers.
CICS applications on mobile and web
CICS applications continue to prove that they have a place and purpose in the evolving organization. A significant majority (65 percent) said some business-critical CICS applications are available to internal or external customers via PC, phone, tablet, or combination thereof, through a web-based interface. Across industry and company size, this was the most prevalent answer. Impressively, another 11 percent stated all of their business-critical CICS applications are available this way.
Only 13 percent said none are available this way and they don't have plans to make them available. Government respondents were significantly more likely than respondents from any other industry to say that.
The future
The survey also sought answers about what respondents see as coming next for CICS.
Predictions about how important CICS will be
This year, respondents were asked if they see the number of CICS applications Increasing, Decreasing, or Staying about the Same in the next three to five years. Overall, most respondents said Staying about the Same (37 percent), but answers were fairly evenly distributed, with those saying Decreasing at 34 percent and those actually saying Increasing coming in at a healthy 27 percent.
When looking at results by industry, some variances appeared. Approximately 48 percent of Financial Services & Banking respondents said Staying about the Same, but another 38 percent actually said Increasing. Only 10 percent of these respondents said Decreasing.
Looking forward, respondents this year were asked what percentage of the business functionality that is currently in CICS is the organization considering moving to another platform in the next three to five years. The data shows that 61 percent of respondents chose 0 percent, 1 to 25 percent, or Don't know. Among all answers, 1 to 25 percent was the top choice.
Did CICS predictions come true?
Back in 2012, respondents were asked if their organization was planning on moving away from CICS in the next three years. Almost one-third said Yes or Don't know. Yet as mentioned earlier, the percent of respondents who said that more than half of their business-critical applications are used online through CICS, increased to 62 percent in 2015 from 54 percent in 2012. So, predictions some made regarding moving away from CICS have not come to pass, or at least not yet.
Conclusion
CICS continues to play an important role for the majority of organization represented. When compared to the 2012 survey results, CICS usage has increased over the past three years with a majority (62 percent) of respondents saying that more than half of their business-critical applications are used online through CICS (up from 54 percent in 2012). In addition, organization continue to adapt CICS to changing business needs, with a significant (76 percent) majority providing all or some of their CICS applications to internal or external customers via a PC, phone, tablet, or combination thereof, through a web-based interface. Respondents also reported that they were happy with response times, with an overwhelming majority — 95 percent — saying that their CICS applications were responding quickly enough.
The second part of the CICS report will cover results related to CICS' relationship to crucial business data and the challenges that relationship can pose. This part of the report will also look at how that relationship has changed since the survey was conducted in past years.
About H&W
References
- IBM. 1.1M CICS Transactions. Every Second. Every day. IBM, February 21, 2014, http://mainframe50.tumblr.com/post/77394705521/there-are-1-1m-cics-transactions-every-second.
- Sun, Janet L., Don't Believe the Myth-information about the Mainframe: Part 1, SHARE, May 07, 2013, http://www.share.org/p/bl/et/blogid=2&blogaid=234.
- Toole, Pat. From Shopping To Space Travel, How The Mainframe Changed Our World. Forbes, April 8, 2014, http://www.forbes.com/sites/ibm/2014/04/08/from-shopping-to-space-travel-how-the-mainframe-changed-our-world/.
