Digital Transformation programs are not easy to achieve. Migrating from live legacy platforms to the latest generation of solutions presents a huge risk in terms of disruption. While organisations are faced with a necessity to digitally transform. They also face other challenges to improve sustainability and other initiatives.
To mitigate those risks, P&O Ferries has strengthened its partnership with Netcompany. To help with the migration of its core ERP to a more modern solution. P&O Ferries is to implement Netcompanys PULSE platform.
PULSE is a control tower for a real-time data ecosystem. It allows businesses to share and act on a single source of truth. It facilitates adaptable planning and forecasting in changing circumstances, breaking down silos and providing a single view of plan, execution, and results.
PULSE will enable P&O Ferries to deliver solutions and capabilities that will set them apart in their market. PULSE will become an integration layer between legacy applications and the new business applications that P&O are currently rolling out.
P&O Ferries first worked with Netcompany in 2022. The IT services company has continued to build the relationship, helping with its digital transformation program.
Chloe Friend, CIO of P&O Ferries, commented, “We are delighted to expand our partnership with Netcompany as we enter a critical part of our digital transformation programme. Modernising our legacy systems is a key part of remaining competitive in the fast-changing ferries landscape. Netcompany has proven over the years that they prioritise service delivery at scale and have the innovative technology to enable current and future operations-sensitive initiatives.”
One pulse at a time with PULSE
P&O Ferries manages 30,000 sailings every year across many ferry routes. Using PULSE as the workflow and data integration layer between the new and old systems, the company plans to migrate one route at a time. Netcompany will implement PULSE initially as a minimum viable product (MVP). One that will provide the integration layer required between the new and legacy applications.
In achieving this, P&O Ferries can prove that the new business application will work. Not only will PULSE provide the workflow and data interchanges between the systems. It can also be used to help improve process efficiency as part of the migration.
PULSE will also help P&O Ferries access AI and Machine learning capabilities to further improve efficiency and add new capabilities in the future.
Once one ferry route instance is completed, the transformation team can build on the capabilities of PULSE to continue the rollout of their new systems. It will be a step-by-step approach that should increase in cadence as more routes are rolled out and more use cases are covered. Ultimately, P&O Ferries will retire the legacy systems to reduce costs and overheads. They will also achieve this with a minimised risk profile.
Damien Venkatasamy, Partner in Netcompany, commented, “We are proud to continue and our strategic partnership with P&O Ferries as a trusted advisor in delivering their digital transformation – to a high quality, long-term efficiency, and with minimum risk,” says “The most exciting part of this legacy replacement programme is the opportunities it opens for P&O Ferries in the future. Using PULSE as a platform means they will be able to maximise and streamline any new technological, or data-driven innovation and sustainability efforts P&O Ferries may want to initiate in the future.”
Enterprise Times: What does this mean
This is another example of where Netcompany has used PULSE to help with the digital transformation programs of enterprises. Using PULSE, Netcompany built an Advanced Event Management platform for Roche, that went live on Oct-2023. It provided an operation tower for the entire order life cycle. At Copenhagen Airport, Netcompany helped develop AIRHART, powered by PULSE. AIRHART enables AI-based real-time decision-making for over 4,500 operational staff at Copenhagen Airport, Denmark.
PULSE can simultaneously process and translate millions of unstructured data from multiple inputs to enable and simplify real-time decision-making. It provides four elements: an integrations platform, a processing platform, a data platform and an ecosystem orchestrator. For P&O Ferries, it provides a net enabling it to safely climb up from a legacy platform to a modern ERP.
What is interesting about this is that many other enterprises are facing the same challenges and risks when migrating from legacy solutions. Netcompany has found a way for organisations to mitigate some of the transition risks. It is something that others will note.
