Case Study
UST seamlessly executed a complex Lawson application upgrade with no business disruption
CLIENT
This American multinational company is one of the leading big-box retail chains in the world. With more than 750 locations globally, the company employs more than 300,000 people and generates annual revenue of nearly $250 billion.
CHALLENGE
Complex, outdated Lawson system needed an overhaul
The retailer planned to expand into many different international markets. The company needed to upgrade its outdated, homegrown Lawson 7.x HR system to the current version 9 to keep pace with new business and compliance mandates to support this initiative. A heavily customized Lawson System meant that the upgrade would be very complex and expensive for the company. Lawson announced that support for version 7 would be discontinued to compound the situation. With no other option than to upgrade the legacy system, the company needed an experienced technology partner to manage the project, while streamlining the system and keeping costs in check.
TRANSFORMATION
Comprehensive plan ensured a smooth application upgrade
UST developed and implemented a functional upgrade plan and architectural roadmap to migrate the Lawson system from version 7.x to 9.x and from IBM AS/400 to the more current iSeries server. The plan included:
- Business process reengineering—to update processes with modern best practices
- A base functionality evaluation—to identify any customizations required in Lawson 9.x
- Data archive and retrieval—so users have access to historical data
- Data migration—from the existing Lawson 7.x to the new 9.x
- System interface integrations—which included upgrading the necessary homegrown, custom interfaces from the legacy system as well as integrating interfaces with third-party administrators and proprietary systems
- GUI deployment—to give users portal access to the upgraded Lawson system
- A comprehensive security plan—including any homegrown security schema that may need to be migrated to the new application version
- Technical modeling—for platform availability, performance, backup and restore, security, and authority
- Testing—for custom code integrations, system, and user acceptance
- Training—for all technical component leads and end users
IMPACT
Successful upgrade completed on time and within budget
UST helped the retailer upgrade and streamline its outdated Lawson system before support expired for the version 7.x system—without business disruption and within budget. System performance improved by eliminating unnecessary customizations and purging redundant old data sets. By creating a “client university” knowledge repository for the retailer’s Lawson system, UST can train and upskill resources as an affordable approach to provide hard-to-find Lawson-skilled talent.
Resources
https://www.ust.com/en/what-we-do/strategy-implementation-operations