SAMBA IST Switch Upgrade (2009-2010)

Business Need
SAMBA has embarked on a major initiative to upgrade its existing IST/Switch   from 7.1 Core to IST/Switch 7.6. The banks have performed some development and customisation over the last 2 decades to satisfy business and compliance needs which required them to modify the core modules of IST/Switch. This led to some difficulties and challenges especially with regard to obtaining standard support on the product, notification on all card scheme mandates and making use of the advanced features and functionality offered by the latest IST/Switch version. 
 
The bank now wants to move to latest IST/Switch 7.6 version without impacting the operation of switch and any business function.  
The Solution
In the solution, we will employ various techniques to keep the upgrade as smooth as possible by trying wherever possible to reuse custom modules to avoid rewriting from scratch, and by using layers to adapt core changes to the standard core where possible
  • Implement standard IST 7.6 
  • Implement custom SHCLOG callbacks for managing the special SAMBA logging requirements, with possibility to use parallel logging tables (standard SHC logging tables and SAMBA-specific logging tables) to minimize the impact on the SAMBA back-office processes or batches that rely on these tables.
  • Implement the latest 7.6 ATM Server and merge into it the SAMBA specific ATM Server customizations that are not already supported in 7.6 version (of course sources to be available)
  • Use standard IST SPAN2 Interface that is already operational at other bank.
  • For all other interfaces, we will update the interfaces to use the standard 7.6 SHCMSG structure with segments to benefit from the fact that these interfaces are all operational and tested. This will speed up the implementation compared to the approach that would require rewriting the interfaces
  • Option to use latest IST 7.4 ISTAUTH package and merge into it all SAMBA’s ISTAUTH customization and table differences, making use of the common translation functions mentioned in point 5 if needed or adapting to standard SHCMSG structure (to be determined during detailed study)
 Benefits and Added Value
  • Leverages the experience of the samba team and enhances its flexibility to be proactive to business needs and time-to-market challenges, at the same time take the best of the product and being current on product version.
  • Moving away from 3 separate environments to a single multi-institution implementation for Riyad, Pakistan and Dubai will save time and effort to support the business needs of the 3 units apart from saving on infrastructure and support costs