Modernization: Microsoft Access to SQL Server Migration

While modernizing a Microsoft Access database to SQL Server on Azure, our team proposed a semi-automated and fully automated approach to many manual processes.

Executive Summary / Key Highlights

One of the oldest retail banks in the Massachusetts
Project Delivery: 90% Poland, 10% Onsite, USA
Audit old existing system, map and document how it works, and provide a solution to modernization
Technologies: Microsoft Access / Proposed solution to migrate to MS SQL on Azure

The Client

One of the oldest banks in the Massachusetts, USA with assets worth over US$ 11 billion

Problem Statement

The data has accumulated over time and the tool was not up-to-date. During maintenance, old versions weren’t changed and posed risks to the functioning. The tool has been modified by many people over time without using proper documentation, technical conventions and good development practices. Lots of old elements were not used anymore because over the years business processes have changed. This resulted in compiler error handling, slow performance, and reliability concerns.

Solution

Maxima Consulting performed an audit and provided documentation, diagrams, and a highly detailed summary of the existing MS Access system. This was completed with a combination of onsite presence in Massachusetts and remote work performed by Maxima in Poland. We proposed solutions that significantly improved the processes and upgraded the database management system.

During the project

The teams had to deal with a time-zone difference but thanks to the use of Agile methodologies they were able to swiftly move on with the work. The deliverables were presented in a thorough Excel workbook which contains documentation on the database. Maxima deeply analyzed the database with a particular focus on data flow and external points of data input and output. We worked closely with the users and stakeholders to fully understand the tool and the main pain points.

Results

We recommended Microsoft SQL Server on Azure as part of this application modernization to take advantage of the latest technology significantly increasing performance and , this allowed us to enhance the performance, improve the security features and efficiently manage log and data files. Our team proposed either a semi-automated or fully automated approach to many manual processes. To make full use of the automation lots of reports had to be standardized, this allowed to manage everything with the tool and save at least 2 hours per day. Thanks to the changes, both the performance, scalability, and user experience could be improved.