How a Fortune 1000 Insurer Modernized Its Data with Hybrid IT Orchestration on IBM Z
See how a Fortune 1000 insurer modernized its IT with Stonebranch UAC — orchestrating workloads across a hybrid environment for agility, compliance, and cost savings.

Financial services organizations are under constant pressure to modernize. For insurers, the stakes are especially high as they balance regulatory compliance, customer expectations, and operational efficiency. A Fortune 1000 insurance company recently faced this challenge head-on, so the IT team partnered with Stonebranch to build a future-ready hybrid IT environment. By leveraging existing investments in IBM Z, the insurer modernized its IT environment while optimizing total cost of ownership.
Their transformation is a textbook example of how organizations in highly regulated industries can modernize their systems without a disruptive approach. With Stonebranch on z/OS, this insurer didn’t have to choose between the reliability of its mainframe and the agility of the cloud — it now enjoys the best of both worlds, orchestrated seamlessly.
The Challenge: Existing Scheduler Lacked Hybrid Cloud Support
A leading Fortune 1000 insurance company faced mounting pressure to modernize its IT infrastructure. With customer expectations shifting toward digital-first experiences, the IT operations team was tasked with transforming legacy systems — centered around a traditional mainframe scheduler — into a modern hybrid IT environment.
Designed for a pre-cloud era, the incumbent scheduler operated in isolation, lacked API-based extensibility, and couldn’t integrate with other modern platforms like AWS or Microsoft Azure. This created silos that slowed cloud adoption and limited the ability to deliver new services.
The insurer needed a future-proof solution that could:
- Seamlessly integrate mainframe, cloud, and on-premises environments.
- Support real-time, event-driven automation.
- Eliminate inefficiencies and centralize orchestration across the enterprise.
The Solution: Hybrid Cloud Orchestration with Stonebranch UAC
The insurer turned to Stonebranch Universal Automation Center (UAC) to future-proof its workload automation strategy. With UAC, the IT operations team gained a single pane of glass to orchestrate jobs across:
- IBM z/OS mainframes
- AWS and Azure cloud services
- On-prem Linux and Windows servers
- Enterprise data pipelines and managed file transfers
Using Stonebranch’s agent-based and agentless architecture, UAC provides native integration with both mainframe environments and cloud-native platforms. The Universal Integration Platform enables fast connectivity to third-party applications via APIs, SDKs, and reusable integration templates. With Stonebranch, the insurer achieves:
- Data Modernization: UAC automates legacy batch jobs while seamlessly integrating them into larger hybrid workflows.
- Event-Driven Automation: Workflows trigger in real-time based on business or IT events, rather than rigid time schedules.
- Self-Service Enablement: Business users and developers trigger and monitor jobs from a centralized self-service portal without needing mainframe expertise.
- Cross-Platform Visibility: Unified dashboards provided complete observability into all automated processes — mainframe, cloud,
and beyond.
“Stonebranch gave us the bridge between our legacy and modern IT environments. Today, we run automated workflows that span our z/OS mainframe, AWS, and beyond — all from one platform.” – Senior IT Director, Anonymous Insurance Customer
The Results: Orchestration Across the Entire Enterprise Offers the Best of Both Worlds
By transitioning to Stonebranch UAC, the insurer transformed its approach to workload automation and orchestration:
- Centralized Hybrid IT Orchestration: Gained full visibility and control across mainframe and cloud environments from a single platform.
- Accelerated Cloud Adoption: Freed IT teams to manage workloads in AWS and Azure without being constrained by scheduler limitations.
- Reduced Complexity and Cost: Eliminated multiple automation tools, reduced manual processes, and lowered overall infrastructure management overhead.
- Improved Business Agility: Real-time event-driven automation allowed the insurer to deliver new digital services faster.
- Compliance and Reliability: Standardized automation improved auditability and reduced operational risk in a highly regulated industry.
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