Integrating a newly purchased company's data into an existing infrastructure could have significant -- and potentially negative -- effects on the IT environment, but by leveraging BMC APPTUNE for DB2, UGI found just the opposite. The utility added an acquisition's entire mainframe to the system and reduced the batch window by 30 percent by retuning with APPTUNE. Reducing the amount of processing time led to an overall improvement of the system's performance and a reduction of MIPS by approximately 10 percent.

BMC also enabled UGI to predict how long system reorganizations will take so that system administrators do not have to worry about running into peak processing times within the batch window. The BMC APPTUNE tool automatically stops jobs from running when they interfere with critical operations.

With a suite of mainframe tools that also includes BMC CHANGE MANAGER for DB2 and BMC SQL Performance for DB2, UGI has saved countless hours of staff time and held IT costs in check. UGI recently used BMC CHANGE MANAGER for DB2 to migrate sub-system data to another mainframe, a process that could have taken days.

"We were able to do that in a weekend," said Dan Fattore, UGI's supervisor of data management. "Without BMC CHANGE MANAGER, we would not have been able to accomplish that in such a short period of time with the amount of data that we had."

With newly freed-up time, the IT staff has spent less time scanning green bar paper and more time with developers and end users to get more ideas to improve database design, a process that cannot be automated.

"We are better able to use our time and our brains because the basic tasks are automated through BMC products," Fattore said.

The end results have been clear: a better functioning and more reliable system for employees and better overall service for customers. "BMC really has become our partner as opposed to just another vendor," Fattore said. "I feel like I can call anytime I have a question, and I will get the answer quickly."

To view more information on the solutions discussed in this release go to:

BMC APPTUNE for DB2

BMC CHANGE MANAGER for DB2

BMC SQL Performance for DB2

To view a video case study on the BMC solutions used by UGI view here.

Business runs on IT. IT runs on BMC Software.

Business thrives when IT runs smarter, faster and stronger. That's why the most demanding IT organizations in the world rely on BMC Software across both distributed and mainframe environments. Recognized as the leader in Business Service Management, BMC provides a comprehensive and unified platform that helps IT organizations cut cost, reduce risk and drive business profit. For the four fiscal quarters ended September 30, 2009, BMC revenue was approximately $1.88 billion. Visit www.bmc.com for more information.

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