We chose OpenLegacy over the IBM product for a few reasons. When it comes to monetizing existing assets — mainframe assets in particular — there are two use cases. One has been solved for years, and that's the ability to expose a mainframe asset as an API. Several technologies can do this, such as the old MQ CICS bridge and IMS Connect. 

But the real challenge has been the ability of mainframe assets or IE programs to consume a microservice API. That's why we gravitated toward OpenLegacy. I know IBM can also do the same thing, but here's the second. The problem is most of the dev teams don't want to touch the mainframe. The mainframe is like a mysterious box that your grandfather worked on.

IBM tooling requires a level of knowledge that most contractors don't have. OpenLegacy involves a very minimal effort on the part of the mainframe team. Connecting is very simple because it connects straight into the CICs applications. It was simply a matter of creating a sub-program and passing the right COBALT copybook out to something called the API caller. There is a bit of work on the mainframe, but it's very contained. At the same time, the other solutions required too much mainframe knowledge for a project where you have a lot of offshoring. We wanted to use primarily non-specialized IT people working with Java or .NET because of those microservices. That was the primary driver: much less complexity. The cost was a factor, but it mainly was the complexity.

OpenLegacy caters to a specific niche, which is one of the reasons why we went with them. We were also looking at MuleSoft, which is a fabulous company that makes a lot of things easy. But even MuleSoft couldn't jump to the mainframe like OpenLegacy. That was really an eye-opener. While MuleSoft is a solid solution, you still have a niche problem with connectors, which OpenLegacy was able to solve. But ultimately we went for an open-source solution and then addressed the niche requirements with solutions like OpenLegacy. 

I don't know if the company actually evaluated other solutions when they brought on Open Legacy as I was not yet in the company at the time. But the investment in the system will probably mean it will not be changed.

Because of sanctions, unfortunately, in our country, we can not use a Cloud-based system so even that could not have been part of the evaluation.