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Industry: TelecommunicationsCompany: KPNEmployees: 31,000Revenue: €13.1 billion

KPN safeguards services for 44 million customers with better applications and more cost-effective testing

BUSINESSKPN provides internet, telephony, television and ICT services for 44 million customers. It is the largest telecommunications provider in the Netherlands and serves both consumer and corporate markets.

CHALLENGE The company needs to be able to launch new applications quickly and to high standards. Testing applications, however, was costly and complex due to a lack of adequate test environments.

SOLUTION Using CA ITKO LISA Virtualise, KPN can create virtualised testing platforms that react in the same way as its production environment. As a result, the availability of its testing platforms has increased to almost 90 percent.

BENEFIT KPN can conduct more tests in a shorter timeframe, which improves application quality. It has also cut costs by reducing its investment in physical test platforms and enabling earlier discovery of major defects.

CUSTOMER SUCCESS STORY

02

KPN

BusinessAnytime anywhere access to information and entertainmentKPN provides more than 44 million retail customers with internet, telephony and television services. Headquartered in the Netherlands, it is the largest telecommunications provider in the country.

The company also provides ICT infrastructure services and network-related solutions for business customers throughout Benelux via its KPN Corporate Market division.

KPN has multiple brands in Germany and Belgium, including E-Plus, BASE and iBasis that provide mobile services, wholesale network services and operate a global IP-based infrastructure.

Across the entire group, KPN has more than 31,000 employees, 19,000 of whom are based in the Netherlands. The group’s goals are to enable communication anytime, anywhere by providing customers with access to information and entertainment from any location and any device – from mobile phones and tablets to computers and television sets.

ChallengeLaunching new customer services on time Growing its business is KPN’s core focus. To succeed in such a dynamic and competitive industry, the company must be innovative, agile and deliver exceptional customer services.

“When we launch new or updated applications, we need to ensure they meet our exacting quality standards.”Robin BleekerProcess Chain Manager Innovation Tooling at KPN

KPN therefore needs to be able to develop new services quickly and ensure they remain highly available – otherwise its customers will turn to its competitors.

Robin Bleeker, Process Chain Manager Innovation Tooling at KPN, comments, “When we launch new or updated applications, we need to ensure that they are not only released in a timely manner, but also meet our high standards for quality.”

03

KPN

KPN outsources its application development requirements to external providers. To ensure consistency, these virtual teams use a unifi ed methodology developed by the company that draws on the benefi ts of agile development techniques.

The group’s key systems normally have four releases per year, which means KPN requires extensive application testing capabilities. “We conduct extensive tests to ensure that new application releases work as expected in our production environment,” explains Bleeker. “For example, our online fi bre order system, which is used by customers and engineers for ordering fi xed broadband lines, comprises several layers of applications. If they do not interact correctly, the supply chain is disrupted and customers may not receive their services in the specifi ed timescales.”

Supporting extensive application testing requirementsTo validate system integration effectively, KPN had to create test environments that exactly replicated its production infrastructure. This was extremely costly due to the hardware resources and IT personnel involved both in initial implementation and ongoing maintenance. In addition to the cost implications, the availability of the test environments was limited, which had an impact on application quality.

“As the test environments were shared among several teams, each team only had access to the test facilities it needed for around 20 percent of the time,” explains Bleeker. “This meant that testing had to be carefully scheduled and contained within tight windows. As a result, we were not always able to perform the breadth and depth of testing that was desirable.”

These constraints sometimes led to delays to release dates, with signifi cant implications for both cost control and competitive advantage. “We were keen to fi nd a way to reduce the costs and complexity associated with application testing,” comments Bleeker.

SolutionCreating virtualised testing environments KPN partnered with Dutch IT innovation specialist Systemation to select and implement CA ITKO LISA Virtualise in early 2010.

“We can create test environments that ensure every composite application integrates seamlessly.”Robin BleekerProcess Chain Manager Innovation Tooling at KPN

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KPN

Due to the high levels of automation, just one administrator is required to create these environments, which are used by around 30 testing and quality assurance personnel to ensure that new and upgraded applications integrate and perform as expected when they go into production.

The solution is used by several testing teams, including the team responsible for the quality of KPN’s critical fi bre ordering system. “Using CA ITKO LISA Virtualise, we can create test environments that enable us to ensure that every composite application – from the front end web portal to the backend database – integrates seamlessly to provide testers with the best possible experience,” explains Bleeker.

Using the CA Technologies solution, test teams now have access to end-to-end and traditional testing environments 90 percent of the time, which means it is much easier to schedule activities to meet business demand.

“The CA Technologies solution was the only tool to offer the functionality we required,” explains Bleeker. “Systemation helped analyse our requirements, identify the solution and implement it.”

CA ITKO LISA Virtualise is used to create Virtual Service Environments that replicate KPN’s production infrastructure. The solution captures the behaviour, data and performance characteristics of composite application environments to create platforms that react and respond in the same way as their production counterparts.

90% availability for testing environments with CA ITKO LISA Virtualise

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KPN

Benefi tDelivering higher quality applications faster and cheaperBetter access to testing facilities means that KPN can perform more tests more thoroughly. Bleeker comments, “We can now test numerous scenarios that we just didn’t have the time to test properly before. This has resulted in improved release quality, which has been noted by our quality assurance managers.”

€200,000 saved per year by removing at least one major defect per release

As well as improving application quality, KPN has been able to signifi cantly reduce costs. This is due to:

Eliminating the need to create new physical test environments•

Higher test coverage due to better availability of the test environments•

Earlier discovery of errors in application design and build, which means they are • easier and cheaper to rectify

An estimated reduction of at least one major defect per release, which results • in an estimated cost saving of €200,000 per year

Additional cost savings resulting from fewer test environments and less late night • staff overtime will potentially double these savings.

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KPN

KPN expects to achieve return on investment from implementing CA ITKO LISA Virtualise within two to three years, but many of the benefi ts of using the solution are intangible. As Bleeker explains, “Enhanced testing capabilities enable us to be more innovative and agile. Application releases are now more likely to be launched on time and offer a better customer experience, which enables us to attract and retain subscribers and increase competitive advantage.”

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Systemation offers software solutions that add value to the innovation process of enterprise customers and increase their return on strategic IT choices.

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