Mainframe Modernization with Perficient & Mechanical Orchard

Mainframe Modernization with Mechanical Orchard is a Perficient-led program that takes organizations from their first mainframe application candidate through full production deployment on AWS, modernizing their COBOL estate one application at a time. Perficient combines deep systems integration and AWS expertise with Mechanical Orchard's Imogen platform to automate the hardest part of modernization: refactoring legacy COBOL, JCL, and CICS code into behaviorally equivalent Java running on Amazon EKS.

The offering covers the complete modernization lifecycle across five phases:

1. Code Discovery and Planning (1-2 Days): Source code parsing, complexity analysis, and application candidate selection to identify the best starting point for modernization.

2. Technical Validation (1-2 Weeks): Characterization testing of approximately 60,000 lines of code, production of modernized Java code, and delivery of a Business Rules Extraction (BRE) report documenting embedded logic.

3. Business Case Analysis: Financial business case modeling and Minimum Viable Modernization (MVM) scope definition to build stakeholder confidence and justify investment.

4. Minimum Viable Modernization (Months 1-6): First application deployed to production on AWS EKS, with data migration from VSAM or DB2 to Amazon RDS or Aurora.

5. Scaled Modernization Program (Months 6+): Multiple pods running concurrently, delivering application-by-application production deployments to reduce or retire the legacy mainframe footprint.

Mechanical Orchard's Imogen platform handles automated code refactoring. Imogen instruments the mainframe application, generates characterization tests from observed behavior, and produces behaviorally equivalent Java code at scale. Behavioral equivalence is verified through automated backtesting. Perficient handles everything else: program governance, AWS infrastructure and DevSecOps, data migration, user acceptance testing, production deployment, and stakeholder alignment.

Supported legacy technologies include COBOL, JCL, CICS transactions, CICS Screens, DB2, VSAM, and IMS DB, all targeting Java on Amazon EKS. Data migration capabilities cover VSAM, IMS DB, and DB2 to cloud RDBMS services.

Flexible engagement variants are available to match organizational readiness: Full Modernization Program (all five phases), Discovery and Validation Only (Phases 1-3), Single Application Modernization (Phases 1-4), or Accelerated Entry via Extended Validation.

Key differentiators include Perficient's end-to-end delivery accountability as an AWS Premier Partner, deep expertise in Amazon EKS, Amazon RDS, and DevSecOps, a pod-based scalable delivery model, and eligibility for the AWS Migration Acceleration Program (MAP). Security is aligned with the AWS Well-Architected Framework and includes IRSA, mTLS, KMS encryption, and support for PCI-DSS and HIPAA compliance requirements.

Business outcomes include mainframe applications running in production on AWS, COBOL replaced by behaviorally equivalent Java, a reduced or retired legacy mainframe footprint, BRE reports documenting embedded business logic, and a financial business case supporting investment in each phase.