Case Study: IBM Audit Defense for a Major US Airline
Challenge
A leading US airline faced a daunting IBM audit with alleged non-compliance claims amounting to $25 million. The airline’s IT systems supported critical operations, including flight scheduling, ticketing, customer relationship management, and maintenance systems. The audit findings highlighted discrepancies in sub-capacity licensing, entitlement mismatches, and virtualized environment misconfigurations. With operations highly dependent on seamless IT performance and a complex licensing environment, the airline turned to Redress Compliance to resolve the audit efficiently and protect its financial stability.
The Process
- Audit Analysis and Review: • Redress Compliance began by thoroughly examining IBM’s audit findings, identifying overestimations and errors in license usage metrics. • Reviewed historical contracts and entitlement data to establish a precise compliance baseline.
- Data Collection and Validation: • Collaborated with the airline’s IT and operations teams to collect accurate usage data from physical servers, virtualized systems, and cloud platforms. • Validated sub-capacity metrics, uncovering significant discrepancies in IBM’s reported usage figures. • Identified underutilized licenses and misconfigurations that could be optimized to address compliance gaps.
- Strategic Negotiations: • Presented IBM’s audit team with a revised compliance report backed by accurate data and legal interpretations of licensing policies. • Highlighted the airline’s proactive efforts to manage compliance and its significant investment in IBM technologies. • Secured major concessions from IBM, significantly reducing the scope of financial liability.
- Optimization and Compliance Management: • Reallocated unused licenses across the organization to close compliance gaps without additional purchases. • Designed a robust compliance framework, incorporating automated tracking tools for real-time license monitoring. • Delivered training sessions to IT and procurement teams, ensuring long-term compliance and preparedness for future audits.
Outcome
Redress Compliance’s intervention reduced the airline’s financial exposure by 96%, bringing the $25 million claim down to $1 million. This settlement covered the cost of additional licenses for future scalability, with no penalties or retroactive fees incurred. The airline maintained uninterrupted operations throughout the audit, ensuring passenger services were unaffected. Enhanced compliance processes were implemented to safeguard against future risks.
Quote from the CIO:
“Redress Compliance was instrumental in turning a complex and high-stakes audit into a manageable challenge. Their expertise saved us millions and gave us confidence in our compliance processes moving forward. Their partnership was invaluable.”
Key Results:
- Initial Audit Claim: $25 million.
- Final Settlement: $1 million (96% reduction).
- Compliance Enhancements: Centralized license management and real-time monitoring tools.
- Business Continuity: Ensured uninterrupted operations for flight and passenger services during the audit process.
This case highlights Redress Compliance’s ability to deliver exceptional outcomes for mission-critical industries, protecting financial and operational stability during IBM audits.
