A large-scale Oracle E-Business Suite upgrade

Ever since the implementation of the Oracle E-Business Suite at the Catharina Hospital in Eindhoven, the Netherlands in 2005, MCX has been the partner for hosting and management, currently via the Private Cloud. We are now well over a decade further on, and this year the collaboration has revolved primarily around an interesting and challenging project. The Oracle E-Business Suite required a substantial upgrade, and the implementation of new functionalities was also on the schedule. Below is a report on this successful yet intensive project.

Upgrade van Oracle E-Business Suite

One of the key challenges on the schedule was the upgrade of the Oracle E-Business Suite. This was no ordinary upgrade, as the hospital was moving from version 11.5.10.2 to the very latest available version, R12.2.5. An additional challenge was the fact that, with this upgrade, the hospital was one of the very first in the Netherlands to start working with the newest version. At that time, MCX had minimal insight into potential bugs and teething problems. This was not the only thing the management partner had to sink its teeth into. Additionally, a database upgrade from 11.2.04 to 12.1.0.2 was required. All these activities fell within the scope of the project.

Process went well

Based on various past best practices, MCX set to work on the upgrade project. There were two iterations in total, after which a sanity check was performed each time. Checks focused particularly on customization and interfaces, in combination with standard functionality. The plan was to execute the entire migration over the weekend. And so it happened: the migration kicked off on Friday afternoon, and everything was live by 12:00 PM on Sunday. The entire upgrade took only four months, whereas MCX normally accounts for a project duration of at least six months.

Na de live-gang

After the intensive three months, there was a one-month follow-up period during which no particular issues arose. MCX can speak of a smoothly executed upgrade process that could also be completed within a reasonable timeframe. This would absolutely not have been possible without the commitment of the Catharina Hospital. They made many of their employees available for testing the application and did not hesitate to make important decisions at very short notice. The hospital also looks back positively on the project. Harald van de Pol, Manager Healthcare Intelligence at the Catharina Hospital, stated that he was very positive about the collaboration with the people at MCX: “They were always easily accessible and proactively contributed ideas. We received the right sense of urgency at the right moments.” A wonderful compliment, of which MCX is naturally incredibly proud.

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