AXA migrated a mission-critical life-insurance policy administration system off IBM i to native Linux on x86 with Infinite i — without changing a single line of its COBOL/400, COBOL ILE, CL, CLLE, and DDS source.
AXA is a French multinational financial-services firm headquartered in Paris, operating across Western Europe, North America, Asia Pacific, and the Middle East. Founded in 1816, it has grown through decades of acquisition into one of the world's largest insurance and investment-management groups.
AXA's IBM i environment ran a mission-critical life-insurance policy administration system — policy issuance, premium calculation, claims, and actuarial modeling across a diverse product portfolio. The codebase totaled roughly 7 million lines across five IBM i language variants (COBOL/400, COBOL ILE, CL, CLLE, and DDS), including complex actuarial pricing logic. As the business grew, IBM i operating costs climbed and the proprietary DB2/400 database was difficult to integrate with AXA's Oracle-based enterprise systems. Rewriting was ruled out as too costly and risky; the choice came down to migrating with Infinite i or paying to upgrade IBM i hardware to meet IBM's mandatory support requirements.
AXA built a cost-oriented business case and selected Infinite i. Its compiler suite natively supported all five language variants, so all 7 million lines compiled and migrated with no source modification. The applications moved from IBM Power to native Linux on industry-standard x86, and the Infinite i runtime replicated the IBM i execution model — command structure, system APIs, and DB2/400 architecture — for complete functional equivalency. The migration was completed in two months, delivering over 50% savings versus the IBM i upgrade path and a fraction of the cost of refactoring.
| Metric | Competing refactoring | Infinite i |
|---|---|---|
| Timeline | ~24 months | 2 months |
| Relative cost | 300x+ the cost | 50%+ savings |
| Code modification | Significant rewrites required | Zero changes |
| Risk profile | High — no guarantee | Low — proven platform |
| Language support | Semi-manual conversion | All 5 natively |
All 7 million lines now run on industry-standard Linux on x86 with no changes to application logic or business rules. AXA's data resides in Infinite DB (a replication of DB2/400), enabling seamless integration across business systems and reporting in Power BI. Application screens are delivered through a web-based graphical UI accessible on mobile by clients, agents, and employees. Developers gained a modern environment with CI/CD pipelines in Git for ongoing enhancements — preserving decades of investment in the original COBOL/400, COBOL ILE, CL, CLLE, and DDS codebase while embracing modern, scalable infrastructure.
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The core platform — recompile RPG, COBOL, CL, and DDS to native Linux on AWS, Azure, or GCP. 45–60 days. Half the cost of staying on Power.
Learn about Infinite i →An Infinite i add-on that turns IBM i 5250 green screens into modern web interfaces in any browser — automatically, with no rewrite.
Learn about Infinite Cloud →An Infinite i add-on that migrates DB2 for i (DB2/400) data to MySQL on AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud — with referential integrity fully preserved.
Learn about Infinite DataLink →An Infinite i add-on: a modern VS Code IDE for RPG & ILE COBOL — syntax highlighting, IntelliSense, Git, debugging, and AI assistance. In private beta; GA Q3 2026.
Learn about Infinite Studio →