Some CIOs in Australia and New Zealand have estimated that it could cost an average of A$10 million or more to update their mainframe applications, according to a new study. The survey which was conducted by Vanson Bourne for Micro Focus in November 2013 interviewed 35 CIOs in Australia and 15 in New Zealand. It was part of a study of nine countries which included the United Kingdom, United States, Brazil, Hong Kong and Singapore. A total of 590 CIOs were surveyed. According to the survey, 48 per cent of A/NZ CIOs said it would take an average of $10 million to update their mainframe applications while 80 per cent said that they find it difficult justifying the expense of mainframe applications due to mounting IT debt. Forty eight per cent of A/NZ respondents estimate that their organisation will be using mainframe applications for at least another 10 years. Westpac to stick with mainframes CIO Insights: Legacy systems – love them or leave them? Changing times in mainframe market for IBM Australia Adding to the problem of maintaining mainframe applications is the skills shortage. Seventy six per cent of A/NZ CIOs said it was proving difficult to find new staff with mainframe skills. In addition, 50 per cent of those surveyed said that they could not keep up with new mainframe compliance legislation because it was ‘highly likely’ that their mainframe expert had retired or left the company. To address the mainframe skills gap, 78 per cent of A/NZ CIOs surveyed said that university students should be learning mainframe programming languages such as COBOL and PL/I. However, according to Vanson Bourne, only 27 per cent of universities around the world have COBOL as part of their core or elective ICT curriculum. Follow CIO Australia on Twitter and Like us on Facebook… Twitter: @CIO_Australia, Facebook: CIO Australia, or take part in the CIO conversation on LinkedIn: CIO Australia Related content brandpost The steep cost of a poor data management strategy Without a data management strategy, organizations stall digital progress, often putting their business trajectory at risk. Here’s how to move forward. By Jay Limbasiya, Global AI, Analytics, & Data Management Business Development, Unstructured Data Solutions, Dell Technologies Jun 09, 2023 6 mins Data Management feature How Capital One delivers data governance at scale With hundreds of petabytes of data in operation, the bank has adopted a hybrid model and a ‘sloped governance’ framework to ensure its lines of business get the data they need in real-time. By Thor Olavsrud Jun 09, 2023 6 mins Data Governance Data Management feature Assessing the business risk of AI bias The lengths to which AI can be biased are still being understood. The potential damage is, therefore, a big priority as companies increasingly use various AI tools for decision-making. By Karin Lindstrom Jun 09, 2023 4 mins CIO Artificial Intelligence IT Leadership brandpost Rebalancing through Recalibration: CIOs Operationalizing Pandemic-era Innovation By Kamal Nath, CEO, Sify Technologies Jun 08, 2023 6 mins CIO Digital Transformation Podcasts Videos Resources Events SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe