As IBM i approaches 35 years of uninterrupted service, a paradox is emerging: the platform remains one of the most stable on the market, yet RPG/COBOL experts are retiring faster than they are being replaced. A sobering reality, and according to the IBM i Marketplace Survey 2025, 60% of CIOs now rank IBM i skills shortage among their top two concerns, second only to cybersecurity.
In this context, modernization is no longer a luxury, but the prerequisite for continuing to evolve critical applications without depending on a shrinking talent pool. While AS/400, iSeries and IBM i applications still drive key business processes, their 5250 ergonomics and delivery cycles remain disconnected from DevOps and cloud-native practices.
Business teams are demanding real-time APIs, AI-ready data streams, SaaS options... requirements that are far easier to meet within a standardized .NET ecosystem.
Our answer: a unique offering
AUMERIAL + FokkerNetwork combine their expertise to provide comprehensive support, designed to secure your application assets while preparing your IT system for modern standards. Rather than imposing a turnkey migration, our approach starts with a shared diagnostic: an assessment of your RPG/COBOL developments, a mapping of business challenges and a jointly defined roadmap.
A complete, coherent offering, backed by a team of experts, to progressively evolve towards current market standards, while guaranteeing the longevity, maintainability and scalability of your existing systems with technology choices built to last.
Build on your legacy code
Since 2016, around 70% of IBM i users surveyed by Fortra report running between 51% and 100% of their business applications on this platform, with 43% running more than 75% of their application portfolio on IBM i: the functional capital at stake is considerable.
Rather than fully rewriting your RPG/COBOL modules, our support aims to reuse your legacy code and give it a second life. Together we define the best way to transform your existing code into reusable .NET components, packaged as assemblies, exposed as services or containerized. A simple deployment on Linux, Windows or in Docker is all it takes for your modules to retain their original logic while becoming portable .NET services.
You move from a legacy monolith to an ecosystem of agile, cross-platform microservices, ready to communicate with new web, mobile or cloud-native applications.
Integrate .NET at the heart of your IT system
The rise of .NET/C# on IBM i reflects a natural evolution in architectures: while RPG and SQL remain dominant, growing language diversification is underway, and .NET/C# now ranks among the most favored choices. This hybridization leverages the modernization of free RPG, capable of calling external services, while opening the door to more agile practices.
.NET today attracts 25% of developers worldwide and relies on a rich set of modern tools: Visual Studio for development, NuGet for package management, and CI/CD pipelines for test and deployment automation. You have a unified framework for designing REST APIs, orchestrating microservices and leveraging cloud capabilities (Azure, AWS), while ensuring the maintenance and performance of your applications.
Services cover the audit of your IBM i environment, strategic consulting and the progressive refactoring of your modules into .NET services. The scope includes hybrid architecture, custom development, performance optimization and operational support. With this dual expertise, .NET becomes the backbone of your information system: a unified, scalable and agile technical foundation, built to last and designed to meet your company's evolving needs.
Maintenance and tailored support
The financial gains are tangible: the Forrester TEI study, commissioned by IBM, puts the average ROI of an IBM i modernization project at +191%, with a payback period of under six months.
To preserve stability and support the continuous evolution of your IT system, invest in dedicated maintenance and support, scaled to your priorities and your pace. By entrusting our IBM i/.NET specialists with the daily monitoring of your environments, proactive handling of change requests and rapid incident response, you secure clearly defined and controlled service levels.
Maximum reuse of your existing code significantly reduces maintenance effort. You benefit from continuous support, cost control and a progressive ramp-up, with no major risk to your operations.
Do not let the skills shortage hold back your growth. Protect your IBM i assets and open up to the standards of today and tomorrow.
AUMERIAL + FokkerNetwork
👉 Contact us now to find out more.
Visual: extract from "2025 IBM i Marketplace Survey Results", Fortra, April 2025. Data source: Fortra Research (© Fortra 2025).
