LAS VEGAS -- Rimini Street, Inc. (Nasdaq: RMNI), a global provider of end-to-end enterprise software support, management and innovation solutions, and the leading third-party support provider for Oracle, SAP and VMware software, announced that the top-ranking higher learning institute in Australia, The University of Melbourne, has engaged Rimini Street to enable greater digital innovation investments for its organization consisting of 55,000 students and 10,000 staff.

By selecting Rimini Support™, Rimini Connect™ and Rimini Protect™ for its Oracle Database, EBS and Hyperion systems, the University has eliminated the need to undertake costly, frequent upgrades without a strong ROI while gaining flexibility to innovate around its core systems. The strategic move supports the academic institute’s continuous commitment to delivering an exceptional student experience.

“Today’s students expect to be online, whether that’s curriculums or access to resources,” said Daniel Buttigieg, director of enterprise technology at the University of Melbourne. “The savings we’re achieving by moving to Rimini Street are enabling us to reinvest and refocus on developing new digital solutions and enhancing online access for our users.”

Reducing Risk for its Customized Oracle Environment with a Better Support Model by Rimini Street

Overseeing the University’s enterprise systems and services, from data centers and networks to ERP and CRM systems, Buttigieg’s remit includes the University’s ERP systems that underpin the back-office activities of financial, HR and payroll transactions, including the 300 plus customizations that have been developed along the way for specialized process and data flows.

With Oracle’s vendor support, which does not include support for these customizations, the University experienced lags in responsiveness which sometimes led to tickets sitting in queue for months without being addressed.

“Before Rimini Street, in order for us to remain supported by the vendor, we had to continually upgrade on their timeline just so when we put in a ticket, they don’t come back to us and say, ‘Sorry, but you’re not on a version we support anymore,’” said Buttigieg. “We were stuck in a perpetual cycle of upgrades, each one taking months of preparation, testing and deployment. The risks were equally high. If an upgrade or security patching goes wrong, we could lose access to things like our ERP or identity management system, which can be catastrophic for an organization of our size and the number of staff and students that we have.”

Buttigieg adds, “We weren’t seeing an investment in the platform that was appropriate to the size of the support cost that we were paying. So, by moving over to Rimini Street and not getting access to those newer releases really wasn’t impacting us because we weren’t seeing the value of that investment through our support costs.”

End-to-end Software Support and Services Enable Accelerated Digital Innovation Without the Disruption

By switching to Rimini Street, Buttigieg says they no longer worry about support for their core systems or having to dedicate funds and team focus on unnecessary upgrade activities. Confident in the value and quality of services provided by Rimini Street, the University added Rimini Connect™ for Email to ensure ongoing compatibility with email servers and take advantage of the latest security protocols.

“Rimini Support keeps our systems running smoothly, Rimini Protect offers us proactive protection against threats and vulnerabilities, and Rimini Connect extends the life of our existing release. This is all without having to perform another upgrade,” said Buttigieg.

University of Melbourne is proving that a smarter IT strategy doesn’t just save money - it opens new opportunities for innovation and growth.

“The education industry is highly competitive, and staying on the forefront of innovation requires investment of people, time and money,” said Rimini Street’s Dion Rooney, vice president, industry team and retail solutions. “We’ve helped many higher learning institutes across Australia, New Zealand and abroad, accelerate their timeline to executing their vision simply by providing better support and the ability to optimize and redirect their resources towards modernization and strategic initiatives. Now that’s a smart move that both the school and students can equally benefit from.”

Learn more about University of Melbourne’s story of innovation in collaboration with Rimini Street here.

Explore the full Rimini Street portfolio of ultra-responsive, trusted and proven support, managed services, security, integration, observability, professional services and Rimini ONE™ end-to-end outsourcing solutions for SAP, Oracle and VMware, and many more applications to support competitive advantage, profitability and growth.