Published

  • White Papers
  • 14.04.2014 10:44 am
  • Darren Stevens, Director at Bravura Solutions

While the life insurance industry continues to experience growth, there is an inherent fragility in a sector being weighed down by its legacy business. A complex web of antiquated technology systems bows each time a new product is brought to market or a regulatory change needs to be accommodated. 

We are, however, standing at the precipice of a technological revolution in this space. 

Players are taking steps to modernise, consolidate and rationalise IT systems, and there is rising popularity of alternative distribution channels, opening up new ways to engage with consumers. 

In the face of an aging population and a burgeoning wave of demand for innovative and targeted products, there are a host of opportunities for those that take the vital steps towards modernisation. 

In this paper we have identifed ten major industry trends around operations, technology, product development, consumer behaviour and overall innovation, and asses their impact and the role each plays in the future of the life insurance sector. 

  1. Steady growth
  2. Challenging legacy rationalisation
  3. Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) 
  4. Regulatory and capital pressures
  5. D2C, afliation marketing and big data
  6. Poor fnancial performance
  7. Little true product development
  8. Competition with platforms
  9. Online support and mobility 
  10. Rise of niche players

- See more at: http://www.financialit.net/white-paper/life-insurance-snapshot--10-industry-trends-shaping-the-landscape/94#sthash.SjVdqjhn.dpuf

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  • 09:00 am
In the first quarter of 2014 ARQA Technologies carried out installation of QUIK software in 4 investment companies and banks. 2 clients have installed a new solution based on QORT software reporting trades to the repository NRD (reQORT).

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  • Case Studies
  • 10.04.2014 08:00 pm

How seek, an ASX-listed online employment websites provider increased automation and visibility in cash and risk management through implementing a new treasury system.How seek, an ASX-listed online employment websites provider increased automation and visibility in cash and risk management through implementing a new treasury system. 

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  • Reports
  • 10.04.2014 08:00 pm

EMIR requires CCPs who wish to continue to trade in the European Union to arrange for accreditation based on new regulatory requirements. Accreditation is accompanied by identification of the financial instruments or type of contracts that each CCP is authorized to clear.

On March19, NASDAQ OMX was the first CCP to be awarded ESMA accreditation. The others are expected to follow fairly rapidly.

This accreditation is one of the prerequisites for implementation of the clearing obligation which will be imposed on a number of standard contracts. Nevertheless, this can only actually enter into effect once ESMA has published the list of asset classes which will be subject to it. And it will take at least 6 months before this list is published, at which time the clearing obligation for the products ESMA deems eligible will be retroactive for ongoing contracts.

Other Reports

  • 04:00 am

Diasoft , a global provider of financial software solutions, is named among Top 5 Global Leaders of Celent Big Leagues Table 2013 for the gross number of deals won in 2012-2013. The results were introduced by Celent in its annual The Big Leagues 2013: Core Platform Sales Ranking issued in February 2014. The report provides a detailed look at core banking deals and measures the number of new banking deals that vendors won in the 12 months between July 1, 2012 and June 30, 2013.

In this report, Celent uses a weighted score designed to assess the value of deals won, rather than merely the number of deals. Celent believes that a sales ranking should include both the size of the deals and an adjustment for the geographical location of the implementation. With that view, Celent introduced the Big Leagues Table to compare how various core banking vendors performed across the world. The report provides a geographical analysis of North America, Latin America, Western Europe, Asia-Pacific, and Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, together with a detailed vendor analysis.

“We are proud to be ranked among Top 5 Leaders globally this year”, said Mikhail Kryuchkov, Director, Global Markets, Diasoft. “This recognition indicates that our customers recognize the value of Diasoft component-based SOA-compliant financial solutions incorporating the most advanced architectural principles and standards.  As we remain to provide our customers with necessary business and technological agility, we expect our position as a world`s leading software solutions provider will continue to rise.”

“Celent is bullish about the core market,” says Dan Latimore, Senior Vice President with Celent’s Banking Group and coauthor of the report. “Standardization initiatives are gaining momentum, and as IT development evolves toward simplicity and modularity, core adoption will become easier to justify.”

“The cycle time for new channels and products will continue to shorten,” adds Stephen Greer, Analyst with Celent’s Banking Group and coauthor of the report. “As complexity grows, vendors will undoubtedly be at the forefront of innovation, with core banking deals not far behind.”

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  • White Papers
  • 07.04.2014 08:00 pm

Many companies are still trying to understand the difference between Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) and Application Software Provider (ASP) in treasury. To make it worse, technology terms such as “cloud,” “hosted,” etc. add to the confusion. But what is all the fuss about anyway? Why should choosing between a SaaS or ASP solution matter to you?  This guide explains the fundamental differences between these two types of offerings and clarifies how the power of SaaS technology delivers much more value to you and your ability to manage treasury and risk in a dynamic global business environment. With SaaS, you can forget about the technology and focus on what’s possible for you to manage and grow your business.

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  • 04:00 am

Leading financial institution, The Saudi Investment Bank (SAIB) announced the selection of iCreate’s Biz$core Fintellix Decision Enablement Solution as a comprehensive platform to enable the bank’s DW/BI strategy. On the threshold of the next level of growth, SAIB required an enterprise-grade innovation that could address its tactical business and compliance challenges as well as augment their strategic decision making capability.

The engagement will involve the deployment of iCreate’s Banking DW/BI platform in line with SAIB’s requirements, data extraction, a web-based portal with necessary infrastructure to access the reports, deployment of Self-service BI layer and will cover business-critical areas such as Islamic Retail Banking and Corporate Banking.

Speaking on the occasion, SAIB's GM – IT and Shared Services, Mr. Al-Obaid said, “SAIB has always made investments in proven Analytics/BI platforms as part of our overarching Information Management strategy. We chose Biz$core Fintellix for its ability to function as a backbone for our enterprise-wide BI requirements. iCreate will help us lay the foundation for enabling a strong decision support system and improve current discipline of information governance at SAIB”.

Amit Agarwal, iCreate’s Global Head for Business Development, said, “I am delighted to partner with a specialised bank like SAIB in their DW/BI journey. I am confident that Biz$core Fintellix will establish a holistic information management platform for  SAIB. This is a significant win for us in a region that has high potential for a solution like Biz$core Fintellix”.

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  • 05:00 am

Diasoft, a global provider of cutting-edge software solutions for front-to-back automation of financial services, introduces its new offering - Diasoft Balance, “Procurement Management”.

Diasoft Balance – is a fully-functional and multi-component solution, developed in accordance with the business-processes based approach. It ensures automation of supplier contract accounting processes of financial institution.

Diasoft specialists have developed and introduced to the market “Procurement Management” component in order to provide its customers with extended functionality of  Diasoft Balance solution.

With “Procurement Management” all the processes, including initialization, approval and realization of procurement procedures, holding of the tender and evaluation of existing suppliers become structured and optimized in terms of time. It allows forming procurement plan basing on existing as well as on potential contracts. New component appears to be a logical extension of Diasoft Balance supplier contract accounting functionality.

Diasoft Balance “Procurement Management” supports the following business-processes:

  • Procurement composition
  • Generation of Tender documentation
  • Organization of Tender committee meetings
  • Forming of procurement plan
  • Periodic assessment of suppliers

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  • 08:00 am
New status of Diasoft confirms the availability of certified specialists with deep technical expertise, skills and competence that are critical for installation, configuration and support of PureFlex system. It is important to highlight that since 2011 Diasoft has its own PureFlex suite within company`s “Center of Competence” that allows testing and adapting IBM solution to Diasoft products for almost 3 years. With IBM PureFlex Diasoft increases quality of company`s solutions on a daily basis and decreases man-hours spent on routine tasks.

IBM PureFlex – is a complete, flexible cloud infrastructure system that integrates and optimizes all compute, storage and networking resources to deliver infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) out of the box. This innovative solution can be configured for any specific business needs and may be complemented by a package of support services.

With PureFlex Diasoft customers obtain balanced solution, complementing computing resources, data storage and network infrastructure, optimized for FLEXTERA and other solutions of the company. Moreover, IBM system ensures increased speed of Diasoft`s solutions installation, requires fewer efforts and simplifies maintenance of IT-infrastructure.

Diasoft has successfully implemented IBM PureFlex in Capital Moscow Bank. With PureFlex system Diasoft was able to prepare and implement working and testing environment for FLEXTERA solution in a record time. Moreover, the experts from Diasoft’s Competency center together with IBM’s specialists deployed an integrated hardware and software platform PureFlex in BANK just within 5 days, after which they proceeded to configuring FLEXTERA applications. As a result the whole process of FLEXTERA implementation was performed in terms, exceeding all expectations of žBANK.

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  • 08:00 am
Diasoft, a global provider of cutting-edge financial software solutions supporting all aspects of banking and insurance businesses, is featured in a report evaluating providers of Insurance Policy Administration Systems by Celent, available to insurers in the EMEA region.
 
In the report EMEA Policy Administration Systems 2013: General Insurance ABCD Vendor View Celent looks at policy administration systems available to insurers in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. This report profiles 52 policy administration systems for EMEA personal and commercial insurance products and focuses on the property and casualty systems, non-life or general insurance systems depending on the country.
 
FLEXTERA Insurance is an innovative front-to-back STP solution catering for every aspect of the Insurance Business. The functional scope of FLEXTERA Insurance covers all major business needs of the companies specializing in General Insurance, Life Insurance, and Re-Insurance. FLEXTERA solutions provide Insurance companies with the most advanced mechanisms ensuring high-level customer servicing, distribution chain management, claims processing, policy and product management, billing, financial control, and business intelligence.
 
The solution is built on JavaEE technology in full compliance with SOA principles and was developed in tight collaboration with IBM — a globally acknowledged SOA industry leader. Due to its component-based SOA-architecture and business process-based approach to automation, the solution can be tailored to fit any individual business and technological requirements of the most dynamic Insurance companies.
 
FLEXTERA Insurance provides comprehensive tools for the management of the whole policy life cycle, including automated application management; underwriting; policy quoting, issuance, and endorsement; generation and management of supporting document; accounting procedures; automatic batch or manual renewal; work with prepackaged and individual policies; and management of the full history of policy versions.
 
“Large transformation projects are always risky and difficult with examples of the effects of poor execution available across EMEA,” says Craig Beattie, Senior Analyst with Celent’s Insurance Group and author of the report. “The evaluation in this report represents Celent opinion mixed with our feedback from the insurer community as well as our involvement in selection and implementation projects. There is never a single best answer for all insurers but we believe the data held herein provides the most detailed view of the vendors in this market and will aid any selection project or IT strategy review. ”
 
In comparison to most insurance solutions FLEXTERA Insurance enables real time integration with the company General Ledger for the immediate update of the company financial data.
FLEXTERA solutions are built on the principles of separated operational product accounting and regulatory financial accounting. The back office systems which are responsible for product management operate with internal product accounting data and do not record transactions into financial accounting systems. A special tool — FLEXTERA Accounting Engine — converts operational product accounting data into financial accounting forms in accordance with national and international accounting rules and standards. Such independence enables the use of various accounting methodologies and adjustment to the local regulatory peculiarities without the need to change the business logic of a financial institution and allows the Insurer to generate sophisticated management reports for multi-sided analysis of products, branches and staff performance.
 
“Our FLEXTERA solution has achieved a strong baseline of good functionality and incorporates modern technologies that allowed it to be named among the top market players by Celent”, said Alexander Budnik, VP, Head of Insurance Business, Diasoft. “We are proud of this achievement and plan to continue the development of our product offering to ensure the business agility and technological flexibility to our customers in order to deliver the best insurance services”.

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