Financial services IT: insurers must bite the SOA bullet

The insurance sector is set to become a forerunner in the adoption of service-oriented architecture (SOA). Insurers increasingly recognize that their neglect of back-office transformation and focus on 'quick-fix' projects in the front-office is cost-ineffective in the long-term, and fails to address their long-term challenges in distribution.

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Centrica: talk is cheap

Centrica [CNA.L] is offering its energy customers a telecoms package that boasts free evening and weekend calls. The company is responding to a difficult operating environment by leveraging the potential of bundled services, but it will not derive the full benefits until its back office is seamlessly integrated.

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Call centers: phone calls fall

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Royal Mail: call waiting

Royal Mail, the state-owned operator of the UK's postal service, has launched a residential phone service, as hinted by the company last year. The new service forms part of a series of initiatives by Royal Mail to create alternative revenue streams to improve the group's profitability ahead of the impending deregulation of the UK postal market.

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EDF Energy: outsourcing is not the only way to save

UK utility EDF Energy has outsourced its customer management systems to a number of contractors for the next three years, at a cost of GBP9 million. Some savings will come from the outsourcer, though Datamonitor analysis suggests more could be made through process efficiencies such as boosting the number of direct debit customers it serves.

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IT in life insurance: North Americans look for rapid new product development

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European asset management: BPO opportunities for service providers

Traditional providers such as State Street, HSBC and Citigroup are demonstrating a keen interest in taking over entire back-office operations of asset managers. While BPO threatens to erode the addressable market for back-office application vendors, it is simultaneously creating a new one in the form of service providers who are in need of scalable migration platforms to take on clients.

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Centrica: One.Tel could follow the AA

The proposed sale of Centrica's AA subsidiary marks a refocusing by the group on its core energy and home services proposition. As Datamonitor's Martin Yuill explains, the deal has likely implications for Centrica's last remaining non-core subsidiary, One.Tel, which it seems sure to divest once the right buyer has been found...

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Endesa: outsourcing for savings

The outsourcing of systems management can be an effective way for utilities to contain costs and improve efficiency within the competitive environment. However, the inherent pitfalls involved in relinquishing control of mission critical systems to third parties can cause as many problems as solutions.

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Royal Mail: answering the call of new markets

The Post Office is thought to be in talks with telecoms company Cable & Wireless [CW.L] and logistics company Servista with a view to penetrating the residential phone market. These developments form part of a series of initiatives launched by Royal Mail to improve profitability by diversifying into new markets, as the liberalization of the UK mail market gathers momentum.

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