The UK-based Co-operative Bank, the banking and
insurance arm of the world’s largest consumer co-operative, has
installed a centralised Teradata data warehouse platform and
Microgen software as part of its core Financial Transformation
Programme. Douglas Blakey reports.
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The
Co-operative Bank’s (Co-op) ongoing and wide-ranging Financial
Transformation Programme, has resulted in major contract wins for
Teradata and Microgen. US-headquartered Teradata secured its first
partner bid with Microgen to re-engineer the accounting process of
Co-op, at the expense of rival vendors, including Oracle.
The first phase of the project –
the replacement of its legacy core banking systems – has been
delivered for corporate customers and will go live next year for
retail customers.
In 2009, Co-op concluded that its
legacy infrastructure, while fit for purpose, was unsuitable for
future needs. It elected to replace its legacy system with the
Finacle core banking platform from Infosys as a central element of
its business transformation programme.
Finacle is replacing Co-op’s
systems across the back-office and channels in the retail and
corporate banking businesses.
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By GlobalDataAs part of the programme, Co-op
required to augment its new IT platform with a world class business
intelligence environment.
According to Teradata, the bank
purchased its Financial Services Data Model (FSLDM) to act as a
solid foundation for credit risk and accounting based business
intelligence.
Within the programme, Microgen’s
Accounting Hub (MAH) and Microgen Aptitude is used to feed the
general ledger (GL) and the Teradata data warehouse with finance
information.
Elizabeth Sipiere, divisional MD
EMEA and Asia-Pacific at Microgen, told RBI: “MAH supports
customer account level journal information as well as summary GL
data.
“It is this level of detail that
enables the bank to align risk and finance data back to the GL and
group financial statements using the transparent and open MAH
architecture on Teradata.”
Kevin Long, business development
manager, UK and Ireland, Teradata, told RBI the combined
Microgen-Teradata solution could cope with ease if Co-op emerges as
the successful bidder for the 600 branches to be sold by Lloyds
Banking Group.
“Teradata and Microgen is more than
capable of such a branch network increase – the system features
linear scaleability and we have absolute confidence in its ability
to manage a huge increase in branches and customer numbers,” Long
added.
David Sherriff, CEO, Microgen, told
RBI: “If you look at environments where very high volumes
come into play, such as retail banks of any significance, in order
to get the performance these banks are looking for, we really offer
the only option.
“That is the combination of the
Microgen software and the Teradata platform, and together they can
deal with that kind of scale and volume of transactions.
“It is worth noting that Oracle
attempted this project prior to us getting involved.”
Long says Teradata has been working
with the retail unit of Co-op for many years, but this deal is the
vendor’s first with the banking unit.
“Our close relationship with
Microgen is viewed as strategic within Teradata. Together with
Microgen, we have a range of solutions that will benefit the market
and we are committed to delivering on this new and exciting
business intelligence application,” he says.
Sipiere adds that the significance
of such IT investment cannot be underestimated in the current
climate.
“There is a big issue in many banks
at the moment that their risk numbers and finance numbers may not
match up,” she said.
Ian Wade, change manager at Co-op, says: “We are delighted to
have signed a contract with Teradata and Microgen. Together, they
offered us a cost effective, scalable solution that offers new
insight for our accounting and credit risk business community.”
