Multi-Provider Development Framework for a Major Austrian Insurance Company
Well-defined processes
Governance
Open and scalable solution
Project Brief
Define a new multi-provider software development framework to boost development capacity and promote vendor independence.
After the first workshop, we were sure that Profinit, with their software engineering expertise and knowledge, were the right partner for us.
Client’s comments
We’ve respected this client’s wish to remain anonymous
Challenge
With a presence in more than 30 countries, our client is the no. 1 insurance provider in Central and Eastern Europe. As an industry leader, the client places great emphasis on ensuring time-to-market, IT service delivery and development capacity are all geared toward providing a superior customer experience.
But at the end of 2018, the client’s IT departments began to encounter significant obstacles in meeting these goals. While business was being held back due to the reliance of core systems and applications on single vendors, the global shortage in software engineering talent was hindering efforts at increasing development capacity. This in turn led to the adoption of suboptimal practices across the organisation.
Our client knew decisive action was required to change the status quo. Faced with the task of considerable modernisation, they invited various vendors to pitch for a solution. The goal? To define a new multi-provider software development framework.
Business Needs
The solution needed to meet the following targets:
- Decrease time-to-market and increase business value
- Optimise IT service delivery
- Deliver a great customer experience
- Mitigate the risk of vendor lock-in
- Upgrade capacity to meet end-user demand and innovation
Solution
Profinit and one other vendor were selected to collaborate with the client on defining the multi-provider framework. Lasting from November 2018 to September 2019, the project was divided into 6 synchronised streams. Profinit was assigned to lead the implementation and maintenance stream, with the remaining streams designated as follows:
• Demand and requirements management (client)
• Architecture, design and system integration (client)
• Environments, deployments, operations and release management (another vendor)
• Quality assurance (client)
• Guidelines and documentation (client)
While principally responsible for overseeing their own streams, each vendor also reviewed other streams as part of an overall collaborative effort. All outputs were continuously validated by small POC teams, each focusing on a specific part of the framework.
At the end of this 10-month period of intensive effort, the client received a fully-realised, full-featured framework rooted in software engineering best practices ready for immediate release.
Project Summary
We collaborated with the client and one other partner to deliver a multi-provider software development framework definition resulting in positive business outcomes (see across):
- Full-featured multi-provider software development framework definition
- Risk of vendor lock-in mitigated to support growth
- Open solution enabling any company member or external partner to join
- End-to-end software development, delivery and IT governance
- Fully scalable and capable of supporting multiple vendors