HypoVereinsbank (HVB) has decided to make Odyssey’s Triple'A and Advisor business solutions available to their retail branch network in Germany.
With the objective to streamline and industrialise the investment process, HVB selected Odyssey’s solution package as the best fit to meet their business needs in the coming years. The decision, which will combine the Triple'A
portfolio management platform already implemented in the bank with the latest relationship management solution Advisor, was based on a detailed business case that calculated expected cost savings over the next 5 years.
Having integrated HVB Wealth Management into the business segment Germany, the bank had identified overlaps in the wealth management functional components. Taking into consideration increasing cost pressures and the trend to industrialise the wealth management business, HVB decided to eliminate operational redundancies and set up an integrated, efficient, industrialised platform for both portfolio and relationship management. The complete wealth management business will be based on a strategic platform built on the two integrated solutions - Triple'A and Advisor, covering the full range of investment services. These range from advice-based investment proposals, made through pro-active monitoring of all portfolios with an advisory contract, to the asset management programs run by the different portfolio management departments.
HVB intends to benefit from the synergies between the private banking and the retail banking business by extending usage of the recently implemented Triple'A private banking solution. The operational strategy is based on a production department that will create new investment management products, which can be quickly rolled out and automatically monitored via the investment management platform. This will allow HVB to offer highly individualised services to different client segments, thus increasing the return on the Odyssey platform investment.
The business case includes the replacement of several existing internal applications covering both divisions, resulting in a significant reduction in the maintenance and running costs.
A unified, standardised IT structure will also allow greater flexibility as well as the potential for outsourcing non-core processes. Through the industrialisation of the business, as well as the production and distribution of banking services, HVB will become one of Europe's leading Banks in terms of cost income ratio for their private wealth management services.
The HVB retail decision follows the successful cooperation with Odyssey since 2002. The implementation of Triple’A at Bankhaus Maffei in a record time of six months and the successful implementation of Triple'A in the HVB private banking division certainly contributed to HVB's decision. The intention to move forward with Odyssey into HVB's retail business area was supported by a number of joint HVB-Odyssey activities that ensured Odyssey's solutions meet the retail business requirements - notably confirming the scalability of Triple'A, and the possibilities for easily adapting the functional coverage. Advisor was validated for its functional content and full support of the customer relationship management profiling process. Odyssey's Web User Interface will serve as a common presentation layer across the private banking and retail banking arms.
"This new strategic choice of Triple’A and Advisor by HVB is a further confirmation of the success that Odyssey is currently enjoying with German institutions, and opens a significant business opportunity for Odyssey in the fast growing retail banking segment," comments Michel Jongen, Odyssey's General Manager for Western Europe.