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Acturis tells brokers to streamline systems

01 June 2001

By Gareth Carpenter

Commercial lines technology provider Acturis wants to take advantage of the perceived consolidation of the UK broker market by targeting brokers who have acquired varying front and back office systems.

They are assuring brokers that data migration from existing systems onto Acturis will not pose a problem.

The Application Service Provider (ASP) war in commercial lines has been hotting up in recent weeks, with Rarrigini and Rosso's 24-7 Broking system making an appearance at the BIBA conference and the launch of the front end solution Covermaker in March.

Acturis co-ceo David McDonald said there was going to be a 'massive consolidation' in the UK broker market as a result of the GISC.

"GISC means that more and more brokers will face the situation of having three or four offices on different systems and they need to get them onto one platform in order to manage the business effectively" he said.

But one industry insider said factors such as current market, trading conditions and the rise of the internet would encourage brokers to merge more than the rise of the GISC.

Some industry observers are concerned about how the data from existing software house systems could easily be transferred to a remote ASP solution. Mr McDonald said Acturis had a team of people from the banking world already looking a this challenge.

"They would say that the migration challenge for reasonably small scale brokerage systems is not nearly as significant as those in banking" he said.

Co-ceo Theo Duchen insisted Acturis could accommodate brokers with a large personal lines requirement. "Personal lines is a much more standardised market there tends to be greater efficiency in it because of Polaris"

Insurance Age


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