ASPEN brings Wealth Management to Vienna

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The Anglo Irish Bank plc has carried out its largest IT-/operations project to date with banking software specialists SDS Wien and Odyssey Luxembourg. In the future, all pan-European wealth management operations of the Irish bank are to be centrally controlled from Vienna. The international "transaction platform" is set to support the bank's operations in Vienna, Dublin, London and Geneva. Vienna has been using the new system since the summer of 2003, while Dublin started using it this year. London and Geneva are set to follow in 2005.

The idea to name the new IT project ASPEN came to the project manager John Butler as he was skiing in the Rocky Mountains near Aspen in Colorado. Shortly thereafter, his colleague, the bank director John O'Connell, started one of the biggest projects in the history of the Anglo Irish Bank: he sought a solution to merge the IT infrastructure and the back office of the wealth management departments of the entire banking group and control them from a centralised location. The project to centralise the wealth management divisons IT- /operations should guarantee the employees in the front and middle offices a even better and quicker customer service. Each office will be able to access its own system.

In a mere one and half years the European IT team (consisting of 50 persons) of the Anglo Irish Bank, along with the Viennese banking software specialists "Software Daten Service" (SDS) and the Luxembourg-based wealth management experts "Odyssey Asset Management Systems", have designed a private banking transaction platform that will run all future investment processes automatically. This solution helps to save time and costs and increases efficiency and speed of customer service.This enables the operations department to focus his attention on exception management and value-added customer service.

Out from Vienna to the whole world

According to the Chief Executive of the Austrian office, Desmond O'Houlihan, it was only a matter of time before Vienna became the administration centre of all the banking group's wealth management operations. "There were already very good software specialists in the office in Vienna who were capable of undertaking a project of this magnitude in close cooperation with the IT experts in Dublin's head office", explained O'Houlihan. The Austrian technical crew have very good linguistic qualifications and the necessary IT know-how to develop the right gateways for each different IT system. "That suited us down to the ground, because SDS met our requirements and they are based in Vienna too. The Vienna office already had the biggest wealth management department of the entire banking group with regards to profits made. Furthermore the quality of the local operation staff is second to know leaving Vienna with a clear starting advantage", added O'Houlihan.

The three solutions: AIBA – GEOS – Triple'A

ASPEN consists of three solutions: AIBA, GEOS and Triple'A. These had to be integrated onto a wealth management platform, in order to be able to simplify the investment process. The long-serving banking system of the Anglo Irish Bank Austria , known as AIBA, had to be connected and aligned with SDS' product GEOS and Odysseys Software Triple'A in such a way that the different systems could communicate with each other. AIBA already existed as a host of all customer accounts. GEOS provides the system "securities processiong system engine" while Triple'A is used to provide customer reports and portfolio modelling.

The SDS product GEOS (Global Entity Online System) is the most used system in Austrian banks. This integrated online system enables high-performance straight through processing (STP) of all securities transactions in real-time. In this way, the transactions in Ireland, Isle of Man, Switzerland and Austria are all standardised and supported by a joint, multi-national back office – which is now located in Vienna.

Odyssey's Triple'A is the window to the system: The well thought-out Portfolio Management System solution was designed for Investor Relations, portfolio managers and the employees of the front and middle offices, and should result in an even better management of investment portfolios. With this new device, asset allocation processes can be customised and complex portfolios can be automatically composed. Real-time analyses are also possible. The solution provides sophisticated analytic tools and performance measures and facilitates customer reporting.

Banking system of the highest complexity

"As far as its complexity goes, this new solution is unique worldwide", informed Gary Browne, project implementation manager who has been working in Vienna for the past four years. "Far larger banking institutions have failed in their previous attempts to carry out a project of this kind. For a time it was even thought to be impossible. The difficult thing in all of this was connecting together the necessary systems and software products in different languages – and taking into account every specific banking law in each country," explained Browne.

Desmond O´Houlihan seems to be satisfied with the development of the system in the new Wealth Management IT/Operations headquarters in Vienna: "We Viennese have been working with the new system since July 2003, and our investment bankers in Dublin have had it since July 2004. Because of the immense amount of time and money it saves, our CRMs are able to address the customer's wishes regarding product conception and develop new investment strategies, which leads to an increased level of customer services." The system is set to be in production in London by the end of the first quarter of 2005, followed by Geneva at the start of 2006.

Automated investment process in practice

If new shares are added to the portfolio, the Relationship Manager is activated across a Triple'A web user interface into the program Triple'A. When customer and shares data are entered, a message is automatically sent to the execution order desk (trading desk), which forwards the information on to the broker. This puts the order on the market and confirms the deal. With this confirmation, a message is generated, which is then received by the securities back office in Vienna, who processes the transaction. The back office in Vienna has to ensure that all transactions settle on a timely basis and correct errors reported by the securities electronic trade confirmation system.

Anglo Irish Bank Corporation plc
The Anglo Irish Bank Corporation plc is an Irish listed banking group that operates in the fields of finance, treasury, private banking and funds management. The group has offices in Ireland, the United Kingdom, on the Isle of Man, Austria, Switzerland and the United States.

Anglo Irish Bank (Austria) AG
The Anglo Irish Bank (Austria), the subsidiary company of the Anglo Irish Bank Corporation plc, and its own daughter company, the funds specialists AIBC Anglo Irish Bank (Austria) GmbH, advise a wide range of Austrian and international customers in the fields of private banking and corporate treasury. The funds management firm administers a broad spectrum of investment funds, which is spearheaded by the Anglo Irish Euroland Equity´s outstanding performance in the last few years.

Software Data Service
SDS is a subsidiary company of T-Systems International GmbH (TSI). Founded in Vienna in 1993, the company specialises in the development of banking software for the international market and achieved its biggest success to date with its development of GEOS. GEOS offers Realtime STP software for securities and derivatives with an integrated front, middle and back office functionality for the private and retail banking businesses of international financial service providers. GEOS has a 90% share in the bonds transactions market in Austria.

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