UKFS Automation Innovation for Origo

Posted on by alansherriff

CBoxx are wrapping up the latest assignment with Origo to conduct comprehensive business case analysis and feasibility research for a series of new industry automation opportunities within the UK financial services industry. At this stage, everything is still confidential so I can only write in outline terms…

The work has entailed developing the first spark of an idea into a realisable concept, then finding and forming an industry working group of interested parties within that area of the market. Through a process of collaboration with the market and Origo experts we then find out the common needs, individual capabilities, specific challenges, business priorities and then propose a set of possible solution options. Group discussions and feedback then refine those options into a preferred approach, that is often a combination of the “best bits” of each.

A concise, costed business case is then generated and presented to the leadership team, enabling them to easily understand the business, technical and commercial parameters of each proposed project and confidently make an informed business decision within their own strategic framework.

The real excitement of this type of work is meeting and learning from experienced practitioners and experts in their field. Of course, there is “the journey” that through constant questioning, listening, revising & refining ideas, can sometimes unveil innovative new approaches to tackling industry problems that were not evident at the outset. Lightbulb moments!

Despite the turmoil of 2020, CBoxx believe that 2021 promises a great deal for Origo and the forward march of digitisation within the financial services industry.

More Projects Successfully Delivered

Posted on by alansherriff

CBoxx are pleased to announce that two more significant UK financial services upgrade projects, supported by CBoxx consultants, have gone live recently:

Origo Options Service Upgrade

The market leading Origo Options Transfers service has just had a major update to bring it in line with the latest UKFMPG Market Practice for Re-registration using ISO 20022 messaging over the Swift network plus the rollout of a set of new features and enhancements such as:

  • The incorporation of intermediate unit holders (third party administrators) into the re-registration process;
  • Support for a broader product range, including pension wrappers;
  • Wider coverage of asset types;
  • Richer data capture.

CBoxx played a key role in analysis, design and development for this project; utilising our in depth knowledge of the industry market practice and ISO20022 messaging standards to ensure that the business process and message workflows conformed to market practice, whilst designing and presenting a concise, informative, easy to use user experience.

Upgrading St James’s Place Wealth Management to Time4Advice CURO 2v0

CBoxx provided Agile project management services to Time4Advice for the delivery of a project to comprehensively upgrade the St James’s Place Wealth Management CURO CRM system. SJP are a leading FTSE 100 UK wealth manager with over £70 billion funds under management. CURO is a financial advice specific customisation of Microsoft Dynamics CRM used by an ever increasing proportion of the SJP adviser network, known as the Partnership. The year long project delivered:

  • An upgrade of the underlying Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 to the very latest, cutting edge CRM 2016 version;
  • This required upgrading, with no data loss or degradation of working hour services, through three intermediate versions of Dynamics;
  • T4A worked closely with SJP UX specialists to deliver a fresh new UX design that was incorporated across the whole system;
  • All SJP systems integrations were fully upgraded and tested;
  • Functional enhancements were designed and delivered across the system;
  • T4A also worked closely with SJP business systems to deliver a whole new set of scalable, performance tested, secure, cloud based production and test environments on Amazon Web Services (AWS).

CBoxx provided Agile project management services from the initial scoping phase through delivery of every phase of work to the live launch process and then post implementation support. Essential to the success of the project was fostering close communication between all project stakeholders throughout, coupled with thorough but flexible planning and the maintenance of detailed records of all works conducted. Technically, the massive volumes of data involved and links to critical systems required extremely careful testing, attentiveness to data security and risk management throughout.