AEGON, an international life insurance, pension and investment company,!ndreligare, a global financial services group have come together to launch!nsurance company. Insurance business in india is considered the fifth largest life insurance market, and growing at a rapid pace of 32-3+ per cent annually.
AEGON, an international life insurance, pension and investment company,!ndreligare, a global financial services group have come together to launch!nsurance company. Insurance business in india is considered the fifth largest life insurance market, and growing at a rapid pace of 32-3+ per cent annually.
AEGON, an international life insurance, pension and investment company,!ndreligare, a global financial services group have come together to launch!nsurance company. Insurance business in india is considered the fifth largest life insurance market, and growing at a rapid pace of 32-3+ per cent annually.
Mithi Connect Xf Case Study Aegon Religare Life nsurance Page of
Copyright 2000-2010 Mithi Software Technologies
A Business Case Study Requirement Solution Top Benefits urlve down Lhe cosL of provldlng emall lnfrasLrucLure Lo a rapldly growlng workforce, wlLhouL compromlse on performance MlLhl provlded a hybrld soluLlon of MS Lxchange wlLh CSS based ConnecL xu Lo help derlve Lhe cosL beneflLs wlLhouL compromlse on speclal feaLures or performance lasLer & Plgher 8Cl ls an auLomaLlc resulL of lower 1CC and no compromlse. Collaboration !nfrastructure for the Agile Enterprise. Aegon Religare Life Insurance Company Mithi Connect Xf Case Study Aegon Religare Life nsurance Page of Copyright 2000-2010 Mithi Software Technologies Overview CountryfRegion : !ndia !ndustry: !nsurance Customer Profile AEGON, an international life insurance, pension and investment company, Religare, a global financial services group and Bennett, Coleman 8 Company, !ndia's largest media house, have come together to launch AEGON Religare Life !nsurance Company Limited (AEGON Religare). This venture is dedicated to build a profitable customer-centric business with scale, providing a work environment that fosters excellence and innovation. AEGON Religare launched its pan- !ndia operations in July, 2008 following a multi-channel distribution strategy.. Insurance business in India The US$ +1-billion !ndian life insurance industry is considered the fifth largest life insurance market, and growing at a rapid pace of 32-3+ per cent annually. The growth of !ndian insurance industry took off after opening up of the insurance sector to private players and allowing foreign direct investment. "We wanted to have an effective e- mail solution that could bring down the cost of e-mail per employee." Srinivasan Iyengar - Director IT & Operations Email Costs trigger the search for alternatives Forrester Research (http:ffwww.forrester.com), in a study conducted by them, recently surveyed !T professionals at North American and European enterprises to find out where they run their email, calendar, contact, and task list services (what Forrester refers to as messaging or email services). Forrester found that cost is the trigger for may of these enterprises to consider shifting from their current systems. Even a back-of-the-envelope estimation of the fully loaded cost of email, factoring in costs of hardware, server software, client software, spam protection, staff, maintenance, storage, archiving, mobile email, and financing, can throw up an astoundingly high figure. Analysing and reducing the fully loaded email costs: To analyze the costs of providing email in a way that reveals where costs can be controlled, it's important to segment your employees based on what they actually need in email. So while the top executives would require a fully loaded email solution with Blackberry 8 Outlook, the middle management and information workers would need most of the email features minus the frills, and the externalffield staff can do with basic functional email. Background The parent companies - Religare Group and AEGON - were both using NS Exchange as their mailing system. So it was natural for AEGON Religare to consider following suit and adopt NS Exchange for its mailing requirements during its inception stage. However, the !ndian financial market conditions are different. The lower transaction value per customer, rapid growth and a highly competitive business environment means lower revenue per employee. The result is a pressure to keep costs low across the board. Challenge The key challenge for the !T team at AEGON Religare was to lower the cost of providing e-mail to its fast-growing employee base without compromising on key features and functionalities. Mithi Connect Xf Case Study Aegon Religare Life nsurance Page of Copyright 2000-2010 Mithi Software Technologies We are always trying to explore ways to manage costs efficiently. And this has been one of the significant projects that we have undertaken to cut costs." Rajeev Chugh - Financial Controller The implementation of Connect XD have resulted in impressive savings of between +0 and 50 percent. The results are way beyond our expectations. We have also scale tested the system for up to 20,000 users." Srinivasan Iyengar - Director IT & Operations Solution Srinivasan !yengar, Director !T 8 Operations, was aware of the cost and scalability benefits offered by Open Source but also did not want to compromise on the features required by the key employees. So he proposed implementing a hybrid solution using a combination of NS Exchange and Open Source Software. AEGON Religare decided to consider OSS based solutions as a way to lower the cost providing email to its employees. The plan was to extend the NS Exchange 2007 based email set-up for additional users. The search zeroes down to Mithi After evaluating a few open source software based email solutions, the AEGON Religare !T team zeroed in on Connect XD from Nithi - an open, scalable and adaptable email and collaboration solution. After initial rounds of discussions with the Nithi team and reference checks with Nithi's customers, they decided to do a Proof-of-Concept (POC). Key expectations from the POC Seamless integration with NS Exchange 2007 for mail-flow A Shared Address Book across both the two systems Seamless access through NS Outlook for all users. Scalability to accommodate rapid growth Implementation The POC was a success, and the team decided to go ahead with a plan to have only about 200-250 of its senior executives - those who also needed to work closely with the parent company - on Nicrosoft Exchange, while the rest of the employees, mostly from branch offices, were to be put onto Connect XD. Mithi Connect Xf Case Study Aegon Religare Life nsurance Page of Copyright 2000-2010 Mithi Software Technologies Nithi's expertise in hybrid solutions and exemplary support during and post implementation ensured that the implementation was smooth and transparent to most users," Paras Kothari, Asst. VP, IT For More Information For more information about Aegon Religare Life !nsurance, please visit http:ffwww.aegonreligare.com For more information about Nithi's products and services, please visit http:ffwww.mithi.com Mithi Solutions center Nithi can consult you to understand your requirement, and suggest the best-fit solution on open standards. To know more about how Nithi has helped over 250 of its customers derive benefit from an open solution, please visit http:ffwww.mithi.com. Nithi team worked closely with the Aegon Religare team led by Nr. Paras Kothari, Assistant vP, !T, to implement the solution while ensuring there were no disruptions in the existing system. The implementation of Connect XD resulted in impressive savings of between +0 and 50 percent. "The results are way beyond our expectations," says !yengar. Which is why !yengar doesn't see the reason why more organizations won't follow his approach given that mailboxes are a commodity. "By default you don't expect much from a mailbox. Unlike an app you don't wonder what business value it can offer or the sort of revenue it can generate. !t's just a mailbox," he says. The Open Source solution is also scalable. !yengar says he has tested his system for up to 20,000 users. "And ! don't have to deal with sophisticated or high-end servers," he says. Nithi's solution provides automated synchronisation between the Nicrosoft Active Directory and Open LDAP directory used in Connect XD to offer a global address book accessible to both NS Exchange and Connect XD users. Benefits Besides the +0-50 cost benefit on the email infrastructure, some other key benefits provided by Connect XD included - Same mail domain for the hybrid combination of Exchange and Connect XD High Reliability Easy Scalability Efficient utilization of !T resources Encouraged by the savings with Connect XD, Kothari's team recently migrated more than 1000 users from Outlook to Thunderbird to further consolidate the cost gains. Connect XD Nithi's Connect XD is currently powering the email systems of over 250 customers in !ndia and abroad. References Forrester Research - http:ffwww.forrester.comf !ndian life insurance industry - http:ffwww.ibef.orgfindustryfinsurance_industry.aspx Forrester Report on Email Cost Analysis - http:ffwww.google.comfafhelpfintlfenfadminsfpdffforrester_cloud_email_cost_analysis.pdf C!O.in Case Study: Aegon Religare Got Great Savings With an Open Source Email Solution - http:ffwww.cio.infcase-studyfaegon-religare-used-open-source-email-solution-and-saved Copyright (c) 2000-2010 Nithi Software Technologies Pvt. Ltd. All rights reserved. This paper is for informational purposes only. Nithi makes no warranties, express or implied, in this paper. Nithi Software Technologies, Nithi Connect Server, Connect XD, Connect Xf, Nithi Web Nail, Nithi Personal Address Book, Nithi Global Address Book, Nithi Corporate Directory, Baya are trademarks of Nithi Software Technologies. Other product names and brands mentioned in this document are for identification purposes only and may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.