Fujitsu wins five-year Royal London processing contract

Fujitsu has won a five year processing contract with assurance firm Royal London. Fujitsu will host Royal London’s VME (Virtual Machine Environment) operating system and deliver mainframe operations, support functions, processing, applications and development.

The VME operating system represents legacy infrastructure which needs to remain in place for the duration of its policy book. Royal London required a low risk, cost effective solution, whilst ensuring long term support for applications needed for many years.

“The customer experience is our primary focus. On this application, we have an estimated 1.5 million policies to service. Our main concern was ensuring that customers are not adversely affected, either during the transition of the hosting of the mainframe, or through the continued support,” said Andy McGarrie, chief technology officer at Royal London.

“By handing over the support of this IT platform to Fujitsu, we can also ensure that we focus on driving technological innovation within the business, allowing us to truly adopt a ‘hybrid’ approach, maintaining legacy where needed and driving innovation where possible.”

During the initial five-year contract, which includes improved disaster recovery services, Fujitsu will enable Royal London to maintain customer service and seek to make the applications more agile and efficient.

“For many organisations there remains a practical requirement to ensure they maintain legacy mainframes, even as the wider business adopts new, innovative platform solutions,” said Anne MacRae, head of financial services, Fujitsu UK & Ireland. “That’s why VME remains an integral part of the technological infrastructure that we call hybrid IT.”