IBM's Expertise Nurturing Transformational Change in Fintech

A consultancy business is only as good as the knowhow it can impart onto clients. So it speaks volumes that, when asked what sets IBM Consulting apart, Lee-Han Tjioe, General Manager for Hong Kong and Macau, points to its rich and varied expertise.

“We have both business consulting and technology consulting in our scope,” Lee-Han says. “We have business consultants in our team that help clients with their strategy, with their new propositions, with defining or optimising business processes. That's one part of our practice. The other part is where we also advise on specific technology topics. So we have consultants that are very specialised in key technologies like AI and Hybrid Cloud that can help clients to achieve technology enabled major operational improvements. We basically have both deep business and technology skill sets to deliver end-to-end solutions.”

IBM has been a trusted advisory and delivery partner with high market reputation for decades, and has further developed into an eco-system provider with recent major corporate acquisitions to expand its AI and Hybrid Cloud skill sets to support clients with implementing differentiating industry and technology solutions. Today, IBM works closely and collaboratively with companies and eco-system partners to achieve required business model changes enabled by modern digital solutions which, without reliable partners, would be hard to scale at fast pace.

In many cases, IBM’s clients are international and local conglomerate companies across multiple key industries. “We are co-creating with our clients and ecosystem partners to develop new propositions and experiences, and applying best practices in a fast fashion with fast go-to-market. One example is with an insurance company that we work with on IOT for “pay-how-you-drive” insurance. And so we helped the client to actually get the right technologies into the cars to track driving behaviours and attach that to very innovative insurance propositions.”

IBM’s partnership with AXA

Another example is IBM’s strong partnership with insurance company AXA, which has endured for many years. Initially, AXA had their applications managed by providers over the world but was looking to consolidate, recognising that it was very hard to achieve consistent levels of service as well as cost-effectiveness. AXA brought IBM on board to manage those applications but also to help them innovate.

“Our partnership with AXA means that we are delivering multi-year support for the business-critical applications that AXA has,” Lee-Han continues. “Those applications are supporting distribution, sales, and key internal operations. We have transferred knowledge of 60 applications within four months and now support about 100+ applications. This is the foundation for our partnership with AXA. We are now helping with further accelerated0 deployment of API-based services on AXA’s digital platform to meet the fast developing new market needs.”

IBM Consulting and Our Transformation

IBM Consulting’s business can be broken down into four pillars: 1. Strategy Consulting, where it works with clients to define vision and blueprint for its future; 2. Experience Consulting, where Garage and Design thinking approaches are applied to redefine new experiences for clients and their customers; 3. Operations Consulting, in which it examines how it can optimise current business activity with automation and new technologies such as AI and IoT; and lastly 4. Technology Consulting, where IBM helps clients to implement or manage enterprise solutions and leverage Cloud technologies for optimising application management. 

It’s a diverse remit – but at the heart of everything the firm does is the Virtual Enterprise, IBM’s framework that helps clients in their pursuit of digital transformation. Transformation is not just about taking on technical hurdles, IBM’s depth of transformation experiences and understanding of key industry opportunities proofs a Virtual Enterprise approach can be achieved with an end-to-end vision for achieving business growth.

READ THE FULL AXA HONG KONG REPORT HERE