Michael Jenkins, The Services Family
A new UK bank which plans to offer financial services to military veterans and “blue light” police and emergency services professional, says it will outsource the management of its IT platform to French-based Sopra Steria. The Services Family, as the bank will be called, will initially offer mortgage loans but plans to establish full retail capability by November 2018. According to Michael Jenkins, director in charge of strategy, the decision to outsource IT infrastructure and services was made because: “User-owned solutions rapidly become legacy systems and they lack the agility to benefit from advances in technology. So an enduring partnership with a ‘full spectrum’ outsourcer was appealing.” The new bank engaged consultancy EY to narrow the search for its IT partner. Sopra Steria will provide it with its core platform and will integrate software from third-party vendors.The consultancy will also help the bank collect and organise data on the functioning of digital systems and security systems. Lynn Millar, director of strategic programmes at Sopra Steria, said that the all-bracing nature of the outsourcing agreement was unusual. “It’s a different way of delivering to a bank because it is a fully outsourced managed service, from the back-end to the front-end. We are providing the full gamut and we will run it in the cloud. In practice we are the bank’s IT and back-office department.”
