For Immediate Release
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Castek Teams
with IBM on Enterprise Software Solutions for Insurance Companies
Customer-centric solutions cut development time,
risk and cost
Toronto, Ontario (October 25, 1999) - Castek today announced
that IBM will market Castek’s flexible, customer-centric enterprise
software solutions for the insurance industry.
The Castek solution covered under this agreement will help insurers
compete more aggressively in the new economy, improving product
launches and bolstering customer loyalty in an e-business driven
economy.
Both companies will now offer insurers a richer array of cutting-edge
technology and a higher level of e-business expertise. IBM will
remarket Insure3 (insure cubed), Castek’s component-based
insurance framework solution for P&C insurers. This can facilitate
better integration of new applications that support administrative
business processes.
"Flexible, fast product development capability that cuts time-to-market
is critical to success in the customer-centric world of e-business,"
said Andrew Williams, General Manager IBM Insurance Industry.
"Insure3, combined with key IBM e-business solutions
for the insurance industry, will help insurers anticipate and
respond to competitive market pressures."
"We are pleased about working with IBM to bring this new
class of solutions to an underserved market," said Yung Wu,
President and CEO of Castek. "The agreement, which grew out
of a common industry vision, allows us to focus on delivering
breakthrough competitive advantage to customers through strategic,
component-based enterprise software solutions and IBM’s technology
initiatives and market expertise."
Insure3 is a cost-effective, flexible component-based
software solution designed to help insurance companies easily
respond to market and regulatory changes, to quickly introduce
new products and rapidly respond to clients’ needs. It is strongly
aligned with IBM’s Insurance Application Architecture (IAA), which
provides a blueprint for application development and integration.
One company already using Insure3 is Universal Underwriters
Group, a Zurich Financial Services Group company. In fact, Universal
was instrumental in helping to create the system.
"Castek and Universal Underwriters Group worked in partnership
to create a new class of insurance systems that will revolutionize
the way we do business," said Steve Smith, CEO, Universal
Underwriters Group. "We are extremely pleased with the results
of our joint efforts. With Insure3 we can dramatically
increase service responsiveness to our customers, while slashing
time-to-market for introducing new insurance products."
"This agreement provides significant opportunities for insurers
that are looking for innovative ways to solve complex business
problems," said Alistair Cumming, VP of Business Development
at Castek. "We have developed a solution that offers significant
competitive advantage for our clients. When we combine this with
IBM’s world-class capabilities in e-business, implementation services
and market vision, the possibilities for a new era of flexibility
and innovation in the Insurance market are within our grasp."
About IBM
IBM is the world's largest information technology company, with
80 years of leadership in helping businesses innovate. IBM Software
offers the widest range of application, middleware and operating
systems for all types of computing platforms, allowing customers
to take full advantage of the new era of e-business. The fastest
way to get more information about IBM software is through the
IBM Software home page at http://www.software.ibm.com/
IBM Global Insurance is the leading provider of end-to-end, enterprise,
e-business solutions to the insurance and financial services industry.
We bring together extensive industry expertise with a broad array
of IBM products and services spanning e-business, software, hardware
and consulting services, to help companies address industry concerns
such as customer loyalty, revamping to compete in a global market,
launching e-commerce -- selling and servicing online, financial
services marketshare, optimizing claims relationships, business
transformation, operational efficiency, security and risk management
and other issues. For more information about IBM, you can visit
http://www.ibm.com/solutions/insurance on the Internet.
About Castek
Castek Software Factory Inc. is an innovative information technology
firm with offices in Toronto and Ottawa, Ontario; Cary, North
Carolina, and operations across North America. The company’s focus
is the delivery of strategic, component-based business software
solutions to the financial services sector.
Founded in 1990, Castek is recognized as the pioneer and leading
practitioner of component-based development and application assembly
from pre-built, reusable software components, delivering systems
that are substantially more flexible, maintainable, and configurable
than any other industry alternative. Castek was recently ranked
as #29 in the 100 Top Independent Software Companies in Canada.