Financial services group Friends Provident has extended
its use of Indian IT outsourcing supplier Wipro, handing the firm
two more projects after its success developing a Friends Provident
web portal for the processing of pensions applications by
independent financial advisers.
Friends Provident, whose 2005 preliminary figures were out last
week, has been working with Wipro since 2001. It uses the firm to
give it the flexibility to deal with peaks in IT demand, but it is
only recently that Friends Provident has felt ready to move most of
the management of some IT projects offshore.
Mike Shapland, Friends Provident's head of IT solutions
delivery, said the company's relationship with the supplier had
matured in the past year, enabling it to "play to Wipro's
strengths".
He said that, in the past, Friends Provident has used Wipro
either to supply workers onshore in the UK to fill gaps in its
project teams, or to undertake offshore software development to
tight specifications set by the IT department. But Shapland said
that it had becoming increasingly clear that such an approach was
not making the most of the resources available.
"Handing an outsourcer more control of an IT project is a big
step to take, and it was not something we were comfortable with at
first. But the success of the web portal project, which was a pilot
development project for Wipro, has shown how effectively the
relationship has moved on."
In that project, Shapland said Friends Provident had been
careful to maintain close communications between the two firms,
with some Friends Provident staff working under Wipro's project
management. "I would say it was 80% Wipro-resourced, leaning on
Friends Provident expertise where necessary."
And like any in-house project, Shapland said that Wipro had to
get its design approved to meet Friends Provident's architectural
standards, as well as getting sign-off at various points along the
way. "Having said all that, the build stage was largely completed
offshore," he added.
IT projects at Friends Provident commonly last between 12 and 15
months. The company has handed Wipro management control for two
more projects, as well as running key subsidiary strands of several
other in-house IT programmes.
"Our first responsibility is of course to in-house people and
managing their workloads, but there is still plenty for Wipro to
get involved with," said Shapland.
"Giving work to an outsourcer also requires the right sort of
projects. So far, Wipro has been used for traditional
mainframe-type projects. We are very aware of the need not to lose
in-house expertise in certain key areas where we need to keep
developing our capabilities.
"That means that leading-edge e-commerce-type projects will
always remain in-house, if only to safeguard our capabilities."
Shapland said Friends Provident's use of technology was a key
differentiator in a crowded and competitive marketplace, and it was
important not to lose control of that.
But he said there had been few problems with the shift towards
working more closely with an offshore outsourcing supplier and
getting more from its talent pool.
"Wipro now has a huge reserve of talent and vast resources, so
there is a clear advantage to be gained from tapping into that. Of
course, we still want to keep a degree of control by building in
checkpoints along the way, but that is just good practice."