Westpac merges seven legacy wealth systems

Westpac wealth management arm BT Financial is consolidating seven legacy wealth management platforms into one as it enters the second stage of its new Avaloq-based 'Panorama' solution rollout.

Panorama is BT Financial’s effort to allow advisors to better manage their client's investments through a single application.

BT Financial ticked off the delivery of the cash and term deposit component of Panorama - known as BT Cash - earlier this year.

BT Cash offers users the ability to invest, make payments and receive income through one interface, which also provides access to account information and consolidated reporting.

The Panorama project, which will run for three to five years, will be delivered in several stages. A BT spokesperson said the business expected to deliver a "managed portfolio" offering from early next year, and an investment platform and self managed super fund platform by the end of 2015.

BT is approaching the overhaul by creating tangible product prototypes and using both agile and waterfall approaches to software development.

“BT is the standout wealth business amongst the banking sector,” Westpac CEO Gail Kelly today said at the bank's annual results announcement. “It is a strategic and competitive advantage for us relative to our peers.”

BT is the first Australian customer of Swiss-based Avaloq’s banking suite, which is targeted at wealth management, universal and retail banks.

Avaloq's customers also include Deutsche Bank - for wealth management back office operations - and HSBC, which is deploying Avaloq's banking suite across its global private banking business.

Retail online banking migration complete

Westpac reported a $1.1 billion investment spend on projects like the BT wealth platform in its full-year 2014 results today.

Of that, the group spent $258 million on "other technology programs" - which included the migration of server infrastructure into Westpac’s new Fujitsu data centre in Western Sydney, “significant upgrades to security applications”, and upgrades to general ledger and payroll systems.

The BT wealth platform project contributed to a $470 million spend on growth and productivity projects within Westpac over the past year.

The $470 million figure also covered the bank’s debut of cardless cash, its new 60 minute mortgage for retail and business banking home finance managers, and the completion of consumer migrations onto its new online and mobile banking platform.

The bank also announced that its Fiserv-based “Westpac Live” online banking front-end had now been rolled out to its 2.7 million consumer customers after being piloted by a limited number of internal Westpac staff last November.

Westpac will now focus its energy on rolling the platform out to its 800,000 business banking customers, which it expects to migrate over by mid-2015.

Westpac Live offers users 'real-time' displays of account balances and credit purchases, search history for three years’ worth of transactions, and mobile access to statements, interest rates and tax information.