Global spend on IT totals roughly $500 billion per year. Almost 50% of that is spent by the banking industry alone.
The banking, financial services and insurance industries have become one of SAP's most lucrative sectors, and earlier this year, this sector became the leading revenue and growth market for SAP, with a 250% year-on-year growth in terms of just licence fees.
This is because banks and financial services institutions have to be first in line when it comes to adopting cutting-edge technologies. Financial institutions favour these solutions because they offer industry-specific features, various functions and provide comprehensive support for several banking enterprise activities, including financial processes and human capital management, among others.
According to Gerald Naidoo, CEO of Logikal Consulting, banks and financial institutions have to deal with huge quantities of data. "Since banks have to keep a close eye on their credit risk and on remaining in compliance with regulatory and legislative standards, they have to constantly upgrade to new systems - a move that can be tremendously taxing on their IT departments," says Naidoo.
Naidoo adds that this puts banks in a predicament, as they cannot get rid of older data when they exchange ageing software systems and applications for updated ones. According to Naidoo, South African banks are legally obliged to retain their records for five years and some keep this data for even longer. "But simply keeping it in its outdated form will be costly, as they will have to continue to pay for software licences, data storage and maintenance."
For Naidoo, the solution to this data management problem is the implementation of an Information Lifecycle Management (ILM) solution. ILM refers to how an organisation deals with the process of managing its data through various operational stages, from initial capture right through to archiving. ILM encompasses everything from backup and data protection, to data replication and application retirement.
Logikal Consulting recently struck a deal with US-based Solix Technologies, a provider of enterprise data management including ILM, to become the manufacturer's sole distributor in SA. Naidoo believes Solix's product suite can streamline and improve business processes across various industries.
"It is cost-effective, quick and easy to deploy, secure and responds to an array of critical business needs, including compliance with those regulatory and legislative requirements that banks need to adhere to," Naidoo says. "In short, it is a solution they can bank on."
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