Central Banking System

DEF3000 - a synonym for a new strategy

Bank Ochrony Środowiska has decided to overhaul the Central Banking System. The undertaking has been given the status of one of the key projects listed in the strategy of BOŚ. It lays down an intensive expansion of the bank in the energy efficiency sector and modernization of the sources of thermal energy and electricity.

The new central system has been recognized as a necessary tool to respond flexibly to market demands, especially in the area of products related to the protection of the environment and ecology. The key criteria for the selection of the new system were advanced technology and short implementation time.

The BOŚ Management Board has decided to entrust this to the provider who proved itself during a longterm cooperation. It has been decided that the def3000 developed by Asseco Poland from scratch will be the new Central Banking System.

The new central system has allowed us to integrate the IT solutions already in use, which translates, among other things, into a greater level of security. It also provides a basis for further development of the IT infrastructure in line with our strategy.
Adam Grzebieluch
Vice President of the BOŚ Management Board

One step ahead of schedule

Asseco Poland for the supply and implementation of a comprehensive def3000 IT system. In November 2010 – more than three months before the deadline – Asseco launched the def3000/TR (Treasury) module; and in September 2011 – nine months before the deadline – the def3000/CL module (for clearings in foreign currency).

Also, the handing over of the system to testing and evaluation took place two months earlier than it would have appeared from the approved schedule.

Before starting the Central Banking System, many related projects had to be done first, such as the data warehouse system and the implementation of the new system of public filing. As many as 30 applications used in the bank had to be adapted.

An important factor determining the success of the bank was to prepare on the regulatory and organizational sides by means of training and changes in processes and internal regulations. The participation of representatives of the bank branches in the testing stage and in the development of the User Manual was not to be underestimated.
Marcin Stalpiński
Director of the Central Banking System Office

Benefits for the client

The integration of the central system with other applications used by BOŚ will allow for a cost-effective extension of the scope of provided services. It will also shorten the time required for transfer order completion, as well as give flexibility of shaping the parameters of the transaction, which will allow the clients to customize transactions according to their individual expectations. It will also increase the number of employees involved in direct customer service, which is especially important given the scheduled increase in the BOŚ bank branches.

Launching the Central Banking System will allow us to shorten the time of introducing new products on the market, improve the efficiency of processes related to customer service and back-office area, which undoubtedly will increase the competitiveness of BOŚ on the market.
Mariusz Klimczak
President of the BOŚ Management Board

Success secret

On 11 June 2012, the migration of transactional data was successfully completed, which enabled the production launch of the major banking systems: the transactional banking system (def3000 Core Banking) and the general ledger (def3000 General Ledger). However, this event was preceded by many months of hard work done by both implementation teams.

The implementation of the Central Banking System – in IT jargon words – was “brought off” according to the schedule approved beforehand. This is worth emphasizing because such long-term, high-level and extremely advanced projects are quite often delayed, which is usually caused by unexpected issues. Also, the very launch, which took more than 110 hours, was carried out as planned accurate within a few minutes.
Marcin Walentynowicz
Director of IT Department at BOŚ

Good cooperation was pointed out from the very beginning of the project. The project started with a series of team building workshops. Also, good atmosphere was the focus during several months of working together, which greatly reduced the distance between the members of the project teams. The effects could be appreciated in the climax, at the start of production, which required the implementation of almost a thousand tasks, as the teams were fatigued and stressed out as a result of a few days of continuous work.

One of the biggest challenges faced by those implementing the project was the abandonment of the transitional period during which both the old and the new systems are usually kept running. This gives rise to additional operational risks. To avoid them, a rapid migration of a large number of extremely important data on clients and transactions is required.

Looking back, I ask myself a question: How did it happen that for the duration of the project there wasn’t even a delay of 1%, while a number of IT projects have this problem on a much larger scale? It was because of the people who were carefully selected for the role given in the project. These individuals despite everyday problems worked with the vision of the end result, overcame internal and external obstacles pursuing the goal step-by-step. This would not happen if it was not for the well thought out and constantly monitored action plan. The work on the project was laid out accurate within a few hours, and there were several thousand tasks to be carried out. We managed to solve even up to 30 project issues in one day, and the shortest time of handling an issue was 23 minutes
Sławomir Filar
Project Manager at Asseco Poland

Description of the technology

The following modules of the def3000 solution were implemented by Asseco Poland at Bank Ochrony Środowiska:

• def3000 Core Banking – universal core banking engine, the module for handling transactions
• def3000 General Ledger – the module for handling the Bank’s general ledger tasks
• def3000 Treasury – recording and processing transactions in money and capital markets
• def3000/CL – handling clearings in foreign currencies
• def3000/UF – the system for preparing printouts in different formats
• def3000/MPS – handling mass payments
• def3000/CP – recording currency position and risk

Benefits for the client

The def3000 system is built based on three-layer architecture. The technologies used in the individual layers are:

• application server – Oracle WebLogic equipped with the solution, which enables to run applications created in Oracle Forms Builder and Oracle Reports Builder
• database – Oracle’s relational database management system
• user interface – runs in the browser, does not require the installation of additional software on workstations.

The def3000 General Ledger module is equipped with an advanced mechanism of definitions of access rights and the ability to define the conditions of acceptance by another person, which enables to reduce the risk of improper accounting records. Each record in the system has a so-called timestamp, containing the data of the operator making the entry and accepting a given record, as well as the time and the ID of the bank unit which reported the event.

The Commercial Banking Division has a broad technological expertise. It continuously follows new technologies emerging on the market. It offers solutions using the most suitable and effective systems which include:

• Internet systems based on the JEE three-tier architecture
• systems developed in accordance with the concept of Service-Oriented Architecture
• Business Process Management class solutions
• Business Intelligence class solutions
• applications of the client-server type• Lotus Notes applications