The report, "Global sourcing in European and North American
Financial Services" is the result of over 400 interviews with key
IT decision makers in banks and insurance firms. It finds that
while outsourcing has to date been largely limited to function
areas such as contact centres and application services, this is
likely to change.
"Offshoring of core competencies amongst financial services
institutions in Europe and North America is increasing as
confidence in the offshore markets – be it via vendor or an
in-house offshore operation – is improving rapidly," says Anders
Maehre, financial services Technology analyst at Datamonitor and
author of the study.
In terms of acceptance and take-up, North America and the UK
remain significantly more advanced than the rest of Europe, says
Datamonitor. However, Nordic financial service institutions (FSIs)
are also increasingly showing signs of embracing nearshore
alternatives, such as in Eastern Europe, for certain services.
According to the report, the shift is the result of a growing
number of outsourcing service providers and IT services vendors
having a credible global delivery capability, an ongoing
simplification of the outsourcing process from the FSI point of
view and improving industry specific expertise among the service
providers.
Datamonitor suggests that FSIs need to develop global sourcing
strategies that enable them to choose between operational locations
and sourcing set-ups – after weighing up factors such as political
and operational risk, regulatory issues, cultural barriers, cost
considerations, vendor offerings and local skill sets.
Maehre concludes:
"Offshore outsourcing has gathered tremendous pace in recent
years. Political pressure and controversy has done little to deter
top-line growth. The improving credibility of many of the offshore
providers and increasingly global delivery capability of the
leading outsourcing service providers will push FSIs in both North
America and Europe towards intelligent use of global
resources."
