Financial Services

Retail banking

Banks have experienced tremendous change over the last decade, including large-scale industry consolidation, the proliferation of alternative delivery channels, and the emergence of new non-bank competitors and online brokerages. Most leading banks have experienced continuous cost reduction and have given significant value back to the customer via margin compression. The question is ‘where is the next source of organic, double digit growth’?

Booz & Company believes banks will need to address the following industry issues:

Redefinition of the customer experience to bring the power and value of advice and service back to the customer interface in an increasingly commoditised and cost pressured environment
Building micro-market analytic capabilities for both product and customer led marketing to combat the ‘death by averages’ phenomena as margin compression and competition for market share continues unabated
Step-change structural re-alignment that demands a fundamental revisit of the underlying process, product and IT architectures that underpin today’s complex array of offers to the market
Redefinition of the banking value chain to identify opportunities and challenges from the emergence of specialist players, particularly in product manufacturing and distribution. Specialist players represent a credible threat, which must be addressed by traditional banks. Remedies include selective and powerful use of industry utilities, alliances, and possibly a re-think on the risk-return of outsourcing
Underpin any changes with a clear focus on execution – realign the organisation to support the strategy (structure, decision rights, roles, people processes, performance management, culture) with tight execution of defined modules of change, each with clear deliverables that fit with the long-term strategy

For more than a half-century, Booz & Company has partnered with many of the world’s largest retail financial-services players, helping them address a wide range of strategy, organisation, operations, and technology issues. Our global team of consultants has worked with banks, savings institutions, and credit card companies on large-scale transformations to deliver tangible results. We help senior executives navigate through such business issues as product-focused to customer-focused organisation transformation, customer-segment alignment, and efficiency enhancement.

Commercial banking

Global corporate banking and capital markets have seen substantial change in the last few years. There is new competition from online brokerages and, after a drop in transactions for debt and equity markets, there is now an increase in mergers and acquisitions, and initial public offerings.

We believe players in the corporate banking and capital markets industry will need to respond to a range of trends, including the trends outlined below:

Industry convergence and market structure shifts, which have positioned participants around customer results; the redefinition of the business; and overcapacity and consolidation on a global, regional, and local scale
Increased demand for customer-focused organisations that offer tailored value propositions and high quality customer service across all channels. Institutions must improve their service to customers, without imposing additional strain on the business model through redundant systems and costs
Pressure to extract value from the operations/technology processing environments, recognising technology as a driver of industrialisation, which has an impact on innovation and scale and unbundles manufacturing and distribution
Evolving organisational models, which are separating manufacturing and distribution and redefining the value chain
Shifts in capital flows to emerging markets and new asset classes

For more than a half-century, Booz & Company has partnered with many of the world’s largest capital markets players, helping them address a wide range of strategy, organisation, operations, and technology issues. Our global team of consultants has worked with segment players including sales and trading, transaction processing, corporate finance, brokerage, wealth management, and information and technology providers, to deliver lasting results. Our work encompasses issues such as customer relationship strategies, achieving organisation transformation, reducing organisation costs, capturing post-merger integration benefits, and strategic sourcing.

Insurance

Booz & Company develops business strategy, provides organisational analysis and helps insurers grow their business through improved distribution performance, stronger marketing capabilities, new markets, acquisitions, and joint ventures.

To help our clients address critical issues such as transforming distribution and product offerings from the winning formulas of the past to powerful solutions for the future, Booz & Company designs practical strategies that are built on innovative solutions as well as the realities of running a business.

Our approach is set apart by capabilities that help companies tie operating and investment decisions to what customers value most.

We work with companies representing many facets of the insurance industry including:

Commercial insurance brokers
Diversified financial institutions
Group health, life, and mutual insurance companies
Multi-line carriers
Global insurance networks

We have conducted extensive work in the Australia, New Zealand and South East Asia region on a range of issues including strategy, operations, and information technology implementation projects across auto, home, commercial, CTP, and healthcare lines of business.

For more information on financial services, contact Vanessa Wallace on +61 2 9321 1900 or email anzsea.enquiries@booz.com.