IBS Journal February 2015


All change at Banque de l’Habitat


Banque de l’Habitat, a housing finance lender in Lebanon, talks to IBS about its choice of new banking software, CapitalBanker, from Paris-based supplier Capital Banking Solutions.


The bank is replacing an obsolete 20-year old system which was written in Cobol, says George Gehchan, who worked as a consult- ant for Deloitte on the project at the bank (he has since been hired by the bank as chief information officer). ‘It was difficult to access information in this system because it was based on Unix command prompts,’ he explains. There were a number of prac- tical problems which flowed from this. The process workflows were manual rather than automated, which was time-consum- ing and risky. The architecture wasn’t scal- able, and there was no built-in audit trail which was a problem for security. Also, ‘the system is no longer supported by a ven- dor and cannot be patched’, says Gehchan. And these problems were compounded as new regulatory demands were made on the bank. The bank resolved to change the sys-


tem and enlisted Deloitte to consult on the project. It produced a list of requirements for prospective suppliers to meet. Suppli- ers were invited to perform demonstra- tions of their offerings. ‘We were looking to see what systems were offering a best match for our functionality,’ says Gehchan. The flexibility and scalability of the sys- tem architecture of prospective solutions were judged, to see how easy it would be to interface to other systems. The perfor- mance of systems, in terms of how well they worked with the databases, was con- sidered. Banque de l’Habitat also examined what maintenance agreements suppliers were offering post go-live. Other issues which came into consid-


eration included the prominence of the supplier in the region, references and final- ly budget. Capital Banking Solutions was select-


ed bearing all these criteria in mind, after ‘looking at several local and international names’, says Gehchan. He declines to name


32 Beirut ©Aldas Kirvaitis, Flickr


which other suppliers were considered. However, the bank was happy with the variety of systems on offer, and Capital- Banker was chosen from a shortlist of three systems which Gehchan believes could have fitted the bank’s needs. A few major steps will be undertak-


en in the course of the project. Now the solution has been selected, the first stage, which is underway at the moment, is the gathering of user requirements. After this, a more detailed gap analysis of Capital- Banker can be performed. The bank will also start a programme of business process re-engineering. Once these tasks are recon- ciled, the data migration can be attempt- ed, and this will be followed by phases of technical testing and then user acceptance testing. Then there will be pre-implemen- tation and go-live phases. ‘For now there is no fixed date because we haven’t started the gap analysis yet,’ says Gehchan. In terms of process re-engineering,


Gehchan thinks that more will be required in some areas than others. For the bank’s core business of how residential loans are created and how the credit department works, not much will change. However, the bank will be looking for efficiencies in other


© IBS Intelligence 2015 www.ibsintelligence.com


areas, particularly related to accessing the bank’s stored data. ‘We are trying to keep continuity for the main part of the busi- ness, but have new processes for parts of the business where enhancements need to happen,’ Gehchan explains. There are only a few interfaces that


need to be built for CapitalBanker. These comprise links to an HR and payroll man- agement system, a regulatory reporting system and connectivity to the Swift mes- saging network. While the bank is not currently plan-


ning to launch new products, it is planning to use the new core solution to improve the services on the products it current- ly offers. ‘We want to add more channels and more reconciliation. Having a single, integrated system will allow customers to make payments on their home loans via Swift or via electronic transfer, for example. It’s about increasing customer satisfaction,’ Gehchan states. Based on Oracle Forms, the ease of use and ease of access of data should improve, with a full audit trail. ‘It’s a full-fledged system. We can easily add new channels, using APIs. And other systems and new modules can be interfaced with it simply,’ Gehchan concludes.


spotlight: banque de l’habitat


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56