A financial technology client in Europe is facing a significant challenge with maintenance and operations of its payments platform. Despite its best efforts, the platform has not been profitable, and the client is seeking ways to reduce operating expenses. In this case study, we will explore the options that the client is considering, including outsourcing IT operations and selling the intellectual property associated with the payment platform and how Avasant’s standard approach on strategic sourcing was applied to this project.
The client’s payments platform has not been performing as well as it had hoped. In comparison to its other products, the platform has fewer features and lower market adoption. As a result, the client is looking for ways to cut costs and improve profitability.
One option that the company is considering is outsourcing its IT operations. However, this is a sensitive topic and must be kept confidential within a small, core group of the company’s organization. While it has done some outsourcing, it has not undertaken a similar exercise at such scale. The existing operations carry significant delivery footprints in high-cost locations such as Germany and Dubai. These are being performed primarily by internal teams, which adds a significant complication in terms of restructuring the support personnel. Additionally, the client is keen to keep this restructuring costs as low as possible, preferring that it be borne by the vendor instead. The company also has its own operational captive at an offshore location (India), which adds to the complexity mix in terms of finalizing the outsourcing option.
At the outset, the client wants a view of the range of operational expenses arising from outsourcing its IT operations by shifting the existing operations to an offshore location to the maximum extent possible.
Avasant utilized its relationships in the service vendor industry to gauge interest in servicing the given scope of work by reaching out to them separately and briefing them about the requirement. The reach-out was objective and neutral in nature, and it only took into account the regional and technical capabilities of the potential vendors to perform the in-scope service.
During the preparation phase, the Avasant project team worked in parallel to put together a sufficiently detailed RFI package and manage the client’s expectations around the output and deliverables from the project. It was paramount for the client to maintain discretion around the sourcing strategy, which restricted Avasant in executing its standard approach toward data collection and current-state assessment. The client needed to provide enough information for vendors to make informed proposals, while also protecting its confidentiality. It was challenging, considering the paucity of time, limited information available for vendors to utilize in solution-creation, and the client’s desire to evaluate alternate solutions for multiple outsourcing scenarios.
Avasant leveraged its standard approach on strategic sourcing, aimed to establish a business case for change, identify sourcing opportunities, and evaluate potential sourcing partner capabilities that could support the future requirements. Avasant facilitated overview discussions and responses to questions from potential vendors, ensuring that the process is transparent and that all potential service vendors have the necessary information to submit informed proposals.
The RFI document was designed to bubble up the most important and required information to the top, in the desired format. This allowed vendors to quickly understand the scope of the project and provide relevant proposals. It also allowed the project team to turn around observations and inferences from the vendors’ responses to the company in one day.
During the vendor evaluation phase, Avasant used a quantitative and qualitative comparison structure to receive and consolidate information from the responses. This enabled an objective and rigorous decision-making process for shortlisting vendors for due diligence. Given the time-sensitive nature of this transaction, not all vendors could manage to meet the client’s expectations in terms of completeness of response. The client wished to evaluate several outsourcing scenarios which were further modified after the release of RFI package to the vendors. While this resulted in delayed submission of responses by some vendors, Avasant was able to quickly analyze the responses and present the firm with a range of expected contract values. It further established the importance of careful preparation and the design of an RFI package that prioritized capturing the most valuable information upfront.
During project closure, all critical information around commercial and technical solution constructs was presented in a lucid manner, which enabled the client to not only quickly absorb the outcome of the RFI exercise but also supplied it with an output ready to be taken to their board for consultation. Avasant maintained clear expectations with the client in terms of quality of output from the vendors, considering that there was significant data deficiency. This was acknowledged by the company and minimized the possibility of misaligned expectations later in the project lifecycle.
In conclusion, this case study demonstrates the importance of managing client expectations and designing clear and effective collaterals in short-fused projects. By utilizing its relationships with vendors, and applying their standard approach on strategic sourcing, Avasant was able to help the company explore its options and make an informed decision about outsourcing its IT operations. According to the responses from various vendors, the client could possibly lower its present expense on labor alone by around 35%-40%.
As a consulting partner, one of the most important responsibilities is to help the client arrive at a set of clear objectives. Secondly, in expedited projects like this, it critical to manage the client’s expectations on quality and completeness of responses from the vendor. Third, the RFI/RFP documents such as fee template, solution summary document, etc., must be designed in a manner which facilitates quick production of output in the desired format. Avasant’s project team’s ability to do this, while also maintaining a high level of confidentiality and delivering results quickly, made them an invaluable partner to the client.
This case study serves as an example of how, with the right expertise and approach, even the most challenging situations can be overcome. The financial technology firm was able to find a solution to its challenge and take steps toward improving the profitability of its payments platform.
By Gaurav Mathur, Managing Consultant, Avasant
Avasant’s research and other publications are based on information from the best available sources and Avasant’s independent assessment and analysis at the time of publication. Avasant takes no responsibility and assumes no liability for any error/omission or the accuracy of information contained in its research publications. Avasant does not endorse any provider, product or service described in its RadarView™ publications or any other research publications that it makes available to its users, and does not advise users to select only those providers recognized in these publications. Avasant disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. None of the graphics, descriptions, research, excerpts, samples or any other content provided in the report(s) or any of its research publications may be reprinted, reproduced, redistributed or used for any external commercial purpose without prior permission from Avasant, LLC. All rights are reserved by Avasant, LLC.
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