The flexible application of cloud computing in the backstage of small and medium banks

The so-called Spadger, spite. China's small and medium-sized banks have always had an embarrassing reality-albeit small, business all-inclusive, and the need for it is not much different from that of big banks. As a result, the requirements for IT systems in small and medium sized banks are little different from those of large banks. But in terms of resources and strength, small and medium-sized banks are far from big banks how to solve this contradiction, cloud computing gives a way.

The statistics of Analysys International show that the IT investment of regional banks such as City commercial banks in 2010 is 4.18 billion yuan, 2011 will reach 4.77 billion yuan. Since 2007, the annual IT investment has maintained more than 20% growth. But the annual increase in IT investment is only a drop in the bucket compared to the all-inclusive IT system requirements, and it is a far cry from the IT effort of large banks. As an example of the IT Blueprint project launched by Bank of China in 2004, the total investment in Bank of China's IT system and process reengineering will be as high as 10 billion yuan, according to the Chinese bank's plan.

From a realistic point of view, the power of a small and medium-sized banks to engage in high-end research and development or outsourcing systems, the cost of large, not cost-effective. This forced the small and medium-sized banks to try to unite to solve the problem, the German savings Bank is a good example. Germany has a total of 489 savings banks, are corporate institutions, the average size of about 2 billion euros, savings banks mainly for residents of individuals, small and medium-sized enterprises and crafts owners to provide services. Through the establishment of a unified rear service support platform, the lines only pay a small cost, you can get a strong rear support, service function is perfect.

The success of the German model has allowed the domestic small and medium-sized banks in the wave of change to see the development path that is different from the integration and reorganization. 3 years ago March 6, 2008, Shandong Province, 14 city commercial banks launched the establishment of Shandong province City Commercial Bank Cooperation Alliance Limited Liability company (hereinafter referred to as "Shandong City Firm Alliance"), officially obtained the approval of the CBRC. Launched the establishment of Shandong City, the alliance of 14 City firms have independent legal personality, Shandong City firm Alliance will provide the 14 member banks with unified IT system and product development, data operation and maintenance, payment and settlement and business Operation Platform Services, financial product development, and information consulting services.

Since then, 14 city commercial banks in Shandong Province began to explore a new development model with the help of the German savings bank this "foreign teacher".

Roads

Shandong City Business Alliance deputy general manager Huangxin has been very busy recently. Shandong City firm the most important work in 3 years is at a critical stage-after completing the integrated business system of the first 4 Bank Access Alliance Unified Construction, Huangxin is leading IT team in 2011 to fight an uphill battle, completes the remaining 11 bank's integrated business system access.

However, in Huangxin view, has been more than half of the 2011 years, although busy, but with the gradual landing of integrated business system, Shandong City, the most difficult phase of the alliance has passed.

"At the beginning of the establishment, we just knew how to make the German savings bank, but how to do it, still have to explore." The most difficult part of the creation of creative things is groping, which is the biggest challenge we've ever had. "Huangxin said:" How the Shandong 14 City firm Common characteristics of integration, to find a solution to the city firm it short Board effective path, is we have been thinking of the problem, but also the original study of the German model set up Shandong City Business Alliance the most direct driving factors. ”

First, by the German Savings Bank to provide technical cooperation, the first will be formed to establish a cooperative alliance, the overall promotion of the unified IT system platform planning and construction, and secondly, to undertake the member units of education and training, product development, strategic research, information consulting and other rear service functions to meet the urgent needs of member units; With a unified IT system platform, the gradual start-up of a number of extensible financial support services projects.

At the end of 2008, Shandong City firm signed a contract with IBM to develop and implement a "single system, multiple legal person" integrated business system for member banks, hoping to build a shared service system platform for 14 members, and build a shared services center for the alliance of Shandong City firm. Thus pull open the Shandong City firm alliance to share it backstage construction prologue.

The integrated business system is the core integrated service platform of Shandong City firm Alliance to provide service for the member row. In the future, the Shandong City firm alliance will mainly rely on the related system for each member row carries on the business development and the Operation service, also will for each member row carries on the fine management, realizes the process reengineering and the strategic transformation, promotes the core competitiveness to lay the important technical foundation.

The construction of the integrated business system of Shandong City firm is very important to the alliance and its member banks. It is really related to the future survival and development of the Alliance, which is related to the business development, innovation and customer service ability and the overall competitive ability of the member line. The construction and successful operation of the system has great relationship with its construction mode, business operation mode and it structure. "said Ding Shaozhong, partner at IBM Global Business advisory services.

At the beginning of 2009, Shandong City firm Alliance completed the core business system construction. The same year in November, Qi Shang Bank first access, Shandong City firm Alliance took a quick first step-only in less than a year, completed a comprehensive business system needs research, system construction and on-line operation, such speed in the banking industry is not uncommon. In Huangxin's view, this efficiency is benefiting from the alliance's one plus one more than the second effect, the alliance can focus on the highest quality of the resources, into the integrated business system such as the focus of the project. At the peak of the integrated business system, nearly 300 people, including IBM's experts and engineers, were involved, a single small and medium-sized bank.

2010, Shandong City firm Alliance has completed the Weifang bank, the Lai Shang Bank's integrated business system access. In March, Changan Bank of Shaanxi became the 15th shareholder of Shandong City firm Alliance, and joined Shandong City firm Alliance, and completed the access of core business system in 2010.

At the same time, the changes in business were immediate after the new system was plugged in. Taking Lai Shang Bank as an example, the original integrated business system has been plagued by the introduction of many new products. The new system after the launch of a regular, group customer service, corporate account overdraft and other functions, at the same time, network silver, bank cards, remittance and other means of payment more mature, convenient and safe. Levin Bank will also rely on this system to open mobile banking, bank companies Direct, telephone POS and other electronic banking services.

However, while the integrated service system's access seems to be methodical, Huangxin has made bold changes to the Shared Services Center model. Because he is more and more discovered, Shandong City firm Alliance Shared Service center model and cloud computing converge.

Huangxin Frankly, because of stability and other considerations, the banking industry in the application of new technology has always tended to conservative, so the first few years, the association of Shandong City more from the traditional technical perspective to consider how to achieve the Shared service model, and not too much attention to cloud computing and other new technical solutions. With the operation of integrated business system, the shared service model built by traditional technology has revealed some problems, such as how to manage the increasing infrastructure, how to optimize the architecture of the system platform and application software, how to charge for the service of the member line, etc. At the same time, a variety of cloud computing technology solutions and systems are more and more mature, just can help the Shandong City firm Alliance to solve these problems.

Firm Private Cloud

"Can the future bank be like today we use electricity and tap water, there is no need to build a large IT department, no need to buy expensive hardware and software equipment, no need to build complex application systems, just according to business needs, like plug plug to get the required services, and then pay the corresponding fees according to the services used. "Huangxin said. Obviously, this is also the Shandong City firm Alliance hopes in the future realization Blueprint.

After 3 years of groping, now talking about the future development plan of Shandong City firm Alliance, Huangxin has been emboldened, "is to build a private cloud based regional bank sharing service center."

IBM development of multiple legal entity integrated Business System and server virtualization technology, in the hardware and software infrastructure level for the Shandong City firm Cloud computing concept to a solid protection, Shandong City, the alliance has been built integrated business systems and online Banking, SaaS (software as a service) mode for the member row services. PaaS (Platform as a service) of the advantages of the development of testing links to appear, and constantly on the line of the new system, so that the union of Shandong City firms face a large number of research and development testing work. In the traditional mode, it is necessary to build a test environment which is similar to the production environment, which involves operating system, database, core system, application system and so on. In PAAs mode, the general research and development test environment can be completed in the same day.

Although the current cloud computing platform of the Shandong City firm is still embryonic, there is no doubt that the cloud based IT shared services model has become their future direction. The alliance of Shandong City firm hopes to provide a strong infrastructure, platform and application service, improve the management ability of regional banks, strengthen the construction of information security, and promote the strategic transformation of regional banks.

"We are using the cloud computing platform to virtualize resources, standardize services, and automate the management of these resources and services to form a truly cloud-based service." These services are then provided to member rows through SaaS, PaaS, IaaS (schema-as-service) patterns. "In the end, these small and medium-sized banks are getting low-cost and premium it platform services that can rival big banks," Huangxin said. They can focus more on business innovation without having to think too much about it platforms. ”

"Shandong City firm Alliance is a bold attempt to innovate the business model of small and medium sized banks in China." Ding Shaozhong said, "It shared service model allows small and medium-sized banks to better focus on the business, and those that are comparable to the large banks of IT technology, infrastructure, system platforms, applications, data, you can make them readily available, on demand, ready to expand." ”

It is estimated that the joint development of IT platform by the Cooperative Alliance, the development cost can be saved to each row development costs of about 1/5.

"When the time is ripe, we will gradually incorporate management systems, channel systems, etc. into the shared center," he said. On the basis of a unified shared platform, strengthen the business cooperation between the lines. Huangxin said, "Our ultimate goal is to build a private cloud within the union of the Shandong City firm." ”

Deep value

While considering cloud computing and shared Service center model construction, Huangxin has some deeper thinking.

The current cloud computing model brings the members of the information level of the overall improvement, so that members can be in a higher information platform for business development and innovation. However, it can only be regarded as the shallow value brought by the alliance of the city firm, and there are many deep values to be excavated on the shared service platform based on private cloud.

Although the members of the Federation are independent legal entities with separate business, but in the back-end IT systems, these independent corporate banks, the interconnection between the degree of interconnection and the same bank of different networks between the level of the basic difference. This paves the way for a joint business based on it. For example, there is no obstacle to the technical cross access of the bank card and the passbook between the member lines of the Federation.

In addition, the current private cloud of the Shandong City firm is serving different legal entities, because of the lack of corresponding industry standards, for different banks, what should be collected business and management data, and did not form a common industry standards, which caused the current stage in the construction of a unified sharing system, Also consider the differences in data acquisition between different banks. In order to solve this contradiction, we need to promote the development of corresponding industry standards, standardization work will be more and more important with the application of cloud computing. The unification of industry standards is the cornerstone of the development of cloud computing applications, the more unified business, the simpler the system, the more stable and efficient operation.

In fact, both the shared service model based on private cloud and the traditional bank-built system are designed to respond to the needs of the business in a timely manner. But compared to the self-built system, private cloud provider requirements will be more and more high, private cloud vendors to share the characteristics of the system decided not to wait for the customer one by one demand to meet, but in the corresponding industry and field, can walk in front of the customer, leading the customer's business needs, early perception and rapid response.