Asia Risk Technologies (ART) is an outsource services provider for the financial services sector with operations in Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan.

The financial services sector in Asia, and in particular the insurance industry, is in the midst of a period of radical and permanent change. Convergence, consolidation and the rise of new and alternative distribution channels are driving business strategy, with the ever-increasing demands of delivering industry best practice and ensuring attainment of internationally recognised corporate compliance standards.


The Challenge
As one component of a comprehensive Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) offering ART provides a number of callcentre- based services. ART targeted Japan to develop the call centre offering and expand the business with value add services to customers including:

• Direct Marketing / Telemarketing Sales Support
• Campaign Management
• Full Cycle Policy Administration
• First Loss Response
• Claims Processing
• Data Collection / Segmentation

The Solution
In 2005 Asia Risk Technologies searched the market for a new call centre infrastructure to support its customers and their contact management requirements. After extensive research ART selected the rostrvm call centre platform from Rostrvm Solutions.

Following a short period of training at Rostrvm Solutions’ premises in the UK, Asia Risk Technologies’ IT team integrated the call centre application with ART’s in-housedeveloped CRM system and deployed the combined solution in Japan. The rostrvm call centre was implemented on an off-the shelf Cisco, Microsoft Windows and Voiceover-IP infrastructure.

"Our needs are unusual and challenging,both technically and commercially" commented Graham Clark, Chief Executive, Asia Risk Technologies. "Each of our customers places unique demands on our business; technically we need a call centre with functionality that can be changed quickly. The rostrvm Invex Voice-over-IP architecture is a perfect technology fit that we can adapt to each customer situation. For example, a key issue in Japan is voice sensitivity. Consumers in Tokyo don’t necessarily feel comfortable buying from people with a Nagoya or Osaka accent,that’s how sensitive customers can be."

"The rostrvm Invex Voice-over-IP architecture gives us the ability to offer a distributed call centre function with small specialist centres in a different number of places. It’s a smart product giving us and our customers the flexibility to manage and support current requirements with the option to change the operating model quickly when the need arises."

Clark continued "The commercial model is also very important. In the fast-moving Asian financial services market our clients’ needs change rapidly. This means that our call centre volume and application requirements can vary from month-tomonth. Rostrvm’s flexible commercial model gives us the edge in this area."


The Results
rostrvm’s pay-for-use commercial model gives us the flexibility of matching costs to revenue with the security and control provided by having the equipment installed on our premises. The reality of business today is that strategies and business needs change quickly requiring a truly flexible approach to any form of business partnership. Rostrvm and ART have approached the call centre project on a professional partnership basis with open communication, laying the foundations for a mutually successful venture."

ART has built upon the technology foundations to offer a range of service models to its clients incorporating:

• An Application Service Provider (ASP) model providing full time call centre services for some customers and out of-normal-hours complementary services to others.
• A transaction-based model to match the market’s unit-cost focus.
• A value-add model delivering services such as telemarketing support.

Graham Clark concluded "As with any responsive business model in today’s market, it is vital for us to seize an opportunity and adapt to the change required for a business to flourish. The structure of our organisation has to be adaptable and it is crucial that the technology infrastructure that we operate reflects the same ability to move quickly to take advantage of any opportunities. The rostrvm product is ideally suited for that environment. In the many different aspects of Asia Risk Technologies’ growth, rostrvm will enhance our speed to market; it’s one of the areas we don’t have to worry about as we are confident that it will continue to grow with us."