Component Business System (CBS) Athena (component business system "Athena")

Core banking system problems

Requirements of banks advance development of the core banking system, and producers are not in time behind these changes both in a functional part, and in improvement of the interaction with banks. ABS producers cannot timely meet specific, especially individual requirements of banks. Especially as today these requirements often belong to a know-how of the bank and directly affect technological effectiveness of its work. During an era of the competition of business technologies each bank wishes to have over them full control.

As the core banking system in principle cannot cover all functionality necessary for bank, banks in parallel use a set of other specialized systems. In such conditions IT infrastructure and its backbone softwares should not depend on features of this or that core banking system, and the functional parts which are directly servicing businesses of bank should be built in that IT landscape which the bank will organize at discretion organically.

Conceptually the majority working in ABS banks do not conform to these requirements!

The reason of it in historicity of their development. Core banking systems developed not "on top", and "from below", not from problems of tactical and strategic management by business, and from the needs for the solution of routine tasks of the different business directions, by automation of separate sets of the most demanded business functions with the subsequent their integration into a unified environment.

Integration of banks involves complication of management systems, and need of the effective organization and system business process optimization comes out on top. The modern top manager thinks of categories of business processes, and the process focused approach not only to management, but also to means of its support is necessary for implementation of his requirements. However this approach is initially not put in the concept of the operated core banking systems. Their architectural organization is incapable to provide needs of modern heads.

In the majority of the core banking system there is no business process as the selected full-fledged entity which can obviously be described, modelled, estimated and optimized both at the level of logic, and at the level of its implementation. Application of these core banking systems for optimization of bank business processes is labor-consuming and costly.

On the other hand, besides owing to historicity of the development of the core banking system impose the restrictions and for a bank IT landscape, and for the system of thinking of personnel. The first limits reasonable freedom of bank regarding creation of the infrastructure, the last leads to problems of management of psychological character.

It is easy to manage personnel which think in the same categories, as the head. But the specialists working with a specific information system think in categories of this system, but not in categories of the process focused approach. It creates a gap in thinking, strengthens mutual misunderstanding. As a result heads and contractors speak different languages …

Requirements to new architecture of bank

Business focus of IT requires selection in bank infrastructure of the separate flexibly configured zones.

The first zone of individual specifics of work of bank — interfaces. It is important for bank as it ensures functioning of users and their interaction. User interfaces should be easily reconfigured by bank at own discretion, and their attribute structure to be easily changeable.

The second zone — business processes. It directly supports business of bank and should be most independent of software which can change for one reason or another. Reorganization of a technology core, for example, should not affect the representative part which is directly influencing work and interaction of users.

The third layer — the transport layer. Here 100% configurability with a possibility of regulation and distribution of information flows between different applications for their actual consolidation in a single system with uniform management is required.

Taking into account these features the modern architecture of means of support of banking activity also should be under construction.

Component business system (CBS): a maximum of opportunities in modern conditions

The adaptive business components satisfying to modern standards of business process management capable should become "cubes" of modern bank infrastructure it is frictionless to be built in the modern IT landscapes forming as a result a single complete component banking system.

Gain of integration of bank infrastructures is inevitable! It is caused by high requirements to technological effectiveness of work of modern bank at all levels of its activity. Therefore, on the one hand, we have inevitability of implementation of approaches of SOA at creation of bank infrastructures, and with another, consolidation of concepts of SOA and BPM for the best satisfaction of business needs of bank.

CBS Athena is implementation of BPM means of SOA

Our new product Component Business System (CBS) Athena (a component business system "Athena") belongs to essentially new class of the systems implementing requirements of BPM in banking activity by means of SOA.

CBS Athena has the open service-oriented architecture (fig. 1) consisting of the sets which are flexibly configured, easily replaced raznourovnevy functional parts and is focused on the maximum use of industrial work benches (IBM, Oracle, etc.), but not on creation of their analogs.

One of the most important advantages of CBS Athena — separation of models of service and the general Business Logic from technology features of specific IT.

Management in CBS Athena is strictly subordinated to business logic of the work of specific bank expressed in models (the formalized descriptions) of its business processes and is provided with means of the specific BPM machine used by bank. The business process models meeting its requirements are a component of the business solutions delivered by the company.

Interaction of users with business processes is provided with means of a layer of interfaces which describes scenarios of interaction of the user with a system and visual representation of entities and interfaces to the executed transactions. The layer of components provides providing necessary transactions to business processes

Feature of architecture of CBS Athena is mutual independence of logic of different layers. Besides what its components make logically uniform finished whole, each of layers pursues the highly specialized aims, encapsulates only functions, characteristic of it, and communicates with components of other layers via the standardized interfaces means of application high-level protocols.

Thus, at an invariable set of components can change both business processes of work of bank, and structure of software used by it, and emergence of new components can not affect logic of already existing. To the contrary, business processes can be optimized at rather invariable structure of components.

Respectively, within one architectural model the set of its technology and hardware-software variations reflecting requirements and specifics of the most different banks can be implemented.

CBS Athena place in bank infrastructure

Specialization and competence of the world software market are extremely developed today. Actively SOA, production of application servers, uniform service buses of the enterprises and other software tools of new generations develops. Notations of BPMN and BPEL become the de facto standard, and supporting their software is made by many suppliers.

The highly specialized master will make the case better, than the broad specialist! In such situation duplication of functions of specialized backbone software within the core banking system loses any meaning. It not only considerably increases cost value of development and cost of ownership of a system, but also imposes a number of unreasonable restrictions on individual IT politicians of banks.

CBS Athena represents essentially new approach — creation of the solution for bank on the basis of the infrastructure which is already available for it. The bank creates the infrastructure according to individual policy in the field of IT, using thus standard software of these or those producers at the choice and also the specialized banking systems intended for the solution of specific objectives.

CBS Athena in essence is the flexible business focused superstructure over this software (fig. 2). Incorporating interfaces to products of third-party producers, CBS Athena with the minimum costs fits into an individual IT landscape of specific bank.

Structure of CBS Athena

Are composition:

• The components and services providing implementation of business processes of bank under control of the external BPM machine.
• IT services — the binding layer providing low-level implementation of logic of accomplishment of business operations.
• Interaction interfaces with all types of the necessary software used by bank at creation of a final system.
• The business process models adapted for requirements of specific sales of BPM machines.

CBS Athena — to business of bank

Strategic business benefits which CBS Athena application, the following gives to banks:

• More strict formalization of business processes and their reduction to the uniform standard (BPMN).
• Possibilities of substantial increase of controllability of business.
• Implementation of complete system approach to creation of business and to management.
• Ample opportunities of business process optimization at all levels.
• Minimum dependence of business on hardware-software platforms and specific applications.
• Strict subordination of IT infrastructure to requirements of bank (business processes) both in operational and tactical, and in the strategic plan.
• Real opportunities of unification and business process optimization in scales of large branch networks.
• Flexible opportunities of formation of various architectural combinations.
• Possibility of consecutive implementation with optimization of investments.

CBS Athena — infrastructure of bank

Development of infrastructure of bank (unlike the core banking system) happens to CBS Athena on a stretcher, but not the replacements existing a component. All functionality acquired by bank is not thrown out as it often happens upon transition to the new core banking system, and is integrated into a new complex of IT management of banking business.

CBS Athena gives to bank not only new functionality, but also new abilities to manage the existing resources due to use of BPM and SOA. Instead of adaptation of infrastructure of bank under requirements of specific ABS bank itself creates infrastructure, being guided first of all by requirements of the business.

At the same time there is a clear split of support of the existing software. Functional units and tools of department of IT become most separated and independent. It allows bank to make the most convenient to it decisions on the choice of databases, application servers, etc.

Use of BPM allows to make development of new functionality more obvious and useful to business. Business becomes the direct participant of process, and it allows to distribute investments into IT effectively.

Besides, CBS Athena allows to carry out more effectively and quickly completions of functionality as the final solution is not clamped by a framework and requirements of the specific core banking system and has a set of alternative options.

With CBS Athena the bank has considerable freedom regarding the effective organization of own business and creation of the infrastructure. It finds independence of the used software, stops being the hostage of the used core banking systems and policy of certain producers. The bank has a real opportunity to select different ways of development of the infrastructure (the supplier, bank, the third-party companies) and to construct especially partner style of work with suppliers. With CBS Athena it is free to select freely those IT solutions most of which fully correspond to its individual requests.

Today, when the market requires new approaches, CBS Athena constructed on the basis of the most perspective world concepts provides the innovation approach to creation of bank infrastructures which is most reducing potential risks of bank and doing it business by the most flexible.