We are delighted to be told today that the Morning Data NOVUS product has been listed in the finalists for Technology Innovation or the year - Better Business. The next stage is to present to the judges - 7 minutes only - which will of course will be a challenge with how much we have to say about NOVUS and all its wonder!

The elements that went into this award were based on:

The "rewrite" of any software is fraught with issues. The stop-start nature of old technology replacement, as well as the adoption of new ideas not just the replacement of old code contribute.  We are a relatively small vendor who could not afford to place one system in run off, with legacy support issues whilst bringing a new product to the market, and even if we could we don’t feel it serves to the Clients’ best interest. The old and the new have to seamlessly evolve, allowing a conversion of over 330 individual programs within the product to be converted in waves.

The legacy software had been written over a period of 30 years in Oracle forms and required to be rewritten in .net. At the same time we needed to introduce greater Compliance and Regulatory tools for the Brokers including integrated and automatic Sanctions Checking, anti-money laundering processes, a function rich Big Data analysis suite, risk marketing and CRM aspects for cross selling and integrated Risk Mapping and Vessel Tracking. As The market leader in the London market for Enterprise Solutions for Binding Authority Management and the adoption of the Acord XML Standards has meant we have been at the very forefront of the move to automate and streamline wholesale Lloyd's Broking market.

The cross fertilization of skills internally required a proactive skills transfer program over a 2 Year period. Retiring long service designers and new staff needing to be trained had to be simultaneously built into our core operations. Thus we combined this with a proactive program to place all staff through their Cii Insurance exams to ensure excellent business analysis and understanding at every level of the company enabling us to address requirements as well as wish-lists from existing and new clients.

The increased speed of roll-out was crucial, the ability to integrate with other systems for increased cost savings and longevity of software application was also critical. Adoption of social media feeds, links into regulatory forums and information, regulatory reports such as ELTO as standard and the development of data imports and exports to meet the Acord Standards have all been part of the system evolution. All these uses of technology have increased Customer efficiency, improved their experience, linked their departments, provided greater information to management and as a result increased client acquisition and retention through satisfaction.

Winners will be announced in the Autumn, watch this space…