Allianz Global Investors in Europe
Allianz Global Investors (AGI) calculates trailer fees payable to sales partners and their branches. Thanks to calculo these external and internal compensation schemes are highly automated. In addition, reimbursements to Allianz branches and sales channels as well as accruals are calculated and processed.
Success Story
Our customer and the project
Allianz Global Investors manages over €498 billion in assets under management for institutional and private investors worldwide. Asset Management experts at Allianz Global Investors have operations in more than 25 offices worldwide, particularly in Europe, the US and Asia. With more than 650 investment professionals, the investment management team covers all major financial and growth markets around the world.
Interviewee
Guido Bachmann leads the Revenue Team Europe, which was set up at the outset of the project as a purely German team and that was responsible for the remuneration of European customers outside France, Italy, the UK and Spain. Following calculo’s roll out, structures were extended and the team was augmented by colleagues from all over the continent.
Details
-
Challenge
AGI operates a trailer fees-based remuneration model for sales partners and its branches. In addition, trailer fees are paid between business units within the AGI group. This was a complex process, as each branch carried out the calculations separately and with local accounting tools.
This was complicated further through the fact that local organisations used and maintained a variety of remuneration methods.
AGI was looking for a solution that could support process harmonisation across Europe and meet its extensive list of requirements.
-
Goal
A flexible and extensible pan-European trailer fee settlement system that:
- Automates and consolidates different compensation philosophies and calculation rules across Europe
- Creates synergies and achieves efficiency by harmonising processes – taking country-specific differences into account
- Creates cost savings by replacing redundant IT systems
- Reduces risks through clearly defined roles- and amount-dependent release processes
- Transfers risk through external software maintenance
-
Solution
We implemented a pan-European trailer fee settlement solution based on calculo.
calculo is a highly configurable, state-of-the-art fee management platform that calculates and processes the full range of invoices,, settlements and reimbursements in a single solution.
The Trailer Fee solution operates in all Allianz Global Investors affiliated countries across Europe.
- Reliable calculation of ~ 530 third party distributers with payments monthly or quarterly
- Settlement of the nine European European AGI branches (i. a. Germany, France, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, UK) and sales channels (transfer pricing) with payments monthly or quarterly
Guido Bachmann is Head of Revenue Europe at Allianz Global Investors Europe GmbH. He steered the project as the business lead. Please find an extract of the interview below.
How have the individual countries been compiling trailer fees up to now?
Each country calculated trailer fees within a legacy-system landscape and primarily with AGI-proprietary interfaces with various SAP instances. AGI France, for instance, used a completely self-developed calculation tool, while AGI Germany used a ten year old Oracle-based product. There was no harmonisation at the European level. In addition, the systems were accessible only from within local networks.
Are there differences in the calculation bases?
There are differences – first, in the compensation philosophy: France uses a invoice-based version, whereas the rest of Europe works with balance-based calculations. Secondly, trailer fee calculations differ depending on the country and the type of contract. For example, they can be based on volume, interest, payment frequency or portfolio data. Some sales partners require variable forms of compensation – for instance, in accordance with fee scales and levels.
How did the organisational units settle fees with each other?
By manually exchanging client portfolios and through independent calculations with two different units and tools. It involved complicated deviation analysis. They had to account for:
- Differences in customer bases
- Consistent use of compensation models
- Differences in prices or exchange rates
- Cumulation of rounding differences
What were some of the other requirements for the rules-based standard solution?
- Market-proven basic functionalities
- Product and provider with a strong name in the market
- The provider had to be able to analyse and correct production problems at any time, at short notice, within a contractually-guaranteed response time
Learn more about calculo
Our customers need flexible and powerful solutions in response to the complexity of regulatory challenges and complience requirements. Sowatec’s software solution calculo is modular and meets the sophisticated needs of all our customers.
Learn more about calculo
Our customers need flexible and powerful solutions in response to the complexity of regulatory challenges and complience requirements. Sowatec’s software solution calculo is modular and meets the sophisticated needs of all our customers.
