On Thursday, Comarch BeNeLux hosted around 40 industry professionals at a Wealth Management Breakfast with UniCredit and KPMG at the Sofitel Europe Luxembourg in Kirchberg, and followed this up with a press conference at which it addressed its innovative IT solutions and strategy for the Benelux region.
Wojciech Pawlus, General Manager for Comarch BeNeLux Region, explained that the company has over 60 people currently working on projects, of which 25 are core staff and the others project-specific, based in Brussels (Belgium) and Strassen (Luxembourg) - the latter from where they have been providing IT outsourcing and cloud services since 2011. Overall the group has more than 5,000 employees from its headquarters in Krackow (71 local offices world-wide), of which 20% work in internal R&D projects, and with the average age being 30-32 years. The group's turnover for 2014 was €249.7 million, of which €26.6 million was spent in R&D.
From supporting its initial client in Luxembourg, Swiss Life, the company intends to increase recruitment in both Belgium and Luxembourg as the market in both is the third most profitable in the group. Comarch's approach is to expand by organic growth, rather than by acquisitions, and aims to increase staffing in the BeNeLux by 20-30% annually, with dynamic recruitment planned from the best universities in the BeNeLux. The projects they want to focus on for this growth include smart city, eHealth and projects involving beacons, a form of indoor gps sensor that measures presence and proximity.
Its six main areas of activity include Telco, IT Infrastructure, Healthcare, Financial Services, Trade & Services, and Public Administration. Their Wealth Management services (within their Financial Services division), centred in Krackow, cover both institutional portfolio management and handling of private clients. As well as integrating third-party solutions, Comarch also offers clients its own range of software systems which are modular in approach. Comarch also hosts systems in Luxembourg data centres, through LPTO with LuxConnect.
Grzegorz Prosowicz, Head of Product Management Capital Markets at Comarch, explained that, in its wealth management offerings, Comarch supports data collection and production of regulatory reporting which are delivered to supervisory bodies (CSSF in Luxembourg). The Wealth Management division has been operating for 20+ years, with activities in Luxembourg for 2 years on UCITS and AIFM projects. It is also enabling the digitalisation of private banking, including communication between the bank and its clients, operational efficiency and the advisory process.
Photo by Geoff Thompson (L-R): Julie Kowalski, Grzegorz Prosowicz, Wojciech Pawlus, Adam Tymofiejewicz
