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Reinsurance Group of America and Fonterra: Going for Unified Global Operations

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Case: Reinsurance Group of America and Fonterra: Going for Unified Global Operation

1. What is the business value of these global systems developments for the companies mentioned in the case?

The business value of these global system developments for the companies mentioned in the case is very high. In case of RGA, the employees can analyze data by client, contract, and product and can find client errors very easily. This has been made possible because data is not stored at one place. This is very important for supporting the reinsurance business. It has made it easy to manage the reinsurance business. The global system developments help RGA data validation and data quality. This enables better risk analysis, and retention analysis …show more content…

There were obstacles in converting historical data and loading it on to the CybeRe system. Further, there were problems related to data cleansing and migration. There were also problems related to differences in terminology used. In case of Fonterra the problems were related to the size of its operations. It was having offices in 70 countries and employed 19,000 personnel. The obstacles were that every part of the business had to be analyzed, all processes, and organization structure had to be analyzed.

2. What are the advantages and disadvantages of a full-blown versus a phased approach for system implementations in general and global ones in particular? How do you make the decision on which road to take?

The advantages of a full-blown approach for system implementation are the speed of implementation and providing the organization competitive advantage because of the immediacy with which the system is implemented. The disadvantages are that there may be disputes and conflicts among the different units because different units do things differently.

The advantages of the phased approach are that it takes the need of all business units into consideration. It reduces conflicts. The disadvantages of the phased approach are that it takes a longer time to implement and there is likely to be a higher cost associated with the phased approach.

3. How important is it that all units in global

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