Application Modernization
NCRIB enhances operational efficiency for Insurance Brokers with customized software from Wragby.
The Lagos State chapter of the National Committee of Insurance Brokers (NCRIB), partnered with Wragby to ignite its digital transformation journey when threatened by enduring inefficiency. Wragby was able to develop an end to end management solution, iBroka, which provides a 360-degree digitization and automation of the entire brokerage operation from claims management to policy management, leads management, HR, accounting, invoicing , mobile accessibility, USSD Integration, and reporting.
The Business Challenge
For years, the insurance brokerage segment had remained immune to meaningful technological disruptions, adapting decades-old manual workflow to rapidly changing regulatory requirements. Before the Microsoft – Wragby intervention, the Nigerian insurance brokers endured inability to sustainably meet up with demanding and time-consuming regulatory compliance, lack of seamless automated process management, The need for simple, scalable, and cost-effective technology tools.
The Lagos State Chapter of NCRIB, in its desire for a comprehensive solution, sought for a brokerage ERP. This solution, it believes, will eliminate manual processes, save time, and boost productivity for its estimated 366 registered insurance brokers. Against the backdrop that the typical brokerage firm has two to three team members who collectively manage sales, marketing, insurer-liaison, accounting, and regulatory reporting, the NCRIB knew that automation is a game-changer. After a review of the prototypes presented by multiple partners, NCRIB selected Wragby’s iBroka as the preferred solution for the sector.
The Solution Implemented
iBroka is the brainchild of Wragby Business Solutions. It is a cloud-based end-to-end ERP tailored to the insurance brokerage sector. Because it is built and hosted on Microsoft Azure, iBroka has the scale and reliability to serve brokers nationwide. It is provided to brokers as a cost-effective Software as a Service (SaaS), with a monthly or annual subscription. The primary code stack is ASP.net Core 2.0, Bootstrap 4.0, and MSSql. The solution is deployed on Azure PaaS and is also consumed as SaaS by other Tier 2 resellers via web services exposed by the Azure API gateway manager.
The iBroka Platform is made up of 5 core modules, covering operations management, HR, Accounts, Reports, and Support. Moreover, the storefront is packaged as a deployable container image, which can be easily integrated as storefronts for other resellers in the industry by leveraging the Microsoft Partner center REST APIs. We integrated intelligent reports through Power BI to facilitate better user experience. We are also incorporating Bots to power non-touch customer-facing self-service insurance brokerage. iBroka is Co-Sell ready.
Before engaging Wragby, NCRIB members had engaged other Integrators who pitched non-cloud, expensive solutions lacking local relevance and cost-efficiency. To compete favorably, our team relied on the rapid development enabled by the SAFe methodology and the code reuse capabilities of Azure DevOps. These capabilities helped our team to develop and deploy the ERP within six months of engagement.
The Wragby DevOps Team also utilized Azure DevOps for the solution Planning, Development, Automated Build, and Testing to Deployment and Monitoring of the solution in various environments (Dev. and Production). Also, by using Open Source technologies like .Net Core with Azure MSSQL DB, the team delivered a secured world-class software solution.
Tight integration across the Continuous Integration and Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) pipeline, work tracking, and source code repository also enabled us to speed up the release cadence of each iBroka iteration. Azure DevOps thus both enabled our win and also ensured the customer got value, with a very short GTM.
The Result
iBroka launched in December 2019 and has provided services to a growing number of insurance brokers in Nigeria, eliciting unprompted recommendations from the early adopters. Before the deployment of iBroka, insurance brokerage teams spent significant time laboring at their transactions and report. iBroka enabled a 60% decrease in processing time and effort, saving the clients much-needed resources while increasing their agility.
iBroka also powered convenience and business continuity, due to its web-based multi-device access. Brokers subscribed to iBroka continue to serve customers, and meet regulatory requirements during the COVID-19 lockdown, a first. It also supported employee remote access, and brokers can work from anywhere via www.ibrokang.com, paying for their subscription in the local currency.
The Future
Through strategic engagements, Wragby is working with more customers in the Telecommunications and Financial Services Institutions (Banks) in Sub-Saharan Africa interested in White-labelling iBroka for their customers. These partnerships will enable us deliver value and empower more businesses across Africa.
