AMSTERDAM, April 29th, 2020 - Today, core banking platform Ohpen and technology and solution provider Ortec Finance announce a partnership to bring much-needed innovation to pensions solutions available in the market. By combining the Ohpen Platform with Ortec Finance’s forecasting engine (OPAL), retail customers of financial services companies now have access to a comprehensive wealth forecast including all of their assets. Those customers now also have the option to keep their assets invested after retirement age, due to the introduction of new individual retirement products like 'doorbeleggen' and options like lump sum withdrawal. For the average Dutch pensioner, choosing a ‘doorbeleggen’ product for their individual pension over a traditional annuity could mean a possible pension increase of one third1.
Ohpen’s platform will be used for the administration of investment accounts and Ortec Finance will provide a forecasting engine (OPAL) which can forecast customers’ wealth based on their investment products and forecast income to extract from such investment products. Both the Ohpen Platform and OPAL work cross-pillar, taking into account all of the customer’s assets - their government pension, workplace pension, fiscal investments, and unwrapped investments and savings. This means for the first-time customers will have a comprehensive view of their forecasted pension income.
Iwan Schafthuizen, Partner Managing Director at Ortec Finance: “We see an increase in life expectancy and more responsibility for customers to arrange their individual pension. Customer research has shown that a better understanding of retirement and retirement options is key. Ohpen and Ortec Finance worked on a simple customer client journey which is accessible to this target group, alerts them to take action for their retirement, let them play with options to retire and help them achieve a better retirement with innovative individual pension products. We strongly believe in combining core-banking technology of Ohpen with our best of breed OPAL calculation engine.”
Currently, when customers reach retirement age their investments are sold, and a cash disbursing product is bought. Now, thanks to this partnership, customers can leave their assets invested after retirement age. This means that if the average pensioner swaps their regular annuity for a ‘doorbeleggen’ product for their individual pension, it can increase by 30%1 over a period of 20 years. As the pension remains invested, customers will also have access to Ortec Finance’s institutional grade economic scenario engine, enabling monitoring of the financial goals of a customer.
Angelique Schouten, CCO at Ohpen explains: “Innovation has been long needed in this sector. Previously, pensioners have had little choice in investment options for their pension once retired. Traditional annuities, while still generating additional funds, are tied to low interest rates and not in line with the returns investments in, say, equity and fixed income can bring. Our partnership with Ortec Finance, and this much-needed innovation, enables banks, asset managers and pension providers to fully support customers across all pillars, offering them a clear view of their monthly income for the first time.”
An integration showing the combined power of OPAL and the Ohpen Platform is available for demonstration. If you are interested in exploring how Ortec Finance and Ohpen can help you innovate your individual pension services, please contact Iwan Schafthuizen (iwan.schafthuizen@ortec-finance.com, +31 (0)6 206 200 86) or Kees Postma (kees@ohpen.com, +31 (0)6 408 659 73).
About Ohpen
Ohpen is the first core-banking engine in the cloud to fulfil one simple promise: IT. JUST. WORKS. The Ohpen Platform was built from the ground up by experienced bankers and software developers to administer retail savings and investment accounts. Ohpen frees financial institutions such as banks, insurers, investment institutions and pension funds from having to use legacy systems and processes. Aegon, Knab, Robeco, Nationale-Nederlanden, Volksbank and LeasePlan Bank are all customers who have found a reliable, flexible and compliant solution in the Ohpen Platform. More than 150 people work at the company’s Amsterdam headquarters and at its software development office in Barcelona, Spain. For more information visit: www.ohpen.com
About Ortec Finance
Ortec Finance is the leading provider of technology and solutions for risk and return management.
It is our purpose to enable people to manage the complexity of investment decisions. OPAL facilitates goal-based planning and monitoring of goals. It is a software solution based on proven asset and liability management techniques from the world of institutional investments and crucial for supporting and improving investment decision making. We do this by leveraging our world-class institutional scenario engine as the core of the solution. OPAL enables financial institutions and advisers to translate clients personal goals into an optimal investment plan and monitor these goals over time.
With more than 500 customers represented over 20+ countries, a retention rate of 96% and 3 trillion euro total assets managed by our clients Ortec Finance is headquartered in Rotterdam and has offices in Amsterdam, London, Toronto, Hong Kong, Zurich and Melbourne.
For more information visit: www.ortecfinance.com/OPAL
See original article: https://www.ortecfinance.com/en/about-us/news-and-events/ohpen-and-ortec-finance-join-forces-to-bring-much-needed-innovation-to-pensions
