Zurich Versicherung

Zürich Agrippina Versicherung (now: Zurich Versicherung) emerged from the formerly independent insurance companies Zürich and Agrippina in year 2000. In the course of combining the IT activities, Zurich Versicherung also started to develop a new, component-based application architecture. adesso contibuted significantly to the definition of this architecture and helped making the first development project in this field a success.

Zurich Versicherung decided to introduce a new, component-based software architecture with step-by-step implementation. This included to define a new software process, because new applications on the basis of modern architectures require a new design of software development processes. Hence, a completely new software process was defined within the ZAVA project (Zürich Agrippina Methodology and Architecure). This new methodology, based on the V-model, which had been customised to the needs of component-based software development, has successfully been implemented in all new development projects within the company.

The foremost goal in defining a new software architecure for Zurich Versicherung was to synchronise modern technology standards with the existing software infrastructure. Therefore, within the project ZAVA, an architecture was defined that allows interaction between new and old systems. A new functional component model was created as a target architecture for all new applications. The system-side implementation introduced the use of Enterprise Java Beans (EJB) on the basis of a powerful application server – a novelty in the core business of large insurance companies.

YTD 2002 Zurich Versicherung was able to start up the first application using the new, component-based architecture. The complete inventory information of 288.000 contracts was migrated to the new system. The new development became necessary in order to solve the unsatisfactory situation the clerks faced in having to operate several systems simultaneously.

The decisive factor for the project’s success was a well-rehearsed communication between the adesso software experts and the Zurich Versicherung staff that was responsible for the maintenance and integration of the existing legacy systems.