Gary Ho on Digital Transformation as CTO at AXA HK and Macau

WRITTEN BY: İLKHAN ÖZSEVIM

PRODUCED BY: JOE PALLISER

Chief Technology Officer of insurance giant AXA Hong Kong and Macau, Gary Ho discusses the relationship between better digitalisation and data

Gary Ho, Chief Technology Officer of AXA Hong Kong and Macau, has been in digital technology for over 2 decades. “Having been the Chief Lead Architect, I have a solid technical background, primarily focusing on leading enterprise solutions architecture.

I have formulated IT strategies and driven multimillion-dollar transformation projects in insurance firms. Changes in enterprise architecture are inevitable alongside digital transformation, and these projects have helped me to understand how the commercial world and technology could go together to create positive impacts,” he says of his tenure within the digital tech sector.

“These diverse experiences have allowed me to prepare for uncertainties and challenges. AXA has a strong emphasis on human values – and it somehow reminds me of my past days in technical consulting, and that we must put ourselves in the customers’ shoes, to work out solutions that resonate with them.”

“Recently, in Q1 this year, our team won Asia’s Best Infrastructure Modernisation at the IDC Financial Insight Innovation Awards. This recognition is a very strong external endorsement that we are playing a leading role and are on the right track in strategy, mission, and vision in the IT industry.”

Recipe for success – responsive, present and sustainable In a climate where it seems every business is undergoing some form of transformation, it has to be asked: what exactly are the focuses of AXA’s digital transformation journey that makes them stand out as giants in the industry?

Ho says: “There are three focal points that set AXA apart, and these are: responding to trends; always being present; and nurturing an environment for sustainable growth. Taken as a whole, these allow us to deliver our promises for both today and tomorrow.”

Being responsive to trends is vital. Customers nowadays are more willing to voice their needs, holding ever-stronger opinions concerning how AXA should approach and communicate with them.

“I see this in a positive light,” says Ho. “Yet, the challenge lies in how we can keep up with their constantly changing needs. We want to be the companion of our customers

GARY

CHIEF

throughout their lifetime, through the ups and downs, and so we have to understand our customers.”

“To achieve this, we must always be present with them – being there for them through their entire journey shows them that we care and that they matter to us. We need to go beyond mere policy, down to even the most subtle details of Customer Experience (CX). ‘Being present’ also extends to the reliability of our systems. We’ve invested significant effort in PaaS (Platform as a Service) and SaaS (Software as a Service), supported by a cloud-native architecture that fuels 24/7 operation.”

This approach then spills over into many different areas and aspects of business and operations at AXA.

“But, of course, we’re not satisfied with the mere status quo,” says Ho. “Digital transformation is an ongoing and constant process for us. We work hard to foster an evergreen environment that encourages and nurtures sustainable growth and on-time responses. It’s also necessary to save the turnaround time spent on systems upgrades and patching so that we can dedicate our resources and time to the applications and CX enhancements.”

Developing stand-out products and services with the technology to match Hong Kong possesses a highly competitive insurance market, with many firms trying to make their mark in the territory. AXA tackles this by providing offerings above and beyond those of competitors via a digital system designed to accommodate them. For such market conditions, what does it take for an IT system that can support AXA’s wide spectrum of service and product offerings to be effectively implemented? In short,

AXA aims for a progressively more seamless architecture, for more agile responses to the market and for synchronisation across multiple departments.

“The market can be worlds apart between today and tomorrow,” says Ho. “It’s crucial that we’ve got the right tools implemented in the right places to endure any challenges that may arise from this constant shifting, so having the flexibility to upgrade any system efficiently, with as little impact as possible, is central to this adaptation.”

“To achieve this, we’ve implemented a Microservice Architecture. We are now able to add or remove any product or component of the system much faster than ever before, and this entire process is also virtually seamless. Since we have a thriving partner ecosystem that involves a hybrid of remote and on-premises teams, an architectural design that includes great adjustability is a better fit for us than the traditional setting. It also sets the basis for the continued development of our services.”

149,000

Number of employees (AXA Group – AXA Hong Kong & Macau is a member of AXA Group)

1816

Year founded

Making use of data-based insights

AXA is leveraging the increasing importance of data in an exponentially expanding age of information. Ho says: “No doubt, data has become an invaluable asset in itself.