Computer Sciences Forms Division for Financial Services

Computer Sciences Corp. has formed a business unit to cater to an array of financial services customers.

Its Financial Services Group last week began offering software, consulting, and outsourcing services to insurance companies, commercial banks, and investment banks, the El Segundo, Calif.-based company said.

These industries spend a combined $100 billion a year on such services, said Thomas Madison, president of Financial Services Group. He described the unit's creation as a "commitment of major magnitude" toward financial services. He said the company created one unit to serve these industries because regulatory barriers between them are starting to fall.

Last year, Computer Sciences derived 17% of its $5.4 billion in revenue from financial services. Mr. Madison said he hopes to boost those revenues by about 50%, to $1.5 billion a year, by fiscal year 1998, which ends April 3.

The company "is going after insurance and banking big time, said Patrick Burton, an analyst at Lehman Brothers, New York. "Financial services are really the prime market for outsourcing for the next five years."

The new unit will consist of 7,500 employees who serve more than 1,000 financial institutions. Computer Sciences employs 44,000 people.

The company, best known for its systems integration work for businesses and government entities, has diversified in recent years. In April 1996, it acquired Continuum Co., which owned bank software provider Hogan Systems Inc.

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