WASHINGTON - All of those Fiserv business units and still not merging.
But there is plenty of change and development going on behind the scenes that has played a big role in leading credit union clients of Fiserv’s solutions providers to consistently ask whether there are plans to shutter their particular provider. Two executives emphasized to the Credit Union Journal, however, that there are no such plans.
“We get those questions all the time,” said Joe Barry, co-president of Fiserv’s Credit Union Division. “This is not a consolidation strategy. We are maintaining our commitment to our brands.”
Even though Fiserv executives go to pains to stress it has no consolidation plans, the company will likely only continue to get those questions following the introduction of a single umbrella campaign it is calling “CU7,” which is says is aimed at accelerating the 2.0 strategy is unveiled a year earlier. The “7” in the name is a reference to the seven Fiserv companies: AFTECH, CUSA, Galaxy, IntegraSys, Summit, USERS and XP Systems.
“CU7 is the symbol for this organizational unification, reinforcing that all seven companies are strategically joining forces and approaching the credit union market as one Fiserv team,” the company said in a released statement.
Scott Butler, Barry’s counterpart as co-president of the Fiserv Credit Union Division, said the goal is to send a message that “Fiserv’s assets in the credit union space are part of a unified team. We are leveraging all of our intellectual capital.”
Barry stressed that contrary to what may be perception, Fiserv is only increasing its commitment to its business lines, which it views as distribution channels for its products.
What can’t be over-emphasized, said Butler, is that even in the technology space customers of XP, for instance, want to do business with the “people they know and trust at XP. This is a relationship business, and it’s ultimately about people-to-people relationships.”
“People say, ‘I don’t care where the code was written. I just want products and services.’” added Barry.
Butler said the individuality of each of the brands will remain, and there are no plans to collapse the back-end to get efficiencies. Instead, the plan is to avoid overlapping product R&D in each of those brands (if one company develops a new product, it is rolled out by the others), and to create collaborative teams that when necessary, can work together virtually.
Barry said the response from clients has been, “‘It’s about time.’ It’s going to allow us to move products sooner to the market faster. In practical terms it takes a lot of time to develop products. This is a labor-intensive business. We have 2,400 people in our credit union division.”
CU7 also reflects a transition within Fiserv, which grew rapidly in the past decade through acquisitions. “We have been a holding company, and all were small to medium size businesses. All of our competitors are small to medium businesses. The customer expects innovative products will be brought to market. When you’re small you’re always on your heels.”
When asked where he expects the CU7 effort and Fiserv to be a year from now, Barry responded that he expects to be able to point to the new products in the pipeline for 2009. “We have drawn a line in the sand and said we want two spanking brand-new items brought to market, and we don’t even know what they are gong to be yet,” said Barry. “We have a team in the Strategic Products Office to create new things. To be innovative, you have to take a flyer on things, even knowing some of those things are not going to fly.”
It’s no secret that for many years if a credit union wanted to hear any negatives about a Fiserv solution, all they had to do was ask a salesperson for another Fiserv solution.
With seven Fiserv companies vying for the business from a shrinking credit union market, it was all too common that sales reps were climbing over each other to land the business. Fiserv said all that has changed now, as it’s sales force has been consolidated into one team, with each given a territory. Each sales rep, now called Solutions Consultants, sells all seven companies that are part of Fiserv.
“Their objective is to know enough about the credit union to know what solution fits best,” said Butler.
The company has named Roger Kunz as the new president of client relations. Kunz does not report into any of the Fiserv units. Clients considering another Fiserv solution but concerned about upsetting their account executive can call into the Client Relations area.
“He is there to let clients know that FIserv wants to keep them,” said Butler.
