Engagement
We were engaged to provide a business capability driven understanding and assessment of First State’s current state application suite and technology landscape via the following:
- Defining and assessing what applications support what business capabilities, how they are sourced and their efficiency and effectiveness in meeting business, technical, and operational expectations;
- Defining and assessing the Technology Operations function and its ability to effectively support and maintain the technical environment;
- Evaluating the organisation’s data architecture and technology infrastructure.
This assessment provided a starting point for the organisation to commence the definition of a target state positioning strategy to achieve its digitalisation ambitions.
First State Super was established in 1992 and today, are one of Australia’s largest super funds with more than 750,000 members. In September 2020 First State Super changed its operating business name to “Aware Super”. As a public offer fund Aware Super are open to anyone to join. The majority of their members are employed in the public sector, education, health and community services, police and emergency services. They are a ‘profit to members’ fund.
In a subsequent engagement, 9Yards was engaged to design and develop a data strategy as a foundation for First State to uplift its information management capability. This included an in-depth assessment of the organisation’s existing data management capability; design framework; data integration maturity; data definitions, classifications and mastering capabilities, and data governance mechanisms.
This analysis informed the design and compilation of a data reference architecture and conceptual data model as foundation artefacts to support the establishment and evolution of First State’s Information Management Strategy.
In June 2016, First State Super acquired 100% of Stateplus – an acquisition that created the largest member-owned advice network in Australia, with over 25 locations and over 200 financial advisors.
Following the Stateplus acquisition, First State Super are custodians of an asset pool of over $90bn, combining superannuation and retirement savings.
Aware Supers underlying philosophy is ‘members first’ and their purpose is “To build a better future for all Australians.
